A 36-year-old Fyz­abad man was ar­rest­ed and two firearms, am­mu­ni­tion and co­caine seized dur­ing an in­tel­li­gence-led op­er­a­tion in the Pe­nal and Fyz­abad dis­tricts.

Hilton Trinidad work­ers have been giv­en a six-month re­prieve af­ter the Gov­ern­ment se­cured a new man­age­ment agree­ment that will keep the in­ter­na­tion­al ho­tel brand at the State-owned prop­er­ty while a longer-term so­lu­tion is de­vel­oped.

A for­mer Trinidad and To­ba­go diplo­mat be­lieves this coun­try was “diplo­mat­i­cal­ly in­sult­ed” dur­ing For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers’ vis­it to Cara­cas, ar­gu­ing that Venezuela’s ac­tions, rather than the cor­dial lan­guage con­tained in a joint state­ment, show re­la­tions re­main far from re­paired.

One year af­ter Caribbean Air­lines (CAL) tem­porar­i­ly sus­pend­ed flights be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and Venezuela, the air­line is prepar­ing to re­sume ser­vice to the South Amer­i­can na­tion.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce has wel­comed the re­open­ing of di­rect di­a­logue be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and Venezuela, par­tic­u­lar­ly re­newed dis­cus­sions on en­er­gy co­op­er­a­tion, but says the fo­cus must now shift from diplo­ma­cy to im­ple­men­ta­tion.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les is ques­tion­ing what Trinidad and To­ba­go ac­tu­al­ly achieved from For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers’ trip to Venezuela and why Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has still not met di­rect­ly with Act­ing Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Del­cy Ro­dríguez.

De­spite con­cerns from stake­hold­ers over the readi­ness of schools for Mon­day’s re­open­ing, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath yes­ter­day ex­pressed con­fi­dence that all schools would re­open.

With just days to go be­fore schools re­open, Route Two Maxi Taxi As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Bren­ton Knights says school maxi taxi con­ces­sion­aires have re­ceived more than $2 mil­lion to­wards out­stand­ing pay­ments, with more mon­ey ex­pect­ed in the com­ing week.

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath is de­fend­ing the late dis­tri­b­u­tion of the School Sup­plies and Book Grant, say­ing the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion had just six weeks to ver­i­fy 20,744 ap­pli­ca­tions.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) is ex­pect­ing a low turnout of stu­dents dur­ing the first week of the new aca­d­e­m­ic year, warn­ing that de­lays in the re­lease and pro­cess­ing of book grants have left many par­ents scram­bling to pre­pare their chil­dren for Mon­day’s re­open­ing.

A trip to a To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) of­fice could soon be­come a thing of the past for res­i­dents seek­ing ac­cess to a range of pub­lic ser­vices.

The State of Emer­gency (SOE) has con­tributed to safer com­mu­ni­ties, par­tic­u­lar­ly in ar­eas af­fect­ed by se­ri­ous crime, ac­cord­ing to Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Hous­ing Philip Alexan­der, who point­ed to a sharp de­cline in re­port­ed crime since the emer­gency mea­sures were in­tro­duced.