Am­bas­sador-des­ig­nate of the State of Pales­tine to Trinidad and To­ba­go, Dr Lin­da Sobeh Ali, has ap­pealed to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and the Gov­ern­ment to con­tin­ue ad­vo­cat­ing for the pro­tec­tion of Pales­tin­ian chil­dren, up­hold in­ter­na­tion­al hu­man­i­tar­i­an law and re­sist any move to “nor­malise” Is­rael’s ac­tions in Gaza and the oc­cu­pied Pales­tin­ian ter­ri­to­ries.

Re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­perts have wel­comed the Gov­ern­ment’s pro­pos­al to use in­mates serv­ing hard labour sen­tences to clean and main­tain pub­lic spaces, but say the ini­tia­tive must be built around re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion, care­ful in­mate se­lec­tion, prop­er risk as­sess­ments and strong se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures.

Trade union lead­ers are de­mand­ing clar­i­ty on the Gov­ern­ment’s pro­pos­al to re­quire con­vict­ed pris­on­ers sen­tenced to hard labour to par­tic­i­pate in pub­lic clean-up ex­er­cis­es, warn­ing that the ini­tia­tive rais­es ques­tions about work­ers’ rights, prison labour and the pro­tec­tion of em­ploy­ment.

The Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion and Ap­pro­pri­a­tions Com­mit­tee (PAAC) has raised se­ri­ous con­cerns over the Min­istry of Health’s in­volve­ment in de­ter­min­ing which phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal sup­pli­ers were paid by NIPDEC, ques­tion­ing why for­mer health min­is­ter Ter­rence Deyals­ingh was in­volved in a process that was sup­posed to be in­de­pen­dent­ly man­aged by the State pro­cure­ment agency.

Four of the mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cers who were sus­pend­ed fol­low­ing the mur­der of act­ing Cpl Anus­ka Ever­s­ley and theft of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion from the San Fer­nan­do Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice Sta­tion back in April have re­turned to work.

Six weeks af­ter a bru­tal at­tack by pit­bulls while on va­ca­tion in Buc­coo, a 65-year-old Trinida­di­an man is still seek­ing jus­tice.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les has ac­cused the Gov­ern­ment of po­ten­tial­ly us­ing the wa­ter sup­ply as a tool for po­lit­i­cal vic­tim­i­sa­tion, say­ing res­i­dents in Ari­ma and parts of East Trinidad be­lieve their wors­en­ing wa­ter short­ages be­gan af­ter the April 28 Gen­er­al Elec­tion.

The Court of Ap­peal has or­dered a re­tri­al for two east Trinidad broth­ers con­vict­ed of mur­der­ing a man and at­tempt­ing to mur­der his broth­er and cousin af­ter al­leged­ly forc­ing the three men to help process a mar­i­jua­na har­vest.

A 25-year-old Va­len­cia man has been sen­tenced to nine years in prison for killing his step­fa­ther af­ter the vic­tim threat­ened his moth­er and at­tacked his younger broth­er.

For­mer pres­i­dent An­tho­ny Car­mona says par­ents must ex­am­ine their role in shap­ing chil­dren who be­come in­volved in se­ri­ous crimes, warn­ing that when a child is con­vict­ed of of­fences such as mur­der, rape or vi­o­lence, the fail­ure of­ten be­gins long be­fore that child en­ters the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.

RM De Souza Fu­ner­al Home has ex­pand­ed its op­er­a­tions with the open­ing of a new cre­ma­to­ri­um fa­cil­i­ty in Diego Mar­tin, mark­ing a ma­jor in­vest­ment in West Trinidad and broad­en­ing the range of end-of-life ser­vices avail­able to fam­i­lies.

Trinidad and To­ba­go’s counter-ter­ror­ism strat­e­gy is plac­ing greater em­pha­sis on fi­nan­cial over­sight, bor­der con­trols and in­ter-agency co­op­er­a­tion as Gov­ern­ment moves to im­ple­ment the 2025 Na­tion­al Coun­tert­er­ror­ism Strat­e­gy.