BBC Caribbean News in Brief

Libya to set up OECS bank

Vincentian Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves says Libya has agreed to establish a Libyan commercial bank in the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) sub-region.

OECS leaders met in Kingstown with a delegation from Libya at the weekend.

It followed talks in Tripoli last month between Prime Minister Gonsalves and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Gonsalves said other forms of cooperation including scholarships were discussed at Saturday’s meeting, “to build the links between the African Union and the Caribbean and Latin America”.

The Vincentian leader said Saturday’s meeting reactivated ideas which had been advanced by Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi when three OECS prime ministers visited Libya in August of 2001.


Earthquake ruffles Atlantic

Seismic experts have confirmed that a powerful 6.0 magnitude earthquake shook the mid-Atlantic Ocean late Saturday afternoon east of the Caribbean.

The US Geological Survey says the quake struck 1,120 miles east-northeast of Antigua.

According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration tsunami scientist, Bill Knight, the earthquake was a “sub-threshold event” that did not merit a tsunami warning.