Staff Editor

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – More than 1 million homes and businesses in a swath from Indiana to Virginia remained without power today, five days after deadly storms tore through the region.

(Jamaica Observer) The Chinese dealer of an emerging laundry detergent brand is investing millions of dollars in a new packaging plant in Portmore, St Catherine.

(Jamaica Observer) Losing unrecoverable millions of dollars in rainfall damage may be a thing of the past when Jamaica signs on to a new insurance plan.

(Jamaica Observer) Ten months into his job as Caricom secretary general Irwin LaRocque is clear that keeping the economic bloc alive will require an overhaul of the secretariat and a reform of the regional integration process.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Allison Peart, managing partner at Ernst & Young Jamaica, said it is in the interest of banks and their customers to start preparing the paperwork required under Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), which takes effect next January.

(Barbados Nation) Prime Minister Freundel Stuart says he isn’t planning to pick a fight with Trinidad and Tobago over that country’s blocking of Bajan goods, but he does plan to warn the twin-island republic that it has too much to lose in Barbados to risk that mistake again.

(de Ware Tijd) PARAMARIBO – The recently issued human trafficking report is not based on facts and contains half truths and lies, Justice Minister Edward Belfort told Parliament yesterday.

(Trinidad Express) Teaching Service Commission (TSC) member Prof Ramesh Deosaran says the number of matters involving teacher misconduct, including assault of pupils, is on the rise.

(Trinidad Express) A mysterious multi-million dollar fire yesterday destroyed the Carapichaima mansion of sanitation contractor Jawarhalal Deosaran.

GENEVA/LONDON,  (Reuters) – Scientists at the CERN research centre have found a new subatomic particle that could be the Higgs boson, the basic building block of the universe.

(Trinidad Express) Less than two months after a 17-year-old boy was shot and killed outside his Laventille home, two of his brothers, on Monday, also fell victim to gunmen close to their home.

OTTAWA, (Reuters) – Canada’s foreign aid minister is resigning from politics after coming under fire for extravagant spending, including a $16 dollar glass of orange juice in a luxury London hotel.

ZURICH, (Reuters) – Traces of the poisonous element polonium have been found in the belongings of late Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, a Swiss institute said today, and a television report said his widow had demanded his body be exhumed for further tests.

A 51-year-old man was this afternoon found buried in a shallow grave in a yard four corners from his Enmore home with suspected stab wounds and the prime suspect has since vanished.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida,  CMC – Dr. Ernest Hilaire, the outspoken and often controversial Chief Executive Officer of West Indies cricket, is leaving the job.

Police say that at about 0830h today, a woman reported to the police at the Divisional Headquarters at Cove & John, ECD,  that she had been sexually assaulted by a Police Constable at the Enmore Police Outpost during the morning of Sunday July 01, 2012.

Former PPP Executive Member Ralph Ramkarran today declined  to comment on his shock resignation from the party over the weekend.

PARIS, (Reuters) – Police raided the home and offices of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy today as part of a judicial inquiry into financial relations between his political camp and the richest woman in France, L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt.

(Reuters) – Actor Andy Griffith, whose portrayal of a small-town sheriff made “The Andy Griffith Show” one of television’s most enduring shows, died today at his North Carolina home at age 86.

Government has retained Trinidad-based Senior Counsel Seenauth Jairam to help challenge the opposition-led budget cuts.