News

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Ukraine will get rid of  its stockpile of highly enriched uranium by 2012, the White  House said  yesterday in the first tangible result from a  47-nation summit aimed at preventing nuclear terrorism.

Trinidad oppostion parties unite The Trinidad and Tobago opposition is promising a solid alliance that’ll work to defeat the governing Peoples National Movement (PNM) in the yet to be announced general elections.

History was created yesterday when for the first time paediatric open heart surgeries were performed in Guyana at the Caribbean Heart Institute (CHI) by a visiting team of experts from New York through a joint public/private sector venture.

A 37-year-old resident of Angoy’s Avenue, New Amsterdam, was brutally chopped to death around 10.45 am yesterday; his assailant has been taken into custody and a cutlass suspected to be the murder weapon, retrieved.

-required by Anti-Money Laundering Act Republic Bank (Guyana) yesterday in a notice to its customers said it would be forced to close their accounts if they do not produce proof of their addresses – a new requirement under the Anti Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Act 2009 – by early next month.

Justice, answers and financial assistance are what the relatives of the ill-fated Island Princess crew are seeking almost six months after the attack.

President Bharrat Jagdeo in an address at the launch of a campaign against child abuse stated that finding a solution to this problem should not be influenced by foreign circumstances but should be tailored to the Guyanese reality.

The Visually-Impaired Cultural Association (VICAG) was launched on Friday at the National Library.

A man charged with attempting to sell a house lot that he did not own to two different men was remanded to prison on Friday.

Still no word on cause of illness   The West Canje, Berbice mother of the three children who were admitted to the New Amsterdam Hospital after they took ill suddenly on Wednesday, said doctors were still not finding the cause of their sickness.

There is a “significant” level of illegality in Guyana’s forestry sector though it is lower than in several other major tropical timber producing countries in South America and around the world, according to a study commissioned by Norway’s Ministry of the Environment.

Minister of Health Dr Leslie Ramsammy on Saturday said that alcohol abuse is one of the main risk factors for the development of chronic diseases in Guyana and in an effort to battle this issue it is necessary to ensure the availability of comprehensive and reliable data.

The police are investigating a fatal accident which occurred around midnight on Saturday on the Meten-Meer-Zorg Public Road, West Coast Demerara, which resulted in the death of 19-year-old pedal cyclist Ramesh Persaud, a resident of the area.

President Bharrat Jagdeo, on behalf of Guyana, has expressed sincere condolences to the people of Poland on the tragic death of their head of state Lech Kaczynki.

WARSAW (Reuters) – Polish President Lech  Kaczynski’s coffin returned home to a stunned nation yesterday,  a day after he and much of the country’s political and military  elite perished in a plane crash in Russia.  

ROME (Reuters) – The powerful head of Italy’s  bishops, responding to mounting pressure on the Vatican, said yesterday those in the Church who mishandled, minimised and covered  up sexual abuse of children should be dismissed.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama  said yesterday that efforts by al Qaeda to acquire atomic  weapons posed the biggest security threat, and world leaders  meeting this week must act with urgency to combat this danger. 

KHARTOUM/JUBA (Reuters) – Confusion, delays and  charges of fraud marked the start of Sudan’s first multi-party  elections in a quarter-century, a vote that will test the  fragile unity of Africa’s biggest country.  

RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – The death toll from  mudslides and flooding in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro state has  risen to 224, its fire department said yesterday, about a week  after heavy rains began pounding the coastal region.

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – Suspected drug hitmen  killed nine people in Tegucigalpa in one of the deadliest  attacks in Honduras since Mexican drug kingpins escalated their  war over smuggling routes, police said yesterday.