Regional News

(Trinidad Guardian) The shake-up in the hi­er­ar­chy of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice has start­ed af­ter ACP Ir­win Hack­shaw was re­moved as ACP (Crime) and re­placed by ACP Jayson Forde.

LIMA,  (Reuters) – Mexico’s new leftist government yesterday called on its peers to refrain from interfering in Venezuela’s internal affairs, declining to back a regional declaration that urged Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro not to take office on Jan.

BRASILIA,  (Reuters) – Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro yesterday called for minimum retirement ages significantly lower than those proposed by his predecessor, sparking concerns among investors that he will back watered-down pension reform legislation.

(Trinidad Guardian) There have been ten con­firmed cas­es of H1N1 virus or swine flu in the coun­try.

(Trinidad Express) Commissioner Gary Griffith said yesterday he is going to arm his police officers with non-lethal weapons like pepper spray and stun guns in the next few weeks.

SAO PAULO/BRASILIA,  (Reuters) – Brazil’s new President Jair Bolsonaro said yesterday that he would be open to the possibility of the United States operating a military base on his country’s soil, a move that would form a sharp shift in direction for Brazilian foreign policy.

(Trinidad Express) The wife of slain Couva fish vendor Samuel Sookdeo said that six months ago she made a police report that she had been threatened.

ROME,  (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – The yield of many staple crops could be boosted by 40 percent by a new process that adjusts the way they turn sunlight into energy, potentially feeding hundreds of millions of more people, American researchers said yesterday.

(Jamaica Observer) Reports have surfaced out of Nicaragua that a Jamaican boat captain is now dead and buried in that country, after he and two others were rescued by locals after spending 22 days adrift in waters off the northern Caribbean country.

(Trinidad Newsday) DIRECTOR of Public Prosecutions Roger Gaspard, SC yesterday said senior magistrate Indrani Cedeno could have requested additional information from police, before she decided to fine a man $17,000 for having 3.9 kilos of cocaine at his St Augustine home.

(Trinidad Express) Three men were killed Wednesday night, bringing to five the number of homicides in the first two days of the new year.

(Trinidad Guardian) The first day of 2019 had bare­ly end­ed, but crim­i­nals had man­aged to snuff the life of an­oth­er vic­tim with the mur­der of Cou­va fish­er­man Samuel Sookdeo on Tues­day night.

BRASILIA,  (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo discussed supporting a return to democracy in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua with Brazil’s new right-wing government yesterday, in a joint effort against what he called authoritarian regimes in Latin America.

(Jamaica Gleaner) The prosecution has dropped its case against the three policemen who were indicted on one count of murder in relation to the shooting death of Andrew Bisson in 2011.

CARTAGENA,  (Reuters) – The United States is deeply concerned about an increase in coca cultivation in Colombia, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said yesterday, but will work with the Andean country to cut production of the raw material for cocaine in half by the end of 2023.

LIMA, (Reuters) – Peru Attorney General Pedro Chavarry yesterday reappointed two lead prosecutors he had dismissed from a high-profile graft probe after the decision sparked widespread opposition and a threat by President Martin Vizcarra to suspend him.

(Trinidad Guardian) Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith has made good on his promise to re­vamp the process for ob­tain­ing a firearm user li­cence.

(Trinidad Express) A Siparia woman who moved to Tobago for a better life has gone missing.

(Jamaica Observer) Police say sharks hindered the recovery yesterday of the body of a 26-year-old Northern Caribbean University (NCU) student — one of two beachgoers who drowned at Frenchman’s Bay in Treasure Beach, about 20 miles south of here, on New Year’s Eve.

(Trinidad Express) A WOMAN who stole money from a bar patron’s wallet, denied that she had taken $1,500.