Jamaica shares same earthquake faultline as Haiti

"The fault that created the quake in Haiti runs right across the western end of the Dominican Republic, through Haiti, cuts across the Caribbean Sea into Jamaica and continues more or less into different fault lines across Jamaica: one continuous fault line runs across from Haiti to Jamaica."

KINGSTON, Jamaica (JIS) -- Jamaica shares the same faultline (a crack or break in the earth's surface) with Haiti, which suffered a devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake on January 11.

This was disclosed by the Head of the Earthquake Unit of the University of the West Indies (UWI), Dr Lyndon Brown, at a JIS Think Tank in Kingston on Wednesday.

"The fault that created the quake in Haiti runs right across the western end of the Dominican Republic, through Haiti, cuts across the Caribbean Sea into Jamaica and continues more or less into different fault lines across Jamaica: one continuous fault line runs across from Haiti to Jamaica," Dr Brown stated.

He added that the activities in the region, following the Haiti earthquake, are not unusual, at this time.

"A number of aftershocks have taken place, and this is quite natural. The aftershocks will be more continuous after the large earthquake, but then this will die down and become less frequent," he said.

Aftershocks, such as the magnitude 6.1 tremor that occurred in Haiti again on the Wednesday morning (January 20), can be large but will become less frequent over time.

He said, however, that the other earthquakes that have taken place in Guatemala, Venezuela, and El Salvador are happening on the Pacific Plate fault line, which is not the same one on which Haiti and Jamaica is located.

"Right now we do not see the association between the events," he added.

He said that while studies are being done by an American researcher, to see the relationships between the fault lines, none has so far been established, and what is happening is that stresses are being naturally released along respective fault lines.

"Earthquakes are very, very, common. If you look at a map of Jamaica you will see that last year we had about eight felt events (earthquakes) and about 200 that were weak but could just be picked up as earthquakes," he said.

He stated that, on average, there have been about16 earthquakes on an annual basis that are greater that magnitude 7.0 , about 120 around magnitude 6.0 and an innumerable amount at magnitude 5.0 and below.

"What is happening in the region is very interesting. Earthquakes are natural events that happen when stresses that have built up along fault lines are released, creating elastic waves that generate convolutions on the face of the earth," Dr Brown said.

He added that the destruction wrought by an earthquake is dependent on the location and strength of a building, as well as the strength of the earthquake.

January 22, 2010

caribbeannetnews

CARICOM strengthens response to Haiti

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (CDEMA) -- CARICOM efforts to provide relief to Haiti after the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Tuesday, January 12, 2010 are being strengthened following an assessment of the situation on the ground. Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) Jeremy Collymore updated on the CARICOM response to Haiti at a press conference Thursday at the CDEMA Coordinating Unit in Barbados.

The Executive Director stressed the role that the region has played to date singling out the role of Jamaica, the CDEMA Sub Regional Focal Point (SRFP) with responsibility for Haiti.

Immediately on receiving notification of the earthquake, the Director of the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) communicated with the Executive Director of CDEMA and confirmed that Jamaica as the SRFP with responsibility for Haiti, would take the lead on immediate actions in response to the event.

Collymore said, “It is important to recognize the efforts of Jamaica within the larger context of the Regional Response Mechanism (RRM). The mission by the Jamaican Prime Minister was the genesis for informing the community’s prioritizing focus of its efforts in Haiti.”

“Jamaica (the SRFP) responded to the catastrophe within the first 24 hours deploying a Jamaica Defence Force (JDF) vessel with military personnel and emergency supplies and is now the staging point for CARICOM relief activities to Haiti.”

CDEMA’s SRFP has provided search and rescue support, rescuing three persons and recovering two bodies in collaboration with international agencies. Additionally, the team has provided health support services, treating approximately 400 persons and performing minor surgeries. The team is also conducting ongoing public health awareness activities.

The SRFP is also providing security assistance to the World Food Programme’s (WFP) efforts and the more than 350 personnel from eleven CARICOM countries currently involved in the operations area.

The CDEMA head declared that responding to the Haiti earthquake has been “the major challenge to the humanitarian response practice globally in recent times.”

He noted that a major challenge to the response effort is “congestion on the ground of ‘unprioritised’ response driven more by emotional considerations rather than a structured mechanism have contributed to delays in the delivery of aid.” He said the delivery of emergency aid is further compromised by the damage to the sea ports.

As CARICOM intensifies its response, efforts will be centered on both short and long term initiatives in the targeted community.

He noted that the Community’s intervention going forward will be based on three principles. It is holistic, targeted and developmental.

The primary focus will be on the health sector. This will encompass assessment of facilities, emergency repair, provision of medical and support personnel, critical medical supplies, emergency supplies and security.

Regional governments have already pledged four million US dollars along with a cadre of emergency support, supplies and materials to the Haiti relief effort. This does not include the substantial fund raising activities by civil society.

CARICOM has also enhanced its presence in Haiti with a Special Coordinator appointed by CDEMA who is working with Haiti Civil Defence Protection, and the CARICOM security forces, international donors and humanitarian community on the ground to ensure a sustained and effective coordination of the CARICOM relief efforts.

In addition, the CARICOM Disaster Relief Unit (CDRU) will continue to deploy regional emergency and medical personnel to strengthen and support the work of 350 CARICOM personnel already on the ground.

CARICOM recognizes the need for the continued support of Haiti beyond the response period and will continue to work towards meeting those needs beyond this initial response phase.

January 22, 2010

caribbeannetnews

CARICOM heightens its response to Haitian crisis

GEORGETOWN, Guyana -- The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) moved its assistance to its earthquake devastated Member State, Haiti to another level with the deployment of a Tactical Mission to that country on Sunday.

On Wednesday, 13 January, less than 24 hours after the earthquake struck on 12 January, Jamaica had deployed medical personnel and security forces to Haiti as a first response. Jamaica is the sub-regional focal point in the area that includes Haiti, The Bahamas and the nearby Associate Members under the system established by the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) the regional response mechanism to natural disasters.

A medical facility was quickly established by the Jamaican team, while arrangements have also been made to transport some of the injured to Jamaica for hospitalisation.

The Tactical Mission is seeking to determine the way forward in the provision of more health related services to Haiti and will provide up to date information as to the situation on the ground in Haiti and identify logistical arrangements which would facilitate the entry and accommodation of more personnel and supplies.

This crucial area of health was identified as the sector that would receive a targeted response by the Community following a meeting on Thursday evening involving CARICOM Chairman, Roosevelt Skerritt, Prime Minister of Dominica, David Thompson, the Prime Minister of Barbados, Bruce Golding, the Prime Minister of Jamaica and Edwin Carrington, Secretary-General of CARICOM. Prime Minister Golding had reported to his colleagues on meetings he had held in Haiti earlier that day with Haitian President Rene Preval and Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive.

CARICOM assistance in the area of health includes the provision of additional medical and support personnel as well as medical and emergency supplies and security for those engaged in the provision of the services. CDEMA, in this effort, continues to work closely with the Pan-American Health Organisation (PAHO), the CARICOM Implementation Agency for Crime and Security (IMPACS), the Regional Security System (RSS) and the CARICOM Secretariat.

On Monday President Preval and members of his cabinet, together with Prime Ministers, Skerritt, Thompson and Golding, Hubert Ingraham, Prime Minister of The Bahamas and Patrick Manning Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago and the CARICOM Secretary-General, participated in a meeting in the Dominican Republic on the crisis arising out of the earthquake. The meeting, convened by Spain in its capacity as current President of the European Union and attended by other countries and international agencies, sought to identify and resolve problems of co-ordination of the aid and relief effort in Haiti.

CARICOM leaders expressed concern over the future of tens of thousands of children who had been made orphans by the tragedy and agreed that this problem needed to be addressed urgently.

All participants acknowledged the major logistical difficulties in the situation including the almost insurmountable challenge of reaching communities outside Port-au-Prince which had also been devastated by the earthquake, and recommended ways to tackle this issue. CARICOM’s role and rapid response to the crisis came in for praise at the meeting.

January 21, 2010


caribbeannetnews

Haiti rejects Dominican Republic troops

By Louis Charbonneau:


UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -- Earthquake-ravaged Haiti turned down an offer of troops from the neighbouring Dominican Republic, forcing the United Nations to look elsewhere for additional peacekeepers, UN diplomats said on Wednesday.

The Dominican Republic had offered an 800-strong battalion to form part of the reinforcement of the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti.

"We understand the Haitian government has said no to them," one Western diplomat said on condition of anonymity. He said he assumed the decision came from Haitian President Rene Preval.

The two states share the Caribbean island of Hispaniola but have a history of tense relations.

A UN official confirmed that Haiti turned down the offer but said the decision might not be definitive and talks were under way to see if Haiti would allow a rescue team or police from the Dominican Republic to help with the relief efforts.

"We're hoping other countries can provide troops," the official said.

The full potential strength of the UN peacekeeping force is now 12,651, up from the current level of around 9,000, after a UN Security Council resolution adopted on Tuesday.

The United Nations is now rushing to find the extra 3,651 troops and police to help maintain security and deliver aid.

Edmond Mulet, sent to Haiti to take over the UN force after its chief, Hedi Annabi, and dozens of other UN staff died in the earthquake, has said that Brazil was offering more troops and France and Chile were offering police.

UN officials have said the Philippines might also top up its existing contingent.

Haitian officials say the death toll from the Jan. 12 quake was likely to be between 100,000 and 200,000, and that 75,000 bodies had already been buried in mass graves.

The United States has around 12,000 military personnel in Haiti, on ships offshore or en route.  They are not under UN command, though they are cooperating with the United Nations, which is overseeing the relief effort.

January 21, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Castro daughter says Cuba communists exclude gays

HAVANA, Cuba (Reuters) -- Cuban President Raul Castro's daughter accused the ruling Communist Party on Tuesday of discrimination against gays and said she will write a letter to its "top leadership" demanding that it end.

Her uncle, Fidel Castro, heads the party, while her father is No. 2.

Mariela Castro, a sexologist who advocates for gay rights, said the party excludes gays who want to become members.

"It is not spelled out in any statute, but implicitly they are rejected," she told reporters at the opening of a conference on sex education and therapy.

"Your ideological and party definition have nothing to do with your sexual orientation," said Castro, who is head of Cuba's National Center of Sex Education. "It's absurd, it's laughable."

She said her letter -- to be sent "as soon as possible" -- would demand that a no-discrimination policy be clearly spelled out in party bylaws.

Fidel Castro, 83, ceded the presidency to his brother Raul, 78, two years ago, but still officially heads the Communist Party.

The Cuban government, which Fidel Castro led for 49 years after taking power in a 1959 revolution, once sent gays to labor camps but ended the policy in the 1970s.

Castro, 47 and married, has led gay rights parades in Havana, and urged the government to approve gay marriage, which has not yet happened.

"We continue to confront strong prejudices," she said.


caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Haiti's Preval, a survivor in a turbulent land

By Joseph Guyler Delva:


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (Reuters) -- When a team of Reuters reporters landed in Haiti the morning after its catastrophic earthquake, President Rene Preval was there on the airport tarmac, greeting some of those arriving on one of the first charter jets coming in from Florida with a handshake and a wry smile.

Impeccably turned out in a starched white shirt and dark tropical wool dress pants, you would never have guessed that he had spent hours the night before getting a first-hand look at the death and destruction wreaked on the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince from the back of a motorbike.

An enigma to many, and often criticized for his seemingly minimalist approach to governance in the poorest nation in the Americas, Prevail has few concrete achievements to highlight since he took office in May 2006.

Far from a hands-on, hard-charging management style, he has even failed to give a national address in the week since Haiti was hit by the 7.0 magnitude quake, which authorities estimate may have taken 200,000 lives in one of the world's worst natural disasters.

Preval has, however, given numerous media interviews and traveled to the neighboring Dominican Republic to meet with aid donors.

The soft-spoken agronomist, 67, took charge of a treasury that was empty and a parliament that was in tatters when Haiti's overwhelming majority of poor swept him to office four years ago.

And international observers say he has held steadfastly to efforts to establish a stable democracy in a country that has suffered upheaval and dictatorship since it threw off French rule more than 200 years ago.

"He's in shock right now, the whole country is in a state of shock, but Preval is not a bad man and I'm sure he'll do the best he can when things settle down a bit and he can focus his efforts on rebuilding Haiti," said Jean Baptiste, a student of international relations whose father is a doctor in downtown Port-au-Prince.

"The question is where does he begin," he added, saying the enormity of the challenges lying ahead after the earthquake were enough to overwhelm anyone.

Violent unrest and rioting could still shake Haiti in the days and months to come, if distribution problems, bottlenecks or corruption prevent international aid from reaching people made homeless and poorer than ever by the Jan. 12 temblor.

But a massive influx of aid, and support from around the globe, could buoy Preval's fragile government before his term ends in 2011 and few here seem to think the balding and graying Haitian leader will be ousted, like so many other elected Haitian leaders have been before.

He became the only Haitian leader to win a democratic election, serve a full term and peacefully hand over power when he first served as president from 1996 through 2001.

Haiti's ornate presidential palace, a relic of better times in the late 1800s when its sugar plantations and other resources prompted the country to be known as a "Pearl of the Antilles," was caved in by the quake.

Preval was not in the building when the disaster struck. But speaking later, in various meetings with reporters and local government officials at the police station that has become his home and office in the wrecked capital, he spoke of the haunting images he saw from one of Port-au-Prince's ubiquitous "motor taxis" on his nighttime ride through the capital a short while after the quake.

"The damage I have seen here can be compared to the damage you would see if the country was bombed for 15 days. It is like in a war," Preval told Reuters.

January 20, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Haiti, past and present, exposes the ugliness of humanity

By Ben Roberts:


We see the devastation in Haiti. We see the broken and lifeless bodies removed from the rubble. We see the walking dead with their bloody wounds, skin whitened by plaster and falling dust, and their hands caked with blood and abrasions from pulling each other from the crushing skin of the earth. We see the hand-wringing of anxious relatives wanting to know about the fate of their loved ones.

We see and hear Pat Robertson expound on his ‘pact with the Devil’ attempt at logical reasoning. We hear of Rush Limbaugh, in all his omniscience, claiming ‘Don’t bother trying to donate to relief efforts. We’ve already donated to Haiti. It’s called the US income tax.’

We see the leader of the most powerful nation in the world, President Barack Obama, in no uncertain terms, directing America’s military, medical, recovery, and whatever else resources, post-haste to assist this stricken country. We see regular genuine human beings from all creeds, colors, and walks of life of trying to be of help in this disaster.

We see all this and cannot help but wonder about our own humanity, about what we are doing in this world, and what we have done in this world. This calamity in Haiti wakes us up to what we are and need to be doing. But Haiti has been a never-ending calamity because of what we have done in this world. Haiti needs us to keep its anemic body and soul together, but we need Haiti just as much to maintain our humanity by reminding us of how ugly the human spirit can be, and how low it can falter at times.

Pat Robertson claims that Haiti made a ‘pact with the Devil,’ and has suffered ever since. For those not well-informed on the history of Haiti, it must be explained that, after Haiti defeated France and got its Independence from the yoke of slavery in 1804, the French demanded one hundred and fifty million francs as compensation for its loss of the wealth it would have realized had slavery remained intact in that former colony. How diabolical! But that is not all.

Think of the world in 1804. In 1804 a hundred and fifty million francs would have amounted to a king’s ransom. Where would a shattered Haiti have gotten this money? A loan from Britain? From America? From Spain? From private entrepreneurs? Not a chance. And who, on moral grounds, would stop France from making this demand? No one, since all these nations were profiting beyond their wildest dreams from slavery.

So this new nation of Haiti, if it wanted to join the club of nations, thought its best bet was to comply with this diabolical demand. Believe it or not Haiti’s way out was to borrow the hundred and fifty million francs from France at extortionist rates. Now that is a pact with the Devil if there ever was one.

In most wars in history the victor demands reparations of the vanquished. In this instance the victor has to compensate the vanquished and has no choice but to get the loan from the vanquished to do so. How low can humanity sink? What a stain on us all who claim to represent a civilized world. No, Haiti did not make a ‘pact with the Devil.’ It made the mistake of not abiding by this long-held saying: ‘When you sup with the Devil be sure to use a long spoon.’ The Devil being all those who had designs on that bountiful nation.

Rush Limbaugh, as stated above, exhorts that we should pass on donating to Haiti since we already do in the income tax we pay. I sometimes wonder who actually listens to this man who pretends to be so informed and all-knowing. Does he even know that his own President James Madison initiated contact with Toussaint L’Overture, imploring him not to send his Haitian agents provocateurs into the US to disseminate word to American slaves that Haiti had defeated their French masters and attained their freedom?

This would have been a disaster to American wealth and profits if American slaves got wind of this and challenged the institution of slavery. Because Haiti wanted to maintain good relations with the United States, Toussaint apparently complied with this request. Now that is a pact.

Honoring such a request from the leader of a country which, a scant twenty nine years earlier, had fought its own war of Independence guaranteeing the rights of man. A war of independence where a number of the prominent Haitians in that nation’s War of Independence had fought valiantly with American soldiers in its War of Independence from the British.

So you see why Rush Limbaugh needs to be informed or read some more before coming out and pretending to be some repository of knowledge about what America has donated to others. If Pat Robertson wants to know about the human capacity for diabolical violence then he should read about the top French military man in Haiti, General Rochambeau, and his mass drowning of Haitians in the harbor of Cap Haitien.

He should read about British military overlord for the region, General Maitland, and his unrivaled wolfish propensity for deception. (Yes. The British were also present in Haiti at this same time, complete with a fort, with designs on Haiti, the bountiful prize sought over by all the major world powers of that time).

If Rush Limbaugh wants to know about outlays to other countries he should read about the aftermath of the Haitian Revolution where his country insisted that the Haitian government change its Constitution to allow outsiders to own property. A decision that affects Haiti to this day. In order to learn about all this these men should find and read: The Black Jacobins by C.L.R. James. In fact anyone who takes the time to read this text will have no choice but to rethink what they thought they knew about Haiti.

Definitely a country with a dual personality. On the one hand it represents the hopes, dreams, indomitable spirit, and ability of a people and segment of humanity to fight and succeed against unimaginable odds to establish their unquestioned legitimacy as members of the human race. On the other hand it represents the fears of another segment of humanity at the prospect of losing their privileges and presumed superiority in the human race.

Simply put, Haiti represents the unlimited potential for the human race to overcome and move into the light. Alternately, it represents the ugliness and darkness of the human race.

But enough of gloom and these bombastic individuals claiming to be authorities on something of which they seem to know very little. They remind one of a quote by the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu in his book The Tao Te Ching: ‘Those who know don’t talk, and those who talk don’t know.’

It is heart-warming to see President Obama taking charge and, in no uncertain terms, making it a priority to put resources into Haiti. What a sight to see the potent military assets of America, such as the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, and a Predator drone, being put to use in this calamity. Weapons of war highly capable of raining down death and destruction being utilized to extend hope and life. America never looked so good or so strong. It gives hope for a better world. Too bad it takes a calamity of such earth-shattering proportions for us to get to that point.


Ben Roberts is a Turks & Caicos Islander. He is a newsletter editor, freelance writer, and published author. He is the author of numerous articles that have been carried by a variety of Internet websites and read worldwide. He is often published in Turks & Caicos news media, and in the local newspapers where he resides. His action adventure novel, Jackals of Samarra, can be found at Amazon.com, and most of the major Internet book outlet sites.

January 20, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Bahamas: The Official Opposition Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) blasts The Bahamas Government's decision to release Haitian detainees

By STAFF REPORTER ~ Guardian News Desk:

The Progressive Liberal Party yesterday hit out at Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham over comments he made on Sunday regarding the government's new policy position on Haitian detainees at the Carmichael Road Detention Centre in the wake of an earthquake that killed thousands and caused widespread devastation in Port-au-Prince a week ago.

Asked on Sunday to respond to the PLP's criticism that it was not consulted prior to the change in policy on detainees, Ingraham said he took what the Opposition says "like water off a duck's back".   The PLP said yesterday the prime minister has no regard for the Opposition party and has no regard for his own Cabinet ministers.   Minister of State for Immigration Branville McCartney told The Nassau Guardian Friday that the decision regarding the detainees had been made at a higher level.

"Most importantly, Mr. Ingraham does not have any regard for the Bahamian people," the PLP added.

"In fact, he said that he is deeply disappointed in the Bahamian people because they are expressing their democratic right to disagree with his policies."

Speaking on Sunday, the prime minister said, "I accept that any decision by my government would be subject to criticism from certain quarters.  That is democracy.  But my colleagues and I — as well as the majority of right-thinking Bahamians — are deeply disappointed at the torrent of misinformation, prejudice and hard-heartedness that has spewed especially from the airwaves."

Additionally, the PLP called on Elizabeth constituents to reject the prime minister and the Free National Movement in the upcoming by-election.

"The people of Elizabeth are not playing games.  Elizabeth is not for sale," said the PLP.

The PLP's call came days after Ingraham accused the Opposition party of cashing in on the constituency.   He was launching his party's campaign at the time.

"Interestingly, Mr. Ingraham is saying that Mr. Malcolm Adderley 'cashed in' on the Elizabeth seat.   Mr. Ingraham is admitting to the charges made against the FNM by our leader and our chairman that the FNM engaged in back room deals and played games with our judicial system.   He is admitting that the FNM engineered a by-election.   This is a game that his party alone hatched, plotted and executed.   It is the FNM who cashed in on the people of Elizabeth and are now plotting to buy them back lock, stock and barrel," the PLP statement said.

The PLP claimed the prime minister is attempting to distract the voters of Elizabeth from the real issues like unemployment, home foreclosures, the non-payment of electricity and phone bills, the lack of health care, and children having to leave private school institutions.

January 19, 2010

thenassauguardian

The earthquake in Haiti requires the world's human response

By Wellington C Ramos:

Ever since the black people of this Caribbean country fought and defeated the French to gain their independence in 1804, this nation has been left by most European countries to just go downhill.

For the people who have no knowledge of the Haitian Revolution, they should take some time to study it.

During the era of colonialism, England, France, Holland, Portugal, Spain and other European countries roamed the planet earth, landed on different continents, slaughtered the indigenous people of most lands, made them slaves and took out all of their wealth and natural resources back to their respective homelands.

The landing of Christopher Columbus in this part of the world in 1492 set the pace for this exploitation to begin, with the approval of the Catholic Spanish Pope Alexander the V1 in the Treaty of Tordesillas signed by Spain and Portugal in 1494.

With the exception of Brazil, Spain was given all the land and people in the Americas and the Caribbean while Portugal had the continent of Africa for themselves.

England, France and Holland protested this bold move by the Catholic Pope and pledged to fight against this unlawful treaty.

The British formed a group called privateers, who were highly trained to navigate the high seas and look for non-British vessels, capture them, take their cargoes and kill all the sailors on board.

In addition, they signed agreements with Spain to temporarily occupy some of their illegal territories with the intention to stay on them permanently.

The French did this on the Spanish island of Hispaniola in the early 1600s which eventually developed into two countries, one by the name of Haiti and the other the Dominican Republic.

Today, these two countries are divided and their relationship remains strained up to this day because of their cultural and historical differences.

The British did the same thing in 1638 by getting permission to cut logwood and mahogany from the Spanish crown in one of their occupied territories in Central America that was under the Captaincy General of Granados, which capital was in Guatemala City and New Spain that had its capital in Mexico City.

The Mexican government, in a treaty with England, later renounced their claim to Belize.

While the Guatemalan government kept hanging on to their unlawful claim.

Like the French, the British had no intention of leaving because they said from the beginning that they will never honor the treaty that was signed between Spain and Portugal giving them both titles to the entire Americas, Caribbean and Africa.

Today, that settlement has led to the emergence of a nation called Belize that is struggling to maintain its independence but still haunted by a Guatemalan claim because of Europeans’ unlawful actions.

The Haitians were able to defeat France with the help of their ancestors and their powerful war god “Ogun”, one of the most powerful gods in the religion of the Yoruba people, who mostly live in the country of Nigeria on the African continent.

Most Haitians are descendants of various African cultures that were brought from the continent of Africa during slavery.

Many Europeans look down on African people with disdain as if they are uncivilized, backward and stupid even up to this day.

Yet they know that the first people on this planet earth were black people and great civilizations existed on the continent of Africa long before the Europeans set foot on the African continent.

In fact many African kings and queens sponsored expeditions and invasions of several territories in Europe, Asia and elsewhere.

The Empires of Mali like; King Askia Mohammad, Songhay and Ghana are typical examples.

The Haitians are still looked upon by many Europeans and some Caribbean people as evil people but this assertion is far from the truth.

They are entitled to practice whatever religion they chose to practice like everybody else to save their own souls. For me it is laughable for anyone to believe that the Europeans are interested in saving the souls of other people after all the atrocities they have committed upon the people of this planet.

Europeans must accept the fact that Christianity is not the only religion on earth.

Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and several other religions are common on this planet earth.

As a Garifuna person, it took me some time to accept and understand my own culture’s religion, which is also based on African ancestral rites called “Dugu”.

I have accepted it and will not depart from my religion just to remain a Christian.

This religion has provided me with solace and healing over the years.

The country of Haiti needs the entire world to be on its side at this current moment because a natural disaster can occur anywhere at any time.

If there are any people in this world who have suffered and been punished, enough they are the Haitian people and enough is enough.

Several people have died in this country and the structural damages and human suffering done nationwide is severe.

Looking at the news has brought tears to my eyes because as a human being, I have feelings and these people are all God’s children like me.

There is enough in this world to give every human being in this world who is in need of something but we have got to rid ourselves from this culture of greed and selfishness and just give.

We all shall die one day and everything we possess will remain here after we have departed this planet earth.

January 18, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Chavez says US 'occupying Haiti' in name of aid

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) -- Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez on Sunday accused the United States of using the earthquake in Haiti as a pretext to occupy the devastated Caribbean country and offered to send fuel from his OPEC nation.

"I read that 3,000 soldiers are arriving, Marines armed as if they were going to war. There is not a shortage of guns there, my God. Doctors, medicine, fuel, field hospitals, that's what the United States should send," Chavez said on his weekly television show. "They are occupying Haiti undercover."

"On top of that, you don't see them in the streets. Are they picking up bodies? ... Are they looking for the injured? You don't see them. I haven't seen them. Where are they?"

Chavez promised to send as much gasoline as Haiti needs for electricity generation and transport.

A perennial foe of US "imperialism," Chavez said he did not wish to diminish the humanitarian effort made by the United States and was only questioning the need for so many troops.

The United States is sending more than 5,000 Marines and soldiers to Haiti, and a hospital ship is due to arrive later this week.

The country's president said US troops would help keep order on Haiti's increasingly lawless streets.

Venezuela has sent several planes to Haiti with doctors, aid and some soldiers. A Russia-Venezuela mission was set to leave Venezuela on Monday carrying aid on Russian planes.

Chavez said Venezuela's planes were the first to land in Haiti after Tuesday's 7.0 magnitude earthquake, which wrecked the capital Port-Au-Prince and killed as many as 200,000 people.

January 18, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Caricom blocked from landing in Haiti

BY RICKEY SINGH Observer Caribbean correspondent:





BRIDGETOWN, Barbados -- The Caribbean Community's emergency aid mission to Haiti, comprising heads of government and leading technical officials, failed to secure permission Friday to land at that devastated country's airport, now under the control of the USA.

Consequently, the Caricom "assessment mission" that was to determine priority humanitarian needs resulting from the mind-boggling earthquake disaster last Tuesday had to travel back from Jamaica to their respective home destinations.

On Friday afternoon, the US State Department confirmed signing two Memoranda of Understanding with the Government of Haiti that made "official that the United States is in charge of all inbound and outbound flights and aid offloading".

Further, according to the agreements signed, US medical personnel "now have the authority to operate on Haitian citizens and otherwise render medical assistance without having to wait for licences from Haiti's Government".

Prior to the US taking control of Haiti's airport, a batch of some 30 Cuban doctors had left Havana, following the earthquake, to join more than 300 of their colleagues who have been working there for more than a year.

Last evening, the frustration suffered by the Caricom mission to get landing permission was expected to be raised in a scheduled meeting at Jamaica's Norman Manley International Airport between Jamaica's Prime Minister Bruce Golding and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Golding, who was making arrangements for the meeting with Clinton, following her visit earlier in the day to witness the devastation of the capital Port-au-Prince, said he could not comment on details to be discussed.

He, however, told this correspondent: "I appreciate the chaos and confusion at Haiti's airport, where there is just one operational runway. But Haiti is a member of Caricom and we simply have to be facilitated and the truth is there is hardly a functioning government in Haiti."

Asked whether the difficulties encountered by the Caricom mission may be related to reports that US authorities were not anxious to facilitate landing of aircraft from Cuba and Venezuela, Prime Minister Golding said he could "only hope that there is no truth to such immature thinking in the face of the horrific scale of Haiti's tragedy".

Golding, who has lead portfolio responsibility among Caricom leaders for external economic relations, got a first-hand assessment of the damage when he flew to Haiti on Thursday.

A contingent of some 150 members of the Jamaica Defence Force has since established a camp with medical facilities in the vicinity of Haiti's airport.

Ahead of last evening's scheduled meeting with Clinton, Prime Minister Golding had discussed on Friday in Kingston some of the problems to be overcome at a meeting with the prime ministers of Barbados and Dominica and the Community's secretary general Edwin Carrington.

Carrington explained that proper use of the Norman Manley Airport would be consistent with a decision last week for Jamaica to serve as the Sub-regional Operational Focal Point for responses to the Haitian humanitarian crisis.

January 17, 2010

jamaicaobserver

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Haiti's fault rupture boosts long-term risk of Jamaica quake

By Tom Randall and Meg Tirrell:


NEW YORK, USA (Bloomberg) -- The magnitude 7 earthquake that killed as many as 100,000 people in Haiti this week may increase the likelihood of a future quake in Jamaica, according to seismologists who study geologic risk.

When aftershocks subside in the coming weeks, Haiti’s prospects of another earthquake will plummet, while areas west along the same fault line will see increased seismic pressure, said Stuart Sipkin, a seismologist at the US Geological Survey in Golden, Colorado.  It could take decades or a century for the pressure to rupture on the western edge of the fault in Jamaica.

A similar quake flattened the Haitian capital of Port-au- Prince 240 years ago, so long ago that most residents were unaware they were at risk, said Roger Musson, who advises engineers on regional dangers for the British Geological Survey.  The 1770 upheaval was part of a string of westward-moving temblors that culminated in Jamaica in 1907, he said.

“In Haiti, there’s not been earthquakes in living memory; now it’s likely that the stress will be increased on the next segment along,” Musson, the agency’s head of seismic hazard, said in a telephone interview.  However, he added, “You are constantly surprised by earthquakes doing things that they’re not supposed to do.”

Haiti lies near the eastern end of a fault line between the North American and Caribbean tectonic plates -- massive subterranean sections of the earth’s crust that move at about the speed that human fingernails grow, Sipkin said.

When the two passing tectonic plates get stuck together, pressure builds until it is relieved through a violent movement of earth, Sipkin said.

It probably took about 20 to 30 seconds for the fault to break, said Kate Hutton, a seismologist at the Seismological Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

“People probably felt it for longer,” Hutton said today in a telephone interview. “People’s perception of time slows down when they get really stressed.”

The Haiti earthquake was a “worst-case scenario,” a shallow rupture in the earth that ripped through a densely populated and poorly constructed city, said Pedro de Alba, professor of civil engineering at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.  The depth of the rupture is important, because if it occurs deep in the earth, much of the energy is absorbed by rock, he said.

“A shallow earthquake is the worst possible kind,” de Alba said in a telephone interview today.  “Pressure was building up for quite a long time.”

De Alba said the probability of a future quake west along the fault line has increased, “but to what extent we simply can’t predict.”

January 16, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas: Evacuated Bahamians tell of Haiti's horror

By KRYSTEL ROLLE ~ Guardian Staff Reporter ~ krystel@nasguard.com:



Amid the death and despair that clouds Haiti, comes a miraculous story of survival.

Two Bahamians narrowly escaped death on Tuesday after a powerful earthquake ripped off the walls of the hotel they were staying in and flattened buildings all around them.

As the death toll rose as more bodies were dug out of concrete graves, Civil Aviation Director Captain Patrick Rolle and Flight Inspector Hubert Adderley said they are lucky to be alive.

The raw anguish permeating throughout the impoverished nation is something they said they could not have concocted in their worst nightmares.

The men, who were evacuated from Haiti on Wednesday and taken to Jamaica before arriving in New Providence on a Sky Bahamas flight yesterday, told of horrific scenes they said would not be forgotten anytime soon.

Both Rolle and Adderley said they were just getting settled in their rooms in Hotel Carib in Port-au-Prince when the earth shook.

The two were in Haiti attending an International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Safety and Security Conference.

"I was just checked in, got into the room and was sending an e-mail to my wife letting her know that I had arrived safe. When I got up from the chair to go over to the bed to make a note of something, the room started vibrating," Rolle recalled.

He said the wall in his room then collapsed around him, part of which hit him in his head.

"The room itself basically caved in," he added.

Rolle said he tried to get out of the main door but could not as the door frame was warped.

As a result, Rolle said he left through a sliding door and jumped a wall onto the roof of a restaurant.

"I did it. It sounds simple, but I don't know how I did it," Rolle added.

Adderley said he made a similar escape.

"My first instinct was to get out of this place quick," he said.

And, according to Adderley, that's exactly what he did.

"The sliding door was open. So I just got out, jumped over the railing, fell on the ground and continued moving to an open area," he said.

"I've never been in an earthquake before. My immediate thought was my family at home. I didn't come over here to not go back."

Rolle and Adderley said as they were riding away from the collapsed hotel, they saw a frightening sight — dead bodies all around them.

The harrowing images that are shown of the ravaged Port-au-Prince only reveal the beginning of the total devastation and despair that the powerful earthquake wrought on the nation, the Bahamian survivors said.

"What they're showing you [on the international news] is the main street," Rolle said. "What they're not showing you are the side streets where everyone lived — where nobody lives now. All the residents moved and now sleep in the middle of the street. Everyone is literally living in the streets."

He said the residents used stones to block the road so they could make their beds in the streets on the side of their dead loved ones.

The magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit the coast of Haiti at approximately 4:43 p.m. Tuesday.

Rolle, who had a gash on his head, said thousands of people were injured during the quake but are unable to get medical help.

"So they're there and there is no medical aid; the hospital has collapsed," he said.

"The UN medical clinic is overwhelmed. Another hospital was declared unfit. So everyone who was in ICU had to be taken out. There were literally hundreds of persons there, arms missing, foot off, bones exposed," he said.

"The media [are] saving the public from some of the things that [are] actually happening. The worst part is seeing persons sitting near their dead relatives. There's no one collecting the dead bodies."

The American Red Cross estimates that the earthquake may have affected about three million people in and near Port-au-Prince.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Haiti are feared dead.

Bodies are piled along the devastated streets of Port-au-Prince. However, no official count has been made as thousands of people are thought to be trapped beneath the rubble of collapsed buildings.

"It's something that I would not like to experience again, seeing the amount of dead persons," Rolle said.

He added that he's still not sure what he feels.

"I can tell you that things that I thought were important in life are no longer important. When you see people lose everything they've got you realize that there is nothing else there. The only thing you have, I guess for myself as a Christian, is a relationship that cannot be broken by disaster," he said.

"And you have a hope that you can't lose but when you see all of the people walking around with no hope and not knowing where they're going to get water or food, with no homes to go to, we realize that as a human the only thing you have are relationships."

Adderley said the images that he saw will stay with him for a long time.

"What was gut wrenching about all this, in the back of the hotel there's a hill and on the side of the hill are all these homes and when you look over in that area all you saw was a white cloud of dust and all you heard were moans and the cries of people and it was just gut wrenching," he said.

"It's something that I would never want to experience again. It's going to take a couple days to process out of this. I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone because there are persons we saw an hour or two before who we haven't seen since. It's a really, really horrific situation in Haiti right now."

January 15, 2010


thenassauguardian

Bahamas Blog International

Haiti quake was nightmare waiting to happen say scientists

By Richard Ingham:



PARIS, France (AFP) -- The quake that hit Haiti on Tuesday was a killer that had massed its forces for a century and a half before unleashing them against a wretchedly poor country, turning buildings into death traps, experts said on Wednesday.

Scientists painted a tableau of horror, where natural forces, ignorance and grinding poverty had conspired to wreak a death toll tentatively estimated by Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive at more than 100,000.

The 7.0-magnitude quake occurred very close to the surface near the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, leaving almost no natural buffer to soften the powerful shockwave, these experts said.

"It was a very shallow earthquake, occurring at a depth of around 10 kilometers (6.2 miles)," seismologist Yann Klinger of the Institute of the Physics of the Globe (IPG) in Paris told AFP.

"Because the shock was so big and occurred at such a shallow depth, just below the city, the damage is bound to be very extensive," he said.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said the quake occurred at 2153 GMT on Tuesday 15 kms (9.4 miles) southwest of Port-au-Prince.

It happened at a boundary where two mighty chunks of the Earth's crust, the Caribbean plate and the North America plate, rub and jostle in a sideways, east-west movement.

The USGS said the rupture occurred on the "Enriquillo-Plaintain Garden fault system," a slow-moving fault that last unleashed a large quake in 1860. Prior major events to that were in 1770, 1761, 1751, 1684, 1673 and 1618.

Sandy Steacey, director of the Environmental Science Research Institute at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland, said the high death toll could be pinned overwhelmingly to construction.

"It's a very, very poor country without the building codes. Probably the fact that earthquakes (there) are very infrequent contributes in a way, because it's not a country that is focussed on seismic safety.

"Looking at the pictures, essentially it looks as if (the buildings are of) breeze-block or cinder-block construction, and what you need in an earthquake zone is metal bars that connect the blocks so that they stay together when they get shaken," said Steacey.

"In a wealthy country with good seismic building codes that are enforced, you would have some damage, but not very much."

French seismologist Pascal Bernard, also at the IPG, said that, given the nature of the fault, there was a "sizeable probability" that another large quake could occur in the same region within a matter of years.

Like other faults around the world, the Haitian crack is well known for domino activity, in which the release of pressure on one stretch piles on pressure in an adjoining stretch, bringing it closer to rupture.

In Haiti's case, the likeliest spot of a bust would be to the east of Tuesday's quake, Bernard said.

Asked whether another big quake was in the offing, Roger Searle, a professor of geophysics at Durham University, northeast England, said, "In the coming years, almost surely."

"We know pretty much where earthquakes occur, they've been mapped themselves and we can map faults and so on.

"The difficulty is it's very, very hard to predict when they will occur, because the network is so complex.

"It's a bit like making a pile of stones. You put more on the pile and it gets steeper and steeper and sooner or later the thing is going to collapse but you never which stone is going to do it and just where it's going to start to fail."

January 14, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Haiti president describes `unimaginable' catastrophe; thousands feared dead

By JACQUELINE CHARLES, CAROL ROSENBERG, JEAN-CYRIL PRESSOIR AND JIM WYSS
jcharles@MiamiHerald.com:

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Haitian President René Préval issued an urgent appeal for his earthquake-shattered nation Wednesday, saying he had been stepping over dead bodies and hearing the cries of those trapped under the rubble of the national Parliament.

Préval, in his first interview since the earthquake, said the country was destroyed and he believed there were thousands of people dead but was reluctant to provide a number.

``We have to do an evaluation,'' Préval said, describing the scene as ``unimaginable.''

``Parliament has collapsed. The tax office has collapsed. Schools have collapsed. Hospitals have collapsed,'' he said. ``There are a lot of schools that have a lot of dead people in them.''

The U.N. said casualties were ``vast'' but impossible to calculate.

The International Red Cross said a third of Haiti's nine million people may need emergency aid and that it would take a day or two for a clear picture of the damage to emerge, the Associated Press reported.

As the scope of the damage was becoming clear Wednesday, some Haitians were crossing the border into the Dominican Republic.

``I don't have work, I don't have a future here,'' said Antonio Bacevil, 39, a farmer wearing ragged shorts and muddy boat shoes who was on his way to Santiago. ``What you see is what I have. . . . A lot of people are dead.''

The U.S. State Department said there are 45,000 American citizens living in Haiti and efforts were being made to locate them. Of the more than 170 personnel at the U.S. Embassy, eight were injured, four of them seriously enough to be evacuated by the Coast Guard, officials said in a briefing.

Préval said he had traveled through several neighborhoods and seen the damage. ``All of the hospitals are packed with people. It is a catastrophe,'' he said.

The U.N. said Haiti's principal prison had collapsed and inmates had escaped.

A Florida-based shipper said the cranes at the Port-au-Prince cargo pier had toppled into the water and that much of the pier was destroyed.

The second story and dome of the ornate Presidential Palace pancaked onto the first floor. The Parliament was also in ruins, trapping Senate President Kely Bastien, Préval said.

The body of the Catholic archbishop of Port-au-Prince, Joseph Serge Miot, 63, was found in the ruins of his office, the Associated Press reported.

In Washington Wednesday, President Barack Obama said search-and-rescue teams from Florida, California and Virginia were on their way to Haiti and that USAID would be coordinating a broad-based effort to take food, water and emergency supplies to the nation.

``We have to be there for them in their hour of need,'' he said.

The military also swung into action early Wednesday, moving a 30-member advance team from Southern Command in Miami by C-130 cargo plane to work with U.S. Embassy personnel and sending a Navy reconnaissance plane from a U.S base in Comalpa, El Salvador, to study the quake damage. The Navy also diverted the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson to Haiti. It was expected to be off the coast Thursday.

According to media reports, survivors were digging through the rubble and stacking bodies along the streets of Haiti's capital after the powerful 7.0-magnitude earthquake rocked the island nation Tuesday afternoon. The earthquake has left the nation virtually isolated, with countless crumbled buildings, including the six-story United Nations headquarters.

The U.N. confirmed five of its workers had been killed and more than 100 were missing. Among those unaccounted for were the mission chief, Hédi Annabi, and his deputy, the U.N. said Wednesday.

Brazil's army said at least 11 of its peacekeepers were killed, while Jordan's official news agency said three of its peacekeepers were killed, the AP reported.

Préval said he has not slept since the earthquake. Others slept in the streets fearing their homes would be toppled by aftershocks.

``This is a catastrophe,'' the first lady, Elisabeth Préval, said. ``I'm stepping over dead bodies. A lot of people are buried under buildings. The general hospital has collapsed. We need support. We need help. We need engineers.''

While official details about the scope of the damage were scarce, eyewitness accounts and media reports painted a picture of widespread destruction that could leave thousands dead.

A hospital was reported to have collapsed and people were heard screaming for help, and the World Bank offices in Petionville were also destroyed, but most of the staff were safely accounted for, the organization said.

Part of the road to Canape Vert, a suburb of Port-au-Prince, has collapsed, along with houses perched in the mountains of Petionville, where the quake was centered. Petionville is a suburb about 10 miles from downtown Port-au-Prince.

As the damage mounted, Florida Republican Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen pressed Obama for immediate humanitarian aid for Haiti and renewed their request for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian nationals residing in the United States.

``Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Haiti tonight as emergency responders work to ensure the safety of their citizens. It is important that the U.S. make available all possible humanitarian assistance to our friend and neighbor, Haiti,'' Lincoln Diaz-Balart said.

And Ros-Lehtinen called for the U.S. to immediately stop deporting Haitian nationals ``due to the crisis in this already devastated country.''

Broward Democrat Alcee Hastings added his name to the effort, calling it ``not only immoral, but irresponsible'' not to do so.

On Wednesday, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon said the organization had released $10 million in ``emergency funds'' to set up immediate operations. He said Assistant Secretary General Eduard Moulet would be dispatched to the region as soon as conditions permit.

OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza said the OAS ``will do everything within our means to support the victims of this catastrophic phenomenon.'' He said Assistant Secretary General Albert Ramdin was gathering damage information to report to the group's Permanent Council Wednesday to allow member states to contribute to Haiti.

``It is at such times that people, governments and leaders across the hemisphere, as neighbors and friends of the people of Haiti, should show solidarity and support in a real, effective and immediate manner, guided by the country's government, which knows best where the most urgent need lies,'' Insulza said.

U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek, a Democrat who represents parts of Miami-Dade and Broward counties, said: ``I am monitoring the situation very closely and am prepared to do whatever it takes to save lives and bring swift disaster relief to Haiti and the Haitian people at this time. I ask that all Americans please keep the Haitian people and all victims of this disaster in their thoughts and prayers.''

From Broward, U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston, who was in Haiti in June, said she was ``deeply saddened'' by the news.

``I know only too well how much this earthquake will add to the already immense obstacles facing the Haitian people,'' she said, adding that she would work with colleagues in Congress and the Obama administration to provide aid to Haiti.

The American Red Cross was poised to move aid from a warehouse in Panama -- blankets, kitchen sets and water containers for about 5,000 families -- as soon as a flight or means of delivery could be found, Eric Porterfield said in Washington.

Field reports, he said, indicated ``lots of damage and lots of aftershocks.''

In addition, the American Red Cross had already released $200,000 to its counterpart Haitian Red Cross.

On Wednesday, Haitian Sen. Joseph Lambert also described the scene in Haiti. Standing outside the Parliament building, he said: ``Imagine schools, hospitals, government buildings all destroyed.''

When asked about the prospect of Haiti rebuilding, Lambert said, ``It's our country. We have no other choice. It's a catastrophe, but we have no other choice but to rebuild.''

01.13.10

miamiherald


Miami Herald staff writers Nancy San Martin, Lesley Clark, Trenton Daniel, Frances Robles, Martha Brannigan, Jim Wyss, Robert Samuels, Nadege Charles, Mary Ellen Klas and Herald special correspondent Stewart Stogel contributed to this report, which was supplemented by wire services.

French Caribbean regions reject more autonomy

By Dominique Bareto:


FORT-DE-FRANCE (Reuters) - Voters in the French Caribbean territories of Martinique and Guyana rejected the option of greater autonomy in a referendum at the weekend, authorities said.

A year after protests against high prices in the island of Guadeloupe spread to other French overseas regions, the referendum offered the chance to vote for giving local lawmakers more scope to initiate legislation of their own.

Like other parts of France's overseas territories and regions, Martinique and Guyana depend heavily on support from the mainland, but suffer from higher unemployment than the rest of France and rely on expensive imported food and fuel.

The proposed changes would have given the regions a status similar to that of French Polynesia, which has more responsibility for its own affairs than the so-called overseas "departments" but they would not have led to full independence.

But nearly 70 percent of voters in Guyana, on the South American mainland, and 79.3 percent of voters on the island of Martinique voted to remain overseas "departments" that count as full parts of France and the European Union.

"I was surprised by the size of the result but not by the trend," said Marcellin Nadeau a local mayor who had backed the "yes" vote in the referendum.

President Nicolas Sarkozy announced the vote last year, saying changes were needed to improve governance in the Caribbean regions but his office said in a statement the vote showed how attached they were to the French Republic.

The vote was widely seen as a rebuff to local politicians who had asked Sarkozy to hold the referendum but officials said various factors were at issue.

"There were those who did not answer the question and who saw it as 'Do you want independence?' and who voted No," said Patrick Karam, a government official responsible for overseeing equality issues in the overseas territories.

"Then there were those...who asked 'What will happen to our social benefits in future?'" he told France Info radio.

The vote came as tensions returned to Guadeloupe, the scene of last year's most violent confrontations, where shops were burned and looted and a union leader was killed during a 44-day stand-off between protesters and police.

High prices, combined with what protesters saw as an unfair dominance of key sectors of the economy by the old white elite were the triggers for the protests and the problems have not disappeared despite an accord last year.

Elie Domota, leader of the LKP group which spearheaded the protests, last week called a strike on the island on January 20, saying prices had gone up sharply at the beginning of the year, despite government pledges.

Last year's protests in Guadeloupe ended with a deal to boost the local minimum wage by 200 euros a month and set price pegs on dozens of staple items to reduce the cost of living.

January 12, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Cuba: We have a youth prepared to give continuity to the Revolution

• Confirms José Ramón Machado Ventura during the 9th UJC Congress Evaluation Assembly

Freddy Pérez Cabrera

SANTA CLARA.—The certainty that Cuban youth will know how to continue the work of the Revolution until its ultimate consequences, was confirmed in the this "city of Che" by José Ramón Machado Ventura, member of the Political Bureau during the course of the 9th UJC Congress Evaluation Assembly.

"We have a strong and well-prepared youth, who are in a position to give continuity to the revolutionary process, under present and future conditions.  This is the commitment made by young people, and we are certain, firmly convinced, that they will carry this commitment to its ultimate consequences," stated the Cuban first vice president during his speech to the plenary.

"There are problems and difficulties everywhere, but we cannot say that this is because of the youth," commented Machado Ventura, who made a call to continue working with young people who are not demonstrating a firm commitment to fulfilling the tasks mentioned.

In another part of his speech, Machado called on UJC members and young people in general to support the election process that has been recently initiated throughout the country.

Yulián García Zayas Bazán, UJC secretary at the Valle de Yabú Mixed Cultivation Enterprise, highlighted the problems affecting the internal workings of the organization, and emphasized that young people cannot only see themselves as activists when meetings take place, an opinion that was shared by Machado Ventura, who acknowledged that we still lack creativity when it comes to planning youth meetings.

Liudmila Alamo Dueñas, first secretary of the UJC National Committee, highlighted the need to eradicate bureaucracy in the work of the organization, and to solve problems resulting from a lack of information and arguments from certain members and local committees, rather than wait for a Congress to take place.

Julio Lima Corzo, first secretary of the party in Villa Clara, commented on this issue and stated that young people need to create the debates, not with empty slogans but with solid arguments, in a way in which they can rise to the historic challenge of preserving the socialist homeland for present and future generations.

The assembly elected the delegates who will represent that area at the UJC national congress and confirmed Richeliet Calderón Acea as the first secretary of the UJC’s Municipal Committee.

Translated by Granma International

January 11, 2010

granma.cu


From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

The Young Communist League (Spanish: Unión de Jóvenes Comunistas, UJC) is the youth organisation of the Communist Party of Cuba.

EU must be 'demanding' with Cuba, says Spain

MADRID, Spain (AFP) -- Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero called Friday on the European Union to be "demanding" with Cuba even while pushing for dialogue with the island's communist regime.

Spain, which assumed the rotating EU presidency for six months on January 1, is at the forefront of efforts to boost relations with Cuba, a former Spanish colony.

"We must be demanding with Cuba but always keep the door open to dialogue," Zapatero said at a press conference with European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso and the EU's new president, Herman Van Rompuy.

Spanish media have reported that Madrid wants to establish a new agreement on EU-Cuba ties in the first half of 2010 but has lowered its ambitions to avoid objects from other EU nations.

Asked about the reports, Zapatero said that "for the entire EU, Cuba is not a priority, even if for Spain it is very important".

"Today we had a long meeting and among the foreign policy topics which we discussed, we did not touch on Cuba," said Zapatero, referring to his talks with Van Rompuy and Barroso.

Van Rompuy said he has had "little time to think about Cuba" since he assumed office on December 1.

Spain wants to see an end to the European Union's position on Cuba, adopted in 1996, which calls for improvements in human rights and democracy on the island as a condition for normal relations with the 27-nation European bloc.

But this is opposed by other EU nations, including the two previous holders of the bloc's presidency -- Sweden and the Czech Republic -- as well Cuban human rights groups.

Spain's policy on Cuba shifted in 2005 after Zapatero, a socialist, came to power the previous year. His conservative predecessor, Jose Maria Aznar, had adopted a policy of isolating the Communist island.

In 2007 Spain and Cuba renewed ties damaged by Havana's jailing of 75 dissidents in 2003.

January 9, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

Bahamas: Reducing the government 'only way' to long-term fiscal security

By NEIL HARTNELL
Tribune Business Editor:


Reducing the size of government is "the only way" to set The Bahamas' public finances back on the road to fiscal sustainability, a leading accountant said yesterday, arguing that the private sector was not large enough to generate the tax revenues needed to pay for ever-expanding public services.

Raymond Winder, Deloitte & Touche (Bahamas) managing partner, also criticised the "average Bahamian" for putting pressure on politicians to continually increase public spending through the mistaken belief that "government can solve all our ills and problems without it costing money".

Acknowledging that Bahamian political, religious and other community leaders "in teaching the average Bahamian that there is nothing free", Mr Winder told Tribune Business that people needed to take more personal responsibility and realise that the country and economy, not just the Government, needed to grow.

"We're not educating people to let them know you can't continually increase the size of government, or have the government continually provide new services, without having that money come from somewhere," he explained.

Raising taxes or introducing new ones was not the long-term answer, Mr Winder added, because the Bahamas - given its relatively small size and population - could only bear this rising burden to a certain point.

And given the recession, which had caused business activity and international trade to contract, and a subsequent decline in government revenues, Mr Winder said companies and households were in no position to absorb new and/or increased taxes and fees.

"We don't have a private sector that is big enough to pay for all these services," the Deloitte & Touche (Bahamas) managing partner said.

"The majority of the private sector is unable to meet their obligations, so how do you expect to get all this without paying for these services. It's just not there.

"We need to tighten our belts and take personal responsibility for some of the things we ought to."

Backing the position adopted by Rick Lowe, an executive with the hawkish Nassau Institute economic think-tank, Mr Winder told Tribune Business: "For the size of our country, the Government is too big and has to be reduced.   That's the only way to right our fiscal responsibility [position]."

Bahamians had been led to believe that growing the Government could fix all this nation's problems and social ills, without realising that the economy and country as a whole needed to grow to.

"The reality is our problems will not be solved if government continues to grow without the wider country growing with it," he added.

Yet Mr Winder said any politician who preached the message of personal and fiscal responsibility, and that The Bahamas should not keep increasing the size of government, was unlikely to find themselves a politician for too much long because it was not something the majority of voters were attuned to or accustomed to hearing.

"I blame the average Bahamian, who believes the Government can solve all our problems and ills without it costing money," Mr Winder said.

He added that "ministers of the Gospel also need to do a better job", as many were "continually pushing" for the Government to provide new services and cure all The Bahamas' problems.

Tribune Business revealed yesterday how The Bahamas' national debt stands at almost $3.8 billion, between $11,000-$12,000 per resident.   Data from the Central Bank of the Bahamas' latest statistical digest showed that at the 2009 third quarter end on September 30, 2009, this nation's national debt stood at $3.675 billion.   Some $3.236 billion of that was directly owed to creditors by the Bahamian government, along with a further $438.486 million worth of borrowings it had guaranteed on behalf of public sector corporations and agencies.

In downgrading the Bahamas' long-term sovereign credit rating, Standard & Poor's (S&P) had warned: "Overall, the general government deficit is projected at 4.8 per cent of GDP in 2009-2010 (ending June 2010) from an estimated 4.1 per cent of GDP in 2008-2009.

"During 2010-2012, we project general government deficits on the order of 3.5 per cent of GDP, compared with deficits of 1.5 per cent of GDP in 2003-2007."

The Wall Street credit rating agency said the Bahamas' net general government debt had risen to 30 per cent of GDP, compared to 22 per cent in 2008, and it added: "We project that it will continue rising to 35-39 per cent of GDP in 2010-2012.

"Gross general government debt is higher at 46 per cent of GDP in 2009, up from 37 per cent in 2008. The Commonwealth's share of external to locally issued debt is 20 per cent, which is relatively low but up from 10 per cent in 2007."

January 08, 2010

tribune242

The Bahamas: Attorney voices concern over retired politicians on bench

By TANEKA THOMPSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
tthompson@tribunemedia.net:



ATTORNEY Damian Gomez contends that the number of retired politicians who are taking up positions on the bench makes it harder for lawyers to find a sitting judge without an apparent conflict of interest in civil suits against the AG's office.

Mr Gomez claims this has created a court backlog contributing to deteriorating public confidence in the legal system.

His comments add to the growing concern that the anticipated appointment of former MP Malcolm Adderley to the Supreme Court bench will undermine the independence of the judiciary from the influence of the executive branch of Government.

"It's just an impossible situation and now we have another person (who may be appointed to the bench) which may add to the difficulty in getting a judge who may or may not have a conflict.

"What it does is lend credence to the critics of our court system, who say all it is, is politics.   I'm not prepared to say it's political interference, I don't know, it doesn't have the right smell.   It undermines the public confidence of the (court), " he said when contacted yesterday for comment.

Mr Adderley is 64 years old, just shy of the mandatory retirement age of 65 for a judge.   It has been rumoured in political circles that Mr Adderley will be offered an extension past the normal retirement age from Government.

Mr Gomez thinks Mr Adderley is qualified for the job but said this reported arrangement would suggest that the ex-MP "will not be as conflict-free in public law matters as he ought".

"I happen to like Malcolm Adderley as a person but I'm just saying that I just find it strange that on the eve of the age of ordinary retirement, he would be given a post which would, in order to make sense, would require him to be extended beyond two years," he continued.

There is also a cry for constitutional reform in order to limit the control a prime minister has over the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government.

Pushing for such reform is fringe political group, the National Development Party, which questioned if Mr Adderley used his political leverage as a bargaining chip to secure a judicial post.   The NDP argued that his resignation from the House was proof that the constitution is "vulnerable to abuse."

"It is because our constitution was not designed to protect the citizenry from the abuse of power by the Prime Minister, that Mr Malcolm Adderley is today causing the public to question whether he used his elected office as a bargaining chip in this game of political poker that has been played between the FNM and the PLP since May of 2007," the NDP told the press in an impromptu press conference on the steps of the House of Assembly yesterday morning, after Mr Adderley resigned from Parliament.

This comes after speculation that Government wooed Mr Adderley away from the PLP with promises of a post within the Supreme Court in exchange for his seat.

The NDP said the country must institute constitutional safeguards to limit a prime minister's "absolute power", if the Bahamas plans to escape being categorised as a "Banana Republic."

tribune242

Cuba rejects inclusion on blacklist

AS WE GO TO PRESS…

WASHINGTON.—The Cuban Interests Section in this capital assured this January 5 that the island government is cooperating in the international fight against terrorism, and it condemned its inclusion on the list of states described by the U.S. administration as sponsors of terrorism, EFE reports.

Alberto González, spokesman for the Cuban mission in Washington, stated that Cuba "has complied with, is complying with and will comply with the internationally recognized security measures in these cases," and he noted that the Cuban people "do not recognize in any way the moral authority of the U.S. government to certify their inclusion on this kind of list."

González unequivocally stated that "Cuban territory has never been utilized to organize, finance or execute acts of terrorism against the United States or any other state," and suggested that this latest attack on the island is politically motivated.

On the contrary, he continued, Cuba has been the victim of violence and terrorism on the part of individuals such as Luis Posada Carriles, who remains at large in the United States and has not been brought to justice.

Translated by Granma International

January 6, 2010

granma.cu

Bahamas Caribbean Blog International

The Bahamas: Criminal justice in crisis

IN A few weeks time the Prime Minister will give his state of the nation message, which will deal with many subjects of importance.   Crime will obviously feature high on his agenda.

This will be the deciding year -- either the criminals will get control or the community, the police and the judiciary will unite to return law and order to the nation.

Today the criminal seems to have the upper hand.   In other words he is literally getting away with murder.

The judge who returns a person to the streets on remand is not doing that person a favour.   Some would have been safer behind bars for whatever length of time they would have had to await trial. In the interim several of them have been killed.

But let's look at it from the point of view of the accused. Recently we were told by one -- a tinge of sarcastic bitterness in his voice -- "Man I just working for my lawyer!"

Translated that comment meant that he fully realised that with a criminal record he had no hope of finding a job once he was returned to the streets on remand.   The reality of life was that he had to eat, secure lodging and in many cases try to support a family. Unable to work, he had to continue a life of crime, and the crime had to be lucrative enough to provide lawyer's fees against the day he was caught and had to again plead "not guilty" before the bar of justice.   His future depended upon that lawyer using his debating skills and the knowledge of the law to keep him out of prison.   And so for him -- and the community -- the cycle of crime continues.

There is then the even more frightening phenomenon of the intimidation of witnesses.   Even from behind their prison bars witnesses are being intimidated by certain accused persons.   Witnesses have often recanted through fear.

A person who has nothing to lose, but everything to gain by using his wits will go to criminal lengths to secure his freedom.   And some of these men, sitting in a jail cell, are going to those criminal lengths to intimidate a community.

We have heard of a case of an accused, in jail, using a cell phone to contact a leading witness in his case to say what would happen to him if he testified.   Imagine in prison with a cell phone.   Imagine what would happen to trials if witnesses are silenced through fear.   No one would go to prison and justice would have to take its course on the streets.

For prisoners to have cells phones in prison -- and this has been reported on many occasions in the past -- there has to be a severe breach of security at the prison.   The police should do a thorough investigation and get to the bottom of this.   From what we understand, this particular prisoner is not the only one who is managing his affairs from a prison cell with the aid of a cell phone.

There was another instance, which we are told took place not too long ago during a hearing in the Nassau Street magistrate's court.   The accused is said to have lifted his hand showing his palm to the witness in the box.   The number 186 was written on the palm.

Later the witness asked the significance of 186.   The reply was that in "street language" 186 meant that the accused planned to instruct his "boys" to shoot up the witness and all his family in a "drive by."

And then there are the lawyers.   Much of the case backlog is caused by lawyers, either because they are not prepared, have too many cases going on at the same time and need postponements, or are just using delaying tactics in hopes that the case will fall off the court calendar for want of many things, not the least among them the absence of witnesses.   The court system not only needs an overhaul, but on the part of lawyers a return to discipline, efficiency and respect for the court's time.

As for some of the judges -- that's another story.   Sometimes we wonder if they live on the same planet and are aware of what they are doing to the community when they return, not once, but twice and in a few cases three times, murder accused to the community to await trial.   There have been occasions when these accused have killed each other and saved the court time, but there also have been occasions when an innocent bystander has been caught in the cross fire.

Last year Dame Joan Sawyer, Appeals Court judge, ruled that in bail decisions if a judge has to warn the bail applicant not to interfere with witnesses, then that applicant should not be granted bail.

We understand that one of that august body retorted that if that were the case then he would not give such warnings in the future for fear of the Attorney General's office applying to revoke the bail.

These are the problems that the Prime Minister and parliamentarians have to face, because legislation is obviously needed to deal with some of them.

January 04, 2010

tribune242

Trinidad and Tobago: Incest A very big problem

Incest has been described as “a very big problem” in Trinidad and Tobago, which needs to be seriously addressed.

“It is a huge problem. People do not want to face what is really going on. Most perpetrators are well known to the family. They can be a stepfather, uncle,” said Glennis Hyacenth, executive director of Advocates for Safe Parenthood: Improving Reproductive Equity (ASPIRE).

She said this was a difficult situation for families to face and they prefer to keep it quiet. They also ignore the pregnancy. In an interview with Newsday, Hyacenth said children from 11 to 14 years go to hospitals and have their babies and no reports are made to the police stations.

Statutory rape–sex with someone under the age of 16 is also a problem which ASPIRE said had to be addressed. Hyacenth said the fathers of the babies being born to young girls were men who were “quite older”.

She described the draft gender policy as “a total disappointment” with respect to sexual and reproductive health of women and youths. ASPIRE has spent years lobbying for reform of TT’s abortion laws but has not been able to get discussion on the government agenda.

Hyacenth said for the past two years, the focus has been on the development of policies and protocols for safe and legal terminations of pregnancy. abortions are legal under certain circumstances such as saving a life, preserving the mental and physical health of the woman.

“Many health care professionals and policy makers are not very clear on what the law is. We are pushing that message that abortion is legal therefore policy guidelines and policies are needed for that legal ambit of the law.”

ASPIRE has been lobbying through education and heightening awareness with different interest groups.

Hyacenth said many people prefer to not face the issue of abortion but her group deals with it and wanted to see unsafe abortions eradicated. Reducing the number of abortions taking place is a goal of ASPIRE. The group also wants comprehensive sexual education in schools.

“Many young people are engaging in things that they have no knowledge about. There are also many myths about terminating pregnancy like drinking a hot Guinness. It is important that the Government and Ministry of Education look seriously at that.”

Hyacenth said abortion was the end stage but something had to be done to prevent this.

ASPIRE held its annual general meeting a few weeks ago and featured speaker, Diana Mahabir- Wyatt, addressed the theme, “The Cycle of Sexual Violence Against Women Rape and Incest, Unwanted Pregnancies and Abortion”. Mahabir-Wyatt highlighted the female secondary school students who were prostituting themselves to support their households.


January 3 2010

newsday.co.tt