Category Archives: International

General T&T, India, PNM, Politics, Race and Identity, Racism Watch, UNC, USA

The Lie…

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By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
May 11, 2020

PART 1

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeI was stunned but not surprised by Roodal Moonilal’s letter to Joseph Mondello, US Ambassador to T&T, asking the US government to act against the best interest of our homeland. His lame excuse, a mea culpa perhaps, was: “If the United States imposes no sanctions against Trinidad and Tobago it will be because of the action of the United National Congress” (Express, May 5). As Mondello asserted, the US does not need Moonilal to tell it where its interests lies.
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General T&T, Health, International, PNM, Politics, Racism Watch, USA

COVID-19 & African-Americans

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By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
May 07, 2020

Dr. Kwame NantambuIndeed, one of the most tragic and realistic fall-outs of the novel, contagious COVID-19 pandemic in the United States is its most violent and deleterious impact/attack on African-Americans. Population statistics reveal that African-Americans comprise 13.4% of the national population but yet account for the following: in May 2020, Wisconsin African-Americans are only a miniscule 6.7% of the population but have accounted for a whopping 32% of COVID-19 deaths; in Michigan, African-Americans account for 14% of the population but 40% of the state’s COVID-19 deaths; in Missouri, African-Americans comprise 12% of its population but 40% of its COVID-19 deaths; while the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) points out that nation-wide, African-Americans are 33% of all hospitalized cases.
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China, General T&T, International, Law, USA

Don’t Blame China For Your Government’s COVID-19 Failures

The anti-China narrative is based on falsities, and serves to distract people from the failure of neoliberalism.

By Davide Mastracci
April 07, 2020 – readpassage.com

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeIn early January, COVID-19 was largely limited to China. Now, just three months later, it has spread far beyond China’s border, and has effectively been halted domestically within the country.

There are currently around 1.36 million reported COVID-19 cases globally, with more than 76,000 deaths. China accounts for just 6 per cent of all cases, and 4.4 per cent of deaths. Yesterday, China reported no new deaths for the first time since January.
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General T&T, International, PNM, Politics, UNC, USA, Venezuela

Kamla Courts Sanctions, Rowley Responds

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T&T FACES US SANCTIONS – ROWLEY’S DANGEROUS ALLIANCE WITH VENEZUELA CAN NOW DESTROY OUR ECONOMY

By Kamla Persad-Bissessar

Kamla Persad-Bissessar and Keith RowleyGood morning everyone.

It is with serious alarm that I note a report in today’s Trinidad Guardian about the United States probing our country over a Trinidad &Tobago fuel shipment linked to Venezuela. If true, our country’s very economic survival is at stake. This since, as our longstanding and greatest global ally, any such rift could gravely damage our very beneficial trade, national security and foreign relations with the United States.
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Agriculture, Finance, Food, General T&T, Health, International, PNM, Politics, Recession

Hooked on foreign foods

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By Raffique Shah
April 14, 2020

Raffique ShahLarge mobs of presumably hungry consumers virtually laid siege to fast-foods restaurants across the country last Monday evening after Prime Minister Keith Rowley announced that all restaurants and retail food services will be closed for business until the end of this month. Embedded in that eruption was a conundrum this country faces as it battles the COVID-19 virus.
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General T&T, Health, International, PNM, Politics

Black Betrayal (In the Age of the Coronavirus)

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By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
April 13, 2020

“They say the sun will shine for all/But in some people’s world, it doesn’t shine at all./ So much been said, so little been done./ They still killing the people/ And they having their fun”

—Bob Marley, “Crisis”

PART 3

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeI have been writing about the plight of black people in Trinidad and Tobago for a while. Like Marvin Gaye, sometimes it “make me wanna holler/The way they do my life” (“Inner City Blues”). I have argued that we will never solve black impoverishment unless we see it as a national problem that demands the same resolve that we brought to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
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General T&T, Health, International

Neither surgical nor cotton masks effectively filter SARS COV-2: Study

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April 6, 2020 – outbreaknewstoday.com

MaskBoth surgical and cotton masks were found to be ineffective for preventing the dissemination of SARS-CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19. A study conducted at two hospitals in Seoul, South Korea, found that when COVID-19 patients coughed into either type of mask, droplets of virus were released to the environment and external mask surface. A brief research report is published in Annals of Internal Medicine.
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Finance, Food, General T&T, International, Oil and Gas, Politics, Recession

After crisis food rationing?

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By Raffique Shah
April 06, 2020

Raffique ShahWhen we will have overcome the COVID-19 multi-pronged attack on Trinidad and Tobago, we will face associated problems ranging from the economy under severe stress such as it has never been before, with unemployment at a crisis level, disruption of the education system leaving all stakeholders confused, and possible shortage of foods. Just when the population thought it was safe to exhale, having survived the deadliest pandemic in modern history, the bugle will sound summoning couch-and television-weary troops to do battle again, and likely yet again, for love of country.
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Barbados, General T&T, Health, International, Politics

Inhumane Treatment of Our Elderly In Barbados

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By Stephen Kangal
March 30, 2020

Stephen KangalThe PNM Government in categorically refusing to arrange entry/arrival home of 35 of our elderly nationals and having forced Barbados to quarantine them somewhere at their own expense when they arrived at Grantley Adams Airport from South Africa via the UK is in flagrant violation of customary law on the treatment of nationals, consular duty and indeed plain humanitarianism.
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