News stories by Peter Richards, page 7

Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders, including the new Haitian President Michel Martelly, will gather here Friday for their annual summit as impatience grows with an array of stalled regional integration initiatives.

Caribbean journalists meeting here last weekend celebrated the news that not a single colleague was killed during the first six months of this year.

What a difference a year makes. Less than a month after she led the five-party coalition to a convincing victory in the 2010 general election, Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar became the first head of government to address a Labour Day rally in Trinidad and Tobago.

The inaugural meeting of the Trade and Development Committee (TDC) of a sweeping trade pact between Caribbean nations and the European Union is being hailed as a success by regional diplomats.

In his first address to the board of governors of the Barbados-based Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), Dr. Warren Smith, the new president of the region's premier lending financial institution, warned of insecurities engulfing Caribbean economies.

By their own account, the police said they had been monitoring five men who attempted to rob a restaurant in the south of the island, and in the ensuing gun battle, four were shot and killed, while the fifth died a few days later in hospital.

When Caribbean journalists met in Antigua in late March to discuss the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) that was signed between the European Union and the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) countries in 2008, they were told that the absence of tax treaties, foreign exchange controls and language barriers were among the factors preventing the full implementation of the accord.

The first public hint that something was amiss within the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) bloc came last week from Belize's foreign minister, Wilfred Elrington, when his country hosted the 18th meeting of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) Council of Ministers, the second highest body within the 15-member regional grouping.

The newly elected chair of the Overseas Countries and Territories Association (OCTA), Montserrat's Chief Minister Reuben Meade, wants 'trade rather than aid' to form the basis of the future relationship between Europe and its colonies around the world.

Caribbean officials gathered in Brussels for the region's annual tourism summit, the first to be held in Europe, are urging their biggest development partner to draft policies supporting the lifeblood sector and ease restrictions such as Britain's Air Passenger Duty (APD), which they say are holding back its growth.