I would like to wel­come Pres­i­dent Nicholas Maduro to T&T. In so do­ing, some­one needs to tell PNM Deputy Po­lit­i­cal leader that his vis­it to this coun­try should not be sul­lied by any men­tion of five de­tained T&T na­tion­als on charges of ter­ror­ism.

In­stead, the sub­stance of the Arms Treaty should be the fo­cus. Of all the things, any ref­er­ence to such a mat­ter which is the sub­ject of court pro­ceed­ings and a mat­ter of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty of a sov­er­eign na­tion, would on­ly be a huge dis­grace. This I imag­ine is what is de­sired by the ad­vo­cate at­tor­ney at law. Had her par­ty been in of­fice and the mat­ter of a spe­cial en­voy been raised, then we would have re­ceived a les­son in diplo­mat­ic re­la­tions and she would have (mis)treat­ed us to a lec­ture on what items could be con­sid­ered for bi-lat­er­al talks.

In­stead, she should be hap­py for Trinidad and To­ba­go's in­volve­ment, side by side with the US, in a re­cent sum­mit to fight ter­ror­ism (read ISIS) which is a feath­er in our cap.

Lystra Mara­jh

The Park, Glen­coe