Richard Lord

The T&T For­eign Af­fairs Min­istry says Gam­bian Pres­i­dent, Dr Yahya Ajj Jam­meh, will not at­tend next week's Com­mon­wealth Heads of Gov­ern­ment Meet­ing (CHOGM) in Port-of-Spain. A re­lease from com­mu­ni­ca­tions spe­cial­ist Lisa Daniel-Charles said the Gam­bia High Com­mis­sion in Lon­don con­firmed the pres­i­dent's non-at­ten­dance.

It said Gam­bia's For­eign Af­fairs, In­ter­na­tion­al Co-op­er­a­tion and Gam­bians Abroad will lead that coun­try's del­e­ga­tion at the CHOGM. And Leader of the Op­po­si­tion Bas­deo Pan­day said the de­ci­sion by the Gam­bian Pres­i­dent not to at­tend next week's CHOGM was a good move. Asked to com­ment on the an­nounce­ment that the Pres­i­dent would not at­tend the meet­ing, Pan­day said it was a wel­come com­pro­mise.

In a let­ter to Prime Min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning, dat­ed No­vem­ber 13, di­rec­tor of the Com­mon­wealth Hu­man Rights Ini­tia­tive, Ma­ja Daruwala, asked that the pres­i­dent be asked to re­pu­di­ate his al­leged an­ti-hu­man rights state­ment and fail­ing this, his in­vi­ta­tion to at­tend the CHOGM should be with­drawn. (RL)