CARIBBEAN ROUNDUP
By Azad Ali
BARBADOS
The Argentina government recently
donated 30,000 doses of the AstraZeneca
COVID-19 vaccine in an effort to help
in the fight against the pandemic.
The shipment arrived at the Brantley
Adams International Airport and was
accepted by Health and Wellness Minister
Lieutenant Colonel Jeffrey Boston,
deputy Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr.
Anthony Best and director of the Drug
Service Maryam Hinds.
The donation was coordinated by the
Argentine White Helmets, a humanitarian
institution with an active presence
in the region.
Aside from the 30,000 doses recieved
by Barbados, donations of AstraZeneca
vaccines have also
been sent to St. Vincent
and the Grenadines,
Grenada and
Dominica.
According to Best,
the Ministry of Health and Wellness was
grateful for the vaccines, which he said
would boost the efforts of the National
Vaccination Program for Covid-19.
“We really relied on the goodwill of
countries to assist small island developing
states, like Barbados,” he said.
CARIBBEAN
The Caribbean Community (Caricom)
Secretariat was recently among
the countries and international organizations
invited by the United States
administration to the International
Partners Meeting on Haiti help by video
conference.
The meeting sought to gain a sense
of what support could be provided by
the international community to help
Haiti, which at present is mired in a
multifaceted crisis.
The Secretariat, Assistant Secretary
General Ambassador Colin Granderson,
informed of the areas where Caricom
heads of government had previously
expressed to the Haitian government
their willingness to provide assistance.
These include good offices to bring
the contending parties together to help
end the political impasse, and capacitybuilding,
in particular for the electoral
process, justice and law enforcement
and public administration.
The importance of a long-term socioeconomic
development plan was also
underlined.
During the meeting, representatives
from the United States announced
plans to provide Haiti with weapons
and armed vehicles in an effort to counter
the numerous challenges facing
the French-speaking Caricom member
state.
Haiti was represented at this meeting
by Haitian Chancellor Jean Victor
Caribbean L 4 ife, January 7-13, 2022
Shaggy. REUTERS/Mike Blake
Geneus and the Ambassador of Haiti in
Washington, Edmond Bocchit.
GUYANA
The United Nations Refugee Agency
(UNHCR) has expressed concern about
the plight of indigenous Venezuelans in
neighboring Guyana.
UNHCR’s Multi-Country Office Representative
in Panama, Philippe Candler
says more humanitarian presence
and support from the international
community is needed for the indigenous
Venezuelan refugees in Guyana.
She noted that an estimated 24,500
refugees and migrants from Venezuela
are living in Guyana, including some
2,500 indigenous Warao. Some have
settled in hard-to-reach areas near the
Venezuelan border
and others around the
towns of Mabaruma
and Port Kaituma.
Since early 2020, an
estimated 250 Warao
also found refugee in Anabisi in Northern
Guyana.
According to UNHCR, these communities
have limited access to services
and the delivery of aid is impeded by
remoteness, lack of transport infrastructure
and distances.
It said assessment conducted in
October and November show mounting
needs, aggravated by the economic
downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
UNHCR said most Warao people have
only one meal a day or less and most
families do not have access to drinking
water, relying instead on rivers for
drinking water, bathing and defecation,
it said.
GRENADA
Grenada police said preliminary
investigations into the discovery of
seven bodies in a boat found drifting
within the island’s maritime border
last month may have been victims of
human trafficking or smuggling.
Police Commissioner Ervin Martin
said the police recovered or discovered
seven corpses on that particular vessel,
all of whom are male persons and two of
whom are believed to be teenagers.
He said the vessel
and the remains have
been secured and are
currently the subject
of an investigation.
Martin told a media that the incident
may have been associated with a
human trafficking or smuggling incident
that went horribly wrong.
The Commissioner said the situation
requires international collaboration
and “we will be seeking the assistance
of Interpol and other law enforcement
agencies to support our investigation
into this matter”.
The boat discovered in Grenadian
water brings to seven the number of
small fishing vessels found drifting
with dead bodies in the Caribbean.
HAITI
Police are searching
for gunmen who shot
and killed seven passengers
and injured
several others on two buses last week.
The authorities said that the gunmen,
who his themselves in houses,
fired upon the public transport minibus
on a road near Martisant, a communal
section of the city of Port-au-
Prince.
In the first instance, four passengers
were shot and killed and four others
injured, while in the second attack, a
minibus carrying 18 passengers were
shot, at killing three people including a
woman, and four others injured.
The drivers said they were forced to
seek refuge at the police station in Martisant
with the surviving passengers.
JAMAICA
Jamaica has officially launched its
digital coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination
card, saying the internationally
accepted document, was developed in
accordance with World Health Organization
(WHO) standards.
Health and Wellness Minister Dr.
Christopher Tifton said it’s an important
step in efforts to digitize the
national COVID-19 vaccination program.
The digital card, which will be made
available in the Ministry’s website, features
a quick response (QR) code to
enable the validation of the information
on the card and of the person’s
vaccination status.
Dr. Tufton said the initiative forms
part of ongoing efforts to enhance the
vaccination program.
He said in light of new and emerging
trends around vaccination
screening, the
development of the
digital card is timely
as it enables people to
provide proof of vaccination, which is
increasingly becoming a requirement
in accessing and conducting transactions.
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