News week ending January 23, 2014
9
| www.caribbeantimesinternational.com
Jamaicans promised Trinidad beverage company denies involvement in multi-million dollar U.S. cocaine bust 10,000 jobs from Goat Islands port
A
Little Goat Island. (Jamaica Observer photo)
fter months of speculation played out in the media and the public domain, the Port Authority of Jamaica (PAJ) Tuesday confirmed that Goat Islands will indeed be the site of a Chinese seaport. The port, which will form a part of the much-touted logistics hub, will provide 10,000 permanent jobs, Professor Gordon Shirley told Jamaican media Tuesday. “It will be the Great Goat Island and Little Goat Island and some lands to the north of there,” said Shirley, chairman and CEO of the port management agency. The area to be developed will total 600 acres, he said. Shirley spoke briefly with the media, after making a presentation on the physical infrastructure of the planned hub on the opening day of the Jamaica Logistics Hub, Symposium at the Jamaica Conference Centre in downtown Kingston. Goat Islands are situated in the Portland Bight Protected Area, an expanse of 1,876 km from Hellshire in St Catherine to Rocky Point in Clarendon. The government declared it a protected area under The Natural Resources Conservation Authority Act, the Fishing Industry Act and the Wildlife Protection Act, in 1999.
Blow to conservation efforts
Portland Bight, which is the subject of two international conventions—The Ramsar Convention and the UN Convention on Biological Diversity—boasts a largely undisturbed dry limestone forest which scientists say is one of the few remaining in the region. It also features coral reefs, mangroves, and seagrass,
and is home to several endemic species, including the Jamaican iguana, which was brought back from the brink of extinction under a programme managed by the University of the West Indies, Hope Zoo in Kingston and a host of others in the U.S. Confirmation of the planned transshipment port will no doubt be a blow to that programme, which had hopes of repatriating the critically endangered reptile on Goat Islands. It is also expected to be a blow to the work of conservationists, who have argued since the project was first hinted at last August, that a large-scale port development will decimate the already fragile ecosystem of Portland Bight. The Goat Islands port is to be developed by China Harbour Engineering Company, the same investors who are behind the Palisadoes Shoreline Protection Project and the North/South link of Highway 2000, at a cost of Ja$1.5 billion. The PAJ, in a document on its website, said locations other than Goat Islands were considered for the port, “however, it was determined that the suitability of those locations was limited based on the scope of the project, as well as other strategic considerations such as proximity to the North/South Highway”. In addition to the new port facility, other infrastructure development will include an expansion of the Kingston Container Terminal (KCT) by 80 hectares, the deepening of the channel between Port Royal and the KCT as well as the basin of the Kingston Harbour to a depth of 15 metres in order to accommodate larger ships. (Excerpted from Jamaica Observer)
T
The 332 kilos of cocaine in paste form seized from a container at the Norfolk Port in Virginia after it was shipped from the port of Port-of-Spain. (TT Newsday photo)
rinidadian beverage manufacturer, SM Jaleel & Co Ltd, Monday sought to distance itself from a multi-million drug bust in the United States insisting that it has had an “unblemished reputation around the world for over 30 years”. The company has launched a series of media advertisements to clear its name, as newspaper reports indicate that investigators from the United States have arrived in Trinidad to investigate the US$640 million cocaine bust. “SM Jaleel & Co Ltd is Trinidad and Tobago’s number one exporter of non-petro chemical products, employing over 2000 people in Trinidad and the Caribbean. Given that SM Jaleel ships over 6000 containers per year, along with the unblemished reputation around the world for over 30 years, SM Jaleel is a natural target,” the advertisements read, insisting that the company “did not export the container of juices with cocaine to the USA”. Last Thursday, Federal officials announced that they had found 732 pounds of cocaine last December 20 concealed in cans of fruit juice at the Port of Norfolk in Virginia. Investigators estimate the cocaine had a wholesale value of about US$12 million and a street value of up to US$100 million. Customs and Border Protection Area Port Director Mark J. Laria called the seizure a record for a single interdiction in the port of Hampton Roads. "This was a cold hit. There was no specific intelligence," Laria said. The cocaine was found inside a shipping
container that originated from Trinidad and Tobago. It was destined for New York.
Whistleblower
Meanwhile, TT media has reported that a local whistle-blower has provided a detailed statement to local law enforcement and visiting Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officials. Based on the whistle-blower’s information, three people who have been described as
“businesspeople,” have been identified as primary suspects in the case. A local broker has also been highlighted as a key person of interest in the ongoing probe. Investigators are also trying to determine whether Caribbean Sea Works Ltd, the company which requested an empty container from local transport company Basics Transport Ltd in order to ship what turned out to be illegal cargo, is a legitimate en-
tity. The situation developed Tuesday as DEA officers continued liaising with local law enforcement and customs officers trying to piece together the final details of the case. TT’s National Security Minister Gary Griffith has since made it clear that there would be no cover-up over the cocaine seizure with links to Trinidad. (Excerpted from TT Newsday)