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VOLUME:116 No.204, OCTOBER 17TH, 2019

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OIL SPILL NOW FIVE MILLION GALLONS

SEE PAGE SEVEN

Resort unveils $300m expansion with water park

By RASHAD ROLLE Tribune Staff Reporter rrolle@tribunemedia.net BAHA MAR is set to launch a $300m phase of development that will provide jobs for up to 500 people and involve a major water park and entertainment amenity known as Baha Mar Bay. A Heads of Agreement between resort representatives and the government was signed at Cabinet Office yesterday. The move will bring Baha Mar’s total investment up to $4.8bn.

The investment will include significant renovations and enhancements to the Melia Nassau Beach Resort, the arrival of new luxury, beachfront adventure experiences for guests and developments to Long

Cay, all of which is expected to be completed within the next 12 to 24 months, officials said.

Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis said Baha Mar Bay will be built on the site of the former Wyndham Hotel on approximately 15.3 acres of land between the SLS and Melia hotels.

“It will include a family friendly recreational area with water attractions for guests of all ages,” he said.

“There will be a ‘public entry area where the general public can enter Baha Mar Bay to enjoy the attractions and activities.

Phase two will also include the widening and lengthening of the existing pier in front of the Baha Mar resort.”

SEE PAGE THREE

KING IN CHARGE AS COMMODORE TAKES THREE MONTHS OF LEAVE

By RASHAD ROLLE Tribune Staff Reporter rrolle@tribunemedia.net RAYMOND King, pictured, the newly appointed deputy commander of the Royal Bahamas Defence Force, will act as the commander of the organisation as Commodore Tellis Bethel goes on three months vacation leave today.

According to memorandums seen by The Tribune, Commodore Bethel will be on leave until January 15, 2020.

Meanwhile, Captain Samuel Evans, the deputy commander of the force, has retired effective October 4, according to a memorandum.

Commander King was appointed deputy commander on October 7. He joined the RBDF as a recruit in January 1987. Over his career he has served as midshipman, acting sublieutenant, sub lieutenant, senior SEE PAGE THREE

AN ARTIST’s impression showing the resort pools in the proposed new Baha Mar development, Baha Mar Bay.

NOW MCALPINE ATTACKS GOVT ‘SHOULD BE ASHAMED’ EVACUATION LAW - AND PM OVER DEPORTATION CRITICISM

By KHRISNA RUSSELL Deputy Chief Reporter krussell@tribunemedia.net

PINERIDGE MP Frederick McAlpine said yesterday it makes no logical sense to legislate mandatory evacuations without first having safe places on every island to send evacuees.

Calling the move “putting the cart before the horse”, the backbench MP

said the amendment bill was reactionary and gave the impression that there would be no law change had Hurricane Dorian not devastated Abaco and Grand Bahama.

The proposed bill was not the only point of contention for Mr McAlpine who further criticised the government’s death toll reporting.

SEE PAGE FIVE

By RASHAD ROLLE Tribune Staff Reporter rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Minnis administration should be ashamed for being “dressed down” by the United Nations Human Rights Council over its policy on migrants affected by Hurricane Dorian, Rights Bahamas said yesterday.

The group also praised Pineridge MP Frederick

McAlpine for his liberal views on same sex unions and abortion, calling him courageous and sensible.

The Human Rights Council has urged the Bahamas to end deportations to Haiti for now, emphasising the vulnerable status migrants affected by Dorian currently occupy. The group called on the government not to deport people SEE PAGE FIVE

STAYING TO REBUILD AMID THE RUBBLE

GAS STATION FIRE DESTROYS BUILDINGS

By DENISE MAYCOCK Tribune Freeport Reporter dmaycock@tribunemedia.net

AT LEAST two buildings were destroyed in a blaze last night after a gas station erupted into flames in Harbour Island.

At the time of going to press, firefighters were still tackling the blaze. Fire Chief Walter Evans said he did not know if the destroyed buildings were homes.

A large quantity of fuel from a fuel truck was involved. Investigators will fly out to the scene today.

QUEEN’S Cove has flooded many times, but residents say the flooding they saw in their homes from Hurricane Dorian surpassed all other previous storms on Grand Bahama.

It is one of the most vulnerable water-front communities because it is SEE PAGE EIGHT

AN EXPLOSION caught on video as a gas station burst into flames in Harbour Island last night, destroying two buildings.

Nassau & Bahama Islands’ Leading Newspaper

PAGE 2, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

US embassy to host college fair

To advertise in The Tribune, contact 502-2394

THE US Embassy in Nassau will host the fifth annual EducationUSA College Fair at the Melia Nassau Beach Resort on October 26-27.

US Chargé d’Affaires Stephanie Bowers has urged Bahamian students to attend. Interested students can sign up for the fair at https://edusafairbah2019. eventbrite.com.

“In 2018 alone, over a quarter of a million new international students started studies in the United States,” Ms Bowers said.

“There are as many reasons for choosing an American university as there are students, but having spoken to quite a few Bahamians who have picked an American institution of higher learning, I have noticed a few trends.

“With over 4,700 accredited institutions in all 50 US states, there is an American college or university that is right for everyone. Whether you are looking for a highly specialised programme in a

specific field, a flexible curriculum that will let you choose your own path, or something in between, you are bound to find a programme that suits your needs.

“There are also a variety of options for different financial situations. Many American institutions offer a uniquely affordable option: the increasingly popular ‘two plus two’ model. ‘Two plus two’ means combining two years of study at a more affordable community college, with a final two years at a four year institution.

In the end, you will earn the same bachelor’s degree as someone who completed all four years at the four-year institution, at a significantly reduced cost,” she said.

Information about the US student visa process can be found at https:// bs.usembassy.gov/, and by following the embassy on Facebook @ USEmbassyNassau.

STUDENTS LEARN ABOUT TRAFFICKING AS part of the entity’s ongoing community outreach programmes, secretary of the Trafficking In Persons Secretariat, Corrections Corporal Keva Sherman (pictured) spoke to T G Glover Primary School sixth grade students on the topic of trafficking in children on Tuesday.

She was joined by training welfare officer at the Department of Social Services, attached to the Ministry of National Security, Leslie Taylor (pictured at whiteboard) and First Assistant Secretary of Ministry of National Security and Co-Chair of the Ministry of National Security’s Trafficking in Persons Inter-Ministry Committee Susanne Knowles.

School Principal Sheniqua Curry (pictured in printed skirt) also introduced the speakers.

The age-appropriate presentation dealt with topics such as being aware of their surroundings, signs that other children could be in danger, being wary of strangers pretending to know their parents, and the importance of having trustworthy adults that they could talk to about various situations.

Photos: Eric Rose/BIS

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 3

AN AERIAL view of the wave pool area at the proposed Baha Mar Bay.

Resort unveils $300m expansion with water park from page one “The existing pier that extends off the beach at the Baha Mar resort is being expanded to better allow for boats to more safely dock at the Baha Mar resort for day excursions and to provide enhanced amenities for guests.

“The new Pier restaurant will provide a greater variety of beachfront and pool dining options for the guests at the resort and Baha Mar Bay, and will complement the existing food and beverage offerings at the resort.

“An upgrade and refurbishment programme

will be launched for the Melia hotel which will include the upgrade to the mechanical, electrical and plumbing infrastructure of the hotel and upgrades to specifically identified guest rooms.”

Dr Minnis said there will be upgrades to the kitchen, convention and meeting spaces, gym, restaurants and public areas.

Children’s programming to educate and entertain children between three and 12 with “activities ranging from Bahamian history, conservation activities, cooking demonstrations, arts and crafts, theatre,

virtual reality gaming and storytelling” will be featured at two activity centres to be constructed, he said.

Long Cay, a private island owned by the project company, will be developed to include enhancements to the “beach areas, design and construction of an extended pier for the safe landing of guests, design and construction of new food and beverage facilities, design and construction of a beach club and construction of facilities necessary to offer recreational and water sports activities,” Dr Minnis said.

Baha Mar currently employs 5,000 people.

ROYAL Bahamas Defenxe Force Commodore Tellis Bethel. Photo: Terrel W Carey Sr/Tribune Staff

KING IN CHARGE AS COMMODORE TAKES THREE MONTHS OF LEAVE from page one

lieutenant, lieutenant commander and commanding officer of HMBS Nassau.

He has also served as administration and human resources officer at the RBDF Coral Harbour Base.

It is not clear if Commodore Bethel will return to lead the RBDF when his vacation leave ends in January.

After several senior police officers were directed to take leave earlier this year, sources told The Tribune that Commodore Bethel and Police Commissioner Anthony Ferguson would

be slated for pre-retirement leave in the near future.

Eight senior police officers were directed to take leave earlier this year. For some of them, their vacation time is insufficient to

lead them into retirement.

National Security Minister Marvin Dames has said those with remaining years to serve will be transferred out of the force when their leave ends.

Resort President Graeme Davis said the new phase will result in 500 direct and 1,000 indirect jobs.

He said officials have hired a local firm to do work, with 80 percent or more of people already engaged being locals.

It’s not clear whether the supplemental Heads of Agreement stipulates specific requirements regarding locals in the workforce.

“As we phase the opening, jobs are starting today,” he said, noting officials are starting to hire lifeguards and food servers, which is expected to continue.

PAGE 4, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

The Tribune Limited NULLIUS ADDICTUS JURARE IN VERBA MAGISTRI “Being Bound to Swear to The Dogmas of No Master”

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Govt must remember Rubis spill lesson THE scale of the oil leak in Grand Bahama just keeps getting worse.

First, there was a very swift comment from the National Emergency Management Agency that there was no public health concern from the oil spill – at a time when there was very little clarity on how much oil had spilled.

Then there was Environment Minister Romauld Ferreria’s much mocked pronouncement that only a goat and three birds had been victims of the spill.

Then finally we hear that first a million gallons – and now at least five million gallons spilled in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian.

To date, more than 35,000 barrels of oil have been recovered – well, where was all of that when people were busily declaring everything to be safe?

The total spilled – according to Mr Ferreira – was 119,000 barrels, which means an awful lot has gone unrecovered.

Thank goodness for environment activists, who have been busily assessing the environment in a manner that the minister’s own department ought to have been doing.

They are reporting contaminated water in wetland habitats as far as a mile away from the spill, with petroleum components showing up in samples.

Workers have been described as being “knee-deep” in oil as they proceed with the clean-up. This seems a long way from the hasty reassurance provided initially by NEMA and Mr Ferreira.

We’d like to know who did those initial assessments – was it ministry representatives or was Mr Ferreira just taking the company’s word for it?

We would also suggest that Mr Ferreira remember a major environmental issue that proved a problem for the PLP before being tossed from office – a

problem that was bigger still for the residents in the Marathon area.

The fuel spill from the Rubis gas station was one thing, the seeming determination of the government to ignore the complaints of local residents was another. People had genuine concerns as to whether the water they were drinking, bathing in and washing with was safe –and they didn’t feel the government was being straight with them when it came to answers.

We would urge Mr Ferreira to heed that lesson – and be more thorough in investigating the effects of this spill, and clear about its effects, on people and wildlife.

This is not something to be casual about – voters will remember if they haven’t been told what they need to know.

Chipman’s political judgement

Well done, Baha Mar

The next phase of Baha Mar’s development is to be much welcomed. Up to 500 jobs and a new addition to the New Providence entertainment market.

There will be a water park that will be open to the public to rival the Aquaventure park over at Atlantis, and a lot more besides.

It comes at a welcome time in the wake of Hurricane Dorian, and it’s a sign of the success and confidence in the future of Baha Mar itself that such an expansion is being pushed.

In yesterday’s Tribune, we reported that tourism was likely to be down nearly ten percent this year because of Hurricane Dorian. With projects such as Baha Mar Bay, we are hopeful that amount will soon be recovered and more besides.

Long may such success continue.

EDITOR, The Tribune.

The great equaliser EDITOR, The Tribune.

WE were all fortunate to have had a lesson that we should have learned from. But judging from how we have been talking and treating each other, we still believe that we are in control and the we are better than others. We hate people from our own region, our forefathers, and most interestingly, our family.

Second generation Bahamians and beyond are intertwined with countries from the Caribbean. Haiti, Jamaica, Trinidad, Cuba, Turks and Caicos, to mention a few. There are also ties through marriage to other far flung island countries, like St. Lucia, St. Martin, Bermuda, St. Kitts, Nevis, etc.

But the disdain for our fellowmen is disheartening. We don’t see the ill-will toward people from European countries, Canada and the United States. Of course we have allowed the Greeks and Chinese to take up residence with little or no resistance.

But we have trained all of our venom on the Haitians and Jamaicans for the most part.

Hurricane Dorian came and showed us that we are are all equal, and should treat each other as such.

Bahamians are weird, we use people for our

convenience and then we discard them. The Christian community is no better, they watch and say absolutely nothing, especially the majority who are now kissing up to the government in hopes of getting Crown Land.

Dorian was adamant that we were all equal, so it set out to stress the point, emphatically. In the aftermath of the hurricane we saw mahogany doors mixed with the plywood doors.

Fancy furniture was mixed with the press-wood furniture. Crystal glasses was mixed with the plastic cups. Mercedes Benz mixed with jalopy. Sinners was all mixed with the saints.

Miss “Goody two shoes” was mixed with Miss “Foot loose and fancy free”. Signature, name brand clothes was mixed with the department store clothes.

Educated fools were mixed with dropouts.

Honour students were mixed with the D Average students. The powerful were mixed with the powerless. Foreigners were mixed with Bahamians.

PLP were mixed with the FNM. All professions were mixed up too. People with position mixed with ordinary people. Blacks were all mixed up with whites.

Bleached skin was mixed

with naturally beautiful.

Picky hair was mixed with weave.

Prejudice fools were mixed with sensible people.

Material from the mansions was mixed with the scrap wood in the Mudd, Pigeon Pea and The Farm.

Meat eaters were mixed with vegetarians. Rigor mortis set in the rich and the poor. Catholics, Baptist, Church of God, Jehovah Witness, Seventh-Day Adventist were ALL mixed with the Atheists. Nobody was left out, nobody could escape.

Dorian mixed up everything in Abaco and Grand Bahama into one BIG pile of rubbish. Did we learn that all people are created equal, and no matter what your position or disposition or your station in life, nothing changes?

If we did, why, only weeks after Dorian, are we still treating people like we are better.

Why are we keeping silent with man’s inhumanity to man?

I am laser focused, I will not let anyone deter me from being honest with what my spirit is telling me.

I thank God for inner vision.

IVOINE INGRAHAM Nassau October 13, 2019.

W

Before he packed up his Georgie-bundle, threw a hissy fit and stormed out of the FNM, Centreville MP Reece Chipman should have bothered to learn a thing or two about partisanship.

This is his new buzz word which only underscores his bewildering lack of knowledge of the profession – politics – that he willingly joined.

It was all a big yawn to read that he had left the party – mentally he left the FNM the very day his ego was bruised when the Prime Minister fired him from a quango that looks after monuments and antiquities.

Chipman squeaked to victory in what is obviously a PLP-leaning seat for which Perry Christie, the loser, has only himself to blame.

Perhaps a bit miffed that his efforts at slaying the dragon didn’t earn him at least a junior minister post, Chipman did the exact opposite of his kin, the studious Hubert Chipman, who also occupied the FNM’s backbench in the last parliament.

Impetuous to the end and impervious to ridicule, the rookie Chipman rubbed against the grain of his party and his leader, practically challenging the authority of the Prime Minister.

He voted against the budget, but then complained that he couldn’t hustle a meeting with the PM. The fact that the PM will broker time in his busy schedule for just about any Bahamian, should have tipped off Chipman that his snub was intentional.

He stormed out of the Public Accounts Committee, the only body in Parliament controlled by the opposition party, when in fact he could have used that membership to

LETTERS letters@tribunemedia.net increase his standing in his own party.

Even Hubert Ingraham, a future PM, once sat on the PAC. Then to show how discombobulated his political thinking is, Chipman said he confided with his Creator, his family and his friends, before finally canvassing the electors in his constituency.

Obviously, he has put his ego-cart before the political horse that transported him to Parliament. Since he serves the people of Centreville, logic would dictate that they and his conscience should have informed his decision. No divine intervention needed.

Chipman does need to understand the dripping hypocrisy of his being fed up with partisan politics when the very essence of our political system is based on adversarial parties – one or more running the government and the other(s) opposing, waiting their turn to run the government.

Before we had political parties, parliament and the executive council which advised the Governor consisted of wealthy men who allied together mostly to advance their own selfish interests.

The greatest reform to our system has been the introduction of political parties. Chipman says that 60 years later this system is no longer fit for purpose.

But he doesn’t propose a fix, a solution or an alternative.

Naively he thinks he can better serve the people of Centreville as an independent member of the House.

We have had independents before but mostly they were men who were chucked out of the party, were profiling to get picked up by another party, were trying to form

their own party, were about to leave politics altogether or, most often, were hoping to get back into their original party once somehow they managed to topple the leader with whom they disagreed.

Chipman is not a profile in courage. He is a lost soul who never understood the constraints of belonging to a disciplined political party and who perhaps was only given the nomination for Centreville to become a sacrificial lamb.

Then he squeaked past Christie but, in his mind, he did the FNM a favour and an ungrateful Dr. Minnis didn’t pay him his earned adulation. He should be reminded of something the late Sir Lynden Pindling said to another puffed-up politician: “It’s the party’s personality that did it, not yours.”

Mr. Chipman will only gain respect if he can run and win in Centreville as an independent, instead of merely sitting in Parliament as one. Christie did it before him but he was not opposed by the FNM, so it is not impossible but highly improbable for Chipman.

For now, his will continue to be a protest vote, but without the sting for the FNM, a privilege that Vaughn Miller and Fred McAlpine still enjoy.

Chipman will cut a lonely figure in parliament. No influence, no standing, no preference and severely restricted by the rules of Parliament which tend to favour political parties.

His voice is totally dependent on the Speaker who must first balance the influence of the parties in Parliament.

Let’s sit back and watch Chipman try to look after the best interest of Centreville having just made them irrelevant in the national political discourse.

THE GRADUATE Nassau, October 16, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 5

‘Why trust govt that has neglected Ragged Island?’

By KHRISNA RUSSELL Deputy Chief Reporter krussell@tribunemedia.net THE “blatant reckless neglect” of Ragged Island residents more than two years after Hurricane Irma devastated the small island has led to mistrust of the Minnis administration, area MP Chester Cooper has said.

This situation, Mr Cooper said yesterday, has left him worried and with a heavy heart over the fate of Abaco and Grand Bahama residents in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian.

Irma ravaged Ragged Island in September 2017 and since then the island has struggled to return to normal. Government essential services, a school, clinic or police station among other things remain absent there.

Given the continuous grim outlook on Ragged Island, its MP yesterday urged the government to extend to his constituency the same tax concessions that have been given to both Grand Bahama and Abaco, allowing residents to further rebuild.

At the same time, he urged the government to table a comprehensive report of the donations given for Ragged Island, noting “people are asking where the hurricane money gone.”

“My heart is heavy because two years ago, September 2017 - 775 days ago roughly - the island of Ragged Island was devastated by Hurricane Irma,” Mr Cooper said during his contribution to debate on the Disaster Preparedness and

DESTRUCTION on Ragged Island after Hurricane Irma.

Response Amendment Bill the scenes I am concerned 2019 at Parliament yesterday. based on the track record “I stick a pin here because of this government that the given the lack of progress people of Grand Bahama in Ragged Island two years and Abaco could also face later, given the depth of this blatant reckless neglect neglect and the disregard as we saw with the people shown to the people of of Ragged Island.

“I can report to you with Ragged Island, it is fair to say I am deeply concerned certainty that the people deeply concerned for the of Ragged Island have lost people of Abaco and Grand faith in this government.

They believe nothing that Bahama.

“You see I have lived you tell them. They believe this movie before. I have nothing that they hear from watched this episode in you and they only believe dismay and I am concerned what they see and they that when the cameras leave don’t see very much.”

He continued: “In Ragged Island there is still no nurse, no clinic, no school, no teachers, no policy, no police station, no postal services, no post offices no government services, no administration building, (and) no solarisation.

“Seven hundred seventyfive days later families remain separated. Children miss their fathers. Wives take the slow moving mail boat to periodically visit Ragged Island while husbands go out to fish to

continue to make ends meet, but I want to tell this government that unlike the song says it’s not too late to apologise and I urge you to do so. It’s not too late to apologise to those you abandoned and appeared to have forgotten. But if you do apologise please do us a favour when you do. Don’t go swinging your hands.

“We invite you to take a full report and accounting off all of the donations collected on behalf of the people of Ragged Island because they would like to

have a full accounting and full report on donations received on their behalf or we invite you to bring that report here so that the country could hear.

“People are asking where the hurricane money gone.

So it’s important that we get this report and it’s good for credibility of our country because people want to know.

“Then I invite this government to extend the concessions to Ragged Island that you’ve now extended to Freeport. They are Bahamians too.”

Mr Cooper said constituents would not absolve the government of its obligation and responsibility to act fairly and compassionately toward all Bahamians across the country.

Following Hurricane Irma’s destruction of the small island, Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis said health and safety conditions there would only continue to to deteriorate.

He then deemed it unlivable as he urged the 18 remaining residents on the island at the time to evacuate in the aftermath.

Months later, the government rolled out a comprehensive plan for Ragged Island.

Dr Minnis said it would be converted into a green city to be a benchmark for other island nations to follow.

However, two years later, little has transpired on Ragged Island and residents have said they are neglected and disappointed with the progress of restoration especially as there is great focus on Abaco and Grand Bahama following Dorian.

NOW MCALPINE ATTACKS EVACUATION LAW - AND PM from page one

For nearly two weeks, this number has stood at 61.

However, the MP said this “miniscule” number has caused the world to view the country as “unintelligent” and “disingenuous” given speculation the figure is much higher.

Mr McAlpine also said some Bahamians were extremely upset that Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis seemed to show more compassion for Dominica than for those storm torn islands of The Bahamas.

“We should have been called back from vacation as an assembly prior to the entrance of Hurricane

Dorian and then perhaps presented with this bill,” he told the House yesterday during continued debate on the Disaster Preparedness and Response Amendment Bill. “Pineridge would have considered it even timelier.

“We are reacting to an action, as supposed to systematically and intellectually coming up with something conducive and uncontroversial for generations to come. Pineridge recognises the need for mandatory evacuations, especially after the death of so many individuals.

There ought to be legal and ethical foundations for this to be carried out. I presume that’s why we are here.

“Nonetheless, we have to understand the psyche of our people and the circumstances that sometimes lead to our people not wanting to evacuate.”

He continued: “There were hurricane shelters on the island where people had to abandon the shelter in the middle of the storm to run for their lives.

If I have to make a choice between dying at home or in a shelter, which one do you think I’ll choose? Many of the places being used as hurricane shelters are not structurally sound nor are they elevated to be free from flooding.

“Pineridge speaks about priority as a government. Whereas it is

important to eventually have a mandatory evacuation bill, Pineridge thinks it’s initially far more important for the government to build structurally sound hurricane proof centres throughout The Bahamas.

Then we can discuss mandatory evacuation. Mama would say, you are putting the cart before the horse.

“It makes no logical sense to me demanding mandatory evacuation without having a safe place to put the evacuees. Whereas Pineridge comprehends what the government proposes by way of mandatory evacuation, this bill seems a bit vague. It needs more specificity to speak to that of hurricanes, fires, flooding,

medical outbreaks or natural climatic disasters.

“When we make bills in here we have to consider future generations. If this bill talks about mandatory evacuation without naming the causes, an incoming prime minister can be a psychopath and may decide to declare a political or economic disaster.

“On that note, let me hasten to say that the bill gives too much power to a prime minister. Such decisions should be made in consultation with the Cabinet of The Bahamas or even voted upon in the House of Assembly.”

Regarding the official Dorian death toll, Mr McAlpine said the

government seemed out of its depth.

“This talk about less than 100 deaths by Hurricane Dorian does not sound good in the local and global sphere.

“To give this minuscule number to the world, knowing that we expect it to be far greater, causes the international world to look at us as ignorant, unintelligent, disingenuous, or simply said, a government that is out of its depth.

“The Bahamian Diaspora outside of this country have been embarrassed by this and more as it relates to Hurricane Dorian. Mama said what you give to the world you can’t take back,” he concluded.

contacts, including the United Nations, the OAS, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and Amnesty International to bring awareness to the enormous excesses of the Immigration Department and the increasingly draconian pronouncements from the executive. Perhaps now they will start to listen.”

As for Mr McAlpine, the MP expressed support for civil unions for samesex couples in an interview with The Tribune on Tuesday. Rights Bahamas went further than him yesterday, saying it encourages the removal of all barriers to same sex marriage in the country.

Mr McAlpine had told The Tribune on Tuesday that he believes eligible people should be entitled to same-sex civil unions and abortion, adding that the country deserves a national conversation about expanding rights in these areas.

Rights Bahamas said Mr McAlpine’s comments “represent what is probably the most mature, rational and sensible perspective offered by any Bahamian politician, on any issue, in many years.”

“Pineridge MP Frederick McAlpine is commended for his enlightened, fair and compassionate remarks

regarding same sex unions and abortion laws in the Bahamas,” the group said.

“The current situation, in which neither option is legally available, should be denounced by all who truly believe in the concept of individual human rights and freedoms.”

“McAlpine’s comments are a breath of fresh air in a society that has stagnated in the grip of antiquated ideas and harmful superstitions for far too long. We hope this is the beginning of a wider national conversation on abortion and same-sex rights in the Bahamas.”

The group said it supports a planned LGBT pride parade for next year and called on authorities to give organisers all the “support and protection they need to make this historic event a reality.”

Regarding abortion, the group said every woman should have the unfettered right to choose what happens to their body.

“Abortions - as McAlpine notes happen regardless, however these are often extremely dangerous undertakings which pose the risk of serious physical and psychological consequences for women,” Rights Bahamas said. “No one should have to risk so much over any personal decision. Meanwhile, the consequences of forcing

unwanted children upon unwilling parents can be seen all around us in the anger, disillusionment and social alienation displayed

by many young people in the country. As McAlpine says, the government should stay out of people’s bedrooms; so too should

the Christian Council. If only more of our political leaders had the vision and bravery of the MP for Pineridge.”

GOVT ‘SHOULD BE ASHAMED’ OVER DEPORTATION CRITICISM from page one who lack documentation without assessing each person’s case and to implement due process guarantees as the people are “entitled to under international law.”

This came after the government reported that more than 100 Haitians were recently deported to Haiti.

Rights Bahamas said: “It is the height of irony that a country newly elected to the UN’s Human Rights Council should have to be dressed down in this embarrassing fashion for its aggressive, inhumane and intolerant behaviour in the face of a humanitarian crisis. We should be working to help all victims of the storm, not heaping further misery on those who are most vulnerable. This FNM government should be ashamed of itself. So too should members of the opposition who have been fanning the flames of hysteria.

“Let us not forget that it was the PLP that recently launched the most frightening and discriminatory attack on people of Haitian ethnicity in Bahamian history. The government has been continually warned that local human rights activists are working with our international

PAGE 6, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

495 UNEMPLOYMENT CLAIMS AFTER HURRICANE DORIAN

By RASHAD ROLLE Tribune Staff Reporter rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE National Insurance Board has processed 495 unemployment claims related to Hurricane Dorian, according to Brensil Rolle, minister of public

service with responsibility for NIB. In the House of Assembly yesterday, he said NIB and the Department of Labour processed 476 claims from Abaco and 19 from Grand Bahama between September 1 to September 24.

Overall, the departments

have received 907 unemployment claims, though a breakdown of how many submitted after October 4 have been processed was not available up to yesterday, he said.

Normally NIB requires in person collection of unemployment cheques to

validate that people are in the country.

“Instead, the National Insurance Board is making it possible for unemployment benefits to be directly deposited to accounts upon in person verification at either the NIB office or the island administrator,” Mr

Rolle said.

He added that the NIB has also facilitated early pension payments in September, injecting $21m into the Bahamian economy because of the need to maintain commerce and the circulation of money. “…The board worked

tirelessly to ensure that the long-term benefit payments for September 2019 were paid one week earlier on Wednesday, September 11, 2019,” he said.

Mr Rolle also said that to date, NIB has replaced 774 smart cards following Dorian.

CAPTAIN STEPHEN RUSSELL, Director of NEMA thanks the Central Banks of The Bahamas, and of Trinidad and Tobago for contributing towards the Hurricane Dorian relief efforts.

Photos: NEMA

More donations given to NEMA DONATIONS continue to flow through the National Emergency Management Agency towards the relief efforts post Hurricane Dorian.

On Friday, October 11, NEMA received cheques from the Central Bank of The Bahamas on behalf of its team members, and of the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago.

Captain Stephen Russell, director of NEMA; John Rolle, governor of the

Central Bank of The Bahamas and staff members were present for the donations of nearly $100,000.

Gevon Moss, head of human resources, training and development at the Central Bank shed light on the initiative.

“We firstly want to use this opportunity on behalf of the Central Bank of The Bahamas and all of the team members to thank NEMA for the work that it is doing in the aftermath

of Hurricane Dorian. We recognise the complexity and levels of responses required, the work that you do isn’t easy,” he said.

He said the Central Bank of The Bahamas recognises its own corporate responsibility and acknowledges its need to respond to and use its influence in the recovery efforts.

“Secondly, we want to publicly thank the team members of the Central Bank of The Bahamas who

graciously responded to the bank’s challenge to match every dollar contributed, and today we are collectively able to present to NEMA $76,160.

“Additionally, our colleagues at the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago in a similar fashion, wanted to support the recovery efforts and contributed $22,091.93 (USD), to support the efforts. Just for some perspective, this works out to be almost $150,000 TT

dollars. We are happy to make this presentation to NEMA on their behalf,” Mr Moss said.

He added that the funds, along with funds from the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB), which is another $100,000, would be effectively used to bring help relief to the people of Abaco and Grand Bahama impacted by the Category Five storm.

In the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Dorian,

the Central Bank donated $250,000.

Those funds were equally split between NEMA and the Bahamas Red Cross.

Capt Russell said that the support locally, regionally and internationally is “tremendous”.

Mr Rolle thanked the bank’s staff members for their contributions. He encouraged banks and corporate entities to continue to support ongoing hurricane relief efforts.

CAPTAIN STEPHEN RUSSELL, director of NEMA, accepts cheques from the Central Banks of The Bahamas, and of Trinidad and Tobago for Hurricane Dorian relief efforts. From left, Tiffany Knowles, accountant, Bahamas Disaster Relief Fund; Captain Russell; and John Rolle, Governor, Central Bank of The Bahamas.

HUNT FOR GUNMAN AFTER ROBBERY POLICE are looking for the gunman who robbed a man of cash in a parking lot on Mackey Street on Tuesday.

The victim was robbed shortly after 9am when a gunman approached him in the business’ parking lot and stole a bag containing cash.

YOUR

The thief escaped in a silver vehicle with two other men.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Central Detective Unit at 502-9991/2, Crime stoppers at 328-TIPS (8477) or the nearest police station.

Investigations are ongoing

CHOICE FOR THE FAMILY WWW.FACEBOOK.COM/JOYFM1019

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 7

Five million gallons spilled from Equinor oil facility

By RIEL MAJOR Tribune Staff Reporter rmajor@tribunemedia.net MORE than 100,000 barrels of oil - five million gallons - was spilled at the Equinor South Riding Point facility in East Grand Bahama during Hurricane Dorian, Environment Minister Romauld Ferreira said yesterday.

To date, more than 35,000 barrels of oil have been recovered from the site. Speaking in the House of Assembly, Mr Ferreira said four thousand acres of forest have been surveyed and 175 acres have been confirmed as affected in some way by crude oil.

“The final determination was 119,000 barrels of oil that was spilled during the passage of Hurricane Dorian. Everybody is aware the roof of the storage tanks blew off. Between wind, rain and tidal surge, oil spread out into the forest to the north and to the containment areas.”

As parliamentarians debated an amendment to the Disaster Preparedness and Response Act, Mr Ferreira said the bill is a part of the government’s response to climate change.

AN AERIAL view of the Equinor facility after Hurricane Dorian.

“It would essentially be unconscionable (to allow persons to rebuild in) no build zones,” he said.

He added: “It would also be unconscionable for us not to make the necessary legislative changes to allow the government to take action where need be to protect people from themselves. In the face of all of this, my ministry is doing its part.”

Meanwhile, environment watchdog groups said the oil spill has contaminated water in critical

wetland habitats, including an area more than one mile away from the spill.

This is according to Waterkeepers Bahamas, Save the Bays, and Waterkeeper Alliance.

The groups noted in a joint statement that they tested water samples at five locations near the Equinor spill site and sent 54 individual water samples to an environmental chemist to a certified water testing lab in Wilmington, NC. The water samples analysis displayed distinct

petroleum components.

Waterkeeper Alliance field investigator Christian Breen said the results are well beyond what would be naturally occurring. The sample profile is distinct and consistent with the makeup of heavy-grade fuel oil, which is not supposed to be there, he noted.

The press statement read: “The affected wetlands provide a vital ocean buffer for Grand Bahama, as well as habitat for migratory birds, such as the West Indian woodpecker and red-legged

thrush. The wetland also provides a critical cleansing mechanism for the island’s scarce groundwater. “...Save the Bays and Waterkeeper Alliance determined during a poststorm site visit that the spill thoroughly polluted the ground of at least a four-square-mile area that includes wetlands, pine forests, and mangroves.”

Save the Bays Chairman Joseph Darville said the group recently witnessed dozens of workers cleaning up the massive amount of oil at the spill site.

Mr Darville said: “There were trucks vacuuming the oil and pumping it into tank trucks. We witnessed workers knee-deep in oil. Not only are these conditions unsafe for workers, but the haphazard and superficial clean-up we witnessed will not be adequate to protect the sensitive pine forest and wetlands threatened by this spill.”

The joint statement continued: “Equinor has recovered 1.8 million gallons of oil from the site, company spokesman Erik Haaland told Waterkeeper Alliance on Tuesday.”

Pete Nichols, Waterkeeper Alliance organising director, said as Equinor

is a Norwegian company, this spill should be cleaned up to at least Norwegian standards. He added that Equinor CEO Eldar Sætre should ensure that the site is left as clean as it would be had this spill taken place behind his home in Norway.

The statement added: “The environmental groups call for a comprehensive impact study to quantify the impact of the spill, to properly identify all impacted areas, and to guide remediation efforts. Equinor agreed on Tuesday to planned monthly visits to the site from Save the Bays.

The company also gave Save the Bays and Waterkeeper Bahamas a tour of the facility and impacted area earlier this month.”

The oil terminal had 1.8 million barrels of crude oil stored there prior to the storm. The terminal has a capacity of 6.75 million barrels.

The dome-shaped lids of two storage tanks – numbers six and ten – at the facility were blown off, and oil was dispersed in the area as Hurricane Dorian unleashed 185mph winds and pummeled Grand Bahama for about 40 hours.

TOUGH TIMES FOR POTTER’S CAY - BUT STILL HELPING STORM VICTIMS

By LEANDRA ROLLE lrolle@tribunemedia.net

DESPITE growing tensions at Potter’s Cay Dock, vendors remain committed to doing their part to assist those who were adversely affected by Hurricane Dorian.

Early last month, the Category Five Storm

pummeled Abaco and Grand Bahama, destroying many homes and businesses, while also leaving thousands displaced.

In response to the devastation left in Dorian’s wake, many local and international organisations joined forces to assist with the relief and recovery efforts in the storm-impacted islands.

And for some Potter’s Cay

vendors, they too wanted to contribute to the relief efforts despite concerns about the major decline in business at the site.

One way of doing this, one stall holder said, was opening a water drive at the popular hub for hurricane victims who may be in need of water.

Owner of TC’s Bayview, Maltese Davis said: “We

wanted to give something to the Hurricane Dorian relief for persons that are in distress and so we got together with a team of our vendors and we all put together and got like 50 cases of water that we would like to donate to the victims.”

According to Ms Davis, at least five persons have participated in the water drive so far.

While she is anticipating more, she said she wants more victims to visit the site and collect water at the respective stalls.

“Of course, I know the word is going to get out because I have circulated it to some of my relatives from Abaco. But, we’re really asking for more (hurricane victims) to come to Archie’s or Tall Boy’s stall

to collect water,” she added.

Ms Davis also told The Tribune that vendors are open to accepting water donations from the public.

“If persons are willing to add to the cases that we have to assist with the victims, we will gladly accept.

You can go to (Archie’s or Tall Boys) to drop off the water there so we can get it out to the victims,” she said.

PAGE 8, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

Staying to rebuild amid the rubble from page one

situated off Grand Bahama’s north shore, and to the west of it is Hawksbill Creek.

When The Tribune visited Queen’s Cove yesterday, this newspaper met only three homeowners.

There is no power and the community is littered with massive debris. Homes are torn apart, gutted and destroyed by the storm surge.

Yet, the homeowners this newspaper spoke with said they are not relocating from where they have lived for decades and are determined to rebuild their homes.

Richard Little, who resides on Queen’s Boulevard, said of all the hurricanes he went through, it is the first time in 15 years that his two-storey home was extensively damaged.

“This storm was exceptionally big,” he said. “I have been living here 15 years and this was the first time I had damage.”

The house, which is on a waterfront lot, was built 10ft off the ground. The lower level of the home sustained most of the damage when windows were swept out by the storm surge, and the entire first floor was extensively damaged.

While that there was some damage to the living room floors upstairs, Mr Little said fortunately there was none to the roof and the structure.

“This is the most damage I ever had; this was worse than Sandy, Frances, Jeanne, Wilma, and Matthew,” the homeowner said.

Despite the storms, Mr Little said that Queen’s Cove is home to him, his wife and their three children. He said that he will rebuild.

The Littles have returned to their house even though there is no electricity. They are running a generator to power the whole house.

Mr Little has started restoring the walls and is now making electrical repairs so that the house can be inspected and re-energised.

He said it would be good if debris removal could commence in the community to give hope to other homeowners.

“The community is great, but if we can get it cleaned up, people will have some hope. So far, I have not seen a garbage truck come through here yet,” he said.

Most of the single-storey homes in the area had

DEBRIS in Queen’s Cove yesterday. flooding near the ceiling.

The surge pushed down concrete walls. Structures were torn apart and swept away. The front portion of one home was broken away and was swept hundreds of feet down the road from its foundation.

Mr Little said despite the situation, he is keeping positive.

“I keep positive and my family are following my lead,” said Mr Little. “If I break down, they would too. But I would really love to see some cleanup effort start in terms of debris removal so that we can begin to have some normalcy here.”

Residents Wayne Burrows and Patsy Roberts are also not giving up on Queen’s Cove.

Mr Burrows, a disabled resident who is wheelchair bound, returned home right after the storm. He said he had flooding almost up to his home’s ceiling.

“I have been through this before many times, but not as bad as this. I lost everything,” he said.

When asked if he would consider relocating, Mr Burrows said: “I staying, I ain’t got nowhere to go.

Where you going? If you go over the bridge it going to be worse, and downtown getting flooded now.

“I been living about 14

years in Queen’s Cove, but we did not know the water was coming so high,” he said pointing to his ceiling fan.

Next door, Ms Roberts’ house was also extensively damaged. She said that her

back windows were blown out and the water level inside was two inches away from the ceiling in her house. Before the storm, Ms Roberts cleared her home of all furnishings in preparation.

Her son has already started repairs to the home.

“I come and stay here in the day and I go up town in the evening,” she said.

Ms Roberts said she is doing fine and is not

worried or stressed about the damage to her house.

“I went through this before with Floyd, and I feel all right. This is not the first or second time – I am glad I am still living,” she said.

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 9

Public to foot bill for Archer killer’s lawyer

By NICO SCAVELLA Tribune Staff Reporter nscavella@tribunemedia.net KOFHE Goodman is to be assigned an attorney at the public’s expense to better enable him to appeal his latest sentence for murdering 11-year-old Marco Archer eight years ago, the Court of Appeal ruled yesterday.

The appellate tribunal of Justices Jon Isaacs, Roy Jones and Sir Michael Barnett ordered that Goodman, 43, receive a court-appointed lawyer to contest his conviction and 55-year sentence for killing the sixth-grader in 2011.

Goodman returns to court on November 13 for a status hearing into his matter. He is remanded into custody until that time.

Archer, a student of Columbus Primary School, went missing from Brougham Street on September 23, 2011, and was found dead days later. The little boy was reported missing by his family after failing to return home from a neighbourhood store where he went to purchase candy. His family begged for help in ensuring that he was returned home safely.

However, days later police discovered Archer’s body in bushes behind an apartment complex on Yorkshire Drive near where Goodman lived.

It was determined he died as a result of blunt force trauma to his head.

Goodman was initially convicted of Archer’s killing on August 2, 2013,

CONVICTED child killer Kofhe Goodman. and sentenced to death by hanging by Justice Bernard Turner on October 29, 2013.

However, the Court of Appeal overturned the conviction and sentence and ordered a retrial because of the “lurking doubt about the fairness of the trial” brought on by adverse pretrial publicity, misconduct of Goodman’s then defence lawyer Geoffrey Farquharson and the former jury’s irregularity.

Goodman was reconvicted of the murder on May 30, 2017, following the second trial before Justice Carolita Bethel. Wayne Munroe, QC, represented him at the time.

In May of last year, Justice Bethel sentenced Goodman to 55 years in prison for killing young Marco after rejecting the Crown’s call for the death sentence. Seven years were ordered to be deducted from that sentence to

account for time he had spent in custody up to that point.

At the time, Justice Bethel determined that she could not conclusively say Goodman is incapable of being reformed. Precedent from the Privy Council dictates a person should be sentenced to death only if a judge is satisfied the case both represents the “worst of the worst” and that the convict cannot be reformed.

Justice Bethel based her decision based on the contents of a psychiatric report by consultant psychologist Dr John Dillet, who said Goodman meets the criteria for several disorders, including lifetime alcohol misuse disorder, lifetime marijuana misuse disorder and anti-social behaviour.

When asked if Goodman could be reformed, Dr Dillet told the court he’s duty bound to believe humans can be rehabilitated, even though he admitted the Bahamas currently lacks the expertise and resources to increase the chances that reform could occur.

“Notwithstanding the heinous crime committed on the young boy and the manner he was found, I cannot say it is a case that satisfies the criteria for a sentencing of death,” Justice Bethel said at the time.

“Should The Bahamas have available that treatment as envisioned by Dr Dillet I do hope there is always a possibility every human being will be capable of reform,” she added.

PAGE 10, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

What went wrong for the man who was America’s Mayor?

STATESIDE WITH CHARLIE HARPER

Trump is still in office, so it seems that in his mind at least, stubborn adherence to 2016 campaign promises and pandering to his base is still a workable formula for re-election.

But what if some of today’s polls are right?

What if much of the national TV and print media are correct that most Americans are weary of Trump and ready and willing for change?

McConnell and South Carolina’s Lindsay Graham, have angrily denounced Trump’s intentions. Other GOP senators are likely to join in this condemnation of a potentially disastrous presidential impulse, and this might weaken their resolve to support him in an impeachment trial if he persists and the troops do leave their border assignment.

The other factor is Utah Senator Mitt Romney, who has probably been the most consistently outspoken congressional Republican in his criticism of Trump.

Immediately denouncing Trump’s shakedown of the Ukrainian president and joining the critical chorus on the troop pullback idea, Romney has staked out a clear potential position as a viable alternative to Trump.

We should not forget Romney was the Republican nominee for president in 2012. Many observers believe that if not for Barack Obama’s smart and timely rescue of the American auto industry in the run-up to that election - which ensured that Obama would carry Ohio, Michigan and other auto industry-dependent Rust Belt states - Romney would now be concluding a triumphant two terms as president.

Of course, Romney’s infamously overheard private remark that 47 percent of Americans were welfare cheats of some kind didn’t endear him to voters. But who will remember that slip of the tongue eight years later?

If Trump does eventually succumb to his largely selfinflicted political wounds and resigns or is impeached, two things could happen that may seem almost inconceivable now.

First, he might take obsequiously loyal Vice President Mike Pence down with him. That would mean the acting president of the United States would be the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

President Nancy Pelosi!

And from the potential wreckage of the Trump presidency, the new standard-bearer of the Republican party might turn out to be Mitt Romney.

Who would you favour in 2020? What if the choice were Romney or Joe Biden? How might Romney fare against fellow senators Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders or Kamala Harris? Ironically, Trump and his damaging attacks on Democratic rivals could fuel Romney’s second bid for the White House.

Some Senate Republicans might be tempted to look ahead to such potential contests if Trump’s presidential ship continues to take on water. They might be tempted to jump off that ship before it sank.

“In the US capitol building, Rudy Giuliani and Ukraine continue to be the lynchpins in the House impeachment ANDinvestigation THEN WHAT into HAPPENS? President Donald Trump.”

WHAT brilliant IF THE year. What a nuisance!

A BIG HEADLINE We all live in a bin democracy.Laden’s POLLStook ARE RIGHT? requires Rudy in Washington thisSometimes week thisattack, charge. more than simply voting has been the qualification Heorwas in the In Washington especially every two or four five everywhere but all over the US, the This is one of those of the city’s major years. league city, leading and rallying times for Americans, and nuisance threat of impeachment is growing. Usually for others baseball team for maybe its first hisaround constituents. the world, too. Laziness and reliable polling indicates World Series appearance Giuliani was soon Let’s think the unthinkhigher numbers disengagement will yield that ever of potential voters want able for a moment. predictably disappointing since 1933. The Nationals dubbed America’s Mayor.

Suppose the evidence results. Engagement and the House impeachment process to continue, and of the president’s outraare the fourth franchise to Bush, meanwhile, never voting might bring welcome change, and that change growing percentages of geous and unprecedented represent America’s capi- really regained the full might even last for four citizens indicate their will- misbehaviour continues to for Trump to be mount, in spite of his resotal city in those 86years! years, stature ofingness his office. lute (for now) removed from and their unexpected resistance to office.

‘Many prominent Congressional That Senate success has provided a subpoenas impeachment delivered to is essentially a Republicans, much-needed diversion White political pro- including Majority the from the disillusioning yet House and cess is actually Leader Mitch many memimbedded in compelling impeachment As mayor, Giuliani is bers of his the American McConnell and administradrama unfolding hardly still credited by many New constitution, South Carolina’s tion. so the poliLindsay Graham, more than a dozen blocks Yorkers tics with making the Suppose of what’s have angrily this leads to going on now from the team’s home city’s streets almost amazan indictment represents denounced field. ingly safe.

Though he (impeachno surprise.

Trump’s intentions. ment) in the House Speaker In the US capitol build- had numerous detractors, House of Nancy Pelosi Other GOP sought no senators ing, Rudy Giuliani and Rudy was the right manare likely Representatives. The case House resoto join in this Ukraine continue to be for the time. may have against Trump lution He prior would move to beginning condemnation the lynchpins in the House been New York’s most to a trial in the formal of a potentially impeachment investi- importantimpeachment mayor since the Senate.

Even today, process, pre- disastrous gation into President Fiorello sumably La Guardia, who there seem to to presidential be faint cracks protect some Donald Trump. Let’s take left office in 1945 after and this in the impulse, dam of House Demomight weaken a look at Rudy and then at three terms leading the GOP support crats currently for Trump in representing their resolve to Ukraine. city out of the Depression the Senate. conservative support him in There are at districts from War II. and through World least two fachaving to an impeachment Giuliani was knighted tors at work cast a vote in trial if he persists One of

by Queenfavour Elizabeth II.the troops do here. and is Trump’s impeaching leave their border He tried to ride his inexplicaa president ble return who retains assignment.’

Giuliani was a federal New York fame to the to an earlier considerable impulse to grass-roots prosecutor in New York Republican presidential pull American troops home popularity.

City and used that posi- nomination in 2008, but The Republicans, clev- from the trip-wire funcerly, have seized on this. tion they presently perform tion, as have many before his campaign faltered They also point out, clev- along part of the unstable him and since, to advance badly and, some erlytoand also observcorrectly, border Syria shares with that the Democrats and Turkey. their political ambitions. ers, humiliatingly.

Such a move, which American liberals generally regard Trumpfalas when Trump pursued it When the US suffered His personal life had profoundly illegitimate, over 18 months ago caused its most significant attack tered several yearsheearlier. both because failed to respected Defence Secrea majority the popu- tary Jim Mattis to resign since Pearl Harbour While hewin was still ofbasking lar vote in 2016 and because in protest, will principally Judith Nathan was tabloid the autocratic leadhe benefited from foreign and the twin towers of in the glow of serving as benefit ersfodder of Turkey, until Russia, Iran (Russian) interference. they married the World Trade centre America’s Mayor, Giuliani But the Dems are also and probably Syria itself. will2003. also represent a really angry because his he It in burned and fell on 9/11, was moving on from neither observes long- comprehensive betrayal of Nathan has told New Rudy Giuliani was the second wife, TV personestablished American America’s long-time Middle allies,Magazine the ethnic that her political norms nor cares a East York city’s mayor. ality Donna Hanover, whit about their objections Kurds. It might also potenmarriage started to fail East he thumbs his nose at tially imperil Middle He performed spectacu- who saidas she learned her a significant poor people, immigrants, Christians, when Rudy lost the 2008 larly well in the moment. marriageglobal waswarming overandwhile other minority in several major nations. presidential nomination policy concepts regional As images proliferated of watchingforeign TV. Many prominent Senate devised in comfortable fight to John McCain. including salons Mrs. in Washington and Republicans, then-president George W. The third Giuliani Majority New York.

“It Leader was Mitch an ongoing Bush looking dazed as he was already on the scene. heard the news of Osama The mayor’s affair with process that began when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has declared the whistleblower complaint about Donald Trump shaking down the president of Ukraine for damaging information on potential rival Joe Biden was finally enough to convince her to take her foot off the brake on impeaching the president.

American voters now have to try to digest all the information that’s coming at them like streams of water from a fire hose. And

it’s not even an election

Safe

Attack

he lost the nomination,” Nathan said.

“For a variety of reasons that I know as a spouse and as a nurse, he has become a different man.” Nathan, trained as a nurse, may have been referring to Giuliani’s earlier struggles with prostate cancer.

Giuliani’s divorce from his third wife was public, and very bitter. “My husband’s denial of the affair with the married Mrs. Ryan is as false as his claim that we were separated when he took up with her,” Nathan told the New York Post. Hospital CEO Dr. Maria Rosa

Ryan has been travelling with and attending White House dinners with Giuliani recently.

Nathan is reportedly receiving $42,000 each month in alimony from Giuliani.

No wonder that Rudy went looking for riches in Ukraine.

Everyone’s playing a game in Ukraine OUR history books tell us that one of the reasons Adolph Hitler and Nazi Germany made the fateful decision to violate the terms of his infamous 1939 non-aggression pact with Soviet Russia was his desire to occupy and feast off an area then called the “breadbasket of Europe”.

That area included the abundant fields of what has been known since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union as the independent nation of Ukraine. For nearly 30 years, Ukraine has remained important for Western policy toward Russia and Eastern Europe generally.

It has been far more important than that for policymakers in Moscow, and especially for Russian President Vladimir Putin. For Putin and his allies, Ukraine is the line in the sand.

The Russians are determined the West will not cross that line.

Buffer The reason lies in Russian history. For more than 200 years, the Tsars, the Communists and now the Russian plutocrats running things in Moscow have feared the West. Moscow’s rulers fretted about Napoleon; the rise of Germany; Britain; and more recently, the United States and its NATO alliance.

Central to their concept of national security policy has been the maintenance of a buffer between Russia and the rest of Europe. In the years after World War II, Poland and East Germany constituted the main buffer between the USSR and the West.

After the USSR fell apart, the West added to NATO and the European Union the following: Poland, the three small newlyindependent Baltic nations of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and most of the rest of Eastern Europe which had been aligned with and under the military thumb of the USSR for 45 years.

Ukraine and loyal Russian ally Belarus have provided the buffer since 1991.

Although there have been many accounts of Western attempts to bring Ukraine into the NATO alliance and full

membership in the European Union, for many reasons it hasn’t happened.

Many observers feel Moscow would do almost anything to prevent Ukraine from coming any further under Western influence.

Anything has so far included invading and annexing the Crimea peninsula and maintaining an active insurrection along the eastern Ukrainian border with Russia. Anything has also included leaning hard politically and economically on Ukraine to remain at least neutral between Russia and NATO nations to the west.

Putin has been especially active in this regard. This former KGB official has made no secret of his desire to return to the good old days prior to 1990 when the USSR was preeminent in the world with the United States.

It obviously vexes him that Russia is now regarded by many western observers as a mere secondary player on a world stage dominated by the US and China.

Three years ago, the Ukraine calculus changed. American voters elected Donald Trump and his curious fixation with and apparent admiration for Putin.

Ukrainian politics have long been fetid and corrupt, fuelled by riches from still impressive agricultural output and transit fees for natural gas and oil from the east. Russia has had many reasons to keep Ukraine out of NATO and other engagements with the West.

FORMER Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort.

JOE Biden’s son Hunter

US President Donald Trump

Add to this mix American political fortune seekers like former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and Trump’s current personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and, apparently, Joe Biden’s son Hunter. All saw a good opportunity to make a lot of money off the loose, fluid situation in Ukraine. As a result, Manafort is serving jail time now. Giuliani may someday face legal jeopardy too.

Hunter Biden has just announced his withdrawal from international boards in the wake of Trump’s embarrassing accusations about his activities in Ukraine.

That was the context for the

RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin.

Trump call to the president of Ukraine in July which finally triggered the Democratic effort to impeach the president.

Trump seems to have seen a chance to enlist a morally uncertain foreign government to help him politically and at the same time help Putin keep Ukraine from straying too far from Russia’s orbit.

The witnesses now testifying before Congress apparently believe that such actions were contrary to the best national security interests of the US. Several GOP senators may agree.

It will be fascinating to see where it all leads, but from a historical perspective, it’s no great surprise that Ukraine is at the centre of it all.

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 11

Chipman: I’m no sell out

By KHRISNA RUSSELL Deputy Chief Reporter krussell@tribunemedia.net INDEPENDENT MP Reece Chipman says he’s no political sell out following his resignation from the Free National Movement a week ago.

Speaking for the first time at Parliament since he quit the governing party, Mr Chipman criticised partisan politics and party loyalty, which he said had forced elected officials to treat key supporters like “potcakes”.

He stopped short during proceedings yesterday of insisting he was not a political prostitute, suggesting he would not affiliate with other parties like the Progressive Liberal Party or the Democratic National Alliance.

“You show me political maturity based on the way it’s defined in this particular system, I show you political sell out at its best,” Mr Chipman said yesterday.

He was allowed to address his colleagues after requesting to do so in his resignation letter to House Speaker Halson Moultrie.

The letter was submitted last Thursday.

“Political maturity are the words used now to describe us as we sell as our ideals; sell out ourselves, sell our

families out and then of course sell our country.

“Your freedom fighters you treat them like political potcakes. Your constituents, your stalwarts, your counsellors, you treat them like political potcakes.

You only know them when you need them. Yes that is what partisan politics does.

“If I had to make a choice, I’d rather be a political potcake than a political pros…I’m sorry, a political sell out.

“See you cannot be a part of a party that doesn’t allow you to participate.”

Mr Chipman said loyalty should not be based on giving people jobs or insisting that elected officials agree with every party policy or position.

“Loyalty cannot be that I must agree with everything you say at the expense of my constituents. Loyalty should never outweigh integrity.

“It should preserve dignity and it should demand honesty,” Mr Chipman said.

The first time MP quit the FNM last week after contemplating the move since January.

He said his resignation was largely based on the government’s handling of Hurricane Dorian recovery efforts and partisan politics.

CENTREVILLE MP Reece Chipman pictured at the press conference after he resigned from the Free National Movement.

Photo: Shawn Hanna/Tribune Staff

CROWN LOSES BID TO ADD JAIL TIME FOR FORMER PRISON OFFICER

By NICO SCAVELLA Tribune Staff Reporter nscavella@tribunemedia.net

A FORMER prison officer remains a free man after the Crown lost its bid to have him committed to prison for attempting to smuggle $1,000 worth of drugs into the Bahamas Department of Correctional Services earlier this year.

Appellate Justices Jon Isaacs, Roy Jones and Sir Michael Barnett dismissed

the Crown’s appeal of a magistrate’s decision to fine Vernard Hinsey and make him perform community service for being caught with nearly two pounds of marijuana when he reported to work in April.

In June, Hinsey, of Pineyard Road, pleaded guilty to one count of possession of dangerous drugs with intent to supply just before the start of his trial before Senior Magistrate Subusola Swain.

According to reports,

shortly before 2pm on April 3, Drug Enforcement Unit (DEU) officers and BDCS officers conducted a search of Hinsey shortly after he reported to work and discovered six packages of marijuana taped to his body.

According to police, the drugs weighed one pound and 11 ounces and were worth $1,000.

Magistrate Swain consequently fined Hinsey $7,000 or otherwise serve nine months in prison. He was

further ordered to perform 200 hours of community service at the Salvation Army. Failure to do the latter would result in an additional three months in prison.

Yesterday, the Crown confirmed that Hinsey had since paid his fine and has also completed the 200 hours of community service.

Yesterday, Justice Isaacs noted that while the court might have intended to impose a different sentence, legal authorities are

“replete” with references to “justice being seasoned with mercy”. Thus, he said, while the Crown may seek to extract its “pound of flesh”, there are occasions when it is “meek and right to leave well enough alone”.

Sir Michael, meanwhile, noted that the Crown likely would not have appealed the sentence had Hinsey been a civilian. The fact that he was a prison officer and in a position of authority served as the primary

impetus for the Crown appealing on the grounds of the sentence being unduly lenient, Sir Michael suggested.

In any event, Justice Isaacs noted that given the “state of the record” of the proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court, which he said didn’t provide sufficient enough information to aid the appellate tribunal in coming to a determination, he and his fellow justices were not inclined to interfere.

PAGE 12, Thursday, October 17, 2019

THE TRIBUNE

How gambling built baseball – and then almost destroyed it

By Rebecca Edwards Professor of History, Rochester Institute of Technology

Imagine if, after watching the thrilling victory of the Chicago Cubs in Game 7 of the 2016 World Series over the Cleveland Indians – a game in which the Cubs won their first championship in over a century – you learned the Indians had collaborated with gamblers to intentionally throw the series.

Would you trust the game, its umpires and its players, ever again?

That was the scope of the crisis that enveloped baseball a century ago, when key members of the 1919 Chicago White Sox, including pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Claude “Lefty” Williams, conspired to throw the series to their opponents, the Cincinnati Reds.

What became known as the “Black Sox Scandal” rocked professional baseball. But it wasn’t an aberration in a sport that was otherwise clean.

Baseball became America’s national pastime because of – and not in spite of – gambling.

GAMBLING FUELS BASEBALL’S RISE In his book “Baseball in the Garden of Eden,” historian John Thorn explains how gambling was far from an “impediment to the game’s flowering”; instead, it was “the vital fertilizer”.

In baseball’s infancy, the sport was thought of as a boy’s game. But over the course of the 19th century, gambling deepened adult interest and investment in the sport, attracting cohorts of older fans.

Gambling’s popularity was helped along by the spread of statistics, that particular lifeblood of baseball that still keeps fans hooked today. Developed initially to allow the results of a game to be printed on to the page in the form of box scores, statistics also created a pool of data that gamblers could use to inform their bets – many of which were made from the stands, in the middle of games.

In his history of Fenway Park, Glenn Stout describes how, in the ballpark’s early years, “the best seats were quickly taken over by a rabid contingent of gamblers who bet on absolute everything imaginable, ranging from the eventual winner … to ball and strike calls” and “even such arcane issues as whether the wind would change direction.”

Fans waving dollar bills and barking out bets resembled “brokers on the floor of the stock exchange”.

This kind of gambling was so common in the stands that Ernest Lawrence Thayer’s iconic 1888 poem, “Casey at the Bat,” captured such a moment in one of its stanzas: “A straggling few got up to go in deep despair.

The rest clung to that hope which springs eternal in the human breast; They thought, “If only Casey could but get a whack at that – We’d put up even money now with Casey at the bat.”

PLAYING TO LOSE Some players also sought to get in on the action.

In 1919, the highest-paid player was Detroit Tigers outfielder Ty Cobb, who earned $20,000 – which equates to roughly $300,000 today, or less than Major League Baseball’s current minimum salary.

IN 1919, the Chicago White Sox, including pitchers Eddie Cicotte (left) and Claude ‘Lefty’ Williams, conspired to throw the series to their opponents, the Cincinnati Reds.

Most of Cobb’s peers earned far less than the future Hall of Famer. Working with gamblers was an attractive way to supplement their incomes – and many of them did.

One of the most notorious was first baseman Hal Chase.

Dubbed the “Black Prince of Baseball” by baseball historians Donald Dewey and Nicholas Acocella, Chase made a veritable career out of throwing games. Playing mostly with the New York Highlanders, Chase, as Charles Fountain noted, “threw games for money, he threw games for spite, he threw games as a favour for friends, he threw games apparently for no reason at all other than to stay in practice.”

But this wasn’t the kind of gambling that brought baseball to the brink of disaster in 1919. That scandal saw the players themselves – working in tandem with professional gamblers and gangsters – fix the World Series.

The 1919 World Series was the best-attended Series at that point in the game’s history, but the play of the White Sox turned the games into elaborate theatrical performances.

Those in on it had to play to lose, and the statistics are telling.

Shortstop Swede Risberg hit .080 – not a typo – while committing four fielding errors. Outfielder Happy

“What became known as the ‘Black Sox Scandal’ rocked professional baseball. But it wasn’t an aberration in a sport that was otherwise clean.

Baseball became America’s national pastime because of – and not in spite of – gambling.”

Felsch didn’t do much better, hitting .192, with just five hits in 26 at-bats. He also committed two errors.

Pitcher Claude “Lefty” Williams surrendered 12 runs in 16.1 innings of work.

While the players tried to pull off authentic performances for fans, they weren’t always successful. Felsch was chided by his fellow cheaters for his

blunders in centre, which they deemed too obvious.

Fundamentally, however, the games lacked the core drama and appeal of sports: the uncertainty of the outcome.

Sportswriters took notice.

Rumours were already flying in the press box before the World Series’ conclusion that something was wrong.

Sports journalist Hugh Fullerton had heard these rumours when he arrived to cover the series, though he tried to convince himself – and his readers – that the story couldn’t be true. Still, once the series ended, Fullerton wrote worriedly in the Chicago Herald and Examiner that “Yesterday’s, in all probability, is the last game that will be played in any World Series.”

Fullerton kept pursuing the story and became the first sportswriter to break the details to the public in December 1919, with an article in the New York World entitled, “Is Big League Baseball Being Run for Gamblers, with Players In on the Deal?”

As more details emerged, the scandal overwhelmed the sport and threatened to destroy it. If the World Series itself, baseball’s premier event, could not be trusted, how would the sport survive?

The new baseball commissioner, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, acted decisively and independently of the courts.

Even after the players were acquitted in a trial that ended on August. 2, 1921, Landis – a former federal judge – had already made his decision.

“Regardless of the verdict of juries,” he announced, on the morning of August 3, 1921, “no player that throws a ball game; no player that undertakes or promises to throw a ball game; no player that sits in a conference … where the ways and means of throwing games are discussed and does not promptly tell his club about it, will ever play professional baseball.”

The stunned White Sox players – including stars like “Shoeless” Joe Jackson, who had hit .375 in the series but was nonetheless aware of what his teammates were up to – were banned from baseball for life.

THE SPECTRE OF 1919 Seventy years later, commissioner Bart Giamatti acted in a similarly swift and punitive manner when he banned all-time hits leader Pete Rose from baseball in 1989.

Bart Giamatti calls the banishment of Pete Rose ‘the sad end to a sorry

episode’ in a 1989 news conference.

Rose had admitted to gambling on his own games, even as a manager. Some thought Giamatti overreacted, given that Rose never bet against his own team.

That argument, as historian Bruce Kuklick wrote in a 1999 essay, doesn’t hold up. Rose, he points out, didn’t bet on every game.

It’s not inconceivable, then, that he would make decisions during games in which he didn’t place bets – say, not bringing in his best relief pitcher – to make sure that reliever would be available for the games he did bet on.

Giamatti surely had 1919 on his mind when he meted out Rose’s punishment. With the game having barely escaped death once, Giamatti knew that organized baseball couldn’t risk skating too close to that edge again.

And yet in August of this year, Major League Baseball made FanDuel – a daily fantasy sports gambling service – its official gambling partner.

It may be that baseball hopes that gambling will bring more adults back to the sport, just as it did in its early days. After all, attendance at games is down.

Football, meanwhile, has become the most watched sport on television in the U.S. Six million viewers even tuned in for the 2019 NFL Draft.

Gambling may fuel more interest in the sport. But throwing on more fuel can result in a fire that burns out of control.

In 1919, baseball came close to burning its own house down. One hundred years later, journalist Hugh Fullerton would surely be stunned to know that big league baseball has once again made a contract with gamblers, in full view of both players and fans.

Let’s hope the story doesn’t end in scandal this time around.

theconversation.com

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 13

PUBLIC NOTICE THE CLEARING BANKS’

ASSOCIATION

FINANCIAL SERVICES HURRICANE DORIAN FRAUD AWARENESS PART 1 Following the passage of Hurricane Dorian, instances of financial fraud may increase. The Clearing Banks’ Association would like to provide useful information on the subject and guidance on how incidences involving spoofing, phishing or spam should be handled.

Below are definitions for spoofing, phishing and spam:

• Spoofing Email spoofing is the forgery of an email header so that the message appears to have originated from someone or somewhere other than the actual source. Distributors of spam often use spoofing in an attempt to get recipients to open, and possibly even respond to, their solicitations. Look at the sender's email address not the "From" address displayed in the in box. You can often identify malicious emails when the two are not consistent.

• Phishing The practice of sending emails purporting to be from reputable companies in order to induce individuals to reveal personal information, such as passwords and credit card numbers, online.

• Spam Irrelevant or unsolicited messages sent over the Internet, typically to large numbers of users, for the purposes of advertising, phishing, spreading malware, etc ..

Don't unsubscribe from emails you didn't sign up for; it just reveals your email address is good.

PAGE 14, Thursday, October 17, 2019

FRENCH President Emmanuel Macron shares a laugh with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. (AP)

MACRON AND MERKEL TRY TO SHOWCASE UNITY AS BREXIT LOOMS TOULOUSE, France (AP) — President Emmanuel Macron and Chancellor Angela Merkel sought Wednesday to demonstrate the solidity of the French-German relationship at a meeting in southern France, one day before a key EU summit that may approve a divorce deal with Britain.

They started with a visit to the headquarters of plane-maker Airbus, widely seen as a symbol of European industrial cooperation, near the city of Toulouse. The company, which is holding its 50th anniversary celebrations this year, has production and manufacturing facilities in countries including Germany, Spain and Britain.

Macron and Merkel had lunch inside a training A350 airbus — where a long table had been set — with high school students and apprentices preparing for a career in aircraft industry.

They were then due to hold bilateral talks in Toulouse, before a joint French-German cabinet meeting.

Macron and Merkel were to discuss Brexit as EU and British officials were scrambling to strike a deal before Thursday’s summit in Brussels — the last one planned for before Britain’s scheduled departure from the EU on Oct. 31.

The French and German delegations, including key ministers from both governments, were also planning talks on global trade tensions, the fight against climate change, European defence projects and how to defend EU copyright rules, Macron’s office said.

French and German defense ministers will try to elaborate common rules on arms exports during a defense security council.

Both countries decided to halt weapons exports to Turkey after the offensive in northeast Syria last week. Germany has also banned defence industry exports to Saudi Arabia over the war in Yemen — while France has not.

Later Wednesday, after a joint news conference, Macron and Merkel will welcome incoming European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for a dinner with members of the European Round Table of Industrialists, a group gathering over 50 major European multinational companies.

They are expected to discuss the U.S. decision to put tariffs worth $7.5 billion on EU goods like wine, cheese and olive oil, following a green light from the World Trade Organization in a case involving illegal EU subsidies for Airbus.

The tariffs, to take effect Friday, will be 10% for EU aircraft and 25% for everything else.

THE TRIBUNE

TRUMP DISMISSES SYRIA CONCERNS; DEMS WALK OUT OF WH MEETING

By ROBERT BURNS AP National Security Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Washing his hands of Syria, President Donald Trump declared Wednesday the U.S. has no stake in defending the Kurdish fighters who died by the thousands as America’s partners against IS extremists. Hours later, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other top Democrats walked out of a meeting at the White House, accusing him of having a “meltdown,” calling her a “third-rate politician” and having no plan to deal with a potentially revived Islamic State group.

Condemnation of Trump’s stance on Turkey, Syria and the Kurds was quick and severe during the day, not only from Democrats but from Republicans who have been staunch supporters on virtually all issues.

The House, bitterly divided over the Trump impeachment inquiry, banded together for an overwhelming 354-60 denunciation of the U.S. troop withdrawal. Many lawmakers expressed worry that it may lead to revival of IS as well as Russian presence and influence in the area — in addition to the slaughter of many Kurds.

At the White House, Trump said the U.S. has no business in the region — and not to worry about the Kurdish fighters.

“They know how to fight,” he said. “And by the way, they’re no angels.”

Briefing After the House condemnation vote, the congressional leaders of both parties went to the White house for a briefing, which grew contentious, with Trump and Pelosi trading jabs. The Democrats said they walked out when the meeting devolved into an insult-fest.

“What we witnessed on the part of the president was a meltdown,” Pelosi told reporters, saying Trump appeared visibly “shaken up” over the House vote.

“We couldn’t continue in the meeting because he was just not relating to the reality of it,” she said.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer criticized Trump for not having an adequate plan to deal with IS fighters who have been held by the Kurds. He said the meeting “was not a dialogue, this was sort of a diatribe, a nasty diatribe not focused on the facts.”

Republicans pushed back, saying it was Pelosi who’d been the problem.

“She storms out of another meeting, trying to make it unproductive,” said House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy.

White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham called Pelosi’s action

PRESIDENT Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with Italian President Sergio Mattarella in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday. (AP)

“baffling but not surprising.”

She said the speaker “had no intention of listening or contributing to an important meeting on national security issues.”

Trump himself has stalked out of his White House meetings with congressional leaders — in May, saying he would no longer work with Democrats unless they dropped all Russia investigations, and last January during the partial government shutdown.

Separately on Wednesday, a letter was disclosed in which he both cajoled and threatened Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week, urging him to act only in “the right and humane way” in Syria.

He started on a positive note, suggesting they “work out a good deal,” but then talked about crippling economic sanctions and concluded that the world “will look upon you forever as the devil if good things don’t happen. Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a fool!”

In public appearances Wednesday, Trump said he was fulfilling a campaign promise to bring U.S. troops home from “endless wars” in the Middle East -- casting aside criticism that a sudden U.S. withdrawal from Syria betrays the Kurdish fighters, stains U.S. credibility around the world and opens an important region to Russia, which is moving in.

“We have a situation where Turkey is taking land from Syria. Syria’s not happy about it. Let them work it out,” Trump said. “They have a problem at a border. It’s not our border. We shouldn’t be losing lives over it.”

Trump said he was sending Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State

Mike Pompeo to Ankara to urge the Turks to halt their weeklong offensive into northeastern Syria. But his remarks, first to reporters in the Oval Office and later at a news conference with his Italian counterpart, suggested he sees little at stake for America.

HOUSE Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“Syria may have some help with Russia, and that’s fine,” he said. “They’ve got a lot of sand over there. So, there’s a lot of sand that they can play with.”

“Let them fight their own wars.”

More than once, Trump suggested the United States has little concern in the Middle East because it is geographically distant -- a notion shared by some prior to Sept.

11, 2001, when al-Qaida militants used Afghanistan as a base from which to attack the U.S. That attack set off a series of armed conflicts, including in Iraq, that Trump considers

a waste of American lives and treasure.

The current withdrawal is the worst decision of Trump’s presidency, said South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who meets often with the president and is one of his strongest and most important supporters in Congress.

“To those who think the Mideast doesn’t matter to America, remember 9/11 -we had that same attitude on 9/10 2001.”

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said he strongly disagreed with Trump and had told the president so.

But he asked, “What tools do we have” to back up that disagreement?

Turkish troops and Turkish-backed Syrian fighters launched their offensive against Kurdish forces in northern Syria a week ago, two days after Trump suddenly announced he was withdrawing the U.S. from the area.

Turkey’s Erdogan has said he wants to create a 30-kilometre (20-mile) -deep “safe zone” in Syria.

Ankara has long argued the Kurdish fighters are nothing more than an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which has waged a guerrilla campaign inside Turkey since the 1980s and which Turkey, as well as the U.S. and European Union, designate as a terrorist organisation.

Trump mischaracterised the progress made thus far by the U.S. military in carrying out his instructions to withdraw all 1,000 troops in northeastern Syria.

He referred to the approximately two dozen soldiers who evacuated from Turkey’s initial attack zone last week, but cast that as meaning the

U.S. has “largely” completed its pullout.

A U.S. official familiar with planning for the withdrawal of the 1,000 said that they are consolidating onto two main bases but have not yet begun flying out of Syria in significant numbers.

Military equipment is being gathered and flown out, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the withdrawal, which poses big security risks.

Trump downplayed the crisis that followed his decision to pull out of Syria, which critics say amounted to giving Turkey a green light to invade against the Kurdish fighters.

“It’s not between Turkey and the United States, like a lot of stupid people would like you to believe,” Trump said.

“Our soldiers are not in harm’s way, as they shouldn’t be.”

Sanctions Trump did impose new sanctions on Turkey this week in an attempt to force Erdogan to end his assault.

But he said Wednesday, “It’s time for us to come home.”

Even as Trump defended his removal of U.S. troops from northeastern Syria, he praised his decision to send more troops and military equipment to Saudi Arabia to help the kingdom defend against Iran.

Trump said the U.S. is sending missiles and “great power” to the Saudis, and “they’re paying for that.”

AP writers Alan Fram, Darlene Superville, Jill Colvin, Kevin Freking and Ellen Knickmeyer contributed.

IN IRAQ, CONCERN THAT SYRIA CHAOS WOULD BRING BACK IS

By HADI MIZBAN Associated Press

RABIAA, Iraq (AP) — Iraq’s defence minister on Wednesday expressed concerns that the Islamic State group could take advantage of Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria to destabilize Iraq, saying that a number of militants have been able to escape detention in Syria amid the chaos and cross into Iraq.

Speaking to a group of

journalists touring the Iraq-Syria border with him, Najah al-Shammari urged the Iraqi government to work quickly on sealing the border.

“The Iraqi government should act quickly to close illegal crossings between Iraq and Syria,” al-Shammari said.

He did not elaborate or say how many IS members have crossed into Iraq.

He said that some of them are still at large while others have

been detained.

There have been concerns in Iraq that the Turkish military operation against Kurdish fighters in neighbouring Syria might lead to the escape of Islamic State group prisoners from detention centres run by Syrian Kurdish fighters. Some 10,000 IS members are being held in prisons across territory in northern Syria.

Over the weekend, 780 supporters fled from a camp for the displaced in the town of Ein Issa.

On Wednesday, an official with an organisation that assesses terror threats in Belgium told a parliamentary committee that at least two Belgian militants fled their detention center in Syria.

Paul Van Tigcheld, head of Belgium’s threat analysis organ, OCAD, told the committee Wednesday: “We know about five (foreign terrorist fighters), three women and two men, who were in camps or prisons, and who are no longer there.”

THE TRIBUNE

Thursday, October 17, 2019, PAGE 15

HAITIAN FUNERALS TURN TO PROTESTS AS MOURNERS, POLICE CLASH

By EVENS SANON AND REBECCA BLACKWELL ASSOCIATED PRESS

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Police clashed with mourners Wednesday as thousands across Haiti attended funerals for protesters who have died in demonstrations aimed at ousting President Jovenel Moïse.

Funerals for 11 of at least 20 people killed were held in six cities, including the capital of Port-au-Prince, where at least two people were injured in a protest that broke out when presidential

guards tried to block a road near where hundreds had gathered around the coffins of two victims.

A group of mourners set one police car on fire, prompting police to fire dozens of rounds as most of the crowd fled. After the injured were taken to a hospital, some mourners with rocks chased away a fire truck that was trying to extinguish the blazing police vehicle.

At another funeral, mourners packed a church in the neighbourhood of Delmas and part of the crowd spilled into the street.

8 PC CHICKEN 1 LARGE FRIES 4 BISCUITS

Some women shouted, rocked back and forth and fell to the floor as people yelled, “Down with Jovenel!” and “Jovenel has to go!”.

Tyres burned in the street outside the church.

Among the mourners was 42-year-old Jean-Mary Daniel, who said the deaths won’t halt the demonstrations that have shuttered many schools and businesses for nearly five weeks.

“A soldier died, but that doesn’t mean you can destroy the army,” he said.

The funerals occurred one day after Moïse held a press

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conference and said it would be irresponsible for him to step down and he repeated calls for dialogue.

However, opposition leaders have rejected those calls and said they will keep organising demonstrations until Moïse resigns.

The protests are fueled by anger over corruption, inflation that has reached

20 percent and dwindling of basic supplies, including gasoline.

Sixty percent of the people in a country of nearly 11 million make less than $2 a day and 25% less than $1 a day.

The funerals were held a day after the U.N.’s Mission for Justice Support in Haiti ended its operations,

marking the first time since 2004 that there is no peacekeeping operation in the country. U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix told the Security Council that progress since 2004 has been “considerable, but the achievements of stability are still fragile and must be deeper rooted in democracy and development.”