PM withdraws from Commonwealth meeting

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has with­drawn from the Com­mon­wealth Heads of Gov­ern­ment Meet­ing in An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, hours af­ter the Min­istry of For­eign and CARI­COM Af­fairs con­firmed she would at­tend.

A state­ment from the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter con­firmed that For­eign and CARI­COM Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers will rep­re­sent Trinidad and To­ba­go. No rea­son was giv­en for the change.

For­mer For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Dr Amery Browne crit­i­cised the Prime Min­is­ter's at­ten­dance record at im­por­tant re­gion­al meet­ings and in­ter­na­tion­al sum­mits.

He ref­er­enced her ab­sence from the CARI­COM Heads of Gov­ern­ment re­treat in Nevis ear­li­er this year and de­scribed her as hav­ing the "low­est work eth­ic in our his­to­ry".

Browne al­so ques­tioned whether the Prime Min­is­ter's pres­ence in Trinidad or An­tigua would make any dif­fer­ence to or­di­nary cit­i­zens.