Moonilal: Energy assets secure amid radar removal and global tensions

RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­[email protected]

Trinidad and To­ba­go’s en­er­gy in­stal­la­tions re­main se­cure de­spite ris­ing glob­al ten­sions and the re­cent re­moval of a Unit­ed States radar sys­tem from To­ba­go, En­er­gy Min­is­ter Roodal Mooni­lal said Mon­day.

Speak­ing with re­porters af­ter If­taar at the Debe Is­lam­ic As­so­ci­a­tion masjid, Mooni­lal said Gov­ern­ment has tak­en steps to pro­tect crit­i­cal off­shore and on­shore in­fra­struc­ture amid in­sta­bil­i­ty in­volv­ing the Unit­ed States, Is­rael and Iran.

He said he has held dis­cus­sions with De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge on en­er­gy sec­tor se­cu­ri­ty, giv­en the coun­try’s in­stal­la­tions in the Gulf and across its mar­itime space.

“But what I can say is that I’ve met with Min­is­ter Sturge to dis­cuss en­er­gy sec­tor se­cu­ri­ty. As you know, we have in­stal­la­tions in the Gulf, we have in­stal­la­tions off­shore and on­shore, crit­i­cal en­er­gy in­stal­la­tions,” he said.

Mooni­lal said Gov­ern­ment has al­so en­gaged multi­na­tion­al en­er­gy com­pa­nies op­er­at­ing lo­cal­ly to as­sess their se­cu­ri­ty readi­ness.

“We have met the multi­na­tion­al cor­po­ra­tions, con­cern­ing their se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures and the state of readi­ness there in terms of se­cu­ri­ty threats and so on,” he said.

“And we are as­sured that all is in place to se­cure all our en­er­gy in­stal­la­tions off­shore in our mar­itime space and on­shore,” he added.

For­mer prime min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley had raised con­cerns about na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty pre­pared­ness and the safe­ty of key en­er­gy in­stal­la­tions.

Mooni­lal de­clined to com­ment on the re­moval of the US radar sys­tem from To­ba­go, say­ing such mat­ters fall un­der the re­mit of the De­fence Min­istry and the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter.

“Mat­ters in­volv­ing na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty, as you know, are not un­der my purview. Those are mat­ters that Min­is­ter of De­fence Wayne Sturge and, of course, the Prime Min­is­ter, Chair­man of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, may share, de­pend­ing on the na­ture of those is­sues. So I pre­fer not to com­ment on that as well,” he said.

Dur­ing the vis­it, Mooni­lal al­so as­sist­ed with elec­tri­cal work at the mosque and was pre­sent­ed with a to­ken of ap­pre­ci­a­tion by Imam Ma­sood Mo­hammed.