Paramaribo, Suriname – Suriname’s military prosecutor Roy Elgin is proposing a tough prison sentence for President Desi Bouterse for his alleged role in the killing of 15 of his political opponents back in December 1982.
Elgin believes the former army leader should be jailed for 20 years.
Bouterse is accused of being responsible for the December 8, 1982 murders at Fort Zeelandia in the capital, Paramaribo, that served as the headquarters of the then military leadership.
Bouterse has claimed political responsibility for the murders since he was head of the military government at the time of the massacre, but has denied any personal involvement in the killings.
He has charged that the trial is politically motivated and has previously proposed the establishment of a special commission to determine the truth behind the so-called “December Murders”. Several attempts by President Bouterse to have the case dismissed have failed.
During the hearing last week, Eglin told the Military Court that Bouterse was behind the killings and had been in Fort Zeelandia when they were committed.
“The murders were planned properly and there was a script. It was premeditated,” said Elgin.
The prosecutor referred to statements of union leader Fred Derby who was the only one of 16 men, who had been arrested, who was not killed.
Derby died from a heart attack in 2001, but he had given a statement in December 2000, in which he said that it was Bouterse who had presided over a tribunal that decided who would die that night.
And Elgin said that even if Bouterse was not present in Fort Zeelandia, he could still be considered the culprit.
Elgin argued that there were enough statements from trustworthy witnesses to back his demand that Bouterse be jailed for 20 years.

St John's, Antigua – Citizens of Antigua and Barbuda travelling to the Canada will now require a visa.
On Monday of last week, the Canadian Government formally notified the Caribbean country that it was imposing visa restrictions, which took effect June 28.
“After carefully monitoring the integrity of Antigua and Barbuda’s travel documents, the Government of Canada has determined that Antigua and Barbuda no longer meets Canada’s criteria for a visa exemption,” a statement from the Communications Branch for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship of Canada said.
The Gaston Browne administration explained in a statement that the decision was taken in light of Canada’s prevailing concerns about the Citizenship by Investment Program (CIP).
“The Canadian High Commissioner to Antigua and Barbuda, stationed in Trinidad, advised Prime Minister Gaston Browne of this development late on Friday prior to an official announcement,” it said.
“At the time, the Canadian official said that a concern is that Antigua and Barbuda’s Citizenship by Investment Programme is not a residency programme.”
Prime Minister Browne has, however, defended the CIP programme, insisting there was “intense vetting”.
He acknowledged Canada’s concerns about security against the backdrop of increasing concerns about terrorism and refugees in North America and Europe, including evidence of ISIS recruits in the Caribbean, but assured that his Government would maintain a tight rein on the programme.
“Antigua and Barbuda would continue to be vigilant with its passports and border security,” he said.
The Prime Minister added that Antigua and Canada have already started working to make the system of visa applications and approvals for Antigua and Barbuda citizens as efficient and affordable as possible.
The Bahamas and Barbados are the only CARICOM states that continue to enjoy visa-free travel to Canada.

Washington, USA – Acclaimed theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking believes that US President Donald Trump has taken “the most serious and wrong decision on climate change this world has seen”, and top scientists agree, especially with respect to small island states like those in the Caribbean.
Experts say it was already likely that Earth’s temperatures and the world’s seas will keep rising to a point where some island states may not survive the next 100 years.
But they say that if the United States pulls out of the Paris global warming pact and doesn’t follow through on promised cuts in heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions, the likelihood increases.
At the beginning of last month, Trump said he’d withdraw the United States from the climate deal, prompting leaders of vulnerable islands to talk about their future with a mixture of hope, resignation and defiance.
“If we really push into action, we can save some (small islands) but we may not be able save all of them,” said Hans-Otto Poertner, a German scientist who chairs the climate impacts study group for the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
“The chances are even less with the US pulling out of the climate agreement in Paris.”
In some countries, it’s almost too late already: Palau ‘s environment minister F. Umiich Sengebau said he has no choice but to cling to hope.
“Right now some of the islands have disappeared,” he said. “And so if we continue this trend our very existence as small islands could very well disappear in many instances.”
The US State Department still maintains that it considers engagement with other counties on climate change important and it will continue, including with small island states.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said after Trump pulled out of the agreement that the US has cut its carbon dioxide emissions “dramatically” even before the Paris pact was reached.
Two years ago, when the Paris pact was being negotiated, small island nations successfully campaigned for a stricter but secondary target for limiting global heat-trapping emissions.
In 2009, world leaders adopted a goal to prevent 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) of warming since the industrial era started, saying 2 degrees is a dangerous level of warming.
The islands’ tougher goal would try to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial time.
The world has already warmed about 1 degree Celsius, so the small islands are really trying to prevent another half degree of warming Celsius (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit).
When Trump announced he would pull out of the Paris treaty, scientists said that made the 2 degree goal close to unachievable and the 1.5 degree goal even harder to attain.
Promised American pollution cuts were about one-fifth of the pledged global reductions hoped for in the accord.
Even if all the pact’s pledges were fully realized, it wouldn’t stop warming from hitting 2 degrees without even stricter actions in the future, according to computer simulations.
According to Kenrick Leslie, executive director of the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre:
“We are pushing the 1.5 (as a goal) but realistically I think we have passed the point that it can be achieved.”
Trump’s Paris pull-out, he said, has “thrown it right out the window.”
Studies have shown that the sea level rise over the past 10 years or so has accelerated compared to previous decades, said University of Colorado sea level expert Steve Nerem.
He estimates a metre of sea level rise by the end of this century and emphasizes it could be worse with ice sheet melts in Greenland and Antarctica.
“Anything over a metre is catastrophic for these small islands,’ Nerem said.
The islands don’t even have to be underwater to become uninhabitable, he indicated, because sea level rise will make them more vulnerable to high tides and storm surges.
Warming over 1.5 degrees is also likely to be devastating for coral reefs, which many islands are dependent on for fishing and tourism.
Besides rising seas that could swamp population centres and infrastructure like airports and seaports all over the Caribbean, the damage to reefs and fishing with increased warming will hurt Caribbean people in the pocketbooks and in their stomachs, several Caribbean climate officials have warned.

By Desmond Brown
Bridgetown, Barbados – A senior European Union (EU) official in the Caribbean said Europe is ready to continue the global leadership on the fight against climate change, including helping the poor and vulnerable countries in the region.
Underlining the challenges posed by climate change, Head of the European Union Delegation to Barbados, the Eastern Caribbean States, the OECS, and CARICOM/CARIFORUM, Ambassador Daniela Tramacere made it clear that the EU has no plan to abandon the extraordinary Agreement reached in Paris in 2015 by nearly 200 countries.
“Climate change is a challenge we can only tackle together and, since the beginning, Europe has been at the forefront of this collective engagement. Today, more than ever, Europe recognizes the necessity to lead the way on its implementation, through effective climate policies and strengthened cooperation to build strong partnerships,” Tramacere said.
“Now we must work as partners on its implementation. There can be no complacency. Too much is at stake for our common good. For Europe, dealing with climate change is a matter of political responsibility and multilateral engagement, as well as of security, prevention of conflicts and even radicalization. In this, the European Union also intends to support the poorest and most vulnerable.
“For all these reasons, the European Union will not renegotiate the Paris Agreement. We have spent 20 years negotiating. Now it is time for action, the world’s priority is implementation,” she added.
The 2015 Paris deal, which seeks to keep global temperature rises “well below” 2 degrees C, entered into force late last year, binding countries that have ratified it to draw up specific climate change plans. The Caribbean countries, the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries and the EU played a key role in the successful negotiations.
On June 1 this year, President Donald Trump said he will withdraw the United States from the landmark agreement, spurning pleas from U.S. allies and corporate leaders.
The announcement was met with widespread dismay and fears that the decision would put the entire global agreement in peril. But to date, there has been no sign that any other country is preparing to leave the Paris agreement.
Tramacere noted that together with the global 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, the Paris Agreement has the potential to significantly accelerate the economic and societal transformation needed in order to preserve a common future.
“As we address climate change with an eye on the future, we picture the creation of countless opportunities, with the establishment of new and better ways of production and consumption, investment and trade and the protection of lives, for the benefit of the planet,” she said.
“To accelerate the transition to a climate friendly environment, we have started to strengthen our existing partnerships and to seek and find new alliances, from the world’s largest economies to the most vulnerable island states. From the Arctic to the Sahel, climate change is a reality today, not a remote concept of the future.
“However, to deliver the change that is needed and maintain the political momentum, it is vital that the targets pledged by countries and their adaptation priorities are now translated into concrete, actionable policies and measures that involve all sectors of the economy. This is why the EU has decided to channel 40 percent of development funding towards climate-related projects in an effort to accelerate countries’ commitment to the process,” Tramacere said.
The EU has provided substantial funding to support climate action in partner countries and Tramacere said it will also continue to encourage and back initiatives in vulnerable countries that are climate relevant as well as safe, sustainable energy sources.
For the Caribbean region, grant funding for projects worth €80 million (US$89.7 million) is available, Tramacere said, noting that the aim is twofold: to improve resilience to impacts of climate change and natural disasters and to promote energy efficiency and development of renewable energy.
“This funding will be complemented by substantial financing of bankable climate change investment programmes from the European Investment Bank and other regional development banks active in the region. With the Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA) instrument, the European Union already works with agencies in the Caribbean such as the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) or the Caribbean Climate Change Community Center (5Cs),” Tramacere said.
In November this year, countries will gather in Bonn for the next UN climate conference – COP23 – to continue to flesh out the work programme for implementing the Paris Agreement.
Next year, the facilitative dialogue to be held as part of the UN climate process will be the first opportunity since Paris to assess what has been done concretely to deliver on the commitments made. These are key steps for turning the political agreement reached in Paris into reality.
“The challenges identified in the Paris Agreement are of unprecedented breadth and scale. We need enhanced cooperation and coordination between governments, civil society, the private sector and other key actors,” Tramacere said.
“Initiatives undertaken not only by countries but also by regions, cities and businesses under the Global Climate Action Agenda have the potential to transform the impact on the ground. Only together will we be able to live up to the level of ambition we have set ourselves – and the expectations of future generations. The world can continue to count on Europe for global leadership in the fight against climate change.”
Caribbean countries are highly vulnerable and a significant rise in global temperatures could lead to reduced arable land, the loss of low-lying islands and coastal regions, and more extreme weather events in many of these countries. Many urban in the region are situated along coasts, and Caribbean islands are susceptible to rising sea levels that would damage infrastructure and contaminate freshwater wetlands.

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