PM Chairs Meeting on External Negotiations

Prime Minister the Most Hon. Portia Simpson Miller on Tuesday (July 3), chaired the Twenty-Third Meeting of the Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee (PMSC) on External Negotiations, at the Bay Gardens Hotel in Gros-Islet, St. Lucia.

The meeting, which was open to the media up to the start of the proceedings, was convened to: assess the Canada-CARICOM negotiations for a trade and development agreement; address concerns arising from the Fourth Meeting of the CARICOM-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement; discuss issues related to the Treaty to continued access of Caribbean Rum to the United States market; and make preparations for the upcoming review of the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA).

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Hon. A.J. Nicholson, who spoke on behalf of Jamaica, told JIS News after the proceedings, that “it was a very successful meeting,” but he could not divulge the course of action that the Prime Minister had suggested, based on the recommendations of the delegates, which included prime ministers and their technical team.

The CARICOM delegates are in St. Lucia for the four-day, Thirty-third Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), which ends on Friday, July 6.

By George Jude