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Lead­ing Caribbean-born schol­ar in in­ter­na­tion­al re­la­tions and glob­al gov­er­nance, Pro­fes­sor Andy Knight, has cau­tioned that while T&T stands to ben­e­fit from joint train­ing ex­er­cis­es with the Unit­ed States Ma­rine Corps, the na­tion must care­ful­ly weigh the strate­gic costs as they re­late to its sov­er­eign­ty.

Speak­ing ex­clu­sive­ly to Guardian Me­dia, Pro­fes­sor Knight said, “The on­go­ing train­ing by US Marines in Trinidad and To­ba­go is part of a long­stand­ing part­ner­ship be­tween the US and TTDF to en­hance se­cu­ri­ty co­op­er­a­tion and build ca­pac­i­ty in ad­dress­ing com­mon threats like drug traf­fick­ing and gang vi­o­lence.”

Knight, who al­so served as di­rec­tor of the In­sti­tute of In­ter­na­tion­al Re­la­tions (IIR) at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI), not­ed the di­rect op­er­a­tional ben­e­fits of the ex­er­cis­es.