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As T&T and the wider Caribbean await an of­fi­cial re­sponse to re­ports that two na­tion­als were among six peo­ple killed in a Unit­ed States ki­net­ic strike off Venezuela’s coast, Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge avoid­ed ques­tions from the me­dia on the mat­ter yes­ter­day.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar was ac­com­pa­nied by sev­er­al Cab­i­net col­leagues at the Ca­roni Lease Dis­tri­b­u­tion Cer­e­mo­ny Part II, held at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre in St Ann’s. Among those present were Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath, Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter Ravi Rati­ram, En­er­gy Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal, Health Min­is­ter Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Michael Dowlath, and Hous­ing Min­is­ter David Lee.

At the end of the cer­e­mo­ny, the Prime Min­is­ter was es­cort­ed away from a me­dia hud­dle that had been set up to pose ques­tions. She paused briefly, say­ing on­ly that she was on her way to a vir­tu­al Cari­com meet­ing be­fore a Cab­i­net ses­sion ahead of to­day’s bud­get de­bate.