Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar has ex­pressed grat­i­tude to the Gov­ern­ment and peo­ple of St Vin­cent and the Grenadines fol­low­ing the res­cue of five Trinidad and To­ba­go fish­er­men af­ter the sink­ing of the fish­ing ves­sel ST VIN­CENT VII.

In an up­date is­sued to­day, the Min­istry of De­fence said the Prime Min­is­ter and the Gov­ern­ment thanked St Vin­cent for its as­sis­tance, prais­ing the coun­try’s re­sponse and the cour­te­sies ex­tend­ed to the crew dur­ing the res­cue op­er­a­tion.

The min­istry said the five sur­viv­ing crew mem­bers were trans­ferred from the MV MAR­VEL KITE to the St Vin­cent Coast Guard at a ren­dezvous point at about 10.22 pm on Tues­day be­fore be­ing tak­en to the Kingstown Cruise Ship Ter­mi­nal.