Bridgetown, BARBADOS, September 1, 2015. The Caribbean Export Development Agency (Caribbean Export), in collaboration with the Caribbean Association of Investment Promotion Agencies (CAIPA), will host their inaugural Caribbean Investment Summit on September 10, 2015 at the Courthouse Hotel, London, UK.

Focusing on 3 key industry sectors; renewable energy, business process outsourcing (BPO) and niche tourism, the Summit is set to provide a unique opportunity for the Caribbean to position its ‘shovel ready projects’ and investment propositions to potential investors from the UK and Europe.

The Caribbean has experienced a long history of foreign investment which has contributed to its development. The region is world renowned as a mecca for tourism and the winter playground for the world’s rich and famous but there is so much more to the Caribbean beyond tourism. Opportunities in renewable energy and the business process outsourcing sectors will be highlighted at the Summit, along with niche tourism opportunities. Over 100 high net worth individuals and investors are pegged to gather next week for the Summit where projects will be unveiled that are ready to receive investment.

Featured at the Summit will be a keynote address from the HE the Honourable Perry Christie, Prime Minister of the Bahamas. The Summit will also see strong support from the Financial Times who will MC the opening plenary and host the reception in the afternoon of the 10th, featuring an awards ceremony for the Caribbean winners of fDiMagazine’s Caribbean and Central American Countries of the Future 2015. The event promises to be a resounding success for the Caribbean with the attraction of new investment projects to the region. Caribbean Export and CAIPA already have their eyes set on the US market with a similar event planned for early 2016 when they ramp up activities to increase FDI flows into the Caribbean.

About Caribbean Export
Caribbean Export is a regional export development and trade and investment promotion organisation of the Forum of Caribbean States (CARIFORUM) currently executing the Regional Private Sector Programme (RPSDP) funded by the European Union under the 10th European Development Fund (EDF) Caribbean Export’s mission is to increase the competitiveness of Caribbean countries by providing quality export development and trade and investment promotion services through effective programme execution and strategic alliances.
More information about Caribbean Export can be found at www.carib-export.com. Contact: JoEllen Laryea, PR and Communications, Caribbean Export Development Agency, Tel: +1(246) 436-0578, Fax: +1(246) 436-9999,

Kentucky clerk jailed

Kim Davis ordered to jail despite 11th hour request for stay

By Kevin Truong From The Christian Monitor

The Kentucky county clerk appeared before a judge Thursday and was ordered to jail for defying an order to grant marriage licenses to same sex couples.

In an effort to stop Kim Davis from being held in contempt of court, the top Republican in the Kentucky state Senate has requested that a federal judge stay a ruling forcing the court clerk to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

State Senate President Robert Stivers filed a motion on Wednesday asking US District Judge David Bunning to give the state legislature the opportunity to pass legislation which would exempt Ms. Davis from issuing marriage licenses.

The state legislature is currently on recess and will not be in session until next year. Sen. Stivers argues that the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges has fundamentally changed the definition of marriage and lawmakers need time to catch statutes up to the new legal landscape.

The motion comes ahead of a scheduled hearing Thursday in which Judge Robert Bunning could hold Davis in contempt of court and decide to levy fines or place her under arrest.

“I’m surprised she hasn’t been held in contempt yet,” Brian Bix, a constitutional law professor at the University of Minnesota, told The Christian Science Monitor’s Patrik Jonsson. “I respect people’s sincere religious beliefs, but she has a job as a government official, and it’s not for her to refuse to do her job.”

After the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling on same-sex marriage in June, Democratic Kentucky Gov. Steven Beshear ordered all county clerks in the state to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Davis decided to take a moral stance and refuse not just issuing licenses to same-sex couples but to all couples.

She said that issuing licenses for same-sex couples would go against her religious beliefs and be a “searing act of validation [of gay marriage] would forever echo in her conscience,” her lawyers argued in court.

A federal district court ordered her to comply with the governor’s ruling and she remained defiant.

In a ruling last month, US District Judge Bunning wrote that the clerk “has arguably [violated the First Amendment] by openly adopting a policy that promotes her own religious convictions at the expense of others.”

Her effort to appeal the order to a federal court and even the Supreme Court went unheeded, effectively leaving her without any legal recourse.

Still Davis refused to issue licenses citing “God’s authority” as higher than that of the highest court in the land.

“Government officials are free to disagree with the law, but not disobey it,” US Attorney Kerry B. Harvey wrote in a statement on the eve of the hearing. “The County Clerk has presented her position through the federal court system, all of the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. It is time for the Clerk and the County to follow the law.”

Still, some experts say arresting Davis could backfire if she effectively becomes a martyr for her religious views, fomenting opposition against same-sex marriage.

The image of “a middle-aged woman being hauled off to jail for purportedly following her conscience would send thousands of anti-gay Americans reaching for their pitchforks (and checkbooks)” to support legal efforts to rebuff gay marriage rights, Mark Joseph Stern notes in Slate.

For more on this story go to: http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2015/0903/Kim-Davis-ordered-to-jail-despite-11th-hour-request-for-stay-video

See related iNews Cayman story published September 2 2015 “Defiant Ky. clerk ordered to court in same-sex marriage standoff” at: http://www.ieyenews.com/wordpress/defiant-ky-clerk-ordered-to-court-in-same-sex-marriage-standoff/