Authorities in Jamaica plan to establish an islandwide child-abduction alert system in the next few months, on the heels of a recent spate of kidnappings.

The decision, according to Robert Montague, Minister of State with responsibility for Local Government Reform in the Office of the Prime Minister, is out of concern from the increase of recent child abductions. Among them were last month's disappearances of Ananda Dean, 11, whose body was later recovered; Aamir Scott, 11, whose dissected remains were also later found; and Baggio Easy, 15, whose decomposing remains were found in water on the edge of a landfill. READ MORE...

WE HAVE LOST ONE OF THE GREAT SONS OF JAMAICAN MUSIC AND CULTURE WITH THE PASSING OF BYRON LEE – MINISTER GRANGE

The Honourable Olivia “Babsy” Grange, Minister of Information, Culture, Youth and Sports with responsibility for Entertainment, has said that she is deeply saddened by the passing of  Jamaican music pioneer and bandleader extraordinaire, Byron Lee, who died this morning.

Minister Grange said that undoubtedly Jamaica has lost another of its “great sons of our music and culture.”

She said that Byron Lee with his band, Byron Lee and the Dragonnaires, played a lead role in taking Jamaican music from the grassroots to the middle and upper echelons of Jamaican society and then to the rest of the world.

Minister Grange pointed to Byron Lee’s versatility in the music industry. “He a musician, bandleader, producer, music studio operator, promoter and the man responsible for Trinidad-style Carnival taking hold in the Jamaican cultural and entertainment landscape.”