FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Anesia Baptiste Democratic Republican Party (DRP) Tel# 1-784-456-6257, 1-784-528-1015 E-mail: democraticrepublicanpartysvg@gmail.

com Website: www.democraticrepublicanpartysvg.com 29th August, 2013

US CONGRESS BILL HR 1687 DOES NOT SANCTION ST. VINCENT & THE GRENADINES

Leader of the Democratic Republican Party Anesia Baptiste is calling upon the New Democratic Party to desist from misleading the public concerning US Congress Bill HR 1687 and its implications for Vincentians and St. Vincent and the Grenadines on a whole. This as the information coming from the New Times program of Thursday 29th August, 2013 suggested the US congress Bill would affect Vincentians negatively as a result of the Countrys membership in ALBA. According to the www.govtrack.us website, the bill which is to be called Countering ALBA Act 2013 threatens, imposition of sanctions with respect to foreign persons responsible for or complicit in ordering, controlling, or otherwise directing, the commission of serious human rights abuses against citizens of ALBA countries, and for other purposes. The sanctions will include the denial of visas, against "officials in ALBA countries who are involved in serious human rights abuses", this according to a news item posted on the 27th April earlier this year on the democraticunderground.com website.

However, Baptiste wishes to point out that on reading the actual text of the bill, clause 2 defines the terms ALBA Countries and ALBA Governments as only 4 of the current members of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas; Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Ecuador. It is clear that none of the Eastern Caribbean members of ALBA such as St. Vincent and the Grenadines, is targeted by the law, Baptiste argued. The four (4) countries are listed for human rights abuses which the US congress bill is proposing they have found their annual freedom and other reports; abuses such as political prisoners, inhumane conditions leading to death in prisons, discrimination against ethnic minorities and physical aggression against journalists and other abuses which are all listed in clauses within section 3 of the bill called Findings The DRP leader is concerned that the message coming out from the NDPs New Times Program today (29th August, 2013) only served to drum up the fears of the people in an effort to score a political point against the Gonsalves led ULP which has facilitated SVGs membership into ALBA. While the DRP has difficulty with ALBAs policies, it finds the message coming from the NDP irresponsible and misleading. Its message is not based on research and factual information and cannot be trusted. Neither St. Vincent and the Grenadines, nor Vincentians are affected by this US congress bill, according to its text. Baptiste declared. About Anesia Baptiste Anesia Baptiste is the founder of the newest political party in St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) called the Democratic Republican Party (DRP). She is the holder of a 1998 Island Scholarship and a 2013 graduate of the University of London International programmes with a Bachelor of Laws Degree- LLB (Hons). Baptiste also holds a Double Master Degree in Hotel & Tourism Management from the Vatel Institute in Nimes and the French state University of Perpignan in France, and is also the holder of a Bachelor of Arts Degree in French from the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine. One of few young women political activists in SVG, Baptiste was honored among the Top 100 Global Women in the International Womens Day March 8th 2013 edition of the Washington based Diplomatic Courier International Affairs magazine. In SVG Baptiste hosts a weekly Television program called Serving the People, frequently hosts TV show The Rights of the People by the Thusian Institute for Religious Liberty and has authored one book- Socialist Revolution: From Grenada to St. Vincent. For
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