Robinson
Independent investigative journalism & global affairs
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Security & stability
28 reports
International Affairs · Investigative Analysis
War-crimes allegations, emergency powers and the legal risks facing Trinidad and Tobago
Mexico and Spain have challenged Trinidad and Tobago’s use of emergency powers. Across the Caribbean, US boat strikes raise a harder question: when can a security partner become legally responsible for the operations it helps?
NOV. 10, 2026
Justice & Rights · Visual Analysis
Same-sex intimacy is not a crime: how Jason Jones defeated Trinidad and Tobago’s law
The Jason Jones judgment is not only a verdict on a colonial inheritance. It is a reckoning with the law Trinidad and Tobago made for itself — and the constitutional rights that law could no longer defeat.
NOV. 10, 2026
World Affairs · Data analysis
Lame duck in Washington, exposed in Port of Spain: the Republican collapse and the Government that bet on Trump
Kansas last elected a Democratic senator in 1932, Texas in 1988. Both did on Tuesday. The data show how deep the Republican losses ran, how fast the party has turned on Trump and Hegseth over Iran, and why a Government in Port of Spain that staked its foreign policy on one President now faces a Congress run by the party it derided.
NOV. 5, 2026
Foreign Affairs · Analysis
Trump's pen, America's verdict: the cost of tying Trinidad and Tobago to one man in Washington
Eight months after Donald Trump handed Kamla Persad-Bissessar one of his signing pens, American voters rejected his party and the war in Iran that her Government endorsed within hours. The record shows a foreign policy built around one American President, and what it has cost with CARICOM and at the UN.
NOV. 4, 2026
Foreign Affairs · Strategic Analysis
The plan to make Trinidad and Tobago Israel's primary Caribbean partner — and Port of Spain a Jewish centre
A Security Council seat creates the opening. Geography, gas, diplomatic investment and a proposed Jewish institutional base could make the relationship last well beyond 2028.
OCT. 5, 2026
State Power · Investigation
A new balance of power: how recent Bills and emergency powers are changing rights, press freedom and public oversight in Trinidad and Tobago
How recent Bills and emergency powers are changing access to information, press freedom, policing and public oversight in Trinidad and Tobago.
SEP. 29, 2026
Caribbean Affairs · Analysis
Mia Mottley’s bigger argument: the global financial system is pricing vulnerability backwards
Barbados is trying to turn the cost of vulnerability into a case for cheaper, longer and more useful finance. The test is whether the architecture changes—not merely its language.
SEP. 27, 2026
Public Money · Investigation
The watchdog may still investigate. The Procurement Bill would stop it from biting.
Trinidad and Tobago’s Procurement Bill reaches far beyond faster paperwork: it widens exemptions, restricts the regulator’s remedies and narrows the time suppliers have to challenge an award.
SEP. 26, 2026
National Security
The permit economy: what a closed area does to a block
Seven policing districts. A permit to enter or leave your own street. A $50,000 fine for getting it wrong. The Special Operations Bill’s heaviest costs fall on vendors, shift workers and anyone who talks to a reporter.
SEP. 23, 2026
Caribbean Affairs
Extrajudicial at sea: 234 dead, and a region that will not say the word
A United Nations rapporteur has called the Caribbean boat strikes serial extrajudicial killings. Two Saint Lucians are dead. Trinidad and Tobago declines to characterise any of it.
SEP. 23, 2026
National Security
Special Operations Bill: Kamla says UNC areas will get “hard policing”
The Prime Minister will authorise special operations in 26 UNC-held constituencies, 70 local government districts and two TPP-held seats. What it means for your home, business and freedom.
SEP. 21, 2026
Press Freedom
What the new Special Operations Bill could mean for press freedom
Clause 15 allows warrantless searches and the seizure of articles and documents, with no express protection for confidential journalistic sources or material.
SEP. 20, 2026
Press Freedom
The courts took six years to protect a source. The Bill would take the protection back.
In April the Court of Appeal held the police search of a newsroom unconstitutional. Five months later Parliament is asked to authorise searches with no warrant at all.
SEP. 19, 2026
International
Human rights are not defended selectively
Gaza, Sudan, Congo, the Uyghurs, the Rohingya and Armenia: the same principles apply to each of them, whether or not it is convenient.
SEP. 24, 2025
National Security
Government confirms fuel oil is leaking off Tobago
The Government now says the substance leaking from the Gulfstream is fuel oil, not crude. That supports the cargo assessment tested with TankerTrackers on 18 February. It settles nothing about the route, the owner or the purpose of the voyage.
FEB. 24, 2024
National Security
Names are circulating for the Gulfstream's owner. I am not publishing them.
Social media posts are naming possible owners of the barge and tug. I have not been able to confirm any of them, so I am not reporting them. The investigation continues.
FEB. 21, 2024
National Security
The Gulfstream: a barge without a number, a tug that vanished and a spill no one has claimed
Twelve days after oil came ashore at Cove, the barge has a name, the tug has a name, and nobody has accepted responsibility. What is known, what is not, and the questions the State has yet to answer.
FEB. 19, 2024
National Security
Thirteen days dark: what TankerTrackers told me about the tug, the bay and the cargo
I put detailed questions to TankerTrackers.com about the tug's missing transponder signal, its stay in Pozuelo Bay, the likely cargo and the vessel's past names. Their answers sharpen the questions the State has not answered.
FEB. 18, 2024
National Security
What the satellite images show, and what they do not
Open-source imagery shows a tug and barge together and an apparent slick south of Tobago. It identifies the vessels more firmly than the official account has. It does not yet say who sent them or why.
FEB. 16, 2024
National Security
The Tobago oil spill story is not adding up
The official account places the tug and barge on a voyage toward Guyana. Open-source tracking material tells a less tidy story. The sequence needs explaining.
FEB. 15, 2024
International
Gaza's dead journalists, and the evidence war leaves behind
Each name requires verification. Each strike requires investigation. The unprecedented toll cannot be reduced to a number or converted automatically into a finding of intent.
JAN. 8, 2024
Press Freedom
The spyware in a Dominican journalist's phone
Forensic analysis found Pegasus infections on Nuria Piera's device. It did not establish who ordered the surveillance.
JUN. 1, 2023
Press Freedom
Shireen Abu Akleh: the evidence pointed to the soldiers' position
The UN Human Rights Office examined the scene, recordings and witnesses. It found the shots that killed the Al Jazeera correspondent came from Israeli forces.
JUN. 24, 2022
Press Freedom
Eighty-four deadlines, and no answer for two murdered journalists
Ten years after Sagar Sarowar and Meherun Runi were killed at home in Dhaka, UN experts described a pervasive culture of impunity.
FEB. 11, 2022
Governance
Safe zones: public policy set by press conference
Restaurants, bars and gyms can reopen only to vaccinated customers. The rules arrived faster than the regulations behind them.
OCT. 12, 2021
National Security
A public health emergency, enforced as a security one
The state of emergency declared on 15 May puts a 9pm curfew in place across Trinidad and Tobago. How the police use their powers under it needs watching.
MAY 16, 2021
Governance
Coming home by exemption: a system with no published rules
Stranded nationals must apply to the Minister of National Security to return. The criteria for approval have not been made public.
JUL. 14, 2020
Press Freedom
Maria Ressa and the danger of making an old article newly criminal
A Philippine court treated a correction to a 2012 article as republication after the cybercrime law took effect. The result extended criminal exposure backward in time.
JUN. 15, 2020