ST. GEORGE’S, GRENADA: Prime Minister Keith Mitchell held a meeting Friday afternoon with President of the Grenada Media Workers Association (MWAG) Carla Briggs and Newspaper editor Leslie Pierre in an apparent attempt to mend the current feuding with the local media. Accompanying Briggs and Pierre was Ainsley Sahai of the Caribbean Publishers Association. The meeting came against the backdrop of threats against the local media for reporting on allegations that Prime Minister Mitchell might have received money illegally during a 2000 European trip, and the recent detention of a journalist for questioning over an article he wrote. Sahai had met earlier in the day with the executive of MWAG, though Briggs did not make herself available for the meeting. He was also scheduled to meet with journalists Leroy Noel and Odette Best, who have been at the center of the ongoing controversy with the government. But there was added significance in the meeting with Prime Minister Mitchell and Briggs, which has already raised some eye-brows in the association itself. MWAG, which held a meeting Friday at which the President was not present, said it was not aware the Briggs was invited to such a meeting, and that it might have been ill-advised for her to attend alone. The first time the rest of the executive heard of the meeting was in a Friday afternoon statement from the Office of the Prime Minister. Briggs was out of the island when the recent controversy broke, and appears to have been at odds to the some of the decisions the entire executive took on the controversy in her absence. Other executive members of MWAG say they fear Friday’s meeting was an attempt by the Prime Minister to “divide and rule” media workers who have stood up to his government’s attempt to “intimidate” the local media. They count as added significance the decision to invite Briggs along with Pierre, the editor of the Grenadian Voice newspaper, who has refused to publicly back MWAG’s stance on the matter. MWAG’s executive meeting Friday, which Briggs did not attend, was called to discuss the current “threats” facing the media, as well as to brief Sahai. Coming out of that meeting, it was decided that letters should be sent immediately to Prime Minister Mitchell, expressing concern to the way a coverage team from the Grenada Broadcasting Network was threatened at his recent party’s general council. The letter, sent out Friday afternoon at the same time the Prime Minister was meeting with association’s president, was signed by its secretary Ray Roberts. It said the recent hostility shown to the GBN team is the continuation of a pattern of hostility to journalists covering NNP events dating back to 1995. The issue of Briggs’ unsanctioned meeting with the Grenadian leader is expected to be raised Saturday when MWAG meets in emergency session. President of the Association of Caribbean Media Workers, Wesley Gibbings is expected to attend that meeting. Following Friday’s meeting with the media officials, the Prime Minister’s office issued an official statement. It quoted the Prime Minister as saying that members of the press have a responsibility to be “as impartial as possible” and should not allow themselves to be used by politicians and political activists or anyone else seeking to influence what is printed or aired. “The Prime Minister noted that some of the recent allegations about him in some local media outlets, for which no clarification was sought, have been repeated in the regional media without anyone bothering to check for verification,” the release said. “Freedom of speech should not interfere with one’s right to defend one’s character,” the Prime Minister was also quoted as saying. SOURCE: CARIBUPDATE.COM