Trinidad’s leader backtracks and says US Marines are in the country working on airport radar

PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad (AP) – The prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago retracted comments where she asserted that no U.S. Marines were currently in the twin-island nation – a development that comes as the U.S. government seeks allies amid ongoing strikes on suspected drug traffickers in the Caribbean and beyond.

Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar told reporters Thursday that U.S. Marines were at the airport on the island of Tobago working on its radar, runway and road just days after she said they had left.

“They will help us to ­improve our surveillance and the intelligence of the radars for the narco-traffickers in our waters and outside our waters,” she said, without providing details.

Trinidad and Tobago’s attorney general, and the ministers of defense and homeland security did not immediately return messages seeking comment on Friday.

It was not clear if the U.S. government plans to use the radar that they’re working on at the Tobago airport.

It also wasn’t clear whether they were installing a new radar or upgrading the current one.

Persad-Bissessar met Wednesday with Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and U.S. President Donald Trump’s primary military adviser, who traveled to Trinidad and Tobago.

A day after the visit, Persad-Bissessar told reporters that Trinidad had not been asked to be a base for any attack against Venezuela, and that Venezuela was not mentioned in recent conversations with the U.S.

Officials in Tobago have confirmed that at least one U.S. military plane recently touched down on the island, saying it was for the purpose of refueling.

Earlier this year, the U.S. approached the eastern Caribbean island of Grenada asking if they could install a temporary radar at its main international airport, but officials there have not said whether they would authorize such a move.

Grenada, like Trinidad and Tobago, is located close to Venezuela, with some experts saying that the ongoing U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean, the largest in generations, is a tactic to force Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to resign.

Earlier this week, the president of the Dominican Republic, Luis Abinader, announced that he would allow the U.S. government temporary access to restricted areas at an air base and at the Caribbean country’s main international airport to help the U.S. in its ongoing fight against drug trafficking. He made the announcement with U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at his side.

The U.S. strikes that began in early September have killed at least 83 people.