~ Reportedly linked to Trinidad assassination plot ~
PHILIPSBURG--Two Israeli citizens arrested in Trinidad and Tobago with "fake" passports and allegedly connected in some way with a plot to assassinate the Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister and some members of her cabinet reportedly were treated leniently by Immigration officials here in St. Maarten.
The Trinidad Guardian newspaper reported earlier this week that the couple had escaped from their hotel in Trinidad under mysterious circumstances last week, five months after having been placed under tight security in the twin-island republic.
According to the newspaper, the two ? Robert (34) and Anastasia (28) ? were arrested first in St. Maarten after raising the suspicions of local airport authorities, but were allowed to board a plane to Trinidad and Tobago.
"St. Maarten did not do anything with them, so they came here (Trinidad)," the Trinidad Guardian quoted a source as saying.
The report also stated that the couple's arrest had been made possible thanks to an early warning received by the Trinidad and Tobago security services from the St. Maarten authorities.
They landed in Trinidad and Tobago on June 6 and were detained the next day while attempting to board a CAL flight to Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
When contacted separately by The Daily Herald Tuesday about the Guardian report, neither Minister of Justice Roland Duncan nor Head of Immigration at Princess Juliana International Airport Geronimo Juliet had any recollection of an incident involving an Israeli couple.
Minister Duncan said he wasn't aware of such a case, but believed that if such an incident had occurred, a report would have been filed. He also explained that while he couldn't recall the exact process involved, in cases in which persons with fake documents were intercepted here, they all eventually were repatriated to their countries of origin.
Juliet said the term "St. Maarten authorities" did not specifically point to Immigration and while he couldn't recall the particular case, he was almost certain that he had not made any passport-related calls to Trinidad and Tobago.
Both Duncan and Juliet said they needed time to research the reports and to review exactly why the persons had been released, if such an event had occurred.
Meanwhile, according to the Guardian, which said the Trinidad and Tobago authorities were looking into suspicions that the Israeli couple "were somehow involved in a plot to assassinate Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar and four members of her cabinet," when asked how the couple had managed to escape it was told by its source: "We don't know how they absconded. Knowing that they have been under watch for this length of time and are well financed, it would have been easy for them to corrupt someone. That is my suspicion."
Another fact adding to the mystery associated with the couple is that they escaped on November 20, days before Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar announced that police had thwarted a plot to assassinate her and four members of her cabinet.
The couple, whose pictures appeared in the Trinidad Guardian report, told Ynet (an Israeli online news site) on Tuesday that their passports had been stolen from their home in Rishon Lezion about half a year ago.
About a month later, the husband received a surprising phone call from Ben-Gurion Airport's passport control. "They told us that someone tried to board a plane with our passports and that the people were arrested. That's the first time we realised that our passports had been stolen," he said.
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