The Minister of Labour, Home Affairs and Housing is focusing on issues of security and law enforcement at the annual CARICOM meeting.

Senator David Burch, along with Permanent Secretary Derrick Binns, is in St. John's, Antigua, for CARICOM's ninth meeting of the Council of Ministers responsible for National Security and Law Enforcement (CONSLE).

The focus is on issues of policing, crime prevention, cross border security and other law enforcement matters in the surrounding jurisdictions.

Also attending the meeting are national security ministers from countries such as Bahamas, Barbados, Jamaica, Haiti, Grenada, Trinidad and Tobago, and Antigua and Barbuda.

It is the third time Senator Burch has attended the forum and said it was an opportunity to inform other countries about what Bermuda is doing.

He said he will update his ministerial counterparts on "the strides being made here at home to combat the rising tide of gun violence as well as exchange regional ideas on battling crime".

Before Antigua, Senator Burch was in Cancun, Mexico, at the first Mexico-CARICOM summit. Held on February 21, the summit focused on helping victims of the Haitian earthquake.

The summit issued three Declarations on Haiti, Climate Change and wider cooperation between the countries. The second Summit will be held in Bridgetown, Barbados, in 2012.