CARICOM Heads, currently meeting in Georgetown, Guyana, have announced that Ambassador Gail Mathurin, a Jamaican, will be the head of a new regional negotiating body.

Mathurin's appointment has come as a result of a decision by CARICOM to absorb the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) into the CARICOM Secretariat.

The CRNM has been redesignated the Office of Trade Negotiations.