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So, it's a war on gangs - not the first time we've heard that one. The PM was quoting Salvadorean President Nayib Bukele today so we probed him on that:

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"Well we have always been very concerned about crime and in my meeting with President Bukele is that there was one thing that stood out when he said to me he said "Sin Paz no hay desarrollo" without peace we can't development. We can have the most thriving economy going but if we can't control crime in this country they are going to leave. Nobody is going to come to Belize. Tourists will not come, investments will not come, people in Belize are going to shut down investments. I say that not that we are not there no where close to that but to make the point that we are taking it very serious yesterday we have decided that we are going to go after these gangs and the law is very clear that if you are a gang member you can get ten years imprisonment and if you are the head of a gang member you can get as much as 20 years"

"We cannot allow a small group of people to terrorize this country and we we even talking about maybe even amending the law to ensure that once you are a gang member and found guilty that you are going to go to jail."

Jules Vasquez
"Is this a failure of Plan Belize, sir, to deliver citizen security?"

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"How could you ever say that Jules? I mean please..."

Jules Vasquez
"Duhhh."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"No I'm serious"

Jules Vasquez
"Sir look at San Ignacio, the doctors are being terrorized by gangsters."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"That would happen in any place it happens in the United States just yesterday in the United States they hijacked a bus, a public transport bus so for you to be able to say oh it is a failure because of something like that, that happens in every society, now the failure will be if we refuse to act. If you look at what we have been doing over the years we have been strengthening the police department we have been giving them more equipment we've given them more police we just agreed now to give them another amount, so we just approved another some more money for them to be able to continue to monitor the northern borders to ensure that the Kaborka gang or the cartel cannot come into Belize, so we are doing as something comes up we are acting on it."

Jules Vasquez
"Sir but would you say it is a failure of the minister of home affairs? In terms of if you say You've given all these things and yet you cannot compare a bus to a hospital. One of them is an institution for the health and well-being of people I am the other is a moving target. There is some type of fundamental failure if 10 days elapses and you don't know anything about this major security breach."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"Not sweating because of your question, but because in here is hot, and if the cameras were to show how much Jules is sweating, so it is not about the questions it is just hot. No it is not a failure, how can you act if you don't know, if your child misbehaves and nobody tells you is it a failure of you?"

Jules Vasquez
"No but something is broken in The Ministry Of Health."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"But the ministry the problem was is that these doctors were terrorized by these people and were afraid to speak out and they finally did so by the time you got your video we were already acting we were already hunting down these two individuals and also now we are going after all of those who were outside in the compound in a threatening manner. We have been acting and I don't see how you could hold the minister in charge of the police responsible for something like this."

Jules Vasquez
"You all shouldn't have to find out about these things on the beef. The commissioner said he found out about it on The Beef."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"But we did not find it out on The Beef, we did not."

Jules Vasquez
"Well the commissioner (said he) got it from us."

John Briceno, Prime Minister
"We found it out from within the ministry of health when they finally told the ministry of health and as soon as they told us we found out and we acted on it and I called the commissioner and I said we need to act on this immediately we can't let these people believe that they could get away with this."

Later in the news, we'll have a recap of the most recent events at SICH - and you'll hear exactly when the COMPOL said he heard about the story on Sunup, and not from the PM.