CASTRIES, St Lucia (CMC) - Caribbean Community (Caricom) leaders were yesterday mulling over the likely creation of an arbitration panel as a "new vehicle" to resolve conflicts between West Indies cricket's players and bosses.

"We want to make sure that there is established a proper - maybe if you want to say it loosely - arbitration panel to which matters can be referred to in the future so that conflicts between the West Indies Cricket Board and the West Indies Players' Association do not continue unresolved," St Kitts-Nevis Prime Minister Denzil Douglas told reporters in the corridors of the 26th Caricom Summit here. "This is extremely urgent for us."

The leaders have appointed St Lucia's Prime Minister Dr Kenny Anthony, who holds the governance portfolio in Caricom, to meet with the WICB and to work out how to introduce West Indies cricket as an associate institution of the Community, through the articles of the Treaty of Chaguramas, Caricom's constitution.

"From there we would be able to establish a particular vehicle and a framework that would allow the subcommittee of prime ministers on cricket to engage more definitely with the West Indies Cricket Board and attempt to develop a structured approach and a development plan for cricket in the future," Douglas added.

Douglas noted the eight-month-old outstanding issue of team sponsorship contracts with two rival multinational telecommunications firms with the players and administrators in the middle.

In the latest chapter of a long-standing and often rancorous impasse between WIPA and WICB, the board was forced to draft a second-string West Indies senior team to the tour of Sri Lanka beginning this weekend.

The contract deadlock cast a cloud of uncertainty over the recent home series. It was sponsored by Irish mobile phone operator Digicel.

Shortly after the series began, the WICB lifted a ban on players who signed contracts with British telecommunications giant Cable and Wireless, the home series' long-time sponsor until this year.

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