A.M. Costa Rica/Saray Ramírez Vindas

The doctor who cloned Dolly the sheep, attracted more attention Tuesday when he received a cloning license from British regulators that allows him to clone and study human embryos.

The license has stirred controversy around the world, particularly in Costa Rica and in the United States, where governmental officials are pioneering a proposal to ban cloning internationally. 

Ian Walmut, who led the team that created Dolly, was granted the cloning license. The experiments he is licensed to conduct do not involve the creation or clone babies. Rather, Walmut intends to clone embryos and extract stem cells from them.

Many scientists believe that stem cells hold the key to healing patients that suffer from motor neuron diseases, such as Alzheimer’s and Lou Gehrig’s disease. 

The embryos, however, will be destroyed after experimentation and that has many pro-life advocates upset. They believe that life begins upon conception and therefore, the destruction of embryos represents the destruction of human life.

Several couples in Costa Rica recently filed a suit with the Inter American Commision of Human Rights over a similar argument. They claim that Costa Rica’s law banning the use of in-vitro fertilization has prevented them from having families. This type of fertilization involves the growth of human embryos outside of the body, many of which are later discarded. 

Costa Rican officials will be watching the development surrounding the Walmut lisence carefully over the next month as they await the Inter American Commission’s March decision. 

Surf circuit continues
at Playa Dominical

The fourth leg of the 2004-2005 Circuito Nacional de Surf will take place Saturday and Sunday at Playa Dominical.  The contest, named "4 Fechas 4 Estrellas," begins at 7 a.m. in front of the Tortilla Flats Hotel. 

The contest is expected to draw more than 100 surfers. As an official event of the national circuit, the competition allows surfers to earn points towards the national rankings.

The event’s official announcement was delayed due to a lack of sponsorship, but organizers decided that they would have to run the event without a sponsor.

The first three events of the circuit were held in Esterillos, Negra and Tamarindo. For more information about the event or the circuit check out the Web site HERE.

More money coming
for banana farmers

Farmers affected by the recent floods in the Caribbean will be given $69,000 in financial aid. The Ministerio de Agricultura y Ganadería launched a campaign to help farmers affected by flooding. 

The donation will come from Central American Bank of Economic Integration, which will help small banana and plantain producers.
Walter Ruiz Valverde, the vice minister of Agricultura y Ganadería, said that the appoved amount will be distributed by the ministry. 

Democrats will hear
about political shifts

Political analyst Luis Guillermo Solís will explain the complexities of the current shifts in political parties to Democrats Abroad of Costa Rica Saturday, Feb. 26, at 9:30 a.m.

The topic of the talk is "Politics in Costa Rica: Chaos or Peaceful Revolution?"

The meeting is on the Fifth Floor of the Gran Hotel Costa Rica opposite the Teatro Nacional. A coffee break menu is 4,000 colons ($8.65), and reservations are required by calling Jo Stuart at 225-3101. Everyone is welcome, the group said.

The Municipalidad de San José approved a request by a construction company that resulted in forcing pedestrians to walk in a busy street.

The company, Gálvez y Volio Asociados S.A., is building a new hotel south of Avenida 3 just east of Parque Morazán. The municipality awarded the firm the right to construct a fence that takes in three meters (nearly 10 feet) of the sidewalk width for at least 50 meters (163 feet) in length.

Remaining is about two feet of the sidewalk, but that is spotted with utility posts and bushes. Pedestrians are warned by signs to use the opposite sidewalk, but there are no safe crossings in the area and only one traffic light to the east.

Guillermo Freer of the urban inspection department of the municipality confirmed Tuesday that the company 

Freer confirmed that his office had received one complaint from a female pedestrian. She said the fence was risking lives.

When Freer inspected the area, he said that he found that workmen had taken three meters of the sidewalk instead of the two and a half meters permitted by the municipality.

Freer said that the company estimates it will need four months to complete the job and remove the fence. He said he would not prevail on the company to make the route a little less dangerous for pedestrians.

However, he said that he asked the company to put up signs telling passers-by to use another route. The signs are on letter-size white paper and appear to be produced by a personal computer and printer.

The Costa Rican government announced Tuesday that it greeted the renewed peace effort between Israel and Palestine with high praise.

The announcement came after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas held a meeting in Egypt to declare a cease-fire agreement.

Abbas called the agreement a new opportunity for both the Palestinians and Israelis to renew their hope for peace. After the meeting, Abbas said that the agreement provides a "new opportunity for restoring the peace process and its momentum so that the Palestinian and Israeli peoples restore hope and confidence in the possibility for achieving peace." 

The Costa Rican announcement declared that the cease-fire is hopeful news and that it might lead towards further peace in the Middle East. The announcement also commended the bravery shown by both Sharon and Abbas in their determination to stop the suffering caused byfour years of violence.

Sharon urged Israelis and Palestinians not to allow this opportunity for peace to slip away. Over the past four years, ten cease-fire agreements have been reached. All of them failed to last.

The meeting was the first since Abbas succeeded Yasser Arafat, who died in November.

Problems still exist despite the agreement, however. Sharon acknowledged that both Israelis and Palestinians would have to give up some of their dreams in order to create a unified state. Abbas noted that several unresolved issues, including the imprisonment of 8,000 Palestinians, would also need to be handled.

Independent factions also present a problem. After the meeting ended, a spokesman for the Palestinian faction Hamas said it was not bound by the cease-fire agreement.