Police at Juan Santamaría International Airport detained a man and found 238,000 colons in doctored exit permits Friday. That’s more than $600.

The arrest came from an operation in which police tried to check the exit permits of all outbound air travelers Friday morning, according to a report from the Ministerio de Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública.

Costa Rican officials always complained that the country was losing money due to exit permits recycled by crooks at the airport, but the seizure Friday is the biggest in recent memory. The permit is a piece of paper to which postage-like stamps are affixed. 

Police intended to locate exit permits that travelers had purchased outside the airport where officials and vendors are in a constant state of conflict. Officials say that is where many of the recycled stamps attached to the permits are sold.

Police said they encountered a suspicious document being carried by a U.S. citizen they identified as Mr. Howell, a tourist. However, the man told police that he did not purchase the 

Police investigators went to the nearby hotel, which they did not name, and interviewed the manager who told them that a man would visit later in the morning to sell the hotel more exit permits. The transactions are handled by a travel agency located in the hotel.

At 11 a.m. the man showed up, and police, in conjunction with hotel security, detained him, they said. He was identified by his last name of Vargas. Police said he was 44 years old.

During the arrest, police said they took 12 permits with exit stamps attached from the man. These were valued at 70,000 colons or $17 each, said police.

Police said stamps used on two of the permits had been cut in half or scanned to resemble unused stamps that had not been canceled.

Later police located 27 additional permits that are suspect, they said. The suspect has an open charge for the same offense pending since 1998, investigators said.

A British man was detained Saturday in Panamá by the country’s national police based on a red alert posted by the French branch of the International Police Agency (INTERPOL), according to news reports. 

Ian Calvert Bleasdale, 62, who lived some months in Costa Rica, was wanted for crimes relating to fraud, falsification of documents and sexual crimes against minors, reported the Panamanian daily newspaper El Panamá América.

The report claimed Costa Rican authorities had issued an arrest warrant for Bleasdale, too. 

Bleasdale left Europe for Central America after he learned he was under investigation, though it is not clear when. The charges of fraudulent activity in Europe are associated with various companies he was involved with, said the report.

Bleasdale is now in the custody of the Panamanian authorities awaiting extradition to either France or Costa Rica. Officials from those countries will travel to Panamá to take part in the extradition proceedings.

A search of Interpol’s Web site did not produce information on any outstanding warrants for Bleasdale’s arrest. 

BUENOS ARIES, Argentina — The government here has summoned a top Iranian diplomat for questioning in a growing dispute over the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center here. The blast left 85 people dead and more than 200 others injured. 

Just days after a judge asked Interpol to arrest four other Iranian diplomats suspected of playing a role in the blast, officials summoned Monday Iran's business attaché here, Mohammed Ali Tabatabaei. 

They say they want the envoy to explain what Tehran meant when it vowed to "take appropriate action" if the warrants are not withdrawn. The envoys in question worked at the Iranian Embassy at the time of the bombing. 

Iran has long denied having anything to do with the attack on the community center. The incident took place two years after another blast destroyed the Israeli Embassy here, killing nearly 30 people. Like the community center case, the embassy bombing remains unsolved. 

Argentina's 300,000 strong Jewish community is the largest in Latin America. 

Leftist group denies
bombing involvement

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — The country’s largest rebel group has denied responsibility for a car bomb explosion last month in a social club that killed 36 people and injured about 160 others. 

In a statement posted on its web site, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia said that after conducting what it called a "patient, rigorous and earnest investigation," it determined not a single one of its members or units participated in the attack. 

The statement claimed the Colombian government planted the bomb then blamed the group in an attempt to unite the country against the rebels. 

But Attorney General Luis Camilo Osorio said Monday the government has evidence linking the group to the bombing. 

The attack on the exclusive El Nogal Club Feb. 7 was the worst terrorist attack here in more than a decade. 

Americas unite to discuss
electoral technology

WASHINGTON, D.C. — An Organization of American States meeting in Panama City this week will bring together senior elections officials from twenty member states to examine the challenges facing the Americas in the area of electoral technology. 

The Inter-American Meeting of Electoral Authorities, scheduled for March 12 to 14, will also review the experience with electronic voting in Brazil as well as horizontal cooperation through the organization to bring the technology on stream in Paraguay. 

The agenda includes as well the experience with electronic voting and horizontal cooperation in Europe, the question of technological adaptation, and awareness by citizens and political organizations, with an emphasis on transparency, security and confidence in electoral systems. 

Specific topics to be addressed include the implementation of electronic voting, technological advances by country and their impact on election organization, the social face of technology, and the advances, successes and goals of computerization procedures being applied to election organizing. 

The organization is sponsoring the upcoming Inter-American Meeting of Electoral Officials through the Unit for the Promotion of Democracy’s Area of Strengthening Electoral Processes and Systems.

Vendor turns tables
in Heredia robbery

Three men held up a vegetable vendor in Barrio El Molino in Heredia Saturday, but one robbery suspect ended up shot and a second was arrested, police said.

The three men pulled up in a car to threaten the vendor, Leonel Sánchez Valverde, with a sharpened screwdriver. The robbers took two gold chains the man was wearing, according to a report.

A witness told police that the vendor managed to escape from the three men, got into his nearby vehicle and pulled out a gun.  Injured was suspect Luis Brenes Cordero, 48, police said. Sánchez denied that he had a gun, and police were unable to locate one when they investigated.

However, Fuerza Pública officers did grab one Uba Fernández, 38,   The case now is in the hands of the Judicial Investigating Organization.

Tucked away in a Cuidad Colón side street, Carla’s Café and Laundry Club takes the imagination on a journey through little country towns in bygone years.

Nestled in between rustic shacks passing for stores, on a dusty street swimming with a mixture of young and old Costa Ricans, the café is easily missed, inseparable from its surroundings.

The café is in what is best described as a living room. And in fact the café is part of the apartment of the Oklahoman owners, Carla and David Clawson. It does have a genuine homey feel to it. 

Mrs. Clawson, 50, said the idea of the café was an accident. She said she used to do a home catering service — as well as laundry service — making food in the couple’s old house up in the hills and delivering it to the homes of customers.

She said: "Once they found out we were here, [when] it became our house, everybody just showed up." The café opened about two weeks ago.

Every Sunday, said Mrs. Clawson, they even have a barbecue cookout, which invariably results in a whole array of food.

The café seems more like a bit of fun for Mrs. Clawson. She said as long as she can afford to pay the young Costa Rican who works in the café and cover the cost of food, she is happy.

Carla Clawson of Ciudad Colón

A.M. Costa Rica/Bryan Kay

She also still does ex-pats’ laundry. She estimates two to three customers per day.

"It’s catching on, it’s not making a lot of money but it’s paying itself," she said.

Mrs. Clawson says: "We have something different every day," after saying that ex-pats get a little tired of the food here sometimes. Indeed, the food at the café is good home cooking, including goulash.

Carla’s Café and Laundry Club is near to the Internet café in the center of Cuidad Colon.

This newspaper seeks the prompt return of two men who ran high-interest investment operations that have gone out of business.

Luis Enrique Villalobos Camacho, 62, was associated with Ofinter S.A., a money exchange house, and with his own private investment business that had about $1 billion in other people’s money on the books.

Villalobos closed his business Oct. 14 and vanished.

Louis Milanes operated Savings Unlimited and several casinos in San José. He left the country with other members of his firm the weekend of Nov. 23. He may have as much as $260 million in his possession. Both operations catered to North Americans.

Villalobos and Milanes are the subjects of international arrest warrants.  Associates of both men have been jailed.

A.M. Costa Rica has posted a $500 reward for information leading to the detention of either man with the hopes that others will make similar pledges. The newspaper believes that investors only will see some of their money when the two men are in custody.

Milanes has few supporters in San José. On the other hand, as the letters frequently on this page show, Villalobos still has supporters who believe that he will reappear and settle his debts. They believe he is in hiding because of a predatory Costa Rican government.