Kidnappers grabbed a 13-year-old girl in Alajuelita April 15, but agents finally were able to liberate her Wednesday night when they raided a home where she was held.

A spokesman for the Judicial Investigating Organization said that the kidnappers and the stepfather of the girl negotiated for days via the telephone. The stepfather is a Quepos businessman involved in the bus transportation business.

The girl, Daniela Gómez, was rescued safe and sound after agents detained two suspects when they tried to pick up a promised ransom about 9 p.m.. That happened in Plaza America in Hatillo. Kidnappers originally demanded 70 million colons, 
 

Two persons were detained when police raided a dwelling in Barrio Verbena in Alajuelita to rescue the child. Held were three men and a 52-year-old woman with the last name of Cascante. She was described as the leader. The men’s last names and ages are Bonilla, 28, Rodríguez, 28 and Campos, 29.

The girl lives in Quepos but was visiting Alajuelita. She was in the company of the Cascante woman, a family friend, when the kidnapping took place, agents said.

The girl told investigators that the kidnappers always wore ski masks when they entered the room in which she was being held.

Kazuaki Tanahaski, a painter, storyteller and author, will be the guest Sunday in the Wisdom Garden at Unity, Piedades, at 10 a.m.

The visitor will be bringing nine other persons with him, including a musician with a unique instrument, said a spokesperson.

Unity is 350 meters south of the Shang Hai Restaurant in Piedades de Santa Ana. More information is available at 203-4411.

Motorcycle club plans
big weekend rally

The Gitanos Motorcycle Club is hosting an international rally of like-minded riders this weekend. The headquarters is the Hotel Best Western Irazu where a variety of motorcycles will be on display until Sunday.

Bikers have come from all over Central America, Curaçao and Aruba.

The local club, predominately of English speakers, supports two primary charities, a home for the elderly and a children’s foster home.

Boy dies from blast

An 8-year-old boy died Wednesday when his brother, 6, accidentally shot him in the chest with a shotgun. The mishap took place in Aguas Arcas de la Bomba in Limón about 6:30 p.m.

The dead boy was identified as Jamaire Duarte Rodríguez.

Investigators said the family purchased the weapon to kill a wildcat that roamed the area.
 

Fiesta in Atenas

The Feria del Clima kicks off today in Atenas. It will run until May 1.

The high point will be the oxcart parade that traditionally is celebrated the last Sunday in April, which is this weekend.

Atenas boasts the best climate in Costa Rica, hence the name of the festival.

Solar energy exhibition

The 14th Fiesta del Sol will be held today, Saturday and Sunday at the Casa del Sol in Santa Bárbara de Santa Cruz. Various organizations, including the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad will be there to discuss tapping solar energy.  Information; 681-1015 or soldevida@racsa.co.cr

Companion set on fire

A woman doused her companion with flammable fluid about 3 p.m. Thursday at an apartment in Escazú. Then she ignited the fluid, according to investigators. The man, identified as Marvin Salgado Martínez was reported in very critical condition in Hospital México.

Cuba cites blackmail
in withdrawing motion

GENEVA, Switzerland — Cuba has withdrawn a resolution it proposed last week at the U.N. Human Rights Commission that accused the United States of abuses at Guantanamo Bay. 

Cuban Ambassador Jorge Mora Godoy accused Washington of using "threats and blackmail" to ensure the resolution would not pass if sent to a vote. 

He said at the commission meeting Thursday that the U.S. administration used, "fascist practices" to pressure Western and Latin American countries to reject the proposal. The United States had no immediate comment on the accusations. 

Cuba was calling for an investigation into alleged arbitrary detentions at Guantanamo, where about 600 al-Qaida and Taleban suspects are being held without trial or access to legal council. Most of them were captured during fighting against the former Taleban regime in Afghanistan. 

Cuba proposed the resolution last week after the commission narrowly approved a U.S.-backed resolution calling on Cuba to respect fundamental civil rights. That resolution also asks Cuba to allow a U.N. monitor into the country, something the Communist island nation has repeatedly refused to do.

Nelson Torres Fitzpatrick is Puerto Rican in his heart, even though he is living here. So Thursday he stationed himself outside the Asamblea Nacional in the hopes of seeing that U.S. commonwealth’s governor and of taking her photo.

He was the only civilian there, even though there were police, guards, reporters and lawmakers in the area.

When members of the governor’s entourage found out that he was there, they made sure that the governor found out, too.

So Gov. Sila María Calderón not only agreed to a photo, she brought Torres into the photo where both beamed for the camera.

Then the governor was off to reopen the Puerto Rican trade office. President Abel Pacheco suggested reopening the office when he visited Puerto Rico a year ago, according to Casa Presidencial. He participated in inaugurating the office, which is in the Oficentro del Este.

A previous office was closed in 2001. Gov. Calderón said that she wants to consolidate relations with Costa Rica. Pacheco was scheduled to decorate her with the Orden Nacional Juan Mora 

Fernández with the grade of Gran Cruz Plata de Oro in a ceremony Thursday evening.

The governor is leading a trade delegation that has scheduled meetings with various sectors of Costa Rican society over two days.

JUAREZ, México — Mexican police have arrested alleged Guatemalan drug trafficker Otto Herrera, who is described by U.S. officials as Central America's most wanted drug smuggler. 

Authorities arrested the Guatemalan native at Mexico City's Juárez International Airport Wednesday. 

He is suspected of using planes, speedboats, and trucks to move Colombian cocaine through Central America en route to the United States. 

Mexican Attorney-General Rafael Macedo de la Concha said that the arrest will help break up the leadership of a criminal organization linked to the most significant transfer, distribution and sale of narcotics in Central America. 

Mexican officials have also announced the arrest of three of Herrara's alleged accomplices. Officials said that the suspects were picked up in the resort town of Cancun.

CARACAS, Venezuela —  Police have arrested at least eight people for allegedly making fake passports and identification cards.

The suspects were picked up during raids at multiple locations in the Venezuelan capital.

The raids came just days after U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson accused the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez of not doing enough to stop widespread sales of false passports. He said that 

After a three-day visit to Venezuela, Nelson also said that Washington may soon have to treat the Chavez government as hostile to U.S. interests. 

Nelson cited allegations that Venezuela supports leftist Colombian rebels and concerns that President Chavez is trying to block an opposition effort to force a recall referendum on his rule.
Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel has dismissed these allegations as untrue. 

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A rebel commander who helped lead the country's February uprising has turned himself in to authorities. 

The convicted murderer and former paramilitary commander, Louis-Jodel Chamblain, surrendered Thursday to face charges.

Chamblain had pledged to turn himself in after meeting with rebel leaders, justice officials, Haitian police, and members of the country's multinational security force. 

Human rights groups have criticized the country's new interim leadership for not doing enough to reign in criminals.

The 160-year-old signaling system of long and short tones called morse code seems antiquated in this age of the Internet and wireless voice communications. But morse code isn't dead yet. In fact, it even made news this past week . The United Nations agency that oversees the worldwide audio-frequency spectrum has approved the first new morse code signal since World War II, 60 years ago. 

Now there is a dots-and-dashes version of the @ sign that millions of people use daily in their computer e-mail addresses.

There's a name for the morse code version of the little a, wrapped in a pigtail, that you find above the number two on English-language keyboards. It's called the commat, short for the 'commercial at' sign. When they were talking in morse code and wanted to exchange e-mail addresses, hams, as the estimated three million amateur radio aficionados around the world are called, used to have to spell out the word "at": a -- t. 

But there was a problem. If you tap out "at" too fast in morse code, the symbol for "a" and the symbol for "t" run together and form, not "at", but the letter "w". Hence the need for an entirely different Morse signal for the at sign. The @ now can be sent in code as o — — o — o or dot dash dash dot dash dot.

The approval of a new morse code for the @ symbol is a reminder that the code still plays a role in modern communications, including the well-known S.O.S. Many people have seen vintage or new versions of the movie Titanic, or naval wartime films, in which the radio operator of a stricken ship frantically taps out a distress signal.

Old-time mariners like Morris Blum, 94, of Annapolis, Maryland, know the universal call for help well. Mr. Blum learned Morse code in the Boy Scouts in the 1920s and used it often during long careers in the Navy and as a civilian ship's radio operator. He says he never actually sent an S.O.S.

"... thank heaven! But I was out at sea in the mid-30’s when the S.S. Morro Castle, a passenger liner, caught on fire and burned in the Atlantic when she was off the New Jersey coast," Blum said. "They lost a lot of lives. I was on a small passenger ship nearby, and I got the S.O.S., sent it up to the bridge. We didn't go because they had plenty of people around their ships. And they beached the thing anyhow in New Jersey, on the sands."

Another time, Blum took in an S.O.S from a Dutch freighter, carrying a cargo of wild animals. It seems a lion had escaped and was roaming the decks, and crewmen were cowering in their rooms. He said, "The radio operator sent out a message, 'Any ship with guns, please answer.'"

It is amateur radio operators who are keeping the code alive.

Ham Radio Dave Patton, an official of the American Radio Relay League, which is the national association of hams, explains that most morse code traffic is in English, though there is nothing to keep French speakers or Arabic speakers or others from communicating in their languages, using the Roman letters common to English. Patton says there are, however, what are called cue signals in International Morse code that everyone understands.

"For instance, the letters Q.T.H. mean 'I am located at,' or 'I am transmitting from this location.' So if I wanted to say, 'I am located in Connecticut,' I'd go, 'Q.T.H. C.T.' on code," he said. 

Ham radio equipment can be rigged for the hearing impaired. Flashing lights send the dot-and-dash messages. 

"And the same thing goes with touch," Patton said. "There are people, of course, who can't hear, and they put their hands on a transducer, and they can feel something buzz for a half-second, and that'll be a dash, and a quarter-second buzz could be a dot."

Amateur radio buffs like Wendell Wilson, 78, of Concordia, Kansas, can tap Morse code in a flash, well over 30 words per minute, and easily understand the flurry of dots and dashes.

The primary function of amateur radio, Wilson says, is to handle traffic in times of emergencies. You'll almost always find a ham operator at the scene of an earthquake or devastating tornado, where morse code is sometimes the only form of communication. Unlike the human voice, which can be lost in atmospheric static, Wilson says, morse code is transmitted in a narrow, continuous wave that can break through clutter and be heard. 

"We are acutely aware of what could happen in this crazy world," he said. "One electromagnetic pulse from a nuclear blast, high in the atmosphere, could disable all the satellites, ruin all the microwave systems, shut down all the VHF, UHF communications, and all the cellphones. And the ham radio operators would be one of the few groups able to continue handling emergency traffic nationwide, worldwide."

A leading U.S.-based international travel company became the first North American enterprise to sign an industry "code of conduct" to protect children from commercial sexual exploitation, a move hailed by government leaders and private organizations as a major step forward in the fight against child prostitution.

"The travel industry is critical in the fight against commercial sexual exploitation," U.N. Children's Fund Executive Director Carol Bellamy said at a signing ceremony Wednesday in New York. "We can no longer look the other way while members of our own communities are abusing children in the most unthinkable ways. These are predators of the worst kinds."

Although nongovernmental organizations have taken action and governments have passed laws in an effort to stop the sexual exploitation of children, this new "code of conduct" provides a way for the private sector to confront the issue, the UNICEF executive director said. Bellamy added that this travel industry initiative will complement the ongoing work of the other entities. 

"It will take all of us — travel professionals, lawmakers, educators and the international community alike — to make tourist destinations safe for all children," Bellamy said.

The code of conduct was signed by Marilyn Carlson Nelson, chairwoman and chief executive officer of the privately held Carlson Companies, the parent corporation of a group of companies specializing in business and leisure travel, hotel, restaurant and cruise services. Through both owned and franchised operations, Carlson employs about 198,000 people in more than 140 nations.

Carlson Nelson said that she hopes the signing will begin a movement for the industry to take responsibility for action against child sexual exploitation.

"The problem has been one that has suffered from . . . a kind of conspiracy of silence. More because it is unthinkable," she said. "It is so painful we want to put it aside."

UNICEF has estimated that 2 million children, 

By signing the code, members of the hotel and travel industry agree to establish a corporate policy against commercial sexual exploitation of children. Signatories also pledge to train personnel on what to do to take action and to include clauses in contracts with suppliers stating opposition to the practice. The code also requires the industry to provide information on the sexual exploitation of children to travelers and provide information to local "key persons" at destinations.

John R. Miller, director of the U.S. State Department Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, said that research conducted by the United States estimates that sex slavery is the third largest source of revenue for organized crime after the drug trade and the arms trade. "Sex slavery, which includes children, is now a major source of revenue for organized crime, probably netting $6 or $7 billion a year," he added. 

Because sexual exploitation of children is a problem not just where it takes place, but in the home countries of the tourists, Miller pointed out that the U.S. Congress has passed the Child Protect Act, which allows the prosecution of tourists who leave the United States and go elsewhere to procure sex from children.

Miller emphasized that the Carlson Companies' action to sign the code of conduct is "a major step forward."

Carlson Nelson said that her company will be undertaking the employee training programs the code requires, and will clearly communicate to all business associates that Carlson will not deal with anyone who knowingly participates in the child sex trade.

The company will establish a hotline for employees to use in reporting a possible problem. Then experts will look into the report, assess if what is suspected is indeed sexual exploitation, and deal with it.