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| A.M. Costa Rica Second newspage |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2007, Vol. 7, No. 162 | |||||||||
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| Costa Rica Expertise Ltd http://crexpertise.com E-mail info@crexpertise.com Tel:506-256-8585 Fax:506-256-7575 |
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 National Hurricane Center/A.M. Costa
Rica
This is the predicted track of Tropical Storm DeanTropical storm expected
to become hurricane today By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Tropical Storm Dean is expected to reach hurricane status sometime today and bring rain to Costa Rica for the weekend. The country already has been soaked and the ground is ill-prepared to handle more rain, said the national emergency commission. Although Costa Rica is never hit directly by a hurricane, these storms affect weather for thousands of miles and most of the storm damage here is caused by hurricane backlash. The Pacific coast and the Central Valley will be most affected by the hurricane if it continues on its predicted track, said the Instituto Meteorológico Nacional. A U.S. Air Force Reserve hurricane hunter aircraft is expected to enter the storm this afternoon to get more data. The last report from the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami was that the storm was getting better organized and there are few factors that would prevent it from increasing in strength over the Atlantic. Arias brings freedom to convicted mothers By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Two mothers got their freedom Wednesday during a Mothers Day excursion by President Óscar Arias Sánchez to the Buen Pastor women's prison. One, Aida Jiménez Hidalgo, was in prison on a drug charge and had served more than five years. But the Consejo de Gobierno, the president's cabinet, cut short her sentence. She is in ill health. Elizabeth Calderón, the other inmate, was facing a 20-year sentence for murdering her husband. But evidence showed that she was an abused wife, said Casa Presidencial. Some 70 percent of the women in the prison are in on drug charges that officials blame on a lack of opportunity. Abangares mine museum voted as official entity By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The Ecomuseo de las Minas de Abangares became a legal reality Wednesday when lawmakers approved it for the second time. The museum already exists, but the legislation makes it official. Saturnino Fonseca, a lawmaker with the Partido Liberación Nacional, said that every family in Guanacaste has at least one relative that worked in the gold mines of Abangares. The municipality will run the museum and mostly rely on donations to support it. Free trade debate in English planned by Democrats Abroad By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Democrats Abroad will be hosting a debate on the Central American Free Trade Agreement with the United States. It may be the only one ever in English. Costa Ricans go to the polls Oct. 7 to accept or reject the measure. Speaking in support of the trade treaty will be Otto Guevara of Movimiento Libertario, a former lawmaker and current party president. The opposing speaker has not been selected yet, but he or she is expected to come from the ranks of the Partido Acción Ciudadana. That party has consistently opposed the treaty. The event will be from 9:30 a.m. to noon Aug. 25, a Saturday, on the Third Floor of the Aurola Holiday Inn in downtown San José. Reservations are required by Aug. 24, the club said. Reservations may be made online at cr.democratsabroad@yahoo.com or by calling Paul Kloes at 228-8260. A donation is collected for meeting room rental and refreshments. Expats and other non-Costa Rican citizens cannot participate in the referendum campaign, but the trade treaty issue is the biggest news of the year. Southern zone will get its cultural festival By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The southern zone will have its cultural festival, Somos el Sur, starting Friday at San Vito de Coto Brus. The event will be in the Casa de Cultura there and will feature workshops, dance, music and theater. This is the first cultural fair in the southern zone according to organizers. They expect participation from some 300 persons from Brus, Corredores, Golfito, Osa, Buenos Aires and Pérez Zeledón, they said. The event will run through Sunday, and some of the performers will reflect the Italian roots of Coto Brus, according to the program.
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| San José, Costa Rica, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2007, Vol. 7, No. 162 | |||||||||
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| Two
firms announce opening of San Pedro animated studio |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Don't call it Hollywood south yet, but San Pedro now has a multi million dollar media studio. Two companies, Motion Pixel Corp. of Florida and Dart of Costa Rica, are working together on the venture. San Pedro is east of San José and contains the Universidad de Costa Rica. The companies are calling the media studio the biggest in Central America and one of the largest in Latin America, according to a press release. There already are five animated productions being worked on at the facility through the partnership with Indian media firm Pritish Nandy Communications with another 10 in planning, said the release. The firms also promise an aggressive push into the music business recording and promoting Latin American jazz, ethno beat and other music genres. “With our current infrastructure we can now continue to build in many different areas including animation," said Manny Bains of Motion Pixel. "We plan on getting very |
aggressive with
our partner Pritish Nandy in India, as well as with Live Action,
targeting shooting four to five live films in the beautiful
backdrop of
Costa Rica within the next 18 months." “We have worked hard to complete a facility which takes pride in state of the art technology and we can offer a broad range of services to our clients at very competitive prices," said Vinicio Musmanni, chief executive officer of Dart. The operation has everything any group needs including a top class post production facility, he said. “We also plan to become a market leader in DVD authoring and duplication," said Bains. "This is a multi-billion dollar a year industry and we are already in talks with several major media groups worldwide to partner in this area.” Motion Pixel Corp. said it focused on the entertainment industry with partnerships with select media groups and athletes globally. Dart said it is an entertainment production company that promotes artists, musicians, and film makers with the latest technology. The company is also dedicated to digital content creation training for Latin America, it said. |
| Arias
administration to reveal its anti-crime proposal today |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica Staff
The Arias administration is presenting today its national plan to prevent violence and promote the social peace. The plan is the work of Laura Chinchilla, vice president and minister of Justicia y Gracia, and a committee. A Casa Presidencial release said that the plan will complement control and sanctions that are already in place in the country and propose a series of actions that will make the fight against organized crime more efficient. Juvenile gangs and drug cartels are the dominant forms of organized crime. Óscar Arias Sánchez, the president, is expected to attend the presentation in the Museo de los Niños. Vice President Chinchilla was tapped to address the crime issues in May. She said then that the survey firm Demoscopía had done a study of juvenile gangs in the country and found that an urgent intervention was needed. She said that the data shows single-family homes in poverty generated juvenile gang members, as did drug use. She said the government would come up with some kind of anti-drug plan in three weeks. But it has not done so up to now. In fact, the Arias administration was going to present three |
measures to the legislature to deal
with crime, but these appear to be
some of the items stalled by the gridlock over the free trade agreement. In addition to a measure against organized crime, the administration was going to provide a plan to protect witnesses. Politicians and many Costa Ricans were shocked to learn in late June that hired killers from Colombia entered the country with the goal of killing Rodrigo Arias, the president's brother, and Fernando Berrocal, the security minister. That was what police officials said when they arrested some of the men. Costa Rican officials deported five Colombians around July 1. They said the men were planning to kill Rodrigo Arias, the minister of the Presidencia, and the security minister because of their anti-drug activities. The Arias administration, through unidentified sources, said that Colombian drug lords sent the men to avenge the confiscation of shipments involving some 400 tons of cocaine since last August. The bulk of these drug shipments were snagged by the U.S. Coast Guard operating with Costa Rican officials. The information that came into official hands was from telephone intercepts. |
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Río Azul
landfill site to be fixed up By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The central government declared a national emergency Wednesday to free up money to eliminate environmental dangers at the Río Azul landfill in La Unión. The dump or landfill was closed at the end of last month and inspections showed that there are dangers of landslides and the release of garbage residue. The site is on land owned by the Ministerio de Salud and had been operating since the 1960s. María Luisa Ávila, the minister of Salud, said the emergency declaration would free up the money so that an environmental study could be done with the Universidad de Costa Rica as well as studies of the health of those who live near the now-closed landfill. The minister estimated that the work to mitigate the environmental dangers would take about nine months. The state of the landfill has been worsened by rains and the fact that some of the garbage has not been covered correctly to prevent mixing with runoff. |
| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
| A.M. Costa Rica fourth news page |
A.M. Costa Rica rates Display and classified rates have increased as of June 18, 2007. The average display increase is between 6 and 8.5 percent. This is the first rate increase in the six-year history of the newspaper. The new rates are posted here: As usual, the bulk of any income goes to get you a better newspaper. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2007, Vol. 7, No. 162 | |||||||||
| Another dissident released from prison by Cuban government |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A Cuban human rights group says the government has released a dissident after he served three years in prison on charges of disrespecting authorities and resisting arrest. Elizardo Sánchez, the president of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation says authorities freed Lazaro González Adan Tuesday in the eastern city of Camaguey. The Havana-based commission says police arrested González Adan in October 2004 after he painted on his home quotes from national independence leader Jose Marti deemed critical of the government. González Adan was detained after ignoring police orders to erase the words. |
The commission says he is the second dissident to be released in less
than a week, but it says both former prisoners were freed because they
served their time. Friday, the government released human rights activist Francisco Chaviano González after more than 13 years in prison. The former mathematics professor was arrested in 1994 and sentenced to 15 years in prison on charges that included revealing state security secrets. The commission says the number of political prisoners in Cuba has fallen to about 244 from at least 283 at the start of 2007. Cuba's government denies holding political prisoners and describes dissidents as mercenaries. |
| Drug suspect's lawyer says his client is anxious to be returned to United States |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The lawyer for a suspected Colombian drug lord says he will travel to the United States to try to expedite his client's potential extradition to the U.S. from Brazil. The lawyer, Sergio Alambert, representing Juan Carlos Ramírez Abadia, says he plans to meet with U.S. officials in an effort to accelerate the extradition process. He said Ramirez Abadia, who is wanted by the U.S. on drug charges, fears for his life if he is sent back to Colombia. Brazilian police arrested Ramírez Abadia last week at a luxury home on the outskirts of Sao Paulo. |
He is accused of shipping tons of cocaine to the U.S. and ordering the
killings of police and informants in the U.S. and Colombia. Ramírez
Abadia is also believed to be the leader of Norte del Valle, Colombia's
largest drug cartel since the 1990s. The United States is seeking Ramírez Abadia's extradition and had offered up to $5 million for information leading to his arrest. Brazilian judicial officials are considering the extradition request. But Brazilian law prohibits the extradition of prisoners to countries where they could face life imprisonment or the death penalty. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2007, Vol. 7, No. 162 | ||||||
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