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A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page |
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San
José, Costa Rica, Monday, Dec. 29, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 256
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 Ministerio de
Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública
photo
A woman
in Tibás directed police to these two fragmentationgrenades and three gas canisters that she found while cleaning a storage area. The Fuerza Pública said the war materials belonged to a man who died recently of natural causes. Press group calls for Cuban freedoms Special to A.M. Costa Rica
The Inter American Press Association has urged that respect for freedom of expression and of the press in Cuba be a key part in the talks between the governments of Raúl Castro and Barack Obama following the announcement of normalization of diplomatic relations after 53 years. Association President Gustavo Mohme declared, “This good gesture between the two governments carries with it the great opportunity for Cuba to be required to respect human rights, freedom of expression and press freedom, that it release jailed independent journalists and comply with what is stipulated about these issues in international treaties.” Mohme warned that “the initiation of new relations cannot remain in just a political agreement on the exchange of spies, but involve all human rights, which makes necessary the release of journalists and everyone jailed for their way of thinking.” The Castro government is keeping imprisoned three journalists: Yoennis de Jesús Guerra García, Ángel Santiesteban-Prats and José Antonio Torres. Juliet Micheleba Díaz, arrested on April 7, was released on Nov. 14. “To them we express our deep solidarity and we will work on insisting on their release,” Mohme added. “Any attempt at dialogue will be doomed to failure if there does not exist a will to guarantee individual and collective freedoms and transparency nor respect for the work of journalists and the public’s right to information,” declared Mohme, editor of the Lima, Peru, newspaper La República. “In this dialogue freedom of expression and of the press should be an essential part. The government of Cuba must assume great responsibilities at this time of opening.”  Ministerio de Gobernación,
Policía y Seguridad Pública
photo
Supermarket robbery suspects are cuffed and
grounded.
Chase leads
to robbery arrests
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Four men held up a Palé supermarket in San Sebastián Saturday evening, and police caught four suspects after a car chase through the capital to Tibás. The stickup took place about 6 p.m., said the Fuerza Pública. Three crooks entered with guns and took money from cash registers. A fourth crook was in a vehicle. At the end of the chase, police said they captured four men in their 20s and that each has a record of such crimes.
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Dec. 29, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 256 | |
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| Police keep up the pressure on vendors of fireworks, legal
or illegal |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
New Year's will see another night of shock and awe, but the Fuerza Pública is doing its best to prevent that. The police agency said that it is aggressively enforcing the firework laws and conducting inspections of where they are sold. Some fireworks are legal in Costa Rica as long as they do not explode. Still, the really impressive fireworks are sold under the counter or in unregistered establishments. Police have been conducting routine inspections of all the |
retail
outlets that sell fireworks. Generally most are in order and have their
permits from the Dirección General de Armamento and the
Ministerio de
Salud. In one case Saturday, police found an underage individual tending the shop while the registered owner was not present. Allowing a minor to sell fireworks is a violation, so police shut down the store and confiscated the fireworks. They said there were 1,500 units. The store was in Alajuelita. Police have been confiscating fireworks that enter the country from both borders, but the amounts have been relatively small. The amount confiscated, according to police reports is around 150 kilos. |
| New guide book features the sights and attractions of San
José |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A new guide book focuses on downtown San José. The book, available in paperback and electronic format is "The Real San José." Author Michael Miller said in an announcement that he wrote the book to introduce new arrivals to Costa Rica's capital. It tells visitors what they need to know to get their feet on the ground and to start enjoying this exciting city, he said. In addition to being the nation's capital and its largest city, San José has a rich history and is a thriving center for culture, the arts and entertainment, he notes, adding that the city is the home to live theater, the national symphony orchestra, and scores of art galleries. It features world-class museums, cathedrals, universities, fine public buildings and beautiful vintage homes, he said. "The Real San José" has 25 photographs along with a foldout map of downtown. Miller said he believes that the more one knows about San José, the more someone will see the tremendous variety of attractions it has to offer to anyone here for a couple of days or to someone thinking about relocating here. Miller said he has been visiting San José since the 1980s and has |
 made it his mission to discover all that the city has to offer. He served in the U.S. Navy and is a Vietnam veteran. The book is available at Amazon/Kindle and other popular E-book vendors and in Costa Rica, a printed paperback version is available at the office of the Association of Residents of Costa Rica and in hotel lobbies, restaurants and other locations, Miller said. |
 Hotel Cocal & Casino photos
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| Young
Anthony Caballero picks out a toy while other youngsters await the rain
of goodies from a piñata at the Hotel Cocal & Casino
Christmas party for needy kids in Jacó. Around 125 kids were
invited, and they enjoyed the |
snowman piñata, rice with chicken, ice cream and a bag of apple, grapes and candies, said Allan Umaña, general manger. The firm also has a similar party at its Sebaco, Nicaragua, facility. |
| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Dec. 29, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 256 | |||||
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| Social media services under pressure to control harassment, threats | |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Social media services came under fire recently for not being more proactive in addressing online harassment and violent threats and for removing offensive comments only after being reported. Now some believe the role of social media in overseeing online behavior should change. “Whoever is in charge of these spaces — that includes the people who are hosting the site, that includes the users on the site, that includes the social media platforms — they have a responsibility to actually try to make their environment such that they are not aggressively targeting and attacking and driving away certain groups of people,” said Mary Anne Franks of Miami University’s School of Law. She recalls that in its early days, social media “transformed our lives and made available things that were not possible a decade ago.” Now she asks why the creativity and resourcefulness that made that possible are not being dedicated to getting the most from online communication without the damage that it can do. Elaine Davies of California’s Chapman University agrees that social media companies should have a more responsible role. But she says the problem is that “if one person creates a fake account or they clone someone’s account, they don’t know until somebody brings it up, and there should be a rapid response.” Professor Franks argues that social media sites can be creative about dealing with abusers hiding behind anonymity or similar tools that foster greater freedom of expression but also have what she calls a darker side. She points out that Twitter, Facebook and many other services already have policies in place to curb spam, for example, and suggests that they can address abusive behavior “without having to fundamentally alter the kinds of beneficial instruments and ways that people can talk to each other online.” “And people will quibble about whether that is a violation of free speech or whether it is a positive factor in reducing harassment,” added Johns Hopkins University’s Patricia Wallace, senior director of the Center for Talented Youth and Information Technology. Professor Davis, who believes the Internet should be for free speech, questions whether it is even possible for social media companies to proactively police abusive behavior. Both Professor Davies and Professor Wallace accuse social media companies of being more concerned with making a profit, although Professor Wallace concedes that Twitter and Facebook, for example, have taken down abusive posts and comments in the past. Twitter and Facebook have clear policies against abusive behavior. While declining an interview request, a Twitter spokesman shared the following statement: Our rules are designed to allow our users to create and share this wide variety content in an environment that is safe and secure for our users. When content is reported to us that violates our rules, which include a ban on targeted abuse, we suspend those accounts. We evaluate and refine our policies based on input from users, while working with outside organizations to ensure that we have industry best practices in place. After a recent spike in cyberharassment, Twitter refined its blocking and reporting tools to make it easier for users to report harassment on their mobile phones. In an interview with TECHtonics, Facebook’s communications manager, Matt Steinfeld, says the company’s community standards state clearly that “harassment, abuse, bullying — things like that — direct attacks from people, are not allowed on Facebook.” But the abusive behavior needs to be reported to the Web site administrators. |
 “We have like 1.3 billion people using Facebook … So it’s really a large neighborhood watch,” he said. “So if somebody is being bullied or harassed, they are really in the best position to tell us that,” he said, given that “as a third party reviewing things, it’s not always apparent based on the language that that person is using whether they are truly bullying or harassing someone else.” Because of the difficulty of proactively looking for abusive content, Steinfeld says Facebook makes it “as easy as possible for people to report it to us” and make sure when they do that, that Facebook has “someone looking at it and responding to it. That’s where we put our priority,” he said. “If it is abusive, if it is harassment, we remove it,” he stressed. But Jayne Hitchcock, president of Working to Halt Online Abuse, says the victims her organization helps often say they went to Facebook or Twitter or other Web sites and their complaints were not taken seriously. “They’ve had friends or relatives file complaints and nothing is being done,” she said. “And the person stalking them or harassing them continues. And then it does get to the point where they do have to go to the police and then hope that the police will believe them and do something. And then it just goes from there. It’s like one big giant snowball.” Ms. Hitchcock argues that social media companies are not doing a good job in addressing online abuse. She says victims who filed repeated complaints with Facebook — and their grievance was not addressed — came to her group for help. She questions if the people tasked with reviewing user complaints are qualified. “It’s one of these things where you wonder, not only in law enforcement, but the so-called abuse people at these Web sites — if they are properly trained,” she said. “And I don’t think they are.” She says responding to complaints isn’t enough if they are not taken seriously or if they are passed off without action. She suggests that social media sites might consider “live chat support, post tips on staying safer and being proactive.” Change is possible, says Professor Franks, although it has to take place on all fronts — legal, social, in the workspace, and on online forums. She describes harassment and abuse as fundamental design flaws and says tech and social media platforms should make structural changes to inhibit harassment and guard against abuse. “To do this, they — and all of us — must reject the tendency to treat social media and technology as though they are natural forces rather than the product of human choices and value judgments,” she said. “Once we recognize this, we can make choices and value judgments that do not merely guard the interests of the privileged, but serve the interests of equality and democracy.” |
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2014 and may
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A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth
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| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Dec. 29, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 256 | |||||||
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| AirAsia jet is search object with 182 aboard feared dead By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The search for a missing AirAsia jet with 162 people on board has resumed in the Java Sea as anguished relatives look for any sign of hope. Flight QZ 8501 was about halfway through its flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore when it disappeared Sunday morning. The pilot had asked air traffic controllers for permission to ascend about 1,800 meters to nearly 11,600 meters (38,000 feet) to avoid stormy weather. An Indonesian transport ministry official says permission was denied because another plane was flying in the area. After that, communication went silent. Controllers did not receive any distress call from the pilot. The last transmission from a crew member on the Airbus reportedly came at 6:12 a.m. local time. Australia, Singapore, and the United States are among the countries offering to help with the search. AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes, speaking to the media in Surabaya, said everyone was devastated. "We are very devastated about what's happened, it's unbelievable, but we do not know what's happened yet, so we'll wait for the accident investigation to really find out what's happened," said he. "Our concern right now is for the relatives and for the next of kin, there is nothing more important to us for our crew's family, and for our passengers' families, that we look after them. That is our number one priority at the moment to make sure that we take care of them. And to fully cooperate with the investigation,” Fernandes added. Fernandes said he did not want to speculate as to what might have happened to the plane. The passengers include 149 Indonesians, three South Koreans, and one each from Britain, Malaysia, and Singapore. There were seven crew members, all Indonesian nationals, except for the co-pilot, reportedly a French citizen. The Java Sea is one of the world's busiest waterways and is relatively shallow. The plane's captain is described as experienced, with about 20,500 flying hours, according to a statement from the airline. Roughly 6,000 of those hours were with AirAsia Indonesia on the Airbus A320. The six-year-old aircraft had last undergone maintenance Nov. 16. The low-cost AirAsia family of airlines, serving more than 100 destinations in 22 countries, has had a good safety record with no fatalities since beginning operations 18 years ago. Malaysia Airlines, which saw its flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing disappear in March, posted a message of support on Twitter on Sunday, encouraging the loved ones of AirAsia's passengers to stay strong. "Our thoughts and prayers are with all family and friends of those on board," Malaysia Airlines tweeted. MH370 has never been found. Plane disasters in 2014 claimed 900 lives worldwide By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Nearly 900 people are dead or missing following air disasters around the world this year, with Southeast Asia taking a particularly heavy hit. Three major events involved weather, two planes were shot down in eastern Ukraine, and one crash was attributed to mechanical problems. Hundreds of passengers and crew remain unaccounted for in the case of a Malaysia Airlines flight that vanished in March. Feb. 11: An Algerian Air Force Lockheed C-130 Hercules transporting 78 military passengers and crew crashes on an internal flight from Tamanrasset to Constantine. One person survives. The Algerian defense ministry attributes the crash to storms and snow over the mountainous Oum El-Bouaghi region. Mar. 8: Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappears en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people aboard. No confirmed wreckage of the plane has been found despite a search of more than 23,000 square miles. June 14: A Ukrainian Air Force Ilyushin Il-76 carrying troops and equipment is shot down by anti-aircraft fire in eastern Ukraine on its approach to the Luhansk Airport. All 49 people aboard died. Ukrainian military forces were engaged in a conflict with pro-Russia separatists in the area at the time. July 17: Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur is shot down over a rebel-held area of eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people aboard. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry condemned Russia for what he called overwhelming evidence of complicity in the airliner's downing. July 23: Taiwan domestic flight TransAsia Airways Flight 222 crashes in heavy rains and wind on Penghu Island after traveling from Kaohsiung International Airport. Of the 58 people aboard, only 10 survive. A preliminary report released by aviation officials Friday indicates the pilots could not see the runway after a failed first landing attempt. July 24: Air Algérie Flight 5017 disintegrates on impact after encountering rough weather in the skies over Mali en route from Burkina Faso to Algiers. All 118 passengers and crew are killed. Aug. 10: Iran's domestic Sepahan Airlines Flight 5915 from Tehran to Tabas crashes shortly after takeoff, killing 39 of the 48 passengers and crew. Iran's aviation chief said those on board survived the crash but died in the ensuing fire. The state news agency cites engine failure as the cause. NATO alliance finishes Afghanistan combat mission By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The NATO-led military alliance in Afghanistan formally ended its 13-year-long combat mission, leaving a relatively under-trained Afghan national security force to fight the deadly Taliban insurgency largely on its own. A special ceremony was organized at the Kabul headquarters of the coalition Sunday to mark the conclusion of operations by the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force. The commander of the International Security Assistance Force, U.S. Army Gen. John Campbell, said the U.S. and NATO are not abandoning Kabul. "Our new resolute mission means we will continue to invest in Afghanistan's future. Our commitment to Afghanistan endures," Campbell said. NATO’s Resolute Support mission will consist of about 13,000 mostly American personnel that will continue advising, assisting and training Afghan national security forces in their fight against the Taliban. In a statement from the White House, U.S. President Barack Obama said, "Today's ceremony in Kabul marks a milestone for our country. For more than 13 years, ever since nearly 3,000 innocent lives were taken from us on 9/11, our nation has been at war in Afghanistan. "Now, thanks to the extraordinary sacrifices of our men and women in uniform, our combat mission in Afghanistan is ending, and the longest war in American history is coming to a responsible conclusion," Obama said. However, "Afghanistan remains a dangerous place, and the Afghan people and their security forces continue to make tremendous sacrifices in defense of their country," he said. Campbell said the road ahead remains challenging. “There is no turning back to the dark days of the past. Insurgents are losing, they are desperate. It is time for the enemy to heed President Ghani’s call, lay down their arms, come to the peace table and help to rebuild the Afghan nation," he said, said President Ashraf Ghani. Whether the Afghan forces can contain the insurgency remains an open question, with militants regularly launching deadly attacks against Kabul's security forces. In a statement, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the coalition's war against the insurgents "made our own nations safer, by denying safe haven to international terrorists. We have made Afghanistan stronger, by building up from scratch strong security forces." New Afghan President Ghani has pledged to seek a political solution to the insurgency and has called on the Taliban and its allies to engage in peace talks with his national unity government. Instead, the militants have intensified attacks, citing Ghani’s move to conclude security agreements with the United States and NATO and allowing an enduring foreign military presence in the country. Afghan National Security Adviser Hanif Atmar, while addressing the ceremony, expressed his gratitude for the efforts and sacrifices coalition forces have made to secure Afghanistan. “Nearly 3,500 NATO personnel have been killed in action and over 30,000 NATO personnel have been wounded in action. The Afghan people pray for your fallen, wounded and their loved ones,” Atmar said. This year has been the deadliest for Afghan security forces in their decade long battle against the Taliban and insurgents have made gains in parts of the country to extend their influence. Atmar said Afghan forces have successfully led security operations for the past nearly two years in most of Afghanistan but underscored the need for continued international help to ensure their long-term sustainability. “We are not yet able to do everything alone. We have made tremendous progress, but we recognize that your continued support will be key in ensuring that our collective gains will be enduring,” he said. At its peak, there were about 140,000 troops from 50 countries taking part in the operation in Afghanistan. It was launched under U.S. leadership to invade Afghanistan 13 years ago to remove the Taliban from power for sheltering the al-Qaida network that plotted the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. Washington has since spent more than $100 billion on Afghan reconstruction in addition to its estimated $1 trillion war effort. N.Y. police shun mayor at murdered officer's rites By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Midway through one of the most heavily attended funerals in the New York Police Department's history, Mayor Bill de Blasio walked past U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and other dignitaries to give his eulogy Saturday for Officer Rafael Ramos. As the mayor started speaking, thousands of uniformed officers outside Christ Tabernacle Church silently turned their backs on him in a pointed display of protest as his image filled the large screens broadcasting the service. Angered by the mayor's qualified support for nationwide demonstrations against the deaths of unarmed black men at the hands of police, some New York police officers had similarly shunned de Blasio as he arrived a week ago at the hospital where Ramos and his police partner, Wenjian Liu, were declared dead. Saturday's funeral for Ramos drew more than 25,000 officers from across the United States. Biden, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and de Blasio eulogized Ramos in speeches to hundreds of people inside the church in the New York City borough of Queens. Members of Ramos' family, including his widow and two sons, were in attendance. Biden said the slayings of the two police officers touched the soul of an entire nation. Cuomo said New York lost a hero in Ramos, and de Blasio said the officer would always be remembered. Ramos and Liu were gunned down in their patrol car in the borough of Brooklyn Dec. 20 by a man who had indicated he was planning to avenge several recent incidents in the United States in which police killed black men who were carrying no weapons. The man who shot the New York officers, Ismaaiyl Brinsley, hours earlier had shot and wounded an ex-girlfriend in Baltimore, about 200 miles (nearly 320 kilometers) away. He later killed himself. He had a history of mental problems and had been arrested multiple times. Ramos was being laid to rest later Saturday. Funeral arrangements for Liu have not yet been announced. The U.S. airline JetBlue offered free flights to at least 700 police officers from other parts of the country who wanted to attend the rites in New York for Ramos. The deaths of black men by white policemen in suburban St. Louis and New York City after confrontations have sparked enormous controversy and a series of rolling anti-police protests across the United States. Violence erupted after grand juries in Missouri and New York declined to bring criminal charges against police involved in the civilian deaths. Describing New York City as incredibly diverse, Biden told mourners Saturday that the city can and will show the nation how to bridge any divide. Sony faces another attack in its PlayStation network By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Sony Corp. worked for a third day Saturday to restore services to its PlayStation network as the FBI said it was looking into the disruption. "We are aware of the reports and are investigating the Sony PlayStation matter," Federal Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Jenny Shearer said via email. She did not elaborate. Sony said the attack had prevented some people who received consoles for Christmas from using their new machines on the PlayStation network, which lets gamers compete with people around the world via the Internet. "If you received a PlayStation console over the holidays and have been unable to log on to the network, know that this problem is temporary and is not caused by your game console," Sony executive Catherine Jensen said on the company's U.S. PlayStation blog. Some customers posted complaints about the outage on the blog. "Three days without PSN. That's absurd,'' one said. "We understand your frustration," Ms. Jensen responded early Saturday afternoon. "Our engineers are working to restore service as quickly as possible!" Later in the day, she said the company had restored access for some users and would keep bringing more back online. Sony declined to say how many of PSN's 56 million users had been affected by the attack. The blog said the problems were the result of "high levels of traffic designed to disrupt connectivity and online game play," otherwise known as a distributed denial-of-service attack. It was Sony's second recent high-profile encounter with hackers after an unprecedented attack on its Hollywood studio, which the U.S. government attributed to North Korea and linked to the release of the low-brow comedy "The Interview." A hacker activist group known as Lizard Squad said it was responsible for the PSN outage as well as delays on Microsoft's Corp.'s Xbox network. Microsoft quickly fixed the problem. The group has claimed responsibility for previous attacks, including ones on PSN in early December and August. The August attack coincided with a bomb scare in which Lizard Squad tweeted to American Airlines that it had heard explosives were on board a Dallas-to-San Diego flight carrying an executive with Sony Online Entertainment. Sony has been the victim of some of the most notorious cyberattacks in history. Besides the breach at its Hollywood studio, hackers stole data belonging to 77 million PlayStation Network users in 2011. |
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2014 and may
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| A.M. Costa Rica's sixth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Dec. 29, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 256 | |||||||||
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Have you seen one of the great trees? The old trees, the trees of history? Some of them are preserved on hotel properties, like the Guanacaste trees in Liberia. Others are preserved by local families, like the 500 year old ceiba tree in Nuevo
The older trees are an even greater wonder. They grew as the Maya and Aztec warred. They grew as the Melecu built their villages around the rivers we now call the Aguacate and Piedras. Their branches built the cook fires and kilns for the pottery whose shards we find around the lake and in deposits of clay around the rivers. They grew before Columbus landed on the shores of the Caribbean and before the conquistadors sweated their way across Central America to see the Pacific Ocean for the first time. People come as tourists to Costa Rica and take home, as a souvenir, a placemat or a carving from a tree root and never think about it as something to be treasured. We know better. We know it is a fragment of a silent witness to history. I run my hand over the wood in the bench outside my front door and marvel at the strength of it, the complexity of its colors, the movement I see in the grain. I wonder what it would say if it could speak. In death, it sheltered bats and bugs and snakes. Perhaps a tayra or a river otter sheltered in it or a rabbit nested in a hollow branch and raised its young. So much history in a single tree, now a bench, a table, a carved piece for the bedroom. The wood is hard and strong, it will last a long time. Look for the great trees. Look with admiration. Look with wonder. These trees are our history. They are national treasures.
If you would like to suggest a topic for this column, simply send a letter to the editor. And, for more garden tips, visit the Arenal Gardeners Facebook page. |
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