QCOSTARICA – A total of 24 travelers, so far, face problems with the law when discovered trying to leave Costa Rica, through the San Jose airport, with a fake covid-19 test.
Though Costa Rica does not require a covid test to leave the country by air, countries like the United States, Canada, Spain, UK and many others do require a test as an entry requirement before boarding a flight.
Alejandro Araya, deputy prosecutor in the Alajuela Prosecutor’s Office, affirmed that in several of the cases the test resulted presented were rather crude, some downloaded a template from an Internet website and then tried to fill it with false information and stamps.
Read more: Foreigners tried to leave Costa Rica with falsified covid-19 tests
According to Araya, the 24, mostly foreigners, had their travel plans delayed and have taken advantage of alternative measures such as donations to social charities, which is provided by law for ‘flagrante delicto’ (caught red-handed) cases, as part of the abbreviated process.
Araya indicated that the idea of fighting against this type of crime is to guarantee to the countries that have demanded this requirement, the assurance that authority is respected in our country.
“We cannot, under any circumstances, allow ourselves as an authority that these people enter their country of origin or the country to which they go with altered or false documents,” he said.
At the moment it is not known if these people have bought the false documentation or have processed it themselves, but the prosecutor added that it is being investigated.
The Liberia Deputy Prosecutor’s Office indicated that at the moment it has not detected any cases at the Daniel Oduber International Airport.
