In Heredia, several people have taken to directing traffic due to daily massive congestion. And help themselves out in the process, threatening drivers to give them money.
Local police have identified them from the cameras in the vicinity of the Paseo de la Flores mall, but have not been able to take action as their thinly stretched, having to answer multiple calls in various locations at the same time.
Authorities are asking drivers to call 911 to report any dangerous situation.
Photographs taken from a cell phone show the process of building a luxurious house facing the sea that is presumed to belong to a supposed narco in the Caribbean city of Limon. The building lacks municipal permits.
According to the OIJ and the Fiscalia (Prosecutor’s Office), the mansion is believed to be owned by a member of a violent criminal gang led by Keylor Jacob Cole Kelly, alias Gato Cole.
The photograph is dated October 16, 2015. In another of the photos dated July 9, 2015, you can see the pool. And in a photo sent on July 10, 2015, a photo shows how the mansion that was built in the Veracruz de Limón neighborhood, facing the Caribbean Sea. The images show the house consists of the main structure of at least two floors with a large balcony, a pool, a soccer field and a ‘rancho’.
The Fiscalia is investigating to determine if the luxurious property belongs to Keylor Jacob Cole Kelly, who is being investigated for money laundering. An investigation is also underway to determine any payoffs to municipal officials to allow the construction without permits.
Poas volcano May 15, 2018. Photo from OVSICORI Facebook
Repeating seismic events—events that have the same frequency content and waveform shapes—may offer a glimpse at the movement of magma and volcanic gases underneath Turrialba and Poas active volcanoes in Costa Rica.
Poas volcano May 15, 2018. Photo from OVSICORI Facebook
At the 2018 Seismological Society of America (SSA) annual meeting, Rebecca Salvage of the Observatorio Vulcanologico y Sismologico de Costa Rica (OVSICORI) presented an analysis of these repeating signals from the volcanos since July 2016.
When these repeating events are identified at a seismic station, researchers assume that these “events are all produced by a single mechanism and at a similar location at depth … and by a source which is either non-destructive or able to quickly renew itself,” Salvage noted. “Therefore, the identification and an understanding of repeating seismicity may allow us some insight into which parts of the volcanic system at depth are active, and the frequency content of the repeating seismicity may be indicative of processes occurring at depth.”
At Turrialba, for instance, Salvage and her colleagues identified a type of repeating event called “drumbeat seismicity,” characterized by a very short time interval between events. In January 2017, drumbeat seismicity at the volcano lasted less than three hours but contained hundreds of events. Eight hours later, there was a small eruption at Turrialba. In this case, the drumbeat seismicity may have been a “precursor signal” of the eruption, related to magma moving toward the surface, Salvage said.
“However, not all eruptions are preceded by these types of earthquakes, and often these earthquakes occur with no identifiable eruptive activity,” she added. “A better understanding of drumbeats in terms of the conditions under which they do occur, and statistical analysis on inter-event times and occurrence rates will allow us to better assess whether these can actually be used as a warning tool.”
At Poas, the researchers noted another interesting halt in six families of repeating seismic events, just two hours after a swarm of magnitude 2.7 and higher earthquakes was recorded very near the volcano. In this case, Salvage and her colleagues think that the earthquakes may have influenced the stress field around the volcano in a way that halted the repeating events. The stress field may have changed when the earthquakes generated small displacements on local faults that created similar small diversions in magmatic gas and ash rising to the surface.
MANAGUA – The crowds waited. The official and independent press waited. They had been called to the Seminario La Fatima, just outside of Managua, for 8:00 a.m. to be let in by 9 am. It was now over 10 a.m. and nothing.
Waiting on the president that was now show on Friday.
Slowly, on foot, representatives of the university students, business sector and farmers group made their way in. Yet the doors to the Seminario remained closed to everyone else.
Rumors began to spread that President Daniel Ortega nor his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, were not going to show. The couple, whose anger is being been voiced by Nicaraguans from every corner of the country, who took direct fire from the opposition on Wednesday in the first day of dialogue, it seemed to most had no interest in resolving the crisis that has left more than 60 people dead, many more injured, during a month of anti-government protests.
The lack of a police presence reinforced it the rumors. People and the press waited.
A 77-year-old woman became the dear of those waiting, The woman, who normally sells water, was giving it away. She is poor, she said, but this is her way of giving back to all those who are today standing up against Ortega and Murillo.
The doors to the Seminario remained closed as people and media outside waitied. And waited,
It was 11:35 a.m. when the government delegation, sans Ortega and Murillo, arrived.
The delegation was led by Foreign Minister Denis Moncada, Finance Minister Ivan Acosta, Health Minister Sonia Castro and presidential adviser Alvaro Baltodano and the inclusion of legislator Edwin Castro, journalist Moises Absalon and the head of the Central Bank of Nicaragua, Ovidio Reyes, among others.
On arrival, the government representatives were berated by protestors holding signs and chanting anti-government slogans, while some demonstrators banged the officials’ cars with their hands.
The crowd demanded that Ortega and Murillo step down. “Killers, Killers,” was chanted.
In this second day of talks, representatives of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) took part, as requested by the Nicaraguan bishops’ conference, who is hosting the dialogue in its role as mediator between the government, business leaders, students and civil society.
Antonia Urrejola, from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) for Nicaragua
As opposed to the first day of talks on Wednesday, reporters were not be allowed into the seminary.
The wave of unrest against the 72-year-old Ortega has been going on for a month, starting on April 18, with no sign of slowing.
Triggered by now-repealed reforms to the financially strapped bankrupt social security system, the nationwide protests has broadened into a rejection of Ortega and his wife and vice president Rosario Murillo, seen as dictator like.
Most of the dead have been youths, mainly university students from Managua who have been leading the anti-government demonstrations.
One of the student leaders, Lesther Aleman, 20, said: “the unrest is not only from the students but from all the population.” He insisted that the only solution was for Ortega and Murillo to step down.
Following their arrival on Thursday, the IACHR, part of the Organization of American States (OAS), called for Ortega’s government to cease the “repression”. The IACHR began taking formal complaints on Friday and will continue today, Saturday and tomorrow Sunday, at the Intercontinental hotel in Managua.
“We reiterate our most emphatic condemnation of the deaths, disappearances and arbitrary arrests of protesters, activists and journalists that have been registered in the country since the protests started,” the Commission’s special rights rapporteur for Nicaragua, Antonia Urrejola, said, reading a Commission statement at a Managua news conference.
The crisis is already having an effect on the Nicaraguan economy, one of Latin America’s poorest countries.
One of the sectors, perhaps the hardest hit, is the emerging tourism sector that has seen visitors leave early, others canceling their travel plans to the country. Economist, Nestor Avendano, told Canal 15 television that dollar deposits fell 5% in the first two weeks of the protests.
The other, the ‘Zona Francas’ (Free Zones). President Ortega on Wednesday expressed concern about the more than 160,000 jobs in jeopardy, the loss of production and possible withdrawal of foreign companies from the country.
Ortega, first ruled between 1979 and 1990 after, first as Coordinator of the Junta of National Reconstruction (1979–1985) and then as President (1985–1990).
As a leader in the Sandinista National Liberation Front (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional, FSLN) Ortega was able to overthrow the ruling President Anastasio Somoza, widely recognized as a dictator, before returning to the presidency in 1996 – 11 years ago.
Ortega was an unsuccessful candidate for president in 1996 and 2001, before winning the 2006 presidential election.
Ortega’s policies became more moderate during his time not in office, gradually changing much of his former Marxist stance in favor of an agenda of democratic socialism.
In 2006, Daniel Ortega was elected president with 38% of the vote. Despite the fact that the breakaway Sandinista Renovation Movement continued to oppose the FSLN, running former Mayor of Managua Herty Lewites as its candidate for president, who died several months before the elections, Ortega was elected.
Post-election, the Ortega policies helped reduce high levels of poverty and inequality in Nicaragua and placed the first lady, Rosario Murillo, in charge of the Citizens’ Power Councils (CPCs), designed to implement his anti-poverty social policies, undermining municipal autonomy, as they effectively functioned as local governments by determining the distribution of public goods and services.
Ortega was re-elected president on November 6, 2011. During the election, the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) blocked both domestic and international poll observers from multiple polling stations. According to the Supreme Electoral Council, Ortega defeated Fabio Gadea, with 63% of the vote.
In January 2014 the National Assembly, dominated by the FSLN, approved constitutional amendments that abolished term limits for the presidency and allowed a president to run for an unlimited number of five-year terms. Critics charged that the amendments threatened Nicaraguan democracy. The constitutional reforms also gave Ortega the sole power to appoint military and police commanders.
Leading up to the 2016 elections, Ortega’s family owned three of the nine television channels in Nicaragua and controlled a fourth (the public Channel 6), collectively known as the “official” media”. Four of the remaining five controlled by Mexican mogul Angel Gonzalez, and are generally considered to be aligned with Ortega.
In 2015, Ortega failed in an attempt to gain control over online media.
On November 7, 2016, Ortega was elected to a third consecutive term (fourth overall). The CSE reported that Ortega and Murillo, who was elected vice-president, with 72.4% of the vote, with a 68% turnout. Months earlier, in June 2016, the Nicaraguan Supreme Court ruled to oust Eduardo Montealegre, the leader of the main opposition party, leaving the main opposition coalition with no candidate.
Ortega has kept power by maintaining leftist rhetoric while ensuring an accommodation with powerful private industry and keeping up trade with the United States.
But that arrangement looks to be falling apart, with business groups distancing themselves from him over the violence exhibited by his police against protesters, and Ortega’s army saying they will not repress the population.
For many there is only one solution to end the crisis and get Nicaragua working again: Ortega and Murillo must go.
Starting a 5 p.m. on Thursday, all the officers of the Fuerza Publica (National Police) took part in the second police mega-operation in different parts of the country.
This was confirmed by newly appointed Minister of Security, Michael Soto Rojas.
Narrow passage ways are common in the barrios. In the photo by Rafael Pacheco / La Nacion police stop and check the identity of people for any oustanding warrants.
The former sub-director of the OIJ also took an active participation the operation, visiting conflictive neighborhoods such as Las Tablas in Desamparados; barrio Las Tenis, in the León XIII, Tibás, and Los Cuadros, in Goicoechea.
“We are operating all over the country starting from 5 p.m. All the delegations of the Fuerza Publica and the different police forces, including the Coastguard, Border and Air Surveillance Police, with the aim to counteract the wave of criminality in conflictive zones and where there is a high incidence of crime,” said Soto.
Soto added that in the first operation, carried out last Friday, they achieved very good results, so they will continue with the police action according to “operational needs”.
Last week’s operation resulted in the release of two people who had allegedly been kidnapped, found in two vehicles stopped by police in Moin, Limon and Sabannilla de Montes de Oca, in San Jose. The operation also resulted in the seizure of weapons, cars, motorcycles, clandestine liquor and at least ¢4 million colones in cash.
“This (police action) generates a sense of confidence to the citizens. The people who see us on the street are happy and ask us to continue with this type of operations, which is very important. We will continue with other actions based on criminal analysis to generate positive results,” Soto explained.
Among the first results of the Thursday night mega-operation is the seizure of a kilo of marijuana, the arrest of six people, the seizure of five firearms, the recovery of a stolen motorcycle and seizure of vehicles for irregularities with the traffic law.
In La Tenis, at least 50 officers made their way through the narrow passage ways (alamedas) common in the barrios, stopping a number of people to check their identity and for any outstanding warrants.
Ileana Córdoba, a resident of La Tenis indicated that “she was very happy about the police presence and that they should enter the area more often.”
The Nemisis, one of three armored vehicles donated to Costa Rica by the U.S. Embassy, is used by the UEA – tactical squad – to assist in the mega-police operations. Foto: Rafael Pacheco / La Nacion
The mega-operation included the use of the Nemesis armored police vehicle which was donated to the Ministry of Security by the Embassy of the United States. In addition, there was personnel from the Unidad Especial de Apoyo (UEA) – tactics = and from the K-9 unit.
The final count of the operation will be released this Friday.
Police report arresting one of the members of a dangerous gang, engaged in kidnapping married men on Saturdays and releasing them on Sundays, and sometimes on Monday mornings.
Authorities warn the gang made up of a group of attractive and voluptuous women force their victims to drink beer, liquor, smoke, party and through hypnosis, sexually abuse them.
Please share.
Be EXTRA CAREFUL not to become the gang’s next victim!!!!!!!!
Source (in Spanish): Pegando Porte Y La Vara Eventos Noticias Y Más 2.0 Facebook page
A crash between a Ferrari and minivan congested traffic on the Bernardo Soto (Ruta 1) in the area of the Dos Pinos plant, near the Coyol intersection.
For reasons still unknown the driver of the Ferrari lost control. The 2013 Italian sports car, with a value of ¢154.340.000 colones, got the worst part of the deal. The vehicle is registered to a corporation and has a fiscal (tax) value of ¢102.200.000 colones.
According to witnesses who spoke to the website Accidentes de Costa Rica, and Teletica television news, apparently the owner, whose identity was not made public, came out of a used vehicle dealesrhip with the car.
Fortunately, despite the extent of the material damage, no injuries were reported by the Policia de Transito. The collision occurred a 3:35 p.m. Thursday, causing tremendous congestion to westbound traffic.
On an isolated road known as ‘Los Italianos’ (The Italians), in the area of San Isidro de Palmares, in the province of Alajuela, a young cyclist came across two bodies by the side of the road on Thursday.
Officers of the Fuerza Publica (national police) responded to the 911 call, but the two men were lifeless. OIJ agents were called in to investigate what appears to be an execution.
According to the Judicial Police, one of the deceased is a 25-year-old, identified by his last name Chacon, a native of Ciudad Quesada in San Carlos. Apparently, Chacon was an employee of the MOPT.
Despite the photo leaves the impression that Carlos Alvarado and his wife are king and queen of Costa Rica, the country is not a kingdom. Photo taken on inauguration day, May 8, as the newly sworn in President waits to receive invited international guests after his coronation, sorry, swearing in ceremony.
On his Twitter account, President Carlos Alvarado posted, that on his first day, after receiving more than 100 international delegations, among many greetings, that of his son, Gabriel, was the most important of all.
Ayer recibimos más de 100 delegaciones internacionales, entre tantos saludos, este fue el más importante de todos. pic.twitter.com/8aoO56oqF9
The government of Carlos Alvarado began on Thursday to intervene the first of the “28 bottlenecks” that hinder vehicular circulation in the Greater Metropolitan Area (GAM).
With the presence of the President and the newly appointed Minister of Public Works and Transport (MOPT), Rodolfo Méndez Mata, began the work to asphalt 1.5 kilometers of road that goes from San Blas de Moravia, Guadalupe to La Robert (in the Alto).
The work will take 15 days to complete, at a cost of ¢150 million colones awarded to the Meco construction company, Mendez said once finished they will move on to two more bottlenecks, mainly the La Robert to the center of Sabanilla de Montes de Oca and the third, In Heredia, the enabling a third lane on the road from the Santo Domingo cemetery, the old INBio road to the La Valencia intersection.
The new government with less than two weeks in action appears to be serious in their intention to decongest the routes around the GAM, responding to the petition of many who spend hours daily in traffic to get to and from work.
President Alvarado, on his Twitter account, says that of 60 kilometers of the road network in the most critical sectors of the GAM, will be the focus of the MOPT.
President Carlos Alvarado (center), the MOPT minister Rodolfo Méndez (right) and vice-minister, Eduardo Brenes (left), during the start-up of works at the Moravia on Thursday. Photo taken from Carlos Alvarado’s Twitter account.
On Monday (May 15), we saw the extension of the bus lanes on the Autopista General Cañas go into effect between La Uruca and Rio Segundo, a total of 10 kilometers, double the original that had been forgotten by many drivers. To that end, six Transitos (traffic officials) are permanently posted, 3 in each direction, to ensure drivers respect the right lane to be used exclusively for buses during weekdays morning and afternoon rush hour.
BOGOTA (Reuters) – President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist government has been giving Venezuelan identification cards to Colombians in order to transport them over the border to vote for him in Sunday’s presidential elections, the Colombian government said on Thursday.
Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro greets supporters during his closing campaign rally in Caracas, Venezuela May 17, 2018. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso
The diplomatic relationship between the neighboring countries has grown increasingly fraught as hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans migrants have fled to Colombia and other countries to escape economic devastation and hunger.
Maduro is likely to win re-election to a six-year term in the contest this weekend, which the opposition is largely boycotting. His main rival is former state governor Henri Falcon, who broke with the opposition to run.
“Through trustworthy intelligence sources we have knowledge of a plan by the Maduro regime, in progress since the end of last year, to give identifications to Colombian citizens and transport them to vote in the May 20 elections,” Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said in a televised address.
“The plan details the manner, procedures and payments to be made to guarantee the movement of the voters and their vote in favor of Maduro,” said Santos.
The Colombian president did not provide further details about the alleged plot, but said it reaffirmed Colombia’s decision not to recognize the results of Sunday’s vote.
The Colombian military will be increasing patrols along the two countries’ porous 2,220-km (1,380-mile) land border to prevent the movement of illegal voters, Santos added.
The Venezuelan government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Reporting by Julia Symmes Cobb; Additional reporting by Alexandra Ulmer in Caracas; Editing by Sandra Maler
BOGOTA (Reuters) – Right-wing candidate Ivan Duque kept his lead over rivals ahead of Colombia’s May 27 presidential election, with 35 percent of voters saying they planned to back him, a survey by YanHaas showed on Thursday.
FILE PHOTO: Colombian presidential candidate Ivan Duque speaks during a campaign event in Bogota, Colombia May 10, 2018. REUTERS/Jaime Saldarriaga
Support for Duque, a protégé of former President Alvaro Uribe, fell 3 points from the last YanHaas survey in April.
Leftist candidate Gustavo Petro, a former M-19 rebel and ex-mayor of Bogota, was in second place with 26 percent, down 2 points from the last survey by YanHaas.
Centrist Sergio Fajardo was third with 14 percent and support for center-right German Vargas Lleras was 6 percent.
Reporting by Bogota newsroom; Editing by Sandra Maler
CARACAS/BARQUISIMETO, Venezuela (Reuters) – Venezuela’s diplomatically isolated president got a show of support from his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan and Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona on Thursday ahead of a weekend election widely decried as unfair.
Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores greet supporters during his closing campaign rally in Caracas, Venezuela May 17, 2018. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso
The United States, the European Union and major Latin American countries have criticized Sunday’s vote in which leftist President Nicolas Maduro is likely to win re-election to a six-year term.
Critics say Maduro, a 55-year-old former bus driver who has presided over an economic meltdown, is virtually assured victory as two of his most popular opponents are banned from running and the electoral council is pro-government.
The Trump administration has threatened further sanctions and urged Latin America to cut off Venezuelan officials from financial systems and restrict their travel visas.
Any foreign shows of support are especially welcome to Maduro in the run-up to Sunday. On the campaign trail he has sought to legitimize his leadership, while playing down the brutal economic crisis that has Venezuelans skipping meals, succumbing to once controlled diseases, and emigrating en masse.
In a split screen chat broadcast on Venezuelan state television on Thursday, Maduro and Erdogan held a stilted, translated conversation that had several technical problems.
“I have faith you will be triumphant,” Erdogan told Maduro, whose main rival is former state Governor Henri Falcon, who broke with an opposition boycott to run for the presidency.
In turn, Maduro told Erdogan “Venezuelans are going to give a lesson on democracy and liberty to the world on Sunday.”
At Maduro’s closing campaign event later on Thursday in central Caracas, Maradona surprised the crowd by dancing to the rhythm of a catchy reggaeton song while waving a Venezuelan yellow, blue and red flag.
Maradona, who has called himself a “soldier” for Maduro, is well-known for supporting leftist politicians and was a friend of his predecessor Hugo Chavez and the late Cuban leader Fidel Castro, whose image is tattooed on his leg.
Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro, his wife Cilia Flores and former Argentinian soccer player Diego Armando Maradona greet supporters during a campaign rally in Caracas, Venezuela May 17, 2018. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins
Maduro and Erdogan have both faced criticism for their authoritarian-style rule and seeking to snuff out dissent while mishandling their economies.
‘I WILL FIX ECONOMY’
Maduro regularly says a right-wing, U.S.-led campaign is sabotaging the economy in order to foment a coup and usher in a capitalist leadership.
“I will dedicate my life to fixing the economy of this country .. My spirit is renewed, my energy recharged,” Maduro told a crowd of red-shirted supporters at his rally, saying he had been loyal to Chavez’s legacy during his first term.
Mainstream economists blame strict currency controls, poor management, and corruption for Venezuela’s deep recession. Rights activists also say Maduro has cracked down on protests and unjustly imprisoned activists.
“The situation is unbearable. Look how hungry we are … I trust God that this goddamn president will go,” said Reina Morillo, 48, among hundreds of Falcon supporters at his closing rally in the central city of Barquisimeto.
Opposition lawmaker and economist Angel Alvarado told Reuters the government no longer cared about its legitimacy in Western eyes, but was looking to cement relations with the likes of Russia, China, Turkey and Qatar.
China and Russia have lent Caracas billions of dollars and both have significant oil fields in Venezuela, home to the world’s biggest crude reserves.
Turkey has a much smaller presence, but Turkish Airlines started flying to Caracas in 2016 – one of a few major international carriers to still service the chaotic country – and Venezuela’s government has said Turkey would invest in its new “petro” cryptocurrency.
Venezuelan opposition leaders say Maduro is selling assets on the cheap in an attempt to keep his cash-strapped government afloat despite a fifth straight year of recession and collapsing oil production.
At his final rally, Falcon waved a rendering of a $100 bill to remind voters of his proposal to dollarize Venezuela’s economy.
“I will free Venezuelan from dictatorship,” he shouted on stage to cheers from supporters. “Maduro, the people want to bid you good riddance because you have caused great harm.”
Additional reporting by Leon Wietfeld, Deisy Buitrago, Andreina Aponte and Girish Gupta in Caracas; Writing by Alexandra Ulmer; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne and Tom Brown
Costa Rica exports in technology, information and communication (ICT) are valued at US$3.3 billion, equivalent to 5.8% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This percentage is similar to what the agricultural activity in the country generates.
This data follows after Costa Rica became the first country in the world to quantify and characterize the exports of services provided through ICTs. The study headed by the Central Bank of Costa Rica (BCCR), emerged as an initiative of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad), with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Trade (Comex), the Foreign Trade Promoter (Procomer), the Costa Rican Coalition of Development Initiatives (Cinde), and the Costa Rican Chamber of Information and Communication Technologies (Camtic).
The analysis took into account the information of the year 2016, which was provided by 984 companies that export technological services.
The destination market of exports was 60% to the United States, 13% to Europe, and 12% to Central America.
In terms of labor, 66% of the positions in ICT are occupied by men and 34% by women. In addition, this field of work generates direct employment opportunities of 5% of the total employment of the country.
A young university student, Lesther Alemán, confronted the president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, for the violent repression against the people, and his opposition to the continuity of Ortega’s mandate.
Student representative Lesther Aleman interrupts Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega, shouting that he must halt the repression, during the opening of the national dialogue. (AP Photo/Alfredo Zuniga)
“Why am I talking? Why do I interrupt you? You sleep peacefully, we do not. Because we have put the dead, we have put the missing, those who are kidnapped. This is not a dialogue table, it is a table to negotiate your departure and you know it very well,” the student told the president, face to face.
“Order it now, in this moment, the (halt to the) repression of the police, of the paramilitary forces, of your party’s gangs that have been massacring and killing…. In less than a month you’ve ruined the country; Somoza took years.” Aleman said, not needing a microphone to heard by everyone, alluding to dictator Anastasio Somoza whose government was toppled by the Ortega and the Sandinista rebels in 1979.
Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega speaks at the opening of a national dialogue, in Managua, Nicaragua, Wednesday, May 16, 2018. Ortega sat down Wednesday to formally talk with opposition and civic groups for the first time since he returned to power in 2007. The dialogue comes after more than 60 people died amid a government crackdown on demonstrations against social security cuts. (AP Photo/Alfredo Zuniga)
Ortega responded that the police were not repressing protests, but preventing chaos. “You can’t go around attacking police stations. Because it’s not little angels out there — there are guns, too, shooting at police,” he said.
On Wednesday, Aleman and fellow university students, union leaders and representative of the business sectors, and the bishops of the Catholic Church participate as mediators, among others, took part in the “national dialogue” with the objective to put and end to the political crisis in the country, the worst in the 11 years of President Ortega’s reign.
The first day of the dialogue, which is televised live in the local media and on the social networks, focused on the request for a cessation of the government repression.
Ortega shouted back at students that they had their own armed paramilitaries.
But Bishop Abelardo Mata of the Esteli diocese echoed the students’ demand, saying it was not an armed revolution.
Student representatives shout at President Daniel Ortega blaming him fro the deaths of those who have been killed in the ongoing protests during the opening of a national dialogue, in Managua, Nicaragua, Wednesday, May 16, 2018. (AP Photo/Alfredo Zuniga)
Before the request, the students read out loud the names of each and every person who died in the clashes during the last month.
“Today we continue as slaves, today we remain subdued, today we remain marginalized, today we are being mistreated. How many mothers are crying to their children, Mrs. Vice President, you are a mother and you know it very well, the pain,” Aleman directed his words to Rosario Murillo, Ortega’s wife and Nicaragua’s vice-president.
President Ortega heeded to the call to “call off the police repression”, following raised voices from all sectors and consulting with staffers, Ortega said “it is done”, referring to the order for the police to stand down against protestors.
It seems that everyone at the dialogue table was looking for a solution to the crisis. Everyone except Ortega, whose agenda was about Nicaragua’s economic stability, that the protests are jeopardizing the foreign investment and travel to the country.
In his speech, Ortega talked about the almost 160,000 workers – emphasizing the number – of workers who cannot get to their jobs due to the roadblocks. The President accused the protestors that their actions are creating massive unemployment. “More than 160,000 workers are paralyzed and you’re sending them to unemployment,” said Ortega.
The Organismo de Investigación Judicial (OIJ) is asking for help to located an Italian businessman who has been missing since Monday, May 14. Stefano Calandrelli, 51, who owned restaurants and is he ex-husband of journalist Adriana Durán.
OIJ asks for help to find missing Italian businessman
According to the OIJ, the last time Calandrelli was seen was the night of May 14 in Escazú Village. The foreigner was chatting with some friends there. Calandrelli is said to have requested an Uber service; however, after that, no one has heard or seen him since.
The OIJ indicated that the friends were surprised that the Calandrelli did not respond to their messages, so, the next day, they alerted the authorities of the disappearance.
“He is Italian but speaks perfect Spanish. Porfa (sic), if you see or have seen him do not hesitate to report to the OIJ. Stefano is a great friend of ours,” said the AMD athletic team on Wednesday.
Call can be made to the OIJ confidential line at 800-8000-645 or 911.
In a few months, the dollar exchange is expected to move, though experts are not clear if the move is upward or downward.
The exchange rate that many see as ‘stuck’ or “artifically floated” is expected with the arrival of the new boss at the Central Bank.
The government of Carlos Alvarado appointed Rodrigo Cubero Brealey as the President of the Banco Central de Costa Rica (BBCR). An economist graduate from Oxford, Cubero is currently working at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and is not available to take on the Central Bank position until August.
In the meantime, Olivier Castro, who was appointed in May 2014 by Luis Guillermo Solis, will continue as the head of the institution.
Experts predict that with the arrival of Cubero, the dollar exchange rate will be closer to the real value that it should have and have had.
This means that will mean that the U.S. dollar will become temporarily more expensive than it is now. But it can also go the other way.
In a report by ElFinancierio, it is argued that productive sectors have lost competitiveness due to the level of this macro-price and an equilibrium must be sought through a gradual devaluation of the exchange rate.
Causing devaluations in the nominal exchange rate to increase its real value, not only leads to errors but is also against the role that society gives the BCCR: the stability of prices,” says the Financiero.
Cubero is Costa Rican born. He is 49-years-old, is married (since 1997) and has three children. The economist graduated with a degree in Law from the Universidad de Costa Rica (UCR), then a master’s degree from the University of Essex and a doctorate from the University of Oxford.
In his doctoral thesis Macroeconomic Effects of Foreign Direct Investment: the case of Costa Rica, he argues that this type of capital flows have had a positive impact on the growth and international integration of the Costa Rican economy.
To date, Cubero has played little role in the Costa Rican public sector. He said he worked as a consultant in the State Reform Program, assigned to the Ministry of Planning, in the years 1991-1992.
“It was an instant, he opened the gate and disappeared,” the grandmother shaking told her story to the television cameras, after learning her 3-year-old grandson, who had been missing for some 2 hours, had been found and safe.
It was around 5:40 p.m. when Gabriel Carballo Figueroa went missing in the barrio Jesús Jiménez, in Tibas, after opening the ‘porton’. Gabriel’s grandmother said she was sure the gate was locked.
According to police, Gabriel was in the care of his grandmother while his mother was at work.
The community came to help. It was raining and dark by the time Gabriel was found by Vianey Muñoz, a teenager who decided to head into the ‘cafetal’ (coffee plantation) that leads to the nearby river.
“The most complicated part is that it was muddy and raining, the danger was that if it rained a lot, there was a risk of falling on a slope, I saw him when I looked down, he was trembling and was calling for his mother and his grandmother. It was barely 25 meters froa m slope. I was wearing a cape and I wrapped him in it. The boy was bruised because apparently he rolled down (the hill)”, explained Vianey.
The young boy was immediately handed over to waiting paramedics. Gabriel was suffering from hypothermia and was immediately taken to the Children’s hospital in San Jose, where he is recovering.
Nicaragua’s 72-year-old leader, Daniel Ortega, who previously ruled between 1979 and 1990, is a former leftist Sandinista guerrilla who helped overthrow the US-backed dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza, but who himself has become seen as dictatorial, faced a confrontation in the first national dialogue held in Managua.
Rosario Murillo, with her husbad, Daniel Ortega, at her side during the opening of the national dialouge in Managua.
Ortega opened talks on Wednesday with opposition groups in a bid to quell a month of anti-government unrest that has seen more than 50 people killed.
The Catholic Church-mediated dialogue involved representatives of university students who are leading the protests against Ortega as well as some from business groups and unions.
Ortega told the room that the aim of the talks was to ‘get past this tragic moment’ and restore ‘peace’ to the country, one of Latin America’s poorest.
He was however interrupted by student representatives calling him a ‘murderer’ and urging’an end to the repression.’
“They were students, not criminals,” the students yelled.
In his oration, Ortega said the protesters are “not little angels”, reiterating that among the dead and wounded in the clashes are also members of the police.
Ortega’s wife, Rosario Murillo, who is also Nicaragua’s vice-president and chief governmentspokesperson, said ‘we came here in good faith’ and urged all present ‘to think of Nicaragua.’
But student representatives in the room made clear that they want the president and Murillo to step down.
They shouted “murderers” at Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo as they arrived and left the Dialogue meeting on Wednesday in Managua.
The leader of the student coalition, Lester Aleman, said “we have come to demand you order the immediate halt of the attacks. You’re the boss of the paramilitaries, of the troops, of the mobs backing the government.”
The unrest was the worst faced by Ortega in his past 11 years as president.
Rights groups say at least 68 people were killed, the majority of the protesters. During the meeting, the names of each and every person who has died during the protests were read out loud to the room and the televised audience.
In the eve of the talks, the most recent clashes between protesters and police took place in the northern town of Matagalpa, which has long been under the sway of Ortega’s Sandinista party.
The town’s mayor, Sadrach Zeledon, said one person, Wilber Reyes, was killed in attacks launched by police.
The Nicaraguan Association for Human Rights spokesman in the city, German Herrera, told local TV station 100% Noticias that 35 people were injured in the clashes on Tuesday and at least 10 people had been arrested.
Also on Tuesday, in Masaya, 30km southeast of Managua, residents reported harsh repression by riot police, while in the capital, parents and students from private high schools marched to demand justice and freedom.
The ex-governor of Antioquia and former mayor of Medellín, Sergio Fajardo, is trying to regain his front-runner status, which he in enjoyed in the Colombian presidential race months ago.
However, in the majority of the polls, he has been unable to rise above third place, separated from second place Gustavo Petro by up to 15 points. This indicates that, at least for now, he has no chance of reaching the second round.
Sergio Fajardo’s attempt to unite a center-left coalition appears to have given way to the rise of Petro. (Facebook).
But what has caused his precipitous decline? Have his countless campaign stops, numerous debate performances, and an impressive quantity of electoral alliances forged been in vain? For several analysts, there are two factors that caused Fajardo’s drop in the polls: 1. his lack of conviction with regard to the crucial issues facing the country and 2. his alliance with one of the most radical figures of the Colombian left, Jorge Enrique Robledo.
Being “neutral” as a strategy
Javier Garay, professor and specialist in economic development, suggests that Fajardo’s carefully cultivated image, “supposedly of an intellectual, of an academic, of a professor…cost him that image of neutrality”, but, he adds, “perhaps his moderate image is not attributable to his academic background, as every academic prefers to avoid giving absolute answers, but to his lack of knowledge in many a subject.”
Presidential elections will be held in Colombia on 27 May 2018. If no candidate receives a majority of the vote, a second round will be held on 17 June. Incumbent Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos is ineligible for re-election, having already served two terms.
Alejandra Ramírez, political analyst, points out that although Fajardo’s image reflects “a political strategy of not taking strong positions on some issues, and making education his priority, it makes him an appealing candidate for centrist voters,” but also subjects him to the charge that he is “a figure with little potential for strong leadership.”
Camilo Bello, a political consultant, says that Fajardo has focused on the “practice of clean politics as opposed to principles or a certain ideology,” which has left an “ideological vacuum” which has led him to make several mistakes. In addition, he emphasizes that Fajardo’s strategy of positioning himself in the center was unsuccessful, because “he did not manage to consolidate the Colombian left vote or the supporters of the peace process,” because those positions were already staked out by Vargas and de La Calle.
However, for Daniel Salamanca Pérez, lawyer, and teacher, “it is absurd to say that Fajardo has not taken the bull by the horns. Fajardo’s tone is contrary to the rest of the candidates, a serious tone that shows his concern for the central issues facing the country.”
Fajardo’s alliances and their incoherence
Although Fajardo has tried to project himself as a centrist politician, with some of his alliances he has shown a tendency to the center-left, because his vice-presidential candidate comes from the Colombian left, and his campaign supporter, Jorge Enrique Robledo, belongs to the most radical left-wing sector in the country, which, for reasons of a power struggle, decided not to support Petro.
The Fajardo-Robledo alliance displays a degree of incoherence because the policies that Robledo has defended throughout his career conflict with those of Fajardo. Apparently, Robledo’s influence is already beginning to take effect on several of Fajardo’s proposals. A few months ago Fajardo defended the Ser Pilo Paga (It Pays to be Smart) program. Now, like Robledo, he says he would dismantle it.
However, Salamanca states that “the fact that he has joined forces with Robledo, López, and Mockus shows that he is a person capable of reconciling different positions in a country so prone to radicalization.” Additionally, he notes that Robledo supports a program based on “classic liberal theory, demonstrating the ability of Fajardo to take a hard look at the serious problems facing the country.”
Garay, on the other hand, suggests that the alliance with Robledo “is incoherent and unpresentable…of all the alliances, this is the one that seems to be the most likely to make him lose support and reduces the coherence of the whole political project.” He adds that the alliance between Fajardo, Robledo, López, and Mockus was not really productive, since “these allies attract the same type of voter.”
Bello argues that Fajardo’s alliances are an attempt “to compensate for his lack of ideology” as he tries to build “a discourse on the moderate left, hand in hand with the advocates of political correctness.” Additionally, he affirms that taking into account that “Robledo represents positions that Fajardo and his movement have previously rejected,” that the alliance is incoherent. However, the title of best senator in Colombia holds more weight for citizens than his objective of “affecting private initiative.”
Will Fajardo reach the second round?
Ramírez thinks that Fajardo will not, “because the reality of the political and social situation in the country, is that the people are looking for a leader who is at the forefront of unresolved issues and problems that need an immediate solution, and for that, they are looking for someone with clear positions, such as Petro or Duque.”
Bello believes the same, suggesting that “the center-left coalition does not have sufficient draw to win the support of traditional leftist unions and ‘caciques’ that prefer to support Petro.”
So, since Fajardo appears unlikely to reach the second, would it be possible to see Fajardo backing Duque or Petro, or maybe Vargas Lleras? This is a dilemma in which Fajardo would be forced to consult with his alliance partners, who could possibly press him for, in a Duque-Petro scenario, releasing his supporters to vote as they please, or promoting a “none of the above” option. In a scenario, with Vargas Lleras, they might choose to back him, due to the continuity that he represents in the peace process.
This note is part of a series of four entries on the main presidential candidates of Colombia (Vargas Lleras, Duque, Petro, and Fajardo).
After the expected completion of the National Dialogue, the different reactions were immediate. One of them was the president of the Unión de Productores Agropecuarios de Nicaragua (UPANIC) -Union of Agricultural Producers of Nicaragua – Michael Healy, who pointed out that President Daniel Ortega has no eyes to see the reality in Nicaragua.
Businessmen say that Ortega lives in a bubble and ignores the reality of the crisis facing the country.
“He is not seeing the reality of this country, I would say to him that he take a helicopter ride, in case he is afraid of being killed, and that he travel the country to see the situation. That is the duty of a president to take clear and concise measures,” he said.
On the other hand, he said that after the dialogue there is no possibility of “real fruition”, since the president only emphasized economic issues and not constitutional issues.
“They are talking about economic issues when we want to talk about constitutional issues, which is the real problem that Nicaraguans have, here the electoral law has to be clear where Nicaraguans can get out to vote and elect their authorities without their vote being stolen,” Healy added.
Juan Sebastián Chamorro, director of the Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, expressed disappointment after the government’s speech. “We’re really disappointed because we thought this was an alternative. A valuable opportunity is being wasted,” he said.
Lesther Aleman led the group of university studenrs in the national dialogue. Aleman told Ortega and Murillo they have to go, that the dialogue table was to negotiate their exit.
For his part, Monsignor Silvio Báez, auxiliary bishop of Managua, said there is still time for the students to raise their voices. “There is still time for them (government) to listen, (the students) have had a great opportunity to vent their pain and their indignation and they have done very well, but this is just beginning. We have to keep going and we must continue to demand the conditions that the bishops put in place. ”
The president of the Supreme Council of Private Enterprise COSEP, José Adán Aguerri, said that “among all Nicaraguans, starting from the first that is the safety of young people and the population and then absolutely going to the investigation of what has happened, we have to deal with other issues, in democratization, in a way out, so that we put the country back in place, Nicaragua cannot be destroyed again, we hope that the dialogue will find that.”
Educator and essayist, Dr. Carlos Tünnermann, who told President Ortega after his speech in the dialogue “was disappointing,” stressed that Nicaragua needs fair and transparent elections, because “here we have not had any since the Lord (Ortega) returned to power.”
“I believe that the Nicaraguan people could observe that, in this dialogue, what dominated in the agenda was the demand of young people. Ortega brought his own agenda, but the young people imposed theirs because they are the ones who have been at the forefront of this struggle and they are the ones who have paid with bodies and it is true what they said, they were not criminals who died, they were students,” he added.
María Nelly Rivas, president of the American Chamber of Commerce of Nicaragua (AmCham), expressed her gratitude to the Episcopal Conference for allowing Amcham’s participation in the dialogue. “I think it was a start. They summoned us and we continue to state that the issues of the agenda as a private sector begin with justice,” she said.
“We have heard today, very strong emotions from everywhere and it is for Nicaragua. To return to the table in a few days to decide the future of this country,” said the Ambassador of the United States in Nicaragua, Laura Dogu.
The students believe that President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo mocked dead in the almost month clashes, and businessmen say that the government lives in a bubble and ignores the reality of the crisis facing the country.
(Prensa Latina) Following the steps taken this week by the United States, Guatemala carried out today the transfer of its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, an action strongly criticized by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
During the opening ceremony of the embassy, Guatemalan President, Jimmy Morales, considered that after taking this step, Guatemala becomes ‘an example for other countries,’ despite Jerusalem’s recognition as the capital of Israel is rejected by most of the international community for being illegal.
Referring to the actions of the Guatemalan government, Saeb Erekat, secretary general of the PLO Executive Committee, emphasized that in this way ‘the Central American country has chosen to remain on the wrong side of history.’
We are not surprised that a president (Morales) who has opposed to the United Nations investigations on corruption and power abuses has decided to violate even more resolutions of the UN General Assembly and its Security Council, Erekat said.
Make no mistake, such an insult against the Palestinian people reflects the disrespect of millions of Central Americans who have struggled for the values of justice and peace, he stated.
After demolishing religious arguments given by Morales, the secretary general argued how the document presented by the Guatemalan government to justify itself also reflects its alliance with the Israeli occupation and right-wing fundamentalists. The fact that they have used the Bible and Christianity as an excuse to move their embassy to Jerusalem, is in contradiction with the position of the Holy See, 13 churches in Jerusalem, as well as several Christian religious leaders throughout the world, Erekat said.
This highlights the fundamentalist nature of the Israeli regime and its allies, such as the current Guatemalan government, he added.
Erekat said in his statements that Palestine will follow the issue within the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference; as well as in dialogue with allies, including those of Latin America, in order to take the appropriate measures in response to the Guatemalan decision.
(Insightcrime.org) US President Donald Trump has proposed a new reform that would ease firearm export controls for US weapons manufacturers, which could increase the already high number of US-sourced firearms used in criminal activities in Latin America.
The proposal, published May 14, would shift authority to regulate exports of certain firearms and related products from the State Department to the Commerce Department. The move aims to streamline the approval process for arms exports so US manufacturers — suffering from decreased domestic sales in the Trump era — can sell more guns, ammunition and accessories abroad.
“There will be more leeway to do arms sales,” a senior administration official told Reuters last year when the plan was first floated unofficially. “You could really turn the spigot on if you do it the right way.”
The rule would apply to “commercial items widely available in [US] retail outlets and less sensitive military items,” the proposal states. That definition would cover products like assault-type rifles, military-grade sniper scopes, armor-piercing ammunition and most handguns.
While many in Congress support the move, several powerful Senators have vowed to fight it.
In a joint press release, the human rights organization Global Exchange and the Violence Policy Center, a pro-gun control group, slammed the proposal, saying it “will likely lead to more US guns getting into the hands of criminal organizations, human rights abusers, terrorist groups, and others who wreak harm.”
Indeed, US-sourced guns play a major role in fueling criminal violence in Latin America and the Caribbean. Data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) consistently shows that a large percentage of firearms seized in Central America and the Caribbean can be traced back to the United States. And a majority of murders in the world’s most homicidal region involve the use of a gun.
The new export rules are likely to affect many countries throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. But due to its proximity to the United States and other factors, Mexico is likely to see a significant impact.
InSight Crime spoke with researcher and activist John Lindsay-Poland of Global Exchange about the flow of US firearms to Mexico, the role these firearms play in rising levels of violence and the potential effects that the proposed reform might have on these dynamics.*
InSight Crime (IC): American guns have for years been flowing into Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America. Can you give us some background on this and some context for the recent focus on this dynamic as of late?
John Lindsay-Poland (JLP): It’s true, US weapons have been flowing into Mexico and other countries both legally and illegally for many years. The end of the assault weapons ban in 2004 created even greater conditions to obtain firearms that are of a special interest to organized criminal groups in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. The structure of the US-Mexico border is such that most controls are on the south-to-north trafficking route, under the idea, in the United States, that the threat is in Mexico. I think that corresponds to an American exceptionalism idea that [the United States] cannot pose a threat. The infrastructure does not control very well for weapons that are going north to south.
When the drug war in Mexico heated up, the market conditions were great both on the supply and demand side for an increased flow of military-grade weaponry. The drug war becomes helpful to the gun industry because the premise of the drug war is that the United States and its allies are going to fight drug trafficking through military and policing means, so therefore they’re going to be armed. The collusion of these forces with organized crime is overlooked in the interest of that market.
IC: Two of the US agencies primarily responsible for combating cross-border arms trafficking are the ATF and the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Have these agencies collaborated effectively or been given the proper resources to stem the flow of US firearms to Mexico?
JLP: There’s a US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that says they were not collaborating effectively. I don’t know this from my own fieldwork, but I would take the GAO’s word for it.
The ATF has been hobbled by congressional restrictions as a result of the gun industry’s lobbying that has prevented it from having a permanent director for years, the resources and the legislation. The fact that international gun trafficking has not been a federal crime in itself is also an indicator of the lack of resources that the agency has.
Because the US prioritizes commerce, the effort to try to stop physical things from going over the border is never going to be successful. There will be people who are caught and weapons that are seized, and that’s a good thing, but any successful effort has to go further upstream to the production and marketing of weapons, as well as the policies and laws related to that, in order to stop the flow.
IC: How effective have Mexican authorities been in stemming the flow of US weapons south to Mexico?
JLP: Not effective. A 2013 study from the University of San Diego estimated that 250,000 firearms purchased in the United States are trafficked into Mexico each year. The number of firearms recovered at crime scenes has gone down in recent years. It’s unclear exactly why, but the incentives within the Mexican police and armed forces are not strong enough to go after weapons. There are incentives to go after drugs, but there’s also of course extensive collusion between police and military forces and organized crime, so that I think is also undermining efforts to recover weapons.
Mexico can work with the United States to strengthen enforcement and market controls on the US side of the border. The other thing is that the approach to security and to drug trafficking in Mexico is supported by the United States, which is reinforcing a kind of arms race between criminal groups and the state. If criminal groups get more weaponry, police get more weaponry, and if police get more weaponry, criminal groups get more weaponry.
IC: Do you think the flow of US firearms to Mexico is used to explain the high levels of violence we’re seeing in Mexico as opposed to flawed security strategies or more structural issues?
JLP: I would definitely affirm that the flow of US guns has contributed to homicides in Mexico. If you look, for example, at the percentage of homicides committed with firearms, it goes up. In the early 2000s, one in four homicides were committed with firearms. In the US context, people expect murders to be committed with guns because that’s been a long-term trend within the United States. In Mexico that wasn’t always the case. The gun-related homicides are going up and the reason they’re able to go up is that there are more guns. That’s not the only reason, but it is one. Since most of those guns are coming from the United States, illegally or legally, of course the United States has a role.
IC: With growing support for stricter gun control in the United States, is there any chance we’ll see a decrease in the number of US guns in route to Mexico?
JLP: I think there is an opening now. The gun violence prevention movement in the United States has been very focused on crimes committed with guns in the United States, and generally has not been aware of how US-sourced guns are being used outside our borders. So that is an important piece of trying to have an impact in Mexico or in other countries.
“The approach to security and to drug trafficking in Mexico is supported by the United States, which is reinforcing a kind of arms race between criminal groups and the state.”
That said, if there were a new assault weapons ban, it would have an impact in Mexico, even if the ban is done without the awareness of the impact in Mexico. When the federal assault weapons ban expired in 2004, California retained an assault weapons ban. Mexican communities on the other side of the border from Texas, Arizona and New Mexico saw a much greater increase in gun deaths after the expiration of the federal assault weapons ban than Mexican communities on the other side of the border from California.
There is interest now in Mexico in increased work around guns both within the country and bilaterally. I think there is increased interest in how to create more awareness that could lead to policy changes that would have an impact on the guns coming into Mexico. But there’s a long way to go.
IC: In a recent article you wrote for Al Jazeera, you argued that the United States should “suspend gun export licenses to Mexico and reorient its security policy there.” Can you explain your reasoning?
JLP: We call for a suspension of firearms licenses to Mexico because under the current system, there is no adequate end-use control mechanism for legally exported weapons to Mexico from the United States. When a gun producer goes to the US State Department to seek an export license, it has to name the end users.
Now in Mexico, only the Mexican military is legally permitted to import firearms. And they’re also the only legal distributor within Mexico, including to the police. All police weapons in Mexico come through the Mexican military, which produces them themselves, although this is a very small portion, or they import them. About two-thirds of the weapons that they have imported have gone outside Mexico City. However, when the license comes before the State Department, 80 percent of those applications, according to a State Department source who I spoke with, said that they name the end users as within Mexico City, the military or police within Mexico City, when we know that most are being distributed outside the capital to police forces around the country.
The US State Department is not getting sufficient information about who the end users really are, which means that they cannot under the current system exclude police forces that have committed severe human rights abuses or colluded with organized crime from getting US-sourced firearms. It’s important that the State Department suspends those licenses and creates a system with end-use controls that allows them to know where the end users are and who they are.
IC: How will the Trump administration’s proposal affect levels of violence in Mexico?
JLP: We can expect even less oversight on end users of US guns, so more weapons going to police and military units that Washington knows are colluding with organized crime, have “lost” weapons, or have committed serious human rights abuses. That further erodes the rule of law and makes conflicts over territory and business even more violent.
* This transcript was edited for clarity and length.
Insightcrime.org – There is no universally accepted definition of what constitutes a “mafia state.” Here are seven arguments as to why we think Venezuela qualifies and what the implications are of this troubled Andean nation as a regional crime hub.
1. Top level criminal penetration into state institutions
For the last three years InSight Crime has been tracking individuals we believe have links to organized crime and have held, or currently hold, senior positions in Venezuelan state institutions. We have found 123 officials that we confidently believe are involved in criminal activity. For legal reasons we will not publish the entire list, but some of the clearest cases are named in this investigation, “Drug Trafficking within the Venezuelan Regime: The Cartel of the Suns.”
What is clear from our investigations is that the following institutions are staffed at the higher echelons by individuals we believe are, or have been, engaged in criminal activity:
The Vice Presidency, the Ministries of Interior (Ministerio del Poder Popular del Despacho de la Presidencia y Seguimiento de la Gestión de Gobierno), Defense (Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Defensa), Agriculture (Ministerio del Poder Popular de Agricultura Urbana), Education (Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Educación), Prison Service (Ministerio del Poder Popular para el Servicio Penitenciario), Foreign Trade and Investment (Ministerio de Estado para el Comercio Exterior e Inversión Internacional), Electricity (Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Energía Eléctrica), the National Guard (Guardia Nacional Bolivariana), the Armed Forces (Fuerzas Armadas Bolivarianas), the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia Nacional – SEBIN) and PdVSA.
The penetration of so many key institutions, and the fact that they constitute the state’s main organs in the fight against organized crime, means that Venezuela cannot even contain organized crime, let alone effectively fight it. With so many state actors with interests in criminal activity, be it fuel smuggling, the black market sale of food and medicines or the trafficking of cocaine, this factor alone suggests that Venezuela qualifies as a mafia state.
2. Evidence of kleptocracy
How does a nation sat astride the greatest oil reserves outside of the Middle East go bust? Staggering incompetence, corruption and kleptocracy.
The state coffers have been pillaged on an industrial scale by the Bolivarian elite. With no transparency or public accounting of state budgets or expenditure, it is hard to calculate how much has been looted from the country. An investigation by a congressional committee put the number at $70 billion. A former minister has stated that the number is closer to $300 billion.
Without hard data, all we can do is recognize the scale of the corruption and look at some of its principal motors. The lack of transparency is one. Venezuela ranks 166 out of 176 countries rated by Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index. If nobody knows how much the state is earning and how it is spending it, then there is no accountability and therefore officials who control budgets can easily divert funds into their own pockets or those of their friends. This kleptocracy has certainly been one of the main factors that has brought Venezuela to the edge of economic collapse and bankruptcy.
Currency and price controls introduced by the Venezuelan government in February 2003 were one of the principle enablers of corruption and kleptocracy during the government of Hugo Chávez. And this continues today, although on a much smaller scale.
“The system was created to be abused,” said Alejandro Rebolledo, a Venezuelan lawyer specializing in organized crime, during an interview with InSight Crime in Caracas. The differential exchange rates were created under the premise of avoiding capital flight in the aftermath of widespread strikes that had led to the 2002 coup. They immediately gave raise to “perverse incentives,” according to Carlos Miguel Alvarez, an analyst at the Venezuelan think tank Ecoanalitica. Unscrupulous businesses and corrupt officials could buy dollars “cheap” at the official rate and sell them for much more bolivars on the black market.
Importers “wildly inflate the value of goods brought into the country to grab American dollars at rock-bottom exchange rates. Sometimes, they fake the shipments altogether and import nothing at all,” according to an investigation by the New York Times.
Now, the exchange system is used to keep key sectors loyal. The privileged get access to US dollars, allowing them to make huge profits. The principal beneficiary today is the military, which controls the importation and distribution of food and medicine, and profits in criminal terms from this monopoly.
3. The devolution of state powers to irregular and illegal actors
Following the 2002 military coup that ousted Hugo Chávez from power for 48 hours, the president made key changes to the levers of power to ensure he could not be toppled in the same way again. One of the measures he adopted was to devolve state functions to irregular and even criminal elements. The security forces also lost the monopoly on carrying arms. Instead there has been a proliferation of weapons and munitions into criminal hands, either by design or through corruption. We have two articles in this investigative series dedicated to two examples of this: “The Devolution of State Power: The Colectivos,” and “The Devolution of State Power: The Pranes.”
The colectivos are irregular, usually armed groups that have control over many neighborhoods, principally in Caracas. They have historically enjoyed government blessing and therefore a degree of legitimacy, but are ultimately accountable to no one. They “police” their areas of influence and some even offer a parallel justice system. While they were initially funded by the Venezuela government, they have increasingly turned to criminal activities to finance themselves, principally the microtrafficking of drugs, as well as extortion. The government of President Nicolás Maduro has used the colectivos to exert social control in their areas of influence and to break up opposition protests.
The Colectivos also perform police surveillance . Credit: Carlos Ramirez
The pranes are the criminal bosses within Venezuela’s prison system. Under Prison Minister Iris Varela, the government has largely delivered control of the prison system to the pranes, with the understanding that they keep violence to a minimum and prevent disorder within the penitentiary system. The system of pranes has become so powerful and successful, that their criminal structures now operate beyond the prison gates, often in tandem with the so called “megabandas,” criminal structures than now exert control over much of the Venezuelan underworld.
4. Exponential growth of Venezuelan organized crime
Venezuela does not have a long tradition of organized crime. Indeed, until very recently it was the Colombian mafias who controlled much of the drug trafficking, extortion and kidnapping, and these were largely confined to the border states.
Today crime is rampant, and Venezuela is likely the kidnap capital of Latin America, although there is no hard data to support this claim.
Right from the outset, the Bolivarian regime adopted a strange attitude to crime. In a now infamous speech Chávez made shortly after becoming president, he condoned those who stole to feed their families, in comments widely interpreted as encouraging crime.
“The truth is that yes, if I were that young man … and I saw my daughter at the point of dying of hunger I think I would go out at midnight to do something to stop her from going to her grave — don’t you think?” he said in a public address.
“The rich are bad and the poor are exploited, the poor are delinquents or violent because they’re poor and exploited,” is how Roberto Briceño-Leon, who heads the Venezuelan Violence Observatory (Observatorio Venezolano de Violencia – OVV), described the regime’s ideological justification for tolerating criminality.
There have been a series of government policies that have directly benefited organized crime. One began in 2013, when the government began implementing what became known as its “peace zone” policy. Run by José Vicente Rangel Avalos, now the mayor of Sucre municipality in Caracas, the policy was to engage in social investment in areas of high criminality and negotiate with local communities to reduce crime. What really ended up happening was Rangel Avalos sitting down with the leaders of megabandas.
Part of the negotiations between the megabandas and the government was a verbal agreement not to allow state security forces into the designated zones without prior agreement, according to reports. Rangel Avalos denied this was the case, but observers and the media reported that the government effectively handed the areas over to the control of the gangs. They became the de facto law, and thus expanded in confidence, strength and territorial control. The absence of the security forces was the most fundamental factor in the growth of the gangs. Much like their colleagues in the prisons, the megabandas were able to create a state within a state.
“They abandoned people when they said to the municipal police, the state police, the city police that they couldn’t patrol these [peace zones] to avoid misunderstandings … and so the criminals said, ‘Hey brother, this is my opportunity to convert this area into our territory, to bring kidnapping victims, to charge ransoms, to batter the people who live here,’” Fermín Mármol, a lawyer and former police chief, told InSight Crime.
The peace zone policy, never officially recognized by the government, has been abandoned, but the zones in which it was practiced remain some of the areas with the highest rates of criminality.
Investigations by InSight Crime point to between 12 and 16 megabandas, some with over 300 members, currently operating in Venezuela, mainly in the states of Miranda, Guárico, Carabobo, Aragua, Zulia, Bolivar, Táchira and in the capital Caracas.
Linked to growth of criminal gangs has been the increase in illegal economies. The biggest has long been the smuggling of subsidized fuel, the cheapest in the world to buy, into Brazil and Colombia. This is now largely in the hands of the National Guard, working with Colombian groups. But a far more widespread series of black markets was created via the system of government subsidies on foodstuffs and medicines. This black market has fed the growth of criminal actors, who profit from their trading or smuggling. Nowadays, almost every Venezuelan does business with black markets, and many state actors, as well as criminal actors, profit from it, once again blurring the lines between the state and criminals, undermining the legitimacy of the government.
5. High levels of violence by state and non-state actors
While there are no official homicide statistics, the most realistic data on murders is provided by Venezuela’s Violence Observatory (Observatorio Venezolano de Violencia – OVV). It placed Venezuela at 89 homicides per 100,000 of population during 2017, making the nation the most dangerous in Latin America, in a region with the highest homicides rates in the world. Caracas ranks as one of the deadliest cities on the planet, with a murder rate of 130 per 100,000.
Of the 26,616 homicides registered by the OVV in 2017, 5,535 occurred at the hands of the security forces, a very high proportion, amid widespread accusations of extrajudicial killings, often in the context of the Operations to Liberate the People (Operativos de Liberación del Pueblo – OLPs). These are anti-crime offensives, launched by President Nicolás Maduro, aimed at bringing down rampant crime rates. They have been marked by high numbers of killings and accusations that there is a “shoot first, ask questions later” mentality. Another factor in the high level of state killings has been the heavy handed response to opposition protests. The United Nations has already questioned the high level of security force killings.
These levels of homicides can be laid firmly at the door of the government. When Chávez took power in 1999, homicide rates were at around 25 per 100,000, with just under 6,000 violent deaths at the end of 1999, according to the OVV. From 1999, homicides began to go up and have risen steadily year on year.
6. The Exportation of Criminality
For decades Colombia exported conflict and criminality to Venezuela, as that country’s civil conflict spilled over the frontier. Colombian drug trafficking organizations and warring factions set up shop, turning Venezuela into a logistics base, safe haven and one of the principal transit nations for Colombian cocaine. However, with the rising levels of criminality and the large-scale contraband to neighboring countries, including many small and vulnerable Caribbean islands, Venezuela is becoming a net exporter of criminality.
Much of this can be laid at the door of sheer desperation. Hungry and penniless Venezuelans, many with little education or marketable skills, have been forced out of the country in their search for survival. They are easy prey for organized crime, as victims and recruits.
The Red Cross estimated that at least one million Venezuelans fled their nation into Colombia over the last 12 months, and that an estimated 37,000 people were crossing the border every day.
Many of these dispossessed are being recruited by organized crime. The biggest recruiters have been the Colombian mafia and rebel groups, but InSight Crime doing field research in Colombia has found Venezuelan women working in the sex trade across Colombia, including as far away as Nariño on the border with Ecuador. The chapter “Colombia and Venezuela: Criminal Siamese Twins” provides further information on the presence of these rebel groups on the border between the two countries.
In the article on the cocaine pipeline from Venezuela through the Caribbean, “Dominican Republic and Venezuela: Cocaine Across the Caribbean,” we track the growing involvement of Venezuelans in a wide variety of criminal activities.
7. Widespread international accusations of criminal behavior
Another indicator of a mafia state is when enough international actors question a state’s legitimacy, not just on its democratic credentials, but for criminal activity.
Not surprisingly, the United States has taken the lead in condemning the Venezuelan government. In one of the most recent declarations, Nikki Haley, the US Ambassador to the United Nations, said that ordinary Venezuelans were “the unwilling victims of a criminal narco-state.”
Colombia’s president, Juan Manuel Santos has accused the Maduro administration of “using criminal gangs to be able to exercise better control over society, over the people, a macabre association of criminal gangs with security forces to control the population.”
The United Nations has received reports of “hundreds of extrajudicial killings in recent years, both during protests and security operations,” the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein stated.
Panama placed 54 Venezuelan government figures, including President Maduro, on a list of persons at “high risk” of engaging in money laundering or financing terrorism.
The European Union placed sanctions on seven senior government officials, including Interior Minister Nestor Reverol, Supreme Court president Maikel Moreno, intelligence chief Gustavo Gonzalez Lopez and the number two of the ruling socialist party, Diosdado Cabello. They are now subject to asset freeze and travel bans.
Even Switzerland, not known for its aggressive foreign policy, announced sanctions against Venezuela, stating it was “seriously concerned by the repeated violations of individual freedoms in Venezuela, where the principle of separation of powers is severely undermined and the process in view of the forthcoming elections suffers from a serious lack of legitimacy.”
Venezuelans go the polls this weekend, to choose their next president. Nobody is expecting free and fair elections, and the favorite to win is the sitting president, Nicolás Maduro. If he wins, the mafia tendencies of the Venezuelan state are likely to further solidify, and this Andean nation will become one of Latin America’s regional crime hubs, with grave consequences for her neighbors and the region as a whole.
This article is part of a multipart investigation looking at organized crime in Venezuela. See other parts of the series here.
Ecuador spent at least US$5 million on a spy operation to support and protect WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in its embassy in London, media reported.
REUTERS / Peter Nichollspe
Documents seen by The Guardian newspaper revealed that millions were put into a secret intelligence operation, dubbed “Operation Guest,” and employing undercover agents to monitor Assange’s visitors, embassy employees and the UK police.
Moreover, a joint investigation by The Guardian and the Focus Ecuador media outlet showed citing sources that the operation had been approved by former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa and former Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino.
According to the newspaper, the security team also recorded the WikiLeaks founder’s daily activities in minute detail, as well as his interactions with Ecuador’s embassy staff and other visitors.
Assange took refuge at Ecuador’s Embassy in London in 2012 after he was accused of sexual offenses. He fears extradition to the United States where he is wanted for leaking damning Iraq War logs.
One of the biggest killers of humans is not a disease, nor is it related to traffic accidents. It’s snakebite.
Minutes to Die” uncovers snakebite crisis
Every year around 125,000 people die from snakebite and about 40,000 more survive but with scars, amputations, and paralysis, resulting in the loss of jobs and loss of self-esteem. The great majority of snake bite victims live in rural areas in poor countries where the nearest clinic is miles away and the necessary serum may not be available. And if it is, the expense may be beyond the family’s means.
The magnitude of the snake bite epidemic is not fully understood in the major advanced countries where it is rare. As a result, little resources and research are spent on snakebite treatment. It is only in recent years that the World Health Organization listed snakebite as a ‘disease’ prolific in tropical climates.
A documentary film called Minutes to Die, directed by James Reid, describes the phenomenon of snake bite and its prevalence in mostly rural areas of Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
“I dream of a more equitable world in which the advances of science and technology would benefit all human beings to fully achieve the richness of human capabilities. I hope, as a consequence of a concerted global action, no person suffering a snakebite dies or is left with permanent physical or psychological consequences.”
José María Gutiérrez, researcher at Instituto Clodomiro Picado at the University of Costa Rica.
The 78-minute film includes the work of Costa Rica’s Clodomiro Picado Institute whose research into and production of anti-venom serum has saved the lives of thousands of victims in many countries and reduced the cost of treatment which is usually covered by government health services. Clodomiro Picado Institute is part of the University of Costa Rica and works with the departments of biology, immunology, and medicine.
José María Gutiérrez
Reid visited the institute and filmed an interview with director Dr. Jose Maria Gutierrez.
“Here we show how a public university is producing anti-venom serums at low cost for Africa and has been doing this for a long time. Costa Rica is a savior for those who live in sub-Sahara Africa because private pharmaceutical companies sell the serum at US$140 to US$150 a bottle,” he points out.
Costa Rica sells it at cost for Nigeria, Mali, Burkina Faso and countries ranging from Sri Lanka to Brazil. The institute works with 115 health agencies around the world in 31 countries.
Dr. Gutierrez points to factors in Costa Rica that have prevented deaths from snake bites. He lists the Clodomiro Picado Institute as fundamental in the development and production of anti-venom serum.
The serum is distributed through the national health system to hospitals (the CCSS or Caja), clinics and EBAIS (health centers). He also credits the education and training of personnel to administer treatment.
Gutierrez says that in Costa Rica there may be between 500 and 600 snakebites a year but almost no deaths.
Programs like the one here in Costa Rica could reduce snakebite deaths in other countries
The Clodomiro Picado Institute is located in Dulce Nombre de Coronado on San Jose´s east side. It began humbly in 1970 in a laboratory of San Juan de Dios hospital by “Clorito” Picado himself. The work included breaking down the poison to study how it affected humans. Then came the work of developing an antidote. The Institute continues research into poisons and their antidotes. Poison from coral snakes is different than that of bushmasters, and poisons from snakes in different climates, in Panama for example, have different markers so studies continue.
The institute distributes about 100,000 bottles of serum a year, to fifteen countries. Different types of serum are produced for different areas. Anti coral for Central America and serum EchiTab for countries in Africa. The amount of serum needed depends on the extent of bite injury and the cost is absorbed by the health services in the various countries. Each bottle contains 10 milliliters of serum.
The documentary shows families who have suffered the loss of someone with snakebite, and the living areas where snakebite is common and includes interviews with six changemakers including Sr. Gutierrez, who are working to eliminate the suffering and to prevent and treat snakebite. The film was shown at the University of Costa Rica and is mostly an educational tool.
More on the film is at www.minutestodie.com or watch the official trailer below.
Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega has ordered an independent inquiry into the killings of dozens of anti-government demonstrators after the Catholic Church called for dialogue.
Critics say Ortega, now 72-years-old and veteran leader of the Sandinista movement, is out of touch with the suffering of the Nicaraguan people.
United in victories!
More than 50 people have been killed in the almost month when violent clashes between university students and anti-riot police. The protests that quickly turned to bloody violence began on April 18, in the streets of the capital, Managua, in protest of the new social welfare reforms.
The legislation which increased social security contributions on the part of employers and employees, and lowers overall benefits, especially pensions, at the same time, have since been repealed.
On April 23, Ortega said his government had repealed the social security reform which had triggered the mass demonstrations, but he did not gauge the anti-government, more specifically, anti-Ortega sentiment.
Many were clear on their position, they weren’t anti-Sandinista, but rather not in favor of the dictator like the rule of Ortega and his wife, now vice-president, Rosario Murillo. The two have been called Nicaragua’s power couple, governing side-by-side, last year Murillo officially being elected to a position in government, previously doing basically the same thing, but solely on the appointment of her husband.
Ortega and his wife have been political survivors who have come through numerous crises.
In the 1970s he was one of the leaders of the Sandinista rebel movement — the FSLN —
These ‘Trees of Life’ were erected by Vice President Murillo but were targeted by protesters
which eventually ousted the US-backed dictator Anastasio Somoza.
The sentiment among Nicaraguans is based on ‘they hike the cost of electrical power and other services and now they want to affect pensioners.’ Some call the pension issue the straw that broke the camel’s back.
The Sandinistas’ victory — which was wildly popular in a country which had been run for the profit of the Somoza family, its cronies and a handful of US companies — did not go down well in Washington.
Now, in 2018, things are different. Not the protests, but that they have lasted and still continue almost a month later. The difference, this time, is the killing of “innocent people”, including journalist Angel Gahona who was shot while filming a Facebook Live.
“The people got fed up with the oppression and police abuse towards innocent people. This is a lot of disagreement, pain, and anger that the Nicaraguan people have been holding back since the 1980s when the Sandinistas were involuntarily recruiting teenagers for the military and starving people with their communist system. I believe that one thing led to another and after the police killed the first protester, that was the point of no return for the community,” said William, a Nicaraguan, who now lives in Miami and runs the Asisomosnicaragua Instagram account.
“Nicaraguans do want Ortega and Murillo to step down and move away from government, including all their tentacles which are entwined in the whole system,” William assures.
The Instituto Costarricense de Turismo (ICT) – the Costa Rican tourist board – is warning of the improper use of the institution’s in the social media, on fan page of Facebook, including that of a self-described “Tourist Advocacy Group”.
The Facebook page is not authorized by the ICT and the Tourist Board does not have a tourist advocacy group or ombudsnan.
The ICT assures there is no such group or any link to social media pages proclaiming to be associated with the tourism board and a defender of the tourist in Costa Rica.
“Although the developers of this information space use images, logos, telephones, lists of companies, data and related links, they do not have the corresponding authorization to make use of our official information and even less of our institutional image,” says a press release by the ICT.
“Many people do not fact check and believe everything that the social networks say. We believe that it is a company that wants to hurt us We have all already met with the ICT to denounce this case,” said Luis Sánchez, commercial director of OneDay Tours Costa Rica.
The ICT is taking up the complaint with Facebook, especially because it is considered an outrage to the the tourism institute in Costa Rica and the misuse of information, which could unintentionally confuse both national and international tourists and the private sector in general.
“We urge you not to enter ‘Defensoría del turista ICT’ (ICT Tourist Ombudsman) and those who have done so, we request to denounce it or stop to following it,” the ICT statement said.
The ICT assured that the only official Facebook profile linked to ICT is VisitCostaRica that is focused to international audiences, as well as Vamos a Turistear, aimed at national tourists.
Those interested in broadening general details about tourist information, consulting companies with declarations and complaints can call 2299-5827 or 2299-5828. In the case of complaints, they can write to quejas@ict.go.cr.
The only websites authorized by the ICT are the following:
In the early hours of Tuesday morning, the Organismo de Investigación Judicial (OIJ) raided a total of 40 homes in the province of Heredia in an attempt to dismantle a gang dedicated to the distribution of illegal drugs. In total 5 groups were targeted operating in Barva, Belén, San Joaquín and San Rafael.
“There is a problem of important internal consumption (of drugs). All the raids are executed, we seek 41 suspects,” said Walter Espinoza, director of the OIJ, explaining that the groups terrorize the areas with violence, with sales of more than ¢100 million colones monthly in crack, cocaine and marijuana, by way of home delivery and in public places.
In total, some 800 OIJ agents participated in the operation called “Club de Amigos”.
Legislator Enrique Sanchez, of the Partido Acción Ciudadana (PAC), said he will push for a law to criminalize hate crimes. “When a trans girl is murdered here in the street, in the statistics it appears as a common murder of between two men because it is the registry sex of that person. I mean, you do not see that crime for what it is: a hate crime, a crime against that woman, for being trans,” he said.
He assured that the text of the bill is being worked with civil society organizations and experts. However, they have yet to discuss the proposed punishment.
“It’s an aggravating factor. As femicide is an aggravating factor to homicide because it is a homicide for being a woman. The hate crime is an aggravating factor in homicide because it is a homicide for being what it is, for being an Afro-descendant, for being a migrant, for being gay, for being a lesbian. So, they are aggravating the penalties of common crimes and then they generally have a greater range of punishment, but we have not yet come to discuss that part,” he explained.
