By Wendy Anders Costa Rica’s President Luis Guillermo Solís and U.S. Navy Adm. Kurt Tidd, commander of U.S. Southern Command, greet each other prior to the opening ceremony for the Central American Security Conference April 7 in San Jose. Photo by Jose Ruiz, SOUTHCOM Today President Obama and Vice President Biden received Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solis at the White House. Enc...

Adding a sexy, healthy spin to our familiar breakfast menu of pancakes, eggs and cereal is now easier than ever with Costa Rica's "gallo pinto." A recent study published by Nutrition Journal found that the pairing of any type of beans with rice can help stop unhealthy blood sugar spikes in adults with type 2 diabetes. With 25.8 million people in the U.S. living with this condition, Costa Rican "ga...

By Wendy Anders Official (red) taxi representatives cancelled a meeting last Tuesday that they had requested with the Public Services Regulatory Agency (Aresep) during the national taxi protest they held Tuesday,  August 9. When Roberto Jiménez Gómez, Costa Rica’s general regulator, called the cancellation “unfortunate,” Rubén Vargas, president of the Costa Rican Taxi Union (UTC) responded w...

Source: MSP A young colt that was about to become a meal for hungry caimans is happily galloping today thanks to a daring rescue by Border Police officers in Costa Rica. Earlier this week, a Border Police aquatic unit was navigating the Agua Dulce bayou of the Colorado River, located in the northern Caribbean region of Costa Rica, when they noticed a group of caimans paying close attention ...

Source: OIJ On Friday afternoon, agents from the Office of Judicial Investigations (Spanish initials: OIJ) raided a home in San Miguel of Naranjo, a coffee-producing region located in the province of Alajuela. The raid was the culmination of a week-long investigation related to crimes against the archaeological record of Costa Rica. According to an official press release issued by OIJ, agen...

Wikimedia Commons Washington, D.C. — The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) welcomes Costa Rica’s ratification of the Inter-American Convention against Racism, Racial Discrimination and Related Forms of Intolerance, on August 5, 2016. With this step, Costa Rica becomes the first country to ratify the Inter-American Convention against Racism, which was approved by the General ...

Illustrative image. (Flickr Commons) A 45-year old man survived a shooting that took place just outside of the Del Rey Hotel, a major sexual tourism hotspot in Costa Rica. According to a news report filed by Esteban Mora of daily tabloid Diario Extra, the man was identified by the last name Fonseca. He is reportedly a taxi driver whose workday often includes parking at the Hotel Del Rey and...

By Wendy Anders AT&T Inc., the Dallas, Texas-based multinational telecommunications conglomerate, was granted a 10-year data transfer and leased line license last week by Costa Rica's telecom regulator Sutel, reported Costa Rica’s Spanish daily La Nación today. This newest operator in Costa Rica’s telecom market will not offer services to individual consumers, rather will “Focus on offer...

Pixabay Commons ST. LOUIS (August 12, 2016) – The U.S. soybean industry is a multi-faceted, global business, and 10 U.S. soybean farmers just got a closer look at how their soy checkoff works in that marketplace to all U.S. soybean farmers’ benefit. Sponsored by the United Soybean Board’s Audit and Evaluation (A&E) Committee, the See for Yourselfprogram connected these farmers with their c...

By Wendy Anders Construction workers on the build site of Croc's Casino Resort in Jaco Beach Business leaders expressed their concerns over stagnant unemployment after 2nd quarter data was made public by the National Census and Statistics Institute (INEC, in Spanish). The INEC announced last week that 9.4 percent of the work force, or over 200,000 people, are unemployed, a figure that ha...

Two weeks after eight people were rushed to the hospital due to lightning strikes at the main airport of Costa Rica, tourists visiting the Fraijanes lakes sector of Alajuela were also affected by a strong discharge of atmospheric electricity. The incident, which was reported on Saturday by Roger Soto of daily tabloid Diario Extra, took place in the early afternoon hours. A man and a woman were ...

The Costa Rica No One Talks Abour François Sylvain is an entrepreneur, author, coach and investor raised in Montreal. After traveling across the United States and Europe, François went to Costa Rica to live his dream of living in a tropical climate. The father of four and grandfather of six has written a unique book about his experiences in Costa Rica. This is how he describes his memoir: ...

Rafael Antonio Rodriguez The Boulder Concert Band, a nonprofit, premier adult community band, today announced that Rafael Antonio Rodriguez has been selected as its conductor and musical director. "I am honored and thrilled to have the opportunity to make music with the wonderful musicians of the Boulder Concert Band as their new conductor," commented Rodriguez. "I look forward to many joyo...

By Wendy Anders Costa Rica’s anti-drug police took to the verdant Talamanca mountains this week with their machetes in hand and destroyed an estimated half a million marijuana plants camuflauged in dense vegetation. The 3.6-square kilometer area held 48 different marijuana plantations in the indigenous villages of Manzanillo, Alto y Bajo Bley, Cerro Papayo, Arco Iris, Bajo Piedra Meza, Tortu...

Pixabay Commons As the next academic year approaches, many parents in Costa Rica are concerned about the educational futures of their children. In choosing the best private school in Costa Rica for your children, there is one golden rule and three mistakes to avoid:   The Golden Rule of Choosing a Private School in Costa Rica   In the minds of parents, there are no perfect schools ...

By Wendy Anders Pedestrian deaths are the second largest type of traffic-related deaths registered in Costa Rica this year, reported the Transportation Ministry today. Of the 42 pedestrian deaths reported so far this year, the ministry claims 37, or 88 percent, could have been prevented by people using pedestrian aerial bridges or crosswalks within close walking distance from where they deci...

By Wendy Anders At ten this morning, the country’s public service regulator, Roberto Jiménez, received taxi sector leaders as they demanded to be heard one more time on the issue of Uber’s legality in the country. Jiménez reiterated that his agency, the Aresep, has done everything in its power to regulate public transportation services, and that any further decisions are pending court decisi...

By Wendy Anders Publications on social media of a major protest by official taxi drivers throughout the country starting at 5:00am today have public authorities and local residents preparing for the worst. Many parents will keep children home from school, embassies are suggesting people schedule appointments on other days, and police are planning a major counter-operation. The official ta...

(Archive / Delta Airlines) Delta Airlines, the second-largest carrier in the United States, said Monday that it fixed the technical problems that caused massive flight delays and cancellations, and was restoring service slowly around the world. "A Delta ground stop has been lifted and limited departures are resuming following a power outage in Atlanta that impacted Delta computer systems an...

By Wendy Anders Border police of Panama In recent days, an estimated 400 irregular migrants slipped over from Panama to Costa Rica in the Paso Canoas border area. They are being registered and receiving lodging at the border, said Mauricio Herrera, communication minister, in a statement to Monumental Radio Saturday. Public Security Minister Gustavo Mata spoke to Monumental Radio this wee...

U.S drillship Joides Resolution The effects of earthquakes are often severe and highly visible. They can destroy homes, induce slope failures and trigger tsunamis. The main cause for earthquakes are the stresses that occur in the Earth's interior, when two tectonic plates pass each other and interlock during this process. But even the worst earthquake starts with a very small first crack in th...

Source: Wikimedia Commons Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Diego Rodriguez, Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation ('FBI'), William J. Bratton, Commissioner of the New York City Police Department ('NYPD'), and James A. McCarty, Acting District Attorney for Westchester...

By Wendy Anders Many suspects awaiting trial are housed alongside convicted criminal in Costa Rica's La Reforma Prison, pictured. (ICR/CRS Archive) La Reforma Prison in La Guácima, Alajuela was ordered this week by the Costa Rican Constitutional Court to ensure clothing requested by and sent to an inmate be provided. The inmate submitted an appeal to the court alleging guards at La Refor...

Sunken coral islands, floating rainforests, giant undersea volcanoes or even spires of rock resembling sunken cities: none of these sites can be inscribed on the World Heritage List because they are found in the High Seas, outside of any national jurisdiction. A report launched today by UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre and International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) explores the different ...

By Wendy Anders Source: Red Cross of Costa Rica After waves of Cuban migrants cruised over the CR-Panama border late last year and earlier this year, and in recent months as the trickle of irregular migrants from Africa, Asia, Haiti and other countries has turned into a sizeable group now parked on the northern border seeking routes northward, Costa Rica’s governmental agencies are taking m...

A municipal health worker fumigates the restroom area of a shopping mall as part of the city's effort to prevent the spread of Zika virus' vector, the Aedes aegypti mosquito, in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, in this January 26, 2016 file photo. REUTERS/Jorge Cabrera/Files The trendy Wynwood district in Miami's urban center has become ground zero in the fight against the Zika virus in the U.S., with f...

By Wendy Anders Costa Rican telecommunications oversight agency, the Superintendency of Telecommunications (Superintendencia de Telecomunicaciones, SUTEL), published today the rules for the auction of spectrum in the 1800MHz and 1900MHz/2100MHz bands. In the first half of 2017, SUTEL will sell 70MHz of frequencies left over from the 2011 tender, including 2×20MHz in the 1800MHz range and 2×1...

By Wendy Anders Merrit Island, Florida resident, Sondra Lynn Payne Elizondo, was found dead in her hotel room in San José, Costa Rica last December. Last week the prime suspect in the case, Alejandro Obando Vega, was ordered three more months in prison by the San José Criminal Court while the case continues to be investigated, reported the judicial branch press office Friday. As previousl...

Source: Flickr CC Theft, robberies, fraud, and crimes related to drug trafficking are a very serious threat to diplomats, expats and tourists from the United States who travel to Costa Rica. Such is the main warning found within the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC) 2016 report for Costa Rica. The OSAC serves the U.S. Bureau of Diplomatic Security; nonetheless, its reports are share...

Illustrative image. (Flickr Commons) Law enforcement officers in Costa Rica are currently engaged in a manhunt for Nicaraguan farmer believed to have carried out a gruesome murder in the Chontales Department. The suspect’s name is Herner José Galeano, and his last known whereabouts place him in the rural canton of San Carlos, province of Alajuela.   According to a recent news report...

Source; RCMP Human remains found by municipal workers in Vancouver Island are those of a 40-year old surfer from Costa Rica who had been missing for more than a month. According to a recent news report filed by Sarah Petrescu of the Times Colonist, the oldest newspaper in Western Canada, Marlon Orozco-Castillo was reported missing by his family after a dispute. The surfer was dealing with p...

By Wendy Anders With tourism generating $2.8 billion in revenue last year, according to the Costa Rican Tourism Board (ICT), and employing more than 1/2 a million Costa Ricans either directly or indirectly, crocodile attacks on tourist beaches are an issue of national concern. That’s why the Tamarindo Integral Development Association (ADIT) has been meeting intensively with a host of local a...

By Wendy Anders In today's early morning hours off Cabo Blanco at the southernmost tip of the Nicoya Peninsula, the Costa Rican Coast Guard reported the seizure of nearly 2,300 kilos of cocaine. This latest illegal drug capture makes for nearly 10 tons of cocaine seized by police since January, according to office police sources. Twelve ships transporting illegal drugs from Jamaica and Co...

Source: UNLV By Greg Lacour Mario Verduzco knew only a couple of things as he flew to Costa Rica in January for a four-month study-abroad/internship experience: He’d be working at a recycling center, and the owners had a project for him. The project turned out to be one of the most challenging experiences of the Las Vegas native and electrical engineering junior’s life. It wasn’t so much...

By Wendy Anders Official taxis have seen better days. A Costa Rica CID Gallup poll published today shows that official “red” taxis are the preferred choice for over half of Costa Ricans, but that Uber is chosen 3-1 over official taxis by those who have used Uber’s services at least once. The 52 percent of those polled who prefer red taxis tend to live outside of the Central Valley metropo...

Thousands of Cuban migrants remain in shelters across Costa Rica. (CIDH/Twitter) The U.S. government announced Tuesday that it will permit Guatemalans, Hondurans and Salvadorans living legally in this country to request asylum for their children and for people they are "caregivers" for - older siblings, parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents - and it will also cooperate with Costa Rica to all...

By Wendy Anders The Costa Rican Legislative Assembly voted in favor of legislation to protect animal welfare yesterday. The President’s press office reported that the law, Ley #18,298 (Bienestar Animal), has received unconditional support from the executive branch, which has already started to implement actions along these lines The law stipulates sanctions against anyone who physically h...

The lifeless body of a retired English language educator, who had gone missing for more than two weeks, was recently found in a remote area of Costa Rica. According to a news report filed by rural reporter Eddis Gomez of daily tabloid Diario Extra, the departed teacher has been identified as Santiago Salguera Hernandez, who was 67 years old when he went missing in the village of Chimurria, part...

By Wendy Anders Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solís signed into effect a citizen monitoring project to aid in protecting the country’s natural resources, stated the executive branch press office today. The volunteers will support the country’s national conservation area system (SINAC) in their work overseeing the country’s 160 protected areas of which 28 are national parks. Residen...

Source: Wikimedia CommonsA 13-year old boy on vacation in Costa Rica was knocked down by a powerful wave and dragged out to sea by rip currents over the weekend. Officers from the National Coast Guard Service found his body floating off Playa Palmeras, located in the Caribbean community of Estero Negro. According to a recent news report filed by Allan Chacon Soto of daily tabloid Diario Extra,...