Source: Flickr Commons Washington, Aug 26 (EFE).- A gunman killed a television reporter and a cameraman working for a CBS affiliate in southwest Virginia while they were doing a live report on Wednesday morning, the television station said. Reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward, who worked for WDBJ-TV in Roanoke, were shot and killed by an unidentified man at around 6:46 a.m., but ...

Wikimedia Commons Los Angeles, Aug 26 (EFE).- More than 13,000 people ended up homeless in Los Angeles County each month between 2002 and 2010, a study released by the Economic Roundtable, a non-profit research organization based here, said. The "All Alone" report found that an average of 100,000 children in the county, which has a population of 10.1 million, are homeless every month. Th...

A long period of inactivity, as well as a conspicuous lack of rhetoric from the administration of longtime President Daniel Ortega, is prompting speculation about whether the quixotic Grand Canal of Nicaragua is an actual civil engineering project or just a smokescreen for some sort of iniquity. As has been reported by The Costa Rica Star over the last couple of years, the Grand Canal of Nicara...

"Hawker Hunter T7 'WV372 - R' (G-BXFI) (12863569924)" by Alan Wilson - Hawker Hunter T7 'WV372 / R' (G-BXFI). Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Commons A midair collision on Sunday afternoon killed a pilot during an airshow in the village of Dittingen in Switzerland. According to a Wikinews report, the crash occurred as three Ikarus C42 planes from the German Grasshopper display team flew tog...

Caracas, Aug 24 (EFE).- Shoppers have been banned from lining up overnight in front of Caracas supermarkets because many among them are speculators who cause product scarcities in regular stores, make illegal sales at inflated prices, and sell contraband to Colombia, the head of government of the Capital District, Juan Dugarte, said. "Standing in line outside of store hours is now forbidden," b...

Wikimedia Commons San Juan, Aug 22 (EFE). - Human rights activist Pedro Julio Serrano asked Puerto Rican authorities on Saturday to investigate the murders of three openly gay young men over the past month on the Caribbean island, and not to dismiss the possible "hate angle" sparked by their sexual orientation. "With the murder of Edwin Giovanni Vazquez last night, three openly gay men have...

Managua, Aug 22 (EFE). - Nicaragua will be the meeting place for the 7th Space Conference of the Americas 2015, or CEA, which is expected to attract more than 200 participants to exchange information and experiences about satellites and other technologies, the authorities said. During the CEA, to be held Nov. 17-19 in Managua, there will be four great areas of discussion: education, science &am...

ANAHEIM, CALIF., Aug. 21, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Discover a different pace of life ripe for exploring and relaxing in Panama, or be fascinated by Costa Rica's nearly half-million wildlife species making their home in one of the world's most biodiverse countries on a hassle-free vacation with Trafalgar. A brag-worthy trip is now even more affordable with savings of up to $350 per couple* on air-i...

Source: Wikimedia Commons Miami, Aug 21 (EFE).- A 10-year-old girl is recovering in hospital after having one leg bitten by a shark while she was playing in the water a few yards (meters) offshore at a beach in Jacksonville, on the northeast coast of Florida, local media reported. The incident occurred last Wednesday when the girl was with her mom in the water close to the shore, and was at...

Wikimedia Commons Miami, Aug 20 (EFE).- Divers from a Florida treasure hunting company have recovered 350 gold coins worth $4.5 million from the wreck of an 18th-century Spanish galleon off Vero Beach. Less than a month after a family found 60 gold coins worth more than $1 million using a metal detector, the 1715 Fleet-Queens Jewels LLC, which holds the rights to several areas containing th...

Chicago, Aug 20 (EFE).- Experts say Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump's promise to seize Mexican immigrants' remittances if Mexico does not pay for the construction of a border wall is just more bravado on the billionaire's part to remain on top of the polls. Trump, who disclosed his plan for dealing with illegal immigration last Sunday, got back in the spotlight when he said that as...

Wikimedia Commons La Paz, Aug 19 (EFE).- Bolivia's government said Wednesday it will submit a bill to Congress that provides economic rewards to energy companies that take exploration risks. Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera made the announcement at the inauguration of the 8th International Oil and Gas Congress, organized by the Bolivian Hydrocarbons Chamber. State-owned and private-se...

Source: Panoramio La Paz, Aug 18 (EFE).- The Bolivian peasants accused of killing one of the police officers trying to evict them from the gold mine they had occupied, have released the four officers they had held hostage since Monday, Bolivian Interior Minister Carlos Romero said. The peasants held the officers captive after ambushing them Monday near the Ananea community north of La Paz, ...

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, Aug 17 (EFE).- Brazilian police dismantled Monday a religious sect accused of subjecting its faithful to slavery-like conditions while accumulating a fortune of close to 100 million reais (some $28.6 million) in donations from its followers, officials said. At least six people were arrested in an operation aimed at dismantling a criminal organization "that use...

Source: FEDEFUTBOL CR The current Women’s Football Champion of the World is the United States, and the most recent match by Team USA against the National Women’s Football Team of Costa Rica proves why. Playing before a crowd of more than 44,000 at the Heinz Field in Pittsburgh, the National Team of Costa Rica (Las Ticas) were blanked out by a barrage of eight goals against zero.   T...

CR Star Archives San Juan, Aug 14 (EFE).- Environmental agencies in Puerto Rico are investigating the destruction of 99 eggs of the endangered leatherback turtle that were found in a nest on a beach in San Juan, activist Deborah Feliciano told EFE Friday. Feliciano, a member of the government-sponsored 7 Quillas group that is charged with keeping watch on the beaches of Condado and Ocean Pa...

Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman. Source: Wikimedia Commons Mexico City, Aug 13 (EFE).- Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquin "El Chapo" (Shorty) Guzman was worried about being extradited to the United States and had learned that "foreign mercenaries" had been hired by officials to kill him, his attorney, Juan Pablo Badillo, said Thursday. "There was an extremely worrisome situation in the sense that foreign m...

Ammonite - Wikimedia Commons Lima, Aug 13 (EFE).- Customs agents and National Police officers seized 156 fossils from an Argentine tourist at Peru's Tacna station, on the border with Chile, the Culture Ministry said. The fossils were found on Aug. 7 at the Santa Rosa international bus depot, the ministry said in a statement. Customs agents and Culture Ministry experts identified the piec...

File photo of retired Cuban leader Fidel Castro. EFE/File Havana, Aug 13 (EFE).- The United States owes Cuba millions of dollars for the harm caused by its economic embargo on the island, Fidel Castro wrote in an article published Thursday, the day before Secretary of State John Kerry is due in Havana to raise the Stars and Stripes over the restored U.S. Embassy. "Cuba is owed compensation ...

Garcia Marquez. Source: Flickr Commons Cartagena, Colombia, Aug 11 (EFE).- The ashes of the late Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez will repose from Dec. 12 in this Caribbean city, the governor of Bolivar province announced Tuesday. "With deep emotion we officially announce that the ashes of Nobel laureate Garcia Marquez will repose in Cartagena," Gov. Juan Carlos Gossain said. "The...

Washington, Aug 10 (EFE).- The U.S. government said Monday it is "deeply concerned" about the detentions for several hours of some 90 dissidents in Cuba, including members of the Ladies in White, and said it will continue working so that the right to peaceful assembly is respected in Cuba. "We are deeply concerned by this round-up of peaceful activists by Cuban authorities," State Department sp...

Wikimedia Commons By Marti Quintana Mexico City, Aug 10 (EFE).- Some 5,000 young men are imprisoned in Mexico after being convicted of serious crimes, with 22 percent of them serving time for murder, a high number that obscures an even more painful reality. Many of these youths and teenagers fall in the trap of organized crime as a result of family troubles, poverty, dropping out of scho...

ISIS fighters in Iraq. Source: Wikimedia Commons Mosul, Iraq, Aug 8 (EFE).- A firing squad of the Islamic State jihadist group executed Saturday at a military camp in the city of Mosul at least 300 civil servants who worked for the Iraqi Supreme Electoral Commission, according to witnesses and security officials. The spokesman for National Multitude, a military force in Nineveh province who...

Source: Wikimedia Commons Caracas, Aug 7 (EFE).- President Nicolas Maduro accused CNN of conducting a "terrorist campaign" against Venezuela by airing false reports about looting in order to "destabilize" the country. "That's what CNN is doing...from the United States once again...but we are dismantling the plan and they know that we're dismantling it," Maduro said during a Cabinet meeting ...

Panama City, Aug 8 (EFE).- The Panama Canal said it will lower the maximum allowable draft of ships passing through the inter-oceanic waterway starting Sept. 8 due to an El Niño-triggered drought. The measure will affect 18.5 percent of the ships that travel through the canal, according to the Panama Canal Authority, or ACP, which said it will not significantly affect "the efficiency and capaci...

Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman. Source: Wikimedia Commons Washington, Aug 5 (EFE).- The U.S. government is confident that fugitive Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman remains holed up in the western state of Sinaloa since escaping from prison last month, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration told EFE Wednesday.   Sinaloa, Guzman's long-time base of operations, "is where...

Young Facebook users in Costa Rica enjoy certain protections with regard to keeping their social media activity hidden from parents. That much is granted by Article 25 of the Childhood and Adolescence Code. Such is not the case in Colombia, where the Supreme Court recently issued an opinion that gives parents the right to monitor the Facebook accounts of their children. In Costa Rica, a legisla...

Source: Flickr Commons Mexico City, Aug 6 (EFE).- The lone detainee in the killings of Mexican photojournalist Ruben Espinosa and four women in this capital has confessed to his involvement in the crime and provided "some information" about the two other suspects, Mexico City's district attorney said Thursday. Rodolfo Rios told the Televisa network he is confident the two other suspected pe...

Wikimedia Commons San Juan, Aug 4 (EFE).- Department of Natural and Environmental Resources, or DRNA, personnel are caring for a manatee calf rescued off a beach in northwestern Puerto Rico, environmental officials said Tuesday. The marine mammal was spotted on Monday off Shacks beach in the city of Isabela, Natural and Environmental Resources Secretary Carmen Guerrero Perez said in a state...

Wikimedia Commons Buenos Aires, Aug 4 (EFE).- Navy and Environment Secretariat personnel are working with whale experts Tuesday to lead a lost whale out of the dikes on the River Plate in Buenos Aires and into open water, Argentine officials told EFE. The young humpback whale, which is seven meters (about 23 feet) long, got lost on Monday in the waterway. Rescuers using motorboats are tr...

Source: Wikimedia Commons Harare, Aug 2 (EFE).- Zimbabwe is suspending the hunting of lions, leopards and elephants outside Hwange National Park in response to the killing of Cecil, the African country's most famous lion, in July, officials said. The Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, or ZPWMA, is also investigating the possible illegal hunting of another lion a day after Cec...

Former President Mujica, right, shakes hands with former President Lula of Brazil Sao Paulo, Jul 31 (EFE).- The think-tank led by former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva reported Friday that its headquarters was the target of "a political attack with an explosive device," adding that "fortunately no one was hurt." "The bomb was thrown at the building from a car," said the note ...

"Embraer EMB-505 Phenom 300 - Wallner" by Rolf Wallner - http://www.airliners.net/photo/Untitled-(Jet-Aviation/Embraer-EMB-505-Phenom/2054788/L/. Licensed under GFDL 1.2 via Wikimedia Commons London, Aug 1 (EFE).- Several family members of the late al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden were killed in an airplane crash Friday in the south of England, the Saudi Arabian ambassador to Britain confirmed ...

Juliana Lopez Sarrazola. Source: Miss World Colombia 2015 Juliana Lopez Sarrazola, a 22-year old Colombian bikini model, could face the death penalty in China for the alleged crime of smuggling cocaine into the People's Republic of China. According to the online news daily El Mundo from Spain, Miss Lopez, who was also the 2015 Miss World Colombia candidate from Antioquia, a major coffee-pr...

Source: Panoramio Mexico City, Jul 30 (EFE).- The deaths of two more religious pilgrims who were run over by a cargo truck in the Mexican state of Zacatecas on Thursday brought to 26 the number of fatalities in the incident, state Gov. Miguel Alonso Reyes said Thursday. In comments to Radio Formula, Reyes said that 46 people hurt in the Wednesday evening accident in the town of Mazapil "rem...

Washington, Jul 27 (EFE).- The United States removed Cuba from the list of countries whose governments do not fully comply with the minimum standards for combating human trafficking and "do not make significant efforts to do so." The U.S. State Department published Monday its annual report on human trafficking around the world in 2014, in which it identified the countries not taking the necessa...

An Uber driver in Bogota. Wikimedia Commons San Jose (The Costa Rica Star) and Mexico City (EFE), July 29.- Mexico City taxi drivers staged a protest on Wednesday against the recent approval of private transportation services offered via smartphone apps, while police are investigating attacks on Uber drivers in the past few hours. In Costa Rica, the National Forum of taxicab drivers assembl...

Story by Lt.j.g. Victoria Einbinder, U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command & U.S. Fourth Fleet MAYPORT, Fla. - More than 75 military personnel, including 54 members of partner-nation navies, assembled July 27 on Naval Station Mayport for PANAMAX 2015, an exercise aimed at developing strong working relationships between multinational forces to ensure the defense of the Panama Canal. The exer...

ISIS fighters in Iraq. Source: Wikimedia Commons Miami, Jul 28 (EFE).- A 23-year-old Hispanic was arrested and charged with preparing to detonate a bomb on a beach in Key West by remote control, the FBI announced Tuesday. The bureau said that Harlem Suarez, who declared himself to be a member of the Islamic State terrorist organization, was charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with int...

Source: Instagram An attractive woman who is very fond of documenting her lavish lifestyle on the online social network Instagram was arrested earlier this month by agents from the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) service. According to the British tabloid The Daily Mail, the 39-year old glamorous woman was trying to smuggle nearly six kilograms of cocaine hydrochloride in powd...