Source: Wikimedia Commons The Associated Press (AP) reported on Tuesday the U.S. Secret Service is conducting drone exercises over Washington, D.C. to defend against unmanned aerial vehicles being flown over the area. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved the Secret Service to conduct these flying exercises. The exercises are to be over parts of D.C. airspace which is normally ...

Source: OVSICORI Despite ongoing ash exhalations from the Turrialba volcano in the province of Cartago, officials from the Directorate of Civil Aviation agreed to allow flight operations to resume at the Juan Santamaria International Airport (SJO) in the province of Alajuela. SJO was closed yesterday afternoon due to low visibility and heavy accumulation of volcanic ash covered the runway. ...

Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Alejandro Solano Ortiz recently traveled to Jakarta, the populous city in the Island of Java, for the purpose of establishing formal diplomatic relations between Costa Rica and the Republic of Indonesia. The ultimate goal of the visit is to establish an Embassy of Costa Rica in Indonesia, a powerful player in South Asia and t...

This photograph from September 2003 shows a Black Hawk helicopter about to take off from an airfield in Iraq. EFE Miami, Mar 11 (EFE).- The seven Marines and four Army soldiers aboard a helicopter that crashed off the coast of northwestern Florida are presumed dead, U.S. military officials said Wednesday.   The Black Hawk helicopter went missing Tuesday night during a routine traini...

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, Mar 10 (EFE).- Brazil's professional soccer clubs will be penalized in the standings for failing to pay players on time, the Brazilian Soccer Confederation, or CBF, announced Tuesday. Under the CBF's "labor fair play" initiative, offending clubs will lose three points for every match played with salaries in arrears. Only players, their attorneys and the pla...

Mexico City, Mar 10 (EFE).- Mexican authorities located a building in the northern state of Nuevo Leon via the Internet that was used as a storage site for wild animals, some of them protected species, being sold by traffickers, the Profepa environmental protection agency said in a statement. The discovery in Monterrey, the capital of Nuevo Leon, was the result of a joint investigation by Profe...

Royal Spanish Academy in Madrid. Wikimedia Commons San Juan, Mar 9 (EFE).- The director of the Spanish Royal Academy predicted a grand future for Spanish in the United States, thanks to the growing regard for the Hispanic population living there. "Spanish in the U.S. is gaining tremendous momentum thanks to the growing regard for Hispanics," Dario Villanueva said in an interview with Efe in...

The Dominican Republic Santo Domingo, Mar 7 (EFE).- The deputy minister of energy and mines of the Dominican Republic, Victoriano Santos Hilario, was gunned down by unknown persons in the northern municipality of Cotui, the ruling Dominican Liberation Party, or PLD, to which he belonged, reported Saturday. During the attack, which occurred Friday night, the official's son was wounded, accor...

Lydia. Source: OCEARCH Twitter San Juan, Mar 6 (EFE; additional context by The Costa Rica Star).- A great white shark weighing 908 kilos (2,000 pounds) returned Friday to the waters of the northern Bahamas, where a GPS device on the marine predator confirmed it had wandered earlier, the non-profit OCEARCH organization said.   OCEARCH confirmed via a Twitter post that the 4.4-meter (...

EFE Madrid, Mar 6 (EFE).- Agencia Efe on Friday denied having sent out any reports on a supposed "self-coup" staged by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and has notified authorities in Venezuela of its surprise at some statements made by the president in this regard.   In an address delivered on Thursday, the Venezuelan president said: "And the stupid people at Agencia Efe, that's...

Airport workers perform de-icing at U.S. airports / EFE Washington, Mar 5 (EFE).- A bad snowstorm accompanied by very low temperatures extending from northeastern Texas to New England is affecting some 94 million people across the country on Thursday. Weather authorities have issued snow advisories from Alabama up through the Mid-Atlantic states and into New England, and Washington D.C. has...

Photo provided by South Korea's Yonhap news agency showing U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert. EFE/File Seoul, Mar 4 (EFE).- The U.S. ambassador to South Korea, Mark Lippert, was wounded on Thursday, local time, when he was attacked by a knife-wielding man who said he was against the joint military maneuvers being staged by Washington and Seoul this week. The suspect, identified as...

Rio de Janeiro's world-famous Copacabana and Ipanema are among the areas contaminated to the point that dermatologists recommend avoiding skin contact with the sands. EFE/File Rio de Janeiro, Mar 2 (EFE).- The sands on the beaches of this Brazilian tourist mecca are heavily polluted, mainly thanks to trash left behind by beachgoers, experts told Efe.   Rio de Janeiro's world-famous ...

View of the vulcano Villarrica erupting on 03 March 2015 at Villarrica, 750km south Santiago de Chile in Chile. Over 4,000 people have been evacuated due to the risk of floods as snow melts due to the volcano's eruption. EFE/Ariel Marinkovic Santiago, Mar 3 (EFE; additional context by The Costa Rica Star).- The Villarrica volcano in southern Chile erupted early Tuesday, sending plumes of smoke...

Moterrico. Source: Wikimedia Commons Guatemala City, Mar 1 (EFE).- The body of a Swiss woman was found Sunday on a beach on Guatemala's Pacific coast bearing knife wounds, emergency authorities said. Fire Department spokesperson Cecilia Chacaj told Efe that Erika Verena Jenni, 57, was found on the Monterrico beach in Santa Rosa province. Chacaj added that emergency authorities were alert...

Any differences with Pope now "completely settled"Mexican Foreign Affairs Secretary Jose Antonio Meade. EFE/File Mexico City, Feb 25 (EFE).- Mexican Foreign Affairs Secretary Jose Antonio Meade said Wednesday that any differences with the Vatican were now "completely settled," after Pope Francis had warned in a private letter of the risk of the "Mexicanization" of Argentina, and he added that ...

Supporters of President Maduro rally in Caracas EFE/AGENCIA VENEZOLANA DE NOTICIAS/ Caracas, Feb 28 (EFE).- Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday ordered the United States, whose government he accuses of conspiring against him, to immediately reduce the staff of its Caracas embassy from approximately 100 to a level similar to the 20 that his government has in Washington.   ...

Brazilian law enforcement agents said the cocaine was hidden in a truck and they had acted on a tip from a taxi driver who apparently was a member of the band of drug traffickers. EFE/File .- Brazilian police seized about 1.5 tons of cocaine in an operation in Mato Grosso do Sul state, which borders on Paraguay and Bolivia, the largest confiscation of the drug in the past 10 years in Brazil, a...

Servando "La Tuta" Gomez Martinez, the reputed head of the Caballeros Templarios drug cartel, is seen in this 2009 file photo provided by Mexico's Public Safety Secretariat. EFE Morelia, Mexico, Feb 27 (EFE).- Mexican authorities early Friday captured the reputed top leader of the Caballeros Templarios drug cartel, Servando "La Tuta" Gomez Martinez, the National Security Commission told Efe. ...

EFE New York, Feb 25 (EFE).- The FBI on Wednesday arrested three New York residents who allegedly were planning to join the jihadist Islamic State and commit terrorist acts in the United States, officials with the agency and the Justice Department said. Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev and Abror Habibov, both citizens of Uzbekistan, and Akhror Saidakhmetov, a citizen of Kazakhstan, are facing ...

Source: OIJ Detectives from the Kidnapping and Abductions Unit of the Office of Judicial Investigations (Spanish: OIJ) in Costa Rica have not been able to ascertain whether Canadian expat Ryan Piercy, who went missing from family for more than 30 days before returning home in a taxicab, was actually snatched and held under threat of harm. As previously reported by The Costa Rica Star: On W...

Source: OIJ Although Canadian businessman Ryan Craig Piercy Bate is reportedly back in the safety of his home in Heredia, there seem to be more doubts than conclusions related to his month-long disappearance. Some news sources reporting on this mysterious case in Costa Rica mention the possibility of a kidnapping event which came to an end after a ransom payment was made to alleged captors; ho...

RCMP crest The strange case of missing Canadian entrepreneur Ryan Craig Piercy Bate, who was reported missing and possibly kidnapped in Costa Rica a little more than a month ago, has finally yielded positive news for his family. According to two news media outlets in Costa Rica, Mr. Piercy arrived in his home in Heredia, where he arrived around midnight on a Saturday via a red taxicab. Nati...

Manuel Antonio Beach in Costa Rica The popular online travel reviews and advice website TripAdvisor recently announced its 2015 Traveler's Choice Awards, a tradition that is currently in its third year. It so happens that one of Costa Rica's most pristine stretches Pacific coastline made the list of the world's Top 20 Traveler's Choice Beaches in the World. Here is the introduction to the o...

Four Seasons Resort Costa Rica at Peninsula Papagayo in Guanacaste Right before Christmas 2014, The Costa Rica Star reported that the Forbes Travel Guide, previously known as Mobil Travel Guide, chose our country as one their markets for the purpose of rating hotels and restaurants. Joining this prestigious travel information resource was a matter of pride for Costa Rica, and it did not take l...

CIMA Hospital in San Jose is often visited by medical tourists Baltimore, MD (PRWEB) February 12, 2015 - Living in a sunny, low-cost, laidback destination overseas doesn't mean foregoing good healthcare. In many countries outside the U.S., the healthcare is excellent and affordable. Malaysia received the top score in the healthcare category of International Living’s just- released Annual Gl...

Basel, Switzerland The Embassy of Costa Rica in Switzerland reports high interest in our country at a recent Travel and Tourism Expo in the large city of Basel, which is strategically located right on the border with France and Germany. According to an institutional communiqué issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Costa Rica was represented along with the Embassies of Chile, Peru and Vene...

Source: Facebook - Paul Watson Paul Franklin Watson, the controversial founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, is a multifaceted man. This Canadian environmentalist is a radical activist, a man of the sea, a reality television star, and a fugitive of justice. From now on, Paul Watson may also be known as an old-fashioned romantic at heart. Despite being the subject an INTERPOL Red...

RCMP crest An update on the case of missing Canadian businessman Ryan Craig Piercy Bate was recently reported by a daily tabloid. As reported by Manuel Estrada of Diario Extra, Mr. Piercy's family has made a payment 136 million colones (more than $250,000) to the alleged kidnappers. This payment was allegedly made in exchange for proof of life, and could signal an upcoming release of Mr. Piercy....

Cody Dial The information herein mostly comes from the GoFundMe online fundraiser set up by the parents of Cody Roman Dial, a college student from the United States who arrived in Costa Rica with adventure in his mind. Cody intended to hike across Corcovado National Park in our Southern Pacific region; he has been missing since July of 2014. For the purpose of style and flow of prose, The Costa...

Preferred weapon of guerrilla fighters. A daily tabloid from Costa Rica and an online publication run by journalists from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom have recently published troubling reports of guerrillas operating in northern Nicaragua. Although both reports present some discrepancies, they both stress the issue of obfuscation by the Nicaraguan government, thereby leavin...

Visitors who arrive in Costa Rica from either the United States or The Netherlands do not have to worry about not being able to find beers that are both iconic and emblematic to their countries of origin. Budweiser and Heineken are just two examples of foreign beers that are brewed in Costa Rica by the Florida Ice &Farm Company (FIFCO), which is gradually becoming a significant player in the l...

Source: Flickr Commons Author's Note: To get some background on the findings of the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) below, please read our previous article on their preliminary recommendations. One of the bottom line recommendations is centered on taxation and its effective enforcement. IMF Executive Board Concludes 2014 Article IV Consultation with Costa Rica Pr...

U.S. State Department The most recent batch of nominations sent to the United States Senate by the White House was announced yesterday. These nominations include posts in the Department of Health and Human Services and the National Transportation Safety Board; furthermore, within the nominations we find the future U.S. Ambassador to Costa Rica. The Costa Rica Star herewith includes the bio ...

Rainforest Alliance In November, the Rainforest Alliance announced the Follow the Farmer contest as part of its popular Follow the Frog campaign. In partnership with the Guardian, a global leader in digital journalism, Follow the Frog 2014 lives under Vital Signs – a destination platform that features a mix of fresh, educational and interactive content developed by the Guardian’s award-winning...

Mr. Ross Denny This press release is kindly provided by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office of the United Kingdom: Change of Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Costa Rica & Nicaragua From: Foreign & Commonwealth Office First published: 3 February 2015 Part of: Foreign affairs, Costa Rica and Nicaragua Mr Ross Denny has been appointed Her Majesty's Ambassador to the Republic of...

Source: Ricardo Retana - Twitter The senseless murder of environmental activist Jairo Mora Sandoval in the Caribbean region of Costa Rica has shaken up the country no only due to its gruesomeness but also because justice has failed to bring closure. As recently reported by The Costa Rica Star, the seven men believed to be responsible for the killing of Jairo Mora Sandoval in late May 2013 were...

Source; Wikiemdia Commons A troubling increase in heroin use and addiction is currently sweeping parts of the United States, and public health officials in that country are once again clashing with law enforcement and legislators as to how they should manage this “substance abuse epidemic” this time around. The cold turkey remedy is hardly an optimal approach to kicking heroin and opiate habit...

Source: CELAC The Third Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), a burgeoning and powerful bloc of nations from the Americas that excludes Canada, the United States, and the European territories in the Caribbean, has been -for the most part- flowing smoothly in Costa Rica. The CELAC 2015 Summit is being held at the Pedregal Convention Center, located in the mu...

Jairo Mora loved to teach children about nature. Wikimedia Commons Some of the mobile phone conversations and text messages between the seven men suspected of being responsible for the killing of environmentalist Jairo Mora in Costa Rica prove that they should not have been cleared of their murder charges. Such is the report published by tabloid and muckraking daily Diario Extra, which has obt...