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Brutal Massacre in La Carpio
A man murdered his three children and then committed suicide in the
community known as La Carpio, west of San José.
The family tragedy occurred yesterday before noon. Wílberth López
Arroñica, 33 years of age, had been accused of aggression and assault
against the mother of his five children, Marta Alvarado Lacayo, on at
least five occasions.
López was under court order not to go near the family home. Nonetheless,
according to reports, he got close to the house, armed with a .22
calibre handgun.
One of the children ran from the house on seeing his father, stopping at
his grandmother's house warning of how they were going to kill his
mother. His younger sister was already staying at grandma's, the reason
both children survived.
According to witnesses, there was a great deal of arguing and screaming
coming from inside the house. A neigbour called 911 asking for police
help when he heard shots and breaking glass windows.
When police arrived, they saw the woman come out of the house with one
of the children with a wound to the ribs, yelling "he's killing my
children". One officer, one of the first to arrive at the scene was shot
at, but through luck the bullet only grazed the police officer's shirt.
Police called for back up though everything in the house had calmed
down.
Police say they tried to negotiate the man to surrender. However, they
got no response and within minutes decided to enter the house, where the
found the bodies of López, his 2 year old son Junior and Liliana of 4
years of age. Manuel who was eleven died on the way to hospital.
Marta Alvarado, the mother, is in hospital with a bullet wound to the
abdomen. She is also pregnant and was submitted to emergency surgery.
Her son Daniel is at the Children's Hospital recovering from his injury.
According to a police statement, the boy is conscious, but is not
speaking. He will need psychiatric attention.
Non-stop to Milan
The Italian carrier Lauda Air inaugurated on
January 16 one weekly non-stop flight linking Milan, Italy, and Costa
Rica.
In a first stage, that is to end next May 7, there will only be
chartered flights, and a Costa Rica-Panama link will be included,
according to a Lauda Air spokesperson
New Spanish Airline to Offer Cheap Flights to Latin American
A new airline plans to offer low
cost flights between Spain and 10 Latin American countries later this
year, news reports said Thursday.
Beginning in May, Air Madrid plans to run flights from Spain to Costa
Rica, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Brazil.
Flights to Caribbean destinations such as the Dominican Republic, Cuba,
Cancun and Margarita Island are also envisaged, the daily El Mundo said
on its Web edition.
The company intends using Airbus planes with a daily offer of some 1,000
seats. It hopes to sell 300,000 tickets yearly and have turn over of
euro200 million (US$ 255 million).
The airline has been formed by at least nine companies including the
Eroski supermarket group and the Hotusa and Catalonia hotel chains.
The company is to be presented at Madrid's tourism fair Fitur which
begins Jan. 28.
Freedom of
Economy
Costa Rica did not improve its performance in the Economic Freedom Index
for 2004 sponsored by the Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street
Journal, since it repeated a 2.71 grade in a range which sets 5.0 as the
lowest and 1.0 as the top rate. According to its position worldwide,
this grade made Costa Rica drop from 43rd to 50th.
The drop in the ranking in spite of the repetition of the grade is due
to the progress made during the last year by nations such as Malta,
Slovakia, France, and Uganda. In Latin America, Costa Rica places third,
surpassed by Chile and El Salvador.
The freedom of economy is the absence of government restrictions on the
production, distribution, and use of goods and services.
Revenues Improved
The regular revenues from taxes collected by the
Government of Costa Rica increased by 18.4 percent in 2003, while the
total expenses not including the payment of interests increased by 10.7
percent as compared to the year 2002.
The cash flow of the Central Government presented a primary surplus
interest payment not included of more than $193 million, which is 36
percent more than in 2002. When the payment of interests to service the
debt is included, there was a $50-million deficit, 10.1 percent less
than the one for 2002.
Revenues from the Income Tax increased by 26 percent.
The Biggest
Sports Gambling Event: Super Bowl
According to SuperBowl.com, the
official website of Super Bowl XXXVII, the
10 most-watched programs in television history are all Super Bowls, with
last
year's game topping the list with over 130 million viewers. With such an
audience, it is easy to see why the Super Bowl is also the biggest
sports
gambling event of the year.
BetonSports.com, the largest online wagering company in the world,
headquartered in San José, Costa Rica, expects a record number of
American consumers betting on Super Bowl than on any other sporting
event in the company's nine-year history.
Christiansen Capital Advisors, a leading management consulting and
market
research firm servicing the gaming and entertainment industries,
estimates
that between $375-400 million will be bet on the Super Bowl through
online
sports books alone, an increase of between $50-75 million from 2002.
Compared to the $71.6 million wagered with land-based sports books in
Las
Vegas in 2003, online gambling is rapidly gaining popularity and
acceptance
among consumers throughout the United States.
Yet, Congress, state and federal officials and consumer watchdog groups
continue to attempt to ban this form of entertainment.
"The Super Bowl is undeniably the biggest sporting event of the year in
America, and therefore captivates one of the largest, most diverse
groups of
viewers who wager money to give themselves a vested interest in the
outcome of
the game," said David Carruthers, CEO of BetonSports.com.
"As more and moreconsumers realize the advantages of online gambling as
a safe, private andconvenient means of entertainment, the Internet will
become the preferred
destination for wagering on sports, not Las Vegas."
Mr. Carruthers added, "It is becoming even more vital, as the number of
consumers betting online increases, that Congress develops responsible
legislation that both protects consumers and allows them to exercise
their rights to wager on sports."
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Colombia welcomes EU proposal on humanitarian accord with guerrillas
The Colombian government welcomed on Thursday the European Union (EU)
proposal for a humanitarian accord on prisoner swap with guerrillas in the
country.
The humanitarian agreement is expected to be participated in by the United
Nations (UN).
Chris Patten, EU external affairs commissioner, appealed Thursday to the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the largest rebel group in
Colombia, to release their hostages and begin peace talks with the
government.
Kidnapping was one of the worst human rights violations, hurting not only
the hostages but their loved ones, said Patten, who is on a two-day visit to
Colombia which began Wednesday.
Colombian Foreign Minister Carolina Barco said President Alvaro Uribe was
expecting a meeting next week in Brussels between Patten and the Secretary
General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan.
Patten said he would discuss with Annan about ways in which the
international organization might be able to help secure release of the
hostages.
"The president has always been open, under certain very clear parameters, to
the humanitarian accord," Barco told local radio Caracol.
"We have always wanted support, as we asked (of) the UN, and we are waiting
for the proposal," she added.
The 17,000-strong FARC has proposed for talks with the government on an
agreement for the exchange, for hundreds of imprisoned rebels, of 100
hostages, including politicians, three United States citizens, and members
of the military.
Peace talks between the government of former President Andres Pastrana and
FARC broke down in February 2002, without reaching agreement on a
42,000-square-km demilitarized zone, which had been recovered by the
Colombian army.
Colombia has been ravaged by a four-decade-old civil war, the longest in
Latin America, in which government forces, leftist guerrillas and far-right
paramilitaries fight one another. About 3,500 people, mostly civilians, are
killed in the internal conflict every year.
US, Spain ask
Paraguay to send troops to Iraq
The United States and Spain have asked Paraguay to send troops to Iraq "to
collaborate in the process of transition and reconstruction in this
country."
The Paraguayan daily ABC Color said on Wednesday the request was
"officially" made by representatives of the US and Spanish governments, on
Tuesday night, to Paraguayan Vice President Luis Alberto Castiglioni at a
meeting.
During the meeting, Spanish Secretary of Defense Fernando Diez Moreno said
Paraguay "has known how to carry out a political transition process toward
democracy." So it had the experience to help others like Iraq, which "needs
help after 20 or 30 years of dictatorship."
United States Undersecretary of Defense Dov S. Zakheim said he was convinced
Paraguay "has a very important role to play in the world."
Because of its participation in Iraq, Paraguay "would provide an excellent
example" to other nations in Latin America which were not willing to
collaborate in the reconstruction in this country, the daily reported.
Paraguayan Vice President Castiglioni said it was the first such request
Paraguay had received. But he revealed that this petition was part of a
conversation between Paraguayan President Nicanor Duarte and his US
counterpart, George W. Bush, when they met weeks ago.
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