Trafficking in Persons Report
Costa Rica is mainly a destination and transit country for
women and children trafficked for sexual exploitation.
Victims are internally trafficked from San Jose to coastal and border
communities in the provinces of Limon, Puntarenas, and Guanacaste.
Victims are trafficked to Costa Rica from Nicaragua, Colombia, Panama,
the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, the Philippines, Russia, and Eastern
Europe.
Although most foreign victims remain in Costa Rica, traffickers also
attempt to transport them onward to the U.S. and Canada.
Complete story
Nera Gets $7.1M Radio Network Contract In Costa Rica
Norwegian telecommunications equipment maker Nera ASA (NER.OS) said
Tuesday it has received a contract worth $7.1 million to build an
InterLink High Capacity Microwave Radio Network in Costa Rica.
This constitutes Nera's second project with Instituto Costarrisence de
Electricidad (ICE), Costa Rica's state-owned electricity corporation.
The contract significantly improves Nera's market position in
Latin-America and Costa Rica.
When Nera now returns to Costa Rica the company provides technology and
products that are far more sophisticated than the first installations
made in the country in the late seventies.
Nera has already established an office in San Jose to manage the turnkey
project.
ICE is extending and modernizing its network throughout the country with
state-of-the-art InterLink technology.
The contract includes SDH radios, multiplexers, power supplies, antenna
towers and a management system for the installed network.
It is anticipated that the network will be completed within 11 months
from the start date. The electronic equipment will be installed to
maintain communications in the event of seismic events.
As with any contract involving a Costa Rican public body, the bid award
is subject to ratification by government authorities before the contract
can be signed.
Neither Nera nor ICE expects any problems with the ratification.
Among Nera's six contenders for the ICE contract were Alcatel, NEC and
ECI, but Nera's bid was deemed the only bid that complied with all the
technical and commercial requirements, the company said.
Nera is a world-leading global supplier of fixed wireless and satellite
communication equipment and systems.
It designs, develops, manufactures and markets point-to-point and
point-to-multipoint radio link equipment, satellite terminals and
gateways for mobile and fixed satellite communication, and is a major
supplier to Inmarsat.
Nera is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange, and its associated company
Nera Telecommunications Ltd is listed on the Singapore Exchange (NERA
TEL). Nera Broadband Satellite is a fully owned subsidiary of Nera
SatCom AS.
Accused in 1995 Slaying is Returned to Canada After
Order by Costa Rican Court
Julia Yvonne Elliott was extradited to Canada yesterday to
once again face charges in the 1995 slaying of Kemptville, Ontario,
resident Lawrence Foster.
Ms. Elliott, the central figure in a
nine-year legal drama some legal observers call a "fiasco," had her
final appeal turned down by a Costa Rican court yesterday and was
immediately turned over to waiting Ontario Provincial Police.
Ms. Elliott was taken on a commercial Air Canada flight to Toronto,
where she arrived at Pearson International Airport last night. Her
first court appearance will be at 9:30 this morning.
While officials from the Ontario Attorney General's office and the
federal Justice Department, which handled Ms. Elliott's extradition,
were unavailable for comment yesterday, Ms. Elliott's return to
Canada was confirmed by the Costa Rican government.
"Ms. Elliott left Costa Rica on a flight to Toronto at (3:45 p.m.
Eastern Standard Time) after the constitutional court turned down
her final appeal," said Marissia Obando Razak, a spokeswoman said in
San José. |
Julia
Yvonne Elliott was extradited back to Canada yesterday after
Constitution Court rejected her latest appeal to the
extradition. |
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"Her request to deny Canada's extradition request was
turned down by a lower court on May 21. The constitutional court has
upheld the lower court's decision, and Ms. Elliott has been extradited
to Canada."
It has been almost nine years since Ms. Elliott was charged with
murdering Mr. Foster, a retired Ottawa mechanic who had moved to
Kemptville.
The legal saga that ensued saw police officers suspended, lawyers
removed and the presiding judge at Ms. Elliott's original trial
suspended and now the subject of a judicial inquiry.
It also briefly made Ms. Elliott a fugitive, and also a hero to some, in
her native Barbados. It is believed Ms. Elliott had asked the
constitutional court in Costa Rica to extradite her to Barbados, instead
of Canada.
"She might have a winnable case if there was an extradition hearing
here," said Andrew Pilgrim, her Bridgetown, Barbados lawyer, in an
interview earlier this year. "There is a lot of sentiment in (Ms.
Elliott's) favour, and the Canadian justice system does not look very
good in this case."
Ms. Elliott, who owned a massage club in Bridgetown, is believed to have
met Mr. Foster when he was on vacation in Barbados in 1993. The
relationship between the two had been the subject of debate, but it is
clear Ms. Elliott began visiting Canada shortly afterward.
The Crown has always claimed that Mr. Foster was killed during one of
those visits, on Aug. 19, 1995. The next day, human body parts began to
be found in the Rideau River, prompting one of the largest Ontario
Provincial Police (OPP) searches and investigations in Eastern Ontario
history.
The human remains were eventually identified as Mr. Foster's, and within
days, Ms. Elliott was arrested in an Ottawa hotel room. She had Mr.
Foster's credit card, his blood on a white dress, and his microwave oven
packed up and ready to be shipped to Bridgetown.
She was charged with second-degree murder, and then sat in jail for four
years. Much of the subsequent legal manoeuvring is still under
publication ban but in total, the first trial managed to sit for only a
few days of public testimony before Justice Paul Cosgrove stayed the
charges, saying Ms. Elliott's Charter rights to a speedy trial had been
violated. He also alleged gross misconduct and abuse of power on the
part of various police officers and Crown attorneys.
CCSS Union Being Bosses Arrested for Fraud
Not even the worker's union the Asociación
Solidarista de la Caja Costarricense del Seguro Social (CCSS), is
escaping the scandal that is crippling the CCSS and the social security
system.
Monday, agents from the fraud section of the Organismo de Investigacion
Judicial (OIJ) and prosecutors, made four separate raids to investigate
the disappearance of about one hundred million colones.
Suspected of fraud against the union are the president, the treasurer,
the lawyer and the wife of the president of the association. The four
were detained by police and the prosecutor is asking for preventative
detention against the four while it conducts an investigation into the
possible fraud within the association.
Authorities claim that the suspects used 'association' funds to make
false purchases and/or altered invoices to defraud the association.
Police raided the offices of the association, as well as a retail store
that the association maintained, and the residences of the president and
the lawyer for the association.
The prosecutor had been keeping an eye on the association following a
complaint almost two years ago. In a preliminary study of the records,
the prosecutor's offices says that an estimated 100.000.000 colones may
have been funneled from association coffers for the year 2002, and that
amount will certainly be greater when they examine records for the year
2003.
Rodríguez Visits Costa Rica
Former president Miguel Ángel Rodríguez returend to Costa Rica over the
weekend as new head of the Organization of American States (OAS) and the
first thing on his agenda was to visit Casa Presidencial and show his
appreciation for the support the current government gave him in the
process of being elected Secretary General of the OAS.
His visit to Costa Rica also coincides with a date the former president
has with the members of the Legislative Assembly to explain the managing
of campaign funds during his 1998 election.
Rodríguez will take over as head of the OAS in September.
 News
Briefs
- Four Colombians were arrested yesterday in Manuel
Antion0, Quepos, when agents with the Ministerio de Seguridad Pública
joined forces with the U.S. Coastguard to intercept a power boat
suspected to be hauling drugs. The chase lasted about 6 hours, 115
kilometers off the Costa Rican coast. Police believe the drugs were
thrown overboard in the chase and will begin an intensive search this
morning.
- In an ongoing battle with street vendors, the Municipality of San
José has announced it will not forcibly remove those vendors who
refuse to go this Friday, 18 June, but will give them 48 hours more to
effectively vacate the streets. Johnny Araya, Mayor of San José, said
that most vendors have agreed to go peacefully, but the Municipality
is prepared to use necessary force to effect it's order to vacate the
streets. However, he stressed that no action will be taken before
Sunday.
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