Intelligence chief claims reporter got it wrong, says no investigation into El Chapo family visits to Costa Rica
December 7th, 2015 (ICR News) The head of Costa Rica’s secretive Directorate of Intelligence and Security (DIS), Mariano Figueres denied in a press release on Friday that he ever confirmed to a reporter for the daily La Nacion that children of fugitive Mexican drug lord, Joaquin “El Chapo” (Shorty) Guzman had visited Costa Rica and said that no such investigation exists.
On December 3rd, La Nacion published a story stating that the DIS was investigating the motive behind at least two trips by children of El Chapo to Costa Rica in 2014, quoting Figueres himself.
According to La Nacion, Figueres told one of the newspaper’s reporters that the visits occurred around the time of the Costa Rica presidential elections and that the drug lord’s children visited a “tourist site” in San Carlos, Alajuela, but declined to elaborate further, citing the ongoing investigation.
However, in a Friday press release, DIS said that “at every opportunity, Mr. Mariano Figueres, head of the DIS, has been clear in pointing out that there is no concrete and reliable information on the alleged visit of two of [El Chapo’s] children to Costa Rica.”
In response, La Nacion on Sunday published an article defending its original report.
“In mid-November, in a personal interview at the Casa Presidencial, Figueres was asked: ‘Prior to the elections (in 2014), during the campaign, there was a party in San Carlos that was attended by a son of Chapo Guzman. What information does the DIS have about this?’,” La Nacion claims in the article.
Acording to La Nacion, Figueres responded by saying “It is information that we have and that is related to two specific cases that we are piecing together and are under investigation.”
In Friday’s press release, however Figueres claims that he reiterated to the reporter during the interview that there was no investigation into the matter, adding, “This is a rumor that dates back to 2012.”
Not a first
This is not the first time that Figueres has contested statements he allegedly made to La Nacion.
In October 2014, La Nacion quoted Figueres as saying that the DIS had detected the entry of foreign nationals into the country connected with terrorist organizations, including the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL).
Two weeks later, however, Figueres contested the report, telling the country’s Legislative Assembly that he told a reporter for the newspaper that DIS had information that such persons could enter the country, not that they had.
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