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Costa Rican
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The game was in a Stadium in Foxboro, Mass., but the thousands of Costa Ricans that went to support the soccer national selection in its encounter with Canada last Saturday in the Copa de Oro tournament made it look like it was right in Costa Rica.
How? About 7,000 fans; faces and bodies painted of red; t-shirts with the names and numbers of the players all over the stands; giant red, blue and white flags waving during the 90 minutes; and Costa Rican songs accompanying the ball movements in the field.
The days before the game the Costa Rican Consulate in Boston received hundreds of phone calls asking for information about the game, and the Costa Rican Association of Massachusetts arranged to obtain at $35 tickets priced $75, all seated in the same area of the Gillette Stadium, Consulate Assistant Monica Pujol said.
Not even the goal with which the Canadians defeated the "Sele" killed the enthusiasm, but it touched pride. "Canada had hardly touched the ball at all...and there they were, only like 15 Canadians in the whole stadium, jumping with their flags," she said.
Ronny Salazar, of Chelsea, Mass., said it didn't really affect the feeling of being there with so many Costa Ricans. In soccer you loose, you draw and you win, he said, but "it was spectacular to see so many ticos together in one place out of Costa Rica."
On Sunday the party continued and about 60 fans and some reporters who were covering the Copa de Oro assisted to a reception for the "Sele" players and executives in Quincy, Mass.
It was just one day after the game but the players had just been training and had to keep their diet. Of course, it was very typical: rice, beans, plantains, salad and meat, like if they were in their homes.
They all signed a T-shirt and an official ball that the captain of the team, Luis Marin, gave to the association for a raffle, and they also took pictures with kids, gave autographs and chatted with fans for about 40 minutes.
After they left, about 9 p.m., the Costa Ricans continued with their music. The National Anthem and the Patriótica Costarricense somehow shared the night with old popular tunes by Gaviota, Marfil and others bands, mixed by Costa Rican DJ Rolando Sáenz.
And with that, an exceptional weekend ended for some Costa Ricans who live away from their country.
"To be away from home is hard and (it's good) to share with out people...speaking the same Spanish with the jokes we know, our sayings and our music," Pujol commented.
Court Orders
Online Gambling Sites To Bar Dutch Users
Ruling last week, a
Dutch Court ordered online gambling websites located
in the Netherland Antilles, Canada, Antigua,
Venezuela, Belize, Haiti and Costa Rica to bar Dutch
visitors from accessing their services.
According to reports,
the case was brought by the country's national
lottery operator, De Lotto, which argued that it is
the only party licensed to offer gambling services
to the Dutch public, and that as the sites can be
accessed directly in the Netherlands, they should be
considered to be operating there illegally.
In a preliminary
ruling, the court ordered that 21 online gambling
sites must refuse to allow access to Dutch internet
users. However, according to a report from the
Financial Times, some 40 companies have been called
before it, and a further 42 internet betting sites
are being eyed by De Lotto.
Natural disasters kill 100,000 in Latin America in last 30 years
More than 100,000 people have been killed in Latin America due to natural disasters over the last three decades, according to a report released on Saturday by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean
(CEPAL).
The report, Manual on the Assessment of the Socioeconomic and Environmental Impact of Disasters, said natural disasters have also caused losses of 65 billion US dollars and affected some 150 million people in the area in the period.
The heavy casualties and material losses caused by natural disasters have been mainly in smaller and less developed countries,especially in the Andean region, Central America and the
Caribbeanarea, according to CEPAL.
The report said that as natural disasters mostly hit poorer andmore vulnerable countries, the damage is "socially more important and more irreversible."
Experience from developed countries shows that it is possible to diminish the impact of natural disasters by reinforcing the response and aid system, CEPAL said.
CEPAL, a UN organization, also said it had concluded a study onthe socioeconomic impact of the Jan. 21, 2003, earthquake in the Mexican state of
Colima.
The quake killed 28 people and injured hundreds of others. The government of Colima has requested CEPAL to assess the damage, originally estimated at 90 million dollars.
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Canadian nurse dies of SARS
A second health-care worker has died of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in Canada's largest city of Toronto, health authorities announced Saturday.
The 58-year-old female nurse, who worked at the William Osler Health Centre in Toronto, contracted the disease during the first cluster of SARS and died on Saturday.
"My sympathies go out to the family and friends of this individual, and to all health-care workers, who continue to respond to the challenge of SARS," said Health Minister Tony Clement in a press release.
The first death of a health-care worker came late last month when Nelia Laroza, 51, passed away. She had worked at North York General Hospital in Toronto and contracted SARS in mid-May during the second outbreak of the disease.
A total of 41 people have now died of SARS in Canada's Ontario Province and 16 SARS patients remain in Toronto hospitals.
UN chief welcomes FARC suggestion for meeting
he UN Information Center in Colombia said on Saturday that UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan "considers as positive" a letter from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), requesting a meeting with him on Colombia's internal conflict.
The FARC proposed early Saturday to meet Annan and brief him onits position on Colombia's internal armed conflict.
The rebel group, through a letter via the Internet, said it hasappointed Commander Raul Reyes as its representative to the meeting with
Annan.
The FARC explained in the letter that the meeting "is aimed at presenting a more complete panorama of our clear purpose in searchof a political solution to the social and armed conflict through diplomacy."
It said that because the United Nations abstains from terming the rebel group as a terrorist organization, it is possible to meet Annan in the short run.
Colombia has been ravaged by a four-decade-long civil war, in which government forces, leftist guerrillas and far-right paramilitaries fight one another. About 3,500 people, mostly civilians, are killed in the conflict every year.
The FARC, the largest guerrilla group in the Andean country, has more than 17,000 members. Peace talks between the government of former President Andres Pastrana and the FARC broke down in February 2002.
Cuba denies blocking US satellite transmission to Iran
Cuba described on Saturday as a "new campaign of anti-Cuba lies" the US accusation that it is jamming satellite broadcasting from the United States to Iran.
"Cuba has never embarked, nor will it embark on this sort of interference with US satellite television signal broadcasting," the Foreign Ministry said in a communique on Saturday.
The ministry rejects what it called the new slander campaign against Cuba and the "unashamed remarks" by Kenneth Tomlinson, director of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a federal agency that supervises all US government-funded international broadcasting, the communique added.
Tomlinson's remarks indicated that Cuba "intentionally and maliciously" jams news broadcasts sent from the United States to Iran, the communique said.
"This new campaign of anti-Cuban lies adds to the long list of hostile actions the imperial administration of US President George W. Bush has taken against our country," it said.
The communique noted that it is Washington that has flagrantly violated the norms and regulations established by the International Telecommunications Union by broadcasting illegal radio and television signals to Cuba.
However, the communique said the Cuban government had informed Washington that "a detailed investigation will be carried out, based on the information provided, to ascertain whether broadcasts originating in our country may unintentionally be interfering with US broadcasts."
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