Today's Stories: • Cold Weather For a Couple of Days More • Puerto Rico Governor Justifies Trip to Costa Rica • Nicargua Will Support Rodríguez, But... • New Nematodes • 4,000 Trees to be Planted • Venezuela again delays unveiling rules • Brazil's Nuclear Plans Worry IAEA

The weatherman, the Instituto Meteorológico Nacional (IMN), says that sudden change in the weather is a result of a cold front from the north and should carry over for another day or so. It also warned of some heavy rains and possible flooding in the Caribbean zone.
 

Puerto Rico Governor Justifies Trip to Costa Rica
Puerto Rico Gov. Sila Calderon dismissed the strong criticism she has received for traveling to Costa Rica along with four government agency heads as well as that of several businessmen, arguing that business relations will improve between Puerto Rico and the Costa Rica.

Contrary to what the New Progressive Party (NPP) opposition has been saying Calderon said that the businessmen invited by the government of Puerto Rico will pay their own expenses.

“The trip is the result of an invitation made to me by Costa Rica President Abel Pacheco. Our intention is to do both economic and commercial development,” Calderon said.

The governor, along with a group of government employees and local businessmen, will be in Costa Rica from April 21 to 24.

Calderon noted that in the last 10 years, imports from Costa Rica have increased from $40 million to $165 million.

Accompanying the governor on her trip will be the Economic Development Secretary Milton Segarra; Secretary of State Jose Izquierdo and Promoexport Director, Antonio Sosa Pascual.

Calderon could not say how much the trip will cost and argued that she has only traveled abroad three times since taking office; twice to the Dominican Republic and once to Panama.

During her visit, Calderon will have lunch with former president Oscar Arias.

Calderon added that her administration has reopened a office of Puerto Rican affairs in Costa Rica, which had been originally established by former governor Rafael Hernandez Colon, but was later shut down by former Governor Pedro Rossello.

The governor was unable to say how much the operation of the office will cost.
 

Nicargua Will Support Rodríguez, But...
Nicaragua announced that it will support former Costa Rican president, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, in his candidacy of the position of Secretary General aspirante of the Organización de los Estados Americanos (OEA).

However, Nicaragua's support of Rodriguez comes with a condition: Costa Rica must resolve it's issues over immigration and navigation problems in the San Juan river which borders with Nicaragua.

The San Juan river has been a long standing issue between the two governments and the change this past January requiring Nicaraguans to have a passport to enter Costa Rican territory has been a sore point for the government of Nicargua President Enrique Bolaños.

Ricardo Toledo, Minister for the Presidency, refused to accept Nicaragua's condition to force Costa Rica to negotiate, saying that "no vote for Rodriguez is tied to any immigration or San Juan river issues."

The OEA elections will be held on June 8 in Quito, Ecuador, where the present secretary general, Colombian César Gaviria, is due to step down.

To date, Nicaragua and El Salvador are the only two countries in the continent who have not yet given their official support for Rodríguez. 32 nations have given Rodríguez their support, the last being the United States, announcing their decision last thursday.

A meeting this week between Costa Rican President Abel Pacheco and El Salvador president-elect Elías Saca, should get the Salvadorian vote.

Roberto Tovar commented that the 32 votes for Rodríguez is an acknowldgement for the former president's stand on human rights and democracy.

Bolaños statement of a conditioned vote was a reaction to Pacheco's comments earlier this week, where Pacheco said he felt hurt and resentful that Nicaragua had not given it's support of Rodríguez, in spite of thousand of Nicaraguans immgrants in Costa Rica.
 

New Nematodes
Researchers from the state Universidad Nacional and the National Institute of Biodiversity (INBio in Spanish) found 14 new species of nematodes, which are at the most 1 millimeter in length, but cause heavy damage to crops.

Some of the 25,000 nematodes known benefit the soil, but a majority of them damage crops for an estimated over $100 million a year, according to a bulletin from Universidad Nacional, and this is the reason why scientists want to learn more about them, in order to control the pest.
 

4,000 Trees to be Planted
The cement company Cemex Costa Rica donated $30,000 to fund a program consisting in planting 4,000 trees along the 14 kilometers of the road connecting Limonal and the La Amistad Bridge, over the Tempisque River, in Guanacaste.

The trees are of native species and the project also takes in two gardens.
 

Venezuela again delays unveiling rules for signature verification
Venezuela's top election authority said on Saturday it has postponed again till next Tuesday the announcement of rules for validating questionable signatures submitted for a recall referendum against President Hugo Chavez.

Ezequiel Zamora, vice president of the National Electoral Council (CNE), denied the measure was "obstructionist" and made itclear that it would facilitate the continuation of talks between the government and the opposition.

The electoral body had scheduled to announce this Saturday the rules to verify the validity of the questionable signatures.

The opposition submitted to the electoral body 3.1 million signatures and the electoral body in march ruled some 876,017 signatures would be scrutinized because their validity was in question.

After this verification, the CNE will make the definite announcement on the authorization of the recall referendum.

The opposition Democratic Coordination has pledged to fulfill the rules for verifying doubtful signatures if the CNE fulfilled their demands.

A minimum of 2.4 million signatures representing 20 percent of the electorate are needed to force the referendum.
 

Brazil's Nuclear Plans Worry IAEA
Brazil's refusal to allow the Inter-national Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to fully inspect one of its nuclear facilities has heightened suspicions about its commitment to nonproliferation.

Although Brazil signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in 1997 and said its nuclear program has peaceful objectives, suspicions over its commitment have simmered for more than a year.

They came to a head last week after the government confirmed that IAEA inspectors were denied access in February and last month to uranium-enrichment centrifuges at a facility under construction in Resende, near Rio de Janeiro.

It cited the need to protect industrial secrets and said the centrifuges were, and will remain, off limits for visual inspection.

Science and Technology Minister Eduardo Campos said that Brazil had invested close to US$1 billion and years of research to develop its enrichment technology.

He said the performance of Brazilian centrifuges was 30 percent more efficient than those found in other countries.

"This is a technology we must protect," he said.

Centrifuges are used to enrich uranium for use in nuclear power plants or atomic weapons.

The doubts over Brazil's nuclear program were likely discussed during two days of closed-door meetings between Brazilian officials and the US Assistant Secretary of State for Nonproliferation, John Wolf.

Wolf left Brasilia on Thursday after two days of meetings of the Brazil-US Joint Committee on Nuclear Energy Cooperation.

Brazil's uranium-enrichment program may be discussed next week during a visit by US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham.

When he arrived Friday in Rio de Janiero, Abraham said, "I don't want to leave the impression that the US and Brazil are not concerned about dirty bombs and terrorism. But I will not speculate on what topics will come up in my conversations with Brazilian officials."

According to the US State Department, those meetings should not be considered the result of "a reaction nor an expression of concern about Brazil's commitment to nuclear nonproliferation," said embassy spokesman Wesley Carrington.

But experts think concerns do exist over Brazil's commitment to nonproliferation.

"Brazil is beginning to be perceived as a country apparently wanting to reevaluate its commitment to nonproliferation and this is a big part of the problem at hand," said Jon Wolfsthal, deputy director for nonproliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

Its refusal to allow the inspections came "in the middle of Iran's and North Korea's challenges to the IAEA's authority," Wolfsthal said.

"Anything seen as undermining the IAEA's authority puts everyone on edge,'' he said.

Brazil's claim of protecting industrial secrets does not hold up because the IAEA has a "proven track record" of respecting such information.

Brazil's government laid plans for the development of nuclear weapons technologies in the 1970s when the country was governed by a military dictatorship whose leaders were oriented by a stern "national security" doctrine and a traditional rivalry with Argentina, which was also developing similar technologies during its military regime. But the plans were abandoned when Brazil returned to democracy in the 1980s.

Suspicions about the nuclear program started months before Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva became president in January, 2003.

"Why should we be asked to use slingshots while others point their cannons at us. Brazil will only be respected when it is strong economically, technologically and militarily," Silva said about the Nonproliferation Treaty.

Six weeks later, as president-elect, Silva said his government would never consider building an atomic bomb and respect the treaty.

Worries that Brazil's technology could fall into the wrong hands has also stoked international fears.

Brazil has the world's sixth-largest uranium reserve and has had the capacity to enrich uranium since the 1980s, but has so far only done so for research purposes.