Powerful Quake Hits Off Coast of Nicaragua
A powerful earthquake rocked Nicaragua's western coast on Saturday, sending residents running from their homes. No major injuries or damage were immediately reported.

The magnitude 6.9 quake struck at 5:26 EDT, or 3:26 p.m. local time in Nicaragua, and was centered about 50 miles southwest of Managua, the National Earthquake Information Center said.

Emergency officials said they had no immediate reports of major damage or injuries.
 

Nicaragua controller asks removal of president over election funding
The federal controller's office said Thursday it is asking Congress on Thursday to remove President Enrique Bolaños for failure to explain the origin of the funds used in his 2001 presidential campaign.

Controller Juan Gutierrez told a news conference that his agency had found "administrative responsibility" by the president. In addition to removing Bolaños, he said the president's salary should be held back.

The action comes against a president who has spent much of his term so far crusading against official corruption -- a battle that turned his own party against him.

Gutierrez said that Bolaños had refused to explain the origin of a dollar-denominated account in his name that had been used to finance his campaign.

Presidential spokesman Lindolfo Monjarretz said his office had no comment because it had not yet received official notification.

However, Bolaños' Interior Minister Julio Vega, said, "I have not the slightest doubt that this is a purely political affair."

He said v is "the only candidate who has put everything (about campaign spending) on the table after the elections of 2001. Everything up to the last receipt of what he spent is there."

The Congress, or National Assembly, is dominated by Sandinistas and Liberal Party deputies opposed to Bolaños.

Gutierrez said the case also was being sent to criminal court system in Managua, to the prosecutor general and to the attorney general.

The Supreme Court already is considering a complaint alleging that Bolaños used money that originated in frauds allegedly committed by his predecessor, Arnoldo Aleman.

Bolaños has denied wrongdoing, saying he used his own funds for the campaign.

Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega, who lost the 2001 race to Bolaños, said "it would be ideal if Bolaños would renounce his immunity" as president to face the charges. Ortega himself gave up his own immunity from prosecution for sexual abuse complaints by his stepdaughter shortly after the statute of limitation expired.

Immediately on taking office, Bolaños announced a crusade to clean up Nicaragua's government -- an effort that quickly centered on his predecessor Aleman, the godfather of the Constitutionalist Liberal Party that elected Bolaños.

Aleman was eventually sentenced to 20 years in prison for fraud, misappropriation of public funds, embezzlement and criminal association and Bolañoss has said he would not approve Aleman's release under any condition.

But most Liberal deputies and other figures in the party stayed loyal to Aleman, creating three mutually hostile political blocs: Bolaños and a small group of supporters, the larger group of Liberal Aleman loyalists and the leftist Sandinistas, who lost power in 1990.

H.B. Zachry to build U.S. Embassy in Nicaragua
The U.S. Department of State awarded H.B. Zachry Co. a $59.2 million contract to design and build a new U.S. Embassy complex in Managua, Nicaragua.

The project is being managed by the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations Bureau. Design work has already begun on the 123,000-square-foot facility and construction is set to begin in March 2005.

PageSoutherlandPage is Zachry's design partner for the project. The firm provides architectural, engineering and consulting services in support of manufacturing, science and technology, public, health care, education, corporate and urban housing facilities.

San Antonio-based Zachry is a privately-held company that provides construction, project development and construction management to clients worldwide. It is currently building U.S. Embassies in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and Beijing, China.

 

Mayorga under house arrest in Nicaragua
Former welterweight champion Ricardo Mayorga returned home Wednesday after a loss to Felix Trinidad and almost immediately was ordered under house arrest.

Mayorga, knocked out in a middleweight bout Saturday in New York, surrendered in court to face sexual abuse charges. A 20-year-old woman last month accused the boxer of rape. He acknowledged having sex with her at a hotel but said it was consensual.

Accompanied by a dozen bodyguards, his mother and his lawyer, Mayorga walked into court as supporters cried "Let him out!" and critics shouted back at them: "Accomplices!" Judge Marta Lorena Martinez placed him under house arrest and posted a bond of $9,000.

Prosecutor Odette Leyton said Mayorga should have been sent to prison pending trial. Bertha Ines Cabrales of the Women's Network Against Violence said she was surprised by the number of people who came to cheer the boxer.

"It is a disgrace that so many youths have become accomplices of a rapist," she said. "It's a disgrace that our society covers up a crime depending on who commits the crime."

On Tuesday, Mayorga told Nicaraguan reporters who had accompanied him to New York that he was retiring from boxing. He has a record of 27-5-1.