Costa Rica last week resumed diplomatic relations with Kuwait, Bahrain and Yemen, according to a statement released Friday by the Foreign Ministry.

During a visit to the United Nations headquarters in New York, Foreign Minister Bruno Stagno met with the Foreign Minister of Kuwait Mohammed Sabah Al-Salem Al-Sabah, the Foreign Minister of Bahrain, Sheikh Khalid Bin Ahmed Al-Khalifa and the Foreign Minister of Yemen, Abubakr A. Al-Kirbi. All meetings were fruitful and resulted in these countries planning to resume diplomatic relations with Costa Rica.

Stagno also met with the Syrian Foreign Minister Bashar Al-Assad to discuss establishing closer relations between the two countries, but he said the two leaders “still have not talked about reestablishing diplomatic relations.”

Stagno said resuming diplomatic relations with moderate Arab nations will allow for “a greater political and diplomatic closeness with the Arab and Islamic world” which could open up markets and attract foreign investment, the statement said.

Many Arab nations cut off diplomatic relations with Costa Rica in the 1980s after the country defied U.N. recommendations by maintaining its Israeli Embassy in Jerusalem, the statement said.

Costa Rica announced in August that it would relocate its Israeli Embassy from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv (TT, Aug. 18).

-Tico Times

By Leland Baxter-Neal, Tico Times Staff

Attorney General Francisco Dall’Anese, in a public presentation of the Judicial Branch’s annual report Friday, warned of a rising trend of murders by hired hit-men, or sicariato, and organized crime in Costa Rica. 

“ Sicariato has been increasing in Costa Rica and is not limited to killing people, but also inflicting injuries, damaging property and making threats — all in exchange for money, ” Dall’Anese told a full auditorium in the Judicial Investigation Police (OIJ) building in downtown San José.

He added that the rise of murders by hired hit-men is “clear evidence of the criminal organizations that contract them. ” The only way to disband these groups is by investigating not only the circumstances and culprits of the crimes, but also the deeper motives, he said.

Dall’Anese added that the discoveries of members of the Colombian guerrilla army Revolutionary Armed Force of Colombia (FARC), and the former guerrilla movement M-19 in Costa Rica “make us realize the weakness of our Immigration system ”.

He also thanked Colombian officials who have recently collaborated with Costa Rican authorities in investigating the presence of these groups in Costa Rica and checking the backgrounds of 18,000 Colombians with residency and refugee status here (TT, Sept. 15).

In addition, he continued, Costa Rican authorities have discovered “at least two” organizations dedicated to the illegal trafficking of children in Costa Rica, one Costa Rican and the other Ecuadorian.

Dall’Anese praised the efforts of the Prosecutor’s Office, in coordination with the OIJ, against Chinese criminal groups dedicated to kidnapping “Costa Rican citizens of Chinese origin.” Because of these efforts, the groups “have abandoned their activities;” there is no evidence that Chinese people have been kidnapped in a pproximately nine months, he said.

Costa Rican law officials have a $50,000 new system to keep track of those who have valid permits to buy or carry a gun.

The system unveiled Friday is the first in Latin America, and there are plans to link systems installed elsewhere in the future with this one. Patricio Zuquilanda represented the hemispheric organization at a ceremony Friday.

What the new permits will look like.

A.M. Costa Rica photos by José Pablo Ramírez Vindas
Fernado Berrocal looks over the new system

Officials said that since January and through August, police have confiscated 1,209 weapons carried illegally, mostly by criminals. Fuerza Pública officers confiscate on the average about six weapons a day.