Signs that Latin America is tipping further from the right were threaded through newly elected Mauricio Funes' inauguration speech Monday.

The first left-leaning Salvadoran president after 20 years of right-wing rule, Funes, of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), pledged to strengthen ties with Cuba and eliminate existing inequalities.

He blamed the country's poverty on the “ruling elite,” saying they “plunged the country into a critical situation in the economic field.”

“The people of El Salvador requested a change and change begins now,” Funes said.

The onetime journalist also promised the creation of 100,000 jobs over the next 18 months and implementation of 25,000 urban improvement projects.

“We want social reconstruction, economic reconstruction and institutional reconstruction of our homeland,” said the new president of El Salvador.

Representatives from more than 72 countries were in the audience for Funes' speech, including Costa Rican President Oscar Arias.

Arias and Funes had already launched diplomatic relations in late March, following Funes' election, and discussed issues ranging from the challenges facing small countries to increases in unemployment and poverty.

“We had the opportunity to discuss common issues affecting these sister countries, El Salvador and Costa Rica, and, in general, Central America. We talk about the major concerns we have,” Arias said following the meeting.

Funes' election ends 20 years of uninterrupted rule by the rightist Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA).

See The Nica Times, a publication of The Tico Times, for more on Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes.

A new study suggests nine of Costa Rica's indigenous languages are in danger of extinction, with every generation producing fewer daily speakers.

The report, released by the United Nations Education, Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), lists three of Costa Rica's languages as “critically endangered,” which is one step away from extinct.

The three facing the most threat, according to the report, all have a dwindling number of people who speak the language regularly with children in upcoming generations learning it as their mother tongue or speaking it at home.

Two of the languages, Boruca and Teribe, spoken in the Térraba Valley in southwestern Costa Rica, each have fewer than 70 native speakers. The third, and most endangered, is Chorotega, which has close to 16 native speakers near Turrialba, east of San José.

The other six endangered languages are spread thin across the country. They range from “severely endangered” to “unsafe,” and from having 55,000 speakers, as does Limón Creole, to fewer than 100, like the three in critical danger.

Languages fall into peril when the older generations stop speaking the language in the household and teaching it to younger generations as their native language, the report says. Slowly, Spanish has begun to replace these local languages as the primary tongue.

According to the report, there are close to 2,500 endangered languages worldwide, with 230 having gone extinct over the past half-century.

PUERTO JIMENEZ, Puntarenas – The rods are being set to pull fishing nets out of the Golfo Dulce forever.

Officials from local and national fishing organizations and conservation groups met in the town hall here on Saturday to discuss a plan that would declare the gulf – home to one of the world's five tropical fjords – a “marine area of responsible fishing” (AMPR). The two-and-a-half-year plan would involve eliminating shrimp trawlers from the area, conducting biological studies and teaching gillnet fishermen how to use sustainable fishing practices.

Officials of the Costa Rican Federation for Fishing Tourism (FECOPT) presented the plan to directors of the National Fisheries Institute (INCOPESCA) and members of the National Artisanal Fishing Federation. Members from all parties were on board with removing fishing nets from the gulf.

“It's the only way to restore this gulf,” said Donald McGuinness, president of FECOPT. “It's already overfished.”

The nets have long been the center of attacks from national conservation groups that worry about the bycatch captured by trawls and gillnets. Dolphins, turtles and sharks are often trapped and killed in the nets used for catching other marine creatures such as shrimp.

Randall Arauz, president of the Marine Turtle and Restoration Program (PRETOMA), said if the fishing institutes are serious about declaring the Golfo Dulce a responsible fishing area, they must first eliminate the shrimp trawlers, which he said have been notorious for pulling unnecessary bycatch out of the gulf. The United States has embargoed Costa Rica's shrimp industry four times since 1999 because of a lack of use and enforcement of sustainable fishing practices.

“We've been telling them for years to get shrimp boats out of here,” Arauz said.

INCOPESCA President Jorge Barrantes said the shrimp boats are among the first of their concerns.

“We are working with the shrimpers now,” he said. “We hope to have them out within a month.”

INCOPESCA officials will meet with shrimping organizations in the Pacific port city of Puntarenas this Friday to discuss the plan.

See the June 5 print or PDF edition of The Tico Times for more on this story.

Click on map to enlarge.

Source: World Health Organization

The number of patients diagnosed with the Influenza A (H1N1) virus has risen to 50 after health authorities detected a dozen new cases over the weekend, the Health Ministry reports.

The flu virus count in Costa Rica is now:

• 50 confirmed cases
• 8 probable cases
• 1,394 discarded cases
• 107 pending cases

Since Costa Rica received the equipment to test for the virus on its own, the number of confirmed cases has surged. In mid-May, Costa Rica reported eight confirmed cases. When the primer kits arrived the week of May 18, many of the probable cases were confirmed.

The Health Ministry continues to recommend consistent hand washing and that people should report to the nearest medical center if experiencing increased fatigue, sore throat or elevated cold symptoms.