The court case that's jeopardized the career and legacy of a former president of Costa Rica and caused one of the country's leading political parties to slip from prominence is entering into its final phase this week.

After nearly nine months of deliberations and 150 witnesses, former President Rafael Angel Calderón – who is at the core of the case – is heading into the four-week process with optimism.

“None of the 150 witnesses who testified under oath (were able to prove) that I am involved in any crime,” he said in a statement released Monday. “All of the evidence and documentation confirms that I did not commit an illegal act.”

Calderón (1990-1994) was arrested in October 2004 and made to spend five months in Costa Rica's toughest prison after allegedly accepting money for securing a $39.5 million contract between a Finnish medical equipment company and the national public healthcare system, known as La Caja.

The former president admitted to receiving $520,000 from the medical equipment company, but said the money was payment for legal consulting services.

Confident of his innocence, Calderón initiated a presidential campaign last spring in the hopes of gaining a second term in office. Based on his first term, he is known for pushing for economic development by reducing taxes and drafting trade agreements, as well as for a handful of initiatives in health and education.

Yet, after Calderon's arrest, along with that of former president Miguel Angel Rodríguez (1998-2002), also on corruption charges, the Social Christian United Party started its retreat from the political scene. It lost 14 seats in the legislative assembly in 2006 and captured few votes in that year's presidential election.

Luis Fishman, president of party, lashed out at those prolonging the trial, charging that they harbor underlying political motives.

“This trial has had a high level of political content and, more than looking for the real and objective truth in the Caja-Fischel case, they've looked to hurt Calderón as a political figure and his party, La Unidad,” he said.

Costa Rica's Administrative Contention Court lifted an injunction on Monday morning that has blocked the much awaited opening of a railway between San José and its northern neighbor, Heredia.

The Costa Rican Railroad Institute (INCOFER) and Comercial El Diez S.A, a private company that had filed suit against INCOFER, agreed to begin the court-facilitated conciliation process.

The agreement does not signify the end of the lawsuit, but it does mean INCOFER may continue with its efforts to begin the inter-city rail service, which were stopped in late May when El Diez filed suit.

According to a communiqué from the court's press office, El Diez claimed that “the cleaning and repair work of the rails, performed by INCOFER, affects the stability of the (plaintiff's) property, which endangers not only the land, but the life of those that travel along the site.”

The conditions of the agreement are private and officials could not say when the conciliation process will begin. But Andrea Marín, press officer for the court, said the “the most important part of today's conclusion is that the train can continue operation.”

Eduardo Brenes, of the Regional and Urban Planning for the Greater Metropolitan Area (PRUGAM), told The Tico Times in early May that the tests and repairs were in the “final phases,” a comment made shortly before El Diez filed suit (TT, May, 8).

Officials from INCOFER were unavailable for comment Monday afternoon.

Nicaragua's total ban on abortions is contributing to an increase in maternal deaths across the country by denying girls and women potentially life-saving treatment, the human rights group Amnesty International (AI) reported Monday.

Thirty-three girls and women have died in pregnancy this year, up from 20 in the same period of 2008, according to official figures cited in the new AI report. The group said the number could be higher as maternal deaths in Nicaragua are often not recorded.

Sandinista and Liberal lawmakers outlawed therapeutic abortion Oct. 26, 2006, in a measure rights activists called an electoral ploy by both parties to pander to religious voters on the eve of the presidential elections.

In the lead-up to the Nov. 5 elections, Catholic and Evangelical groups ran a campaign under the banner “Abortion is murder” (NT, Nov. 3, 2006), which helped prompt four out of five candidates to come out against abortion in all forms.

The church in Managua continues to uphold a firm stance. “The doctrine of the church is clear,” Mons. Miguel Mántica, of the Archdiocese of Managua, told Catholic news wire ACI last week. “A decriminalization of therapeutic abortion means accepting the existence of difficult situations in which it's legal to kill the innocent.”

In Nicaragua, girls and women who seek an abortion and health professionals who provide associated services can face a prison sentence for doing so – an absolute abortion ban that's in place in only 3 percent of the world's countries, according to AI.

The report, “The total abortion ban in Nicaragua: Women's lives and health endangered, medical professionals criminalized,” is AI's first study examining the implications of the denial of abortion when the life or health of a woman or girl is at risk, including when she is a victim of rape or incest, according to an AI press release.

AI leaders have called the ban a “disgrace,” because it compels rape and incest victims to bear children and denies pregnant women the care that could save their lives.

“It is a human rights scandal that ridicules medical science and distorts the law into a weapon against the provision of essential medical care to pregnant girls and women,” said Kate Gilmore, AI's executive deputy secretary general, according to the release.

The convenience store retailer AM/PM will continue to expand in Costa Rica, announcing plans to open five more locations in 2009.

The California-based chain, which opened its first store in Costa Rica in the eastern San José neighborhood of Los Yoses in 1987, will have a total of 20 establishments in the San José, Heredia and Alajuela area by the end of the year.

The new AM/PM locations will create 80 new jobs and require an investment of $1 million to construct, according to a statement released Monday. The AM/PM chain also intends to open a new Fresh Market grocery store location. Fresh Market, which is run by AM/PM, currently has five San José locations.

Managers at AM/PM stated that their decision to expand stems from the continued success of other AM/PM locations. They said their chain's competitive advantage is found in offering freshly made products such as warm bread and other items that produce high revenues, as well as ice cream, soft drinks, liquors, wines and a variety of sandwiches.

The new AM/PM stores will be located in areas of high pedestrian and automobile traffic. The locations for the first three new store locations are in José María Zeledón, in the eastern San José district of Curridabat, near Parque España and behind the Banco Central. The locations of the other two AM/PM locations and the new Fresh Market store have yet to be decided.

AM/PM plans to employ 30 people in each location and is said to have employed 400 persons since they began operations in Costa Rica in 1987.