The Tico Times Online Daily Page

Daily Edition: San José, Costa Rica, October 17, 2003

INHUMAN CONDITIONS: Maria, a 12-year-old Honduran girl, picks through the trash at a dump outside Tegucigalpa. New study shows 42% of Central Americans are living in poverty.
AFP/TT

42% of Central Americans
'Stuck' in Poverty
Madrid (AFP) -- Some 13 million Central Americans - about 42% -- have been stuck in poverty for the past five years, according to a report published yesterday by the Spanish non-governmental organization Fundación Intervida.
(Click for more)

El Salvador's Foreign Minister Asks
For Regional Trade Pact with Europe
Brussels (AFP) - Apparently riding on the success of this month's cooperation agreement between Central America and the European Union (EU), Salvadoran Foreign Minister María Eugenia Brizuela de Avila this week asked European leaders to begin free-trade negotiations with Central America by next May.
(Click for more)

Canopy Operator
Guilty of Involuntary Homicide
A canopy-tour operator on trial for the 2000 death of German tour guide Patricia Baron was found guilty yesterday of involuntary homicide, which carries a jail sentence of two years, reported the daily La Nación.
(Click for more)

October 17

Don't Miss the "Great Occasion"
José Joaquín Vargas Calvo is hosting the play "La Calle de la Gran Ocasión," (The Street of the Great Occasion), at 8 p.m., Fri-Sun., through December. The play offers seven short acts with dialogues about different situations dealing with love. See the play at the Sala José Joaquín Vargas Calvo, Av. 2, Ca. 3/5. Info: 221-5103.

Salsa, Reggae and Rock at Sabana
Bring family and friends for a day of sports and music tomorrow in the park. Play some basketball and enjoy the all-day concert with salsa and rock bands La Selección, Los Huracanes, Los Aventureros, Suite Doble, Inconsciente Colectivo and other reggae musicians. The activity is to support Costa Rican model, Vica Andrade, who is participating in the Reality Show Big Brother Vip 2 in Mexico. The concert begins at 9 a.m., Oct. 18, outside the National Gymnasium in La Sabana Park.

Concert En Voz Plena
Celebrated national singers are getting together to honor Master Gourguén Mkrtytchian, their singing professor, with a concert. Talented vocalists include Marta Fonseca, Sasha Campbell, Tango India, Expresso, the Buba Girls, Por Partes and others. Shows are tonight and tomorrow, 7-9 p.m., at the Eugene O'Neal Theater, at the Costa Rica-North American Cultural Center in Barrio Dent. Info: 269-6835, 811-8489.

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42% of Central Americans 'Stuck' in Poverty

Fatima Gonzales, 9, is one of millions of Nicaraguans living in poverty.
AFP/TT

Madrid (AFP) - Some 13 million Central Americans - about 42% -- have been stuck in poverty for the past five years, according to a report published yesterday by the Spanish non-governmental organization Fundación Intervida.

The report, published in commemoration of the International Day of Poverty Eradication, found the situation is "most alarming" in Nicaragua, where the overwhelming majority live on the equivalent of less than $2 a day.

In Nicaragua, 94.5% of the population lives off less than $2 a day, while the percentage drops to around 45% in El Salvador and Honduras, and 40% in Guatemala, according to the report.

Only Costa Rica is on track to meet the so-called "Millennium Goals" of slashing poverty rates in half by the year 2015, the report found.

The Spanish foundation attributed the stagnation of poverty in Central America to the deceleration of economic growth and the string of natural disasters that have affected the isthmus over the past five years.

The lack of basic services is another major stumbling block for poverty reduction in Central America.

"For the great majority of Central Americans, access to primary education, potable water and health care is impossible," the report states.

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El Salvador's Foreign Minister Asks
For Regional Trade Pact with Europe

Brussels (AFP) - Apparently riding on the success of this month's cooperation agreement between Central America and the European Union (EU), Salvadoran Foreign Minister María Eugenia Brizuela de Avila this week asked European leaders to begin free-trade negotiations with Central America by next May.

The new cooperation agreement focuses on strengthening Central American integration and modernizing local industries. The agreement is intended to act as a precursor to an eventual trade agreement between the two regions, but does not include any immediate plans to liberalize trade relations (see today's TT print edition).

Brizuela, who remained in Brussels after the cooperation meetings ended, asked EU leaders to set a trade-negotiation calendar for May, 2004.

"During the [May, 2004 Ibero-American summit] in Mexico, we could begin negotiations on a Central American-EU free-trade union, similar to the free-trade agreement negotiated between Mexico and Chile," Brizuela said.

She noted that the preferential trade system the EU currently extends to Central America expires next year, and "the only way to have a permanent tie to the EU would be to form a free-trade agreement."

The EU has hinged the possibility of a free-trade agreement on the Central American integration process, something Brizuela insisted is more advanced than Europe thinks.

The Salvadoran minister claimed that Central America's customs integration is 80% completed (with Costa Rica being the only holdout), and said the isthmus is working on an institutional integration model similar to that of the EU.

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Canopy Operator Guilty of Involuntary Homicide

A canopy-tour operator on trial for the 2000 death of German tour guide Patricia Baron was found guilty yesterday of involuntary homicide, which carries a jail sentence of two years, reported the daily La Nación.

Álvaro Serrano, who had installed and was testing the zipline tour at Valle Escondido Hotel in San Ramón when Baron fell to her death, will be allowed to wave his jail sentence for a conditional freedom parole of four years, during which time he will not be allowed to work as a canopy tour guide. He also must pay the victim's family $164,000 in damages.

The hotel owner was absolved of responsibility.

Serrano was found guilty of negligence for improperly inserting the pin that held Baron's pulley to the zipline cable connecting the two treetop platforms.

Baron, a 42-year-old German citizen with Costa Rican residency, fell 40 meters to her death Sept. 3, 2000, while testing a new canopy tour at the Valle Escondido Hotel. Her fall initially was blamed on a faulty pulley, which broke 10 meters before she reached the treetop platform, throwing her body into the side of the tree and down to ground (TT, Sept. 8, 2000).

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