Word: costa
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Honduras and Costa Rica, concern about the U.S. presence increases...
Near the dusty cattle town of Liberia in Costa Rica, members of the Civil Guard are listlessly chasing a stray hummingbird through their armory. "Actually, most of these guns are for the birds," jokes Colonel José Ramón Montero, a rice farmer who prefers T shirts to camouflage and diligently observes banker's hours. "These M-1s could have seen service at Normandy, and most of these weapons would be more valuable in Hollywood." His company's mission, however, is no scriptwriter's flight of fancy: his men are serving as a first line...
Neither Honduras nor Costa Rica is currently at war. But both border on Nicaragua, whose imposing military buildup and revolutionary Marxist rhetoric have caused its neighbors alarm. Both are also bases for thousands of U.S.-backed contras, Nicaraguan rebels fighting to overthrow the Sandinista government. Now, to varying degrees, Honduras and Costa Rica are growing apprehensive about the close relationship with the U.S. that their geopolitical predicament has forced upon them...
...Costa Rica too has resisted U.S. attempts to turn it into a stronger military buffer against Nicaragua. Last week, in a show of independence from Washington, President Luis Alberto Monge announced that he had obtained $154 million in loans from Western European nations. The neutral Costa Rican government also ousted a contra spokesman by canceling his tourist visa...
...from civilian economies that are already in dire straits. Honduras has virtually ceased payment on its $2 billion debt to foreign Danks and international organizations, a move almost unnoticed during the Argentine debt crisis. Capital flight in the past two years alone has been estimated at $1 billion. Although Costa Rica is substantially better off (it receives more U.S. aid per capita than any other country except Israel), it can barely meet the interest payments on its $4 billion foreign debt...