Word: ricas
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...civilian democratic government." As the crisis deepened, Spain confirmed that it would offer political asylum to the general, provided that the U.S. agreed not to demand his extradition. Spanish Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez was expected to discuss the Panamanian situation this week during a visit to Costa Rica. If Noriega does go abroad, he might settle first in Spain and eventually in France, where he is believed to own a Paris apartment and a home in the south. Noriega reportedly wants full access to his Swiss bank accounts, which are believed to hold millions in drug-trafficking profits...
...fragile governments. The tentacles of the narcotraficantes reach up to top officials and down to lowly policemen. With a wink and a nod from cooperative judges and prison officials, notorious narcotics peddlers have strolled out of jails in Colombia, Mexico and Bolivia. Customs and immigration officials in Costa Rica and the Bahamas look the other way as some of the hemisphere's most wanted men have walked from their private planes to waiting limousines. Police and military officials in Honduras and Panama have tipped off traffickers to impending raids. Efforts to slow the trade, from destroying coca crops to extraditing...
...tightly organized enterprise. Coca leaves are grown mostly in Peru and Bolivia, where they are turned into a thick paste. The paste is shipped to processing laboratories, most of them in Colombia, where it is converted into the powder that drug users, especially in the U.S., consume. Costa Rica, Honduras, Panama and the Bahamas are among the favored transshipment points. Profits are usually laundered in Panama and invested...
...Costa Rica, by contrast, seems an unlikely target for the Medellin cartel. The country has no army, is not dominated by greedy generals or politicians, and is proud of a democratic tradition. Yet Costa Rica's ports and its more than 200 rural airstrips have become key transit points for cocaine cargos. In recent years the Costa Rican business community has noticed that shipments of perishable products receive a less rigorous Customs inspection than nonperishable goods upon entering the U.S. Thus they are often used to conceal drugs...
...same can be said of attempts at interdiction. For each shipment discovered in such transit countries as Panama, Costa Rica and Honduras, several others coast through. Yet U.S. officials nonetheless believe that if drug dealers feel pressured, they may resort to riskier routes and contacts, making their organizations more vulnerable to penetration...