New Drug Control Checkpoint Opens

THE Public Security Ministry will inaugurate a new U.S.-funded drug control checkpoint today at the Peñas Blancas station on the northern border with Nicaragua.

The $1 million station will serve as a “strangulation point,” to help combat the flow of drugs through Costa Rican territory, according to ministry officials.

Paul Chaves, special advisor to the Drug Control Police (PCD), said authorities have made a solid connection between Guatemalan trucks and cocaine trafficking, and that the new center would make it nearly impossible for traffickers to get across the border undetected in large vehicles (TT, April 2).

Even before the opening of the station this year, police seized hundreds of kilograms of cocaine at the Peñas Blancas border crossing.

In the last week of March alone, police seized more than 550 kilograms of cocaine at Peñas Blancas in two separate busts. Both involved Guatemalan trucks.