Ex-President Figueres returns to Costa Rica

Former Costa Rican President José María Figueres arrived Sunday morning in the country he governed from 1994-1998, where he plans to hold a series of meetings, including one with the director of the State of the Nation program, Miguel Gutiérrez Saxe.

A spokesman for the former president, José Manuel Peña, said Figueres arrived at 10:45 a.m. Sunday after a flight from Spain was diverted the previous afternoon to Panama. Figueres, who many analysts believe is launching a run for a second presidential term in 2014, will also meet with former presidential candidate Rolando Araya, from the National Liberation Party, as well as other political groups.

According to Peña, Figueres’s meetings aim to “take the country’s pulse.”