FROM protests against the mere principle of a Hollywood adaptation of the final hours of the life of Jesus Christ to securing the approval of the Catholic Church, perhaps no movie has been more shrouded in controversy than Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ.”

The movie premiered in Costa Rica last Thursday to a packed theater of more than 500 viewers – including President Abel Pacheco and Archbishop of San José Hugo Barrantes – at Cine Magaly in San José.

The film, directed by Gibson, is not the first to take on the story of Christ, however, it is perhaps the first to make such an effort to strive for meticulous accuracy. With a majority of dialogue coming verbatim from the Bible, the entire picture is filmed in Aramaic, Latin and Hebrew.

Depicting the last 12 hours of Christ’s life, the film portrays the betrayal, torture and crucifixion of the man believed by Christians to be the Son of God. Beginning on Holy Thursday (the night of the last supper), the film chronicles those final hours in a linear narrative, using occasional flashbacks to bring in key scenes of Christ’s life, including the last supper, his preaching to followers and Palm Sunday.

BEFORE the screening, Barrantes said the message of the film has great importance.

“In this age of terrorism and violence Christ brings us the solution to all problems,” he said. “This message (of Christ’s life) is very pertinent in today’s society, ‘that it is with love that we can create a better world.’”

After the screening (close to 11 p.m.), a panel of four priests along with the Archbishop, convened to reflect on the film briefly and field questions from the audience.

The panel agreed that the historical and biblical accuracy of the film was faithful to the story of Christ’s last days as described in the Bible.

Those extremely familiar with the story will notice scenes have been added, including several interactions between Jesus and his mother that illustrate their strong bond. There are also scenes in which Satan is directly present as a representation of temptation and evil. The clerics said these scenes help fill in areas of the story where details are absent in the Bible. Of these additions, the majority are based upon Biblical passages.

THE panel addressed one of the primary controversies surrounding the film – its portrayal of the Jewish people, which has been interpreted by some within the Jewish community as anti-Semitic.

“The only thing I ask is that we do not take the ‘The Passion of the Christ’ as being anti-Semitic,” said Father Randall Soto. “The Jews that condemned Christ were few, not all, and in no moment is it said that those few represented all of Israel.”

When asked later about his feelings on the film, Rabbi Isaac Gustavo Azar said he felt the film was biased, anti-Semetic and did not present the truth.

“In my opinion, the picture is very bad,” Azar said. “It’s very bloody and it only gives a partial view of the last 12 hours of Christ’s life.”

“The visual is very strong against the Jewish people,” he continued. “The idea should be about the truth and show all sides, but this film doesn’t.”

AZAR described direct scenes from the film that he says are contradictory to the truth, including the idea that Jewish leaders would have the power to demand Pontius Pilot punish Christ and that crucifixion was not a part of Jewish law.

During the panel, Father Hugo Munguia spoke about the power of the film, saying several scenes should be recognized for the emotion they provoke and messages they convey.

He cited among these moments Jesus’ second fall, a scene not directly from the Bible, where Jesus says to Mary, “See, I make all things new.” The combination of the love and pain shown in that interaction make it incredibly moving, he said.

Munguia also noted the resurrection of Christ, which is subtly done, a scene just before the film’s end in which an anguished Satan cries out from hell because the prophecy has been fulfilled, and a scene depicting the destruction of evil.

The brutal violence in the film has also been a topic of discussion. Scenes vividly depict torture, including the beating of Christ by temple and Roman soldiers, the tearing of Christ’s flesh when being flogged by a cat-o’-nine tails and graphic imagery of the nailing of Christ’s hands and feet to the cross. The panel addressed this, noting that was how punishment was given out in that time and while violent and disturbing, it is not something created by Hollywood.

Following the discussion, the floor was opened to questions, however the crowd was relatively silent with only one question being posed regarding historical accuracy.

WHILE viewers may not have had many questions for the panel, amongst the murmur of those leaving the theater it seemed the film moved a majority of the audience. Several theater-goers said the film was extremely well done.

“It showed how it really was,” said Adriana Rivero of the film. While admitting that it was graphic, she echoed the panel, saying “It’s known history that this was how the Romans exercised the law. It’s not something that the directors or the producers or anyone else invented.”

Ana Hidalgo also praised the film, saying it was moving and powerful – exposing the audience to a reality they have never seen in movies before.

“People are not used to a film like this, because no movie has ever shown something like this so accurately,” she said. “At parts we almost can’t deal with the suffering of Christ because it is so great. We have never seen anything so real until now.”

Santiago Velez said people should be aware it is a very intense film before viewing.

“There are many things you have to understand, as some scenes and images are very strong,” he said.

The Passion of the Christ opens today. See The Tico Times movie listings for times and theaters.

CARATE— Macaws, macaws, macaws! The raucous birds are such a constant fixture at Lookout Inn in the OsaPeninsula in the Southern Zone, that gregarious owner Terry Conroy confidently tells guests “If you don’t see a scarlet macaw while you’re here, your lodging is free.”

The inn is perched on a hill that climbs up from the beach at Carate, with three stories of viewing decks. There’s plenty of room for nature photographers to set up a tripod and capture the scarlet, yellow and blue lapas streaking past in pairs, performing aerial ballets and congregating in the almond trees bordering the beach, where Terry says he once counted more than 120 scarlet macaws.

Boisterous birds aside, there are plenty of other reasons to visit this comfortable beachfront hotel at the end of the road that leads from Puerto Jiménez to the Carate airstrip. An hour or so on foot along the beach brings you to the La Leona entrance to CorcovadoNational Park. If trudging doesn’t appeal to you, you can also charter an air taxi to fly into Sirena Station from Carate.

Closer to the inn, there’s endless beach to comb, wild waves to bodysurf and a calm lagoon to canoe. The National Save the Sea Turtle Foundation also has a thriving hatchery project on the beach.

IF you are an habitué of the stair climber at the gym, you have come to the right place. Terry is an indefatigable builder of stairs. Sixty-four wooden stairs lead up to the inn from the beach, through a kaleidoscopic garden bursting with bougainvillea, gingers, crotons, hibiscus and volcano flowers.

At the bottom of the stairs is a cool, blue, very deep plunge pool filled with refreshing water channeled down from the mountain. Comfortable lounging chairs await on the deck, and there’s a thatched-roof hammock house nearby. On the climb up the tree-shaded stairs, you pass a frog pond, home in season to the red-eyed tree frog that is the inn’s logo and mascot. Just 14 steps short of the inn, you pass a side path to a secluded fresh-water soaking tub, where you can cool off in privacy amid flowers, chirping honeycreepers and the soothing sound of water trickling on down to the frog pond.

Onward and upward, you reach the first level of the inn, where there is a huge sunny terrace with a view that makes the climb worthwhile: the green Osa coastline undulating its way north to Punta Salsipuedes, and blue Pacific as far as the eye can see.

Large green umbrellas shade wooden tables where the breakfast buffet is served.

The inn’s three luxurious rooms are tucked at the back of the terrace behind a green screen of tropical plants.

A sign at the bottom of the next set of stairs advises “This is a barefoot inn,” so shoes are doffed before you climb the 12 steps to the covered deck of polished wood where you’ll find the bar, open kitchen, hammocks and comfortable chairs. Very popular with local expatriates and Corcovado guides, the bar really hops some nights, with ad hoc guitar sessions and storytelling. Katya Bellanero, Terry’s gracious wife, mixes a mean Margarita.

Continuing the climb, you ascend a 12-step spiral staircase to the top deck, where lunch is usually served. The breeze never fails to cool, nor the panoramic view to impress here, especially at sunset.

IF you are a really avid stair climber, the fun is only beginning. Terry has just finished building his “Stairway to Heaven,” 217 steps that lead up, up to a ridge trail that passes through primary forest to a waterfall.

The 2-km loop trail hooks up with

, a scenic dirt road that is an earlymorning birder’s paradise.

If climbing stairs is not your idea of a good time, you can drive your car up the steep, concrete driveway straight to the inn and never climb more than the stairs between the three decks. Along with the view, there’s plenty to enjoy at the inn without getting your heart rate up.

Terry, originally from Santa Fe, has a quirky sense of style – and humor. There’s a decorative surprise in every corner of the inn. The winding, wood rail of the spiral staircase ends in a carved serpent’s head. A driftwood log in the lounge is populated with sculpted frogs; ceramic iguanas burst out of vases; a shaggy Indonesian mask greets you in the rest room; the inn’s deck railing is an artistic latticework of twigs.

THE three rooms in the inn are bright, white and spacious, with large arching windows and handsome, carved-wood doors.

Colorful murals feature fish, monkeys and birds. Beds have tree-trunk frames, and the large, tiled bathrooms have hanging plants and plenty of solar-heated hot water (Carate is off the electrical grid).

Hidden in the garden are two very private cabins, with screened windows, good crossventilation and solar-powered fans. Reading lamps over the beds are welcome, and hanging lanterns with candles create a romantic mood for non-readers. Bathrooms have pebbled floors and smooth stones to sit on under hotwater showers. Arare and wonderful amenity is a two-sided hanging closet that allows you to completely unpack and keep your clothes wrinkle-free. Large verandahs come with hammocks and comfortable cane chairs.

Food at the inn is plentiful and imaginative, with fresh fish, fruit and vegetables, sometimes spiced with Asian flavorings. When the excellent cook is off for the day –his cheesy drop scones are not to be missed –Terry takes over, cooking up, say, mahimahi fillets sautéed in a spicy coating, accompanied by broccoli in sesame oil with almonds and a salad of interesting mixed greens harvested from a neighbor’s garden. Katya contributes the sweet endings: homemade cheesecakes, cookies and cakes.

From top to bottom, all 305 steps of the way, Lookout Inn is a stairway to both earthly and heavenly delights.

Lookout Inn (tel/fax 735-5431, www.Lookout-inn.com) is in the OsaPeninsula, on the beach at Carate, 300 meters east of the landing strip. High-season double-occupancy rates, including all meals and taxes, are: $99 per person in the inn, $109 per person in the garden cabins. For information on the turtle project, visit www.savetheseaturtle. org

GETTING THERE

By Plane: SANSA (221-9414) and NatureAir (220-3054) fly regularly to Puerto Jiménez. Air taxis from there will take you to the Carate airstrip.

By Car: Turn south off Inter-American Highway at Chacarita, drive about 40 km to Rincón on paved but bumpy road, then south along gravel road roughly 35 km to Puerto Jiménez. From there, drive 1/12 hours towards Carate. About nine hours.

THE opposition Sandinista National Liberation Front appears to have scored the first point in the political ping-pong match over former President Arnoldo Alemán’s jail terms, following the former President’s dramatic March 19 midnight transfer to La Modelo prison in Tipitapa, east of Managua.

As government leaders and politicians scratched their heads over last week’s contradictory resolutions from Managua’s Appeals Court regarding Alemán’s transfer from house arrest to jail (TT, March 19), criminal judge Juana Méndez ordered and carried out the former President’s arrest that same night on separate charges related to Alemán’s alleged siphoning off of $1.3 million of state funds from the Channel 6 television station.

Alemán, whose personal fortune is estimated at $250 million, is already serving a 20-year sentence on a separate fraud and money-laundering conviction. The Channel 6 case has been pending since March 2002.

ALEMÁN was arrested at his private compound known as El Chile, outside Managua, where because of health considerations he had been allowed by Judge Méndez to serve out his sentence.

The former President’s family, including his wife Maria Fernanda Flores, and one of his daughters, congresswoman María Auxiliadora Alemán, attempted to impede the police’s entrance into the house by blocking the door and punching police officers.

In a spectacle broadcast live on TV, the frantic women warned the police and judges they would seek revenge once they came back to power.

After the family members were peeled away, police barged through the front door and moments later came out escorting Alemán, who walked out smiling and raising his fists in the air like a prize fighter being led to the ring.

THE former President was placed in the back of a sports utility vehicle and taken in a police caravan to Tipitapa. Several hundred Alemán sympathizers poured out onto the dark streets and threw rocks and burning tires onto the roads in Managua, attempting to stop the caravan.

Riot police opened fire on the protestors with rubber bullets, one of which hit a photographer from the daily newspaper Hoy.

The photographer suffered a massive welt on his right shoulder, but was otherwise okay.

The protests continued Saturday as several dozen arnoldistas protested in front of the party headquarters of Alemán’s ruling Liberal Constitutional Party, breaking bottles in the street and lighting more tires on fire. By Tuesday, the protests had simmered.

ALTHOUGH a public opinion poll published this week in the daily La Prensa suggests most Nicaraguans believe Alemán is guilty and should serve his sentence in jail, many were quick to condemn the midnight arrest and blast it as politically authored revenge by Sandinista party boss Daniel Ortega, seen by some as the power behind the gavel of Sandinista judge Méndez.

The Catholic Church condemned the way the arrest occurred, and President Enrique Bolaños, who was on a diplomatic visit to Sweden at the time, denounced the action as reminiscent of the midnight purges during the years of the Sandinista government in the 1980s.

CURBSIDE vendors in San José are vowing to do everything in their power to overturn a recent decision by city officials aimed at ousting them from the sidewalks along several of the capital city’s main streets.

“We’ll fight!” vowed Cecilia Tercero, 42, a fresh fruit vendor working on Ave. 6, near Calle 4, in the central district of La Merced. “The livelihoods of 400 families depend on this. We’re working here. What we want to do is work without problems. We’re hardworking, honest people.”

Last week, the Municipal Council of San José voted to give informal street vendors three months to clear away all chinamos (street stands) in the Zona de Tregua (Zone of Truce) – an area spanning Ave. 1 from the Central Market to the Coca Cola bus stops, Calle 8 from Ave. 2 to Ave. 8, small sections of Ave. 4 and Ave. 6 and one block on Calle 13.

These areas were given that name in 1996 after city officials agreed to temporarily allow informal vendors to operate there.

According to the new decision, after the three months are up, police will be ordered to forcefully shut down all chinamos that remain open.

“WE consider it a reasonable length of time for them to individually or collectively come up with a strategy to relocate,” said San José Mayor Johnny Araya during a press conference March 17.

He accused the vendors of spreading “chaos and anarchy” in San José, and said they were responsible for “strangulating the sidewalks by leaving no room for pedestrians and forcing them onto the streets, creating conditions favorable to criminal actions and the sale of drugs, producing large amounts of garbage, giving San José a dirty image and polluting its scenery.”

Municipal authorities claim the 1996 agreement gives them the right to unilaterally revoke the concession when they see fit. Council members, who represent four different political affiliations, voted unanimously to impose the ban.

According to a survey conducted by the Metropolitan Police, approximately 440 informal street vendors are operating in these areas. That number does not include the permanent street vendors in those areas who have operating permits from the Municipality.

The decision to expel the informal curbside vendors is part of the municipal government’s plan to “reactivate, regenerate and repopulate” San José by transforming it into a place for residents and tourists to visit and shop.

ARAYA said the vendors obstruct access to formal commercial establishments, making it difficult for the latter to conduct business. This, he said, works against urban renewal in San José.

“What this does is make formal businesses – commerce, restaurants and hotels – leave the city,” he said.

The mayor pointed to a survey of city residents, conducted by the San JoséMunicipality Nov. 4-8, 2003, as proof the measure has popular support.

Out of a sample of 429 josefinos, 62% said they agreed the Municipality should “completely shut down” all informal street vendors. Another 19.8% said the situation with the vendors should be left as is, while 12.1% said the vendors should be relocated.

When asked if the municipality should use “extreme measures such as expelling illegal street vendors,” 58.7% said yes, and 38.5% said no.

“I applaud Don Johnny’s actions,” said Marta Mora, a resident of La Merced. “I, like many Costa Ricans, don’t own a car and have to use the sidewalks to get to work each morning. The vendors force pedestrians onto the streets.”

Mora called the vendors “vagabonds” and said they should “go to the country to pick coffee and cut sugarcane.”

VENDORS insist the chinamos are their only way of making a living and they will fight to ensure their livelihood.

The Costa Rican Association of Street Vendors last week announced it would file a complaint before the Inter-American Human Rights Commission. The group also plans to file an injunction before the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court (Sala IV), according to the daily La Nación.

“Every Costa Rican has the right to work – period!” said Fernando Hierro, 46, a vegetable vendor. “That’s what the Constitution says. They [municipal officials] don’t own the sidewalks. The sidewalks belong to all Costa Ricans.”

Hierro says a compromise between the vendors and the municipality is possible. However, the municipality must be willing to negotiate, he said.

VEGETABLE vendor Liliana Dixson, 39, said the municipality has refused to listen to vendors.

“I depend on this job,” she told The Tico Times on Tuesday. “I haven’t taken any courses so I can’t go look for a job in an office. Now, even to sweep streets they require a high-school degree.

“We’re asking the mayor to think this through,” she explained. “He has his family, he lives well. He’s not poor like us. He doesn’t have to be here day after day, under the sun and the rain, even when he’s sick. At the very least he needs to relocate us.”

Araya said the municipality will not assist vendors in relocating to other parts of the city, since previous efforts to do that in the 1970s and 1990s had a high cost and were unsuccessful because vendors kept returning to the areas where they had been removed.

STILL, Dixson feels her right to earn a decent living is being trampled by municipal officials.

“As a vendor of Ave. 6, I feel the municipality needs to let us work,” she said. “This is what our families depend on. I have three children that go to school.

“One of them is a 10-year-old girl with a small tumor in her head that needs treatment,” she explained. I sell vegetables and make the money I use to buy her medication. It’s hard to be told you can’t work. We’re all depressed, very sad. We will fight because we depend on this.”

As the battle to protect Costa Rica’s national parks continues, Environment and Energy Minister Carlos Manuel Rodríguez this week said the Environment Ministry is considering emergency measures to combat the problem on a national level.

Such measures might include requiring tourism businesses that profit from the parks to make financial contributions toward their maintenance, he said.

We are in a state of emergency,” Rodríguez told The Tico Times. “Many people who should contribute to the park do not contribute, starting with the state – the government.”

Rodríguez said the problems facing the parks are “very, very serious.”

Unless the Environment and Energy Ministry (MINAE) can come up with additional funding, he warned, several parks may have to close as early as June – a move that could devastate nearby businesses who tout the protected areas and their wildlife as a main attraction.

IT is those business owners, Rodríguez said, who keep them open.

“The operation of national parks should be a complimentary effort between the state and the private sector: the state behind basic operation, and the private sector should pay for the environmental services that the national parks provide,” he said.

Rodríguez said “environmental services” include use of scenic beauty and  biodiversity for profit, as well as consumption of water coming from sources inside the national parks.

He said that if the ministry receives approval via executive decree, he could start applying measures to charge businesses for those services sometime this year.

THE lack of government funding, according to the minister, stems from a history of relying on international funds to operate the parks. He said that since the parks stabilized in the early 1990s, most international funding was diverted to protect areas in the Amazon region, Africa, or Asia.

The main thing lacking to operate the parks effectively, the top environmental official said, is more rangers to patrol the parks and prevent poaching.

The poaching problem in CorcovadoNational Park, for example, has become so critical that Central American jaguars and white-lipped peccaries could disappear from the park this year, according to scientists (TT, March 19).

PARKS nationwide face poaching problems, but Rodríguez said the situation in Corcovado has received special attention because of the number of scientists and activists involved in stopping the illegal hunting there.

He said the country’s national park system has 100 fewer employees than it did a decade ago.

The minister will make a presentation before President Abel Pacheco sometime this month outlining what is needed to keep the parks open, and said MINAE may seek a declaration of a state of environmental emergency.

Alvaro Ugalde, director of the Osa Conservation Area, which includes Corcovado, and one of the men who designed Costa Rica’s national park system 34 years ago, drafted an emergency decree and sent it to Rodríguez last week.

UGALDE said he completely agreed with the minister. He said it saddens him to see understaffed and overworked rangers “cleaning bathrooms instead of protecting the forest.”

Ugalde, named in 1999 as one of Time magazine’s Latin American Leaders of the Century, said closing the parks would send a message to tourism business owners:

“Chip in if you want to keep this thing.” “I was so sure, 10 or 15 years ago, that  we only needed time to see the parks producing money, and then the army of protectors would be huge,” Ugalde told The Tico Times. “The army of moneymakers is huge, but the defenders of the parks are very small.”

Some business owners do contribute to the parks. The owners of Bosque del Cabo resort on the OsaPeninsula, for example, provided enough funding to pay one park guard’s salary for a full year. Another business in the area, Lapa Ríos, did the same.

DAVE Thomas, owner of the Turtle Beach Lodge in Tortuguero, on the northern Caribbean coast of Costa Rica, said he occasionally provides food for park guards and allows them to use his hotel as a base camp for patrols. He also sends the hotel’s security guard on patrols, he said.

“I’m very much worried about conservation, and not because I’m a tree hugger or anything like that,” said Thomas, who owns the only hotel inside the limits of TortugueroNational Park. “If my product disappears, I’m out of business… Without the turtles, I’m dead.”

Thomas called the idea of closing the parks “ridiculous” and said it would devastate the local economy. He said national parks have ample opportunity to make money. For example, he said, they could require tour guides, who charge about $10 per person per tour, to pay a small commission to the park for each of their customers, in addition to the regular park entrance fee.

ACCORDING to MINAE officials, revenue brought in by the parks is absorbed by the national budget, and rarely makes its way back in the form of park guard salaries or other much-needed funding.

The bottom line, according to various experts, is that if more money doesn’t make it back to the parks, what is now touted as the country’s main attraction may no longer be a viable source of revenue for the nation.

“People get so caught up in tourism they forget what tourists come to see. They don’t come to see our cathedrals,” Ugalde said, and then paused. “Well, they do – our green cathedrals.”

Dear Tico Times:

As many enlightened people know, in all the world the mono titi (squirrel monkey) exists only in Manuel Antonio, in Costa Rica’s central Pacific coast, and is threatened with extinction.

One of the surest ways to speed extinction is for humans to give these monkeys food, upsetting their natural diet of insects, fruits, nectar, bird eggs, lizards and bats.

Manuel Antonio’s resounding motto is “do not feed the monkeys!”

Yet an unknown number of Manuel Antonio hotels and restaurants have installed and maintain artificial feeders to lure the monkeys as a “service” to their customers. While sitting at these hotels and restaurants, tourists are “guaranteed” the pleasure of seeing monkeys come to feed, enhancing the tourist experience.

However, this causes a change in the animals’ natural behavior and exposes both the animals and people to contagious diseases.

The practice of using artificial feeders is ethically criminal.

These hotels and restaurants should be identified and a cross-and-bones flag hoisted on each, to warn off ethical tourists. Spotting monkeys in these places is nothing more than a trained monkey hurdy-gurdy-type of experience.

RICHARD FROST

Quepos

THE Central America Water Tribunal, which held hearings in San José last week to pass ethical judgments on nine water-related cases throughout the region, announced its verdicts late last Friday.

In two of the nine cases, the court did not rule in favor of the parties who brought forth the complaint.

In one Costa Rican case, in which Caribbean-slope residents claimed fumigation of banana plantations had contaminated vegetation and water sources, the court sided with the defendant, the Standard Fruit Company.

The water tribunal said it rejected the complaint “because no existent relationship between Standard Fruit Co. and the Finca Carrandí has been demonstrated. The tribunal recognizes the efforts of the banana industry to minimize impact on the environment,” according to a statement from the tribunal.

THE complaint had been filed by Oscar Iván Pérez, a resident of Larga Distancia (about 20 kilometers west of the Caribbean port town of Limón), and by Marco Machore, a member of the Committee for Vigilance of Natural Resources of Costa Rica’s Environment and Energy Ministry (MINAE), according to the tribunal.

Consulted by members of the tribunal during the public hearing last week, the two men “could not present concrete cases of persons affected by the chemicals, nor the precise nature of the products being used,” according to the tribunal.

Although representatives of Standard Fruit Co. did not attend the hearing, they presented a detailed report of the products they use to fumigate bananas in the area and the procedures they use to prevent environmental damage.

IN the case of the El Chaparral Hydroelectric Dam Project in El Salvador, the nine-member panel opted to abstain from a verdict until the results of an environmental impact study surrounding the project is made available, according to the same statement.

If carried out, the project could displace as many as 21,000 people, mostly agricultural workers (TT, March 19).

In the other Costa Rican case brought before the tribunal, involving extraction of water from an aquifer in Guanacaste for use by hotels, the panel ruled government officials were responsible for ensuring no wateruse concession be granted until a more thorough study of the aquifers in the area can be completed and their capacity more adequately determined, according to documents released by the tribunal.

THE tribunal also demanded that the Panamanian government cease transportation of all nuclear waste across the Panama Canal.

Raúl Escoffery of the Panamanian Human Rights Committee, in San José for the tribunal, said the government has yet to conduct studies pertaining to environmental and security risks associated with the shipments.

He also said a simple accident could be devastating if a ship were carrying nuclear waste, potentially resulting in more than 100,000 deaths in the region.

During the 2003 fiscal year, the Panama Canal Authority reported 12 maritime accidents from a total of 13,154 transits (TT, March 19).

In the remaining five cases, the court asked government officials and businesses to take more drastic steps to prevent misuse and contamination of hydrological resources throughout Central America.

The court’s decisions are only ethical recommendations and are not legally binding.