$Unique_ID{COW00981} $Pretitle{290} $Title{Costa Rica Chapter 5C. Foreign Security Assistance} $Subtitle{} $Author{Donald P. Whitaker} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{costa states security united rica assistance facilities military central forces} $Date{1983} $Log{} Country: Costa Rica Book: Costa Rica, A Country Study Author: Donald P. Whitaker Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 1983 Chapter 5C. Foreign Security Assistance Costa Rica has long depended on outsiders to provide what arms and other equipment its security forces have needed. After more than a decade when it had acquired few new weapons beyond some arms received at the time that Costa Rica had been involved in funneling weapons to the Sandinistas in 1978-79, the government sought foreign sources to strengthen the security forces in the early 1980s. Because of the inability of the struggling economy to pay for an arms buildup, the government sought, and for the most part received, military assistance on concessional terms from its foreign partners. The United States has been the source of most of the weapons and equipment in the Costa Rican inventory. Much of this materiel-small arms and light weapons-had been delivered in the years before a 1974 ruling went into effect in the United States prohibiting assistance to foreign police forces. Significant United States military aid was given during World War II under the lend-lease program. Between 1952 and 1968 the United States transferred US$930,000 worth of arms and equipment to Costa Rica under the Military Assistance Program (MAP); the terms did not require reimbursement in dollars. During the 1960s nonlethal equipment and training were also provided by the Office of Public Safety in the United States Agency for International Development, which specialized in training foreign police forces. The United States military was also heavily involved in training Costa Rican security personnel. Between 1952 and 1968 a total of 711 Costa Ricans were sent to the United States for training under the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program. The United States Army School of the Americas at Fort Gulick, Panama, trained Costa Ricans between 1946 and 1968. Military assistance from the United States during this period was administered by a United States Army mission accredited to Costa Rica. In 1968 the United States ceased providing military training and equipment to Costa Rica's police forces. A United States congressional ruling in 1978, however, defined the Civil Guard as having primarily military responsibilities and permitted selective programs to be instituted to improve the security forces. That year the United States Department of Defense was able to guarantee a US$5 million loan to Costa Rica for the purchase of five light patrol boats. North American assistance began to increase in the United States fiscal year (FY-see Glossary) 1981, when 37 students were trained under the IMET program, 20 of them at Fort Gulick. In FY 1982 the United States provided US$2 million in military assistance under MAP and trained 55 Costa Rican guardsmen. The US$3 million in MAP aid given in FY 1983 included US$750,000 for field equipment, such as tents and boots; US$850,000 for improving the country's police communications system; and US$280,000 for repairing one of the damaged Civil Guard helicopters. Other funds were devoted to supplying outboard patrol boats, 52 four-wheel-drive trucks and .30-caliber ammunition. Some 70 guards were also slated to be trained at Fort Gulick in 1983. In August of that year, a nine-man United States training team arrived in the country to teach a group of Civil Guardsmen who had been selected to be instructors. Other United States training teams were scheduled to go to Costa Rica to train other Civil Guard personnel in equipment maintenance and repair. Other countries also provided Costa Rica with security assistance. Panama and Venezuela have been the most prominent, having supported Costa Rica in the late 1970s when Somoza was threatening reprisals for its assistance to the Sandinista rebels. In 1982 and 1983 Venezuela provided the Costa Rican Civil Guardsmen with M-14 rifles and uniforms. Panamanian security aid was more extensive, and the Panamanian National Guard trained over 400 Civil Guardsmen from the Condor and Cobra battalions. On a visit to Costa Rica in 1983, Panamanian National Guard leader General Ruben Dario Paredes offered his country's "unconditional help" to "defend [Costa Rica] from any attack from a neighboring country." More controversially, he stated "with all due respect for the Costa Ricans, the Panamanians consider that the current situation has extended Panama's borders up to the Costa Rican-Nicaraguan borderline." The general later declared that his statement had not been meant to imply that Panamanian troops would be sent into Costa Rican territory. Costa Rica also received security assistance from countries outside the hemisphere in the early 1980s. Israel sent a shipment of Galil rifles as well as a group of experts who instructed Costa Ricans in combating terrorism. The country also received 40 to 50 police patrol cars from the Republic of Korea (South Korea), and the Taiwanese government sent riot gear and uniforms. The Prison System The prison system is composed of 31 so-called central penitentiaries and a number of prisons and detention facilities distributed throughout the country on a broad geographic basis. The central penitentiaries are the principal penal institutions and in 1978 included 2,083 inmates, the majority of the prison population. The Ministry of Justice is charged with the administration and operation of the central penitentiaries; the subordinate facilities are supervised by local authorities. In 1978 over 60 percent of the inmate population of the central penitentiaries was housed in two prisons-La Penitencaria Central and La Reforma Prision, both in the San Jose area. Other major facilities included La San Lucas Prision on an island in the Golfo de Nicoya and the Tierra Blanca juvenile detention facility in Cartago. Except for the central penitentiaries, the prison system is loosely organized and receives little centralized guidance or direction. Few penal statistics are published, and local authorities have a free hand in methods and procedures. There are jails or detention facilities in most communities down to the canton level, and these range from simple enclosures with little security and few amenities to well-constructed prison buildings that provide sound protection and adequate accommodations. The Civil Guard maintains a jail in each of the provincial capitals, and the political chief is responsible for providing confinement facilities at the canton level. The size and character of these facilities are largely determined by the size of the community and the area's crime rate, but few subordinate areas under Rural Assistance Guard jurisdiction have formal facilities that measure up to even the limited standards of the provincial prisons. A provision of the Penal Code requires penal magistrates to visit prisons in their jurisdictional area at least once a week in order to hear complaints and confer with the wardens. Prison facilities were generally regarded as old, lacking proper sanitation, and being in very poor condition. In order to redress these problems, the government in 1978 announced that it would undertake a [C]100 million program of construction and improvements of the central prisons. The Constitution (Article 40) states: "No one shall be submitted to cruel or degrading treatment nor to life imprisonment.... A declaration obtained through violence shall have no value." Despite poor physical facilities, Costa Rican treatment of prisoners in 1983 was regarded as one of the most progressive in the hemisphere. Inmates are classed and treated according to four main categories: maximum security (closed)-the most severe-followed by maximum security (open); two classes of medium security; two classes of minimum security; and limited confidence, whose inmates are permitted to spend one night a week with their families. Those in the widened confidence and complete confidence categories are essentially on probation, but those in the former category must spend Saturday nights in detention. Throughout the course of their sentences, inmates are progressively moved into more lenient categories. As in most Latin American countries, prisoners-except those classed in the maximum security (closed) category-are allowed to receive periodic conjugal visits from their wives. * * * Despite (or perhaps because of) the uniqueness of Costa Rica's "demilitarized" public security forces, few comprehensive studies of these organizations have been published. Among the more informative works are "Demilitarization in Costa Rica: A Farewell to Arms?" by Tord Hoivik and Solvieg Aas and a fairly thorough but dated master's thesis prepared by Jon D. Cozean of George Washington University in 1966, entitled "The Abolition of the Costa Rican Army." Other sources helpful in understanding the disbanding of the former national army include John P. Bell's Crisis in Costa Rica: The 1948 Revolution and Charles Ameringer's Don Pepe: A Political Biography of Jose Figueres of Costa Rica. Periodical literature has provided the most useful information on Costa Rica's security concerns in the 1980s and the structure of the police forces. In addition to the weekly newspapers, La Nacion Internacional and the Tico Times, both published in San Jose, a variety of newsletters supply useful and current news and analysis of security issues. Articles in the London-based newsletter Latin America Weekly Report, the San Jose-based Mesoamerica, and the Central America Report printed in Guatemala City have been particularly helpful. (For further information and complete citations, see Bibliography.)