Óscar Arias

Óscar Arias
Óscar Arias in 2009
President of Costa Rica
In office 8 May 2006 – 8 May 2010
Preceded by	Abel Pacheco
Succeeded by	Laura Chinchilla
In office 8 May 1986 – 8 May 1990
Preceded by	Luis Alberto Monge
Succeeded by	Rafael Ángel Calderón Fournier
Personal details
Born	(1940-09-13) 13 September 1940 Heredia, Costa Rica
Political party	National Liberation Party
Alma mater	Boston University University of Costa Rica London School of Economics University of Essex
Religion	Roman Catholicism

Óscar Arias Sánchez was President of Costa Rica from 2006 to 2010. He previously served as President from 1986 to 1990 and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987 for his efforts to end the Central American crisis.

He is also a recipient of the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism and a trustee of Economists for Peace and Security. In 2003, he was elected to the Board of Directors of the International Criminal Court's Trust Fund for Victims.^[1] He is also currently a member of the Club de Madrid, a nonprofit composed of 81 former leaders of democratic states, that works to strengthen democratic institutions.^[2]

Early life

Raised by an upper class family in the province of Heredia, Arias concluded his secondary schooling at the Saint Francis College in the capital city of San José. He then went to the United States and enrolled in Boston University with the intention of studying medicine, but he soon returned to his home country and completed degrees in law and economics at the University of Costa Rica. In 1967, Arias traveled to the United Kingdom and enrolled in the London School of Economics. He receive a doctoral degree in political science from the University of Essex in 1974. Arias has received over fifty honorary degrees, including doctorates from Harvard University, Princeton University, Dartmouth College, Oberlin College, Wake Forest University, Ithaca College and Washington University in St. Louis.

First presidency

Arias in the 1980s

Arias joined the National Liberation Party (PLN), Costa Rica's main social democratic party. In 1986 he ran successfully for president on that party's ticket. Arias's presidency saw the transformation of Costa Rica's economy from one based on the traditional cash crops (coffee and bananas) to one more focused on non-traditional agriculture (e.g., of exotic flowers and fruits) and tourism. Some within the PLN criticize his administration for abandoning the party's social democratic teachings and promoting a neoliberal economic model. He is now often regarded as a neoliberal although he is a member of a nominally social democratic party.^[3]

Arias received the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize with the help of John Biehl, his peer in England, and Rodrigo Madrigal Nieto for his work towards the signing of the Esquipulas II Accords. This was a plan intended to promote democracy and peace on the Central American isthmus during a time of great turmoil: leftist guerrillas were fighting against the governments in El Salvador and Guatemala, which were backed by the United States under the auspices of the Cold War; the Contras, supported by the United States, were fighting an insurgency against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua; Honduras, only recently wresting political power from its military, was caught in the middle as a base for U.S. military forces; and on Costa Rica's other border, Panama faced the oppression of Manuel Noriega's military dictatorship. With the support of Arias, the various armed conflicts ended within the decade (Guatemala's civil war finally ended in 1996).

Arias then called for a higher level of integration in the Central America region and promoted the creation of the Central American Parliament (Parlamento Centroamericano). During his current administration, Arias has declared that Costa Rica will not enter the Central American Parliament. Arias also modified the country's educational system. The most notable action in this respect was the reintroduction of standardized academic tests at the end of primary and secondary school.

Second presidency

Arias in 2006

The Costa Rican constitution had been amended in 1969 to include a clause which forbade former presidents seeking re-election. Arias challenged this at the Sala IV, the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of Costa Rica, which initially rejected his application in September 2000. In 2003, a group of Arias supporters presented an unconstitutionality challenge against the 1969 constitutional amendment forbidding re-election, and this time the ruling in April 2003 struck down the prohibition against non-consecutive re-election ^[4] This decision was denuncied as a "state blow" or "coup d'état" by ex-president Luis Alberto Monge.^[5][6]

Arias announced in 2004 that he intended to run again for president in the February 2006 general elections. Though for years private polling companies and several news media published polls predicting Arias would win by a wide margin, the election was initially deemed too close to call. A month later, on 7 March, after a manual recount, the official results showed Arias beat center-left contender Ottón Solís by 18,169 votes (1.2% of valid votes cast). He took the oath of office at noon on 8 May 2006 at the National Stadium. In his speech on 15 September 2008, he admitted that he was tired because of the criticism of his opponents.

On 1 June 2007, he switched Costa Rica's diplomatic recognition from the Republic of China (Taiwan) to the People's Republic of China, making Costa Rica the 167th nation in the world to do so. Subsequently, under diplomatic and financial pressure from Beijing, he induced the Dalai Lama, a fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate, to postpone indefinitely a proposed and much anticipated visit during Beijing's suppression of controversial riots in Tibet.

At the 5th Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, on 18 April 2009, Arias gave a speech on the topic "We've been doing something wrong". Directed at fellow Latin American leaders, he decried Latin America's lack of development compared to other parts of the world, calling for pragmatism, and more resources directed at education rather than militaries.^[7]

Mediator in 2009 Honduran Constitutional Crisis

In 2009, the Supreme Court of Honduras issued an arrest warrant on Manuel Zelaya because of violations of the constitution and laws.^[8][9] Two days later, the National Congress of Honduras (in which Zelaya's own party held 62 out of 128 seats, more than any other party), also voted to dismiss Zelaya.^[10][11][12] Zelaya was sent to Costa Rica. The Honduran constitution mandated that the head of Congress, Roberto Micheletti, who was next in the Presidential line of succession, becomes the provisional head of state since Vice President Elvin Ernesto Santos had resigned in December 2008 to run for President. Micheletti’s term ended 27 January 2010.^[13]

Arias began serving as mediator between Manuel Zelaya and Roberto Micheletti in the 2009 Honduran constitutional crisis. Representatives of the two Hondurans met with Arias on various occasions but so far have failed to reach any kind of agreement. As described above (with factual citations), Arias himself was initially prohibited by Costa Rica's constitutional court from another term, due to constitutional term limits, but this was reversed using legal means, with the consent of the Costa Rican Sala IV court, unlike in Honduras. New elections in Honduras are planned for 29 November 2009. Micheletti's government stated on 2 July 2009 that it is willing to hold this year's presidential election early. Costa Rican President, Oscar Arias, presented a seven-point agreement, which calls for the return of Zelaya as President – a condition deemed unacceptable to the interim government. Zelaya's representatives accepted the Arias proposal "in principle" but Micheletti's representatives balked at the key point of Zelaya returning to power in Honduras.^[14]

Health

In August 2007, Arias was affected by tendinitis, and in April 2008 he canceled some activities because of muscular pain in his lumbar region. Subsequently, due to increasing difficulty in speaking over the course of several weeks, Arias went to the Philadelphia Ears, Nose and Throat Associates medical center in the United States on 20 May 2008, where it was determined that he had a nonmalignant cyst on his vocal cords. As a result, it was announced on 21 May that doctors advised him not to speak for one month, saying that if this did not help, surgery would be considered.^[15] On 11 August 2009 Arias was diagnosed with H1N1 Influenza, but he recovered.^[16]

Controversy

Some Oscar Arias acts have generated controversy:

• In 2006, in response to a candidate (Ottón Solís) who challenged him to a debate, Oscar Arias said: “Eagles live on high and see from on high, and don’t bother to watch what the snails are doing”, referring himself as an eagle and the other candidates as “snails”.^[17]
• In 2010, during the closing weeks of his second term, he inaugurated various unachieved projects with ribbon-cutting and bronze plaque ceremonies:
  • The new National Stadium, despite the fact that it was only about 75% finished.^[18]
  • The "new presidential offices" despite the fact that these offices do not exist yet. In fact, the land is still for sale and the Legislative Assembly has allocated no funds yet in order to buy it, let alone build anything on the vacant lot.^[19]
  • The new Juan Santamaría International Airport installation, despite the fact the project was only 82% completed.^[20]

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Óscar Arias Sánchez.

• Interview in Guernica magazine
• Official biography at the Wayback Machine (archived March 19, 2009) (Spanish)
• Ubben Lecture at DePauw University; December 8, 2010 (includes audio/video)
• English translation of the "Algo hicimos mal" speech
• U.S.: Arias Government Knew How The Constitutional Court Would Vote On The TLC/WikiLeaks On Costa Rica: Translated From La Nación
• Accomplishments of Oscar Arias Sanchez

v t e Presidents and heads of state of Costa Rica Juan Mora Fernández Gallegos Carrillo Joaquín Mora Aguilar Carrillo Morazán Pinto Alfaro Oreamuno Gallegos Alfaro Castro Miguel Mora Juan Mora Porras Montealegre Jiménez Zamora Castro Jiménez Zamora Carranza Guardia Esquivel Sáenz Herrera Guardia Lizano Fernández Soto Rodríguez Zeledón Yglesias Esquivel Ibarra González Víquez Jiménez Oreamuno González Flores Tinoco Quirós Aguilar Acosta Jiménez Oreamuno González Víquez Jiménez Oreamuno Cortés Calderón Guardia Picado Figueres Ferrer Ulate Figueres Ferrer Echandi Orlich Trejos Figueres Ferrer Oduber Carazo Monge Arias Calderón Fournier Figueres Olsen Rodríguez Echeverría Pacheco Arias Chinchilla

v t e Laureates of the Nobel Peace Prize 1901–1925 1901 Henry Dunant / Frédéric Passy 1902 Élie Ducommun / Charles Gobat 1903 Randal Cremer 1904 Institut de Droit International 1905 Bertha von Suttner 1906 Theodore Roosevelt 1907 Ernesto Moneta / Louis Renault 1908 Klas Arnoldson / Fredrik Bajer 1909 A. M. F. Beernaert / Paul Estournelles de Constant 1910 International Peace Bureau 1911 Tobias Asser / Alfred Fried 1912 Elihu Root 1913 Henri La Fontaine 1914 1915 1916 1917 International Committee of the Red Cross 1918 1919 Woodrow Wilson 1920 Léon Bourgeois 1921 Hjalmar Branting / Christian Lange 1922 Fridtjof Nansen 1923 1924 1925 Austen Chamberlain / Charles Dawes 1926–1950 1926 Aristide Briand / Gustav Stresemann 1927 Ferdinand Buisson / Ludwig Quidde 1928 1929 Frank B. Kellogg 1930 Nathan Söderblom 1931 Jane Addams / Nicholas Butler 1932 1933 Norman Angell 1934 Arthur Henderson 1935 Carl von Ossietzky 1936 Carlos Saavedra Lamas 1937 Robert Cecil 1938 Nansen International Office for Refugees 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 International Committee of the Red Cross 1945 Cordell Hull 1946 Emily Balch / John Mott 1947 Friends Service Council / American Friends Service Committee 1948 1949 John Boyd Orr 1950 Ralph Bunche 1951–1975 1951 Léon Jouhaux 1952 Albert Schweitzer 1953 George Marshall 1954 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1955 1956 1957 Lester B. Pearson 1958 Georges Pire 1959 Philip Noel-Baker 1960 Albert Lutuli 1961 Dag Hammarskjöld 1962 Linus Pauling 1963 International Committee of the Red Cross / League of Red Cross Societies 1964 Martin Luther King, Jr. 1965 UNICEF 1966 1967 1968 René Cassin 1969 International Labour Organization 1970 Norman Borlaug 1971 Willy Brandt 1972 1973 Le Duc Tho (declined award) / Henry Kissinger 1974 Seán MacBride / Eisaku Satō 1975 Andrei Sakharov 1976–2000 1976 Betty Williams / Mairead Corrigan 1977 Amnesty International 1978 Anwar Sadat / Menachem Begin 1979 Mother Teresa 1980 Adolfo Pérez Esquivel 1981 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1982 Alva Myrdal / Alfonso García Robles 1983 Lech Wałęsa 1984 Desmond Tutu 1985 International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War 1986 Elie Wiesel 1987 Óscar Arias 1988 UN Peacekeeping Forces 1989 Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama) 1990 Mikhail Gorbachev 1991 Aung San Suu Kyi 1992 Rigoberta Menchú 1993 Nelson Mandela / F. W. de Klerk 1994 Shimon Peres / Yitzhak Rabin / Yasser Arafat 1995 Pugwash Conferences / Joseph Rotblat 1996 Carlos Belo / José Ramos-Horta 1997 International Campaign to Ban Landmines / Jody Williams 1998 John Hume / David Trimble 1999 Médecins Sans Frontières 2000 Kim Dae-jung 2001–present 2001 Kofi Annan / United Nations 2002 Jimmy Carter 2003 Shirin Ebadi 2004 Wangari Maathai 2005 International Atomic Energy Agency / Mohamed ElBaradei 2006 Grameen Bank / Muhammad Yunus 2007 Al Gore / Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2008 Martti Ahtisaari 2009 Barack Obama 2010 Liu Xiaobo 2011 Ellen Johnson Sirleaf / Leymah Gbowee / Tawakkol Karman 2012 European Union 2013 Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons