Donald Trump’s government canceled on Tuesday, April 1, the US Visa to the former president of Costa Rica and the Nobel Peace Prize Óscar Arias, who has been critical of the current head of the White House.
Twice President (1986-1990 and 2006-2010), Arias won the Nobel in 1987 for his active diplomatic work to end civil wars in Central America. In addition, he pioneered the region by breaking ties with Taiwan and establishing diplomatic relations with China, in 2007.
He received an email where he was notified that his visa was canceled, said Miguel Guillén, general secretary of the National Liberation Party (PLN), the social democratic formation to which Arias, 84, belongs.
Guillén indicated that the notification did not mention the reasons for the revocation, but Arias has criticized the migrant deportation policy and Trump’s global trade war, as well as the treatment he gave to the Ukrainian president Volodimir Zelenski.
The former president summoned a press conference on Tuesday afternoon at his home, in San José, to comment on the cancellation of his visa, a sanction that also affected four Costa Rican deputies, according to local media.
Arias is also critical of the current Costa Rican president, Rodrigo Chaves, whom he accuses of receiving orders from Washington.
“We don’t know the background reasons, but we must bear in mind that Don Oscar was the one who established diplomatic relations with China, and we could suspect that it could have to do with this issue,” Guillén pointed out.
Arias is not the first private Central American ex -president of the American visa, although the others affected generally faced corruption processes in their own countries.
The Trump government also canceled the US visas of Costa Rican deputies Francisco Nicolás (PLN), Vanessa Castro (social -Christian) and independent Johanna Obando and Cynthia Córdoba, according to local media.
“High and humiliating”
On February 28, Arias criticized Trump’s behavior on his Facebook page by receiving Zelenski in the White House.
Diplomacy, leisure, respect and calm was absent, and instead deprived the high and humiliating language of President Trump and his vice president JD Vance in front of the television cameras, to be seen by the whole world, he wrote the Nobel Prize.
On February 14, Arias stressed that during his governments Costa Rica maintained an independent foreign policy, without receiving “Washington orders.”
It has never been easy for a small country to disagree with the United States government and, even less, when its president behaves like a Roman emperor, telling the rest of the world what he should do. In my governments, Costa Rica never received orders from Washington, as if we were a banana republic, he said then.
He also said that he has always “believed that the United States is a nation in search of an enemy. Today that enemy is China. Having an alleged enemy has allowed them to feed the arms industry.”
Ties with China
After Arias established ties with China in 2007, four other Central American countries followed their steps: Panama (2017), El Salvador (2018), Nicaragua (2021) and Honduras (2023).
Beijing financed the construction, during the mandate of Arias, of the National Football Stadium in San José, in thanks for establishing relations, and now has a strong economic presence in the region.
In Central America, only Guatemala and Belize maintain relations with Taiwan, considered by Beijing a rebel province, and has threatened to anex the island, even with the use of force.
Donald Trump’s government canceled the US visa on Tuesday to the former president of Costa Rica and Nobel Peace Prize Óscar Arias, who has been critical of the current head of the White House.
Twice President (1986-1990 and 2006-2010), Arias won the Nobel in 1987 for his active diplomatic work to end civil wars in Central America. In addition, he pioneered the region by breaking ties with Taiwan and establishing diplomatic relations with China, in 2007.
He received an email where he was notified that his visa was canceled, said Miguel Guillén, general secretary of the National Liberation Party (PLN), the social democratic formation to which Arias, 84, belongs.
Guillén indicated that the notification did not mention the reasons for the revocation, but Arias has criticized the migrant deportation policy and Trump’s global trade war, as well as the treatment he gave to the Ukrainian president Volodimir Zelenski.
The former president summoned a press conference on Tuesday afternoon at his home, in San José, to comment on the cancellation of his visa, a sanction that also affected four Costa Rican deputies, according to local media.
Arias is also critical of the current Costa Rican president, Rodrigo Chaves, whom he accuses of receiving orders from Washington.
“We don’t know the background reasons, but we must bear in mind that Don Oscar was the one who established diplomatic relations with China, and we could suspect that it could have to do with this issue,” Guillén pointed out.
Arias is not the first private Central American ex -president of the American visa, although the others affected generally faced corruption processes in their own countries.
The Trump government also canceled the US visas of Costa Rican deputies Francisco Nicolás (PLN), Vanessa Castro (social -Christian) and independent Johanna Obando and Cynthia Córdoba, according to local media.
“High and humiliating”
On February 28, Arias criticized Trump’s behavior on his Facebook page by receiving Zelenski in the White House.
Diplomacy, leisure, respect and calm was absent, and instead deprived the high and humiliating language of President Trump and his vice president JD Vance in front of the television cameras, to be seen by the whole world, he wrote the Nobel Prize.
On February 14, Arias stressed that during his governments Costa Rica maintained an independent foreign policy, without receiving “Washington orders.”
It has never been easy for a small country to disagree with the United States government and, even less, when its president behaves like a Roman emperor, telling the rest of the world what he should do. In my governments, Costa Rica never received orders from Washington, as if we were a banana republic, he said then.
He also said that he has always “believed that the United States is a nation in search of an enemy. Today that enemy is China. Having an alleged enemy has allowed them to feed the arms industry.”
Ties with China
After Arias established ties with China in 2007, four other Central American countries followed their steps: Panama (2017), El Salvador (2018), Nicaragua (2021) and Honduras (2023).
Beijing financed the construction, during the mandate of Arias, of the National Football Stadium in San José, in thanks for establishing relations, and now has a strong economic presence in the region.
In Central America, only Guatemala and Belize maintain relations with Taiwan, considered by Beijing a rebel province, and has threatened to anex the island, even with the use of force.