2008 – Page 78

Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 10-12 October, stretches of the Duarte Highway will be closed off to traffic to allow for the installation of a pedestrian overpass. Drivers should avoid the highway on Friday, from 10pm through 6am on Saturday. The Ministry of Public Works will be habilitating one side of the highway for double-sided traffic. …

Read more…

The DR is ranked 98th among 137 countries evaluated for their competitiveness, as part of the World Economic Forum Global Competitiveness Index. The country more or less maintains its position from last year, as while it dropped two points in its ranking, this year three more countries were added. Only Ecuador, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia …

Read more…

Supreme Court president Jorge Subero Isa has ordered an investigation into claims of strong ties between state prosecutors, judges and drug traffickers in La Vega province put forward by La Vega Senator Euclides Sanchez. Sanchez agrees with Peravia senator Wilton Guerrero’s claim of government complicity with drug dealers. Senator Sanchez complained that drug dealers were …

Read more…

In an attempt to motivate citizens to pay their electricity bills, the State-run Electric Companies (CDEEE) admits that energy distributors are resorting to turning off entire power circuits. The CDEEE denies that outages are due to problems in the system. CDEEE vice president Radhames Segura says that only 22 of the country’s 530 circuits were …

Read more…

Tourism Minister Francisco Javier Garcia announced that last week the Council for the Promotion of Tourism Investments (Confotur) approved 24 new hotel and residential tourism developments nationwide. He said this was a RD$3.4 billion investment to build capacity for 14,000 new hotel rooms. He said there has been an injection of fresh funds that were …

Read more…

The president of the National Border Council Radhames Batista has spoken out against the construction of the Cibao-Sur highway that would cut through the Central Cordillera. He said this would affect three protected national parks and 15 river sources. He said that it would have a catastrophic effect on the environment. Radhames Batista says that …

Read more…

Economist Hector Salcedo has told Hoy that the US financial crisis is smaller in proportion than the crisis that affected the Dominican banking sector in 2003. He said that the salvage operation for fraud at Mercantil, Bancredito and Baninter banks represented 18% of the country’s Gross Domestic Product. He said that in the US, the …

Read more…

Newly appointed ambassador to Colombia Angel Lockward has been ordered to pay a RD$500 fine and RD$2 million in compensation for defamation against Judge Alejandro Vargas. Lockward is an erstwhile PRSC political activist who has also held numerous jobs in the governments of former Presidents Joaquin Balaguer, Hipolito Mejia and now, Leonel Fernandez. During former …

Read more…

New York Mets pitcher Ambioris Burgos has been sentenced to three months preventive custody for his alleged role in a hit and run accident in which two women were killed. Burgos’s cousin had originally taken the blame for the accident, saying that Burgos was an accomplice. Burgos then fled and was nowhere to be found …

Read more…

The General Prosecutor’s office has handed over Italian Massimo Dalla Mora to Interpol for deportation to Italy, as reported on the Huchi Lora CDN afternoon radio talk show. The Italian authorities had requested his extradition since he has more than 10 arrest orders and three sentences pending for fulfillment in Italy. After his arrest he …

Read more…