President Mocoso put Panama's National Police on a special state of heightened alert after Colombia's government and FARC rebels ended their peace talks and intensified their fighting. Colombia's President Andrés Pastrana declared an end to the talks and sent troops into the former demilitarized zone after FARC hijacked a plane that was carrying one of the government's peace commissioners. Colombia's military and right wing AUC paramilitary forces control the northern part of the Colombian side of the frontier, opposite Kuna Yala, while the leftist FARC guerrillas are dominant along the southern two-thirds of the boundary, opposite the Darien. At least 500 and probably more than 1,000 Colombians have fled across the border to get away from fighting or escape reprisals by one armed faction or another, and a new influx is expected.

First Sergeant Arquimedes Martínez became the first Panamanian police officer to fall in the line of duty this year, when he died on February 20 of gunshot wounds he had received on January 28 while trying to apprehend an escapee from La Joya Penitentiary.

The Electoral Tribunal, whose magistrates and prosecutor are drawn from the nation's political parties, have suspended the Panama's independent elected official with the largest constituency. Brenda De Icaza, the mayor of La Chorrera, beat the PRD, Arnulfistas and all the minor parties in a 1999 upset and has had trouble with the partisan city council ever since. When Icaza took over as mayor the former assistant manager of the city slaughterhouse, David Toppin, sought to get his job back after havin taken a leave of absence to run for alternate legislator. The mayor didn't give Toppin his job back, arguing that the city did not have the money to maintain the position. That led to charges that De Icaza violated the immunity from firing that Panama's election laws give to political candidates. The tribunal set a May 13 trial date and removed the mayor from office pending their decision, which would come sometime after a trial. The mayor, who presides over a cash strapped city, has repeatedly fought with the representantes over municipal spending, which she has tried to cut. De Icaza's suspension has prompted protests by many of the country' other mayors.

On February 21 police moved in to evict some 60 families from the wooden slums in Rio Abajo known as Boca Town, and in the course of the eviction three buildings burned down while the riot squad kept the residents at bay. Some of the displaced people say that the police set the fire, either intentionally or as a consequence of one of the tear gas grenades they fired into the premises. The police issued a statement denying resposibility and claiming that prosecutors are conducting an investigation that will prove the fire was set by persons resisting eviction from their homes.

This year three people died in traffic accidents during Carnival, as compared to 10 in last year's festivities. This year drownings --- nine of them, three of whom were children --- were a bigger holiday safety problem.

Part of the Panamanian Carnival tradition is that supporters of rival queens in Las Tablas --- the "tunas" of Calle Arriba and Calle Abajo --- sing mocking songs and otherwise insult one another. This year the mayor of Las Tablas issued a decree prohibiting public insults, which was ignored. Both organizations were fined $500 for proscribed lyrics and throwing water and toilet paper at one another.

Whether it's true or not, it's a crime to make public references to bounced checks written by the representante's wife. At least that was the ruling in Capira, where the Calle Arriba organization was fined $50 for lyrics that were considered offensive.

Though security around the US Embassy in Panama City has been tightened, for many years the State Department has wanted a more easily defended building and the events of September 13 have now put that wish higher on the list of federal budget priorities. According to a report by La Prensa's Betty Brannan Jaén, the money for a new American Embassy in Panama is part of the fiscal year 2003 US federal budget, which is now being debated in House of Representatives committees. The embassy here was put on a list of facilities to be replaced after the US State Department reviewed its security following the 1998 Al Qaeda bombings of embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. At its present location on Avenida Balboa, it's not possible to retro-fit the embassy to be at least 100 feet from any street, which is one of the safety standards to resist a truck bomb attack.

In the ongoing squabble between the Arnulfista-led executive branch and the PRD-led legislature, President Moscoso has suggested that government spending could be slashed by reducing legislators' salaries. Legislative Assembly president Rubén Arosemena (Partido Popular - Panama City) has cut many staff positions at the legislature but points to the Constitution in response to the president's suggestion. The law says that the solons' pay can't be reduced, at least not during the time of one assembly. To reduce salaries, this legislature would have to pass a law which would then have to be ratified by the next legislature, which will be elected in 2004.

A number of statues, most of them erected by civic organizations like the Kiwanis Club and the Abou Saad Shrine, have been removed from the median of Avenida Balboa between the Hotel Miramar and the municipal seafood market. The public art was taken down to make way for a power line. Some of the statues will be relocated to other sites within Panama City.

A group of attorneys has filed charges that Government and Justice Minister Aníbal Salas exceeded his authority when he signed an anti-drug agreement with the United States. The pact would allow US planes to conduct anti-drug aerial operations over Panamanian territory, force planes to land in Panama, and to make arrests on Panamanian soil or territorial waters and take suspects back to the United States without legal proceedings in this country. The Moscoso administration argues that the "Complementary Agreement" a mere codicil to a 1990 US-Panamanian anti-drug treaty, but the lawyers and other critics say that it's a distinct treaty that must be submitted to the Legislative Assembly like most other international agreements. A lot of the criticism of the agreement --- for example that of former President Jorge Illueca --- has been couched in terms of how it allows US military activities that infringe Panama's sovereignty. Salas, however, defends the agreement as a practical update to an existing treaty by which Panama and the United States cooperate in fighting a drug problem that both countries have in common.

At least two Colon residents have died and several others have been hospitalized after consuming cocaine adulterated with ground glass. One of the fatalities was 32-year-old Ismael Laguna Sotomayor, the son of former world champion boxer Ismael Laguna.

On February 19 police arrested four Colombians and three Panamanians and seized two pickup trucks carrying 1,619 kilos of cocaine concealed under fruits and vegetables near Baru. The drugs had been processed in Colombia dropped from aircraft into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of eastern Chiriqui province, recovered in small boats and loaded onto the pickups for land transport to Costa Rica and points to the north.

The Second Superior Tribunal of Panama's First Judicial District has ordered the Public Ministry's top prosecutor in the Darien, Belisario Espino Villarreal, separated from his post and arrested on a series of corruption charges. The case arises from accusations that Espino tampered with documenary evidence in a case about sexual abuse of a girl, in order to exculpate the man who was accused.

Due to an outbreak of whooping cough that has claimed at least two children's lives and sent at least two dozen other kids to hospitals and clinics around the country, the Health Ministry has begun a campaign to make sure that children under five years old get their vaccinations. The campaign began in the Panama City neighborhoods of Betania and Pueblo Nuevo, the two urban corregimientos with the worst problems.

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