ally for the United States in Central America. They are a democracy and have a very stable government. Costa Rica is the only country in the western hemisphere without an army. In fact it abolished its army in 1949 and allocated the defense budget to education.

Costa Rica has managed to create one of the most attractive investment environments in Latin America for the development of industries. Costa Rica’s unique characteristics—its strategic location, political stability, business incentives (including free trade zones), supply of high quality human capital—and its proactive promotion of these assets—have all contributed to an increase of investments by high-tech companies in the fields of power technologies, systems integration technologies and call centers.

Over the past five years Costa Rica has become one of the fastest growing tourismif it were attacked. During the years of Sandinista arms build-up in Nicaragua, many Costa Ricans longed for the United States to invade and put an end to that regime. Then-president Arias faced as much internal opposition to his peace plan as he did external. In fact, it was not until he won the Nobel Prize that his critics started to let up a bit. Similarly, the vast majority of Costa Ricans lauded the U.S. invasion of Panama. Disarmament does not necessarily imply pacifism.”

The Tailevu Provincial Council has rejected the National Council for Building a Better Fiji and does not want to have any part in it.

The decision was relayed to the NCBBF media team led by Bau chief Adi Finau Tabakaucoro today, after it made a presentation