Ex-Costa Rica president says US visa revoked after criticism of Trump

Former Costa Rican president and Nobel winner Óscar Arias said on Tuesday that the US had revoked his visa to enter the country, weeks after he criticized Donald Trump on social media saying he was behaving like “a Roman emperor”.

Arias, 84, was president between 1986 and 1990 and again between 2006 and 2010. A self-declared pacifist, he won the 1987 Nobel peace prize for his role in brokering peace during the Central American conflicts of the 1980s.

Arias also promoted a free trade agreement with the US during his last term and in 2007 established diplomatic ties with China.

“I received an email from the US government informing me that they have suspended the visa I have in my passport. The communication was very terse, it does not give reasons. One could have conjectures,” Arias told reporters outside his home, without elaborating on his suspicions.

In February, Arias had on social media accused the current government of President Rodrigo Chaves of giving in to US pressure, as the US has sought to oppose China’s influence in the region and deported migrants from third countries into Central America.

“It has never been easy for a small country to disagree with the US government, and even less so, when its president behaves like a Roman emperor, telling the rest of the world what to do,” he said on social media in February.

His statements came after the US withdrew visas from three Costa Rican lawmakers who opposed Chaves’s decision to exclude Chinese firms from participating in the development of 5G in the country, following US demands. On Tuesday, another opposition lawmaker was also stripped of her US visa.

US secretary of state Marco Rubio had in early February visited Costa Rica and offered to help Chaves “punish” Costa Rican officials who collaborate with “foreign actors who pose a threat to the country’s cybersecurity”.