The Google Earth war between Costa Rico and Nicaragua
Image via CrunchBaseWill the Obama administration ever start standing up to the Latin axis of caudillos? Nicaragua invaded Costa Rica last month -- yet the State Department is all but AWOL.So, why hasn't Google (Do no evil) withdrawn the map as inaccurate? That seems like an easier step than working anything through the UN and OAS. Is the company waiting for a call from its buddies in the Obama administration? It just seems strange that a company whose motto is "Do no evil" would let something like a war fester over its maps which should have no legal effect anyway.
State is taking a carefully worded, almost neutral stand in the dispute between Costa Rica -- our ally, and the world's most pacifist country -- and Nicaragua, a key player in Hugo Chavez's group of Latin strongmen.
Last month, Nicaragua sent troops into a jungle area at the mouth of the San Juan River, which has long been determined by mediators to be on Costa Rica's side of the border. The excuse for the invasion: Google Maps recently showed the area as part of Nicaragua.
Costa Rica, as its President Laura Chinchilla Miranda noted in a Nov. 3 address to the nation as the dispute begun, is "a peace-loving country -- and this is what distinguishes us the most, among nations in the world." The country has long chosen to have no army and to rely solely on diplomacy to solve disputes.
So Miranda appealed to the Organization of American States for help. Last Friday, the OAS voted to punt. And Washington agrees: State Department spokeswoman Viriginia Staab told me yesterday that "we encourage both sides immediately to distance any armed military and civilian security forces from the disputed area and avoid provocative rhetoric and actions."
Costa Rica's deputy UN ambassador, Saul Weisleder, told me Washington's low-key support of his country is meant to avoid riling the region's anti-Yanqui-imperialist hotheads while other countries do the heavy lifting. But, really -- "Both sides"? "Armed forces"? "Provocation"? Again, Costa Rica has no military -- it merely sent some policemen in to stare at the troops occupying its soil.
Indeed, State should be doing more, if only because Google was relying on State Department data when it mislabeled the land in question.
To be fair, Staab tells me State had warned Google that the database was "unsuitable for users of Google Earth who zoom in to view large-scale images." But the Nicaraguans somehow missed the nuance. Their troops remain in the area, citing Google.
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To be fair, Google has indicated it will correct its map. Will the State Department also correct its data on which Google relied?
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