Costa Rica Urges Nicaragua to Increase Surveillance on the San Juan River to Prevent Smuggling of “Costa Rican Gold”

Costa Rica’s Security Minister, Mario Zamora, said Monday, February 23, 2026, that illegal miners are extracting gold in Costa Rica to process and sell it in Nicaragua, and urged the neighboring country to increase surveillance along the border San Juan River, where a “smuggling route” exists.

“The theft of Costa Rican gold is carried out by coligalleros (illegal miners) who use smuggling routes that pass through the San Juan River and reach the country to the north (Nicaragua), where the mining sediment is processed, gold is extracted, and the profits remain,” Zamora said in a statement sent to the media.

The minister announced that he had asked Foreign Minister Arnoldo André to approach the Nicaraguan government to request increased police patrols along the San Juan River, which forms the border but is under Nicaraguan sovereignty.

“We are requesting that Nicaraguan authorities exercise their policing authority on the San Juan River and along the Nicaraguan bank of that river, in order to prevent the use of Nicaraguan territory along this gold smuggling route,” Zamora said.

According to Zamora, the mining material is being extracted from Las Crucitas, in Alajuela province near the Nicaraguan border, with the participation of transnational organized crime networks.

Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves announced that he will raise this case as one of his country’s security concerns at a meeting that U.S. President Donald Trump will hold with Latin American leaders on March 7, 2026, in Miami.

Mining Activity in Las Crucitas

In Las Crucitas, an open-pit gold mine operated by the Canadian company Infinito Gold was set to begin operations in 2010, but after a lengthy legal battle, a Costa Rican court annulled the permits and the company was unable to begin building the mine. The site was subsequently exploited by illegal miners who use environmentally harmful techniques such as mercury, causing severe environmental damage in the area.

The current government of President Rodrigo Chaves is promoting a bill to restart gold mining in Las Crucitas through a private company. The initiative is also supported by President-elect Laura Fernández, who will take office on May 8.

The bill — opposed by environmental groups and a segment of the opposition — establishes that the state would receive 5% of the project’s profits, which would operate under a concession model for the extraction and operation of the “Las Crucitas Centralized Processing Plant,” without the use of mercury and without causing environmental regression.

In addition, the Ministry of Environment and Energy would be responsible for running competitive bidding processes, using an auction-based scheme to award one or more concessions to operators that comply with environmental requirements.