Costa Ricans considering asylum for Cubans

The authorities in Costa Rica are interviewing a group of twenty-two Cuban nationals who arrived on a fishing boat over the weekend seeking political asylum.

They are the first Cuban refugees to arrive in Costa Rica in four years.

In a BBC interview, the Costa Rican Security minister, Rogelio Ramos, said officials were looking into Cuban claims that the boat had been hijacked and forced to sail into international waters.

The Cubans spent more than a week at sea, stopping off at a Colombian island in the Caribbean to refuel.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service