Yahoo! News
August 28, 2001.
U.S. Paper Currency Accepted in Cuba, but No Quarters, Dimes, Nickels,
Pennies
HAVANA, 28 (AP) -- Cuban banks and stores that do business in U.S. dollars
will stop accepting American coins this fall, the Central Bank said Tuesday.
In a short note in the Communist Party daily newspaper, Granma, the bank
announced that beginning Oct. 15, only Cuban-made "convertible pesos'' will
be accepted for denominations smaller than a dollar. American paper currency
will remain valid, but quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies will no longer
circulate.
"It is international practice to not accept foreign coins, owing to the
high cost associated with its use and exportation,'' the announcement said. An
earlier version of the "convertible peso'' coins, minted by the Tourism
Institute, will also no longer be accepted.
The use of American dollars by Cubans was decriminalized in August 1993 as
part of a series of modest reforms aimed to help citizens weather a severe
economic crisis caused by the collapse of the Soviet Union a decade ago.
Dollar transactions on the island have increased significantly in recent
years, but many goods and services for Cuban citizens are provided for ordinary
Cuban pesos whose current official exchange rate is 22 to the dollar, including
public transportation, utilities and subsidized food.
The Central Bank did not say how much U.S. currency circulates on the
island, which has been under a U.S. trade embargo since 1961. It said Cuba has "sufficient
quantities of Convertible Cuban Peso coins to substitute the circulation of the
United States coins.'' The convertible pesos have the same denominations as U.S.
currency.
It is estimated that at least 60 percent of Cuba's 11 million citizens have
some access to U.S. dollars -- from relatives abroad, as tips for tourism
workers or through salaries in some sectors that now pay workers partially in
American currency.
Human Rights Groups Push Agenda
By Edith M. Lederer, Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS, 27 (AP) - Days before the U.N. racism conference starts,
human rights groups are campaigning to raise the profile of issues that have
been overshadowed by the fight over slavery reparations and the Mideast
conflict.
The range of unresolved issues include affirmative action, sexual
orientation, hate speech, the death penalty, the caste system, and refugee
rights.
But with so much attention focused on the most contentious debates over
anti-Israeli language and slavery, human rights groups are concerned other
issues will be neglected at the eight-day conference which starts Friday in
Durban, South Africa.
"This meeting needs to offer something to the refugee in Europe who is
beaten up simply because he is a foreigner, to the scavenger in India whose low
caste prevents him from rising in life, to the Tibetan tortured by Chinese
police,'' Reed Brody, of Human Rights Watch, said Monday. He added it must also
address problems Palestinians face under Israel as well as the struggle of U.S.
blacks to improve their living standards.
The challenge facing delegates from over 150 countries is mammoth: More than
half the conference declaration and about 15 percent of the program to battle
the problem are in dispute.
The United States and Israel are threatening to boycott unless anti-Israel
and anti-Zionist language is eliminated from the documents. The State Department
announced Monday that Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) will
not attend, an indication of the Bush administration's unhappiness.
Although Arab and Muslim states, under pressure, abandoned efforts to revive
a U.N. resolution repealed in 1991 that equated racism with Zionism - the
movement that led to the founding of the Jewish state - language to that effect
still exists in the draft document.
One paragraph being debated would refer to racist movements including "the
Zionist movement which is based on racial superiority.''
Felice Gaer of the American Jewish Committee called that statement the most
offensive. "It revives the anti-Semitic canard of 'the chosen people' at
the same time as it undermines the right of Israel to exist by claiming that the
founding philosophy itself is racist,'' she said.
On the slavery issue, the United States and the Europeans are at odds with
African nations and many advocacy groups. The former colonial powers and
slave-trading nations fear that apologizing for colonialism and slavery, or
acknowledging either was a crime, could lead to huge compensation claims.
For human rights groups, caste discrimination is high on the agenda.
India wants to get rid of language opposing discrimination based on "work''
and "descent'' because it doesn't want to discuss the plight of the Dalits,
or untouchables, on the lowest rungs of India's centuries-old caste hierarchy.
Muslims have contested references to discrimination on the basis of sexual
orientation. Calls for affirmative action programs remain in dispute, and
negotiators are arguing over a paragraph that calls on countries with capital
punishment to halt executions while they investigate the impact race may have on
sentencing.
On the issue of the media and the Internet, Western nations want to balance
freedom of expression with limits on hate speech that can be linked to violent
acts. But Cuba, China and some Mideast nations are attempting to use the control
of hate speech to further clamp down on the free flow of information, Gaer said.
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