July 31st., 1997
Government Aims First Strike at New Press Agency
HAVANA, 24 July (APIC) - The recently established independent press agency, New Press (ANP), has already felt the sting of government repression. When non-governmental journalist Ramón Alberto Cruz Lima was transmitting a news bulletin to volunteer transcriptionists in Miami via telephone [standard practice for the underground press], three State Security agents burst into the house.
The news transmission interrupted, the political police seized Cruz Lima and the journalist whose phone was being used for ANP reporting, Lázaro Lazo. Both reporters were taken to the local Revolutionary Police unit, threatened, and released.
Lazo was warned there would be reprisals if he continued using his phone for relaying ANP articles. Cruz was taken to the train station where he was forced to return to Ciego de Avila, where he lives.
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