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October 2, 2002.
Mexico nominates new ambassador to Cuba after asking predecessor to step
down
AP. Tue Oct 1,10:00 PM ET
MEXICO CITY - President Vicente Fox nominated longtime diplomat Roberta
Lajous as Mexico's new ambassador to Cuba, the foreign relations department said
in a statement Tuesday.
Lajous would replace Ricardo Pascoe, who was asked to step down. Her
appointment must be confirmed by Mexico's Senate.
Pascoe and Foreign Secretary Jorge Castaneda had sparred over Mexico-Cuba
relations, with Pascoe supporting Havana's communist government and Castaneda
often squabbling with Cuban officials, including President Fidel Castro.
The standoff began when Pascoe canceled Mexican Independence Day
celebrations in Havana after Castaneda's office refused to pay for the
festivities.
Lajous began her diplomatic career in 1980, serving as the director general
for North America and Western Europe in the foreign relations department as well
as Mexico's ambassador to Austria and the country's alternate representative
before the United Nations.
Confirmation of her appointment could be difficult in a Congress that has
criticized the Fox administration for favoring the U.S. government while
shunning longtime ally Cuba.
Also Tuesday, Fox named Arturo Puente as Mexico's ambassador to Lebanon.
Puente has spent 25 years in diplomatic service, serving in Mexican consulates
in Montreal, Miami, Houston and Chicago, among other cities.
Hurricane Lili strengthens as it batters western Cuba and aims for Gulf
of Mexico and U.S. coast
Tue Oct 1, 9:19 Pm Et . By Anita Snow, Associated Press
Writer
HAVANA - Hurricane Lili strengthened as it roared across western Cuba and
into the Gulf of Mexico, forcing thousands on the island from their homes before
taking aim at the U.S. Gulf Coast.
Lili prompted NASA on Tuesday to postpone its first shuttle launch in four
months. The space agency did not want to take a chance of launching Atlantis
from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Wednesday, only to have the hurricane bear down
on Houston, home to Mission Control.
Residents in south Louisiana faced their second evacuation in a week as Lili
steadily gained strength and speed as it entered the open gulf on Tuesday.
"We're probably going to be evacuating some time (Wednesday) morning,"
said Ray Santiny, city councilman from the barrier island of Grand Isle, south
of New Orleans.
Lili was upgraded to a Category 2 hurricane when its winds increased to
nearly 100 mph (160 kph) as it whipped across Cuba on Tuesday afternoon and into
the Gulf of Mexico.
No casualties were reported in Cuba, where the government canceled all storm
warnings for the island at 0000 GMT Wednesday. The storm earlier killed seven
people in Jamaica and St. Vincent.
A hurricane watch was declared for parts of the northern U.S. Gulf Coast.
The National Hurricane Center in Miami said some squalls with gusts to tropical
storm force could occur over the lower Florida Keys overnight.
"By the time the storm gets to the United States, it will be stronger
and it will pack a bigger storm surge," said Martin Nelson, lead forecaster
at the hurricane center.
Cuban President Fidel Castro traveled to the western province of Pinar del
Rio early Tuesday afternoon to check on civil defense plans as the hurricane
roared across the island's southern end. There were reports of flooding, downed
trees and roofs ripped off homes, but no other word of major damage.
Cuba's state television Tuesday afternoon showed images of high winds
whipping the leaves of towering palms on the small Isle of Youth, south of the
main island.
Rains were heavy in the western port city of Batabano, about 30 miles (50
kilometers) south of Havana. Aleida Castel, 39, protected her family's three
horses from the downpour on the front porch of her home.
At 0000 GMT, the eye of the storm was pulling away from Cuban territory into
the Gulf of Mexico, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) north of the western tip of
Cuba at Cabo San Antonio, Cuba.
Lili, the fourth hurricane of the Atlantic season, was moving northwest at
about 15 mph (24 kph) and its wind speeds had increased slightly, to 105 mph
(165 kph). It could strike the Gulf Coast areas of Texas, Louisiana and
Mississippi by Thursday or Friday, Nelson said.
Hurricane force winds extended 40 miles (65 kilometers) and tropical storm
force winds another 150 miles (250 kilometers).
In New Orleans, authorities were discussing possible evacuation plans while
coastal residents boarded up and sandbagged homes, cleared debris and stocked up
on food and storm supplies.
Some companies were already evacuating employees in the Gulf of Mexico,
which was battered last week by a weaker Tropical Storm Isidore.
The Houston-based Apache Corp., an energy producer, said it was evacuating
its oil and natural gas producing platforms in Galveston, Texas, and High Island
and moving to the east.
It would decide about other facilities in the Gulf of Mexico later in the
day. The company has about 160 workers in the area.
Isidore forced energy companies to pull offshore workers and shut in almost
25 billion cubic feet of natural gas and about 4.5 million barrels of oil. The
Gulf of Mexico provides about 25 percent of U.S. energy production.
Mexicans also were abandoning homes in the northeastern Yucatan peninsula,
where Lili's heavy rains were expected later Tuesday. Isidore damaged 95,000
homes there. The Yucatan coast from Cozumel to Progreso was under tropical storm
watch.
Lili grew into a hurricane on Monday and its eye tore across Cayman Brac,
uprooting trees and utility poles, knocking out power and tearing roofs from
apartment complexes.
By mid-afternoon Tuesday, electricity in the Cayman Islands had been fully
restored and telephone service returned to most customers. All 300 persons
sought safety in public shelters on Brac and the neighboring island of Little
Cayman returned home earlier in the day.
Lili reached the Caribbean last week as a tropical storm, leaving four dead
in St. Vincent and three in Jamaica.
Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Kyle remained virtually in the same place but sent
winds gusting over the mid-Atlantic British island of Bermuda, which posted a
tropical storm watch. Kyle's winds were nearly 40 mph (64 kph) and it was about
275 miles (442 kilometers) south-southwest of Bermuda.
Cuba to Commemorate Missile Crisis
Tue Oct 1, 3:10 Pm Et . By Anita Snow, Associated Press
Writer
HAVANA (AP) - Former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara is among American
protagonists expected at a conference in Cuba this month marking the 40th
anniversary of the missile crisis that brought the world to the brink of nuclear
war.
Also attending the conference, which will focus on Cuba's role in the
crisis, will be Arthur Schlesinger Jr., former special aide to President John F.
Kennedy, Cuban organizers said Tuesday.
"This was the most dramatic episode of the Cold War, and perhaps of all
contemporary history," said Cuban Vice President Jose Ramon Fernandez, a
key organizer.
Fernandez said he hoped the academic conference bringing together American,
Cuban and former Soviet protagonists would evolve in "a cordial spirit of
analysis, without tensions, insults or hatred."
The conference's aim is to shed light on events leading up to the crisis,
which peaked when the United States learned there were Soviet nuclear missiles
on Cuba — an island just 90 miles from the United States.
Following several tense days of negotiations with Washington, Nikita
Khruschev withdrew the weapons without consulting with Havana — a move that
enraged Fidel's government.
Former presidential speech writers Richard Goodwin and Ted Sorensen, and
then-CIA analyst Dino Brugioni, will also take part, said Fernandez. He said
Castro is among the Cuban protagonists invited to participate.
Also taking part in the Oct. 11-13 event will be a number of Soviet military
officials, Fernandez said. There will be two days of seminars and a day of
visits to sites related to the crisis, including a former missile silo in the
western state of Pinar del Rio.
The nonprofit, non-governmental National Security Archive at George
Washington University also has been invited. The international affairs research
institute maintains an extensive archive on declassified U.S. government
documents.
Fernandez said the Cuban government will release a number of formerly
classified documents on the crisis in conjunction with the conference.
During a similar conference on the Bay of Pigs last year, Cuban organizers
worked with National Security Archive directors to release a wealth of U.S. and
Cuban documents on the unsuccessful CIA-backed invasion attempt.
Fernandez, also a key organizer in last year's conference, is a retired
military officer who helped lead Cuban troops during the disastrous Bay of Pigs
invasion the year before the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962.
Lili smashes into western Cuba
Tue Oct 1, 2:14 Pm Et . Buzz Bernard, Sr. Meteorologist.
Tropical Update, The Weather Channel
Wind gusts as high as 108 mph were reported from Punta Del Esta on Cuba's
Isle of Youth early this morning as Hurricane Lili swept over on its way to
western Cuba. Lili is pummeling western Cuba now with high winds and torrential
rains and will churn into the southeastern Gulf of Mexico later this afternoon.
Once in the Gulf, Lili could intensify into an extremely dangerous hurricane
with winds ratcheting up to 120 mph or more. Lili's U. S. target still appears
to be some portion of the western Gulf Coast, probably between Houston and New
Orleans sometime Thursday. Folks along and near the Gulf in those areas should
pay very close attention to Lili's progress and projections. A hurricane watch
may be posted for a portion of the western and central Gulf Coast later today.
In the western Atlantic, Kyle has managed to rejuvinate itself into a
minimal tropical storm and appears to have set up camp several hundred miles
south of Bermuda. Little movement or change in intensity is expected over the
next day or two.
In the western Pacific, Tokyo, Japan, was slammed by Typhoon Higos early
this morning (EDT). Narita Airport reported heavy rain and wind gusts to 78 mph
as the eye of the typhoon swept by very close to the city. Higos is now racing
northward over northern Japan. | 
