CUBA
NEWS The
Miami Herald
Dissident group released after attempted
demonstration
Several Cuban dissidents
were allowed to return home after a night
of being detained for trying to participate
in a public demonstration.
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Sun, Jul. 24, 2005.
Several Cuban dissidents picked up by authorities
during the second attempt this month to
launch rare public protests in Havana were
released without charges Saturday.
But leaders vowed to continue their bold
acts of defiance even as the fate of about
a dozen detained dissidents remained unknown,
clashes with government supporters continued
and police presence on the street increased.
''We are going to continue to insist and
we are calling for demonstrations across
the island,'' Martha Beatriz Roque, Cuba's
most prominent female opposition leader,
told reporters in Havana after being released
from custody Saturday. Roque, who in May
also led an unprecedented two-day gathering
of government opponents , said that while
no charges were filed authorities warned
that the attempted protest was viewed as
a "provocation.''
Meanwhile in Washington, the State Department
condemned the arrests.
''We call on the Cuban government to end
this deplorable repression and immediately
free all of those arrested. We urge other
countries to join us in condemning these
acts,'' said Adam Ereli, a spokesman.
The protest in front of the French Embassy
was called to demand the release of all
political prisoners, including six who remain
jailed on ''public disorder'' charges for
taking part in demonstrations on July 13
to commemorate the 1994 deadly sinking of
a tugboat filled with Cubans trying to flee
the island.
The six were among as many as 30 would-be
protesters taken into custody July 13 after
clashes with a contingency of government
supporters who carried out raucous counterprotests.
Prominent dissident Vladimiro Roca told
The Herald that police presence has since
been bolstered.
''A large apparatus of security is roaming
the streets, even in neighborhoods where
they aren't usually visible,'' Roca said
by telephone from Havana. "Police presence
is heavy, especially in central and Old
Havana.''
As many as 26 government opponents were
detained Friday either at their homes or
on their way to the French Embassy, human
rights activists on the island reported.
At least nine, including Roque, were allowed
to return home but the whereabouts of the
remainder were not known.
''Since they took him at 9:30 in the morning
Friday, I know nothing,'' said Jorge Gómez
Manzano, brother of opposition leader René
Gómez Manzano.
''I've called everywhere and authorities
keep saying they have no information,''
an agitated Gómez told the Herald
in a telephone interview from Havana. "I'm
very worried.''
René Gómez Manzano, a lawyer,
and engineer Félix Bonne, who also
was detained Friday, are the two other leaders
who joined Roque in the creation of the
Assembly for the Promotion of Civil Society.
The assembly, which lists more than 300
opposition groups as members, has labeled
Fidel Castro's government as ''Stalinist''
and called for the return of ''democratic
traditions'' in the communist-ruled island.
Herald staff writer Pablo
Bachelet contributed to this report.
Roque among 20 well-known dissidents
retained by government
Martha Beatriz Roque,
who spearheaded an unprecedented May 20
dissident meeting, was among 20 dissidents
rounded up Friday.
By Andrea Rodriguez, Associated
Press. Posted on Sat, Jul. 23, 2005.
HAVANA - As many as 20 dissidents were
detained Friday, including the top three
organizers of an unprecedented meeting of
opposition members in Cuba this spring,
said a veteran human rights activist who
tracks the communist-run island's political
prisoners.
Martha Beatriz Roque, who spearheaded the
May 20 dissident meeting, was among those
rounded up by state security agents, said
Elizardo Sánchez of the nongovernmental
Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National
Reconciliation. He said René Gómez
Manzano and Félix Bonne, two other
organizers of the May opposition meeting,
were detained after chanting government
supporters helped dissolve a protest they
planned for Friday morning.
Sánchez said in a telephone interview
that he confirmed the detentions through
relatives. He said it was unclear if the
opponents had been formally arrested or
were detained temporarily to prevent them
from attending the morning protest they
planned outside the French Embassy.
About 200 people attended the Assembly
for the Promotion of Civil Society that
Roque organized in May in Bonne's backyard.
Dissidents and observers were surprised
then that the government allowed the event
to go ahead without interruption.
Roque and other organizers of that meeting
had been expected at the Friday morning
protest outside the embassy, but she never
showed and her whereabouts were unknown
until Sánchez confirmed her detention.
Gómez Manzano's arrest was confirmed
earlier in the day by his brother, Jorge
Manzano.
A dozen dissidents showed up for the morning
protest to demand the release of political
prisoners, far fewer than expected.
''Our objective is to demand that the European
nations take an interest in the political
prisoners of our country,'' said opposition
member Adolfo Lázaro Bosk.
At least 40 cases of dissidents being blocked
from attending the event were reported by
Sánchez earlier in the day.
Sánchez said that government supporters
from the dissidents' neighborhoods organized
counter-protests around their homes, making
it impossible for them to leave for Friday's
opposition event.
In some cases, dissidents planning to attend
were visited and warned by state security
agents not to go, Sánchez said.
Pro-government neighbors of dissident León
Padrón Azcuy surrounded his home,
sang the Cuban national anthem and shouted
in support of the revolution and President
Fidel Castro.
''That man belongs to the mercenary groups
paid by the United States,'' Alberto Lisea
said.
Exiles helped found high school
Once upon a time, La
Salle High School moved across the Florida
Straits with the help of 100 Christian brothers
and six students.
By Joselle Galis-Menendez.
jgalis-menendez@herald.com. Posted on Sat,
Jul. 23, 2005.
It's 1961.
In Cuba, Fidel Castro has closed all Catholic
churches, convents and schools, and banned
priests and nuns from the island.
Over 100 Christian Brothers of La Salle
arrive in Miami -- with no money. But with
a small group of teenagers, they start one
of the most successful private schools in
Miami history.
These days, La Salle High School is known
for its scenic campus on Biscayne Bay and
a history that stretches from Cuba's communist
revolution to the band of undaunted Christian
brothers.
The expelled brothers arrived in Miami
and were rushed to the Everglades Hotel
for a warm welcome from six former students,
including Jose Arellano, then about 16.
The brothers told the kids about their
plan to open their school in Miami.
At first, Arellano said they were reluctant
to set down roots like that.
''We still had hopes of returning to Cuba,''
he said.
But the reality of relocation soon set
in. They took up the challenge to help open
the Catholic school by helping rally support
from the growing exile community.
And then, they approached the Archdiocese.
''It was actually Father Bryan Walsh who
arranged the meeting with Bishop Coleman
Carroll,'' Arellano said.
What the group didn't know was that the
diocese already had its hands in another
project aimed at protecting exiled children
-- Operation Pedro Pan.
These children were being housed and Carroll
and Walsh wanted a Catholic education for
them.
So, the brothers got their funding for
the relocated LaSalle.
''In a week they approved it and in three
months they had it built,'' Arellano said.
But there was more money that had to be
raised.
''We raised about $5,000,'' Arellano said.
"In those days that was all the money
in the world.''
And the biggest expense was the bill at
the Everglades Hotel, where the brothers
had spent two weeks before finding housing.
''We laugh now, but it wasn't funny back
then,'' he said. The diocese had already
funded one Catholic school, Immaculata Academy
for girls, with the Sisters of St. Joseph.
The school sat near Mercy Hospital and
Vizcaya and the two schools shared the land
and certain facilities.
La Salle High School was ready just in
time for the 1961 school year with about
160 students from grades eight through 12.
In May of the following year, 30 graduates
marched together in the face of exile, assimilation
and suffocating odds.
Among them were the six students from the
Everglades Hotel.
All 30 graduates moved on to colleges and
universities.
In 1970, the school merged with Immaculata
Academy and became Immaculata-La Salle High
School. The school is run by The Salesan
Sisters and its name was later changed back
to La Salle High School.
In 2004, Arellano, whose two children Gaston
and Diana now attend La Salle, and his five
friends were inducted into their school's
Hall of Fame.
''I could hardly believe my eyes,'' he
said. "To think, we started this.''
Cuban system gains support in Venezuela
Two polls showed Venezuelans'
support for Cuba's form of socialist government
is increasing but remains unpopular with
the majority.
By Phil Gunson, Special
to The Herald. Posted on Fri, Jul. 22, 2005.
CARACAS - Venezuelans' support for Fidel
Castro's model of government and the installation
of socialism here has been growing, two
recent polls show, although a majority remains
critical of the Cuban system.
The polls suggest that President Hugo Chávez,
Castro's closest ally, is succeeding in
shifting public opinion toward the left
as he pushes his ''revolution'' among a
population that historically identified
more with the values of Miami than Havana.
Chávez, whose own approval rates
are running at over 70 percent, makes frequent
pro-Cuba speeches, and more than 20,000
Cuban medical personnel and sports instructors
work in poor neighborhoods here.
A poll released last weekend by the Caracas-based
Datanálisis company showed 11.6 percent
approved using Castro's Cuba as a model
for Venezuela, while 63.2 percent said they
were opposed.
The percentage of pro-Cuban sentiment represented
a significant increase. In July 2002, in
response to the same question, only 3 percent
expressed support and more than 91 percent
were opposed. As recently as this January,
the support was under 6 percent.
Another nationwide poll, carried out by
Seijas & Asociados in late May and early
June, showed that about 48 percent of respondents
preferred a socialist over a capitalist
system, with less than 26 percent preferring
the latter.
After years of denying that his ''Bolivarian
revolution'' -- named after independence
hero Simón Bolívar -- was
socialist, Chávez now openly calls
himself a socialist and attacks what he
calls the ''perversions'' of capitalism.
Datanálisis director Luis Vicente
León warned, however, that the various
poll results must be analyzed ''with tweezers''
and do not necessarily mean that Venezuelans
want a Cuban-styled system in their country.
Venezuelans, León said, associate
the Cuban system not with socialism but
with communism, which the majority abhors.
''There remains a very high level of rejection
of extreme models such as communism,'' he
said.
''Chávez has not succeeded with
his discourse in diminishing people's association
of capitalism with well-being and development,''
León told The Herald. "Nor has
the opposition succeeded in demonizing socialism
by reference to Chávez's relationship
with Fidel.''
Venezuela and Cuba recently agreed to increase
by the end of the year the number of Cuban
medical personnel here to 30,000. The Information
Ministry has reported that more than 9,000
Venezuelans have been treated in Cuba for
everything from cataracts to heart disease.
''Socialism is just another word for the
social work the government does,'' said
Cuban doctor Angel Sosa, who works in a
housing project in western Caracas. "Some
people who come to the clinic are pro-government,
others are not. We don't care what they
think.''
The government clearly does, however, and
has been using its Cuban-inspired health
and social welfare programs as a major element
in its electoral propaganda.
According to the Datanálisis figures,
almost one in two Venezuelans does not believe
Chávez intends to create a ''second
Cuba,'' while about 37 per cent are convinced
he does.
The poll also showed support for President
Bush is running at less than 14 percent
and for imitation of the U.S. system at
under 16 percent.
''What the majority wants is a home-grown
model,'' León said.
Cuban Vegas troupe granted asylum
Members of the Havana
Night Club show defected to Las Vegas from
Cuba in November. Now, the U.S. government
has granted them asylum.
By David Ovalle, dovalle@herald.com.
Posted on Fri, Jul. 22, 2005.
Members of Havana Night Club, the show
that drew headlines when its members defected
en masse last year from Cuba and settled
in Las Vegas, will walk into a government
office today to apply for something many
Americans take for granted:
Social Security cards.
''Then, a new life starts,'' said Nicole
Durr, the show's director.
The 49 dancers, singers and musicians this
week received letters in the mail at their
Las Vegas apartments with the word: They
had finally been granted U.S. asylum.
Said Puro Hernández, the show's
musical director: "Now comes the responsibility
that comes with credit cards and bills.
You have it all -- now you have to know
how to manage it.''
The troupe defected in November and began
an extended run at the Wayne Newton Theater
at the Stardust Resort & Casino.
The show spans the history of Cuban music,
starting from deep drums entrenched in the
island's African roots, to the Spanish colonial
era, the Tropicana cha-cha-cha pre-Castro
days and the infectious reggaeton of today.
''This is great news and I'm glad they've
been received as openly and generously as
they have,'' said Joe Garcia, the former
executive director of the Cuban American
National Foundation, who lobbied for their
visas.
Havana Night Club had performed across
Europe and Asia and was invited to play
in Las Vegas by entertainers Siegfried &
Roy.
But troupe members couldn't obtain visas
because of the chill in relations between
Cuba and the United States.
After Durr proved to the U.S. State Department
that the troupe operated independently of
the Cuban government, visas were granted.
Cuba balked at letting them come, but amid
international pressure -- from exile groups
and even protests by cast members -- the
Castro government relented.
Saying they would never be able to return
to Cuba and perform, 51 of 53 members defected.
Two of the defectors eventually went back
to the island.
Gloria Estefan performed with the troupe
in Las Vegas in December.
Later, professional baseball pitcher Orlando
''El Duque'' Hernandez, who had defected
with the help of the same immigration attorney
as theirs, also visited the show. He teared
up after seeing the performance.
The troupe has since done two stints at
the University of Miami's Convocation Center.
The group also made headlines in June when
producers pulled from the market a CD that
featured a music video that critics said
promoted travel to Cuba. The show said the
CD was produced well before the defections.
Havana Night Club's run has been extended
at the Stardust until Sept. 4.
Big plans are in the works, said show director
Durr, who promised the performance is being
made even grander.
Posada's lawyer claims lack of evidence
Lawyers for Cuban exile
militant Luis Posada Carriles asked a judge
to throw out the government's evidence against
Posada, claiming it's based on hearsay and
media reports.
By Alfonso Chardy and Oscar
Corral, ocorral@herald.com. Posted on Wed,
Jul. 20, 2005.
A lawyer for anti-Castro militant Luis
Posada Carriles is asking an immigration
judge to throw out the U.S. government's
case against his client, arguing that it
hangs on hearsay testimony that Posada masterminded
the bombing of Cuban tourist sites and other
terrorist acts.
Attorney Eduardo Soto is also fighting
Posada's deportation, saying that his client
has had a relapse of skin cancer and has
a worsening heart condition.
U.S. immigration authorities declined to
comment on the motion.
Soto contends the case is tainted because
it is partly based on an interview Posada
gave a New York Times correspondent who
likely will refuse to testify.
The Posada interview with The New York
Times in 1998 is a key component in the
U.S. government's case to deny him asylum
because Posada reportedly acknowledged his
involvement in the Havana blasts, which
killed an Italian tourist.
The motion was filed in preparation for
next Monday's immigration hearing in El
Paso, where Posada will ask a judge to release
him on bail. Soto said doctors had recently
discovered that Posada is suffering from
new manifestations of skin cancer and a
heart condition.
A key point for Soto has always been that
Posada has not been directly linked to an
attack -- only via hearsay from supposed
accomplices who have been convicted of attacks
and have no credibility.
The closest link comes from Cuban investigative
records, which The Herald reviewed in Panama.
The records say that one of the Havana bombers
linked Posada to the terror attacks in Cuba.
U.S. immigration authorities don't cite
the Cuban records found in Panama, where
Posada and three accomplices were once accused
of trying to kill Cuban President Fidel
Castro.
CONFESSIONS
The Cuban case files contain signed confessions
by one of the two convicted bombers -- Otto
Rene Rodriguez Llerena, who said Posada
hired, paid and trained him for the attacks.
At the time, Rodriguez said, Posada was
using the alias Ignacio Medina.
''Medina visited him in his office and
gave him a passport with a plane ticket,
a visa and a tourist package for three nights
at the Hotel Ambos Mundos, a Casio calculator,
a detonator, an interface, a battery to
put in a digital radio, a green nylon bag
with explosives and markings of where to
set the detonators,'' said the confession
signed by Rodriguez.
Matthew J. Archambeault, a lawyer in Soto's
office, called the Cuban investigation ''unreliable.''
Homeland Security declined to comment.
Cuba sent the files to Panama, hoping that
country would extradite Posada to Cuba to
stand trial, but Panama refused.
Cuba has been widely condemned for its
lack of an independent legal system.
''It's a justice system that doesn't guarantee
a right to a fair trial, doesn't guarantee
judicial independence, and doesn't guarantee
due process,'' said Joanne Mariner, deputy
director of the Americas division of Human
Rights Watch, which monitors human right
abuses around the world.
Posada and three other Cuban exiles were
convicted in Panama of endangering the public
because they allegedly had explosives, but
then-President Mireya Moscoso pardoned them
last year.
According to the Cuban files, Rodriguez
told investigators how Posada -- posing
as Medina -- gave him instructions on where
to place and how to assemble the explosives.
''Medina proposed placing an explosive
device in one of the tourist sites in our
country with the goal of discrediting tourism,''
Rodriguez's purported confession says. "As
payment, Medina told Rodriguez he would
be paid $1,000 plus the expenses of the
trip and he agreed to it.''
On Aug. 3, 1997, Rodriguez walked into
the lobby of the Hotel Melia Cohiba, slipped
the bomb under a couch and left. It exploded
the next day, causing damage but no injuries.
Rodriguez said he returned to El Salvador,
and Medina paid him $1,000, then sent him
back to Cuba: ''Medina gave him a briefcase
with a false bottom, a pair of shoes, a
container of shampoo, a tube of toothpaste,
and a tube of deodorant all containing plastic
explosives,'' the signed confession says.
Cuban authorities caught Rodriguez in June
of 1998, as he tried to smuggle the explosives.
He was convicted and sentenced to death
by firing squad.
Also sentenced to death is Cruz. The Cuban
government said he planted four bombs at
three Havana hotels -- Chateau Miramar,
Copacabana and Triton Hotel -- and at the
landmark Bodeguita del Medio restaurant
in colonial Havana. The Copacabana blast
killed Italian national Fabio DiCelmo.
ANOTHER MAN
After his arrest, Cruz told Cuban investigators
a man named Francisco Chavez Abarca hired
him for the attacks. Cruz Leon never met
Posada, but a Herald investigation discovered
in 1997 links between Chavez and Posada.
Posada, in the 1998 interview with The
New York Times, admitted a role in the bombings
-- but he has since refused to repeat his
confession.
The Herald first linked Posada to the bombings
in a 1997 investigation, which found that
he was the key link between the Salvadoran
bombers and South Florida exiles who raised
$15,000 for the operation.
Soto's motion said media reports included
in the government's package cannot be used
in the case because they cannot be corroborated.
Cuban spy ruling irks U.S.
The State Department
rejected a ruling by a United Nations panel
questioning the conviction of five Cuban
spies.
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Wed, Jul. 20, 2005.
WASHINGTON - The State Department said
Tuesday it would not accept a ''ridiculous
and perplexing decision'' made by a United
Nations panel last week, which ruled that
the detention of five Cuban spies convicted
in Miami was arbitrary and in violation
of international law.
A senior official told The Herald the ruling
was a ''politically motivated'' maneuver
orchestrated by the Cuban government and
added that other efforts within the U.N.
to take up the case had been rejected.
'NOT LETTING THIS GO'
A U.S. response to the panel's ruling is
under way.
''We have a number of ideas on how to respond,''
said the official, who cannot be named due
to department policy but was speaking officially
for the U.S. government. "We're not
letting this go.''
The judgment came from the U.N. Working
Group on Arbitrary Detention, one of several
sections within the Geneva-based U.N. Commission
on Human Rights. The group found that the
five Cubans, convicted in Miami federal
court in 2001, were denied full access to
evidence and to their lawyers.
The panel also urged the U.S. government
to ''adopt the necessary steps to remedy
the situation,'' The Associated Press reported.
''The defendants in this case were tried
in federal court and convicted for being
covert agents,'' the state department official
said. ''They've never denied being covert
agents. It's outrageous.'' The official
said the ruling calls into question the
work of the U.N. panel, citing provisions
that stipulate that the group is supposed
to provide a platform for individual complaints
"not for states to use to go after
other states. It's a complete perversion
of the process.''
FIVE MEMBERS
According to the U.N. website: "The
Working Group on Arbitrary Detention is
the only nontreaty-based mechanism whose
mandate expressly provides for consideration
of individual complaints.''
Established in 1991, the panel includes
five members, currently from Algeria, Spain,
Iran, Hungary and Paraguay.
The five convicted Cubans -- Geraldo Hernández,
Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labanino,
Fernando González and René
González -- were arrested in September
1998 and are serving sentences ranging from
15 years to life.
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