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December 20, 2006

Radio, TV Martí face a congressional probe

A congressional investigation of TV and Radio Martí is slated for early 2007, a Massachusetts Democrat said.

By Christina Hoag And Oscar Corral, choag@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Wed, Dec. 20, 2006.

Congress early next year will investigate allegations of mismanagement and political cronyism at taxpayer-funded Radio and TV Martí, a ranking Democrat said Tuesday.

Rep. William Delahunt, D-Mass. -- slated to chair the oversight and investigations subcommittee for the House International Relations Committee -- said he will move to hold hearings on the Martís in late January or early February. His comments came a day after Radio Mambí, WAQI-AM (710), and Azteca América, WPMF-TV 38, each began carrying an hour of Martí programming daily for payment.

''This will be a priority,'' said Delahunt, who was in Cuba this week as part of a congressional delegation. "There's mismanagement . . . that really demands a thorough review.''

Government-funded media such as the Martís cannot broadcast on U.S. airwaves because their mission is to present the U.S. viewpoint to foreign audiences. However, there are loopholes in the law: Time on an AM transmitter can be leased to circumvent signal-jamming, and TV Martí can be ''inadvertently'' picked up by U.S. viewers as long as it reaches Cuba.

The Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which oversees the Martí operation, portrays the contracts as just another way to reach Cubans on the island. Radio Mambí's signal can reach Cuba under certain circumstances, and WPMF-TV is carried on DirecTV, which some Cubans can receive via a pirated signal.

Delahunt said the U.S. government is essentially hiring the stations to reach mostly local audiences, funded with taxpayer money. The six-month contracts call for Mambí to be paid $182,500 and WPMF $195,000. WPMF general manager Enrique Landín said Channel 38 also will sell commercials during the Martí newscasts -- which enraged Delahunt.

''Now we're subsidizing private commercial stations,'' said Delahunt, who called the Martís politically motivated boondoggles. The Martís will receive $37 million this year. "This is outrageous.''

The criticisms didn't surprise U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, who earmarks funds for the Martí operation.

''I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for Delahunt . . . to stop trying to help the Cuban dictatorship,'' Díaz-Balart said through his chief of staff, Ana Carbonell.

Larry Hart, a spokesman for the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the government arm that oversees the Martís, said the charges of political patronage were "ridiculous.''

Both Radio Mambí and WPMF-TV were selected after a media market survey, Hart said. Although many government contracts are awarded through competitive bidding, the law allows some vendor contracts to be issued as ''sole source'' -- without bidding -- under circumstances such as urgency or a unique service. In this case, Hart said, time was of the essence after Cuban leader Fidel Castro transferred power to his brother Raúl in July.

''We have been redoubling efforts to get through,'' Hart said.

Two other South Florida stations were approached, WSBS-TV 22 and WJAN-TV 41, but neither was willing to lease the blocks of time Martí was seeking. Representatives at WSBS-TV had no comment, and calls to WJAN were not returned.

HIGHLY RATED

Radio Mambí is one of the highest-rated radio stations in South Florida and is known for its strong anti-Castro stance. Popular Mambí commentator Ninoska Pérez-Castellon is also a board member and spokeswoman for the hard-line Cuban Liberty Council.

Mambí is the only Spanish-language AM station that carries a 50,000-watt signal through the night and is able to reach Cuba, Hart said.

Most AM stations reduce their signal at night when there are fewer listeners.

Hart acknowledged that the Cuban government's Radio Rebelde transmits on the same frequency as Mambí -- 710 AM. But he said the jamming does not block Mambí in all locations or at all times, and that the signal gets through, particularly on the northern coast.

Representatives at Univisión, Mambí's corporate owner, had no comment.

WPMF-TV is a small, low-power TV affiliate of the Azteca América network, owned by Mexico's TV Azteca. The station is carried on local cable systems, as well as DirecTV and over the air. It was selected because it is carried on DirecTV Latin America, which is pirated in Cuba, Hart said.

Landín and Jorge De Cárdenas, a marketing consultant to the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, are former business partners. State corporate records show De Cárdenas and Landín were partners in Creative Developers, a real estate investment company that dissolved in 1980. They also had a 30-year business relationship, De Cárdenas said, when Landín sold radio time to De Cárdenas, then an advertising executive, to place ads for his clients.

De Cárdenas said a 2003 consultant report for the Office of Cuba Broadcasting recommended using radio stations around the Caribbean to transmit Radio and TV Martí. That never happened, but the idea remained.

Calls to Pedro Roig, director of the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, weren't returned Tuesday.

VIOLATION OF LAW

Former Director Herminio San Roman, who ran the operation from 1997 to 2001, said the Martís transmitted via a Miami station, WCMQ, in the late 1980s for several months. But an attorney for the U.S. Information Agency found such transmissions violated the law, he said. He could not provide a copy of the opinion.

This is not the first time the U.S. government has contracted U.S.-based radio stations to air its propaganda, said John Nichols, associate dean of Pennsylvania State University's College of Communications.

During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, the government leased time on private radio stations in South Florida and as far away as New Orleans to beam Voice of America into Cuba.

And in September 1987, Radio Mambí and WQBA-AM La Cubanísima rebroadcast a Martí interview with Cuban defector Florentino Azpillaga Lombard after U.S. officials did not make him available to U.S. media.

Nichols noted that using the Miami stations to broadcast overseas violates international law because they are licensed to serve only U.S. audiences. Cuba has long complained to international telecommunications authorities about the Martís.

''This gives more fuel to the Cuban government's position,'' he said.

The hearings are almost certain to be politically charged. Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Arizona, a longtime critic of the Martís, said Tuesday that the transmissions over the Miami stations appeared to be legally fuzzy.

Tape contradicts Ros-Lehtinen

The director of a documentary on Fidel Castro says he's awaiting an apology from Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who had accused him of distorting her comments.

By Pablo Bachelet, pbachelet@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Wed, Dec. 20, 2006

WASHINGTON - An Emmy Award-winning documentarian, angered over Miami Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen's charge that a video in which she appears to endorse the assassination of Fidel Castro was altered to make her look more extreme, is circulating another version of the video to make his case.

The uncut version of director Dollan Cannell's video shows Ros-Lehtinen twice welcoming an attempt on Castro's life.

''Ileana Ros-Lehtinen has made a very serious accusation against the team who made the films,'' Cannell said Tuesday. "You can't get more serious than that in terms of an accusation of gross professional wrongdoing.

''Her accusation is completely, totally false,'' he added. "I'd like her to retract what she said and to apologize.''

Ros-Lehtinen, an ardent Castro opponent, declined to comment Tuesday on the unedited tape.

But the Republican lawmaker probably has not heard the last of her statements that on video appear to welcome the communist leader's assassination.

The British documentary 638 Ways to Kill Castro is to be released on DVD ''around the New Year,'' Cannell told The Miami Herald by phone. A broadcast on the Sundance Channel is also planned.

The five-minute video, which has been posted on the MiamiHerald.com website, shows Ros-Lehtinen seated at her desk, listening to an off-mike question and welcoming the opportunity of being in a free Cuba "whether that meant that somebody killed Fidel Castro or whether somebody toppled his government.''

According to a transcript of the 45-minute interview released by the filmmakers, the interviewer compared an opportunity to kill Castro with one to eliminate Hitler in 1939. "And I'm just wondering in terms of Fidel Castro, is there an argument for assassination or an argument that would have said, maybe this guy should have been killed or should be killed?''

''I would never compare any demon to Hitler,'' Ros-Lehtinen responded. "He is in a special category of hell.''

She then goes on to utter the words that earlier appeared on a 28-second version of the interview that made the rounds on Youtube.com, the video-sharing website, and has been repeatedly played by TV stations in Miami.

''I welcome the opportunity of having anyone assassinate Fidel Castro and any leader who is oppressing the people,'' Ros-Lehtinen says in the video clip.

The lawmaker, who will become the ranking Republican member of the House International Relations Committee when Congress reconvenes next month, told The Miami Herald when the earlier version of the interview appeared that it was "twisted in a way that gives the viewer a totally wrong impression.''

''I've said the community has moved on, that those strategies are not being used today,'' she said, "but apparently the filmmakers think we're still in a '60s mentality.''

The five-minute tape shows her qualifying her comments by saying that "if they don't assassinate him and bring him to trial, I welcome the opportunity to have him meet a jury of his peers and answer.''

The transcript then moves on to other topics.

The British 75-minute version of 638 Ways to Kill Castro is touted as a "50-year-long detective thriller about the man who always got away.''

The DVD version of the film will include 75 minutes of extra material, including the interviews with Ros-Lehtinen and former President Jimmy Carter, who, Cannell says, has an "entirely honorable role in this story.''

Those interviews were cut from the UK broadcast because of time constraints.

''So much story to tell in such a short time, we decided to focus on people who've been directly involved in assassination attempts against Castro,'' Cannell said.

In years past, Castro was the target of several U.S.-sponsored assassination attempts.

The Ros-Lehtinen interview was conducted in March, before the July 31 announcement by the Cuban government that Castro was sick and was temporarily transfering his powers to his brother Raúl and a group of select advisors.

Couple strikes plea deal in Castro 'spy' case

A couple who worked at Florida International University pleaded guilty to reduced charges in a Cuban government 'spy' case.

By Jay Weaver. jweaver@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Wed, Dec. 20, 2006

Almost one year after his arrest jolted Miami, former Florida International University professor Carlos Alvarez pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring to be an unregistered agent who informed on the Cuban exile community for the communist government of Fidel Castro.

His wife, Elsa, an FIU counselor on leave, also pleaded guilty in federal court in Miami to being aware of his illegal activity, harboring him and failing to disclose it to authorities.

The Alvarezes averted a difficult jury trial next month on the more serious, previous charge of being Cuban agents who did not register with the U.S. government, an offense that carries up to 10 years in prison.

The plea deals were struck after a judge decided to allow a major piece of incriminating evidence at trial -- Carlos Alvarez's ''confession'' last year to the FBI of his collaboration with Cuban intelligence agents, including use of a home computer, encrypted disks and travel to the island.

''The entire case against Dr. Alvarez came from his own mouth,'' defense lawyer Steven Chaykin said outside the courthouse. He argued that his client told FBI agents ''everything he did'' after they dangled a ''promise'' to leave him alone if he told the truth.

Both Chaykin and Elsa Alvarez's lawyer, Jane Moscowitz, stressed to reporters that their clients ''never sought to do any harm to anyone in this community.'' Chaykin said his client was simply trying to work toward lifting the U.S. embargo against Cuba through exchange programs -- an ''idealism'' infused with ''naiveté'' that ''ensnared'' him in the Cuban intelligence service.

Prosecutors condemned the Alvarezes' felony activities with Cuba's hostile regime.

''Today's guilty pleas serve as a stark reminder that there are among us some who, while enjoying the freedom and liberty our great nation offers, continue to serve the interests of another master,'' U.S. Attorney R. Alexander Acosta said.

The plea agreements, approved by U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore, mean that Carlos Alvarez faces up to five years in prison and his wife, Elsa, up to three years at their sentencing, which is set for Feb. 27. Carlos, who has been held at the Miami Federal Detention Center since his arrest in January, smiled and blew kisses to a half-dozen supporters in the courtroom. His wife, who was released on a $400,000 bond by the judge in June, remained stoic.

Alvarez, 61, was a longtime FIU psychology professor who formally resigned on Nov. 22, according to a school spokeswoman. His wife, Elsa, 56, was placed on a leave of absence without pay on Nov. 3.

The couple, who have five children, had been on paid administrative leave.

The FBI began targeting the couples' activities in 2001, when the agency installed a hidden microphone in the bedroom of their Miami-Dade home.

In the summer of 2005, two FBI agents picked up Carlos Alvarez at a local Publix and took him to a hotel, where he detailed his ''conspiracy'' with Cuban agents.

On Tuesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Axelrod, aided by prosecutor Brian Frazier, depicted the Alvarezes in distinctly different roles.

Axelrod said Carlos Alvarez's involvement with the Cuba intelligence service began in 1977, noting he gathered information in Miami "on prominent people, community attitudes, political developments and current events of interest to the Cuban government.''

Among the exiles under surveillance: FIU president Modesto ''Mitch'' Maidique. He declined to comment.

Axelrod revealed a web of technology, secrets and cover-ups that would have been presented at trial.

''Alvarez received these instructions through personal meetings, messages written on water-soluble paper, coded pager messages and encrypted electronic communications,'' he told the judge. "The electronic communications involved shortwave radio messages from the Cuban intelligence service, which Alvarez decrypted using a computer disk.''

Alvarez then gathered the requested information and compiled written reports, which he encrypted using another computer disk. Alvarez signed these reports with his code name, "David.''

''Alvarez mailed these reports to various post office boxes in New York,'' then destroyed the evidence, Axelrod said.

Communication between Alvarez and his co-conspirators ''ceased'' when the U.S. attorney's office in Miami charged 10 suspects with espionage in the so-called Wasp spy case in 1998.

The prosecutor said Elsa Alvarez became aware of her husband's ''conspiracy'' in 1982. He said her role ''helped conceal the true nature of his activities'' -- until July 2005, when she spoke to the FBI.

Elsa Alvarez's lawyer, Moscowitz, said her client "was very concerned for Carlos.''

Radio, TV Martí to be aired locally

U.S. audiences will be able to get news from TV and Radio Martí via two South Florida stations, despite a law that generally prohibits distribution in the United States.

By Christina Hoag, choag@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Tue, Dec. 19, 2006

Taxpayer-funded TV and Radio Martí are spending $377,500 to air select programs on South Florida broadcast stations over the next six months, using loopholes in a law that prohibits the propaganda channels from distribution within the United States.

The deals appear to be the first of their kind between the Martís and private commercial stations with mostly U.S. audiences. The stations -- Univisión's Radio Mambí 710 AM and WPMF-TV 38, the Azteca América affiliate owned by TVC Broadcasting -- technically can reach Cuba.

The agreements come at a time when Fidel Castro, Cuba's longtime leader, is thought to be dying. The Cuban government jams Martí transmissions directly to the island, but experts said the signal from a South Florida AM radio station can get there, very clearly at night. And WPMF-TV, an over-the-air station, can be seen by Cubans with satellite dishes.

''It's another method to get our signal in,'' Pedro Roig, director of the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which runs the Martís, said on Radio Mambí Monday. Roig estimated that 30,000 Cubans can receive satellite TV. "It's a decision taken at the White House.''

Critics, however, noted that a Cuban audience for either station is only an infinitesimal fraction of their South Florida audience, and both stations are clearly aimed at South Floridians.

''It certainly sounds like it's inconsistent with the spirit of the federal law,'' said John Nichols, associate dean of Pennsylvania State University's College of Communication. He is a longtime monitor -- and critic -- of the Martís.

Joe García, executive vice president of the New Democratic Network, said he was outraged. Radio Mambí, known for its virulent anti-Castro commentary, is blocked in Cuba, he said.

''This is a fraud,'' García said. "This is using taxpayer dollars for a political payoff to benefit the most Republican and politically charged radio station in Miami. They know well that the station isn't heard in Cuba, because Cuba transmits Radio Rebelde over the exact same frequency.''

Ninoska Perez, a commentator for Radio Mambí, declined to talk to The Miami Herald. Mambí general manager Claudia Puig did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

TV and Radio Martí, and other U.S. government-funded media such as Voice of America, are prohibited by law from airing in the United States because their content is designed for foreign audiences. The Martí programs -- which include documentaries, comedies, interviews and talk shows -- are aimed at balancing the information Cubans on the island receive from their government, which restricts press access, with the viewpoints of the U.S. government.

However, there are exceptions to the prohibition, said Larry Hart, a spokesman for the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which oversees the Martís.

''We believe we have the authority to do this,'' Hart said. He added that the deals were made after extensive consultation with the congressional committees overseeing the Martís.

According to the act governing Radio Martí, the U.S. government is allowed to lease time on the AM band to overcome significant signal-jamming by the Cuban government.

The provision for the TV Martí broadcasts is far less clear. The Broadcasting Board of Governors appears to be relying upon a paragraph in the law that terms dissemination in the United States illegal unless "such dissemination is inadvertent.''

Hart likened inadvertent dissemination to a person in the United States picking up Radio Martí on a shortwave. However, in the case of WPMF-TV, South Floridians are not ''inadvertently'' tuning into the station, they are the station's main audience.

Hart noted that the law was written before the advent of new technology, such as satellite and the Internet.

On Radio Mambí Monday morning, Jorge Luis Hernández, director of broadcast operations for the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, said the White House pushed to have the Martís broadcast using local stations in Miami.

''The U.S. government has decided that DirecTV, as of today, is a new way for TV Martí to broadcast,'' he said.

Under the six-month contracts, Mambí will earn $182,500 to carry Radio Martí from midnight to 1 a.m. nightly.

WPMF-TV will earn $195,000 to air TV Martí's half-hour news programs at 6:30 p.m. and 11 p.m., plus one-minute news briefs from noon to midnight. WPMF may pick up Saturday programming as well, said general manager Enrique Landín.

''We're hoping that Cuba will pick up the signal on DirecTV and Dish network,'' said Landín, who is Cuban. "The newscast is well done. It's not too political and it's very informative.''

Miami Herald staff writer Oscar Corral contributed to this report.

Problems dog broadcaster

The most recent analysis of the Office of Cuba Broadcasting found some programs have let bias creep in.

By Oscar Corral, ocorral@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Tue, Dec. 19, 2006

Almost four years ago, an Inspector General's audit ripped TV and Radio Martí bosses for improper hiring practices. The director resigned under a barrage of criticism for cronyism and patronage. Programming needed an overhaul to curtail bias, a separate study concluded.

Miami's powerful Cuban-American congressional leaders looked to local lawyer Pedro Roig to turn the operation around.

Today, many of the problems that have dogged the Martí broadcasters for two decades remain. A miniscule number of people in Cuba hear or see the broadcasts. The Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which oversees the Martí operation, is once again beset by scandal -- a top executive was indicted last month on a kickback-for-contracts scheme.

Roig -- who turned in the executive to investigators -- says his goal has been to improve and diversify programming by contracting the best talent available.

''What interests us is professional content. All these people I see here are magnificent professionals, and it gives me great pride to know that we can have people of this caliber in Radio and TV Martí,'' Roig said. "It's a magnificent rainbow.''

Roig, 66, set out to clean up a government-financed media operation plagued with low morale, allegations of cronyism -- but still highly paid. OCB salaries are higher than those at other U.S. government-financed media.

One of Roig's first hires: his wife's nephew, Alberto Mascaro, as chief of staff. His salary: more than $100,000 a year. Mascaro had no media management experience.

''I was an international business manager for a Fortune 500 industrial parts and supply company,'' he told The Miami Herald.

This year, Roig tapped Luis Zuñiga, a former political prisoner and the executive director of the Cuban Liberty Council (CLC), to run ''special projects.'' Yearly salary: $100,000. Zuñiga had no media management experience.

Zuñiga said he is qualified because he has a bachelor's degree in business from Florida International University. He also helped the Cuban American National Foundation launch a radio show to Cuba -- before he and a group of hard-liners split because they felt CANF had gone soft on Fidel Castro.

Roig said several ''very qualified'' people applied for Zuñiga's position, which he said posted publicly.

CLC Treasurer Feliciano Foyo said Roig recruited Zuñiga: "We found out from Roig, who told us he was interested in Luis and wanted us to agree with an offer he had for him.''

A Bay of Pigs veteran and historian, Roig concedes he lacked media management experience when got the OCB job in 2003.

Roig sought help from Herbert Levin, a veteran radio executive who already had a $5,000, no-bid contract with OCB to help Radio Martí boost its signal to Cuba. Levin got that contract three months after the U.S. Senate confirmed Joaquin Blaya, his former business partner at Radio Unica, to the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which oversees OCB.

Salvador Lew, OCB's former director, said Blaya did not sway his decision to give Levin the original contract. Blaya said he did not get involved. Levin's company won subsequent contracts by competitive bid.

With Roig at the helm, Levin partnered with Jorge De Cárdenas, a popular advertising executive convicted on obstruction of justice charges in the late 1990s in a Miami corruption case. De Cárdenas said he and Roig are longtime friends who have run political campaigns together, but that their friendship did not help him or Levin get OCB work.

Roig said he did not tell Levin to hire De Cárdenas, who has acted as a media liaison to Roig and interviews new arrivals from Cuba to help shape programming.

''I paid my dues to society, and I have a right to make a living,'' De Cárdenas said. Roig said De Cárdenas does not need security clearance to enter Martí headquarters -- as required for employees and contractors -- because he goes there as a visitor.

Spanish Radio Productions Inc., owned by Levin, has received more than $210,000 since 2003 to overhaul programming.

Despite having dozens of U.S.-paid journalists on staff, OCB has spent about $1 million since 2001 to contract at least 49 other news gatherers who also work or freelance at major media outlets in Miami. Several have reported on TV and Radio Martí for their local news organizations.

Joe Garcia -- a former CANF director and now vice president of the New Democratic Network, which helps Democrats recruit Hispanic voters -- said paying local journalists gives the appearance that OCB is trying to buy off criticism.

Roig and his predecessor, Lew, say they hire local journalists to improve programming: ''No one is asked, and it has never been a point of discussion with anyone to defend or protect a certain policy viewpoint,'' said Roig, adding that contract journalists are hired without bidding, based on their talents.

Lew jokingly said OCB policy had resulted in contracts going to "half the Miami phone book.''

OCB's contracts, hiring practices and salary scale have come under fire for two decades. In 1985, in a funding debate on the floor of the U.S. House, critics of Radio Martí called it a ''gold-plated operation'' for its lavish salaries.

Roig says he has moved to bring contractor salaries in line with federal requirements, reducing payments for half-hour shows to between $75 and $125 per show. During Lew's tenure, some contractors earned as much as $400 an hour.

Bias in some programming persists, though objectivity overall continues to improve, according to two recent evaluations by the International Broadcasting Bureau's Office of Performance Review.

Program quality reports done this summer for TV Martí and for Radio Martí found many news and entertainment shows met U.S. guidelines for balance and fairness, but bias and vulgarity crept into some shows, and selection of guests or contract hosts seemed out of place for topics covered in other shows. Quality reports come out every year or two.

The analysis found one show in particular, La Oficina del Jefe, which spoofs a decrepit Fidel Castro, to be funny but sometimes ''vulgar'' and to inordinately poke fun at the Afro-Cuban religion of Santeria. It also found bias among a few news shows hosted by contractors.

A presidential advisory board was created to guide Martí policy and provide oversight. Yet it has not met in the six years of Bush's presidency, BBG officials say, for lack of a quorum.

The nine-member board is supposed to act as a check and balance for Martí, but several members say they haven't been called to meet.

Asked why the board hasn't met, White House spokesman Blair Jones said in an e-mail:"The president has concentrated primarily on putting key personnel in place on the Broadcasting Board of Governors and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting and remains focused on empowering Radio and TV Martí so they are able to broadcast a message of freedom and democracy to the Cuban people.''

''Radio and TV Martí are more under the influence of the exile community than Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty were from European emigrés,'' said Ross Johnson, who ran Radio Free Europe from 1988 to 1991. "Radio Free Europe fought those battles in the 1950s and established their distance from the emigrés.''

The exile community consolidated its control over the Martí operation when Congress and the Clinton administration, in the run-up to the 1996 election and under pressure from CANF founder Jorge Mas Canosa and other exiles, agreed to move the stations from Washington to Miami.

The OCB building in Miami-Dade is named after Mas Canosa.

''It can be negative if it affects the objectivity of the reporting and keeping your distance from the story,'' Johnson said of exile influence.

"It can also affect objectivity if the emigré community affects who gets hired and promoted.''

Roig said politics doesn't influence OCB. "No one has broken the firewall. We are totally independent.''

Fake money prompts issuance of new bills in Cuba

In a mission to combat fake currency, Cuba has introduced a new line of peso bills with tougher security measures.

By Miami Herald Staff, cuba@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Tue, Dec. 19, 2006

In line at a Havana currency exchange house recently, 62-year-old Carlos suddenly saw the customer in front of him dash out at top speed as he heard the teller shout, "Stop, chico! This is a fake!''

''The guy took off running,'' said Carlos, a newspaper vendor whose last name was withheld by The Miami Herald for fear of reprisals. "The guards went after him and probably wherever he got the counterfeits from.

'SHARP AS A KNIFE'

"No one passes fake bills off on me. I'm as sharp as a knife with that.''

Responding to increasing reports of false convertible peso bills in Cuba, the Central Bank on Monday announced a new series of bills with enhanced security features. The bills are worthless anywhere else in the world, but are the main tender used for most shopping on the island.

The new bills will include the denomination in the watermark, adding the value next to the hidden image of patriot José Martí.

The back of each bill will also have a new picture, depending on its value. For example, the one-peso bill will show a picture of Martí's combat death; the three-peso bill, a picture of the 1958 battle of Santa Clara, in which rebels scored a victory over Batista's regime; the five-peso bill, a picture of the protest at Baragua in the struggle for independence from Spain.

'FATHERLAND OR DEATH!'

The bills maintain the security thread that reads "Fatherland or death! We shall overcome!''

The Cuban government first introduced the convertible peso in 1994, shortly after legalizing the U.S. dollar. The greenback was pulled off the market in 2004, making the so-called ''cuc'' the most widely used legal tender on the island and the only way to buy most consumer goods.

It is worth $1.08 but cannot be exchanged anywhere but in Cuba.

The Cuban government has denounced the use of fake bills as an exile-driven plot to destroy the Cuban economy. During a 1999 terrorism trial in Cuba, a self-proclaimed spy for the Cuban government testified that a Cuban American National Foundation board member gave him thousands of fake pesos to dump on the Cuban economy.

Some stores in Cuba keep a log of shoppers' names and ID numbers in case a 50-peso or 100-peso bill turns up fake.

''I saw a fake five cuc once given to a vendor last year,'' said Lorenzo, who works in a bookstore. "But that is really, really rare. You're more likely to see a fake $100 American bill. Our bills are hard to copy.''

But several waiters, taxi drivers and currency exchange tellers in Havana said although counterfeits are uncommon, they pop up sporadically.

'CUBANS KNOW'

''We have gotten fakes, mostly from tourists who don't know any better,'' said Damián, a waiter. "Cubans know what to look for.''

The new bills will circulate alongside the old ones until the older bills are gradually withdrawn, Cuba's daily paper Granma reported.

The Miami Herald withheld the name of the correspondent who filed this report because the author lacked the Cuban journalist visa required to work on the island.

TV and Radio Martí face another audit

By Oscar Corral, ocorral@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Mon, Dec. 18, 2006

Inside a heavily guarded, three-story building in an industrial section of West Miami-Dade, Radio and TV Martí spent $37 million this year to crank out news and entertainment that few Cubans on the communist island ever hear or see.

U.S. funding has remained generous despite Cuba's persistent jamming of TV Martí signals, plummeting numbers of listeners for Radio Martí and two federal audits -- in 1999 and 2003 -- that found a repeated history of cronyism and ''inappropriate and inadequate'' hiring practices at the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which oversees the operation.

OCB has spent $250 million in the past 10 years to reach Cuban listeners and viewers -- by far the largest expenditure per listener or viewer among U.S.-government financed broadcasts.

''As a taxpayer and as a government official, the money has not been well spent [on TV Martí],'' said Otto Reich, former Undersecretary of State for the Western Hemisphere, who stressed he supports Radio and TV Martí's mission because if the U.S. broadcasts could reach more Cubans, they could help spark Democratic change.

OCB Director Pedro Roig says TV Martí turned the corner in August when U.S. flights resumed, in an attempt to overcome Cuba's jamming of TV signals.

''I believe in what I'm doing,'' said Roig. "The best way to help people attain democracy in Cuba is to give them the information they need.''

Despite Roig's focus on improving the Martí operation, OCB faced embarrassing news last month: Federal prosecutors indicted a senior TV Martí executive in a kickback-for-contracts scheme. The Inspector General's Office has launched a broad look at OCB operations, searching for fraud, mismanagement and misuse of taxpayer dollars.

An investigation by The Miami Herald of OCB spending records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act found:

o TV Martí spent more than $10 million this past fiscal year to produce and broadcast programming unseen by the vast majority of Cuba's 11 million citizens. A military plane tasked with trying to counteract Cuba's jamming of TV Martí was reassigned to Iraq last year. After about a nine-month absence, the U.S. contracted a private plane to fly daily in August, following Cuba's announcement that strongman Fidel Castro was ceding power to his brother, Raúl.

ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE

Martí administrators offer only anecdotal evidence that the plane occasionally penetrates Cuba's aggressive jamming. An independent survey of viewership conducted by a government contractor in June 2005 found TV broadcasts reached about 9,000 Cubans -- just one-tenth of one percent of the island's adult population of 8.9 million on a weekly basis. Results of a new government-financed survey will be available in the coming months.

o OCB spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on its website, but even at the height of Castro's announcement that he had undergone surgery, only 388 of the 422,647 hits on Radio and TV Martí's website that month came from Cuba, according to Jorge Luis Hernandez, OCB director of broadcast operations. In November, martinoticias.com received 135 hits from Cuba.

OCB bosses admit that few Cubans, except high-ranking government officials, have access to satellite broadcasts or broadband Internet. It is illegal in Cuba to have an unauthorized satellite antenna. Nor can most Cubans afford one.

o Even though OCB employed 149 people as of January -- with an average annual salary of $79,795 and with 18 of them earning six-figure salaries -- it spent more than $2 million of its budget to hire about 200 contractors to host shows or provide other services, such as technical support. Among those benefiting from a lucrative contract is a convicted felon who is a longtime friend of Roig.

Contractors include at least 49 journalists and commentators also working for South Florida Spanish-language media -- among them Channel 41, Telemundo, Univision and, until recently, El Nuevo Herald. In all, OCB spent $11 million on contractors since 2001.

A 2003 Inspector General audit of OCB found cronyism in hiring and an overreliance on local journalists -- the latter left experienced Martí journalists idle for chunks of their day, which contributed to sagging employee morale, raised security concerns and wasted taxpayers' money. Roig said he did end some contracts, while adding others, and also has moved some projects in-house.

UNPAID JOURNALISTS

o Independent journalists in Cuba who provide 10 to 40 percent of Radio Martí's news programming on any given day are not paid. The reason: to protect Cuban journalists from being charged as ''mercenaries'' and imprisoned by the communist government.

Yet U.S.-financed Radio Free Asia, which broadcasts into communist countries, such as China, pays its freelance reporters, even though they, too, face ''grave repercussions'' from the governments they cover, said RFA spokeswoman Sarah Jackson-Han.

''No one wants to talk about money, but we deserve to get paid for the work we do,'' said Jaime Leygonier, an independent journalist in Cuba who reports for Radio Martí. "To take the economic anguish away from the opposition is huge. I see it not as money, but as ammunition, as though we were in a war and our supporters were throwing us bullets.''

Even Radio and TV Martí's defenders in the Bush administration and Congress have questioned spending millions to produce TV programs that Cuba systematically blocks.

''It was like a bone that was thrown at the Cuban-American community to pretend that there was this TV Martí operation with studios and interviews and programs going to Cuba,'' said Reich, who made his comments before the daily plane flights began in August to transmit broadcasts.

LIMITED REACH

For months, TV Martí broadcast only from a Spanish satellite of limited reach because the plane was reassigned to Iraq. That plane had replaced a blimp destroyed off the Florida Keys by a hurricane in 2005. Current flights are trying to overcome Cuba's jamming in Havana and central and western Cuba of TV Martí signals for five hours every night.

Under Roig, viewership has continued to plunge -- just one of 1,500 Cubans polled by the government in 2005 said they were able to see TV Martí -- and radio's weekly audience has dropped from 1.7 percent of Cuba's adult population in 2003 to 1.2 percent last year. Broadcasting Board of Governors spokesman Joe O'Connell said the drop was not "statistically significant.''

GAUGING INFLUENCE

Gauging the broadcasts' influence in Cuba remains a challenge. Cubans reached by phone may be reluctant to admit they see or hear the broadcasts, fearing retribution from the communist government.

The Herald contacted 10 random Cuban households in December and found no one willing to admit they hear Radio Martí or get the TV signal.

''I don't get that here. We don't listen to that stuff in this house,'' said Maylen, who lives in Holguin. She declined to give her last name.

However, 10 dissidents contacted in Havana said they hear Radio Martí, mostly on shortwave radio, and that the Cuban government's jamming has grown worse since August.

TV reception remains virtually nonexistent, they said, even with the U.S. flights -- unless they watch the TV programming on the Internet site of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

''Up to now, I have not been able to see TV Martí, but Radio Martí you can catch,'' human rights activist Elizardo Sanchez said Friday by telephone from Havana. "The country is listening.''

Dissidents said Radio Martí fulfills a critical role.

''The government has kidnapped the media,'' said Laura Pollan of Havana. "We need other points of views so we can make our own analysis of what's going on in the world and here.''

The stagnant, if not slipping, audience numbers worry OCB's defenders as a new, Democrat-controlled Congress may try to cut the budget.

OCB leaders have taken to local airwaves to defend Martí's mission -- and its budget -- at a critical juncture when Castro is said to be on his death bed.

Hernandez -- a former city of Miami spokesman -- was on a Miami Cuban radio station recently warning that critics in Washington would try to slash the Martí budget. He called the OCB's $37 million budget "a drop in the Pacific Ocean.''

Attempting to show that a growing number of Cubans can watch TV Martí, he produced taped calls with unidentified dissidents and others who spoke about Martí-produced shows they had seen or heard in Cuba.

'IMPORTANT ROLE'

U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart did not answer a reporter's question Friday about whether the U.S. government can do anything more to improve Martí operations, instead saying the broadcasts play an important role.

''Radio and TV Martí will play a significant role in providing the Cuban people with vital information on the pro-democracy movement's efforts throughout the island to bring about democratic change,'' Díaz-Balart said in an e-mail through a spokeswoman.

Records show that in 2005 Radio Martí -- which is best heard on shortwave radio that bypasses Cuba's jamming -- spent about 250 times more money to reach a listener in Cuba than the U.S. spent to reach listeners through Middle East Broadcasting Networks, Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

For TV Martí, reaching a viewer was 1,500 times more expensive than for those other U.S. broadcasters.

Despite transmitting challenges and ghost broadcasts, Roig doubled the number of TV shows this year, and some of TV and Radio Martí's contractors' hours were extended, he said -- all in an effort to broaden the appeal of programming to a younger and more diverse Cuban audience.

He has added lifestyle and comedy shows to the mix of news, sports and political analysis -- and produced shows offering opinions by more Afro-Cubans living on the island or abroad.

''We always thought the [plane] was going to come back,'' Roig said. 'And what do you say? What do you do with your employees -- send them home? . . . When I saw that situation, I said, 'Let's prepare for the daily plane flights.' ''

Miami Herald staff writers Gladys Amador, Alfonso Chardy and Breanne Gilpatrick contributed to this report.

Analysis finds bias in TV, Radio Martí programs

By Oscar Corral, ocorral@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Mon, Dec. 18, 2006

Miami's powerful Cuban-American congressional leaders looked to local lawyer Pedro Roig to turn the operation around.

Roig -- who turned in the executive to investigators -- says his goal has been to improve and diversify programming by contracting the best talent available.

Roig, 66, set out to clean up a government-financed media operation beset with low morale, allegations of cronyism -- but still highly paid. OCB salaries are higher than those at other U.S. government-financed media.

One of Roig's first hires: his wife's nephew, Alberto Mascaro, as chief of staff. His salary: more than $100,000 a year. Mascaro had no media management experience.

''I was an international business manager for a Fortune 500 industrial parts and supply company,'' he told The Miami Herald.

Roig said several ''very qualified'' people applied for Zuñiga's position, which he said posted publicly.

CLC Treasurer Feliciano Foyo said Roig recruited Zuñiga: "We found out from Roig, who told us he was interested in Luis and wanted us to agree with an offer he had for him.''

A Bay of Pigs veteran and historian, Roig concedes he lacked media management experience when got the OCB job in 2003.

Roig said he did not tell Levin to hire De Cárdenas, who has acted as a media liaison to Roig and interviews new arrivals from Cuba to help shape programming.

Spanish Radio Productions Inc., owned by Levin, has received more than $210,000 since 2003 to overhaul programming.

Joe Garcia -- a former CANF chairman and now vice president of the New Democratic Network, which helps Democrats recruit Hispanic voters -- said paying local journalists gives the appearance that OCB is trying to buy off criticism.

Roig and his predecessors, Lew, say they hire local journalists to improve programming: ''No one is asked, and it has never been a point of discussion with anyone to defend or protect a certain policy viewpoint,'' said Roig, adding that contract journalists are hired without bidding, based on their talents.

Lew jokingly said OCB policy had resulted in contracts going to "half the Miami phone book.''

Bias in some programming persists, though objectivity overall continues to improve, according to two recent evaluations by the International Broadcasting Bureau's Office of Performance Review.

Program quality reports done this summer for TV Martí and for Radio Martí found many news and entertainment shows met U.S. guidelines for balance and fairness, but bias and vulgarity crept into some shows, and the selection of guests or contract hosts seemed out of place for topics covered in other shows. Quality reports are published every year or two.

OCB has a presidential advisory board, which was created to guide Martí policy and provide oversight. Yet it has not met in the six years of Bush's presidency, White House officials say, for lack of a quorum.

The nine-member board is supposed to act as a checks and balance for Martí, but several board members say they haven't been called to meet. Robert McKinney, 80, a former radio station owner and current member of OCB's advisory board, said the board could provide helpful programming advice now that Castro has ceded power to his brother Raúl.

''It's been disappointing,'' he said.

Asked why the board hasn't met, White House spokesman Blair Jones said in an e-mail:"The President has concentrated primarily on putting key personnel in place on the Broadcasting Board of Governors and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting and remains focused on empowering Radio and TV Martí so they are able to broadcast a message of freedom and democracy to the Cuban people.''

The U.S. government has a long tradition of using broadcasting to promote democracy, most notably in Eastern Europe during the Cold War with Radio Free Europe. The OCB and the Washington-based Voice of America operate as part of the U.S. government, and not as an independent nonprofit. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia, and Middle East Broadcasting Networks all operate as nonprofits with public funds, but independent of federal government control.

''Radio and TV Martí are more under the influence of the exile community than Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty were from European emigrés,'' said Ross Johnson, who ran Radio Free Europe from 1988 to 1991, as the Cold War ended. "Radio Free Europe fought those battles in the 1950s and established their distance from the emigrés.''

''It can be negative if it affects the objectivity of the reporting and keeping your distance from the story,'' Johnson said of exile influence. "It can also affect objectivity if the emigré community affects who gets hired and promoted.''

Roig said politics don't influence OCB. "No one has broken the firewall. We are totally independent.''

Migrants say Cuba is slow to issue exit visas

A group of Cuban migrants talks about their successful trip back to Florida on a homemade boat -- almost a year after they were repatriated because they had landed on an old bridge.

By Elias E. Lopez, elopez@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Sun, Dec. 17, 2006

Reunited and relieved.

That summed up the sentiments of a group of Cuban migrants who went before a cluster of microphones and television cameras Saturday to talk about their successful journey to U.S. soil -- nearly a year after the U.S. government had returned them to Cuba in a controversial decision that angered many in Miami's Cuban exile community.

''We're very happy to be here,'' said Marino Hernández, 42. "We were never afraid, we just decided to do it.''

Hernández was among nine Cuban migrants who made it to shore in a homemade boat on Friday. The group landed in the Florida Keys, just south of the Seven Mile Bridge.

Hernandez and 14-year-old Osmiel were reunited with Mariela Conesa, of Hialeah, who had not seen her husband and son in almost nine years.

''He's already a man,'' said Conesa, 36, rubbing her son's shoulders at the press conference. "He's braver than I ever was.''

The reunification of the family brought to an end a long odyssey that began in the predawn hours of Jan. 4 when Hernández and Osmiel first landed on a piling of the Old Flagler Bridge near Marathon with 13 other Cubans.

What they didn't realize is that they and the others would become entwined in an immigration debate centered around the wet-foot/dry-foot policy, which was adopted in 1994 by the Clinton administration to deal with the Cuban rafter exodus.

Under the policy, Cuban migrants who reach U.S. soil are allowed to stay and apply for residency, but those intercepted at sea are generally returned to Cuba.

Federal officials determined that the bridge, not connected to land, was a structure and not part of U.S. territory.

As a result, the Cubans were repatriated, setting off a legal battle. The migrants ultimately won the fight earlier this year, when a federal judge found that the U.S. government erred and that the bridge was part of the United States.

Since the judge's decision, U.S. and Cuban officials have been negotiating the return of the migrants. But some of the migrants who arrived Friday said they saw no choice but to attempt the journey again because they claimed the Cuban government was dragging its feet in providing them exit permits.

''The Cuban government forced us to do it,'' said Tomás Perdomo, a Cuban dissident. "I wanted to come the legal way.''

''This is a testimony of the tragedy of the Cuban people,'' added Ramón Saúl Sánchez, who heads Movimiento Democracia, which organized the news conference and provided the migrants with attorneys.

Several members of the group who reached the Keys in January are still in Cuba, including Elizabeth Hernández, her husband Yunior Alexis Blanco and their 3-year-old son.

''We're very happy that they made it,'' said Elizabeth Hernández in a telephone conversation from her home in San Francisco, a small town in Cuba's Matanzas province. "Now we're hopeful that the Cuban government would expedite our permits . . . because I know how dangerous is the sea and we think it's logical to wait and not to risk the life of our son.''

Life as Castro's daughter-in-law

Idalmis Menéndez, who now lives in Spain, provides a rare and sometimes surprising up-close view of life in Fidel's household.

By Lisa Abend, Special to The Miami Herald. Posted on Sun, Dec. 17, 2006

BARCELONA, Spain - Idalmis Menéndez can't help but smile when she recalls meeting her first husband.

Visiting an aunt on the outskirts of Havana, she was startled when a young man appeared in the patio, smelling of fresh dough and tomato sauce. ''He told me he was a pizza maker,'' she giggles. "And that he adored my hair. It was love at first sight.''

Menéndez quickly learned his name was Alex, but it took awhile before she found out he'd been joking about the pizza. And a couple of weeks passed before she discovered his real identity.

''We were in his car,'' Menéndez recalls, 'and he said, 'I'm Fidel Castro's son.' ''

Twelve years later Menéndez, 34, still takes pleasure in recalling her days with Alex, but her memory is now tinged with anger and resentment. As girlfriend, and then wife to Castro's son, she would be among the privileged few with access to the comandante's famously secretive personal life. But the lively, outspoken woman says she also was subjected to intense pressure and near-Machiavellian manipulation.

In an interview with The Miami Herald, she provided a rare and sometimes surprising up-close view of life in the Castro household -- a warm Fidel and his strong-willed wife, Dalia Sotodelvalle, and the well-off children of his brother, Raúl Castro.

FIRST MEETING

The Havana daughter of a chemist and former schoolteacher, Menéndez studied computer science, took an office job and, at 22, was living at home when she met Alex, then 31, on her aunt's patio in 1994.

Even today, it's easy to see what attracted Alex. Stylishly dressed for this interview in a form-fitting jacket, her thick black hair running midway down her back, Menéndez today gives the impression of someone who speaks her mind clearly and convincingly, without mincing words or exaggerating.

The second-oldest child in the Castro family, Alex is not particularly good-looking -- his family refers to him as El Gordito (an affectionate term roughly translated as ''little fat one'') -- and when Menéndez met him, his personal life was complicated. He was estranged from, but still married to, his first wife, and he had a mistress. Menéndez was smitten nonetheless.

Because Menéndez lived at home, and Alex's first wife Miriam was still living at the Castro compound, the two at first spent a lot of time in Alex's car. Within a few months, however, space in an apartment that Alex's brother Antonio kept for his girlfriend opened, and the two moved in there together. The couple also frequently spent weekends at the Castro vacation home in the beach town of Varadero, although never when Fidel himself was around.

To avoid Fidel was Menéndez's decision. In fact, Alex often invited her on family fishing trips with his father, but she always declined because she was unwilling to curb her opinions.

''I was critical of many things that were being done in our country,'' she says, "and I knew that if I went, I would have to bite my tongue, which would take a lot of work.''

'I JUST LOST IT'

She gave in after her grandfather fell gravely ill with tuberculosis, and Alex accompanied her to visit him at the hospital. She was horrified by the conditions there.

''They didn't even have light bulbs,'' she says. "But they had two photos of Fidel and Raúl on the wall. I just lost it.''

Alex chastised her and said not all of Cuba's problems were Fidel's fault. He challenged her to meet his father and see for herself. She agreed, and Menéndez finally met Fidel at the wedding of one of Alex's four full brothers. Fidel has three other children by different partners.

''Fidel came in after the bride because he's more important,'' she says. "But he came right over to me and introduced himself very warmly.''

At the reception, the two talked at length, and Castro invited her to come live with Alex at Fidel's house. But she still had reservations about moving to the compound.

'I told him, 'My family is very revolutionary, but there are many things I don't like about the revolution, and I've spoken badly of you. I have friends in Miami, and I'm not going to give them up for anything in the world.' ''

Fidel praised her honesty and said there would be no problem as long as she set limits and didn't publicly discuss ''our things,'' says Menéndez. "He told me that by tomorrow he wanted to see me in the house . . . So I went, had lunch, and my life with them began.''

In November of 1995 she moved into the Castro family home in the sprawling, heavily guarded compound, known as Punto Cero, in the western Havana neighborhood of Siboney -- a compound that few Cubans, and even fewer outsiders, have ever visited.

Three of the sons lived with Fidel and Dalia in the four-bedroom main house, an L-shaped structure made up of two houses built by wealthy Cuban families before the Castro revolution's 1959 victory. The houses were abandoned by their owners when they flew abroad afterward and then linked when Fidel moved in, according to Cuban defectors who have been there. The two other sons lived in smaller buildings within the compound.

Although the family lived better than most Cubans, Menéndez said, conditions at the house were hardly luxurious.

'My friends would say, 'Oh, you live in a house with a swimming pool, you eat meat every day,' '' she says. But when she and Alex got married, workers "built him a room on top of the garage. He's a big guy, and he barely fit between the bed and wall. That is not luxury.''

Alex bought his own car, an old white Pontiac, with money he earned from his job as a computer programmer. But the first time Menéndez saw him undressed, she says, "he had holes in his underwear. That is not what you expect of a president's son.''

That kind of paradox helps explain Menéndez's own complicated attitude toward Fidel. She takes issue with some of Fidel's decisions, but not all: She also criticizes U.S. policy toward Cuba, for example. And overall, she admires Fidel's work ethic and dedication to his principles.

She recognizes that her nuanced attitude may not be welcome among Cuban exiles in Miami. Nevertheless, she hopes to be heard, and Spanish-language media officials in Miami say they are negotiating to fly Menéndez to Florida to appear on shows.

Menéndez also doubts that Fidel really has the nearly $1 billion fortune that Forbes magazine recently reported.

''What if this all ends?'' she recalls him saying. "Nothing of this is mine; it all belongs to the state. What my children will get after I go is what the revolution gives them as thanks for my being president. But I will leave nothing to them.''

Menéndez and Alex married in 1997. She wore a white wedding gown given to her by a French friend. Fidel wore his traditional olive green uniform to the reception.

In most ways, life at Punto Cero was simple. Fidel often had breakfast in his pajamas, and he enjoyed the stuffed turkey the cook would prepare for birthdays and other celebrations. One of his great pleasures was playing with his granddaughter Adali, Alex's child from his first marriage.

He also liked conversations with Menéndez. ''Even when we disagreed, he liked talking, because he could tell that I was being sincere with him,'' she says.

One argument erupted when Castro learned that Menéndez had left her government office job to work in tourism -- where she could earn needed U.S. dollars.

'I said to him, 'Look, I have food every day, a glass of milk every day, because you give it to me. But my family doesn't have milk. You don't know what it's like out there.' He listened to me, and he said I was right.''

That openness from Fidel is one reason that Menéndez still feels affection for the man who ruled Cuba for 47 years until he became ill in July and turned over power to Raúl.

'He is egotistical. If he didn't like something, he would pound the table and say, 'Coño, what the hell is this?' But we had a good relationship. He was always affectionate with me.''

RAUL'S HOUSE

Menéndez's respect does not extend to Raúl and his family, who apparently did not live the same relatively austere life that Fidel's family did. Once, she saw how Raúl's children lived.

Fidel's five boys and their wives were in Varadero and went to visit the house where Raúl's children were staying. Most of the Varadero houses now used by senior Cuban government officials were seized when their owners left the country after 1959.

''It was a splendid house, with a lot of servants. A maid was serving them breakfast,'' she recalled. "You couldn't help but notice that they had a different standard of living. Their father permits it.''

Menéndez says the two brothers are not personally close.

''Politically, yes,'' she says, "but not as a family. They don't even get together at the end of the year; they never sit down to share a meal. Raúl's children hide from Fidel because they don't want him to see how they live.''

DALIA'S PRICEY TASTES

Menéndez saves her harshest criticism, however, for Dalia, Fidel's companion of 40 years, whom she describes as demanding that her sons and their wives live austerely while she enjoys some luxuries.

''When Fidel was around,'' says Menéndez, "Dalia would dress in simple clothes made by a seamstress. But at night, when he would leave, she would put on expensive suits and Chanel perfume.''

Although she and Alex, while staying with them on one of Fidel's fishing boats -- he is reported to have several large pleasure crafts at his disposal -- once overheard the two having sex, ''they never kissed or hugged'' in public. And they would argue heatedly. Says Menéndez, "He would call her a liar.''

Menéndez agrees with that assessment of Dalia, who has stayed far out of public view. The first mention of her in The Miami Herald was in 1993 -- 25 years after she gave birth to her first child with Fidel.

"Dalia is very manipulative. She couldn't be first lady like she wanted; Fidel forced her into a secondary role . . . So she looked for her own world to run, and that world is controlling her kids and their wives.''

From the beginning, the relationship was frosty. At their first meeting, at a sailing regatta in Cuba, Dalia refused to take off her sunglasses when she was presented to Menéndez. She commented acerbically on the latter's youth.

Recalling Dalia's jealousy, Menéndez describes an occasion when she wore a nice dress for Sunday dinner and Castro complimented her. ''Afterwards,'' she says, 'Dalia pulled me aside and said, 'I didn't know you were going to get so dressed up . . . From now on, you have to tell me what you're going to wear.' ''

A MISCARRIAGE

But Menéndez says Dalia's worst manipulation may have come when she told her mother-in-law that she suspected she was pregnant. The next day, when Menéndez went to a clinic, her regular gynecologist had been replaced by another doctor. The new physician gave her some pills, telling her that the medicine -- harmless if she was pregnant -- would induce menstruation if she wasn't.

The pills caused her to miscarry. When she went back to the clinic for a checkup, a nurse took Menéndez aside and told her that if she wanted to have children with Alex, she shouldn't return to that clinic. Menéndez believes that her mother-in-law arranged for the doctor to induce the abortion.

'Dalia never wanted [her sons'] families to grow,'' she says.

Although Menéndez says she eventually discovered that Alex was being unfaithful, she places a good deal of the blame for their eventual breakup on Dalia.

Dalia was especially unhappy with her efforts to persuade Alex to meet a daughter from a previous relationship. ''She used all her means to go after me,'' says Menéndez, "and things started to add up.''

When Dalia prohibited Menéndez from decorating the kitchen in her and Alex's apartment with tiles because they were ''too luxurious,'' Menéndez complained bitterly in a phone chat with her aunt. The call was recorded at Dalia's orders, and the tape given to Fidel.

Dalia used the tape to turn Fidel against Menéndez. "He said he was very disappointed in me and that he didn't want to see me for awhile.''

Dalia then prohibited Alex and Menéndez from eating meals with the family and from doing their laundry at Punto Cero. She cut Alex's gasoline allowance and put the two on food rations. For Alex, it proved too much.

''One day, he told me there was too much going on with his family,'' she said. 'He drove me to my parents' house and left me there.'' When Menéndez tried to retrieve her things from the Castro compound, she was turned away.

Even that didn't completely end her relationship with Alex. For a while, he spent nights with her at her parent's home. But eventually she realized the indignity of the situation, and she divorced him in 2000.

Menéndez then tried to leave Cuba but found herself stymied by immigration officials until Alex intervened on her behalf. These days, she lives in a town outside Barcelona, Spain, with her new Spanish husband and their 20-month-old son. Two Cuban exiles once close to the Castro family confirmed Menéndez had been married to Alex.

REMAINS ANXIOUS

Today, Menéndez speaks with the determined air of someone who has come forward after a long silence. She recently granted an interview to the Spanish TV program Donde Estás, Corazón?, in part because she knew that her story would garner the most interest before Castro dies and in part because she finally felt free enough to speak.

Although she says she doesn't fear the consequences of speaking out, she clearly remains anxious about the Cuban government's long reach. She refuses to conduct interviews by phone, worried both that her lines may be tapped and that she cannot assess the interviewer by voice alone.

Although she occasionally communicates with Alex, her only access to Fidel now is through television. The latest images of the Cuban leader -- wearing a jogging suit and looking frail -- made her cry.

''I never thought I'd see him looking ridiculous,'' she says.

She has no reliable information on the ailment that has kept Fidel away from public events since July 26, and she believes that someone needs to tell the truth about his health.

"From what I've heard from the family members with whom I'm in contact, he's still alive. But he owes the Cuban people an explanation. To not tell them what is happening is one more display of his lack of respect.''

And while she believes that Fidel did good things for Cuba, that doesn't prevent her from offering him advice.

"Fidel was always obsessed with the threat of imperialism, and he thought he could do the thinking for 11 million Cubans. But he can't. He should have listened to the voice of his people.''

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