HAVANA, Oct 15 (Reinaldo Cosano Alén / CubaNet) - Cuban customs
officers at Jose Martí International airport are reportedly confiscating
videotaping equipment found on Cuban-born travellers.
"They confiscated my video equipment, and I asked the official why he
was taking it, and he answered, ‘M’am, I don’t know either,’
Mirtha Pavón Saavedra, a Cuban-American living in Las Vegas, said.
Pavón, 60, threatened to break her equipment, rather than have it
confiscated. The Customs officer then searched her luggage, seizing 35 pounds of
clothes Pavón had brought for relatives on the island.
"Plus, I had to pay $200 and I don’t know why," Pavón
said.
The Customs officer, who identified himself as "Ulises," told Pavón
that the video camera would be sent to "one of the country’s schools."
The sale of video cameras, as well as the sale of UHF antennas and other
items that allow the reception of foreign radio or television signals, is banned
in Cuba’s "dollarized" stores, once the only place to buy such
products.
Television and video gear have been a key tool of late in the Castro regime’s
so-called "war of ideas," with the equipment being used to
indoctrinate Cuban scholars.
The custom agent’s treatment of Pavón is said to be common
practice toward Cubans living outside the island who return for visits.
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