CUBA NEWS
The Miami Herald

U.S. envoy denounces Castro

The lead U.S. diplomat in Havana unveiled a Statue of Liberty replica at his residence during July Fourth ceremonies while calling Fidel Castro's government highly repressive.

By Pablo Bachelet, pbachelet@herald.com. July 6, 2005.

WASHINGTON - The top U.S. diplomat in Havana denounced Cuban leader Fidel Castro's government as ''one of the most repressive in the world'' and unveiled a three-story Statue of Liberty replica at a July Fourth ceremony.

James Cason, who is moving on this summer after three years as head of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, said he had gone to Cuba with the ''illusion'' he could ''pragmatically engage'' the government.

''My initial dealings with the Cuban regime quickly brought home to me that in Cuba, appearances are fundamentally deceiving,'' said Cason, who has been highly outspoken in criticism of the Castro government. Havana has attacked him for supporting dissidents whom the government there considers to be U.S.-paid mercenaries.

''If you go more than three blocks behind the main tourist thoroughfares, you will see the shabbiness and decay of the real Cuba,'' he said at the Monday ceremony. The State Department distributed a copy of his speech Tuesday.

Cason called Cuba ''one of the most repressive regimes in the world'' and said one of his frustrations was his inability to get some foreign visitors "to see that behind Castro's Potemkin village is a cynical, ruthless totalitarian system.''

The replica of the Statue of Liberty unveiled at the official residence of the lead U.S. diplomat in Havana showed the number 75 on its torch, a reference to the number of dissidents arrested and sentenced to long prison terms during a 2003 crackdown. Fourteen of the dissidents were later paroled for medical reasons.

Cason sparked a row with Cuba when he included the number ''75'' as part of the Christmas decorations around the U.S. mission in December.

''Symbols are important; they are powerful in closed societies,'' he said, adding that the speech could be "my last opportunity to address you.''

Cason also told the crowd -- which included members of virtually all dissident movements on the island -- Castro was "literally on his last legs.''

''Stay and be ready for when the personality withers away. . . . When that time comes, the United States and others will be at your side to help you build a democratic, prosperous Cuba,'' he said.

GUIDO LLINAS / 'Abstract master' of canvas

By Wilfredo Cancio Isla, El Nuevo Herald. Posted on Wed, Jul. 06, 2005.

Cuban painter Guido Llinás, a pioneer of abstract expressionism in Latin American art, died Monday night in a Paris hospital. He was 82.

Llinás had been in an irreversible coma for more than three weeks after being struck by a motorcycle while walking in early June. He suffered serious head injuries. His condition gradually worsened, friends said.

Llinás was on his way to buy brushes at the store where he had purchased art supplies for more than 40 years when the accident occurred.

''He was a very healthy man who exuded an impressive energy and displayed a boundless memory,'' said art critic and professor William Navarrete. "He lived in his house in Montreuil, outside Paris, with the same habits and customs of a guajiro [peasant] from Pinar del Rio.

''With him dies the last of the great Cuban abstract masters,'' said Navarrete, who lives in Paris but was in Miami when news came of Llinás' death.

A MAJOR FIGURE

Considered by critics to be a major figure in Cuban painting during the second half of the 20th century, Llinás was part of an artistic generation that broke away from the nationalist vanguard of the 1930s and '40s and incorporated modern U.S. and European trends into their work.

Born in Pinar del Rio, Cuba, in 1923, Llinás took courses at the city's School of Fine Arts but was basically self-taught. At 22, he moved to Havana, where he -- along with José Mijares and Roberto Diago -- created the group known as Those Younger Than 30.

In 1953, he co-founded The Eleven, seven painters and four sculptors who launched an era of modernity in Cuban art.

''The true vanguard in Cuba emerged with The Eleven, who reacted to the nationalist exaltation of painters like Víctor Manuel and entered the contemporary stream with a language that had greater universality,'' said critic Carlos Luis. "Among his generational colleagues, Llinás was faithful to the end to a language of aesthetic schism.''

In the 1950s, Llinás' paintings appeared in numerous exhibitions in Havana and abroad, but international recognition as a master of abstract art came in the 1960s. Unhappy with the regime of Fidel Castro, Llinás left the island and settled in Paris in 1963. Until that year, he had taught art at the University of Havana's School of Architecture.

Since his move to Paris, Llinás' works have been displayed in numerous galleries in Europe, Latin America and the United States. They were the subject of a retrospective show at Florida International University in 1997.

The artist also cultivated engraving and silk-screen painting.

MIAMI TRAVELS

Llinás traveled frequently to Miami in recent years. Miami Dade College presented an exhibition of his engravings and wood carvings last summer .

He is survived in Cuba by his brother René Llinás and nephew Sergio Llinás. Funeral plans had not been completed Tuesday night.

Naples rugby club to play in Cuba

The Naples Rugby Football Club will compete today against the Cuba National Rugby Football team in Havana. The U.S. players say there's no political agenda.

By Cammy Clark, cclark@herald.com. Posted on Mon, Jul. 04, 2005.

'We wanted to go to Cuba because of the mystique of it.'

SEAN REDDICK, part-time rugby player, full-time trial lawyer

Almost every day for a month, Sean Reddick called an automated line at the U.S. Treasury Department, checking on the status of the Naples Rugby Football Club application for a license to play in Cuba.

The part-time amateur rugby player, full-time trial lawyer kept hearing: pending, pending, pending. But on April 20, the automated voice said: "Approved.''

''I was shocked, so I thought I'd better talk to a real person,'' Reddick said. "I had to ask: Are you kidding me? Or are you actually going to let us do this?''

Reddick made the call and learned it was official. The U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control -- which enforces sanctions against countries, terrorist networks and drug traffickers around the world -- granted the Naples club a license for a nine-day trip to play four games in Cuba.

So today, on the day America celebrates its independence, the 45-member Naples' team -- which includes three players from Miami-based clubs and four from the Key West club -- will compete against the Cuba National Rugby Football team at the partially renovated Jose Marti Stadium in downtown Havana.

''I bet there aren't a bunch of teams playing on July Fourth in Havana. It's Cuba versus Florida -- you know it's going to be competitive,'' Reddick said with sweat pouring down his face during a break in an evening practice three weeks ago in Naples.

Competitive and potentially controversial: The Naples team has invited Cuban President Fidel Castro to attend.

Reddick insists there's no political agenda.

''We wanted to go to Cuba because of the mystique of it,'' Reddick said. "The fact that it's forbidden and you're not supposed to go there as an American and you have to jump through all these hoops to do it.''

Molly Millerwise, a Treasury Public Affairs spokesperson, said in an e-mail that more than a dozen U.S. sports teams have been permitted to travel to Cuba for athletic competitions within the past year.

But it's rare for Florida-based teams to travel to Cuba. One of the last was the Maitland Sting, an AAU girls softball team from Melbourne, in 2001.

Most U.S. sports teams that have gone to the island nation have played Cuba's national pastime of baseball. Most notable was Major League Baseball's Baltimore Orioles, which had a home and away series against the Cuban National team in 1999.

The game in Baltimore, just 40 miles from the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., drew anti-Castro demonstrations by protesters that included U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart of Miami.

''We're just a bunch of dumb rugby players; I don't know if we're qualified to really get into the politics of it,'' Reddick said.

"We're going to have a good time and go to support those guys. Rugby is different. You go out and play hard and rough, but the tradition afterward -- we call it the third half -- is to get together and have a little party.''

After completing a tour in the Cayman Islands last year, the Naples team pondered where to play next and thought of Cuba out of curiosity. Nobody knew if Cubans played rugby, a sport similar to football but played without pads.

Reddick searched the Internet and found a Cuban rugby website. He contacted Chukin Chao Campanioni, director of Cuban Rugby Development, who extended the Naples team a formal invitation. Reddick put together the license application, which required a letter of official status from the sports' governing body, USA Rugby.

Reddick originally had included joint training sessions in the application, but was told that that type of activity is not allowed. The Americans also must abide by strict travel restrictions, which limit how much they can spend in Cuba and how much luggage they can each bring (only 44 pounds of luggage, making the donation of equipment limited).

''Rugby is not a popular sport in Cuba yet, but little by little Cubans are getting familiar with this game,'' Campanioni wrote to The Herald via e-mail, explaining that his team, Indios Caribe, was founded in 1992 at Havana University by 12 students studying law, economics and language.

To help the Cubans promote rugby, Reddick said the Naples team officially invited Castro to today's match in a letter dated April 26.

Reddick said he's received no negative feedback, but real estate lawyer Wadie Zacca, a Jamaican who lives in Miami and was chosen team captain for the tour, said a few of his Cuban-American friends are not happy.

Alfredo Mesa, executive director of the anti-communist Cuban American National Foundation, said his organization supports "purposeful travel that goes to support the dissident movement.''

But he's upset that Castro was invited to watch.

''What can I say? That's disheartening,'' Mesa said. "That's like inviting Osama bin Laden to view the reconstruction of the World Trade Center.''

While the Naples club acquired the license, Reddick invited players from all over Florida to play on the team to make it as competitive as possible. The scouting report on the Cuban team is that their players are fast, fit and skilled, although not as experienced.

Todd Cherner, a 10th-grade English teacher who plays for the Orlando Ironhorse Rugby Football Club, is the only player going of Cuban ancestry. His mother, Isa Tanenbaum, was born in Cuba and at age 7 fled to the United States with her family, shortly after Castro took power in 1959.

''My family is pretty stoked about me going,'' said Cherner, whose mother has never returned to visit Cuba. "They want me to check out the family estate. My grandma sent me a book about Cuba.''

Claims conflict in case against Posada

A Herald examination of a previous Venezuelan extradition request for Luis Posada Carriles in Panama reveals differences with Venezuela's latest extradition package delivered last month to the United States.

By Oscar Corral And Alfonso Chardy, ocorral@herald.com. Posted on Mon, Jul. 04, 2005.

PANAMA CITY, Panama - When the Venezuelan government formally demanded that the United States hand over Cuban exile militant Luis Posada Carriles, it said it had evidence that he was ''the intellectual author'' of the bombing of a Cuban jetliner in 1976 that killed 73 people.

But a Herald review of Venezuela's request in 2001 that Panama extradite Posada contained no firsthand testimony linking Posada to the attack.

The most incriminating evidence in Venezuela's failed effort to persuade Panama to give up Posada was a secondhand statement by a Trinidad and Tobago investigator, who said that one of the convicted bombers told him Posada had been informed of the "results of the operation.''

A Venezuelan Embassy officer in Washington said there is new information in the extradition request to the United States, but declined to provide it.

A U.S. immigration judge does not need much evidence to deny asylum, which Posada is seeking. Immigration law prohibits asylum to foreign nationals believed to have committed a ''serious nonpolitical crime'' before entering the United States.

For extradition, however, Venezuela would need to convince a federal magistrate that its evidence is strong enough to convict Posada.

Although it declines to release its June extradition request, Venezuela at the time sent out a press release highlighting some of the evidence.

In both extradition packages, Venezuela pinned its case largely on the testimony of the two convicted bombers, Hernán Ricardo Lozano and Freddy Lugo, and the Trinidadian officers who arrested them.

STATEMENTS DIFFER

But the statements attributed to them in the press release differ from statements found in documents in Panama.

Among discrepancies:

o The June 10 news release says the evidence given to the United States contains testimony from Ricardo in which he "admits he placed the C-4 bomb in the rear bathroom of the plane, after having boarded the aircraft in Caracas, and that he informed Posada Carriles, referring to the passengers as dead dogs.''

In Panama, the Venezuelan files do not contain any such statement from Ricardo. That account comes secondhand from Lugo and a Trinidadian investigator who quoted Ricardo as saying that he and Lugo planted the bomb and afterward called Posada and fellow exile militant Orlando Bosch.

''Ricardo told me that he had made a call to Bosch and had informed him by telephone of the results of the operation, and said that Posada also was informed,'' said Trinidadian investigator Dennis Elliot Ramdwar, who further quoted Ricardo as confessing to the massacre: "I want to tell you in the utmost confidence that Lugo and I blew up the plane.''

Bosch, who now lives in Miami-Dade County, has denied plotting the attack. But he told The Herald that ''the truth'' about the attack will be revealed in a tape and documents that will be made public when he dies.

o The Venezuelan files in Panama also say that Ricardo and Lugo boarded the jetliner in Trinidad, not Caracas. The two men left the Cuban plane at its next stop, in Barbados. Explosives were detonated on board shortly after the plane took off from Barbados.

o No files in the Panama case show that Ricardo spoke to Posada.

o Venezuela says it has testimony from Lugo acknowledging that the bombers called Posada after the attack, ''seeking his help.'' In Panama, no case files show Lugo admitting a role or trying to contact Posada afterward. But there is one document in which Lugo suggests that Posada and Ricardo spoke.

Attempts by The Herald to find Lugo and Ricardo -- both now out of prison -- were unsuccessful.

Case files in Panama provide gripping details about the attack and how Ricardo and Lugo reacted afterward.

Ricardo alternates between euphoria, panic and tears while he downs shots of whiskey.

''The Jackal can have his history as a great terrorist, but I already beat him and the Palestinians too in terrorism,'' Lugo quotes Ricardo, who supposedly compares himself to a legendary Venezuelan terrorist who acted on behalf of Middle East militants. "Now I am the one who has the record because I am the one who blew up that thing.''

In 1987, Ricardo and Lugo were convicted in the bombing and sentenced to 20 years in prison. They were released in 1993. Two Venezuelan courts cleared Bosch. And a military court acquitted Posada. He then escaped from prison while awaiting the results of a second trial.

POSADA DENIAL

Posada has long denied any role in the bombing. His lawyer, Eduardo Soto, called Venezuela's evidence "circumstantial.''

Ramdwar, the Trinidadian investigator, wrote that Ricardo blamed Posada and Bosch for the bombing, but his information was secondhand.

''Lozano [Ricardo] told me that Bosch was conscious of all his activities and that he always informed his immediate superior Posada or Orlando Bosch personally,'' Ramdwar said.

Ricardo told investigators he tried to call Posada, but only for advice: Ricardo said he feared that he would be blamed for the attack because he had been traveling with a false passport.

Ricardo, according to the case files, also called a friend in Venezuela, Marinés Vega Urbina, to reach someone named Luis, presumably Posada.

''[Ricardo] gave me some numbers that I don't remember,'' Vega told Venezuelan investigators. "He told me to ask for Gustavo or Luis to tell them that they were in trouble, that they were in an emergency situation, that the bus was loaded with dogs.''

Urbina told the Venezuelan investigators that she never passed along the message.

Cubans practice for hurricanes

Posted on Sun, Jul. 03, 2005

HAVANA - Cubans across the island practiced emergency drills for hurricanes and other natural disasters Sunday, part of a two-day activity called Meteor Exercise 2005, local media reported.

They were also clearing off roofs and patios ahead of what's expected to be an active hurricane season with heavy rains in the Caribbean this year.

The drills, organized by the Cuban government and local social groups, focused on hurricanes but also reacted to potential earthquakes, fires or toxic leaks.

Authorities gathered Saturday, the first day of the exercise, to coordinate plans, focusing on evacuation strategies to avoid loss of human life and ways to diminish economic damage to buildings and infrastructure.

The hurricane season runs from June to November in Cuba. The island's top meteorologist, Jose Rubiera, has reported there will be some 13 tropical storms forming in the Atlantic this year, with seven of them being potential hurricanes and at least one of those likely to hit Cuba.

3 lawmakers sought freedom for Posada and then fell silent

South Florida members of Congress urged Panama's president to pardon Cuban exile militant Luis Posada Carriles. But they haven't asked President Bush to free Posada this time.

By Oscar Corral And Alfonso Chardy, ocorral@herald.com. Posted on Sun, Jul. 03, 2005.

PANAMA CITY, Panama - Two years ago, when anti-Castro militant Luis Posada Carriles was imprisoned here for his role in an alleged plot to assassinate Cuban President Fidel Castro, South Florida's three Cuban-American members of Congress lobbied the Panamanian government to pardon him.

But today, with Posada in the United States seeking political asylum after sneaking into the country illegally, the same lawmakers -- Lincoln Díaz-Balart, Mario Díaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen -- have remained quietly on the sidelines.

The reason, political observers say, is political pragmatism in light of the American public's heightened sensitivities after 9/11 toward anything smacking of terrorism.

It is one thing to speak up for Posada in Panama, despite accusations from Venezuela and Cuba that he is a terrorist who helped mastermind the bombing of a Cuban jetliner in the 1970s, said Kevin Hill, professor of political science at Florida International University. It's another to rally to his side in the United States, where the Bush administration, which is holding Posada in an immigration lockup in Texas, has to tread delicately on the terrorism issue.

'POLITICAL FAVOR'

''Politically, the situation has changed,'' Hill said. "In Panama, their support for these exiles was a political favor to help Bush get support [among Cuban exile voters]. Now, they don't want to put the president on the spot because they don't want to burn bridges with him. . . . There's consistency, and then there's politics.''

Posada and three other exiles were caught with explosives in Panama in 2000, and prosecutors accused them of plotting to kill Castro, but they were eventually convicted of lesser charges of endangering public safety.

Posada has made no secret of his disdain for the Castro government. The Cuban and Venezuelan governments consider him a mastermind of the bombing of a Cubana jetliner in 1976 that killed 73 people, and of being behind a series of explosions in Cuba that left one man dead.

Posada has always denied any role in the plane attack, but has admitted, and then dodged questions about, a role in the Cuban bombings.

The Panamanian government unsealed its case files in the Castro plot at The Herald's request, and records highlight how the prominent exile lawmakers went to bat for Posada and his accomplices.

The 2003 petition from the Republican representatives asked Panama's president at the time, Mireya Moscoso, to free Posada and three accomplices.

''We ask respectfully that you pardon Luis Posada Carriles, Guillermo Novo Sampol, Pedro Crispín Remón and Gaspar Jiménez Escobedo,'' the signed letter, written in Spanish on U.S. Congress stationery, shows.

Moscoso stunned prosecutors in Panama when she pardoned the men last August. By then, they had served about four months of a seven- to eight-year sentence on charges stemming from the alleged plot to kill Castro.

Panamanian prosecutors say they are investigating the legality of the pardons.

The letters might not have drawn attention had Posada not shown up in Miami in March. The Díaz-Balarts and Ros-Lehtinen issued a joint statement Friday, saying that they wrote to Moscoso after two of the prisoners' wives had come to them for help. Their statement also said they had wanted to express ''concern over the lack of due process in their cases'' in Panama.

''Regarding Mr. Luis Posada's current detention, we have confidence that the rule of law and all due process guarantees will be followed in this immigration law case in the United States,'' the statement said.

The Panamanian files also show that some local South Florida exile leaders petitioned Moscoso, too. Among them: former Roman Catholic Auxiliary Bishop Agustín Román, Miami Commissioner Tomas Regalado and then-Sweetwater Mayor José ''Pepe'' Díaz, now a county commissioner.

APPEAL TO PRESIDENT

''We beseech you, Ms. President, that within the power that your authority permits,'' Román wrote in Spanish, "you let the four return to the homes where their families await them.''

Regalado said he wrote because the four men are his friends and he felt that they were wrongly accused by Castro. Regalado said Posada should receive asylum in the United States.

''He should be free now,'' the commissioner said. "I have no respect for people who wanted him free in Panama but don't support him now.''

Diaz also said Posada should be granted asylum.

CASTRO'S VISIT

The Panama case began in dramatic fashion in 2000, when Castro stepped off an airplane to attend a presidential summit here and immediately announced that there was a plot to kill him. He named the four exiles, prompting Panamanian authorities to arrest them.

Posada has said he was in Panama to help a Cuban general defect. But investigators here found bags of plastic explosives and surmised that the exiles planned to kill Castro at a local auditorium.

The Panamanian case files show that the U.S. legislators sent their first letter on May 8, 2003, asking Moscoso to speed up the case, which had dragged on for three years.

The four exiles were convicted by a Panamanian judge on April 20, 2004, on lesser charges -- called common crimes -- of endangering public safety.

The U.S. legislators sent a second letter on Nov. 5, 2003.

''As you know,'' that letter said, 'Article 179 of the Constitution of the Republic of Panama authorizes the President of the Republic to 'decree pardons for political crimes, reduce sentences and grant conditional liberty to prisoners who committed common crimes.' ''

Moscoso, who could not be reached for comment, has denied that the U.S. government influenced her decision. She said she pardoned the men because, among other reasons, she was leaving office and feared that the exiles would be extradited to Cuba, where they could have faced a death sentence.

But Mara Silvera, a Panamanian federal prosecutor, told The Herald that Moscoso may have overstepped her powers and could face charges that she violated her country's constitution. Silvera said the constitution permits presidential pardons in political cases, not common crimes.

AN INVESTIGATION

Another federal prosecutor, Maribel Cornejo, said Panama is investigating the police chief of that time, accused of spiriting Posada and the other exiles out of the country before government authorities had signed off on the releases.

Moscoso's lawyer, Rogelio Cruz, said everything was done legally. He also said the letters from the exile leaders helped influence Moscoso.

''They were part of all the elements she used to make her decision,'' he said.

House blocks efforts to ease U.S. sanctions against Cuba

The U.S. House, reversing a years-old trend, dealt a heavy blow to supporters of easing sanctions on Cuba by rejecting three proposals.

By Pablo Bachelet, pbachelet@herald.com. Posted on Fri, Jul. 01, 2005.

WASHINGTON - Reversing years of congressional votes that showed supporters of easing U.S. sanctions on Cuba gaining strength, the House on Thursday rejected three such proposals and gave a categorical win to supporters of a tough line on Havana.

An amendment seeking to overturn limits on Cuban-Americans' family travel to Cuba was defeated 211-208 -- the first time such an initiative was beaten back in a congressional vote. A similar amendment, also submitted by Florida Democrat Jim Davis, was approved last year on a 225-174 vote.

Both opponents and supporters of the sanctions credited the turnaround on a determined lobbying drive by Cuban-American lawmakers and the entreaties made by dissidents in the communist-ruled island such as Martha Beatriz Roque, who recently addressed the Congress members on a phone link from Havana.

Two other amendments -- all three were part of a spending bill for the treasury, housing and transportation departments -- were shot down by lopsided margins.

A proposal to ease restrictions on U.S. student travel to Cuba, presented by Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., was defeated 233-187. Last year it was so heavily backed that it passed by a simple voice vote.

And an amendment that would have completely lifted the U.S. trade embargo on Cuba, submitted by Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., was rejected on a 250-169 vote.

Arizona Rep. Jeff Flake, a Republican and always one of the strongest critics of the U.S. restrictions on travel to Cuba, withdrew several amendments after the defeat of the Davis initiative.

Miami Republicans Lincoln and Mario Díaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen hailed the votes as ''historic'' in a joint statement.

''The solid defeat of these amendments sends a definitive message of support for the president's Cuba policy,'' Ros-Lehtinen said.

EMBARGO PROTECTED

Since 2001, a group of moderate and farm-state Republicans have annually joined with Democrats to pass a series of amendments to spending bills that tried to chip away at the embargo, and especially the travel restrictions. Even after Fidel Castro's security agents arrested and jailed 75 dissidents in 2003, an amendment to lift the travel restrictions passed by a comfortable 30-vote margin.

The amendments were never implemented because congressional negotiators, operating under a veto threat by the White House, would strip them out of the final bill. But each year it seemed that the next would see a significant weakening of the sanctions.

But this year Cuban-American groups that support the sanctions say they have recovered some of the political weight the community had when Jorge Mas Canosa ran the Cuban American National Foundation. Some say they let down their guard with President Bush in the White House and his brother Jeb in the governor's mansion.

''The void that occurred with the death of Jorge Mas Canosa has slowly and steadily started to be filled again,'' said Ignacio Sánchez, a member of the Cuban Liberty Council. Many of its members broke off from CANF to espouse a tougher line on Castro.

In March, Cuban American lawmakers and their congressional allies arranged for three Cuban dissidents -- Martha Beatriz Roque, René Gómez and Félix Bonné -- to endorse Bush's restrictions in a phone-link testimony before a House panel.

Thursday's votes came atop other recent setbacks by those who favor relaxing U.S. restrictions. An amendment to ease humanitarian travel lost in a procedural vote in the Senate Wednesday night. Last month, a Flake initiative to lift a ban on sending personal hygiene items such as toilet paper and toothpaste to Cuba was also defeated in the House.

U.S. EXPORTS

And on Thursday, Bush threatened to veto a provision in the spending bill that would reverse recently enacted regulations making it more difficult for U.S. farmers to be paid by Cuba for U.S. exports. ''The administration is strongly opposed to any efforts to weaken these regulations, and if the final version of the bill contained such a provision, the President would veto the bill,'' the White House said in a statement.

Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, a Missouri Republican who has been leading the charge to overturn the restrictions, said she would "keep plugging forward and see what happens.''

John Kavulich, a senior policy advisor with U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, which tracks economic trends in Cuba, said the Castro government has been purchasing less U.S. foodstuff since the new restrictions were adopted, but only to put political pressure on U.S. lawmakers who want their farmers back home to benefit from trade with Havana.

''The Cuban government has a genetic need to be a part of the U.S. political discourse,'' Kavulich said.

Castro: Would-be killers fooled

Cuban President Fidel Castro said his last-minute decision to visit Venezuela caught potential assassins off guard.

By Ian James, Associated Press. Posted on Thu, Jun. 30, 2005.

PUERTO LA CRUZ, Venezuela - Cuban President Fidel Castro said his visit to Venezuela for a Caribbean oil summit Wednesday was possibly the first overseas trip he has taken in which foes have not mounted a plot to assassinate him.

Castro told Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and other Caribbean leaders that his last-minute decision to attend the meeting in Venezuela appeared to have thrown off anyone who may have been plotting against him.

''This is possibly the first visit made in which there was no plan to attack me, simply because I wasn't going to make the trip,'' said Castro, citing assassination plots that were thwarted during past summits.

DECOY PLANES

Castro said that he occasionally uses two airplanes -- one for travel and another as a decoy -- when attending summits as a means of confusing those bent on assassinating him.

The Cuban government claims there have been countless assassination plots against Castro and his closest advisors.

''I had have to make things up all may life in order to survive, which is a miracle,'' Castro to a rousing applause from many of those present at the meeting.

''You are a miracle, Fidel,'' said Chávez, an admirer of the 78-year-old Cuban leader. "Fidel has said that this is the only summit in which they didn't have time to prepare an assassination attempt, and I believe him.''

Security was tight near the resort where the talks were taking place in the coastal city of Puerto La Cruz, with troops blocking roads and stopping cars for checks.

REGIONAL TALKS

Castro, Chávez and top officials from 14 other Caribbean countries met for talks Wednesday on a Venezuelan plan to sell fuel more cheaply to the region as world oil prices remained near record highs.

Most of the delegations were expected to sign an accord to set up a cooperative program for Venezuela to distribute fuel across the region on preferential terms.

''Today I propose to the Caribbean that we form an energy alliance,'' Chávez told the visiting leaders, saying the oil plan would be a new force for integration.

SPECIAL FINANCING

The initiative, called Petrocaribe, would extend and improve special financing arrangements under past oil deals and use an expanded fleet of Venezuelan tankers to deliver fuel directly to bypass costly intermediaries, Chávez said.

2001 PLOTS CITED

Castro, who arrived in Venezuela on Tuesday, said Cuban authorities detected two assassination plots when he visited Venezuela's Margarita Island for a summit hosted by his close friend and ally Chávez in December 2001.

Castro accused the United States of backing many of the assassination plots against him.

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