Cuban News December 11 2006

Havana, Dec 8 (EFE).- A mob of some 200 people on Sunday used force to halt a peaceful march organized by a group of government opponents in a central Havana plaza to commemorate International Human Rights Day.

At least three of the dozen or so participants in the march, which was organized by the National Council of the National Patriotic Front, were shoved forcefully into cars and taxis halted by the mob and driven away from the spot along with people who had tried to intervene in the violent disruption of the protest, Efe learned.

Some of the demonstrators were shoved, pushed and grabbed by the mob and whisked out of the park where they were organizing their protest in the capital neighborhood of El Vedado.

Three people in the mob tore off a white T-shirt worn by one of the marchers that said "Change."

The foreign press were also verbally abused by people who were against the dissidents' protest, with members of the mob calling reporters "mercenaries" and "worms."

The opposition members, who carried no signs or banners, were able to begin their march around the park, but they quickly began to be shouted at by some 200 people who had gathered in the area to participate in a National Defense Day event, according to reports from those present.

Shouting "Viva la Revolucion" and "Viva Fidel," the regime's supporters first blocked the marchers from continuing and then started attacking them.

Among the dissidents who were taken by force from the area were independent reporter Carlos Rios and regime opponent Darsi Ferrer, two of the people who had organized the march.

In addition, according to Elizardo Sanchez, the head of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, independent journalist Julio Aliaga was arrested in El Vedado as he was trying to join the march.

Ferrer told Efe moments before the beginning of the march that "this is not a counterrevolutionary act or a demonstration to demand anything, but a simple march on human rights day."

"They're not very smart. The day for the maximum revolutionary high spirits is today, National Defense Day," a man who participated in the assault on the dissidents who identified himself as Juan Perez, a 47-year-old mechanic, told journalists, adding that "what they are are provocateurs."

Another man, who identified himself simply as Pedro, 38, denied that there had been "any hitting; that's your idea," adding that the incident had occurred in response to the "feelings of the Cuban people."

Shortly after the violence in El Vedado, about 30 women belonging to the Ladies in White, a group of wives and other relatives of imprisoned dissidents, marched peacefully down 5th Avenue in the Havana neighborhood of Miramar after attending Sunday Mass to call for the release of incarcerated opposition members.

Their march concluded in front of the Santa Rita Church with shouts of "Long live human rights" and "Freedom for our political prisoners." EFE

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Cuba's Human Rights Day Turns Ugly

By VANESSA ARRINGTON

Associated Press Writer

10 December 2006

HAVANA (AP) - Dozens of government supporters broke up a silent march by a small group of dissidents marking International Human Rights Day on Sunday, roughing up participants and accusing them of being mercenaries of the U.S. government.

A second opposition march by wives of political prisoners took place without incident.

The first demonstration, involving fewer than a dozen people in a public park in Havana's Vedado neighborhood, was interrupted as soon as it began by burly men who surrounded and pushed protesters.

The activists led by physician Darcy Ferrer tried to keep walking around the park, but they were eventually forced out of the park and they fled in taxis.

"Long live Fidel and Raul!" the government loyalists chanted, referring to ailing leader Fidel Castro and his brother. "Down with the worms!"

"They are mercenaries!" some of the loyalists shouted of the dissidents.

The government supporters were waiting for the activists at the park before the march started.

Residents near the park came out of their homes to witness the confrontation, which spilled into the street and disrupted traffic. Some expressed contempt for the dissidents, who they said are being manipulated by Cuba's enemies and trying to destroy the island's socialist revolution.

"Every country has to choose its own destiny," said Eduardo Gutierrez, a 68-year-old mechanic who sat across the street from the park. "If you start receiving money from outside, you are no longer a patriot."

The Cuban government frequently accuses dissidents of working with U.S. officials to undermine the island's system. That charge -- denied by the dissidents and Washington -- was used against 75 activists rounded up in the spring of 2003 and sentenced to prison terms ranging from six to 28 years.

Sixteen of those prisoners have since been released for health reasons, but more than 300 human rights activists, independent journalists and members of outlawed political parties remain behind bars, according to rights groups.

Activist Hector Palacios, who was let out of jail Wednesday in the first release of a high-profile dissident since the 80-year-old Fidel Castro became ill, denied he ever received money from the U.S. government.

"The problem is that we don't have a voice, so we are unable to defend ourselves," Palacios said.

Palacios spoke while waiting for his wife as she walked Sunday with the Ladies in White, a group of wives and mothers of political prisoners who walk down one of Havana's main streets every week following Roman Catholic Mass to demand the release of their loved ones.

The women marched peacefully, with no counter-protests. The weekly march has been held regularly for several years, though it was broken up once last year by a group of mostly women screaming pro-government slogans.

The Ladies in White also issued a statement in honor of Human Rights Day.

"In Cuba, lamentably, the totalitarian government has kept its people submerged in repression and fear for 48 years to prevent them from expressing their most basic ideals and aspirations," the statement said.

It called for increased respect for human rights and the release of all political prisoners.

Miriam Leiva, one of the Ladies in White, expressed dismay at the harassment of the dissidents in the earlier march.

"They should have the right to protest, just like anywhere else in the world," Leiva said. "It's pitiful that this happened on Human Rights Day."

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Cuban mob attacks human rights protesters

By Marc Frank

HAVANA, Dec 10 (Reuters) - More than 200 Cuban government supporters attacked 15 human rights activists on International Human Rights Day on Sunday, manhandling the demonstrators as they drove them from a Havana park.

"Fidel, Fidel" and "Raul, Raul," the mob shouted as it swarmed the dissidents before their protest could begin, breaking up the group and shoving and dragging the activists for a few blocks. One protester's shirt was ripped off and he was threatened with a beating.

"One of us suffered a fractured arm and almost everyone was hit," march organizer Dr. Darcy Ferrer, said in a telephone interview. "We do not know if anyone was detained as we still haven't heard from six or seven people," he said.

The attack took place in view of foreign journalists, who were also the target of angry shouts by the crowd, and appeared to signal that acting president Raul Castro has no intention of softening his ailing brother Fidel's no-tolerance policy toward political opposition to the Communist state.

Cuba freed dissident Hector Palacios for health reasons on Wednesday, sparking speculation Raul might ease policy toward the 300 political prisoners local human rights groups say are in Cuban jails.

Palacios was arrested in 2003 in a crackdown on dissent that landed 75 pro-democracy activists in prison for conspiring against Cuba with its ideological enemy, the United States.

Palacios was the 16th member of the group to be freed on health grounds and the first since Fidel Castro temporarily handed over power to Raul after emergency surgery in July.

Since the 2003 arrests, the government has staged dozens of mob actions to intimidate dissidents but claims they are spontaneous and there is no physical violence.

The rowdy crowd on Sunday was closely watched by state security agents, who on more than one occasion had to intervene. At one point the agents shoved a woman into a taxi as the crowd pounded the vehicle with their fists.

The protest was called by the National Patriotic Front, one of dozens of small opposition groups in Cuba the government charges are organized and financed by the United States.

Asked why the group had acted so aggressively, a furious Mercedes Morejon, a middle-aged woman, shouted she would do worse if she could. "They are our enemies, they are paid by imperialism, they have no rights and got what they deserved."

(additional reporting by Esteban Israel)

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Significance of photos of Castro debated; Cuba watchers debate the reasons behind the Cuban government's release of unflattering photos and videos of a feeble Fidel Castro. CUBA

BY FRANCES ROBLES

frobles@MiamiHerald.com

11 December 2006

The Miami Herald

As the head of a Cuban revolutionary radio station and newspaper, there was a time that Carlos Franqui worked a great deal on Fidel Castro's image.

Now he looks at the unflattering photographs and videos the Cuban government has released of the 80-year-old Castro since he got sick four months ago and wonders: What are they thinking?

Or rather, what was Castro thinking, for Franqui believes that it is the Cuban leader himself who has been directing the release of the images from his sickbed.

''Evidently, it shows he has lost mental control,'' Franqui said by phone from his home in Puerto Rico. ``If he was in his right mind, he would never have published those pictures.''

One of the photos shows an ugly purple mark on the back of Castro's neck. In another, a lump under Castro's track suit raised the possibility that he had been fitted with a colostomy bag. A third shows an almost gaunt figure in pajamas and slippers, resting on a rocking chair.

In videos of visits by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, Castro doesn't even sit up, and a close-up of the Cuban leader's hand appears almost skeletal. A video of Castro walking shows an awkward gait as he swings his arms oddly.

And so a man who for 47 years created an iconic image of himself as a strong and defiant leader was suddenly in a bit of a jam: Allow people to think he's dead, and risk unrest, or let them see him alive -- shrunken, sickly, feeble, but breathing.

Since his illness, the Cuban government has released five videos and more than a dozen photos of Castro attributed to Estudios Revolución, the Communist Party central committee's photo department.

No new photos, however, were released to mark Castro's 80th birthday celebration, as some observers had expected.

''After years of seeing this furious and arrogant man and now seeing an elderly dying man, you almost feel bad -- if it weren't for all the crimes he's committed,'' said Franqui, who broke with Castro in the 1960s. ``When I saw those pictures, I saw a man closer to death than anything else.''

But other Cuba watchers say the images show Castro is willing to pay the cost of looking frail in public in order to ensure higher goals: letting folks know that he's alive; making them understand his brother Raúl is in charge; and preparing them for the inevitable.

Manuel Vásquez Portal, a former dissident journalist who now lives in Miami, said he believes the government is deliberately releasing unbecoming pictures to prepare Cubans for Castro's upcoming death and the transfer of power to Raúl.

Officially Castro's health is a state secret, and Cuban government officials insist he is continuing to recuperate from the July surgery. U.S. officials have said they believe Castro has terminal cancer and less than 18 months to live.

While theories abound as to why the images of Castro in his sickbed are being made public, most experts agree that there is but one photo editor involved: Fidel himself.

''I would have to assume it's him choosing those pictures, and it's to show he is alive,'' said University of Massachusetts professor Dick Cluster, author of History of Havana .

Dissident journalist Ahmed Rodríguez believes the images also carry a subtle message from Castro to the Cuban people: It ain't over till it's over.

''It's important to show his picture, even in deplorable condition, to keep the people quiet. They can't have people thinking he's dead and taking to the streets,'' Rodríguez said by telephone from Havana.

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Czech dissident-turned-president calls on tourists to shun Cuba

WARSAW, Dec 11, 2006 (AFP) -

Former anti-communist dissident turned Czech president Vaclav Havel on Monday urged tourists to shun Cuba as a holiday destination, in a video message showing solidarity with Cuban dissidents.

"I cannot go to Cuba to lounge on the beach and pretend not to notice anything while there are dozens of political prisoners behind bars," Havel said.

He recalled a personal experience when he was a political prisoner in what was then Czechoslovakia.

"Once, when I was in jail, I was taken, hand-cuffed, from my cell to go see a dentist in town," he said.

"In the waiting room, people pretended not to see me," he said, as the video showed the former Czech president dressed in a prisoner's uniform, sitting in a make-believe waiting room amongst patients who were completely oblivious of him.

In the tongue-in-cheek video, some of the other patients were eating bananas.

"Today, we must not allow ourselves to be deluded that nothing bad is happening in Cuba. A lot of bad is happening in that country," Havel continued.

Havel's message was aired at a conference organised by Polish Nobel Peace Prize laureate and former president Lech Walesa, aimed at showing solidarity with dissidents in Cuba.

In a speech to open the conference, Walesa assured that the aim of the meeting was not to foment revolution on the Caribbean island, but to help Cubans to help themselves.

"We are not trying to bring the people into the streets to start a revolution," Walesa said.

"Our aim is more to give advice, because there are solutions to be found there," said the former leader of the Solidarity trade union, whose creation in 1980 as the first free trade union in the communist bloc signalled the beginning of the end of communist rule in Europe.

"Poland is an excellent example of the role that reconciliation can play on the peaceful path to democracy," Walesa said. mc/kdz/mb

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Gore Vidal Slams U.S. Policy on Cuba

By ANITA SNOW

Associated Press Writer

10 December 2006

HAVANA (AP) - Celebrated American writer Gore Vidal slammed the four-decade-long U.S. trade embargo against Cuba on Sunday, saying during a visit to the island that he hopes recent changes in U.S. politics will help end the sanctions.

"I've never been here before and it's a fascinating country," Vidal said, touring Old Havana. He arrived late Sunday and is scheduled to return to the United States on Thursday.

Vidal said the United States is "undergoing tremendous political change," referring to growing opposition to the war in Iraq and the Democratic Party's return to control of both houses of Congress in November midterm elections.

"After more than 40 years, the embargo is ridiculous," said Vidal, who himself ran for Congress and who regularly raises funds for Democratic candidates.

The United States imposed economic and commercial sanctions against Cuba in 1961 after the CIA-backed assault at the Bay of Pigs was defeated. Last month, for the 15th straight year, the United Nations voted overwhelmingly to urge Washington to lift the embargo.

Vidal is to visit museums, a ballet school and other cultural centers during his stay. He also will meet with Culture Minister Abel Prieto and Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, among other officials.

American filmmaker Saul Landau, who has produced four documentaries about Cuban President Fidel Castro, was among those in Vidal's small delegation.

Landau said it was unlikely that the group would meet with the ailing 80-year-old leader who ceded power to his brother, Defense Minister Raul Castro, earlier this year while he recovers from intestinal surgery.

Vidal, also 80, published his first novel at the age of 21 and has had a prolific career as a playwright, essayist, scriptwriter and novelist.

He recently published his memoirs, "Point to Point Navigation," and a paperback book called "Dreaming War: Blood for Oil and the Cheney-Bush Junta."

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Analysts Predict Castro Will Never Return to Power

10 December 2006

NPR: Weekend Edition - Sunday

ANDREA SEABROOK, host:

This is WEEKEND EDITION form NPR News. I'm Andrea Seabrook.

Will Fidel Castro ever return to power? Many analysts are doubtful, especially since the Cuban leader didn't show up for his 80th birthday celebration last weekend. Since he became ill last summer, Fidel's brother, Raul, has been in charge. And while the Cuban government says Fidel Castro is recovering, no one else knows his real condition.

NPR's Lourdes Garcia-Navarro reports.

LOURDES GARCIA-NAVARRO: The dignitaries from around the world were there. The Soviet-era tanks and planes were on parade. The guest of honor, though, was missing, confirming what long-time Cuba observers suspected.

Mr. BRIAN LATELL (Author, "After Fidel"): I don't think he's coming back. No, I don't.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Brian Latell is author of the book "After Fidel" and former Cuba analyst at the CIA.

Mr. LATELL: You know, this is the second big occasion that he missed. He missed the nonaligned conference in Havana last September. This event on Saturday, his delayed birthday celebration, the parade and all of the honors that were being heaped on him, he would have been there, I think, had he been able to.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Louis Perez is a Cuba expert with the University of North Carolina. He says, though, that Fidel's long goodbye is actually a boon for the communist regime.

Mr. LOUIS PEREZ: What seems to be happening is that a transition process is unfolding, in a way that is actually quite remarkable. That is, if Fidel Castro is no longer present, but he is, in a kind of cosmic sense he's there, he's still alive. If one had come up with an ideal way to transition from Fidel Castro to Raul Castro, this would be it. That he's still alive, but functioning in the background, as ill as he may be.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Still, the transfer of power is raising hopes among some in Cuba that there will be real change. Independent economist and dissident Oscar Chepe(ph) spoke to NPR by phone from Havana.

Mr. OSCAR CHEPE (Economist): (Through translator) I think the era of Fidel Castro is over, and this is a new time in Cuba, with Raul Castro at the head. And he has a very different style than his brother. He is more consulted, more organized.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: On Wednesday, Cuba freed leading dissident Hector Palacios from jail on medical parole. It was the first release of a prominent government opponent under acting president Raul Castro. But while Chepe said that he thinks Raul may open up the economy, he doesn't think political change is coming to the island anytime soon.

Mr. CHEPE: (Through translator) There is still repression in Cuba. The jails are still full. The prohibitions are still present. In China, there has been economic liberalization and there has been repression. One thing does not mean the other will change as well.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: At the moment, everyone is trying to decipher in what direction Raul Castro will take the country. In his speech on Saturday, Raul said, quote, "This is an opportunity to once again declare our disposition to resolve on the negotiating table the longstanding conflict between the United States and Cuba." This is the second time that he's made that offer since assuming control, but never in such a public form. Brian Latell thinks the statement was significant.

Mr. LATELL: He knows what happened in November in our elections. He knows that Democrats are taking control of Congress. He recognizes that the president very soon is going to have a new secretary of defense. I know Bob Gates. He's a realist. Perhaps the Cuban government believes there's a new possibility for some progress in bilateral relations.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: So far, the Bush administration says it will not engage with any Castro. And it's actually against the 10-year-old Helms-Burton law to do so. That is to America's detriment, says Perez.

Mr. PEREZ: There's a transition going on right now in Cuba. I mean, Cuba's gone for the last 40 years through various phases of transitions. And at each point have been opportunities for the U.S. to engage with Cuba, to participate and influence the outcome of those transitions. And at each point the U.S. has chosen to - rather than engage, has chosen to further isolate. And so nothing developed.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Tom Miller is the author of "Trading With the Enemy: A Yankee Travels Through Castro's Cuba." He says he's already imagined how Castro's send-off will be.

Mr. TOM MILLER (Author, "Trading With the Enemy: A Yankee Travels Through Castro's Cuba"): I think the first thing that's going to happen, it will be announced in the form of a letter from Fidel to the Cuban people and it will be printed everywhere. And then they'll have an enormous funeral in Havana, three days lying in state. They'll bury him in Santiago near Jose Marti and he'll be away from Havana. He never really liked Havana much anyway. And he'll be away from the current government. Even in death, he'll be looking over their shoulders.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Even in death, says Miller, Castro will want the next government to feel that he'll be watching.

Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, NPR News, Mexico City.

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U.S. Presbyterian official helps Cubans mark 100th anniversary of first Protestant temple

By ANDREA RODRIGUEZ

Associated Press Writer

10 December 2006

HAVANA (AP) - The executive officer of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) helped Cubans celebrate the 100th anniversary of the opening of the capital's first Protestant temple on Sunday, giving a sermon in which he urged all Christians to do more to eliminate global inequality.

The Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick spoke in both English and Spanish to hundreds of followers and diplomats at the ceremony in central Havana. Delegations from Florida and Washington D.C. were also present.

"A better world is possible," said the American minister, criticizing Christians who fail to work toward creating a planet where everyone has a dignified life and enough to eat and drink.

Kirkpatrick first came to Cuba 20 years ago. He spoke of the history of the church, which was inaugurated in 1906 and hosted the founding of the Cuban Council of Churches in 1941.

"This church has been witness to very difficult, very complex times," he said, referring to low attendance rates and tension with the Cuban government in the past.

A Cuban choir sang Christmas songs, bathed in colorful light from exquisite stained-glass windows, at the ceremony.

Cuba is home to some 20,000 Protestants, according to Rev. Hector Mendez, who leads the Havana church. Protestants are a minority on the island, where the Catholic Church and followers of the syncretic Afro-Cuban Santeria religion dominate.

Mendez said Kirkpatrick's participation in Sunday's ceremony symbolized the brotherhood between the people of the United States and Cuba, despite tense relations between the two governments. He said he is against a series of U.S. regulations which squeeze the Cuban economy and limit religious contact between Americans and Cubans.

"We must set an example of love, of reconciliation," he said.

The Havana church offers home bible study, music and relaxation courses, and assistance to the elderly.

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Chavez victory bolsters Cuba's succession hopes CARACAS-HAVANA RELATIONS.

By MARC FRANK

9 December 2006

Financial Times

Hugo Chavez's sweeping victory in the Venezuelan presidential election this week could help to ensure political cover and economic support for the emerging leadership in Cuba as Fidel Castro fights for his life somewhere in Havana.

"As long as oil prices stay high, subsidised and bartered oil from Venezuela to Cuba will remain a huge source of support to the island," said Julia Sweig, director of the Latin America programme at the Council of Foreign Relations in Washington. "And precisely because Venezuela is more strategically important to the US than Cuba, if the US-Venezuela relationship stays at its current high-pitch, Raul Castro will be able to consolidate the succession in the shadow of the larger regional tension."

Fidel Castro said in a 68-word message of congratulations to Mr Chavez: "I shall be brief, lest emotion betrays me. The victory was re-sounding, crushing and without parallel in the history of our America.''

Mr Castro, after missing a military parade and other events in honour of his 80th birthday last week, also failed to meet visitors such as Bolivia's President Evo Morales, or call Mr Chavez after his victory, sparking fresh speculation that his health has deteriorated.

Venezuela and Cuba have found a strong synergy, playing off each country's strength since Mr Chavez won his first election in 1998. Venezuela received an in-stant free healthcare system from Cuba that would have taken years and tens of billions of dollars to build, and education resources to help Mr Chavez keep his promise to teach every citizen to read and write.

Cuba received preferentially-financed oil in return and, after signing an agreement with Venezuela in late 2004, payment for health and other technical assistance that had been provided free, according to Havana.

Cuba's imports totalled Dollars 5.5bn in 2004 and non-tourism service income was about Dollars 1.5bn, compared with an estimated Dollars 10bn (Euros 7.5bn, Pounds 5.1bn) of goods imported this year and non-tourism service revenues of more than Dollars 5bn. The steady oil supply and billions in revenues from the export of professional services are fuelling an economic boom after more than a decade of crisis.

Most important, Cuba's leaders are now able to point to a way out of the ideological and political debacle that followed European communism's collapse. The lights are back on, decrepit waterworks and transport are being gradually upgraded, new housing built, consumer goods replaced and there is more food on the table.

"Chavez's election was key," a European diplomat said. "Cuba will now be at least partially protected from what happens outside the country as the succession takes place."

Venezuela is using its vast oil wealth and Cuba its human capital to push their anti-US vision of a united, more socially-oriented Latin America at a time of growing restlessness among the region's poor.

US allies in Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua have lost at the polls to men who blame the US for the region's woes and favour a closer relationship with Venezuela, Cuba and their proposed model of local integration against US-centred trade pacts.

Venezuela provides the financing and Cuba the -professionals to jump-start each new leader's social -programmes.

Thousands of Cuban doctors and other professionals are already at work throughout Bolivia. However, there is some evidence that Cuba's human resources - about 30,000 of 70,000 doctors work abroad - can no longer meet the demand, creating strain on health services and doctor shortages even in Venezuela. Venezuela and Cuba have launched a crash programme to train 100,000 doctors from the region over five years to fill the vacuum.

Most other Caribbean and Latin American countries, though more moderate, are under increasing domestic pressure to meet basic social needs and also favour a regional integration that includes Cuba, as it increasingly provides them with relatively cheap services and educates their youth.

But here the Venezuela relationship is crucial. "God, imagine what would have happened with Fidel sick if he (Mr Chavez) had lost," said a secretary at a Havana day care centre. "We have fewer doctors but, so far, the benefits are worth it."

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GOP Rep. Denies Castro Killing Remark

10 December 2006

MIAMI (AP) - A congresswoman says a video clip showing her calling for Fidel Castro's assassination is fake, a charge denied Sunday by the film's director.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., appears in the 28-second clip made available on the Internet by the makers of a new British documentary, "638 Ways to Kill Castro."

In it, she says: "I welcome the opportunity of having anyone assassinate Fidel Castro and any leader who is oppressing the people."

However, the Havana-born lawmaker, recently tapped to become the top Republican on the House International Relations Committee, says the filmmakers spliced clips together to make the sound bite.

"It's twisted in a way that gives the viewer a totally wrong impression," Ros-Lehtinen told The Miami Herald. "I've said the community has moved on, that those strategies are not being used today, but apparently the filmmakers think we're still in a '60s mentality."

Still, she said it was possible she has, at some point, mentioned Castro's potential assassination.

"If someone were to do it, I wouldn't be crying," she said.

The film's director, Dolan Cannell, stood by the authenticity of the footage.

"I can assure you categorically and completely that there has been no distortion of what she said," Cannell told The Associated Press on Sunday.

Ros-Lehtinen said she has seen the documentary and the final cut does not include that video clip. However, the documentary's Web site -- http://www.638waystokillcastro.com/ -- has a link to the clip.

The congresswoman said she's not shy about wanting Castro dead.

"No one advocates assassination," she said. "What we are advocating for is free elections, freedom for political prisoners, free expression of ideas and respect for human rights. That's how you get change in Cuba. Not assassination."

Jane Saunders, a spokeswoman for the British filmmakers, did not immediately respond to a call Sunday seeking comment.

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The end of an era; FIDEL CASTRO

BY BRIAN LATELL

iccas@miami.edu

10 December 2006

The Miami Herald

Perhaps only Fidel Castro's most fanatical followers truly expected him to appear during his belated 80th birthday celebrations on Dec. 2 in Havana. Fewer still expected him to be strong enough to deliver a speech. There is perhaps nothing he would have liked to do more. But what would the man who has spoken more words on the public record than any political figure in history have said that day?

Recent rumors that he is experiencing a deathbed religious catharsis, possibly even repenting and recanting, seem wildly improbable. He has never been known as an adult to have confessed to morally indefensible behavior or admitted to regrets about his treatment of others. All his life he has been incapable of introspection in the presence of witnesses. So if he were to rally sufficiently to deliver another oration. it would most likely resemble his two most recent ones.

Castro's speeches on July 26 -- the first delivered at dawn in Bayamo, in eastern Cuba, and the second, more perfunctory one a few hours later in Holguin -- are likely to be recorded as his last. He was already gravely ill on that 53rd anniversary of the Moncada attack and was operated on the next day.

Near Sierra Maestra

Raúl Castro, or some third tier leader, could have substituted for him at the podium. But perhaps Fidel knew that his condition was so acute that he might not have another chance to preside on his favorite revolutionary holiday. He had personally selected Bayamo, near the Sierra Maestra where he had fought as a guerrilla, to host the observances. He wanted to be with the humble guajiros (peasant farmer) of the eastern countryside, back possibly for the last time in that remote region where he had spent his troubled youth, where he had also both pejoratively and affectionately been called guajiro.

It was in the early morning when he walked slowly to take a seat at the front of a crowd assembled downtown. On cue, thousands of little paper Cuban flags began to flutter in greeting, waved by an otherwise subdued audience. It was about 7 a.m. Many had come a long way, from mountain hamlets and crossroads villages, bussed in by local Communist Party bosses over rough roads in the middle of the night.

The Cuban media said that 100,000 were there in the spacious Plaza de la Patria. Politburo members and top civilian and military leaders were also in attendance in a show of solidarity, but Raúl was not present. He was no doubt preoccupied with organizing the military and security forces that would be deployed and ready for any eventuality once Fidel's condition was revealed to the populace.

The sun was just beginning to rise when Castro began speaking. In earlier years, it had been more common for him to conclude speeches in the early morning hours near sunrise, but he and his doctors knew he had to avoid the summer heat that day. Reading from a prepared text, he boasted of accomplishments in health, education and construction. But his recounting of excruciating statistical details was in a passionless monotone.

He said nothing memorable or at all revealing of his state of mind in those moments of personal anguish, suspecting that the speeches that day might well be his last.

Unlike many of his previous July 26 appearances, there was no reminiscing about his triumphal revolutionary feats, no boasting of victories against ''imperialism.'' He criticized the United States and capitalism, but vaguely and with no real feeling. He went through some bouts of coughing, sipped tea, and once became annoyed that the crowd was not waving their little flags energetically enough.

''It is good exercise,'' he told them, ``so keep on waving them.''

Castro talked for almost 2 ½ hours. That speech, and the shorter one a few hours later in Holguin, were sodden rhetorical anticlimaxes to the nearly six decades of his remarkable public performances. His audience in Bayamo was tired and sullen. There was nothing he said that rallied or inspired the people or raised new hopes for a better day. They were merely going through the motions with him.

Unyielding, implacable He announced no new policies or initiatives, shared no new visions or hopes and

in fact did not speak at all about the future. He gave perhaps a single hint of his deteriorating condition, the only sentence he spoke that day that was both personal and uncharacteristically reflective.

``I will fight for the rest of my life, until the last second, as long as I have the use of my reason, to do something good, something useful.''

But now, more than four months later, he is near death, no longer in control of his revolution.

And not surprisingly, in what may have been his last public utterances, Fidel Castro was as unyielding, implacable and unchastened as ever in his long career. He might just as well have said again, ``History will absolve me.''

Brian Latell is a senior research associate at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban American Studies at the University of Miami. He is the author of the recently released After Fidel: The Inside Story of Castro's Regime and Cuba's Next Leader.

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Rights prize awarded to residents of Cuban town

Miami, Dec 8 (EFE).- The residents of a town near Havana have been honored by a European human rights groups for defending an opposition activist when Cuba's secret police went to his home to take him away, a Cuban exile organization announced here Friday.

The Miami-based Cuban Democratic Directorate said the citizens of the municipality of Madruga received the Pedro Luis Boitel Freedom Prize.

The directorate said the prize was awarded "to the town of Madruga because on the 2nd of November hundreds of people took to the streets when the political police showed up at the home of human rights activist Eddy Hernandez Arencibia."

Hungarian Ambassador to the United States Andras Simonyi presented the prize in a ceremony at the offices of the directorate and Jose Manuel Lopez Montero, a Madruga resident who recently arrived in Miami, accepted the award on behalf of the town.

"In our transition process it was very good to know that there were other democracies supporting us. Transition is difficult, but it can be achieved. What the residents of Madruga did is important because change in Cuba has to come from the Cubans," the diplomat said.

Lopez Montero thanked the group for awarding the prize to his town "and to the people who have fought to defend human rights in Cuba."

The Pedro Luis Boitel Freedom Award was created by Romanian physicist Gabriel Andreescu in 2001, with the support of eight Central and Eastern European human rights groups, to honor dissidents in Cuba.

It takes its name from Pedro Luis Boitel, a Cuban political prisoner who died while on a hunger strike in 1972.

The prize was first given out in 2001 to Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leiva, a blind activist and president of an outlawed human rights foundation.

The 2005 award went to the Ladies in White, a rights organization made up mainly of wives, mothers and daughters of political prisoners. EFE

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Hot item among Palestinians: tourist visa to Cuba

December 10, 2006

BY SARAH EL DEEB

Chicago Sun Times

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Travel agents report a brisk demand for visas to Cuba, one of the few places that welcomes Palestinians.

Driven by fear of civil war and increasingly bleak economic prospects, Palestinians are fleeing their violence-wracked lands in growing numbers. Many are skilled and educated, and are leaving behind an increasingly impoverished and fundamentalist society.

Many countries make it difficult for the stateless Palestinians to obtain even tourist visas, because they often overstay them.

Two popular destinations for Gazans are Canada, which still offers legal immigration, and Cuba, which imposes few restrictions on Palestinian travelers.

Those with tourist visas to Cuba often don't plan to go there. Instead, they get off in transit at a European airport, rip up their Palestinian travel document and seek asylum.

Fictitious trips

Travel agencies in Gaza arrange for fictitious invitations, hotel bookings and Cuban visas for their clients, a Palestinian security official said. The cost of the service has gone up from $200 to $1,500 because of the high demand and increasing risk, the official said.

Palestinian, Egyptian and European officials have begun to tighten restrictions in an attempt to stem the flow. Travel agent Mohammed Mouin said 65 of his clients with Cuban visas were sent back from Egypt, but that many more are trying. "Traveling to Cuba has become a fad," he said.

The emigration is hurting Palestinian prospects for statehood, says pollster Nader Said. ''What Israel couldn't do by force,'' he said, ''we were able to do with internal dispute, lack of leadership, accompanied by economic pressure and the siege on Gaza.''

10,000 emigrated

About 10,000 Palestinians emigrated between June and October and another 45,000 have made preparations to leave, said Ahmed Suboh, a Palestinian Foreign Ministry official, citing reports from Palestinian missions abroad.

Emigration from Gaza, in particular, has picked up. The World Bank estimates 70 percent of Gaza's 1.4 million people live in poverty, defined as living on less than $2.30 a day.

Although Palestinian society tends to stigmatize its emigrants as deserters, a recent poll indicated the number of young Palestinians willing to leave if given a chance has jumped from 25 percent to 44 percent over two years.

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THE REEL THING; CUBAN FILMMAKER POUNDS STREETS TO FIND BACKING

By Doreen Hemlock Business Writer

10 December 2006

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

HAVANA

As a young filmmaker in communist Cuba in the 1980s, Jorge Luis Sanchez never worried where to find money for his work. The government's Film Institute provided him everything -- a full-time job, technical crews, equipment and funding.

But to launch his recent release, El Benny, about the life of Cuba's acclaimed big-band singer Benny Moré, Sanchez pounded the pavement.<