Posted on 05/17/2003 1:04:17 AM PDT by kattracks
Edited on 05/26/2004 5:13:52 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
May 17, 2003 -- IT wasn't the most sophisticated hijacking ever planned.
In Havana Bay on April 2, a small group of Cubans armed with a pistol and several knives seized control of a 45-foot ferryboat and ordered the pilot to head for Florida.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Judy Woodruff and CNN masturbate orgasmically over their beloved, worshipped, and adored Comandante Castro in his spiffy standard Caribbean Stalinist green uniform.
Geez, it's something about a totalitarian's military outfit that makes these silly girls and CNN girly men just SWOON!
"Here's a fact about the executed men that's gone virtually unnoticed: Lorenzo Copello Castillo, Barbaro Sevilla Garcia, and Jorge Luis Martinez Isaac were black.""This is very important," says Jaime Suchlicki of the University of Miami. Though Castro and his top officials are white, dark-skinned Afro-Caribbeans account for about two-thirds of the island's population - and many of its leading dissidents."
"They are among the most restless of Cuba's people, in part because they're the poorest. Afro-Caribbeans don't receive cash remittances from relatives in Miami, and are blocked from many of the coveted tourist-industry jobs. "By executing them, Castro was sending a clear message to a certain segment of the population," says Suchlicki. "But nobody's picked up on this. Certainly not CNN."
Thought you may be interested in this story. Could you do your *PING* thing here.
Apartheid in the worker's paradise...
Castro and his villany is the same vein as Hitler's anti-Jewish ways.
An official statement said the men were tried "with full respect for their ... basic rights," convicted Tuesday and shot dead at dawn Friday. Another four of the men involved in the hijacking of the ferry with some 40 people aboard were sentenced to life in jail, and one man to 30 years in prison. The three women who took part were sentenced to five, three and two years respectively.***
Megaphone for a Dictator CNN's Coverage of Castro's Cuba, 1997-2002
May 16, 2001 - Arrested Cuban Dissidents Feel Betrayed by CNN***The oppositionists are desperate for their activities, and their very existence, to be known. They are certainly unafraid to challenge the regime; but they would naturally like some reward for their courage. There is no doubt that CNN filmed the protest; a network spokeswoman confirms as much. But, for reasons unknown, the network chose not to air the film, or to report on the matter at all.
There was, however, a report from Cuba on CNN that day: It was about the return of Elian Gonzalez to Cuban society, where "he is a typical, happy-go-lucky schoolboy." Many of the Cubans who participated in the November 23 protest were later rounded up at a religious gathering. They were beaten and jailed.***
"We will pull no punches," promised chief news executive Eason Jordan when the bureau was opened in 1997. "If we get booted out, we get booted out."
Has a familiar ring to it, doesn't it. Now where did we hear this before...oh yes, something about Baghdad.
"WE did not and have not made any journalistic compromises in order to report from Cuba," says Jordan today. "CNN's reporting from Cuba has been forthright and tough."
Really not even worth commenting on, except for WHEN he said this.
Even Cuba's plainly fraudulent elections are treated seriously: Newman once suggested that Castro could teach Americans a thing or two about democracy because his rigged campaigns include "no dubious campaign spending" and "no mud-slinging."
May I be so bold to ask, who were Castro's opponents?
Good ol' CNN, nothing but a bunch of marxists @ss-kissers.
A Havana court convicted the five men of terrorism for planning to commandeer a plane with a stolen rifle and knives.
The five would-be hijackers, and three accomplices -- who received jail sentences ranging from 20 to 30 years -- were arrested as they prepared to take over a domestic airliner at the Isle of Youth airport on April 10, during a spate of hijackings by Cubans trying to reach the United States.
On April 11, Cuba executed three men who hijacked a Havana Bay commuter ferry with a handgun and knives in an attempt to sail 90 miles across to Florida. [End]
I cannont help but think: How appropriate that Darth Vader endorses this monstrous evil propaganda machine.
The idiots at CNN (and elsewhere) just haven't figured out how to 'spin' it.....so that Castro can be painted in a good light.....and the USA can be blamed and spit upon.
When CNN figures out how to do so...this fact will be on every ten minutes.
redrock
p.s....I still think the 82nd would be enough to do the job.
Stephan Archer
Tuesday, May 9, 2000
Although Fidel Castro has done much to make world observers believe that he has introduced a true color-blind society in Cuba, evidence suggests that black and mulatto Cubans are treated unfairly and even harshly.
On the surface, Cuba’s constitution, as it pertains to discrimination, has the familiar ring of many American laws that deal with the same subject.
With laws touting that discrimination is forbidden on the basis of race, sex or national origin, it would appear that Cuba’s multiracial society lives without fear of official harassment and prejudice.
Brave Cubans still publicly point their fingers at a hypocritical regime that all too often breaks its own official discrimination codes. As a reward for their honesty, many are thrown in prison.
Prison conditions continue to be harsh in Cuba, but for the black prisoner, particularly those who speak out against the government, conditions are even worse.
"The fact that there are black dissenters is a tremendous slap in the face for the Castro regime, and when they encounter such an individual, they treat them even worse, if that’s possible, than another dissenter,” explained Mariela Ferretti, a spokesperson for the Cuban-American National Foundation.
Though the Cuban government offers no statistics, former prisoners indicate that Cuban blacks – though 12 percent of the general population – are a majority in Castro's prisons.
Currently, blacks and mulattos continue to be discriminated against in government leadership positions, even though they make up over half the population, says a 1998 U.S. State Department report on Cuban human rights abuses.
Blacks and mulattos, states the report, hold only six seats in the 24-member Politburo, and according to Luis Zuniga at CANF, only around 15 blacks hold seats in the 150-member Central Committee.
Castro's military leadership – the backbone of the regime – has practically no blacks in its ranks.
The State report goes on to say that much of the police force and army enlisted personnel is black.
Targeting Blacks
Castro's regime has openly targeted its black populations.
The U.S. State Department reports that police harassment seems to be disproportionately aimed at the country’s black youth.
In 1997, Castro implemented Decree 217, which was designed to control the migration flow from the poorer provinces to the capital city of Havana.
"Human rights observers noted that while the decree affected migration countrywide, the decree was targeted at individuals and families from the poor, predominantly black and mulatto eastern provinces,” states the State Department report.
The decree also resulted in numerous credible reports that said many blacks and mulatto squatters, not having official permission to reside in Havana under Decree 217, are forcibly evicted from their homes and sent back to the countryside.
Ferretti believes Castro is getting away with this deception because human rights groups in the United States believe things are getting better.
"This smacks of hypocrisy," said Ferretti. "These so-called liberal groups – when they are encountering a situation of discrimination, of violence, in Castro’s Cuba – they look the other way. And then at the slightest excuse, they say things are getting better."
Things are getting better?
Not according to the State Department’s own report.
"Evidence suggests that racial discrimination occurs often [in Cuba],” the report says.
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