[Full Text] HAVANA - An authoritative fist knocked on our apartment door.It was State Security with a search warrant to look for what they called, "material proofs of an offense."
The head of the search, who said his name was Pepe, came in at 4:10 p.m., ignoring the fact that I was in my underwear. He stayed watching me, and I had to throw him out of my room to dress. He told me to be quick because he had a search warrant.
For 10 hours, 12 officers, two of them armed, searched our home. The fruits of their literary looting, now in a crammed warehouse of the Cuban government, were: hundreds of newspaper articles, journalism manuals, 150 books (politics, law, economy, social sciences), more than 50 envelopes containing Internet printouts, a video camera, a digital camera, an old laptop, 36 diskettes with the testimonies of victims of the legal whims of the Cuban government, and six compact disks, some containing the underground journal "De Cuba" published by our independent journalists' association, others containing the Encyclopedia of the European Union for Young People.
Even as these officials were going through my drawers and family photos, state television was broadcasting its daily "Round Table" talking-heads show, a chorus of denunciation of us as "traitors."
Over the course of the evening, these officers listened to the audiocassettes of my German lessons, and they took away all the bulletins of the Liberal International, an umbrella organization for all the liberal parties of the world, including my husband's.
They read the love letters that my husband, Osvaldo Alfonso Valdes wrote to me eight years ago; then they took him away from me like a trophy to the cells of the State Security in Havana, in Villa Marista.
It is true that anyone involved in civil society was always branded as "mercenary" and "counterrevolutionary" by the Cuban authorities - and 18 defenders of human rights have been held in custody without trial for over a year.
But what came as a surprise this week was that they would come and get so many of us. Was it because we reported on electricity shortages, on prostitution, on illegal detentions? Was it because we held a workshop on ethics in journalism, exercising our freedom of assembly? Or because we discussed with foreign visitors the political situation in Cuba? Because we dared to have an opinion and took the liberty of expressing it?
What are they afraid of? I ask myself this while in my conscience and in the consciences of the many journalists and leaders of organizations that were also victim of confiscations and arbitrary arrest - the hope remains for a free and democratic Cuba, where to read Vargas Llosa and Milan Kundera will not be "material proof of an offense." [End]
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Castro: Bush is "stupid" - Cuban Crackdown Deepens Strains With U.S.*** *** The Bush administration, unhappy about the Cuban action, is contemplating ways to make Fidel Castro's government pay a price. It also has undercut embargo foes on Capitol Hill.
"The embargo is still a bad idea, but changing it isn't going to happen any time soon," Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., said Monday.
Brian Alexander of the anti-embargo Cuba Policy Foundation said some House members who had entertained dissidents not long ago at a restaurant in Cuba's capital, Havana, were appalled to learn the waiters were state security agents who testified against the activists at their trials.
Cuba contends these dissidents, many of them independent journalists or directors of independent libraries, were subversives working hand-in-hand with the U.S. diplomatic office in Havana, led by career diplomat James Cason. Cuba says the dissidents were funded by the U.S. mission; the State Department denies it and says the mission's role is to seek a peaceful transition to democracy.
Neither Washington nor Havana pays much attention to diplomatic decorum nowadays. In Powell's references to the Cuban leader, he goes straight to "Castro," skipping "president." Castro says President Bush is "stupid." Each side has imposed travel restrictions on the others' diplomats lately. Cuba has even talked about shutting down the U.S. office in Havana and bringing its own envoys home from Washington.***
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Blocking a new axis of evil*** A new terrorist and nuclear weapons/ballistic missile threat may well come from an axis including Cuba's Fidel Castro, the Chavez regime in Venezuela and a newly elected radical president of Brazil, all with links to Iraq, Iran and China. Visiting Iran last year. Mr. Castro said: "Iran and Cuba can bring America to its knees," while Chavez expressed his admiration for Saddam Hussein during a visit to Iraq.
The new axis is still preventable, but if the pro-Castro candidate is elected president of Brazil, the results could include a radical regime in Brazil re-establishing its nuclear weapon and ballistic missile programs, developing close links to state sponsors of terrorism such as Cuba, Iraq and Iran, and participating in the destabilization of fragile neighboring democracies. This could lead to 300 million people in six countries coming under the control of radical anti-U.S. regimes and the possibility that thousands of newly indoctrinated terrorists might try to attack the United States from Latin America. Yet, the administration in Washington seems to be paying little attention.***
Left Wing Stooges create another front for Castro--[Excerpt] --In April, the "neutrality" of the CPF was questioned when it was honored by the officialist propaganda organ of the Castro dictatorship, Radio Havana. Radio Havana in its report ended up praising Grooms Cowal's efforts in starting the Cuba Policy Foundation by stating the following: "The Cuba Policy Foundation has challenged the ultra-right-wing Cuban-American National Foundation to a public debate concerning the merits of Washington's blockade of Cuba."
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The CPF is bankrolled by the Arca Foundation. For those of you who don't know about the Arca foundation, it passes itself as a philanthropic organization that gives millions of dollars annually to organizations that fight for social justice around the world. Unfortunately a grand majority of these organizations are of a far leftist nature, like in 1998 when it gave $1,000 to an obscure contingent called Fondo Del Sol which helped surviving members of the Stalinist Abraham Lincoln Brigade view a photo exhibit on the Spanish Civil War! Among the pro Castro groups Arca has funded have been the Pastors for Peace ($10,000 in 1999), Global Exchange ($50,000 in 1999), and the TransAfrica Forum ($100,000).
Communist Cuba is the main focus of Arca's Foreign Policy grants list, and although it gives money to other international and domestic institutions, it annually gives a substantial amount of funds to causes dealing with communist Cuba. In 1999 alone, the Arca Foundation gave to over 19 organizations that are sympathetic to revolutionary Cuba. [End Excerpt]