Cuba reform effort renewed

THE WASHINGTON TIMES ^ | April 29, 2003 | Sharon Behn

[nickcarraway]

The United States would use "new creativity and vigor to hasten the inevitable democratic transition on the island," said Roger Noriega, President Bush's pick to be assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs.

Washington is incensed by Mr. Castro's roundup of 75 journalists and political dissidents, and the summary trials and executions of three persons found guilty of trying to hijack a ferry boat to reach the United States.

[theDentist]

:-) This fills me with joy! Somewhere tonight, Baba Wawa is weeping and filled with dread.

[DeuceTraveler]

It's about time. It's like spring cleaning from the Cold War.

[pachanga]

I've always wondered that as much as this self-honoring POS appears in public for hours and hours upon end; how hard can it be to cause him an accident? He seems to very much believe in the myth of his own immortality.

[nickcarraway]

ping

[nickcarraway]

ping

[nickcarraway]

ping

[nickcarraway]

ping

[William McKinley]

I can't help but thinking that something is brewing for ol' Fidel.

I can hardly wait to find out what.

[livius]

I hope you're right. I really, really want something to be brewing for Chavez, too - but on the other hand, if Fidel goes, Chavez will probably collapse too. A consummation devoutly to be wished.

[friendly]

The reason Castro is so brutal recently is that he is so weak. The people in the street are cheering the families of the dissidents (something you will never see in CNN/Castro propaganda).

I believe that if Bush applies a Reaganesque tough and ferocious response, Castro will fall.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

"Castro continued to do nothing but oppress, suppress his people, suppress opinion. And we're reviewing all of our policies," he told reporters.

Well surprise us and Newt and do something bold!

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Willful blindness shattered by Cuba's crackdown - Castro shows the brutal face of his regime***The wilful blindness to President Castro's repression has been underlined by the shock at the recent crackdown. The Pope, who insisted on his controversial visit to Havana five years ago that he had won significant human rights concessions, spoke of his "deep sorrow" at the executions and urged Señor Castro to consider a "significant gesture of clemency" toward those convicted. Perhaps the biggest shock was felt by the writers, poets and artists who have long defended Cuba and its autocratic ruler. The Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes called the country "a suffocating dictatorship", the Portuguese Nobel laureate José Saramago said Fidel Castro "cheated his enemies" and the Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano, who once praised him as a "symbol of national dignity", acknowledged that the crackdown had fuelled opposition claims that he was a dictator. There have been demonstrations in Caracas and Madrid.***