[Cincinatus' Wife]

Castro Defends Executions, Says US Provoking Conflict - Nothing A Little Freedom Wouldn't Cure*** "The sinister idea is to provoke an armed conflict between Cuba and the United States in the hope of ending the revolution," he said on a television program where he spoke for almost four hours. Cuba has allowed mass departures in 1980, when 125,000 people left from the port of Mariel, and in 1994, when 35,000 Cubans were picked up at sea by the U.S. Coast Guard, many taken to the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay. Most ended up in the United States. Castro said the top U.S. diplomat in Havana, James Cason, was sent to Cuba last year with instructions to stir up opposition to his government and had overstepped the boundaries of diplomatic conduct.

The Cuban leader repeated his accusations that Cason was "a bully with diplomatic immunity" who had turned the U.S. mission into "an incubator of counterrevolutionaries" by allowing dissidents to openly hold meetings in his residence. Most of the 75 dissidents and independent journalists arrested and given stiff prison terms on charges of being on the payroll of the United States and conspiring to subvert the government were activists seeking peaceful reforms.***

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Castro cannot quash all dissent - books not bombs put them in prison *** Owning ''books contrary to the socioeconomic process,'' an old computer and a video camera, and ''acting on behalf of a foreign power,'' were some of the charges the prosecution put forward during the 18-hour trial of independent journalists Maseda and Oscar Espinosa Chepe and the dissidents Héctor Palacios, Marcelo López and Marcelo Cano.

They were all sentenced to more than 15 years for not agreeing with the official or party line.

The blow that the government has struck against the peaceful opposition within the island (no home search turned up bombs or guns) shows that the dissidents were doing a good job.

To accuse them of ''subverting the established order'' demonstrates how feeble the administration's hold on power really is. Ideas cannot be smothered, even if those at the top think that they have eliminated all opposition.

………………….To complain in a soft voice on the bus, in the bread queue and at the grocery store are the are the only escape mechanisms for the bitterness of not being able to say what we are thinking.

My husband told me during the last visit that State Security agents tell him about me every day, with whom I meet and what I say. This is their way of putting the fear in him and make him understand that I, too, could go to prison.

That's the daily blackmail at State Security headquarters. It's the blackmail of those who fear the power of humble but firm words with which some of us dare call a spade a spade.

Maybe some more of us will still be stuffed into a cell in a Cuban prison, but I'm positive that they won't be able to smother ideas.

In the world beyond, Castro does not have absolute power.

Claudia Márquez Linares is an independent journalist in Cuba. Her husband is among a group of peaceful dissidents recently rounded up and sentenced to prison terms in Cuba.