Cuba Friday slammed US plans to tighten sanctions on the cash-strapped communist country as "cruel and cowardly," with the Communist Party insisting it will stand strong against US President George W. Bush's "putrid ideology."
"His cruel and cowardly measures surely will impose some sacrifices on our people, but they will not stop for a single second its strides toward human and social goals" a Cuban Communist Party statement said.
PHOTO: AFP
The US is determined to push to get "the Cuban example ... wiped off the map," the party statement charged in its official newspaper, Granma.
"All of the craziness of the maniacal and insane Cuba transition program of a fraudulently elected president [Bush] is geared to that end," it said, calling the US plan unveiled Thursday a hodgepodge of "lies, rancor, frustrations and meddling in the domestic affairs of a country" in line with an "imperialist plan to annex Cuba."
"Cuba shall never return to the horrible, savage and inhuman condition of being a colony of the United States," said the party document, one of its harshest against Bush since he took office in 2001.
A US military plane will broadcast pro-democracy messages into Cuba as part of a plan Bush endorsed in Washington to "hasten" Castro's departure.
Washington will also tighten restrictions on Cuban-Americans' cash remittances to relatives on the island and limit family visits between the US and Cuba to one every three years, officials said in Washington.
And US funds will be used to spread information worldwide about Washington's accusations that Havana harbors terrorists; foments subversion in Latin America; and has at least a limited developmental offensive biological weapons research capability, according to the report.
Cuba denies these charges and has urged Bush's administration to substantiate them.
Goals of the US initiative are to undermine Castro's plans that his brother, Raul Castro, succeed him; speed up Cuba's "transition to democracy"; and put in place US programs and policies in anticipation of what Washington sees as the eventual defeat of Cuban communism, US officials said.
This "is a strategy that says we're not waiting for the day of Cuban freedom, we are working for the day of freedom in Cuba," Bush said after meeting with the panel, which he created to recommend a tougher line on Havana, as the November US presidential election looms. Florida, home to some 800,000 Cuban-Americans, is considered likely to be a key state in the election.
The US plan also recommends the spending of up to US$18 million between now and 2006 to deploy "Commando Solo," a specially outfitted C-130 transport plane that has beamed US messages into Afghanistan and Iraq over the past three years.
That money would eventually purchase and refit a dedicated "airborne platform" over international waters for Radio and TV Marti, which Cubans often miss because Havana jams them, the panel's report said.
Cuban dissidents welcomed the plan with skepticism.
Elizardo Sanchez, who heads the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, said the was "very skeptical" and saw "few practical results" in the plan.
Vladimiro Roca, Todos Unidos coordinator, said the plan was "a show of solidarity with the Cuban people and democratization," but he added that there were "questionable" measures in the plan.
On Feb. 24, 1996, the Cuban air force shot down civilian aircraft with the Florida-based Cuban exile group Brothers to the Rescue, killing all four men on board and sharply raising tensions between the neighboring countries, which do not maintain full diplomatic relations.
Cuba said the planes were in its airspace though a UN body found they were not.
The US has had a comprehensive economic embargo clamped on Cuba, the Americas' only one-party communist state, since 1962.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday vowed that those behind bogus flood control projects would be arrested before Christmas, days after deadly back-to-back typhoons left swathes of the country underwater. Scores of construction firm owners, government officials and lawmakers — including Marcos’ cousin congressman — have been accused of pocketing funds for substandard or so-called “ghost” infrastructure projects. The Philippine Department of Finance has estimated the nation’s economy lost up to 118.5 billion pesos (US$2 billion) since 2023 due to corruption in flood control projects. Criminal cases against most of the people implicated are nearly complete, Marcos told reporters. “We don’t file cases for
Ecuadorans are today to vote on whether to allow the return of foreign military bases and the drafting of a new constitution that could give the country’s president more power. Voters are to decide on the presence of foreign military bases, which have been banned on Ecuadoran soil since 2008. A “yes” vote would likely bring the return of the US military to the Manta air base on the Pacific coast — once a hub for US anti-drug operations. Other questions concern ending public funding for political parties, reducing the number of lawmakers and creating an elected body that would
A feud has broken out between the top leaders of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on whether to maintain close ties with Russia. The AfD leader Alice Weidel this week slammed planned visits to Russia by some party lawmakers, while coleader Tino Chrupalla voiced a defense of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The unusual split comes at a time when mainstream politicians have accused the anti-immigration AfD of acting as stooges for the Kremlin and even spying for Russia. The row has also erupted in a year in which the AfD is flying high, often polling above the record 20 percent it
‘ATTACK ON CIVILIZATION’: The culture ministry released drawings of six missing statues representing the Roman goddess of Venus, the tallest of which was 40cm Investigators believe that the theft of several ancient statues dating back to the Roman era from Syria’s national museum was likely the work of an individual, not an organized gang, officials said on Wednesday. The National Museum of Damascus was closed after the heist was discovered early on Monday. The museum had reopened in January as the country recovers from a 14-year civil war and the fall of the 54-year al-Assad dynasty last year. On Wednesday, a security vehicle was parked outside the main gate of the museum in central Damascus while security guards stood nearby. People were not allowed in because
RSS