KOFY ANNAN WELCOMES THE AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE VENEZUELAN GOVERNMENT AND THE OPPOSITION

    Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General, welcomed the agreement signed by the Venezuelan government and the opposition. He said that the UN would continue supporting this country in its efforts to find a pacific solution to the crisis.

    Annan "urged all Venezuelans to benefit from the agreement (signed on Thursday) to make progress in the search of a pacific, constitutional and electoral solution to the problems of the country," according to a declaration read by UN assistant spokesperson Hua Jiang. He also praised the efforts made by the international brokers, and particularly César Gaviria, OAS Secretary General.  Likewise, he stressed that the UN would firmly maintain its support for Venezuelans as they look for pacific solutions to solve their differences.

    PRESIDENT CHAVEZ IS CONFIDENT OF VICTORY

    President Hugo Chávez said he was confident he would win a revoking referendum backed by opposition groups.

    He said he did not believe the voting would be made, but added that "if a referendum is held, it will not be a revoking referendum, but a knocking down referendum, as we are going to knock down the oligarchs, the enemies of the country, the enemies of the people". However, according to opinion polls made by the major Venezuelan polling companies, over 60 percent of Venezuelans support the referendum to take Chávez out of power.

      CASTRO FAINTED AGAIN, THIS TIME IN BUENOS AIRES

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro was talking to an Argentine protocol officer and an unidentified woman when suddenly one of his bodyguards rushed toward him, pushing the woman to the floor, and grabbed the Cuban dictator by the arm as he began to fall to the ground. Another bodyguard reportedly grabbed Castro by the other arm, while the Argentine diplomat helped sustain Castro by holding on to the back of his pants. The trio then carried the failing Castro, who had a similar fainting spell in June 2001, to a car parked in front of the building.

    Information about Castro's fainting spell came as eyebrows were being raised in Washington over statements by the new Argentinean  foreign minister, former left-wing activist Rafael Bielsa, in which he skirted questions about recent human-rights violations in the Caribbean nation. "I wouldn't dare to say, 'In Cuba, human rights are violated,'" Bielsa told the Spanish newspaper ABC, adding that he did not have "the job nor the moral authority to breezily say that."  In recent months, Castro dictatorship has imprisoned some 75 pro-democracy activists for terms of six to 28 years in what observers call the most severe crackdown in Cuba in recent years. 

    STATE OF EMERGENCY IN PERÚ

    Peru's government dispatched troops and tanks to clear streets of striking workers and restore order Wednesday after President Alejandro Toledo announced a 30-day state of emergency that followed weeks of widespread strikes and growing unrest. Peruvian soldiers and police forcibly removed farmers from highway roadblocks and used a water cannon against teachers blocking the entrance to the national Congress. ''Patience has a limit,'' Toledo said as he announced the crackdown late Tuesday night.

    Around the country, combined units of soldiers and police officers used tear gas to battle rock-throwing protesters in several of cities. Some of the worst confrontations took place in the city of Chiclayo, 410 miles north of Lima, where demonstrators closed roads and attacked local businesses. The armed forces began flying anti-riot units to different cities to end protests by teachers, who have been on strike since May 12. Tanks were dispatched to protect the presidential palace and stand guard over several plazas in the capital's downtown area, where the national offices of major trade unions are located.

    The U.S. Embassy in Lima released a statement supporting Toledo's government, and the president got a boost from Otto Reich, the White House's special envoy for Western Hemisphere initiatives, who arrived in Lima shortly after the state of emergency was declared. Reich met on Wednesday with Toledo and a number of administration officers. ñThe president acted within the laws and constitution of Peru. He felt it was necessary to establish this temporary measure to restore order,'' Reich said.

    AS USUAL, CASTRO HARSHLY ATTACKED US FOREIGN POLICY

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro harshly criticized U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and Latin America in a speech Monday in Buenos Aires. Castro, who attended Sunday's inauguration of President Nestor Kirchner, was on his first trip to this economically troubled South American country since 1995.

    Dressed in a dark blue suit and tie, Castro drew shouts of "Ole! Ole! Ole!" and "Fidel! Fidel!" as he spoke for more than two and a half hours. Castro compared his country's achievements in health care and education to levels attained by the United States in the same field. But his criticism of the U.S-led war in Iraq drew the loudest applause.  "We send our doctors, not bombs, to the farthest corners of the world to help save lives, not kill them," the dictator said. Castro also accused President Bush of trying to impose ña universal nazi-fascist tyrannyî.

    "The people of Buenos Aires are sending a message to those in the world who want to ride roughshod over our cities and our countries in Latin America," Castro added in a thinly veiled reference to the United States. Earlier Monday, the Cuban dictador met with Kirchner for almost an hour. Argentine Foreign Minister Rafael Bielsa later said Castro had asked the new president to strengthen the countries' ties by appointing a new ambassador to Cuba.

    DISMANTLING OF IDLE HERSEY SUGAR MIL LABELED CHAOTIC

    Several people involved in the dismantling of the former Hersey sugar mill near Havana say the work seems to lack direction. "What they are doing is absurd," said one mill worker, "they are burning sugar cane that at the very least could be used as cattle feed. The shoots produced by burned cane when it rains, are so bitter and hard the cattle won't eat them."

    The man was referring to an order from the Ministry of Agriculture to burn all cane in more than 1,320 acres in order to plant other crops. But, some of the workers point out, the required plowing hasn't been done, since there is no fuel for the tractors. Others point out the tractors themselves were taken away by order of the administration and no one knows where they are now. Another worker said "As hungry and needy as we are here in Santa Cruz del Norte and other nearby towns, they should have sold cane juice." There is a rumor among the workers that the machinery from the sugar mill was bought by Venezuela to be used as spare parts.

    U.S. DISSOLVES IRAQI MILITARY

    The Chief U.S. civilian in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, formally dissolved the Iraqi military and its paramilitary offshoots last week. The decree by Bremer was largely symbolic, since the Iraqi military fell apart as U.S. forces took over the country last month. But it left 400,000 former members of IraqÍs regular army, the Republican Guard and various branches of the Defense ministry without a job at a time of deep economic crisis.

    Under the order, retirees, war widows and other pensioners will continue receiving payments. Officers with the rank of colonel and general will not receive any benefits, not even the one monthÍs severance pay that all enlisted personnel and junior officers will receive, because of their Baath Party affiliation. The soldiersÍ job prospects are bleak in a postwar economy showing few signs of life six weeks into the U.S. occupation. Although some may eventually find a place in a future Iraqi military, their sudden addition to the jobless ranks appeared particularly worrisome to U.S. military officials struggling to bring security to a country increasingly frustrated by the slow pace of recovery.

    Bremer had already outlawed senior Baath officials from posts in the new government and banned HusseinÍs image and Baath insignia from public places.  Last weekÍs order struck at the power  behind the former governmentÍs repressive machinery, especially the various militias and security agencies that Hussein used to monitor political opponents and protect himself against coups.

    ANOTHER PERSON KILLED DURING VENEZUELA OPPOSITION PROTEST

    An opposition party held a protest in a slum area considered a stronghold of President Hugo Chavez, killing one person and injuring 17. Once political heavyweights, Democratic Action emerged from relative obscurity to hold Saturday's rally, challenging the president in his own backyard - the crime-infested slum of Catia.

    Several hundred turned up before unidentified gunmen interrupted the rally and protesters ran for cover. Ten people were wounded by gunfire and seven more were treated for cuts from glass bottles. None of the injuries were life-threatening. Police sharpshooters stationed on a rooftop above the rally fired at public housing buildings where the shots apparently originated several blocks away.

    Members of the government had warned of violence before the protest, calling it a îprovocation'' because of Catia's alleged overwhelming allegiance to the president. Some 4,000 police and National Guardsmen were deployed in Caracas ahead of the event but failed to guarantee security at the protest. More than 50 people have been killed in politically related violence since April 2002 and over 300 wounded by firearms, according to local human rights group.

    BRAZIL WILL INVITE CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO TO NEXT YEARÍS RIO GROUP SUMMIT; OF COURSE IF HE'S STILL IN POWER

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro will be invited to attend next year's Rio Group summit, Brazil's leftist president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva announced Saturday at the end of the pro-democracy group's 17th conference held in the Peruvian city of Cuzco. ''I confess. I see no reason for Cuba to be out of the Rio Group,'' da Silva said. ñSince it was first created in Brazil, I don't know why they have not been invited. We are going to investigate that, and, next time, Cuba will be invited.''

    The roots for the organization of Latin American presidents began in 1983, with a handful of nations trying to bring peace to Central America. It was formalized three years later, and its 17 conferences since then have stressed strengthening democracy. Cuba has been shunned from the Rio Group for years partly because of its communist government, but more because the group largely focuses on South American integration issues. In past Rio Group summits, the organization has ''expressed profound concern'' for the human rights situation in Cuba, but never condemned Castro.

    The big difference now is that next year, da Silva -- a old friend of Castro's -- will be president of the Rio Group and Brazil will host the summit. The move to invite Cuba is unlikely to make many waves in Latin America, where Castro has friendly relationships with the presidents of not just Brazil but Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru.

     THE CUBAN DICTATOR OFF TO ARGENTINE PRESIDENTIAL INAUGURATION 

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro left for Argentina on Saturday to attend Sunday's inauguration of the South American country's president-elect, Nestor Kirchner, a governmentÍs spokesman said. It is Castro's first trip abroad since Cuba imprisoned 75 dissidents in April and executed three men who hijacked a ferry in a failed bid to reach the United States. The wave of repression implemented by the communist government has provoked international criticism.

    A brief government statement did not indicate when Castro departed, in keeping with the traditional cloak of secrecy over his international movements. Local analysts said Castro's trip could signal the normalization of the two countries' bilateral relations, all but frozen in recent years due to Argentina's sharp criticism of Cuba's human rights record. The U.S. government will be represented by the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Mel Martínez.

     NEVADAÍS SENATORS OFFER CUBA DEMOCRACY PLANS

    Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev., and Harry Reid, D-Nev., Tuesday unveiled separate efforts aimed at establishing democracy in Cuba. Reid introduced a resolution calling on the State Department and the Organization of American States to gather a tribunal that would have jurisdiction to try Cuban dictator Fidel Castro and other Cuban leaders who have committed "crimes against humanity," Reid said.

    Reid put Castro in the same category as Saddam Hussein as a leader who terrorized his citizens. "They have willingly chosen to torture and kill their people, and it is time to hold them accountable for that decision," Reid said in remarks prepared for a Senate floor speech. Meanwhile Ensign in Miami unveiled a bill that expresses support for active dissident pro-democracy groups in Cuba. The legislation would launch an international group to facilitate planning for a democratic government. The bill authorizes funding to help nongovernmental groups in Cuba prepare for a peaceful government transition.

    The legislation specifically authorizes up to $15 million for democracy-building, including helping political prisoners, aiding in workers' rights projects, helping independent journalists, youth groups and environmental groups, and improving Internet access. "The sad truth is that the Cuban people still are not free," Reid said. "Castro's regime is an insult to the legacy of the Cuban independence movement. As long as he continues to stifle the will of the Cuban people by denying them basic human liberties, any celebration of Cuban independence will ring hollow."

    CUBA: U.S. BOOSTING BROADCASTS INTO CUBA

    Cuba charged Friday that the U.S. government was stepping up radio and television broadcasts into the communist island, saying that the transmissions violate international law and the island's sovereignty. The Foreign Ministry said it had delivered a verbal protest to the top American diplomat here. The U.S. State Department in Washington denied that such broadcasts violated any laws or international norms.

    ñThis week's transmissions did not, nor will they, contravene any of our international obligations,î a U.S. State Department official said in Washington. ñThis was considered carefully.î  Cuba has long complained that both Radio Marti and the newer TV Marti, both U.S. operated, are used by the United States to send anti-Cuba propaganda to the communist island. For many years, authorities here have used transmitter antennas to interrupt frequencies used by Radio Marti, which broadcasts in the Spanish language.

    PRISONERSÍ RELATIVES ATTEND MASS DESPITE THREATS

   Wives and mothers of recently imprisoned government opponents staged a silent protest at a local church on Sunday despite repeated efforts by the political police to discourage them. The women, all similarly dressed in white with a black neckerchief, attended 10 o'clock Mass at St. Rita's Catholic Church, in the Havana suburb of Miramar.

    Twenty women in white among hundreds attending Mass may not constitute a political demonstration anywhere else, but in Cuba, where nothing is quite as it seems, small details acquire magnified meaning. The corroborating evidence: a disproportionate number of accredited foreign journalists at the church and a heavy display of force by the political police, with agents in mufti and special reserve corps stationed for blocks around the church.

    For the first few weeks after the trials of the 75 dissidents in early April, the women would silently walk up and down Fifth Avenue, in front of the church, after Mass. Lately, they have given up on that after repeated threats from Department of State Security agents. "They are afraid that something may happen to them," said one of the women.

    CUBA THREATENS TO DISRUPT COMMERCIAL RADIO STATIONS IN SOUTH FLORIDA

    On orders from the White House, the Pentagon deployed a special airplane this week to beam the signals of Radio and TV Martí to Cuba, using a technology that one administration official said ''breached the wall'' of Cuban jamming efforts. ''The political green light is on'' to make the controversial U.S.-operated stations more effective at reaching Cubans, said the senior official.

    An Air Force EC-130 plane conducted the transmissions between 6:30 p.m. and 10 p.m. Tuesday. It operated within U.S. airspace, not passing into Cuban territory. Cuba acknowledged that the United States had altered its normal transmissions of the two stations, but said they were ineffective and hinted that Cuban dictator Fidel Castro government might retaliate.

    ''The government of the United States should not forget that Cuban radio might be heard on standard frequency in many American states,'' an editorial in the Communist Party libel Granma said. The statement appeared to suggest that Cuba might consider boosting the power of its own radio stations, a move that could disrupt the broadcasts of commercial radio stations in South Florida. Both Radio and TV Martí have transmitted from the Florida Keys. The TV Martí signal is sent from a balloon tethered 10,000 feet above Cudjoe Key at a low angle toward Cuba that is easily blocked.

    U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL LIFTS IRAQ SANCTIONS

    The U.N. Security Council voted Thursday to lift sanctions against Iraq after almost 13 years and to give the United States and Great Britain authority to control the country until an elected government is in place. Resolution 1483 passed by a 14-0 vote, with no abstentions. Syria's ambassador to the United Nations was not present and did not participate in the vote.

    John Negroponte, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said. "The lifting of sanctions marks a momentous event for the people of Iraq. It's the turning of a historical page." Negroponte said that "it is time for the Iraqi people to benefit from their natural resources" after being frozen out of the world's economy under Saddam Hussein's rule.

    U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is in Paris for the G-8 economic summit, told reporters Thursday that France's vote was "a step in the right direction" for the relationship between the United States and France. The resolution dismantles the oil-for-food program in six months and lifts all sanctions except those on weapons.

    A GREAT AMERICAN GENERAL PLANS TO RETIRE 

    Army Gen. Tommy Franks, who planned and commanded the American-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, has decided to retire, defense officials said Thursday. General Franks won high praise from President Bush and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for his handling of the operation to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

    The 57-year-old native of Midland, Texas, comes to the end of his three-year term as head of the military's 25-nation U.S. Central Command in July, but it was not immediately clear when he would leave. No replacement has been nominated. Franks had been considered a leading candidate for the top Army job of chief of staff, which opens in June. But associates doubted he would want the position and Franks said recently that the job title sounded ''very interesting'' but ''not on my scope.''

    Franks is credited with developing a war plan that efficiently defeated the Iraqis with fewer U.S. casualties than many had expected. He also ran the 2001 war against Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban regime and ended Afghanistan's role as a haven for the al-Qaida terrorist network.

    CUBAN AMERICAN LEGISLATORS UNHAPPY WITH ADMINISTRATIONÍS WAVERING

    The celebration of CubaÍs Independence Day yesterday at the White House, where President George W. Bush sent a 40-second message to the Cuban people and met with a small group of eleven former Cuban political prisoners and relatives of newly imprisoned dissidents, did little to assuage the Cuban American communityÍs disappointment with the administrationÍs wavering. 

    Cuban American members of Congress and activists not only from Florida but from all over the country have accused the president of failing to fulfill the promises he made to crack down on Cuban communist government during Independence Day speeches last year, the year before and during his presidential campaign. 

    A terse statement issued by Cuban American Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Mario Diaz Balart, all Florida Republicans, said they had recommended that President Bush meet with the Cuban group after ñwe were informed that the White House had not yet completed its ongoing review of U.S. policy toward the Cuban dictatorship.î None of them attended the White House meeting. Rep. Robert Menéndez (D-NJ), also a Cuban-American, was more direct saying that President Bush has not lived up to his promises, after ñrelentlessly attacking Clinton policy as soft on Cuba, has done no better.î Menéndez, using very strong language, also accused the president ñ...for playing on the emotions of the Cuban American community.î 

     TWO MORE JOURNALISTS ñWARNEDî BY STATE SECURITY AGENTS

    Two officers of the Department of State Security (DSE) called on independent journalists Ernesto Roque and Anna Rosa Veitía May 14 to warn them they would be charged under the terms of Law 88, the "gag" law, if they continue working as journalists. The agents, Roque said, told him that "in Cuba, the independent press is no more," and that he shouldn't visit the U. S. Interests Section in Havana again.

    Roque said the agents told him to convey the same message to Veitía, his wife. The agents, Roque said, identified themselves as "Jesús" and "Manuel," the same names given by a pair of agents visiting other independent journalists the past two weeks and conveying a similar message. It is not clear whether the same two agents have been detailed to visit the journalists, or whether other agents are involved in the campaign and they all give the same names.

    TO OBSERVE CUBAN INDEPENDENCE DAY, PRESIDENT BUSH SENDS A 40-SECOND MESSAGE OF HOPE TO THE CUBAN PEOPLE 

    With political tensions high between the United States and Cuba, President George W. Bush marked Cuban Independence Day on Tuesday by denouncing Cuban dictator Fidel Castro and expressing hope his rule will soon end.

    "My hope is for the Cuban people to soon enjoy the same freedoms and rights as we do. Dictatorships have no place in the Americas. May God bless the Cuban people who are struggling for freedom," President Bush said in a 40-second message played on U.S.-backed Radio Marti, which is beamed into Cuba.

    President Bush was also marking the 101st anniversary of Cuban independence from Spain by meeting at the White House with Mario Chanes de Arms and a small group of former Cuban political prisoners and relatives of current prisoners. There were no plans for Bush to announce any new steps, if any, to punish Cuba for the recent dissident jailing.

    RICARDO ALARCÓN SAYS GOVERNOR BUSH IS URGING AN ATTACK ON CUBA

    Appearing on ABC's This Week, Ricardo Alarcón, the leader of Cuba's National Assembly, said Florida's governor was urging President Bush to invade the island. ''You have, first of all, those in Miami that are calling for even a military action against Cuba, including the governor,'' Alarcón said.

    Later in the interview Alarcón said: ñI am convinced that not very far from President Bush and his entourage are people that are not just willing, but actively working toward that . . . [Jeb Bush] was very open, calling publicly in Florida to do in the neighborhood, in the nation of Cuba, what you just did to Iraq.'' In recent weeks, U.S.-Cuban relations have reached a low point over the arrests and secret trials of 75 Cuban dissidents and the expulsion on orders from the State Department of 14 Cuban diplomats from Washington and New York.

     Following the interview, a spokeswoman for Gov. Bush dismissed Alarcón's charges.  Gov. Bush's press secretary said that the governor has not changed his views on Cuba. ''Gov. Bush has been very clear in his position that he does not condone Castro's repressive regime,'' she said. ñAmericans should continue to show their support for the brave men and women who continue to seek change through continued support of an economic embargo and travel restrictions.''  In the interview, Alarcón also pointed to a March 28 demonstration in Miami that featured some members of Congress and included a banner that read, ñIRAQ NOW, CUBA NEXT.î
 

HAVANA, May 19

    CUBA JAILS FIVE WOULD-BE HIJACKERS FOR LIFE

    Cuba sentenced five men to life in prison for attempted to hijack a plane to the United States, the island's authorities said on Saturday in a statement published by the ruling Communist Party daily Granma, the libel of the Communist Party. 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 (140 kms) across to Florida.

    THE CUBAN DICTATOR PULLS REQUEST TO JOIN COTONOU AID PACT

    Amid world criticism for locking up dissidents, Cuba's communist government on Friday withdrew a second request to join a European Union aid and preferential trade agreement for former colonies, European diplomats said. Cuba's Foreign Ministry summoned the European Commission delegation's charge d'affaires in Havana, Sven Kuhn von Burgsdorff, on Friday afternoon to inform him Havana was canceling its application. The recent arrests signal a further deterioration of the human rights situation and ''will affect Cuba's relations with the European Union, and the perspective of increased cooperation between both groups,'' the EU statement read.

    Cuba applied in January to join the Cotonou Agreement with 78 developing nations in Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP), mostly former European colonies. But the European Commission shelved Cuba's request indefinitely after President Fidel Castro's government sentenced 75 dissidents in April to prison terms of up to 28 years and executed three men by firing squad for hijacking a commuter ferry in an attempt to cross the Florida Straits to the United States.

    The EU has sharply criticized the recent political repression in Cuba and called for the release of imprisoned dissidents. The crackdown began just days after EU Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid Poul Nielson opened an EU diplomatic delegation office in Havana in February. The EU is the largest trading partner and foreign investor in Cuba. The pact would have tripled European financial aid to Cuba's battered socialist economy.

    OLIVER STONE FINALLY ACCEPTED TO SHOW THE OTHER FACE OF CUBAN HISTORY 

    Director Oliver Stone was back in Cuba this week to ask Cuban dictator Fidel Castro about a recent crackdown on dissidents and interview some of his opponents for a controversial documentary that HBO considered incomplete. "The interviews and information will be added to the documentary," Stone's publicist Tony Angellotti said on Friday from Los Angeles.

    The U.S. cable television network HBO last month pulled the documentary "Comandante" from its May schedule after the Cuban dictator jailed 75 dissidents and executed by firing squad three men who hijacked a ferry in hopes of reaching the United States. The 90-minute documentary, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January, is a profile of Castro. Critics said the film was a whitewash of human rights abuses in Cuba by the director of the films "JFK" and "Nixon." HBO had canceled "Comandante" saying that unless Stone returned to Cuba and interviewed the dissidents, the documentary would appear " dated and incomplete."

    On Tuesday, Stone interviewed dissident Oswaldo Paya in Havana. "I thought he was very misinformed about what is going on in Cuba. He was more interested in the love life of Fidel Castro than what is happening to 11 million Cubans," Paya said. ñI was the one who insisted in talking about the dissidents, but he seemed not to hear my comments and asked questions as if he were a prosecutor.î  Stone's production team also interviewed Elizardo Sánchez Santacruz and Vladimiro Roca. Later, they went to the home of Blanca Reyes, wife of writer Raúl Rivero, to interview her, and Miriam Leiva and Claudia Márques, wives of Oscar Espinosa Chepe and Osvaldo Alfonso, both sentenced to up to 28 years in prison.

    PRESIDENT BUSH FILES PAPERS FOR RE-ELECTION BID IN 2004

    President Bush launched his re-election bid Friday, formally filing papers to seek a second term with his postwar popularity soaring despite a sluggish economy. On orders issued by the president late last week, a law clerk hand delivered and filed the formal notice of Bush's intentions at the Federal Election Commission. The step allows the president to raise money, hire staff and open a campaign headquarters. Filing with the FEC is a legal step required when a candidate plans to raise more than $5,000.

    It is the first chapter in a meticulous campaign plan devised by chief political operative Karl Rove, who will run Bush's campaign from the White House. Rove has already drafted a campaign plan that looks 18 months down the road and outlines a strategy aimed at giving Bush a second term, a goal denied to his father in the 1992 race against then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton.

    The elder Bush began his re-election campaign with high approval ratings after the 1991 Persian Gulf War but was defeated by a Democratic candidate who tapped into the public's anxieties over the weak economy. His son hopes to avoid the same fate by underscoring GOP efforts to improve the economy, primarily with a multibillion-dollar tax-cut plan.  In the filing, Bush lists Cheney as the vice presidential candidate. Cheney signed the forms last Friday; President Bush signed them Thursday.

    FBI MEMO BEHIND CUBANSÍ EXPULSION

    The Bush administration's decision this week to expel 14 Cuban diplomats had its genesis in an FBI memorandum sent to the State Department last October citing concern about Cuban intelligence activities, officials asserted Thursday. ''Cuban intelligence agencies have and continue to pose a significant threat to the national security of the United States,'' the FBI statement said.

    ''Based on thorough investigations, and to preempt the activities of Cuban intelligence in the United States, the FBI recommended to the State Department that a number of Cuban intelligence officers be declared persona non grata and expelled,'' the statement added. ñThe State Department acted on our recommendation.'' For decades, the FBI has maintained an active counter-intelligence unit to thwart Cuban espionage in the United States. Its mission is ''to identify and neutralize agents'' seeking to harm the United States, one official said.

    By mid-April, more FBI documentation arrived recommending expulsion of Cuban diplomats, officials said. Authorities said they are required by the Immigration and Nationality Act to take action against foreigners who are believed to be engaged in spying. However, some analysts said the Bush administration is looking for ways to express its displeasure with a crackdown on dissidents in Cuba and the harassment of U.S. diplomats in Havana but don't have many tools available. The White House is under pressure from a great majority of the Cuban exiles to tighten the screws on the regime of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.

    U.S. STOPS SIX CUBANS FROM REACHING FLORIDA KEYS

    The Coast Guard stopped six illegal Cuban migrants who tried to enter the Florida Keys on a small boat Thursday, plucking all six from the water, two after they tread water for more than two hours, authorities said. The six were taken aboard a Coast Guard boat off Tavernier, about 75 miles south of Miami. After receiving medical treatment, they will be questioned by a U.S. Border Patrol agent involved in the rescue to decide whether to send them back to Cuba or bring them ashore. Under the ñwet foot, dry foot'' policy, Cubans who reach U.S. shores are generally permitted to stay, while those caught at sea are sent back.

    In an earlier case, two of the three Cubans arrested after swimming ashore near Key Largo on May 6 appeared Thursday before a federal magistrate judge in Key West. They are charged with threatening Coast Guard members with a knife and part of their boat's mast. They each face possible 20-year prison sentences. Bond was set for each of the men at $70,000. The third man was not charged and is en route to Krome Detention Center in west Miami-Dade County for processing.

    U.S. AND SOUTH KOREA WILL NOT TOLERATE NUCLEAR WEAPONS IN NORTH KOREA

    President Bush and South Korea's leader said they were united in seeking a Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons, and expressed confidence that the standoff with North Korea could be resolved peacefully. ñWe're making good progress toward achieving that peaceful resolution ... in regard to North Korea,'' Bush said in a White House Rose Garden appearance with Roh. However, North Korea and the United States remained far apart in their positions on the nuclear issue.

    Bush described Roh as ñan easy man to talk to,'' and Roh said the U.S. president had dispelled his concerns. ñNow I return to Korea with only hopes in my mind,'' Roh said.  Numerous obstacles lie in the path of a peaceful solution to the crisis over North Korea's suspected development of nuclear weapons. South Korea wants the United States to be more open to dialogue with North Korea, but Washington says it won't negotiate its key demand that the North immediately abandon its nuclear programs.

    Roh and Bush issued a joint statement asserting that their countries would not tolerate nuclear weapons in North Korea and invited other nations in the region to help defuse the standoff. The leaders stated their confidence that peaceful resolution was possible ñwhile noting that increased threats to peace and stability on the peninsula would require consideration of further steps.'' ñEscalatory moves by North Korea will only lead to its greater isolation and a more desperate situation in the North,'' their statement said.

     VENEZUELA BLASTS U.S. AMBASSADORÍS ñPROVOCATIONî

    Venezuela's government on Thursday sharply criticized U.S. Ambassador Charles Shapiro for hosting an event at his official Caracas residence during which an impersonator used a puppet to ridicule President Hugo Chavez. "What we have here is an irresponsible U.S. ambassador," Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel told a news conference. Rangel said the incident could be interpreted as "a provocation."

    The event marked International Press Freedom Day during which Shapiro criticized what he called a deterioration of press freedom in Venezuela. The event was broadcast on local television and was attended by several anti-Chavez media personalities. It ended with the appearance of a male comedian dressed as a Venezuelan female media broadcaster and carrying a large puppet wearing a red beret representing the Venezuelan president.

    Pro-government deputies at the National Assembly drafted a motion calling on the ambassador to make a public apology for what they called his "unfriendly action." Rangel said Venezuela considered Shapiro's behavior an act of personal irresponsibility and did not want the incident to damage relations with Washington. "In spite of Mr. Shapiro, we want excellent relations with the United States," Rangel said.

    CUBA SAYS U.S. EXPULSION OF DIPLOMATS ïIRRATIONALÍ

    Cuba said on Wednesday the expulsion of 14 of its diplomats from the United States showed the Bush administration was embarked on an aggressive course of confrontation with the island's communist-run government. The Cuban Foreign Ministry said the expulsion of its envoys -- seven at the U.N. mission in New York and seven in Washington -- was an escalation of diplomatic tensions aimed at the closure of the low-level interests offices the two political foes maintain in the absence of formal diplomatic relations.

    But a ministry statement said Cuba would not give in to "provocation" and announced no Cold War-style retaliatory expulsions of American diplomats from the U.S. Interest Section in Havana. "The expulsion of 14 Cuban diplomats is an irrational act of revenge by the U.S. government against Cuba," said the ministry statement published on the front-page of the libel Granma. 

    In March, Cuban authorities rounded up 75 dissidents and jailed them for terms of up to 28 years after summary trials that convicted them of conspiring with U.S. diplomats to undermine Cuba's one party communist system. The worst wave of political repression in decades was followed by the firing squad executions of three men who hijacked a commuter ferry in a bid to cross the Florida Straits to the United States.

    TWO MORE JOURNALISTS THREATENED WITH JAIL TERMS

    Two independent journalists received visits from officers of the Department of State Security (DSE) who warned them to either stop working as journalists or face the strictures of Law 88, the "Gag" law under which 27 journalists were sentenced to up to 27 years in prison in April.

    Two agents who identified themselves as Jesús and Manuel called on Fara Armenteros, the director of the Union of Independent Cuban Journalists and Writers on May 8. Armenteros said that in the course of a 45-minute conversation, the officers referred to several of her articles published in CubaNet and told her that rather than being independent, she was a mercenary.

    As several journalists compared notes later, they realized that after the officers left Armenteros, they headed to the home of independent journalist Gilberto Figueredo, who lives nearby in the 10 de Octubre municipality of Havana. Figueredo, the director of a publication called Carta de Cuba (Letter from Cuba), based abroad, said the officers asked him to go for a walk, and told him: "This is either the end of Carta de Cuba, or we will finish the director of Carta de Cuba. We are giving you two options. You choose."

    THE UNITED STATES IS EXPELLING 14 CUBAN DIPLOMATS

    President Bush administration has ordered the largest expulsion of Cuban diplomats in recent times with the ouster of 14 diplomats for allegedly engaging in espionage activities, U.S. officials said Tuesday. The 14 diplomats hold positions at varying levels at Cuba's United Nations Mission in New York and the Cuban Interests Section in Washington.

    The Bush administration has declared the diplomats persona non grata in response to "inappropriate and unacceptable Cuban activities ... deemed harmful to the United States," the official said. Seven of the diplomats are based in Washington, at the Cuban interests section in the Swiss Embassy, and seven are at the U.N. mission in New York. They  were informed by letter Monday evening.  The seven diplomats who work out of the Interests Section were declared ''persona non grata'' because of ''intelligence activities incompatible with their diplomatic status,'' said a State Department spokesman.

    They have 10 days to leave, the U.S. official said. The Cuban diplomats from the U.N. mission are said "not to be at the top level but at various levels of the mission," a U.S. official said. The FBI and CIA tracked their activities, the official said. The seven Cubans at the U.N. Mission who received notice Monday have until May 22 to leave the country, ''unless we get information provided to us that justifies a contrary result,'' said a spokesman for the United States' U.N. ambassador.

    WORLDWIDE PROTESTS FOR CUBA

    The world, thank God, for a few minutes has fixed its glance on our small island that for more than forty-four years has been deprived of Liberties and Rights. Its old and crazed governor has dared to do publicly what he has always done in silence; he has just shot three of our brothers for wanting to leave the island. He has just jailed, with big drums and cymbals, more than seventy Activists of human rights, applying a personal decree using legal terms not seen in any law or constitution. The decrepit Governor is an old political wolf, his action is not isolated, take Note, the message is: Here nothing changes, I, as always, do not respect anybody; I am the state.

    What the regime in Havana has done has no parallel in history. That is why the civilized world must raise not only its voice but its action and condemn the Cuban dictatorship and those that support such sinister characters, because this challenge to the violation of Human rights was public. If we citizens of the world do not contribute so that the world is freer and better every day, and we permit with crossed arms that this type of Government exists, simply it's an erroneous legacy that we leave for our children and humanity.

    NORTH KOREA NULLIFIES NO-NUKE ACCORD

    North Korea said Monday a 1992 agreement with South Korea to keep the Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons was nullified, citing a "sinister" U.S. agenda. The accord was the last remaining legal obligation under which North Korea was banned from developing atomic arms. In January, Pyongyang withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, a global accord to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. "The joint (inter-Korean) agreement to keep the Korean Peninsula nuclear free was nullified because of a sinister and hostile U.S. policy against North Korea," the North's official news agency KCNA said. The statement was monitored by South Korean news agency Yonhap.

    The two Koreas signed the agreement in January 1992, pledging to renounce hostilities and ban the development and deployment of nuclear weapons on the divided peninsula. North Korea has accused the United States of planning to attack the isolated country, using the nuclear dispute as an excuse for invasion. Washington says it wants to resolve the crisis through dialogue, though U.S. officials have not ruled out a military option.

    U.S. COALITION FORCES ARRESTED IRAQÍS ñDR. GERM,î AND MILITARY CHIEF

    The Iraqi woman labeled by Central Command as "Dr. Germ" is in custody, as is the former head of Iraq's armed forces, U.S. officials said Monday. Rihab Taha al-Azawi al-Tikriti, the British-educated Iraqi referred to by U.S. officials as "Dr. Germ," was No. 197 on Central Command's most-wanted list. Taha could prove instrumental in leading U.S. and British forces to the former regime's suspected biological, chemical and nuclear weapons, officials said.

    U.S. officials also said the former head of Iraq's armed forces is in U.S. custody. Ibrahim Ahmad al Sattar Muhammad al-Tikriti served as Iraqi armed forces chief of staff under Saddam's regime, according to U.S. officials. Muhammad is No. 11 on the U.S. list of 55 most wanted Iraqis and the jack of spades in the U.S. card deck. It was not clear whether either Muhammad or Taha surrendered or was captured. Of the 55 most wanted list, coalition forces say they have 21 in custody. Three others are suspected to be dead.

    ARRESTED DISSIDENTSÍ WIVES PRAY FOR THEIR FREEDOM

    Approximately thirty wives of dissidents detained by Cuban Communist Fidel CastroÍs government demonstrated outside of the Santa Rita Church, Sunday, in Havana. For the third Sunday, prisonersÍ wives wearing white clothes denounce the conditions their husbands are living under in the different jails of the country where most of them are serving sentences of over 20 years. The Cuban government prohibited them from marching in silence for two blocks near the church, as they've done on past Sundays. "They thought it would be a provocative act," said one of the wives. "They were prepared to arrest us."

    ñThe best gift t we could get today is their freedomƒthis is a desperate situationî, said Gisela Delgado, wife of Hector Palacios Palacios, one of the 75 reporters and writers que were sanctioned last month to long years of prison. Secretary of State Colin Powell recently said: "The dissidents are representatives of a growing and truly independent civil society that were arrested, convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms in summary, secret trials...Their only crime was seeking basic human rights and freedoms.''

    PROTEST AIMED AT CUBA OVER DENIAL OF VISAS

    Chile's government lodged a formal protest with Cuba after Havana denied visas for two Chilean lawmakers who accused Fidel Castro's regime of human rights violations, the press reported Saturday.

    ''From now on, [Chile] will apply reciprocity in relations between the countries in such matters,'' Foreign Minister Soledad Alvear said in an interview published by the newspaper El Mercurio.

     CASTROÍS ASSERTIONS ABOUT U.S. ATTACK ARE STARTING TO WORRY SOME CUBANS

    In speeches, television broadcasts and almost daily news reports, Cubans have been subjected to ''evidence'' that they are next on the U.S. invasion list. The snippets of ñproofî come through disturbing images of warfare in Iraq, a string of hijacking incidents blamed on the United States, strong statements by President Bush administration repeated by Cuban officials for internal consumption and, now, the continued inclusion of Cuba as one of seven nations that sponsor terrorism.

    "By maintaining Cuba on its list of states sponsoring terrorism, the U.S. government is demonstrating that its irrational thirst for vengeance against the Cuban revolution is greater than any genuine interest to curb international terrorism,'' according to a statement published Thursday in the libel Granma. In the lengthy article, Cuba also accused the United States of trying to create ñthe right conditions for a possible military attack against Cuba.''

    The campaign to create a siege mentality is having an impact on the island, where some citizens are beginning to believe that something is in the works, opposition leaders in Havana said. ñThere is a fear that Cuba will be invaded, some people are saying, ïWhat will happen if the Americans come?Íî U.S. officials, meanwhile, have said numerous times that Cuba is not a military target. However, Cuba and six other nations -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria and Sudan -- remain on a State Department list as sponsors of terrorism.

    GROUP OF FRIENDS FAILS TO BROKER DEAL ON VENEZUELA

    President Hugo Chavez's supporters said Thursday that they would agree to a referendum on Chavez's rule if his political opponents would also face recall votes. Government delegates last month backed out of a deal setting up a plebiscite this year on President Chavez's rule. Representatives from Chavez's government and opposition officials met with envoys from Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Portugal, Spain and the United States Thursday as the six nations attempted to restart talks.

    On Thursday, government representative Aristobulo Isturiz said any referendum on Chavez should also allow Venezuelans to vote on opposition politicians.  Venezuela has been riven with political violence in the past 13 months. Dozens of supporters from each side have been killed and hundreds of others wounded in street marches and rallies over the past 13 months. Venezuela's opposition blames Chavez's left-leaning policies for the country's deepening economic crisis and accuses the former paratrooper of riding roughshod over the democracy. The diplomats were slated to leave Venezuela on Friday, and it was unclear when they would hold their next meeting with the two sides.

    SENATOR LIEBERMAN URGES PRESIDENT BUSH TO PRESSURE CUBA

    In a live broadcast to Cuba, Democratic candidate for president Joe Lieberman urged President Bush administration Thursday to ratchet up the pressure on Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's communist government and help the island nation's dissidents. The senator from Connecticut called on President Bush in an interview with Radio Marti ñto be very aggressive'' in implementing the policies the president outlined in a May 2002 speech in which he promised to provide American aid for the development of civil society in Cuba.

    ñAnd what does that mean? Specific support for the dissidents, the freedom fighters in Cuba and not stepping back at all in our position that we will not rest until this regime falls and the Cuban people rise to enjoy their freedom,'' Lieberman said in a brief interview. Lieberman told listeners in Spanish, ñI have always fought for a free Cuba.''

    In response to reporters, Lieberman criticized the Bush administration's follow through on the 2002 speech. ñThere has been not adequate support particularly of the creation of civil society in Cuba and not adequate support of the dissidents,'' Lieberman said. Lieberman, the 2000 Democratic vice presidential candidate, voted for the 1996 Helms-Burton Act that tightened the U.S. economic embargo against Cuba. 

    CUBA ANGRILY REJECTS INCLUSION IN THE ANNUAL REPORT ON TERRORISM

    Cuba on Thursday rejected U.S. charges that the communist-run Caribbean island sponsors terrorism, and accused the Bush administration o obsessively trying to overthrow President Fidel Castro's government. Cuba charged the list was politically motivated, created "favorable conditions for a possible military aggression" and undermined the global war on terrorism. The new communiqué said the U.S. annual "Patterns of Global Terrorism" report, issued along with the list, contained "flagrant lies against Cuba." Our country has firmly and decidedly opposed the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq and the new Nazi-fascist doctrine (of preemptive war) that the United States is attempting to impose on the world," the statement said.

        "The Cuban government energetically rejects, once again, the infamous inclusion of our country on this unilateral and spurious list," a statement published on Thursday by both Granma and Juventud Rebelde states. The U.S. State Department on April 30 issued its annual list of "state sponsors of terrorism," including Cuba, which has made the list since 1981, this year with Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria. Relations between the United States and Cuba, enemies since Castro took power in a 1959 revolution, have been increasingly strained during the Bush administration.  

    ACTIVISTS CRITICIZE CUBA PRISON MEASURES

    Human rights activists in Havana bitterly criticized the Cuban government Wednesday for allegedly placing at least 65 of the 75 dissidents in solitary confinement and sending them in remote prisons, making family reunions difficult. ''This is beyond cruelty; it's an extra judicial punishment,'' said longtime activist Elizardo Sánchez. ñAt least 65 of them are in solitary confinement in the punishment wards of maximum security prisons.''

    Sánchez, who heads the Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation, keeps tabs on the prisoners through family contacts. He also complained of what he said was a deliberate attempt by the government to make family visits nearly impossible. ''In Cuba, where the public transportation system has virtually collapsed, family visits become an odyssey,'' Sánchez said. ñIt requires tremendous sacrifice for relatives and takes some [of them] several days to get to the prisons to visit their loved ones.'' In Havana, Sánchez said the dissidents were being held in ''inhuman conditions,'' confined to tiny cells and receiving inadequate food and contaminated water. ''So all of them are sick due to parasites,'' Sánchez said.

    VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY HAS AGREED TO BE PRESIDENT BUSHÍS RUNNING MATE IN 2004

    Vice President Dick Cheney has agreed to be President Bush's running mate in 2004, saying past health problems won't prevent him from being on the next presidential ticket.  "The president has asked me if I would serve again as his running mate. I've agreed to do that," he said Tuesday in an interview with The Dallas Morning News.

    Vice President Cheney's position on the 2004 ticket has been the subject of heightened speculation because of his heart condition. He has had four heart attacks, though none as vice president. "I've got a doc with me 24 hours a day who watches me very carefully," said the vice president. "If I ran into problems where I felt I couldn't serve, I'd be the first to say so and step down."

    Vice President Cheney, 61, has already said he would relish a chance to join Bush for any 2004 re-election run. In November, President Bush indicated he wanted his vice president to reprise his role, saying "there's no reason for me to change." The Vice President said he did not know when President Bush would formally announce his candidacy.

    THREE CUBANS SWIM TWO MILES TO FLORIDA SHORE

    Three Cubans who jumped from their rickety wooden boat and swam to shore after refusing help from the U.S. Coast Guard were being detained, along with a fourth man who was captured at sea. The Cubans were spotted by a Coast Guard jet around 2 p.m. and three vessels were sent out to the area, an officer said. The men swung their oars at the boat to keep the vessels at bay, then got out of their boat and swam the two miles to shore. The three initially threw life jackets back to Coast Guardsmen, but eventually put them on. One was wearing flippers.

     A fourth migrant, too tired to stay afloat, allowed himself to be taken aboard a Coast Guard vessel. With rescue boats following and officers watching, the three Cubans kept swimming, hoping to make it two miles to freedom. Nearly three hours after throwing themselves from their rickety boat to stave off the Coast Guard, three Cuban migrants slogged through thigh-high water and into the mangroves off Key Largo on Tuesday. 

    Barefoot and wearing nothing but brief trunks, the trio gingerly picked their way across a bed of coral to the mangrove swamp ringing the affluent enclave of The Ocean Reef Club shortly before 6:30 p.m. As the ocean gave way to shallow puddles, one of the men lifted his arms to the sky, pumping his fists with joy. Under the wet foot/dry foot policy, Cuban migrants who reach shore are generally allowed to stay, while those interdicted at sea are typically sent back to communist Cuba.

    DR. ELIAS BISCET IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

    Imprisoned Cuban dissident Oscar Elías Biscet has been in solitary confinement for more than ten days, clad only in his shorts because he refuses to wear prison garb, his wife, Elsa Morejón, said Monday. Biscet, 41, is ''in an isolation cell as punishment, because he believes he's a prisoner of conscience and won't accept the rules that apply to common criminals,'' Morejón told El Nuevo Herald. He may not receive visitors or packages from his family until he agrees to wear a uniform, she said.

    Dr. Biscet is serving a 25-year sentence for alleged ''acts against the state.'' He was arrested Dec. 6, 2002, and sentenced April 10 after a summary trial. He is serving his sentence at a provincial prison in Pinar del Río province.

    OAS CONCERNED ON CUBA

    Cesar Gaviria, General Secretary of the Organization of American States, said Monday he was concerned about Cuba's crack-down on dissidents and the OAS was working on a statement about the Latin American country. "I am personally concerned about the situation of human rights and public liberties in Cuba, and I am waiting for the OAS permanent council to express (this) politically," Gaviria told reporters in Montreal.

    Gaviria would not say when the statement would be issued and stressed some countries did not only want to deal with the human rights issue in Cuba. "Many countries do not just want to talk about human rights. They want a statement (on Cuba) that is more comprehensive of the current situation," Gaviria said.

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's government has come under heavy international criticism after sentencing 75 dissidents to long prison terms last month, and executing three men who hijacked a ferry in a failed bid to reach the United States. Havana has said the crackdown is in response to what it says is a U.S. plot to topple the Castro government.

    NORTH KOREA PROTESTS U.S. ACCUSATION IT SPONSORS TERRORISM

    North Korea on Monday rejected as ''foolish'' the latest U.S. designation of it as a state sponsor of terrorism, saying that doing so only complicates the dispute between the two countries over the North's nuclear program. ''The U.S. smear campaign against the DPRK will only make the settlement of the nuclear issue between the DPRK and the United States more complicated and aggravate the situation,'' a Foreign Ministry spokesman told the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), monitored in Beijing.

    The DPRK is an abbreviation for North Korea. The U.S. State Department's latest annual report on global terrorism, released last Wednesday, designates North Korea as one of seven ''state sponsors'' of terrorism along with Cuba, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Iraq and Libya.

    Last week Secretary of State Colin Powell issued a strong condemnation of the Cuban government, describing it as ña regime that is one of the last of its kind on the face of the earth and really is an aberration in the Western Hemisphere.î

    NINE IRAQIS EXPECTED TO LEAD INTERIM GOVERNMENT

    A group of nine Iraqis is expected to head Iraq's interim government in the coming months, retired Army Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, the U.S. civil administrator for Iraq, said Monday. Garner said the group includes Massoud Barzani, leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party; Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress; and Jalal Talabani of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.

    The group also includes Iyad Allawi of the Iraqi National Accord; and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, whose elder brother heads the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, according to Garner, who spoke to reporters in Baghdad as he prepared to depart for the southern Iraqi city of Basra.  Garner also indicated the interim leadership group may be expanded, according to a pool reporter accompanying the retired lieutenant general. Garner did not specify how the multiethnic group would operate.

   MIAMI PROSECUTORS SHOW TOUGHER U.S. STAND AGAINST HIJACKERS

     Miami prosecutors are going to extraordinary lengths to keep a group of Cuban skyjack suspects behind bars -- mainly to send a message to island residents and their leader, president for life and dictator, Fidel Castro, that the United States will be tough on hijackers. The U.S. attorney's office has tried twice, and failed, to block the release of the six defendants on bond before their trial. Now prosecutors say they may ask the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta to overturn a judge's bail order.

     'With all due respect to the court's decision, it's a violent crime that put people's lives in danger,'' said U.S. Attorney Marcos Jiménez, citing knives used by the suspects to commandeer a plane with 31 passengers and crew members from Cuba to Key West. The skyjacking case represents more than just a criminal prosecution for Jiménez and the U.S. Justice Department. It is driven by decades of friction between Castro and the federal government over hijacking prosecutions and migration policies.

     On March 19, the six Cuban men allegedly used kitchen knives, hijacked a twin-engine DC-3 to Key West. They each face at least 20 years in prison if convicted. U.S. Magistrate Hugh Morgan of Key West set bond at $100,000 each, and it was later upheld on appeal by Senior U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King of Miami. Both judges ruled the defendants were not flight risks or dangers to the community.

    MARIO VARGAS LLOSA  ATTACKS GARCIA MÁRQUEZ FOR HIS TIES TO THE CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO

    Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa criticized Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez on Friday, calling him ña writer who is a courtesan of Fidel Castro, whom the dictatorship holds up as an intellectual alibi...And he so far has come to accept very well all the abuses, the trampling of human rights that the Cuban dictatorship has committed, saying that secretly he helps some political prisoners get released,'' Vargas Llosa told Caracol radio during a visit to the Bogotá book fair.

    ''It is no secret to anyone that Fidel Castro hands over some political prisoners to his courtesans once in a while,'' Vargas Llosa said. ñThat is how [García Márquez] keeps his conscience clean. To me it sounds more like repugnant cynicism.'' Vargas Llosa challenged García Márquez to ''intellectually'' explain his support of Castro, but added: ñI doubt very much that he will.''

    García Márquez recently condemned the death penalty ''anywhere and for any reason,'' in reply to American writer Susan Sontag, who said she was troubled that the writer had not condemned recent executions in Cuba. García Márquez, who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1982, and Castro have long been friends. His signature was among 164 intellectuals from several countries on a letter asserting Cuba was the victim of a worldwide campaign of ''harassment'' that could serve as a pretext for a U.S. invasion.

    IRAQ, CUBA ARE MOST PERILOUS VENUES FOR JOURNALISTS

    Where is the worst place in the world to be a journalist? A new report by a U.S.-based media watchdog says Iraq, where nine journalists died in the first three weeks of the U.S.-led invasion.

    Second on the list was Cuba, where Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's government launched a crackdown on dissidents and the island's fledgling free press in March, arresting dozens of journalists and handing down prison terms of up to 28 years.

    A CUBAN REFUSED JOB FOR BEING DISSIDENT

    Administrators at a Ministry of Agriculture facility in Pinar del Río province told Héctor Ramón Novo that they wouldn't give him a job because he is a dissident. Novo applied for a job in the agricultural collection center once he learned they were hiring. Officials, however, told him they would not hire him because he belongs to the 30 de Noviembre "Frank País" party, one of many dissident organizations in the island.

    Local inspectors also confiscated the goods a self-employed merchant had for sale, telling him they were doing so because he is a dissident. The merchant, Jorge Luis Blanco, is an independent journalist.

    PRESIDENT BUSH LANDS ON CARRIER FOR IRAQ SPEECH

    President Bush made a historic landing aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, Thursday, arriving in the co-pilot's seat of a Navy S-3B Viking after making two flybys of the carrier. It marked the first time a sitting president has arrived on the deck of an aircraft carrier by plane. The president was in the co-pilot's seat of the aircraft with the safest flight record in the Navy's jet fleet with a second pilot and a Secret Service agent in the rear seats of the Viking, said White House spokesman Scott McClellan.

    The jet made what is known as a "tail hook" landing in which the plane, traveling about 150 mph, hooked onto one of four steel wires across the flight deck and came to a complete stop in less than 400 feet. The outside of the four-seat S-3B Viking was marked with "Navy 1" and "George W. Bush Commander in Chief." President Bush's plane flew from Naval Air Station North Island near San Diego, California, to the carrier about 100 miles offshore in the Pacific. The president is scheduled to deliver a national television address from the deck of the Lincoln at 9 p.m. EDT Thursday. The Lincoln is heading home from the Persian Gulf after taking part in the war in Iraq.

    CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO SAYS U.S. IS PROVOKING WAR

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, addressing a May Day rally of hundreds of thousands of people, accused the United States on Thursday of trying to provoke a war with Cuba. ñIn Miami and Washington they are now discussing where, how and when Cuba will be attacked,'' the Cuban dictator said in a speech at the annual celebrations in Havana's Plaza of the Revolution. Castro charged President Bush administration was out to assassinate him or invade the country, stating that he was not worried about being killed, but rather about a U.S. attack.

    ñOn behalf of the one million people gathered here this May Day, I want to convey a message to the world and the American people: We do not want the blood of Cubans and Americans to be shed in a war.'' Castro accused the United States of hypocrisy over recent hijackings of Cuban planes and boats, saying Americans were provoking and actively encouraging the hijackings, only to later denounce them. "Castro appears to be using the U.S. threat as a cover to clamp down because the economy is not doing well, though he does have some reason to worry about the Bush administration," a European diplomat said.

    "If the solution were to attack Cuba like Iraq, I would suffer greatly because of the cost in lives and enormous destruction it would bring Cuba. But it might turn out to be the last of the (Bush) administration's fascist attacks, because the struggle would last a very long time," he said. As an example of America's ñbrazenly provocative'' actions, Castro said Kevin Whitaker, chief of the State Department's Cuban bureau, warned Cuban diplomats in Washington on Sunday that the American government ñconsidered the continued hijackings from Cuba a serious threat to the national security of the United States.''

    FRESH VENEZUELA CLASHES LEAVE ONE SHOT DEAD AND SEVERAL WOUNDED

    One man was shot dead on Thursday when a gunman fired on opponents of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez after tens of thousands of demonstrators jammed Caracas streets in rival Labor Day marches over his populist rule, officials said. In confused running skirmishes, police fired tear gas after the shooting to disperse rival bands of demonstrators who clashed in the center of the capital with volleys of rocks, bottles and fireworks.

    Witnesses and officials said the gunman opened fire at one opposition labor leader and then fled to a nearby building, where state security police fought back angry demonstrators clamoring for justice. The man's body lay draped in a flag on the street. "They fired at point-blank range three times. He didn't stand a chance."

    In a huge fluttering sea of banners, placards and national flags, thousands of Chavez opponents earlier snaked along a Caracas highway in what they billed as a renewed campaign for a referendum to unseat the leftist president. "Everyone on the streets again to democratically resolve this crisis. We will defeat him ... From today the people will take the streets," barked an anti-Chavez union chief and opposition leader.

       CUBA IS A DICTATORSHIP

    The world is beginning to understand the tragedy that the CastrosÍ dictatorship has been for the people of the island of Cuba.  Celebrities who spent a few hours with Fidel Castro and breathlessly recounted his charisma now are shocked to learn he ordered people assassinated and jailed.   Recently we have seen newly freed Iraqis take to the streets and condemn the leader they were formerly forced to cheer for the cameras of CNN.  They spit on the images of Hussein as a perplexed world says, ñ We thought they liked him.î  Can anyone doubt that the same thing will happen in Cuba after the fall of the Castro brothers? 

    A close friend told me,  ñThat what happened in Iraq will be mirrored in Cuba.  The people that are with the Castro brothers now, will turn against them immediately, once they see that they are no longer in controlî.  Is this so difficult to understand?  The Cuban people are subjugated.  They cannot speak or act freely.  No one in their government represents the people.   Men, women and children are forced to march and stand in the sun for hours listening to the dribble of a diseased old tyrant.  Complaining and attempting to leave Cuba may get you shot or thrown in jail for a lifetime.  What is there to like about the Castro brothers?  What is so great about living in a country where two old men tell you what you can eat, what you can think, where you can go, what you can do and with whom, what you can write or read, who can be your friends, what you can say, whether you can worship, what movies, TV and radio you can see or hear, etc., etc.

    Why is the world so caring about whales and trees and so ignorant about the welfare of 11,000,000 people living in the CastrosÍ gulag?  Our brothers in the Cuban military are also perplexed that the free world is so blind to Fidel and Raul Castro.  CAMCOÍs message today is one of hope and redemption.  The time is near.  You know it and we know it.  We understand that these are desperate and dangerous times for you and your dear ones.  Hang on.  DonÍt despair.  Stick it out.  CAMCO is with you.  A poem:  Zunzun nests near the eagle, Clouds forecast the storm, Lightning will spare the parrots, maybe some vultures, Zunzun song is acknowledged.  VIVA CUBA LIBRE!