ñFAHRENHEIT 9/11" SHOWN ON PRIME TIME TV IN CUBA

    U.S. director Michael Moore's anti-Bush documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" was shown on prime time Cuban state-run television on Thursday after playing to packed cinemas for a week. In a country with a deep-seated distrust of U.S. governments, the film has generated widespread public interest and added to a recent barrage of official criticism of U.S. President George W. Bush.

    Cubans have stood in long lines to buy tickets to see rough DVD copies projected at 120 cinema theaters across the island to unfailing applause. "We hope this film will lead Americans to see the reality of their government, and not only deny Bush reelection but put him on trial for the harm he has done to humanity," said retired worker Armando Rodriguez.

    Hostility between Washington and Havana dates back four decades since President Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution, but relations have become very tense since Bush launched a plan to undermine Castro's communist-run government in May. Cuban dissidents who saw "Fahrenheit 9/11" praised the United States for its freedom of expression and lamented that such criticism of a president was not allowed in Cuba where the one-party state controls the media.

    BAD NEWS FOR THE TYRANT, OIL FOUND OFF CUBA BUT NOT COMMERCIALLY VIABLE

    The discovery of a non-commercial oil deposit deep under Cuba's Gulf of Mexico waters dampened high expectations of a needed bonanza for the communist-run island's battered economy Thursday. Spanish oil company Repsol YPF announced it had found high-quality oil but decided its first exploratory well drilled one mile under the sea was not commercially viable and it was studying its future exploration options.

    But Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's cash-strapped government, which relies on generously financed imports from Venezuela, had been crossing its fingers for a major strike. "This has thrown cold water on these hopes. Cuba needed good news, because oil was the great hope at this moment," said a Cuban economist, who asked not to be named.

    Cuba faces the prospect of losing a favorable supply deal of 53,000 barrels a day of Venezuelan oil if that country's leftist President Hugo Chavez --a close ally of Castro's-- is ousted in a recall referendum August 15. Even if commercial deposits are discovered, experts say they would require more than $1 billion to develop and four to five years before oil flows.

    US STANDS BY COMMENTS ON CUBAN SEX TOURISM 

    The United States refused to back down from US President George W. Bush's charge that Cuba is a favored destination for pedophiles and other sex tourists after Cuban dictator Fidel Castro angrily denied the claim in an invective-filled speech.  "The issue of prostitution in Cuba is something, I think, that is well-documented," deputy State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said.

    He referred to a 2002 report from a Washington-based human rights group, The Protection Project, that said Cuba had replaced Southeast Asia as one of the world's top sex tourism destinations and the State Department's own annual Trafficking in Persons reports.  The 2004 edition of the State Department report, released in June, slams Cuba for failing to take action against the sex trade, particularly involving children, tolerating and in some cases encouraging prostitution.

    "Cuba's tourist industry is heavily dominated by state companies, and government employees tolerate corrupt practices that facilitate this sexual exploitation, sometimes even making state-run facilities available for underage prostitution," the report says.  At a July 16 speech in Florida, Bush accused Castro's regime of turning Cuba into the favored destination for sex tourists from the United States and Canada as way to to earn money for his cash-strapped government.  "The dictator welcomes sex tourism," Bush said. "Sex tourism is a vital source of hard currency to keep his corrupt government afloat." 

     ANTI-GOVERNMENT SLOGAN ON CEMETERY WALL

    An unknown but imaginative wag in Santa Clara exhorted visiting Cuban dictator Fidel Castro to make himself at home. Problem is, he painted his message on the front wall of the local cemetery. The graffiti was discovered in the early morning of July 26, when Castro was expected in Santa Clara for anniversary ceremonies of his revolution. The sign, written in red in block letters, read: "Welcome, Fidel. Make this your home." The slogan has been quite common in Cuban homes since the inception of Castro's rule.

    Police and security operatives went to work quickly to eradicate the graffiti as soon as it was discovered, but not before townspeople flocked to the site to take a look. One anonymous voice in the crowd of onlookers said even the cemetery would not want him for all the pain and suffering he has caused Cubans.

    IRAQ SUICIDE BLAST KILLS 68

    Iraqi forces, insurgents, civilians and three U.S. service members lost their lives in violence Wednesday, with at least 68 killed in a Baquba suicide bombing and 42 dead in fighting in south-central Iraq. Also, an Iraqi was killed in a blast near a Baghdad police station and an enemy combatant died in fighting in Ramadi.

    At the same time, several hostages remain under the gun of Iraqi militants, and authorities are working to free them.  Speaking in the Egyptian capital of Cairo, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell condemned the Baquba attack, which wounded at least 56 others, calling it "an attempt by murderers to deny the Iraqi people their dream."

    Powell is scheduled to meet with Iraq's interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on Thursday. Police said the bomber drove a Toyota mini-bus into a marketplace near a police station, where would-be recruits were lined up outside, and detonated the explosives. Among those killed were 21 passengers on a bus driving by.  The Baquba suicide blast was so intense it shattered glass in nearby cafes, ripped facades off buildings and set fire to other vehicles, video from the scene showed. The deaths bring the number of U.S. troop fatalities to 912 in the war in Iraq.

    AGAIN. CASTRO INSULTS  PRESIDENT BUSH

    Cuban dictator Fidel Castro on Monday vigorously denied recent charges by President Bush that he encourages sex-tourism in Cuba to attract U.S. dollars to the impoverished island. The Cuban president also became personal with Bush, bringing up old reports about his American nemesis' alleged past drinking habits. Speaking at the island's annual Revolution Day celebration in the central city of Santa Clara, Castro said the sex tourism allegations show that what the White House considers to be true about Cuba is ñthat which the president makes up in his head, whether it corresponds to reality or not.''

    During a speech in Tampa earlier this month, Bush accused Castro of turning Cuba into a major destination for sex tourism, which is ``a vital source of hard currency to keep his corrupt government afloat.'' ''The regime in Havana, already one of the worst violators of human rights in the world, is adding to its crimes. Castro welcomes sex tourism,'' Bush said at the July 16 conference on ''human trafficking'' -- forced labor, sex and military service.

    Castro said someone should have told Bush that before Cuba's 1959 revolution about 100,000 Castro went on to lash out at Bush in a more personal manner, saying that Bush apparently had replaced his drinking with religious fundamentalism. ''He depends on religion as a defense mechanism, substituting thought,'' said Castro. ñIn some ways, he doesn't even have to think.'' Castro ended his comments to Bush saying he hoped God does not ''instruct'' the U.S. president to invade the island, a fear the Cuban leader often repeats. ''He had better check on any divine belligerent order by consulting the pope and other prestigious dignitariesƒ asking them for their opinion,'' he said.

    MEXICO, CUBA AMBASSADORS RETURN TO THEIR POSTS

    The ambassadors for Cuba and Mexico returned to their posts Sunday. The rift between the two countries climaxed May 2 when Mexico asked Cuban Ambassador Jorge Bolaños to leave, accusing Cuba's Communist Party of holding unauthorized political meetings in Mexico.

    Mexican Ambassador Roberta Lajous Vargas returned to Havana on Sunday "with the aim of working toward a new vision of the future," Mexico's Foreign Relations Department said in a press statement.  Relations soured after President Vicente Fox took office in 2000 and criticized Cuba's human rights record. In 2002, Mexico supported a resolution of the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva condemning Cuba.

    In May, Cuba said it had videos proving a Mexican business mogul arrested in Havana was part of a Fox government conspiracy to smear leftist Mexican politicians. The government denied that, and said Cuba's Communist Party was holding unauthorized political meetings in Mexico.

    PRESIDENT BUSH WINNING THE ELECTORAL VOTES

    John Kerry narrowly trails President George W. Bush in the battle for the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House, as he makes his case at the Democratic National Convention this week to topple the Republican incumbent. With three months remaining in a volatile campaign, Kerry has 14 states and the District of Columbia in his column for 193 electoral votes. Bush has 25 states for 217 votes, according to an Associated Press analysis of state polls as well as interviews with strategists across the country.

    Both candidates are short of the magic 270 electoral votes. Bush and Kerry are running even in 11 states with a combined 128 electoral votes. Two tossups, Pennsylvania and Oregon, could soon move to Kerry's column. Maine, Minnesota and Washington (a combined 25 electoral votes) favor Kerry over Bush by a few percentage points. Gore carried them in 2000.

    North Carolina, Colorado, Louisiana, Arizona, Virginia, Arkansas and Missouri (a combined 73 electoral votes) give Bush modest leads. He won all seven in 2000. Four years ago, Bush won 30 states and their 271 electoral votes - one more than needed. Gore, who won the popular vote, claimed 20 states plus the District of Columbia for 267 electoral votes. Kerry's best prospects may be in the five tossup states won by Bush in 2000: Ohio, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire and West Virginia.

   PRESIDENT BUSH ADMINISTRATION PRODS CUBA ON DR. OSCAR ELIAS BISCET 

    The U.S. State Department called on Cuba Wednesday to allow humanitarian groups to monitor the treatment of jailed dissidents, including Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet. Biscet, a prominent Cuban dissident, was arrested in December 2002 and sentenced to 25 years in prison for calling for a peaceful political change in Cuba.

     The Cuban government does not allow Biscet's wife to bring him rations and food - a privilege other prisoners are allowed, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said. Biscet -- now in solitary confinement -- is among 75 independent civil society activists currently imprisoned for their opposition to the Fidel Castro regime.

    "We call on the Cuban government to allow humanitarian organizations to monitor their treatment," Boucher said, adding the State Department fears Biscet's condition will become worse. "We do believe that his health is deteriorating, that he's been suffering in confinement, and would be expected to suffer even more in solitary confinement," Boucher said.

     CUBA MYSTERY MONEY GETS CLOSE SCRUTINY

    The Cuban government received up to $3.9 billion it funneled through a Swiss bank over seven years. According to United Bank of Switzerland (UBS) officials Wednesday, Havana delivered up to $3.9 billion in U.S. currency to UBS in 1,900 transactions from 1996 to April 2003 for deposit to one Cuban government bank account at UBS. In a statement published last month in the state-run Granma newspaper, the government said the cash was ñobtained from sales in the hard-currency stores, tourism-related activities and other commercial services in foreign banks.''

     According to Cuban government figures, its revenues from tourism and hard-currency stores -- where goods are sold for U.S. dollars, mostly to Cubans who receive remittances from abroad -- amounted in 2002-03 alone to about $2 billion.  Deputy Assistant Treasury Secretary Juan Carlos Zarate said Thursday that the U.S. attorney's office in New York is investigating a ''potential nexus out of New York'' with the Cuba-UBS deal, but declined to go into details of the investigation.

     The tale of Cuba's dealings with UBS started within another mystery: the $762 million in U.S. cash that American troops in Iraq found in hide-outs linked to Saddam Hussein. The cash was traced to several foreign banks, including UBS, that had been contracted by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to exchange new U.S. dollars for worn-out bills being taken out of circulation. The program is known as the Extended Custodial Inventory. But the ECI agreement specifically barred the foreign banks from doing business with countries as Cuba under U.S. sanctions.

     FORMER PRISONER DEMANDS CHANGES IN CUBA'S POLITICAL SYSTEM 

    Leonardo Bruzon Avila, a former political prisoner whose case was highlighted by President Bush, urged Cuba's government Friday to hold a referendum on whether to change the communist island's political system. In a 10-page report called The Cuba We Want, Bruzon Avila and fellow dissident Carlos Rios Otero called for the referendum and laid out a plan for Cuba's transition to a multiparty, democratic system and free-market economy. The report was delivered Friday to the offices of Cuban Justice Minister Roberto Diaz Sotolongo. There was no public reaction by the President Fidel Castro's government to the recommendations.

    The proposal echoed dissident Oswaldo Paya's Varela Project, rejected by Cuban authorities. Bruzon is a former political prisoner who was arrested more than a year before the March 2003 crackdown. He was one of four dissidents who, after never being tried in court, were suddenly released without explanation in June. Bruzon was relatively unknown in Cuba before his arrest but gained fame through international campaigns for his release. At the time of his release, Bruzon said he wanted to leave Cuba soon to live in France, which granted him a visa after his family became alarmed about his health during a hunger strike in jail.

    URUGUAY STILL NOT READY FOR CUBAN RELATIONS

    Uruguay Foreign Minister Didier Operetti said Wednesday that the conditions still are not right for re-establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba. But Operetti also said the nation must respect the decision to resume relations with the Cuban government if that was the policy of the winner of the next presidential election, to be held in October 2004. Three of the candidates have announced their intention to re-establish ties.

    Operetti also said that diplomatic relations aren't established forever, nor are they broken forever. The phenomena of international relations are completely dynamic. It is certainly logical to think that the government that emerges from the next elections will view the Cuba question from a new page.

    He expressed the hope that Cuba will have sufficient merit to involve itself in a friendlier regional dialogue and that, in the international arena, Cuba will open its borders to allow the United Nations human rights inspectors to enter. We aren't dealing here with a people issue, but rather a policy problem. No government can avoid the issue of human rights policies. The three presidential election candidates -- Tabaé Vázquez of the leftist Wide Front party, Jorge Larrázaga of the Partido Nacional, and Guillermo Stirling of the currently governing Partido Colorado -- have all voiced intentions of solving the diplomatic dispute with Cuba.

    NATIONAL GUARD TROOPS HELP POLICE TO STOP VIOLENCE IN PUERTO RICO

    Dozens of National Guard troops joined police on patrols Friday in a deployment aimed at helping ease violent crime in Puerto Rico. The troops started patrolling with police before dawn, carrying M-16 rifles and riding along as backup in San Juan and some other areas of the U.S. territory, officials said.

    Gov. Sila Calderon ordered the deployment of some 500 troops on Sunday, citing a series of drug-related killings and the shooting death of a 22-year-old police officer a day earlier. On Friday, police found the bodies of two unidentified men in a car outside San Juan. Police said they believed the men had been shot to death.

    BRAZIL STUDIES CUBAÍS OIL POTENTIAL

    The head of Brazil's state oil company Petrobras will be in Cuba over the weekend for talks on deepwater oil exploration and the building of a lubricants plant, a company official said on Friday. "We are talking about deepwater projects, incremental production contracts and downstream projects," said Demarco Jorge Epifanio, Petrobras coordinator of Cuba projects. "Petrobras is deeply interested in anything related to deepwater projects," he said.

    Epifanio said Petrobras is analyzing available data on two blocks in Cuban territorial waters of the Gulf of Mexico, in the same area where Spanish oil major Repsol YPF has almost completed drilling of a first exploratory well. Petrobras had been evaluating three blocks, and a diplomatic source in Havana said the Brazilian company had discarded one as uninteresting.

    Since June, Spain's Repsol has been drilling a wildcat 18 miles (29 kms) off Cuba's northwest coast in waters a mile deep. Oil industry experts say Cuba's Gulf waters, like those of Mexico and the United States, could harbor large quantities of medium-grade crude. Four years ago, Petrobras drilled a wildcat well off Cuba's northern-central coast, but it was dry. Last August, the Brazilian company signed an agreement with Cuba to take another look at exploration and consider downstream projects.

    CUBA FREES MARTHA BEATRIZ ROQUE 

    Cuba released dissident economist Martha Beatriz Roque on Thursday, the only woman among 75 people arrested 16 months ago in a crackdown on dissent. Roque was the eleventh dissident to be freed in the last few months. Since April, the government has released seven of the 75 jailed dissidents for health reasons. Four others who had been held without trial for two years were also freed.

    A year ago, Roque was moved to a military hospital because her health was failing. She was suffering from high blood pressure, chest pain and nose bleeds. Roque, 58, was serving a 20-year sentence for conspiring with the United States against Cuba. She was found guilty, among other things, of creating a Web site that reported on Cuba's deteriorating economic situation. It was Roque's second stint in jail. She served three years in the late 1990s for criticizing the government's economic policies along with three other economists known as the Group of Four.

    CUBAN BEACHGOERS CLOSELY WATCHED 

    Cubans are only allowed at Esmeralda beach in Holguín province, a popular tourist destination, under strictly regulated conditions and are closely watched while there. Until recently, Cubans were not allowed to approach the beach fronting the three hotels in the area at all, but a complaint by a foreign journalist evidently embarrassed authorities into relaxing the regulation, to some extent.

    Now Cubans are allowed in after presenting identification and signing up in a registry, and only between the hours of 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. All the time they are there, they are watched by security agents for the three tourist hotels that front the beach. Several security guards have acknowledged that they feel watching the Cubans is an additional burden to their job.

    U.S. SAYS YOUNG CUBANS, DOCTORS ESCAPE FROM THE ISLAND BY RAFT

    Growing numbers of young Cubans and a significant number of doctors are trying to leave the island in rafts and smugglers' boats, the top U.S. diplomat in Cuba said Wednesday. James Cason, head of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, said the United States had by last week fulfilled this year's visa quota for Cubans. Under agreements signed a decade ago to avoid mass exoduses, Washington grants visas to at least 20,000 Cubans every year.

    Cason said there was tremendous pent-up desire to leave Cuba, particularly among young Cubans. "They have no hope. They don't believe in the revolution. They have a failed economic system," he said. Since the accords were signed, some 250,000 Cubans have moved to the United States legally, most of them selected through a lottery last allowed by Cuba in 1998. Cason said Cuba's Communist-run government was denying exit permits to 1,352 people with U.S. travel documents, 80 percent of them medical personnel.

    "More and more people on the rafts are people under the age of 25, close to 30 percent," he told a news conference. "We are also finding that a number of doctors are leaving on rafts." About 1,000 Cubans illegally reach the United States each year, some floating on precarious rafts on inner tubes, others paying $8,000 a head to be smuggled across in speed boats. The United States repatriates those intercepted at sea, and the number of intercepted Cubans increased last year to 1,555 from 666 in 2002. So far this year, 983 Cubans have been picked up at sea.

    CUBAN ñDISSIDENT" SAYS U.S. REVOKED HIS VISA

    A Cuban ñdissident" said the U.S. government revoked his visa after granting him political refugee status, prompting other opponents of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro to express concern they are losing support from the United States. Bernardo Arevalo Padron, a journalist, was granted political asylum by the United States after being released earlier this year from a Cuban prison, where he served a six-year sentence on a contempt charge against Castro and Vice President Carlos Lage.

    Last week, the ñdissident" said, he received a letter from the U.S. Interest Section in Havana, saying his visa had been revoked. "It's an outrage," Arevalo, a former Cuban intelligence agent, said late Monday. "I was all ready to travel on Aug. 25." The letter accused him of cooperating with state security agents, he said. Last month, the U.S. government also denied a visa to Cuban ñdissident" Dimas Castellanos, who had been invited to participate in a conference at the Institute of Cuban Studies in Miami. Other ñdissidents" said they have also been denied visas or suddenly lost permission to enter the U.S. Interest Section in Havana and use computers there. "They didn't give me an explanation. The guards at the door simply took away my pass," said ñdissident" Gradys Muñoz.

    Vladimiro Roca, a leading dissident, said officials at the American mission "have really changed their treatment of some dissidents lately." Elizardo Sanchez, another well known activist, said the U.S. government appeared to suspect that dissidents were working as undercover agents for Castro. "I am very surprised and worried about the possibility that the United States' immigration service is adopting unjust measures in the midst of a certain paranoia," said Sanchez, who was accused recently by the Cuban government of being one of its secret agents called ñJuana."

    POOR RELATIONS WITH IRAN TURNING WORSE

    Iran's ruling mullahs recently announced resumption of activities that could lead to development of a uranium-based bomb, apparently violating commitments they made to three European countries last fall. Iran insists its nuclear program has nothing to do with weaponry but with meeting domestic electricity needs. The Bush administration is not buying it. Shunning direct engagement with Iran for now, the administration is banking on international pressure to induce Iran to roll back its nuclear program.

    John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control, told Congress last month that the Iranian program was a "threat to international peace and security." He said Iran's hard-line Islamic regime, now 25 years old, clearly has a covert program to develop and stockpile chemical weapons and probably has an offensive biological weapons program.

    Until about a year ago, the United States maintained a low-key dialogue with Iran, then decided it was a waste of time. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher says a renewed engagement is possible only under certain conditions. "We're willing to sit down, if the president determines it's in our interest to do so, and if we think there's the opportunity for progress," Boucher said Monday.

    SANDY BERGER, FORMER CLINTON ADVISOR, UNDER INVESTIGATION FOR TAKING CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS

    Samuel ñSandy" Berger's home and office were searched earlier this year by FBI agents armed with warrants after the former ClintonÍs National Security Advisor voluntarily returned some sensitive documents to the National Archives and admitted he also removed handwritten notes he had made while reviewing the sensitive documents. However, some drafts of a sensitive after-action report on the Clinton administration's handling of al-Qaida terror threats are still missing.

    Berger served as Clinton's national security adviser for all of the president's second term and most recently has been informally advising Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.  Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket and pants, and also inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio.

    The FBI searches of Berger's home and office occurred after National Archives employees told agents they believed they witnessed Berger place documents in his clothing while reviewing sensitive Clinton administration papers and that some documents were then noticed missing, officials said. When asked, Berger said he returned some classified documents that he found in his office and all of the handwritten notes he had taken from the secure room, but could not locate two or three copies of the highly classified millennium terror report.

    U.S. ACTIVISTS DEFY CUBA TRAVEL RULES

    Groups of American activists returned Monday without incident to U.S. soil after deliberately defying new rules increasing travel restrictions to Cuba. About 90 members of the Venceremos Brigade re-entered the country on foot in groups of 15, carrying banners and pulling suitcases behind them.  Breaking the U.S. travel rules can lead to fines of up to $7,500.

    Meanwhile, in Texas, about 100 volunteers with Pastors for Peace crossed the U.S.-Mexican border over the Hidalgo International Bridge without any incident or arrests. The group had brought busloads of medical and other equipment to Cuba, traveling through Mexico to avoid U.S. travel restrictions. Aid was shipped from the Mexican port of Tampico, and volunteers followed by plane. Border agents had warned the group that only three were authorized to travel on to Cuba.

     PRESIDENT BUSH ASKS FOR HONESTY IN PRESIDENTIAL RECALL VOTE 

    U.S. President George W. Bush urged for honesty in the recall referendum on President Hugo Chávez' mandate to be held on August 15, and requested cooperation towards international observers so that they can perform their mission without interference.

    "The recall referendum should be performed in an honest and open manner," Bush told the journalists after a meeting with Chilean President Ricardo Lagos in the White House. Bush said that Lagos' influence on Venezuela was "important" and added that the Venezuelan government "should not interfere in the process so that people have the opportunity to express their opinion without fearing a revenge."

    AUTHORITIES COLLECT ALL FIREARMS IN SANTA CLARA

    This week authorities in Villa Clara province, central Cuba, began collecting all firearms in the province. The measure is thought to be related to the celebration of the upcoming anniversary of the Revolution July 26, for which the capital city of Santa Clara has been designated as the principal site. "This is not the first time they pick up all firearms," said a local resident, "every time a member of the Political Bureau or the Council of State is coming this way, the same thing happens."

    The measure applies to all those licensed to bear arms, such as guards, officials who need them in their official capacity, hunters, or retired armed forces personnel, no matter how high their rank.  Although troops in parades and military reviews sport their regulation rifles, the individuals participating have invariably been thoroughly searched beforehand for ammunition. Thus authorities insure that no Anwar Sadat-like incidents take place during parades or celebrations.

    MEXICO AND CUBA WILL REINSTATE AMBASSADORS

    Mexico and Cuba agreed Sunday to send their ambassadors back to each others capitals, easing the worst dispute between the once-close allies since President Fidel Castro came to power in 1959. The dispute over Cuba's human rights record and Mexico's close ties to the United States led both countries in early May to the point where they appeared on the verge of breaking off relations altogether.

    Mexican Foreign Minister Ernesto Derbez and Cuban counterpart Felipe Perez Roque made the announcement at a Havana news conference after a meeting for which Derbez flew into town. "July 26th the ambassadors will be back in their respective posts," Perez Roque said. President Vicente Fox's government expelled Cuba's envoy and withdrew its ambassador from Havana May 2, charging Cuba was meddling in Mexican politics after two Communist party members met with opposition politicians in Mexico.

    That followed a May Day speech in which Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, angered by Mexico's condemnation of Cuba's human right record at a United Nations hearing, said Mexico's influence in the world had been "turned into ashes" by its friendship with Washington. Perez Roque and Derbez made clear that while diplomatic relations were normalized, differences remained. "Between friends there can be differences around some issues which they can discuss ... What we did was focus on issues we could work together on," Derbez said.

    CUBA COMMUNIST REGIMEN AWAITS RESULTS OF OFFSHORE PETROLEUM DRILLING

    As a Spanish firm enters the last stage of petroleum exploration off Cuba's coast, officials and economists are growing increasingly hopeful of news that could profoundly affect the communist country's struggling economy.  "Supposing there is petroleum, it would be really good news for the country," said Jorge Mattar, a specialist on the Cuban economy for the U.N. Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean.

    Battered by world oil prices and a foreign exchange deficit, Cuba spends "a good percentage" on the purchase of foreign petroleum, Mattar said.  Spanish petrochemicals company Repsol-YPF (REP) is currently doing exploratory drilling about 18 miles north of the island's coast in Cuban waters, spending $195,000 a day to rent a Norwegian platform since early June. Cuba currently produces 75,000 barrels daily, about half of what it needs. It imports the rest, much of it on favorable terms from political ally Venezuela.

    Mattar said that short term, a significant petroleum discovery would could result in easier international financing for Cuba, under a U.S. trade and financial embargo for more than four decades.  But it would be at least three or four years before such a find would have a significant impact on the economy, said Mattar, a Mexican economist in Cuba recently for the release of a new U.N. report.  Eventually, said Mattar, a major find could "create more freedom for in development policies."

    PRESIDENT BUSH ACCUSES CASTRO OF ENCOURAGING SEX TOURISM

    President Bush on Friday accused Cuba dictator Fidel Castro of exploiting Cuba's children by encouraging a sex-tourism industry designed to draw cash to the impoverished nation. "The regime in Havana, already one of the worst violators of human rights in the world, is adding to its crimes. The dictator welcomes sex tourism," Bush said at a conference on "human trafficking" - forced labor, sex and military service.

    In a report last month, the State Department listed Cuba among 10 nations that engage in human trafficking. The president said Castro had "bragged about" Cuba's sex industry and he quoted Castro as saying: "Cuba has the cleanest and most educated prostitutes in the world." President Bush said Castro has turned Cuba into a major destination for sex tourism, which is "a vital source of hard currency to keep his corrupt government afloat." "My administration is working toward a comprehensive solution to this problem: the rapid, peaceful transition to democracy in Cuba," Bush said.

    The president said an "influx of American and Canadian tourists contributed to a sharp increase in child prostitution in Cuba," a claim he attributed to a report from the Protection Project, a legal human-rights research institute based at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. Bush said the institute had found this was the case.

    EX-MEMBERS OF CUBAN ARMED FORCES VETERANS ASSOCIATION ABUSE MEMBERSHIP CARDS

    Some former members of the Association of Combatants of the Revolution have been accused of abusing the membership cards they kept when they didn't renew their membership. The association which consist of former members of the armed forces is currently led by commander of the revolution Juan Almeida Bosque. 

    "Many of those who left the association did not return their membership cards and now are using them even to use public washrooms free of charge," said an association leader in the Managua section of the capital. Current members have until August 20 to provide photographs for new cards.

     DESPITE THE NEW ñTOUGH" RESTRICTIONS, PRESIDENT BUSH ADMINISTRATION GRANTS ANOTHER EXCEPTION TO CUBA EMBARGO

    President Bush administration has approved drug developer CancerVax Corp.Ís deal with the Cuban government to develop three experimental cancer drugs created in Havana. It's the first such commercial deal approved by the government between a U.S. biotechnology company and Cuba, which has spent $1 billion building a biotechnology program that is among the most advanced in the Third World. One of the three drugs included in the deal attacks a cancer cell in a novel way.

    In Havana, Dr. David Hale, CEO, CancerVax, gave the good news to Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, who seemed very delighted with the deal. U.S. Government approval comes as President Bush toughens the 41-year-old economic embargo of the communist nation. On June 30, Bush implemented new rules that sharply reduce Cuba-bound dollar flows from the United States and curtail visits to Cuba by cultural and academic groups as well as Cuban-Americans. CancerVax will develop the drugs in its Carlsbad laboratories and share profits with the Cuban government if any of the drugs are approved for sale in the United States.

    The deal also calls for CancerVax to pay Cuba $2 million annually over the next three years. CancerVax agreed to U.S. government demands to pay Cuba in food and medicine instead of cash. Of course, Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has already made several changes to the new regulations, recommended approval of the deal, which was ultimately granted by the Treasury Department.

    U.S. ACCUSES CUBA OF BLATANT DISTORTIONS

    The United States is accusing Cuba of "blatant distortions" in claiming that Washington intends to invade the island and evict people from their homes as part of a post-Castro occupation plan. Responding to an official Cuban statement on July 1, the State Department registered its disagreement in a four-page note sent to the Cuban diplomatic mission in Washington last week.

    The Cuban position had been set forth in a statement by National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcón the day after new U.S. penalties against Cuba took effect.  Alarcón's statement began by saying that "the empire (the United States) plans to crush the Cuban nation and proclaims its intentions with insulting arrogance." It said the United States "is intensifying the economic war, the internal subversion, the anti-Cuba propaganda and the pressures on the rest of the world designed to pave the way for a direct military intervention that would destroy the Revolution, end our independence and sovereignty and realize the old annexationist fantasy of seizing control of Cuba."

    The State Department note said Secretary of State Colin Powell and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld have said repeatedly that the United States has no intention of invading Cuba. It added that Cuban authorities have refused U.S. offers to directly inform the Cuban people of American policy, including the goal of a peaceful transition in Cuba. "The mendacious threat of military action does not fool the Cuban people and cannot obscure the regime's half-century of economic failure and political repression," the note said. It added: "The United States does not intend to dictate terms; the Cuban people have already had to suffer that for the past 45 years." 

    EU ASKED FOR THE RELEASE OF ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS IN CUBA

    The European Union Thursday welcomed the recent release of some dissidents in Cuba, but said the gesture was not enough. A statement made in Brussels by the EU presidency and distributed in Havana called the freeing of six of the 75 dissidents sentenced last year to jail terms of up to 28 years a "positive gesture." But it added that "the aim continues to be the immediate release of all political prisoners."

    Since April, Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's government has freed six dissidents on health grounds and released another group of four opponents, who had been held without trial for two years. Last year's repression led to a dramatic deterioration in the EU's relations with Cuba, which froze its contacts with European diplomats in Havana for their support of dissent.

    The European statement repeated the EU's wishes to reopen dialogue with Communist-run Cuba on political and economic matters, as well human rights and aid, which has been halted. Western diplomats in Havana saw the release of dissidents as a gesture aimed at bringing about a thaw in the diplomatic freeze and possibly aimed at Spain's new Socialist government.

    THE CUBAN MILITARY AND TRANSITION DYNAMICS (BY: DR. BRIAN LATELL) 

    The Revolutionary Armed Forces (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias „ FAR) has long been the most powerful, influential, and competent official institution in Cuba, and top generals will play crucial roles in all conceivable succession scenarios.

    The generals will either dominate a new regime after Fidel Castro dies or is incapacitated, or, like the militaries in the former communist countries of Eastern Europe, be the willing accomplices in the demise of Marxist rule. The critical variable is likely to be the degree to which institutional unity „ military command and control „ is preserved as the transition unfolds. Institutional integrity will be determined by the cohesion, singularity of purpose, professionalism, popular support, and morale of uniformed personnel and by the political and other skills of ranking officers. 


    CLICK HERE      AND READ THE COMPLETE REPORT 

    CUBA TIGHTENS ITS CONTROL OVER TOURISM INDUSTRY

    Cuba's government is reasserting central control of the tourism industry, industry sources said this week. As part of the move, the government is removing dozens of executives who presided over a boom that turned the industry into Cuba's most-important economic sector and generator of hard currency. The Tourism Ministry has begun merging operations of four big state-owned tourism companies that control 30,000 hotel rooms.

    One executive of a foreign firm in a joint tourism venture with Cuba expressed displeasure, but said business remained strong. "We are not happy, but have adopted a wait-and-see attitude. We are being kept completely in the dark," said the executive, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The restructuring comes amid a drive by the ruling Communist Party to reverse modest market-oriented reforms that Cuban dictator Fidel Castro's government adopted after the collapse of the Soviet Union plunged Cuba into a deep economic crisis.

    The tourism industry was the major benefactor of CastroÍs reforms. It was the first sector opened to foreign participation, and it was allowed to import at will. Tourism, which has averaged 15 percent annual growth since 1990, compared with the overall economy's 3 percent.

    CRUEL AND DEGRADING TREATMENT OF POLITICAL PRISONERS IN A GUANTÁNAMO PRISON IS DENOUNCED

    Political prisoners in Combinado de Guantánamo managed to smuggle a note out of the prison, exposing the cruel and degrading treatment that the political prisoners are suffering at the hands of the prisonÍs military personnel. In the first paragraph of the note, the dissident and prisoner Jesús Aguilera Basulto points out that last May 10, he witnessed when Lt. Colonel Jorge Chediak Pérez ordered a Lieutenant named Céspedes to take any measures he deemed necessary against political prisoner Nelson Alberto Aguiar Ramírez to crush him if needed.

    Aguiar Ramírez, born in the capital municipality of Regla, and president of the Cuban Orthodox Party, was sentenced to 13 years in prison in the cause of the 75 activists and independent journalists sentenced in the spring of 2003. Aguilera Basulto has served two years of his 15 years sentence, mostly in punishment cells, isolated and at times in hole of torture for exposing the violations and injustices perpetrated inside the prison. He accuses Lt. Colonel Chediak Pérez of violating prisoners' rights by denying them proper medical assistance.

    THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE SINKING OF "REMOLCADOR 13 DE MARZO" 

    The members of the Cuban American Military Council (CAMCO) commemorate today the 10^th Anniversary of the ñ13 de Marzo" tugboat massacre by the Cuban communist government with a moment of silence and a prayer for the victims.

    On 13 July 1994, 72 Cubans attempted to flee to Florida  on an old commandeered tugboat ¿ the "Remolcador 13 de Marzo". The Cuban authorities had been informed beforehand what was going to happen. Orders came from the Ministry of the Interior to attack and sink the boat once it was in open water. Cuban government-owned ships attacked the tugboat, ramming into it and aiming high-pressure water hoses at it despite the screams and pleas from the families onboard. The attack resulted in the sinking of the tugboat and forty-one dead, 11 children and 30 adults -- only 31 survived the ordeal.

    In the years following the drama, the inter-American organization for human rights of the Organization of American States (OAS)  and other organizations such as Amnesty International demanded the Cuban authorities to justify their actions ¿ the Cuban authorities promised to comply, but up to this date, never had done so. The survivors who dared to protest the massacre, or who called for the Cuban government to launch an investigation, were either threatened or incarcerated. 

    CUBA STUDIES MILITARY RECRUITMENT PLAN

    Cuba has ordered a study of its military recruitment program, hoping to enlist more young men in the armed forces during a period in which authorities say they are increasingly concerned about a U.S.-led military attack. A special commission to "study, propose and control (military) recruitment policies and their ties with the nation's education program" will be created under a decree signed July 2 by President Fidel Castro and his brother, Defense Minister Raul Castro.

    "In the last years, the politico-military situation has deteriorated considerably, creating a new situation that has elevated international tensions against our country," the text reads. Although the decree does not single out the United States, Cuban authorities in recent months have repeatedly expressed concern that the United States might attack. Officials in Washington have repeatedly insisted that there are no plans for an American military attack on Cuba.

    The decree acknowledges a drop in recruits for career military service in recent years, in large part because of increasingly lower birth rates over the past two decades and a shortened period of compulsory service for young men. Under Cuban law, men 18 and older must serve in the military 24 months, or 12 months if already enrolled in university. Little more than a decade ago, young men had to complete 36 months of service. Military service for women is voluntary.

     CASTRO SYMPATHIZERS ARRIVED IN CUBA IN VIOLATION OF PRESIDENT BUSH'S NEW RESTRICTIONS

    About 120 volunteers with Pastors for Peace, founded by Rev. Lucius Walker, a Baptist minister from New Jersey, arrived in Cuba Saturday in defiance of U.S. law and wearing T-shirts calling for "REGIME CHANGE IN THE US (PASTORS FOR PEACE) NOT IN CUBA." They flew in from Tampico, Mexico, where they had loaded a caravan of 12 vehicles filled with goods onto a ship bound for Cuba - all in violation of the new restrictions implemented this month by the Bush Administration.

    The relief trip marked the 15th straight year that Pastors for Peace has taken supplies to Cuba in spite of the embargo. Officials at the border handed out fliers warning that only three of the group's members were authorized to travel on to Cuba and the rest were subject to prosecution leading to jail time or fines if they went to the island. Walker was fully aware of the warning, he said that U.S. authorities threatened to fine members of his group upon their return to the United States for traveling to Cuba without a license. "That only strengthened our resolve," he said.

    Seven members of the Virginia-based African Awareness Association arrived this week to show their ñsolidarity with Cubans." "Since the war against Cuba has been intensified, we wanted to make sure that as Africans residing in America we would not let Cuba down," Lee Robinson, the founder of the group, said as he waited at the airport to greet Pastors for Peace. A large group of Puerto Rican communists, members of "Brigada Venceremos," also arrived this week to the eastern city of Santiago to protest U.S. policy.

    CUBA HOLDING COLOMBIAN DRUG KINGPIN

    Cuba's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that it was holding one of Colombia's top drug kingpins, Luis Hernando Gomez Bustamante. Bustamante, also known as ñRasguño'' or ñScratch,"  was captured when he entered the country July 2 on a false passport. The top figure in the Northern Valle drug cartel was being held at an Interior Ministry center for crimes against state security, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

    Bustamante was arrested after Colombian intelligence agents learned that he traveled to Havana last month on a fake Venezuelan passport, the official said. Colombia then notified Cuban authorities. Agents planned to travel to Cuba on Saturday in a bid to get him extradited. The United States has been offering a $5 million reward for information leading to Bustamante's arrest. He was indicted last May on charges of drug-trafficking, money-laundering and racketeering.

    However, there is no extradition agreement between Cuba and the United States. Bustamante also is wanted in Colombia, but it was unclear whether Cuba would agree to turn him over to that country or try him in Cuba. There are reports that if Bustamante were deported to Colombia, Colombian authorities planned to extradite him to the United States for trial. Bustamante, 46, is one of several leading members of Colombia's Northern Valle cartel.

    OSWALDO PAYÁ INVITES EXILES TO DEBATE

    Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá urged exiles in Miami to join Cubans on the island in planning for the nation's future transition to democracy. ''All Cubans have the right and duty to participate,'' He said in a telephone call from Havana to a small gathering at Our Lady of Charity Shrine. ñWe should all be protagonists.''

    The pitch was part of a national dialogue taking place on and off the island so that all Cubans can review and give their opinions on the Cuban Transition Project unveiled by Payá in Havana in December. Payá's 48-page Transition Project outlines proposals on everything from human rights to reconciliation in Cuba. The project is meant to provide the framework for changes if the Cuban government ever honors Payá's petition drive, known as the Varela Project, seeking a referendum on democratic reforms.

    Payá's Transition Project outlines proposals for public health, education, transportation and economic reforms. It suggests a general political amnesty, the abolition of the death penalty and the demilitarization of society. Remarks collected from exiles will be forwarded to Havana in November and added to opinions gathered across the island. A final draft will be turned over to the National Assembly as early as February.

    BIOTECHNOLOGY COMPANY FINED FOR TRADING WITH CUBA

    Biotechnology company Chiron Corp. admitted it illegally exported goods to Cuba and paid the U.S. government $168,500 in civil penalties, the U.S. Treasury Department reported last month. The Emeryville-based company voluntarily disclosed to the department that a European subsidiary illegally shipped two vaccines for infants to Cuba between 1999 and 2002.

    "It was an inadvertent shipment on our part," said Chiron spokesman John Gallagher. He said Chiron is licensed to ship one type of pediatric vaccine through UNICEF to Cuba but inadvertently shipped two others not approved by the U.S. government. Gallagher said Chiron reported the shipping error to the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC, which enforces the United States' 42-year-old embargo on Cuba and other economic sanctions against six other countries.

    It's the second highest fine OFAC announced this year and the highest by a U.S.-based company. Panama City-based Alpha Pharmaceutical Inc. agreed to a $198,700 fine for also trading with Cuba. In all, OFAC announced this year that 122 companies violated economic sanctions and were fined a total of $1.97 million for doing business with Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Sudan and Syria. Most of the violations involved dealings with Cuba.

    COLIN POWELL TRIES TO "SOFTEN" NEW REGULATIONS AGAINST THE CUBAN DICTATOR

    Just at the moment in which President Bush tries to hasten a transition to democracy in Cuba with the implementation of tough measures against the Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, Secretary of State Colin Powell is trying to slow down things a little bit. Days before tighter restrictions on travel to Cuba went into effect last week, Powell quietly softened the new rules to allow a group of U.S. students attending medical school on the island to continue to do so.

    Under the old travel restrictions, these students were exempted from the Cuba travel ban because their stay was funded by the Cuban government „ not payments from this country. But under the new rules, this "fully hosted" category expires on Aug. 1. "We ought to find a way to fix this, Powell said to an assistant. According to a State Department spokesman, a special education-travel license is being hurriedly written to ensure that current and future students traveling to Cuba can ñtake advantage of this offer," the spokesman said. "Our goal is to get the regulation change out on the street by July 15."

    After the House vote yesterday to block Bush administration for enforcing the new rules, a State Department official said that Powell wants the rules modified once more to permit the sending of toiletries to Cuba in a ñcontinued effort to achieve the right balance." PowellÍs actions reflect his true feelings about the Cuban dictator and his communist regime. It should be remembered that after becoming Secretary of State he praised Castro and said: "He's done some good things for his people.'' One wonders whether the Secretary would have made the same statement about a U.S. President who would have decided to stay at the White House for the rest of his life.

    HOUSE VOTES TO OVERTURN PRESIDENT BUSH'S RULES ON CUBA

    The House dealt an election-season setback to President Bush on Wednesday by voting to overturn restrictions his administration has issued on the gift parcels that Americans can send to family members in Cuba. The 221-194 vote was won by a coalition in which Democrats were joined by nearly four dozen farm-state and free-trade Republicans to rebuff the president. The vote came just four months from an Election Day in which Bush would like to once again win Florida, the pivotal state in his 2000 victory, by gaining the support of that state's Cuban-Americans.

    The House vote followed a familiar pattern of recent years in which the Republican-run House - and sometimes the Senate - has voted to block Bush policies restricting trade and travel with Cuba, which communist leader Fidel Castro has now run for more than four decades. Last year, both chambers voted to end curbs on travel to Cuba by Americans, only to see lawmakers back away after Bush issued a veto threat.

    Wednesday's debate was an emotional one, as the debates over Cuba policy often are. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., a Cuban-American, said the proposal was ''dishonest'' and ''condescending,'' adding, ''It seeks to undermine an entire policy President Bush has just implemented ... to hasten the Democratic transition in Cuba.'' The amendment was offered to a $39.8 billion measure financing the departments of Commerce, Justice and State next year. The Senate has yet to write its version of the bill.

    CLUB MED SUED OVER PROPERTY CLAIMED BY CUBAN EXILE

    A 95-year-old Cuban exile sued the French resort chain Club Med on Thursday for building and operating a luxury hotel on Cuban beach property she says was seized from her family in Fidel Castro's communist revolution. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Miami, claims Paris-based Club Mediterranee made millions running the Club Med Varadero for six years before selling the property last year to Spanish hotel firm Grupo Pinero.

    Elvira de la Vega Glen, of Miami, and her son Robert Glen, 60, of Plano, Texas, said Club Med built a 337-room, five-star resort on undeveloped beachfront owned by her family for decades until it was seized shortly after the 1959 revolution.

    Lawyers said they would also sue Grupo Pinero over the same piece of property and planned legal action against the Sandals Caribbean resort chain and Spain's Iberostar over hotels on other land owned by the family. The suit also alleges Club Med violated the U.S. Trading with the Enemy Act.

    POST-CHAVEZ VENEZUELA WOULD BE US ALLY

    Venezuela will restore friendly ties with its main oil client, the United States, and scale back relations with Cuba if opponents of Hugo Chavez win a referendum on his rule and elections, an opposition leader said on Thursday. Alejandro Armas said the opposition, if elected to govern following a defeat for left-winger Chavez in the Aug. 15 recall vote, would reshape his foreign policy, which has distanced Venezuela from the United States.

    "Our political relations with the United States cannot be at odds with our economic relations," Armas told Reuters. The opposition's blueprint for a post-Chavez government will be formally presented on Friday. It calls for a foreign policy that "helps to restore confidence in Venezuela as a democratic nation and as a political and commercial partner."

    Most opinion polls had shown Chavez losing the referendum, but some recent surveys say he is gaining ground. Chavez, a populist first elected in 1998, portrays himself as an ideological foe of what he calls the "imperialist" U.S. government. He has snubbed Washington by forging alliances with anti-U.S. states, especially communist Cuba, and has called U.S. President George W. Bush "a jerk." Armas said Venezuela's cooperation with Cuban President Fidel Castro would be scaled back to dismantle what he said was "a kind of sinister alliance."

    DROUGHT CREATES A DANGEROUS SITUATION IN CUBA

    Prolonged drought from the eastern to the central parts of Cuba has destroyed and stunted cane earmarked for the coming harvest, and slowed planting for 2006. But the unusually dry weather now extends across the entire territory of  Cuba.

    This week's official Bohemia magazine, the country's most widely read publication, described some plantations in eastern Cuba as "torched" by heat and drought. "I have never before seen such massive areas of cane perish completely. Eighty percent of the plants have died," said the president of a Holguin province sugar cooperative. "There are plantations that simply no longer exist. The little bit of rain that has fallen has revived others. ñ

    From April 2003 through May 2004 rainfall in parts of central and eastern Cuba was 400 millimeters (16 inches) short of the norm, and worse in the provinces of Camaguey, Holguin, Las Tunas, Granma, Santiago and Guantanamo, which together produced more than 1 million tonnes of raw sugar this year.

    IRAQ ATTACKED U.S. SATELLITES

    Military sources confirmed a recent report that Iraq attempted to disrupt U.S. satellites. Signals transmitted from the Iraqi embassy in Cuba jammed American commercial communications satellite traffic during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

    The jamming effort by Iraq shows a growing vulnerability in U.S. space assets. According to Pentagon sources, U.S. military satellites have suffered a number of attacks by ground based laser systems. Pentagon officials refused to identify the sources of the laser "dazzle" attacks. The growing number of attacks on U.S. satellite is matched by an increase in space-based assets designed for use against America being offered for export by Russia and China.

    The space race is heating up into a new global arms race. Unfortunately, America stands to lose the next war because of politicsƒ "To avoid significant 21st century consequences, we must act now to protect and defend America's interests in space." (Click here and read the complete report written by Charles R. Smith, News Max)

    NO THAW IN TOTALITARIAN CUBA

    It seemed good news when it was announced last week that poet and journalist Manuel Vázquez Portal, who was sentenced to 28 years for writing articles about life in Fidel Castro's Cuba, was suddenly released after completing 15 months of his sentence. He is the 10th dissident to be freed by the Castro dictatorship since the March 2003 crackdown when 75 dissidents were rounded up and sentenced to long prison terms.

    But it has been reported that Mr. Vázquez release was not purely humanitarian, but simply reflected the Castro regime's fear that there would be an international outcry if any of the dissidents should die in jail. Vázquez has been threatened with being re-imprisoned if he resumes his journalistic activities.  In a telephone interview, Vázquez said state security agents had suggested that he leave the country. He has been granted a political refugee visa by the United States, and the Cuban authorities have given him an exit permit. But now, he says, he wants "to see the end of the film".

    Since the beginning of this year, according to the commission, there have been between 20 to 30 arrests of dissidents. And, of course, the entire population, denied the right to leave Cuba without permission from the dictatorship, remains imprisoned on Castro's repressive island.

    WOMAN DIES AFTER FIVE-HOUR WAIT FOR AN AMBULANCE

    A 69-year-old woman died after waiting five hours for an ambulance to take her to the hospital. Delfina Fundora checked into the Managua polyclinic Thursday with what doctors called an ischemic attack. Medical personnel called for an ambulance to transport Fundora to the hospital, but ambulance central said at the time that they had no vehicles available.

    Fundora waited from 11 a.m. until 4 p.m. for an ambulance to show up and suffered a second attack while waiting. She died before finally arriving at the hospital.

    DESPITE BUSH ADMINISTRATIONÍS NEW "TOUGH" REGULATIONS, ñPASTORS FOR PEACE" AGAIN VIOLATES EMBARGO AGAINST CUBA

    Nine buses and other vehicles loaded with medical and office equipment crossed the border into Mexico on Wednesday on a trip to Cuba that violates the U.S. embargo. It was the 14th straight year that "Pastors for Peace," organized by a sympathizer of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, has transported supplies to the Communist nation in spite of the embargo.

    Border officials did not try and stop the nine buses, a truck and several minivans loaded with donations. In fact, customs agents and Hidalgo police blocked border traffic to allow the caravan to cross. However, they did hand out fliers warning that only three of the group were authorized to travel on to Cuba and the rest were subject to prosecution leading to jail time or fines if they tried to travel to the island. The group was to spend the night in the border city of Reynosa and then depart Thursday for Tampico after clearing Mexican customs.

    CASTRO-SYMPATHIZERS LEAD PROTEST MISSION TO CUBA

    Leaders of "Pastors for Peace" this year filled nine old buses with donations including medical, sports, and office equipment gathered by church and other groups in 127 cities. More than 100 volunteers from across the nation and several foreign countries planned to ride in the caravan from the U.S. border to Tampico, Mexico. There they will load the goods, including the buses, on to boats bound for Cuba. The volunteers also planned to fly to Cuba.

    The U.S. embargo against Cuba is now in its fourth decade. President Bush last month stepped up the embargo with more stringent restrictions on U.S. residents' travel to visit family there. "It's a policy that has no redeeming value," said the Rev. Lucius Walker, a New Jersey Castro-sympathizer pastor who founded "Pastors for Peace." "What we're doing is an act of civil obedience to a higher power that says you should love your neighbor."

    The group violates the embargo by refusing to apply for documentation to export to Cuba and by using Mexico to bypass U.S. restrictions to Cuba. The caravans have in recent years passed through the border without much incident. Molly Millerwise of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, which regulates U.S. travel in Cuba, said the Bush administration stood by its decision to keep wealth from entering Cuba and strengthening the Fidel Castro regime. U.S. family members were spending too much money during visits to Cuba, she said, and the money was being funneled to Castro. "The continuing crackdown measures are meant to help hasten the day to a free Cuba," she said.

    KERRY SELECTS SENATOR JOHN EDWARDS AS HIS VICE-PRESIDENT

    Democratic White House hopeful John Kerry on Tuesday tapped a Senate colleague and former rival Tuesday to be his running mate, calling John Edwards "a man who understand and defends the values of America." Edwards, a one-term U.S. senator from North Carolina and highly successful trial lawyer, was Kerry's most persistent rival in the Democratic primaries, but he became one of his biggest boasters once he threw in the towel on his own campaign.

    Kerry, who has been all but crowned for his party's presidential nomination, announced his choice to a cheering crowd here. "I trust that met with your approval," Kerry, a four-term U.S. senator from Massachusetts, deadpanned. Although Edwards has served only one term in the Senate, Kerry said Edwards, 51, "is ready for this job."

    Kerry is a Northeastern liberal; Edwards is a more moderate Southern Democrat. Kerry is a "Boston Brahmin" blue blood; Edwards, the son of a mill worker, made a fortune and gained a national reputation in legal circles as a skillful trial attorney. He entered the Senate in 1998 and chose not to seek a second term when he decided to run for the presidency. Democratic strategists say Edwards' presence on the ticket could also boost Kerry in key swing states -- particularly in the Midwest. 

     BROTHER ASSERTS CAPTORS HAVE RELEASED MARINE

    The brother of an American Marine who had been taken hostage in Iraq asserted Tuesday that his brother, Cpl. Wassef Hassoun, has been freed. Sami Hassoun, speaking from Tripoli, Lebanon, said there is clear "sign" that his brother is "alive" and has been "released." Hassoun was trained as a truck driver, but worked as an Arabic translator. He was last seen June 19 and was reported missing when he failed to report for duty the next day.

    "We are happy that he is alive," said Sami Hassoun, whose brother is a 24-year-old Marine translator of Lebanese descent. He said earlier reports that his brother was beheaded in an execution was a shock, and the family gave each other comfort and prayed. "He's alive and he's released and thank God for that. The sign came to us, we are sure of it."

     Monday, a group -- which calls itself "Islamic Response," the security wing of the Islamic Resistance of Iraq -- faxed a statement to the network, saying Hassoun "has been sent to a safe place after he had announced his forgiveness and his determination not to go back to the U.S. forces." Al-Jazeera broadcast a videotape June 27 showing Hassoun blindfolded, a sword over his head. A narrator on the tape said the captive would be killed if the United States did not free jailed Iraqis.

    OUTRAGEOUS; MEXICAN TROOPS INTERRUPT FUNERAL OF U.S. MARINE 

    Mexican soldiers with automatic weapons interrupted the July 4 funeral of a U.S. Marine and demanded the Marine honor guard give up ceremonial replicas of rifles they carried. Hundreds of friends and relatives packed a small cemetery for the funeral on Sunday of 22-year-old Juan Lopez. He was killed in an ambush in Ramadi, west of Baghdad, on June 21. Maj. Curt Gwilliam presented an American flag to Lopez's widow, Sandra Torres.

    Problems began moments after the start of the ceremony. Four U.S. Marines marched solemnly to the grave carrying an American flag and the colors of the Marine Corps. Four Mexican soldiers blocked their path, asking the four Marines and six others who had served as pallbearers to return to the car that had brought them to the funeral. When the ceremony was complete, the Marines returned to a U.S. Embassy vehicle and waited. Fourteen Mexican soldiers arrived to guard the premises. About 40 minutes later, the Mexican soldiers allowed the van to leave.

     "I'm outraged that this would take away from the ceremony honoring U.S. Marine Juan Lopez Rangel, whose family requested he be buried in his town of birth with full military honors," U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza said in a statement. "These are ceremonial weapons," Dickmeyer said. "We were told not to bring M-16s, we didn't bring M-16s. We were told not to fire in the air, we didn't fire in the air." Lopez's cousin, Octavio Lopez, called the interruption "a big mistake."

     INDEPENDENCE DAY

    Today is the most important Holiday of this Nation because on JULY 4TH, 1776, the United States of America Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence.

     Some of us take our liberties for granted, but we shouldn't. So, letÍs take a few minutes while enjoying this JULY 4TH, 2004, and silently thank the American patriots for the freedom and democracy we enjoy today. It's not much to ask for the price they dearly paid. We, free men and women, should also pray for almost twelve million Cubans who cannot enjoy our freedom today because, for almost half a Century, they have lived under a hideous Communist dictatorship.

    Remember: Freedom is never free!

    ANTI-GOVERNMENT GRAFFITI IN NUEVITAS

    Unidentified persons posted at least four signs bearing anti-government slogans around the CamagÙey-province port city of Nuevitas, one of them very close to the local Communist Party offices, during the night of 23-24 June.

    Authorities promptly had the signs painted over, but not before many residents saw them. According to one resident, the signs reflected the people's unhappiness with the frequent blackouts in particular and with Cuban ruler Fidel Castro in general. A local human rights activist, said the daily blackouts have extended for between eight and twelve hours lately. So far, no one has reported any arrests related to the signs, but police and the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution have instituted special watches around the city.

    POWER OUTAGES IN CUBA BRING RESENTMENT TO THE FORE 

    Cubans are reacting to frequent power outages by openly voicing their resentment of the ruling elite when they meet in the streets. "Those of us at the bottom are the ones suffering," said one woman, who added, "I'm going to say this and I'm not afraid: the director of the power company is a fat cat whose name is Rolando Catalá. Do you know where he lives? In a place where the power never goes out. The big chiefs had a line run from there to the building where they live, and they're never without power. What a way to be a communist! "

    The woman was reacting to 14-plus-hour blackouts in the province of Pinar del Río. To top it all, they won't tell us what the problem is. I think we are going through another Special Period and they are just afraid to tell us." A young woman stopped to say: "What's happening is they know things are getting tight for Chávez in Venezuela, and they are starting to save oil already." "We are going to lose the Venezuelan crude, and that they can't tell the people."  "They are fooling the people," said a young man who works for a messenger service. "Nobody slept in my house last night. They cut the power at 5 p.m. and didn't reestablish it until 5 a.m. Then we had power for a few hours and off again it was."

    BLACKOUTS IN VILLA CLARA

    Blackouts are becoming so frequent and extended in the central Cuban province of Villa Clara that people have begun referring to them as "lightons," implying the blackouts are the standard and having electric service is the anomaly. The blackouts, which started becoming more frequent several weeks ago, are being reported from every province in the island.

    Government officials have been stressing energy-savings in messages to the population and everywhere saving measures can be seen: street lighting out, few lights and no air conditioning in the government-operated dollar stores, early vacations granted to personnel of numerous government enterprises. The official newspaper, Granma, said unexpected breakdowns have taken some generating units off line and that some others have been taken off the grid for scheduled repairs.

    TWO LAST FLIGHTS TO CUBA GROUNDED

    Scores of  Cuban exiles were turned away from their scheduled flights at Miami International Airport (MIA). With stricter regulations on travel to Cuba taking effect yesterday, many had been looking to beat the deadline by flying there a day earlier. But it turned out that the charter airlines that sold them their tickets had not been authorized to do so by the State Department -- and that neither were the flights authorized to take off. Eleven of the 16 flights scheduled to leave MIA for Cuba on Tuesday did so without passengers.

    ''What we understand,'' he said, ñis that, prior to the extension of the June 30 deadline, a couple of charter operators had basically put together flights that would have gone down to Cuba empty and picked people up, then returned to the States full, yet when the extension to July 31 was granted, these charter operators turned around and requested licenses to take additional people to Cuba in the last couple of days in June.''

    Approving such requests, Casey said, would have been inconsistent with State Department policy designed to reduce the amount of foreign currency going into Cuba and would have made it more difficult to get back from the island in an orderly fashion. ''We recommended that those licenses to bring people down to Cuba not be approved,'' Casey said. ñObviously, applying for a license doesn't mean you're going to get it.''

     CAMCO FULLY SUPPORTS THE NEW REGULATIONS ADOPTED BY THE U.S. TO HASTEN THE FALL OF THE DICTATOR -- MAJ. GEN. (DCNG-RET) ERNEIDO A. OLIVA (CAMCO CHAIRMAN)

     The Cuban American Military Council  (CAMCO) fully supports the new economic sanctions against Cuban dictator Fidel Castro by the Bush Administration. These sanctions are aimed at hastening the fall of the Castro regime by cutting the flow of tourist and family visits to the island.  Included in these sanctions are rules published by the Treasury Department on June 16th which obliged thousands of Cuban-Americans visiting relatives on the island to return before June 30, or face fines of up to $55,000. The date has now been extended until July 31. Cuban-Americans will now only be able to visit their relative in Cuba once every three years instead of yearly as before. When they do visit the island their stay will be capped at two weeks and they will be allowed to take with them less baggage, no more than 40 pounds, and be allowed to spend only $50 dollars daily instead of up to $160 per day.  Additionally, cash from the United States will can only be sent to immediate first-degree relatives (not members of the Communist Party) in Cuba, thus excluding aunts, uncles, cousins or other extended family members.

     Cuban dictator Fidel Castro called the new measures "cruel and inhumane." CAMCO not only approves the necessary changes, but it considers them ñjust and humane."  The present administration's determination to accelerate the demise of the communist government in Cuba, has not been seen in any of the previous nine administrations.  These new pressures on Cuba's state-controlled economy will deprive Castro of funds that he has been using to oppress the Cuban people. Although the sanctions will affect some Cubans on the island„their numbers are small compared to the millions of Cuban families who are lacking food and necessities for living because they were not receiving help from relatives in the U.S. Certainly, there will be Cuban families who will temporarily feel more separated than before and their needs will rise. However, responsibility for the separation and misery of the Cuban families falls squarely on the shoulders of Fidel Castro„not the U.S. President. The Cubans affected by the new measures should blame Fidel, not President Bush.

     The solution to this horrible tragedy is not in the hands of the U.S. government. It is in the hands of the Cuban people.  If the majority of the Cuban people want to have their families reunited NOW. If the Cuban people want to improve their standard of living and economic well-being NOW. If the Cuban people want to insure a brighten future for their children NOW. If the Cuban people want to be free NOW. Then they should stop waiting and fighting desperately for the crumbs that trickles to them from the "worms" in Miami and strongly demand NOW that the two individuals responsible for the dreadful conditions they have lived for almost half a Century leave the country NOW. The two individuals responsible for all the atrocities committed in Cuba, who betrayed their revolution and who have enslaved the island: FIDEL and his brother RAÚL.