Tony Soprano has nothing on Fidel Castro

Tony Soprano has nothing on Fidel Castro

Like a slumlord who doesn't want to openly evict unwanted tenants,
Cuba's dictator is turning up the heat on the U.S. Interests Section in
Havana.

In the last week, the Cuban regime has cut off electricity. It's also
restricting water supply. The moves are only the latest in a bizarre
harassment campaign escalating for months.

These are troubling signs of how far Fidel Castro will go to counter any
source that might infect ordinary Cubans with ideas about human rights,
democracy and free thinking. And there's no telling when, if ever, the
campaign will stop.

The United States needs to steel itself. Castro is spoiling for a
confrontation. We shouldn't give it to him or close the Interests
Section in Havana.

Tony Soprano has nothing on Fidel Castro. Late last year, a top diplomat
in the U.S. Interests Section entered his Havana home to find it covered
in excrement. It was payback for allowing Cuban dissidents access to the
Internet. Other diplomats have had tires slashed and utilities cut.
Czech, Spanish and Polish envoys have been targeted, too. Castro wants
only foreign diplomats who protest no human-rights violations and ask
"How high?" when he says "Jump."

Perhaps this explains the contradictory stance of the EU Council Monday.
While EU foreign ministers deplored increases in political prisoners and
repression in Cuba, they refused to reinstate sanctions that had been
lifted last year. Had sanctions been renewed, EU diplomats could have
faced a new round of nasty harassment in Havana.

The U.S. Interests Section, meanwhile, has fired up generators and its
desalinization plant. It's also working around other imposed
difficulties to get gas and diesel fuel. The processing of the 20,000
annual immigrant visas for Cubans has not been affected, so far. Those
visas and support for dissidents provide Cubans a lifeline of hope that
the U.S. government should sustain.

It would make no sense for Castro to close the U.S. Interests Section
and disrupt those visas, a key escape valve for dissidents and
disaffected Cubans. But rationality has never been this dictator's
strong suit. His sole aim is to stay in power by acting like a thug, and
he has no intention of changing his style.

If anything, Castro is emboldened by the support of proteges Hugo Chavez
and Evo Morales. Like China's Mao Zedong and the Soviet Union's Joseph
Stalin, Castro may be growing more paranoid and harsher as he ages. None
of this bodes well for the United States or Cuba's people.

- The Miami Herald

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