Communists bash satellite TV

Communists bash satellite TV

United States steps up broadcasts as uncertainty over Castro's health eases

By Anita Snow
The Associated Press
Posted August 10 2006

HAVANA · TV satellite dishes amount to a "germ-filled stew" that receive
subversive propaganda, Communist officials told Cubans on Wednesday as
Washington increased transmissions of its TV channel to the island while
Fidel Castro recovers from surgery.

The Communist Party daily Granma also alluded to Miami news programs and
talk shows that have been filled in recent days with speculation about
Castro's health and the island's future. The shows are received with
illegal dishes, highly popular here among those who can afford them.

"In the case of Cuba, a good part of the programming received this way
has content that is destabilizing, interventionist, subversive and
encourages, more and more, the carrying out of terrorist activities,"
Granma said.

The U.S. government this week scaled up transmissions by its TV Marti,
which features anti-Castro programming. TV Marti's stated objective is
to break Cuba's "information blockade" by offering its own current
affairs shows as alternatives to state television programming, the only
thing Cubans receive if they don't have satellite dishes.

The government's unleashed its attack on satellite dishes as Cubans'
uncertainty over the health of the man who has ruled them for 47 years
begins to ease.

State-run media on Wednesday ran messages of support for Castro, who
turns 80 on Sunday. Youth organizations said on the front page of the
Communist Youth newspaper Juventud Rebelde, "We will fight and work
harder every day to maintain and cultivate the values that the
Revolution has sown in us."

About 150 medical workers gathered outside a major hospital on Wednesday
to express support for Castro, who announced on July 31 he was stepping
aside temporarily, granting his powers to his brother Raúl as head of
the government and the Communist Party so he could recover from
intestinal surgery.

Neither brother has been seen in public since then. Details of Castro's
condition, his ailment and the surgical procedure he underwent are being
treated as a "state secret."

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called Castro "the father of this
continent's revolutionaries," and expressed confidence he would fully
recover.

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias said Wednesday that Cubans should
decide who will rule the island once Fidel Castro is no longer in power.

"After 47 years, wouldn't it be more convenient to see what the Cuban
people want?" asked Arias, who won the Nobel Peace Prize as president in
1987 for his work as a mediator in Central America's civil wars.

Cuban leaders were enraged that Miami-based TV Marti beefed up its
transmissions over the weekend.

The U.S. government's Office of Cuba Broadcasting on Saturday unveiled a
new G-1 twin turbo propeller plane, which is increasing the
transmissions from one afternoon a week to six. The new privately owned
plane was set to go up in mid-August, but TV Marti pushed the date
forward after Castro's surgery.

But Cubans interviewed seemed more interested in getting access to Miami
channels through Direct TV dishes that are smuggled into the country and
sold on the black market. Some Cubans even hook up neighbors to their
boxes, charging the equivalent of about $10 monthly to see
Spanish-language news, soap operas, movies and cartoons.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/cuba/sfl-acuba10aug10,0,3796605.story?track=rss