Cuba moves to block US electronic message board
Wed Jan 25, 2006 12:04 PM ET
By Anthony Boadle
HAVANA (Reuters) - Bulldozers dug up a street in front of the U.S.
diplomatic mission in Havana on Wednesday apparently preparing to block
the view of an electronic billboard carrying human rights messages that
has angered President Fidel Castro.
Brigades of workers began the task on Tuesday night, hours after Castro
and hundreds of thousands of Cubans marched past the mission to protest
against the five-foot-high (1.5- meter) ticker that streams messages
across the facade of the U.S. Interests Section.
U.S. diplomats said Cuba's communist authorities were building a
concrete wall or screen to obstruct view of the ticker, which displays
messages to the Cuban people, news headlines and quotes from Abraham
Lincoln, Mahatma Gandhi and Lech Walesa.
"It is very clear that the Cuban government is building a wall to cut
off dialogue," a spokesperson for the Interests Section said.
Cuban officials said they were extending an open-air stage that has
been the main venue for political rallies against the United States
since 2000.
"We are expanding the Anti-Imperialist Stage," an official overseeing
the work said as an excavator ripped up the asphalt. Another said flag
masts would be erected on a new square.
The ticker across the 25 windows of the fifth floor of the Interests
Section on Havana's Malecon waterfront is a new salvo in a decades-old
propaganda war between Washington and Havana.
TIT-FOR-TAT BILLBOARDS
Last year Cuba set up billboards with pictures of abused Iraqi
prisoners at the site in reply to a Christmas decoration displaying the
number of dissidents jailed in a political crackdown.
On Tuesday, Castro called U.S. diplomats "cockroaches" and accused the
government of President George W. Bush of seeking a new crisis between
the United States and Cuba with "perfidious" provocations.
As Castro spoke from a podium, the U.S. ticker flashed "Conservatives
win elections in Canada" and other news headlines in bright letters in
full view of the marchers.
The headlines were followed by quotes from Lincoln, Gandhi and Walesa,
founder of the Solidarity movement that toppled Poland's communist
government and helped bring about the collapse of Soviet control over
Eastern Europe.
The ticker began flashing messages on January 16 with "I have a dream
that one day this nation will rise up" from black civil rights leader
Martin Luther King Jr's 1963 speech.
U.S. diplomats said they wanted to break the "information blockade" or
censorship of Cuba's state-run media.
Castro said Cuba would not accept the "perverse violation of its
dignity and sovereignty" and warned of a firm, though peaceful, Cuban
response.
Organizers said 1.4 million people took part in Tuesday's six-hour
demonstration along the seafront.
The two governments, bitter enemies since Castro came to power in a
1959 revolution, do not have formal diplomatic relations. Interests
offices were opened in each other's capital during the Carter
administration. Washington has enforced sanctions against Cuba since
1962.
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-01-25T170241Z_01_N25303495_RTRUKOC_0_US-CUBA-USA.xml
Wed Jan 25, 2006 12:04 PM ET
By Anthony Boadle
HAVANA (Reuters) - Bulldozers dug up a street in front of the U.S.
diplomatic mission in Havana on Wednesday apparently preparing to block
the view of an electronic billboard carrying human rights messages that
has angered President Fidel Castro.
Brigades of workers began the task on Tuesday night, hours after Castro
and hundreds of thousands of Cubans marched past the mission to protest
against the five-foot-high (1.5- meter) ticker that streams messages
across the facade of the U.S. Interests Section.
U.S. diplomats said Cuba's communist authorities were building a
concrete wall or screen to obstruct view of the ticker, which displays
messages to the Cuban people, news headlines and quotes from Abraham
Lincoln, Mahatma Gandhi and Lech Walesa.
"It is very clear that the Cuban government is building a wall to cut
off dialogue," a spokesperson for the Interests Section said.
Cuban officials said they were extending an open-air stage that has
been the main venue for political rallies against the United States
since 2000.
"We are expanding the Anti-Imperialist Stage," an official overseeing
the work said as an excavator ripped up the asphalt. Another said flag
masts would be erected on a new square.
The ticker across the 25 windows of the fifth floor of the Interests
Section on Havana's Malecon waterfront is a new salvo in a decades-old
propaganda war between Washington and Havana.
TIT-FOR-TAT BILLBOARDS
Last year Cuba set up billboards with pictures of abused Iraqi
prisoners at the site in reply to a Christmas decoration displaying the
number of dissidents jailed in a political crackdown.
On Tuesday, Castro called U.S. diplomats "cockroaches" and accused the
government of President George W. Bush of seeking a new crisis between
the United States and Cuba with "perfidious" provocations.
As Castro spoke from a podium, the U.S. ticker flashed "Conservatives
win elections in Canada" and other news headlines in bright letters in
full view of the marchers.
The headlines were followed by quotes from Lincoln, Gandhi and Walesa,
founder of the Solidarity movement that toppled Poland's communist
government and helped bring about the collapse of Soviet control over
Eastern Europe.
The ticker began flashing messages on January 16 with "I have a dream
that one day this nation will rise up" from black civil rights leader
Martin Luther King Jr's 1963 speech.
U.S. diplomats said they wanted to break the "information blockade" or
censorship of Cuba's state-run media.
Castro said Cuba would not accept the "perverse violation of its
dignity and sovereignty" and warned of a firm, though peaceful, Cuban
response.
Organizers said 1.4 million people took part in Tuesday's six-hour
demonstration along the seafront.
The two governments, bitter enemies since Castro came to power in a
1959 revolution, do not have formal diplomatic relations. Interests
offices were opened in each other's capital during the Carter
administration. Washington has enforced sanctions against Cuba since
1962.
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-01-25T170241Z_01_N25303495_RTRUKOC_0_US-CUBA-USA.xml
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