Dissident blogger launches Cuba's first independent online newspaper
(Reuters) - Dissident blogger Yoani Sanchez launched Cuba's first independent online newspaper on Wednesday with reports questioning the quality of Cuba's healthcare system but access to its maiden edition was soon redirected to another site mocking the journalist.
The new site 14ymedio.com seeks to draw attention away from the communist-ruled country's state-controlled media and challenge the government's heavy media restrictions. Cuba has been tolerating a greater criticism in recent years but not yet from such a professional-looking website produced on the island.
Within its first 90 minutes on line, links to 14ymedio.com instead led to a site called yoani$landia.com, a reference the official Cuban critique that she is motivated by greed. The lead headline on the site was about her former Italian translator who split with Sanchez, saying she was rude and only wanted to become rich and famous.
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From her Twitter account, Sanchez called it a "bad strategy by the Cuban government to redirect our web 14ymedio.com from Cuba. Nothing more attractive than what is forbidden."