Cuba begins to publish leaked U.S. documents

[Judi Lynn]

Source: CNN

Cuba begins to publish leaked U.S. documents
By Patrick Oppmann, CNN
December 24, 2010 -- Updated 1459 GMT (2259 HKT)

Havana, Cuba (CNN) -- A Cuban government-run website has begun translating into Spanish and posting online leaked U.S. government cables that discuss the island nation.

"Las Razones de Cuba" or "Cuba's Reasons" has as of Friday published seven cables originally released by WikiLeaks, the group whose leaks of confidential documents has been deeply embarrassing for U.S. officials.

The translated cables detail meetings between independent Cuban bloggers with officials from the United States Interests Section, the U.S. diplomatic mission in Cuba.

According to the "Cuba's Reasons" website, the cables show an attempt by U.S. officials to "organize youth networks to subvert the Cuban Revolution."



Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/12/24/wikileaks.cuba/index.html

---

Thanks to EFerrari for her info. Cuba's publishing Wikileaks.

[Arctic Dave]

1. "organize youth networks to subvert the Cuban Revolution."

Sounds like a few posters on DU. Not going to point fingers or anything. Just sayin'.

[dipsydoodle]

2. Hasta la victoria siempre

and "youth networks" can go fuck 'emsleves.

:hi: and Happy Chrtistmas.

[mudplanet]

3. Viva Fidel!

[Joanne98]

4. "organize youth networks to subvert the Cuban Revolution."

Sounds just like the Venezuela opposition students!

[Billy Burnett]

20. Does Yoani Sanchez' Generation Y ring a bell.

Wikileaks revealed communications between the USSD and Yoani about her US taxpayer paid-for cell phone minutes and servers that host her blog.

Even Huffpo gets in on the act and publishes Yoani's swill.

Here's a pic of her, roughing it in Cuba,
blogging from (I'm not kidding ...) her
mother's internet connection.

(You know ... the internet in Cuba that
Castro's iron fisted and brutal dictatorship
controls and censors every bit and byte that
passes through Cuba, and arrests any and all
who disagree with Castro.)
:eyes:

[earcandle]

5. Oh our crooked CIA and international mercenaries know their agenda. They are testing it on us now.

Are we so unaware and trusting to allow it is the question. 

[molly77]

12. earcandle

WikiLeaks is helping US all to see the propaganda more clearly.i.e. Pope calling on christians to resist the Chinese govt. That would read ..the fascist countries owe communist China a lot of money. Fascist are broke. My prediction for 2011. We will see more and more of the smearing of China as they have the upper hand financially. When , for at least a decade , trade policies have been favoring them. China was good enough to prop up the financially irresponsible US govt.Now, WE will probably try to get out of paying our debts.

[earcandle]

38. Thanks for your very informative response.

I am grateful for WikiLeaks, Anonymous, and hope Mr. Manning
gets out of jail until charged. 

[defendandprotect]

6. Good for Cuba -- US/CIA has been trying to assassinate Castro and regain Cuba....

since 1960's --

One of the many things that make me ashamed to be an American --

[molly77]

13. Cuba offered medical personnel to victims of Katrina

g bush refused..He wanted them to die. So there could be a land grab for US mercenaries/developers.

[defendandprotect]

21. Agree with you -- but right now viva Cuba re the cables -- !!

[Crunchy Frog]

33. I doubt they were actually trying to assassinate him.

I don't think they are that incompetent. My guess is that they were just trying to stoke his paranoia to try to make his regime more repressive.

[Judi Lynn]

36. He has had an excellent organization looking out for him. They located a bomb plot

a few years ago in Panama involving a former CIA creep, Luis Posada Carriles, and others, and reported it to the Panamanian authorities in order to protect their President and the anticipated very large audience which was scheduled to hear him make a speech in a large auditorium there.

The scums were caught, their materials confiscated, stored at the police station, the men went to prison, but not until someone removed certain parts of the equipment from the police station which weakened the case. Very typical. Then the _{George W. Bush-} friend, Mireya Moscoso pardoned the Cuban "exiles" the day before she was due to leave office, telephoned the Cuban "exile" community in Miami to inform them they had been "sprung" and moved to Miami immediately herself.

The Cuban President would have been assassinated and an enormous number of people murdered had the Cuban intelligence people not been extremely good at their job.

The CIA admitted over 600 attempts YEARS ago publicly, it has been commonly known for years, and a documentary made on the subject.

[liberaltrucker]

7. Che would be proud

As said upthread:

Hasta la victoria siempre

Viva Fidel!

:applause:

[davidinalameda]

8. is Cuba going to release some of their secret documents as well

[EFerrari]

9. Like where they lie about bombing Yemen or

block the torture investigation in Spain or screw with Michael Moore's movie in New Zealand?

Probably not. But then, the US didn't release anything either. They were just caught.

[davidinalameda]

10. like the true number of political prisoners

their role in destabilizing other countries in the region

their role in Angola

[EFerrari]

11. The more we demonize Cuba, the more we reveal about ourselves.

It's sad, really.

[davidinalameda]

15. nice deflection

so what about those numbers?

how about where the bodies are buried?

have all the Cuban missile crisis documents been made public?

[EFerrari]

19. The Cold War is over, david. n/t

[davidinalameda]

29. but yet Castro is still dictator in Cuba

I'm sure that those who lost loved ones to his regime, and who have family members still be persecuted, would like to know exactly what happened

where are the bodies buried?

[Crunchy Frog]

32. Where are the bodies buried? What bodies?

The last time I can remember hearing that expression was on FOX News by RW whackos during the Elian Gonzales hysteria.

Does Cuba really have more bodies to account for than most Latin American countries? Have there been large scale disappearances anytime in recent history?

[davidinalameda]

34. so are you saying that the regime

releases the bodies of all of its victims to their families?

[Crunchy Frog]

35. I didn't say anything at all. I asked a question

that was prompted by your previous statement.

[davidinalameda]

39. you asked what bodies

the bodies of the political prisoners that have been killed over the years by the Castro regime

I'd like for the Cubans to release the names of those murdered by the regime

I doubt they're stupid enough to keep records because they'll know what will happen as soon as the communists lose power

people will start looking for revenge

[Judi Lynn]

40. Had they killed any of those US-financed clowns, the U.S. would have instantly used it as an excuse

to invade.

Don't try to push that garbage over on people who know better. Cuba has a few very active critics who are widely recognized. They are the ones who ARE NOT PAID BY OTHER GOVERNEMNTS, nor by known terrorists in Miami, like Santiago Alvarez, associate of former CIA mass murderering bomber, Luis Posada Carriles.

It's those who take money from the US, which has been well known FOR YEARS who have gone to the slammer. That practise, taking money for acting as an agent of another government is ILLEGAL HERE, TOO. Not to mention everywhere else.

[Crunchy Frog]

42. Have you got any documentation for large scale killing of political dissidents

in Cuba under the Castro regime, and after the immediate aftermath of the revolution. Can you point to any evidence that it is significantly worse than (or even on a par with) the killing that has occured under other Latin Amerian dictatorships including Cuba under the Batista regime?

I'm genuinely curious. I don't know alot about Cuban history. I certainly haven't been aware of any large scale killing happening recently, and I think we would have heard something about it if it were happening now.

As far as the demand to "show us the bodies", I only ever remember hearing on that FOX News from Cubans in Miami during the Elian Gonzales hysteria. I've never seen any evidence, apart from that verbal assertion, of any large scale killings going on there. I'd be interested in seeing your documentation.

Oh, and people didn't start looking for revenge in Argentina or Chile or South Africa, or even in post Soviet Russia. Do you think that Cubans are just naturally more out of control and violent than people in those other countries? I did kind of wonder about that after watching the ones in Miami after Elian was returned to his father, so maybe you're right.

[Judi Lynn]

43. Miami Cubans who graced Florida with their presence at the end of the Revolution

were so violent they turned Miami, through their appalling record of murder, mayhem, bombings into what the F.B.I. designated as "America's Terror Capital."

They also quickly and tightly controlled public political opinion to the point Human Rights Watch made a public statement that in Miami First Amendment rights were in serious jeopardy.

An article was published during the Elian Gonzalez circus discussing the sordid history of violence in Miami. I've kept it as a useful reminder of how they conducted business from the moment they arrived, the people Cubans overthrew, within the borders of the U.S. As it was written in 2000, no more recent stats on Miami "exile" violence made it into the report. The incidents are only representative, not ALL, by any means, of the violent criminal, murderous political acts:

Mullin
The Burden of a Violent History
By Jim Mullin Thursday, Apr 20 2000

~snip~
Phrases like "mob rule" evoke frightening images of violence, which in turn sends Miami's damage-control specialists rushing to the microphones and insisting to the world that the Cuban-exile community is peace-loving, law-abiding, and (with emphasis now) nonviolent. Miami Mayor Joe Carollo in particular has been tireless in promoting that message. "Miami has been a peaceful, nonviolent community," he stressed to CNN last week. The historical record, however, clearly contradicts those assertions.

Lawless violence and intimidation have been hallmarks of el exilio for more than 30 years. Given that fact, it's not only understandable many people would be deeply worried, it's prudent to be worried. Of course it goes without saying that the majority of Cuban Americans in Miami do not sanction violence, but its long tradition within the exile community cannot be ignored and cannot simply be wished away.

The following list of violent incidents I compiled from a variety of databases and news sources (a few come from personal experience). It is incomplete, especially in Miami's trademark category of bomb threats. Nor does it include dozens of acts of violence and murder committed by Cuban exiles in other U.S. cities and at least sixteen foreign countries. But completeness isn't the point. The point is to face the truth, no matter how difficult that may be. If Miami's Cuban exiles confront this shameful past -- and resolutely disavow it -- they will go a long way toward easing their neighbors' anxiety about a peaceful future.

1968 From MacArthur Causeway, pediatrician Orlando Bosch fires bazooka at a Polish freighter. (City of Miami later declares "Orlando Bosch Day." Federal agents will jail him in 1988.)

1972 Julio Iglesias, performing at a local nightclub, says he wouldn't mind "singing in front of Cubans." Audience erupts in anger. Singer requires police escort. Most radio stations drop Iglesias from playlists. One that doesn't, Radio Alegre, receives bomb threats.

1974 Exile leader José Elias de la Torriente murdered in his Coral Gables home after failing to carry out a planned invasion of Cuba.

1974 Bomb blast guts the office of Spanish-language magazine Replica.

1974 Several small Cuban businesses, citing threats, stop selling Replica.

1974 Three bombs explode near a Spanish-language radio station.

1974 Hector Diaz Limonta and Arturo Rodriguez Vives murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1975 Luciano Nieves murdered after advocating peaceful coexistence with Cuba.

1975 Another bomb damages Replica's office.

1976 Rolando Masferrer and Ramon Donestevez murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1976 Car bomb blows off legs of WQBA-AM news director Emilio Milian after he publicly condemns exile violence.

1977 Juan José Peruyero murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1979 Cuban film Memories of Underdevelopment interrupted by gunfire and physical violence instigated by two exile groups.

1979 Bomb discovered at Padron Cigars, whose owner helped negotiate release of 3600 Cuban political prisoners.

1979 Bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1980 Another bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1980 Powerful anti-personnel bomb discovered at American Airways Charter, which arranges flights to Cuba.

1981 Bomb explodes at Mexican Consulate on Brickell Avenue in protest of relations with Cuba.

1981 Replica's office again damaged by a bomb.

1982 Bomb discovered at Nicaraguan Consulate.

1982 Two outlets of Hispania Interamericana, which ships medicine to Cuba, attacked by gunfire.

1982 Bomb explodes at Venezuelan Consulate in downtown Miami in protest of relations with Cuba.

1982 Bomb discovered at Nicaraguan Consulate.

1982 Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre defends $10,000 grant to exile commando group Alpha 66 by noting that the organization "has never been accused of terrorist activities inside the United States."

1983 Another bomb discovered at Replica.

1983 Another bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1983 Bomb explodes at Paradise International, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1983 Bomb explodes at Little Havana office of Continental National Bank, one of whose executives, Bernardo Benes, helped negotiate release of 3600 Cuban political prisoners.

1983 Miami City Commissioner Demetrio Perez seeks to honor exile terrorist Juan Felipe de la Cruz, accidentally killed while assembling a bomb. (Perez is now a member of the Miami-Dade County Public School Board and owner of the Lincoln-Martí private school where Elian Gonzalez is enrolled.)

1983 Gunfire shatters windows of three Little Havana businesses linked to Cuba.

1986 South Florida Peace Coalition members physically attacked in downtown Miami while demonstrating against Nicaraguan contra war.

1987 Bomb explodes at Cuba Envios, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes at Almacen El Español, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes at Cubanacan, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Car belonging to Bay of Pigs veteran is firebombed.

1987 Bomb explodes at Machi Viajes a Cuba, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes outside Va Cuba, which ships packages to Cuba.

1988 Bomb explodes at Miami Cuba, which ships medical supplies to Cuba.

1988 Bomb threat against Iberia Airlines in protest of Spain's relations with Cuba.

1988 Bomb explodes outside Cuban Museum of Art and Culture after auction of paintings by Cuban artists.

1988 Bomb explodes outside home of Maria Cristina Herrera, organizer of a conference on U.S.-Cuba relations.

1988 Bomb threat against WQBA-AM after commentator denounces Herrera bombing.

1988 Bomb threat at local office of Immigration and Naturalization Service in protest of terrorist Orlando Bosch being jailed.

1988 Bomb explodes near home of Griselda Hidalgo, advocate of unrestricted travel to Cuba.

Much more:
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2000-04-20/news/mullin/

[Crunchy Frog]

46. I guess I'm not going to get an answer from him.

Just post right wing Cuban talking points and then run when someone asks him to back them up. :shrug:

[JVS]

47. And yet we still have a malignant military industrial complex that dominates our government and..

thwarts democracy.

Funny how things don't change.

[mudplanet]

16. Their role in Angola! You've got to be kidding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angola - I guess if you call supporting the legally and popularly elected government "destabilizing" your definition is accurate. There's a little thing called history, supported by inconvenient facts, you might want to consider.

Savimbi started a war when he didn't win the elections after independence. That's who the US, Israel and South Africa backed.

"More than 70 types of mines - manufactured in at least 22 countries - have been planted in Angola during recent decades. Mines were installed by the government military, the South Africans, the Cubans, the Russians, UNITA, the police, by neighboring governments and several other Angolan armed groups. This panoply of mine layers makes demining - which includes understanding the strategy and patterns of mine laying - even more complicated. Mine clearance experts say only the Cubans made accurate maps of their mine fields.
The tens of thousands of one-legged Angolans hobbling around their country on crutches provide graphic evidence that most of the mines laid here are small anti-personnel mines designed to maim rather than kill. Yet the explosives are often targeted at civilians, most often women and children, rather than soldiers. Planted near water sources and under shade trees in the savannah, they are designed to terrorize, often with the goal of depopulating the countryside." http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/emergency/angolalandmines.cfm

Reminds me a lot of El Salvador. After the end of hostilities, the rebels (mostly FMLN) dug up and destroyed all of their mines. The Salvadoran army just walked away. What did they care?

[davidinalameda]

18. elected government?

please provide evidence of that

the sources I've seen state that the Cubans became involved in Angola before independence

it's hard to have a free and fair election while a civil war is going on

[mudplanet]

23. read the wikipedia article, or any other account of Angolan independence

that doesn't come from the John Birch society. I'm sure if you go to the right web pages you can find "proof" that Obama is a communist Marxist fascist who wants to become dictator and healthcare is part of that.

You'll be unable to understand Angola's transition for independence unless you also understand what was happening in Portugal at the time.

So, we've got a racist government (South Africa and the United States) providing all of the logistical and intelligence support for Savimbi on one side, and Cuba helping on the other side. The war ends and it turns out that the Cuban mines are the only ones that can be located and dug up, and the ones provided by the US and South Africa continue to blow the legs off of little children to this day.

Google "land mines" and you'll find that the problem in Angola is the worst in the world. Courtesy of your and my tax dollars. But at least those little legless children know they're free. Freedom isn't free.

[davidinalameda]

28. and the Soviets and the Chinese facing off in Angola as well

the Chinese came in to try and block the Soviets and their puppet Cubans

[flamingdem]

26. Thanks for this interesting info about Cuba and the FMLN nt

[Billy Burnett]

22. Nothing more destabilizing to corporate privatization goals than education and health care.

Cuba's "political prisoners", as Wikileaks has pulled back the covers on, were on the payroll of US (Miami) based Cuban exile terrorist groups with known terrorist histories, like Luis Posada, Orlando Bosch, Santiago Alvarez, Alpha 66, CANF, and more. This money was being funneled to them via US diplomats using their diplomatic cover to deliver the blood money.

[sabrina 1]

24. Have they illegally invaded any countries lately, slaughtered and tortured

to death untold numbers of human beings? Have they boiled any of their own citizens in oil and left the remains of their bodies on their families doorsteps all because they spoke out against their government for torturing to death other dissidents?

If not, then I imagine whatever they have to hide, pales by comparison.

Airc, Castro wanted to take back Guantanamo to stop the mistreatment of the illegally detained and tortured citizens of other nations the U.S. is responsible for, but you know, we're an Empire, we do what we want.

Ever heard of a real dictator named Karamov in Uzbekistan? Compare that sick, filthy brutal criminal to Castro if you can, and try to explain why we try to kill Castro, while paying millions of OUR tax dollars to support monsters like Karamov.

The days of trashing Castro giving anyone any credibility in this country are over. Our actions and the actions of our allies, have enhanced the reputations of people like Castro around the world.

We would do best to start wondering why this government is still supporting foreign dictators who boil their own people in oil eg and handing them over millions of our tax dollar.

These days, Castro looks like Santa Claus compared to the U.S. and some of our allies.

[catzies]

50. I particulary like a line of your and just want to repeat it:

The days of trashing Castro giving anyone any credibility in this country are over.

[grahamhgreen]

25. Destabilizing corrupt banana republics into social democracies?

[mudplanet]

37. Please provide one example of a corrupt bannana republic that the US

has played a positive hand it transforming into a social democracy.

I can't think of one.

[ronnie624]

17. And the extra 15,000 deaths in Iraq

and knowingly facilitating an illegal coup d'etat in Honduras. Important events with global ramifications that everyone in the world has a right to learn about and understand.

As if anything the Cuban government has ever done can compare. :crazy:

[JVS]

41. LOL! Nice

[Better Believe It]

14. As soon as the Obama administration releases their secret documents!

Especially the Obama Administration files on their domestic spying operations against progressive individuals, groups and websites like Democratic Underground!

[daleo]

27. Wikileaks did that for U.S. and other western secrets

So, it's up to Wiki to release any secrets Cuba might find uncomfortable. I would be interested in those too.

[Crunchy Frog]

31. I wasn't aware that the US had "released" any documents

unless that's the new word for "leak". :shrug:

[LanternWaste]

44. Hard to tell...

"is Cuba going to release some of their secret documents as well?"

Hard to tell, really. I would think not as most countries are not in the habit of publishing embarrassing material (see: U.S.) I imagine you could do some research on that very question and find an answer for both yourself and others.


That is if it was a sincere question, of course; though I imagine though the query was merely a rhetorical question designed to advertise an agenda that is at best, merely tangentially related to the OP. :shrug:

[fascisthunter]

49. awwww

[Crunchy Frog]

30. The main effect that our meddling has

is to bring discredit to every independent activist group in Cuba. Even the ones who have absolutely no affiliation with us will be painted with the same brush. All we do is delegitimize every type of opposition and independent political activity there.

Of course our policy makers don't give a damn about that. It has never been about the Cuban people and their political freedom. It has always just been about scoring political and propaganda points.

[Mika]

45. Maybe in US and MSM eyes. Cubans know the difference between native & foreign spawned "dissidents".

The Cuban government does not crack down on political activity of domestic creation. Only the so called "dissidents" who are on the US payroll and Miami based terrorist payrolls are busted up in Cuba for being unregistered foreign agents aiding and abetting the self declared enemies of the Cuban state (the US government and Miami RW exiles).

---

[JVS]

48. "Even the ones who have absolutely no affiliation with us"

Are there any?

[Vidar]

51. Bravo Cuba!