RHC Weekend - 15 September 2001 Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit Radio Havana Cuba - Weekend News Update - 15 September 2001 . *THOUSANDS CONDEMN TERRORISM, DEMAND RELEASE OF CUBANS HELD BY US *US ACTIVIST AND PROF. NOAM CHOMSKY WARNS THE WORST IS YET TO COME *NEGROPONTE WINS UNANIMOUS SENATE APPROVAL IN WAKE OF ATTACKS *RUSSIAN PRESIDENT URGES WASHINGTON NOT TO ACT LIKE BANDITS *US PLANNED TO COMMIT DOMESTIC TERRORISM AND BLAME CUBA AS PRETEXT TO INVADE *CUBA OBSERVES WORLD DAY FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE OZONE LAYER *FIDEL HIGHLIGHTS ADVANCES IN THE FIELD OF EDUCATION AND HEALTH *PRESIDENT OF MALI WINDS UP OFFICIAL VISIT TO CUBA *RAUL CASTRO PRESIDES OVER 35TH ANNIVERSARY OF MILITARY SCHOOL . *THOUSANDS CONDEMN TERRORISM, DEMAND RELEASE OF CUBANS HELD BY US Havana, September 15 (RHC)--In the wake of Tuesday's terrorist attacks against New York and Washington, more than 20,000 Cubans gathered this morning in Majibacoa, located in eastern Las Tunas Province, to demand an end to all types of terrorism. Participants and speakers showed their solidarity with the U.S. people for the tragedy they are suffering. Speakers recalled that Cuba has been the victim itself of terrorism and pointed to the 1976 in-flight sabotage of a Cubana airliner with 73 people on board. Luis Posada Carriles, currently being held in Panama, and Orlando Bosch, walking the streets of Miami, masterminded that terrorist attack. Teachers, doctors, young children and farmers took their turns at the podium to voice their solidarity with the five Cubans in jail in the US. For Cuba, the five are patriotic citizens who were helping the island to preserve its national security in the face of terrorist actions against Cuba, that repeatedly, and with impunity, are being organized and financed in the United States. The rally, which was headed by Cuban Vice President Raul Castro, also demanded an end to the U.S. blockade against the island, the Cuba Adjustment Act and the Helms-Burton Law. *US ACTIVIST PROF. NOAM CHOMSKY WARNS THE WORST IS YET TO COME Havana, September 15 (RHC)-- U.S. political activist and academic Noam Chomsky warns that the impending military strikes by the United States against so-called "terrorist states" overshadows the recent attacks in New York and Washington. In an editorial published in this morning's Granma newspaper, Chomsky writes that the terrorist attacks against the U.S. were "major atrocities." But he adds that "in scale, they may not reach the level of many others, for example, Clinton's bombing of the Sudan with no credible pretext, destroying half its pharmaceutical supplies and killing unknown numbers of people." The well-known linguistics professor points out that this week's events will "likely prove to be a crushing blow to Palestinians and other poor and oppressed people" and "lead to harsh security controls, with many possible ramifications for undermining civil liberties and internal freedom" inside the United States itself. Noam Chomsky states that the events of this past Tuesday are "a gift to the hard jingoist right, those who hope to use force to control their domains." While noting that upcoming U.S. military actions will only trigger more attacks like the ones that took place against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Chomsky writes that "prospects ahead are even more ominous than they appeared to be before the latest atrocities." Chomsky contends that "this is not the war of democracy versus terror, as the world will be asked to believe in the coming days." He said "it is also about American missiles smashing into Palestinian homes and U.S. helicopters firing missiles into a Lebanese ambulance in 1996 and American shells crashing into a village called Qana and about a Lebanese militia -- paid and uniformed by America's Israeli ally -- hacking and raping and murdering their way through refugee camps." Chomsky concludes by saying that the U.S. people have a choice: to seek to understand what may have led to the crimes committed on Tuesday or blindly accept the explanations of the U.S. government and believe that these attacks just came out of the blue. And he warns that with the impending military strikes by Washington, the worst is yet to come. *NEGROPONTE WINS UNANIMOUS SENATE APPROVAL IN WAKE OF ATTACKS Washington, September 15 (RHC)-- John Negroponte, the controversial nominee for U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, has won unanimous Senate approval following the recent terrorist attacks in the United States. Negroponte, who served as U.S. Ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985 under the Reagan administration, was strongly criticized for his role in Honduras during the contra war against Nicaragua. But he received full support Friday by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Nominated six months ago for the post, his approval was said to be in trouble. Since March, numerous senators have requested declassified CIA documents that demonstrate Negroponte's role in the dirty war against the Nicaraguan Sandinista government, as well as human rights violations by the Honduran government. But on Friday, Senate Committee Chairman Jesse Helms rose to defend the nomination and called on his fellow senators to give President George W. Bush everything he asks for in light of the recent attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Without further debate, even those senators who had previously voiced strong opposition to the nomination gave in and voted unanimously to award the seat of U.N. ambassador to the controversial nominee. *RUSSIAN PRESIDENT URGES WASHINGTON NOT TO ACT LIKE BANDITS Moscow, September 15 (RHC)-- Russian President Vladimir Putin has urged Washington not to act like bandits in its impending retaliation for the terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington D.C. last Tuesday. The Russian leader also urged the U.S. government to act only after they have collected sufficient evidence. During a press conference on Saturday in Moscow, the Russian president stated that the international community should not act hastily, although he added that those responsible for the attacks must be punished. Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the issue could be discussed at upcoming Russia-U.S. summits and in future consultations with the European Union and NATO. *US PLANNED TO COMMIT DOMESTIC TERRORISM AND BLAME CUBA AS PRETEXT TO INVADE Washington, September 15 (RHC)--U.S. military leaders proposed a secret plan in 1962 to commit terrorist acts and blame Cuba, designed to create a pretext for an invasion of the island. Written by James Bamford and published by Doubleday, "Body of Secrets" contains documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act or found in government archives. Bamford, a former investigative reporter for ABC News, wrote a book on the National Security Agency called "The Puzzle Palace" in 1982. His latest book provides a history of the eavesdropping agency based at Fort Meade, Maryland. Bamford said that he was most surprised by the anti-Cuba terror plan, code-named Operation Northwoods. The secret plan outlined a number of possible scenarios to be carried out by the United States in order to justify an invasion of the island and the destruction of the Cuban Revolution. Citing a White House document, the Bamford writes that the idea of creating a pretext for the invasion of Cuba might have started with President Dwight D. Eisenhower in the last weeks of his administration, when the plan for an invasion by Cuban mercenaries, trained in the United States and Central America, was hatched. The Bay of Pigs invasion was carried out in April 1961 and failed in its objective to create a beachhead by U.S.-backed forces. According to "Body of Secrets." the Northwoods plan proposed the sinking of a boatload of Cubans en route to Florida and blaming it on Havana. Yet another idea involved the shooting down of a CIA plane designed to resemble a passenger aircraft and then announcing that Cuban forces shot it down. And it was even suggested that if the 1962 launch of John Glenn into orbit were to fail, resulting in the astronaut's death, the U.S. government would publicize fabricated evidence that Cuba had used electronic interference to sabotage the space flight. The also reveals that while several Joint Chiefs of Staff signed-on to Operation Northwoods, U.S. President John F. Kennedy rejected it because he reportedly did not want any actions against Cuba that could be traced back to the United States. Bamford's book contains many other revelations in its detailed account of the National Security Agency, the biggest U.S. intelligence agency and Maryland's largest employer, with more than 25,000 personnel at Fort Meade, site of its global eavesdropping efforts. Among them: the NSA has recently listened to Osama bin Laden's unencrypted telephone calls. Agency officials have sometimes played tapes of bin Laden talking to his mother to impress members of Congress and select visitors to the agency. When U.S. troops evacuated Vietnam in 1975, "an entire warehouse overflowing with NSA's most important cryptographic machines and other supersensitive code and cipher materials" was left behind. It was the largest compromise of such equipment in U.S. history, Bamford writes, but the National Security Agency still has not acknowledged it. According to "Body of Secrets," when Israeli fighter jets attacked the NSA eavesdropping ship USS Liberty in the Mediterranean in 1967, killing 34 Americans and wounding 171, an NSA aircraft was listening in and heard Israeli pilots referring to the U.S. flag on the ship. Officials, including President Lyndon Baines Johnson, decided to forget the matter, Bamford writes, because they did not want to embarrass Israel. Bamford says the reason for the strike was Tel Aviv's desperate effort to cover up its attack on the Egyptian town of El Arish in the Sinai. The Liberty was sitting offshore and the Israelis feared that the ship would detect the operation, which included the shooting of civilians. When James Bamford wrote "The Puzzle Palace" in 1982, he was attacked by NSA officials, who said his revelations gave U.S. adversaries too much information on the secret agency. One former director of the NSA referred to him as "an unconvicted felon." *CUBA OBSERVES WORLD DAY FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE OZONE LAYER Havana, September 15 (RHC)--Cuba will commemorate the World Day for the Protection of the Ozone on September 16. A special program has been developed to eliminate pollution and promote a program of environmental education. Cuba's ozone technical office, created in the second half of the 1990s, is the main organizer of work in the field; it leads the research associated with the care of the ozone layer and promotes the gradual eradication of polluting substances. Provincial delegations of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment are also part of the project for the protection of the ozone layer. These institutions are in charge of taking inventory of refrigeration centers, the substitution of freon with a natural gas refrigerant, as well as the management and recycling of gases extracted from the equipment with the aim of avoiding contamination of the atmosphere. Among the tasks developed to protect the ozone layer, there is the elimination of methyl bromide in tobacco seeds through tested alternative products. In addition to this, environmental education in the schools is also an important element in the further preservation of the environment. The thinning of the ozone layer over the Antarctic provoked a world reaction against the countries emitting freon gases. It led to the Vienna Convention in 1985 and, two years later, to the Montreal Protocol -- signed by 168 nations, including Cuba. The agreement calls for the elimination of the use of polluting substances that damage the ozone layer. *FIDEL HIGHLIGHTS ADVANCES IN THE FIELD OF EDUCATION AND HEALTH Havana, September 15 (RHC)--Cuban President Fidel Castro has pointed out that the island is taking firm steps forward in health and education, despite economic difficulties as a result of the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the tightening of the U.S. blockade. The leader of the Cuban Revolution spoke Friday evening at the inauguration of the Training School for Nurses, located in Havana's Cotorro municipality. The Cuban president indicated that the island has made important progress in these areas over the last two months. Health and education have been a top priority for the Cuban government since the triumph of the Revolution in 1959. Fidel recalled that Cuba had to face a deep economic crisis following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the tightening of Washington's blockade during the 1990s. He said that although the island has not yet come out of the Special Period, there has been notable progress. Regarding nurses' training, the Cuban leader stressed that there is a shortage of nurses around the world, due to neo-liberal policies and privatization. In Latin America, he said, there are only 10 nurses for every 10,000 inhabitants and contrasted that to more than 74 nurses for every 10,000 in the Cuban health system. He added that a new school similar to this one is now under construction. Both will train no fewer than 4,000 nurses over the next two years. This, he went on to say, will help face the shortage of specialized personnel in the capital, the only place on the island needing to increase its ranks. *PRESIDENT OF MALI WINDS UP OFFICIAL VISIT TO CUBA Havana, September 15 (RHC)--The President of the African nation of Mali, Alpha Oumar Korane, wound up his official visit to Cuba on Saturday. Yesterday, the African leader visited Havana's International School for Sports and Physical Education, as well as the Museum of Fine Arts. At the center for the training of athletes, opened in February of this year, the African leader was welcomed by the president of the Cuban National Sports Institute, Humberto Rodriguez, and the school's board of directors. He was briefed about the development of sports on the island and facilities at the school. It was noted that there are currently 883 students from 61 countries studying at the center. Some 97 students come from 29 African nations; and Mali is represented by five students. In addition, seven Cuban sports specialists are currently lending their services in Mali, covering boxing, judo, track and field, volleyball and basketball. In all, 44 Cuban specialists have worked in Mali in the field of sports. President Alpha Oumar Konare recalled the time when he served as Sports Minister in his country and the attention he has paid since then to bilateral ties with Cuba in the field of sports. He also highlighted Cuba's support in the training of athletes and to Third World nations in general. During his four-day visit, the African president and his delegation visited areas of economic, scientific and historic interest. He came to Cuba at the invitation of President Fidel Castro. *RAUL CASTRO PRESIDES OVER 35TH ANNIVERSARY OF MILITARY SCHOOL Havana, September 15 (RHC)-- Cuban Vice President and Minister of the Armed Forces, Raul Castro, has expressed great satisfaction to see how students currently studying in the Camilo Cienfuegos' Military School, established 35 years ago. Raul Castro spoke with members of the institution, journalists and government officials who attended a ceremony to celebrate another anniversary of the military school on Friday. He recalled that more than 74,000 students have graduated from the school over the past 35 years. According to figures from the Minister of the Armed Forces, three brigade generals, nearly 100 colonels, thousands of officials of the Armed Forces and many Cuban leaders and professionals have graduated from the Camilo Cienfuegos Military School. The center has an annual enrollment of 2,700 young people. (c) 2001 Radio Habana Cuba, NY Transfer News. All rights reserved. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= rhc-eng-21624 2001-Sep-16 04:11:32