Radio Havana Cuba-27 February 2002 Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit Radio Havana Cuba - News Update - 27 Febuary 2002 . *CUBA CALLS ON UN SECURITY COUNCIL TO TAKE DECISIVE ACTION IN MIDEAST *CUBA WORKS TOWARD CREATION OF THE NEW HUMAN BEING *WOMEN'S ROLE IN THE CUBAN REVOLUTION *IN THE US, OPPOSITION TO EXPANDED AID TO COLOMBIAN ARMY *RUMSFELD CONFIRMS THE PENTAGON'S DISINFORMATION PROJECT IS DEAD *US ATTACKS ON FRIENDLY AFGHANS: THE WITNESSES VS. THE PENTAGON *ARGENTINA: NEW SURVEY SHOWS LOCAL POLITICAL LEADERS DISCREDITED Viewpoint: *MONTERREY DEVELOPMENT CONFERENCE: MANY GOOD INTENTIONS, FEW CONCRETE TOPICS . *CUBA CALLS ON UN SECURITY COUNCIL TO TAKE DECISIVE ACTION IN MIDEAST New York, February 27 (RHC)--Cuba has called on the United Nations Security Council to fulfill its responsibilities and take decisive action in the Middle East crisis. During his speech before a session of the UN Security Council on Tuesday, Havana's Ambassador to the United Nations, Bruno Rodriguez, referred to the escalating violence and extremely dangerous situation in the region. He pointed to Tel Aviv's attacks against Palestinian civilians and the fact that Palestine National Authority President Yasser Arafat has been surrounded by Isreali tanks for the past two months -- a situation which the Cuban ambassador to the UN said was "totally unacceptable." Bruno Rodriguez noted that as a result of Israel's aggressive policies, UN workers have been injured and offices of the world body, or agencies related to the United Nations, have been damaged. The Cuban ambassador to the UN said that while violence is increasing daily, the Security Council seems content to sit back and watch a situation unfold that directly affects international peace and security. Havana's representative to the United Nations said that the UN Security Council has not even been able to establish a peacekeeping force or another impartial mechanism to protect innocent civilians -- affirming that what is needed most is an immediate cease-fire and an independent monitoring force. Addressing the special session of the UN Security Council in New York, the Cuban ambassador to the United Nations said that the United States has consistently opposed a peaceful solution to the situation in the Middle East. He recalled that the U.S. vetoed a resolution to send UN peacekeepers to the region in December -- effectively stopping the Security Council from carrying out its obligations under the UN Charter. Bruno Rodriguez called on Washington to condemn Israeli state terrorism and immediately suspend its military support of Tel Aviv -- if the U.S. is truly serious about fighting terrorism. Expressing his country's condemnation of suicide attacks against Israeli civilians -- who he said are also innocent victims of the spiraling violence -- Rodriguez said that Cuba recognizes the legitimate and heroic struggle of the Palestinian people against Israel's illegal occupation of its territories. *CUBA WORKS TOWARD CREATION OF THE NEW HUMAN BEING Pinar del Rio, February 27 (RHC)--Cuba continues to work toward the creation of the new human being -- also known as the "new man." During a local meeting of the Cuban Communist Party in Pinar del Rio, Political Bureau member Jose Ramon Balaguer said that "everything we do is with the goal of achieving the new human being and strengthening ourselves to better defend our ideology." Speaking before more than 400 delegates to the special Communist Party meeting, Balaguer said that the overall objective is to prepare people to selflessly give of themselves for the benefit of society. The high-ranking Cuban leader told Party members that "the Revolution is able to educate men and women in a different way, in relation to the socialist society we are constructing, and completely distinct from that which exists in the rest of the capitalist and neo-liberal world." Also during the meeting in Pinar del Rio, the general secretary of the local Communist Party, Armando Rodriguez, stressed the importance of "the Battle of Ideas" and the social programs being carried out by the Revolution. Noting that three schools in his district had been having serious electrical problems, Armando Rodriguez reported that the schools have now been connected with solar panels, providing electrical power for students in the area. Ernestina Ramos, a prestigious educator and leader of the Communist Party in the area, emphasized that there has been a qualitative change for the better in grade school education, but said there are still some problems on the high school level. She told delegates to the meeting that those difficulties are being sorted out and that every effort is being made to improve the educational level of high school students, as they prepare for their university studies. *WOMEN'S ROLE IN THE CUBAN REVOLUTION Havana, February 27 (RHC)--The National Committee of the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) held a two-day plenary session on Monday and Tuesday -- examining women's role in the island's revolutionary process. Vilma Espin, President of the FMC, and Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, a member of the Political Bureau of the Cuban Community Party, presided over the meeting. Cuban Vice President Carlos Lage addressed the plenary session on Tuesday. He said that it is necessary to work harder for more women to be in leadership roles and affirmed that the Revolution was conscious of shortcomings in this area. Carlos Lage said that promoting women into administrative and leadership positions was not just a nice thing to do, but absolutely necessary for the future of the country. He noted that when evaluating the small steps recently made in this area, it is easy to see that the results are still quite insufficient and must be improved. And he added that particularly given the apparent acknowledgement of the fact that more women need to be in top positions, much more needs to be done. Delegates to the National Committee meeting of the Federation of Cuban Women cited a number of reasons for the lack of women in top leadership positions. Among them: prevailing sexist attitudes; the persistence of sexual stereotypes, where women are overloaded with housework and taking care of the children; and an inadequate domestic infrastructure. *IN THE US, OPPOSITION TO EXPANDED AID TO COLOMBIAN ARMY Washington, February 27 (RHC)--More than 30 US human rights, policy, and church groups have urged the George W. Bush administration not to expand US aid to the Colombian army. The groups -- including the Washington Office on Latin America, Global Exchange, the Center for International Policy, and the National Council of Churches - sent a letter to Secretary of State Colin Powell expressing deep concern about the devastating consequences for the civilian population if Washington helps to fuel an intensification of Colombia's civil war. But the Bush administration's early reaction to the end of the country's rebel-government peace process indicates that Washington fully intends to expand its assistance to Colombia's military. Even before the collapse of the peace process, the administration had asked Congress to approve some 250 million dollars more in military aid to Bogotá, including 98 million dollars to train and supply new army brigades to protect an oil pipeline owned by the US transnational firm Occidental Petroleum. Due to the Colombian army's history of abuses and ties to rightwing death squads, the US Congress has restricted military aid to the army's counter-drug operations and has forbidden its use for counter-insurgency purposes. But in practice the line between the two types of aid has been blurred, with much of the money used by the Colombian army to fight leftist rebels in coca-growing regions. Meanwhile, the United Nations refugee agency is preparing for a probable exodus of Colombians fleeing stepped up fighting between rebels and government troops. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees is reportedly working with authorities and aid agencies in Ecuador, Panama and Venezuela, fearing that an escalation in Colombia's civil war will cause a regional humanitarian crisis. Earlier this week, the stepped up rebel offensive against the country's infrastructure - including dynamite attacks against power stations, gas pipelines and telecommunications centers - left a small region in neighboring Ecuador without electricity. *RUMSFELD CONFIRMS THE PENTAGON'S DISINFORMATION PROJECT IS DEAD Washington, February 27 (RHC)--US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has confirmed the scrapping of a project to disseminate disinformation to foreign media outlets. Earlier this week, Rumsfeld said the Pentagon would never spread lies, but late Tuesday he suggested that the Office of Strategic Influence was shut down because of the bad publicity it received after the plan was leaked to media outlets. He said the office's proposed activities have clearly been so damaged by commentaries and editorial cartoons that it could not function effectively. Rumsfeld also denied that the Pentagon's integrity had been compromised, though numerous media outlets have expressed the opinion that the disinformation project was threatening to undermine the Defense Department's credibility. The small but well-financed office was in response to concerns in the Bush administration that the US was losing public support overseas for its so-called war on terrorism, particularly in Islamic nations. Classified briefings that circulated in the Pentagon said the office should find ways to "coerce" foreign journalists and opinion makers and "punish" those who convey the wrong message. In response to aggressive questioning at Tuesday's press conference, Rumsfeld told reporters: "The office is done, what do you want -- blood?" The Defense Secretary's announcement coincided with a new Gallup poll showing that the majority of residents in the Muslim world harbor strong anti-American sentiments. In a poll of nearly 10,000 Muslim residents from nine countries, Gallup editor-in-chief Frank Newport told the "USA Today" news daily that respondents in Indonesia, Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey overwhelmingly described the United States as "ruthless, aggressive, conceited, arrogant, easily provoked and biased." *US ATTACKS ON FRIENDLY AFGHANS: THE WITNESSES VS. THE PENTAGON Kabul, February 27 (RHC)--Afghan officials and witnesses of last month's mistaken and deadly US Special Forces raid against friendly Afghan forces have continued to dispute the Pentagon's version of events. Relatives of Afghans killed in the attack have rejected the Pentagon's inquiry into the January 24 raid, insisting that men were shot without a chance to surrender and that the Americans, not the Afghans, fired first. In recent days, Pentagon officials have asserted that in the attack on two compounds believed to house Taliban and Al Qaida fighters, American soldiers fired on only one of the compounds after they were fired on. But 30-year-old Muhammad Kadir Agha, who watched the raid on one of the compounds from the roof of his house 200 yards away, told western media outlets that the Americans fired first. He said that although weapons were fired by both sides, it was easy to distinguish between the fire of the American weapons and the shots from Afghan guns. Other witnesses affirmed that several of the Afghans were found dead where they had been sleeping, and apparently had no chance to surrender before being shot. After the assault on the two compounds, US soldiers attacked various groups of buildings, including one where the former district government chief, Muhammad Yunas, had been sleeping with dozens more men. Recognizing the soldiers as Americans, Yunas said he called for his men to hold their fire, but that the Special Forces soldiers began shooting anyway. He said a 16-year-old guard was killed, while he and most of his men were able to escape from the building. *ARGENTINA: NEW SURVEY SHOWS LOCAL POLITICAL LEADERS DISCREDITED Buenos Aires, February 27 (RHC)--More than half of Argentineans believe that none of the country's politicians can manage the socio-economic crisis, while only one in five believe that President Eduardo Duhalde is capable of doing so, according to a new survey. The poll reflecting the discredit of political leaders, carried out by the Ricardo Rouvier & Associates consulting firm, coincides with numerous cases of verbal abuse against current and former government officials in public places like restaurants and gas stations. It also comes as Duhalde struggles to reach a tax-sharing accord with Argentina's provincial leaders while he pushes to cut government spending to lure back financial aid from the International Monetary Fund. Duhalde has asserted that the country will not be able to right its economy without at least 23 billion dollars in emergency international assistance. But Argentina has frozen its foreign debt payments, failing this week to pay an almost 8 million dollar interest payment on a one billion dollar loan last March from Spain. And in another tragic manifestation of the hardships facing the Argentinean people, in the town of Campana, 50 miles north of Buenos Aires, some 200 gathered Tuesday outside a supermarket begging for food. When the supermarket refused, some in the group attempted to loot the establishment, leading riot police to open fire with rubber bullets. Close to 10 people were arrested, though there were no reports of injuries. Viewpoint: *MONTERREY DEVELOPMENT CONFERENCE: MANY GOOD INTENTIONS, FEW CONCRETE TOPICS Something must change if we are to live in a sustainable world. It appears that will be the call of the International Conference on funding for Development that will be held in Monterrey, Mexico from March 18 - 22. Some 40 presidents and heads of state along with six thousand officials from around the world will attend the gathering. Though the draft copy of the final declaration recognizes that we are far from achieving the goal set by the United Nations that the developed nations dedicate seven per cent of their Gross Domestic Product to developing the Third World, the document offers no concrete measures to remedy the situation. The final declaration, which according to experts will experience a few changes in the final stage of the meeting, simply calls on the rich nations to comply with the objectives of the so-called, Summit of the Millennium, which among other things, is to reduce the growth of poverty by the year 2015. The fact is that at least half of the developed countries have failed to meet that objective, because conditions are lacking for this to occur, both internally and because of difficulties like the lack of fair trade in the international market. The critical problem of the foreign debt continues unresolved. It is a debt that is literally strangling the countries of the South, to the point that according to the World Bank's own figures, each dollar that the developed nations invests in "donations," they receive nine in return through the payments of interest on the credits extended. As they say, "with friends like these, who needs enemies?" If that is how "help" works, the poor would be better off on their own. Looking at the situation from another point of view, if the foreign debt of the world's poorest 20 countries were forgiven, and that money were destined for development, the lives of seven million children a year would be saved. Already the civil organizations are viewing the possibilities of the Monterrey Conference with marked skepticism, so much so that the United States, whose president will attend the gathering, has already expressed that Washington will not increase its assistance for development. This, despite the fact that the United States is one of the world's richest and contributes the least and the one that has perhaps benefited the most from the current unjust economic order. Perhaps we should run down the history of Latin America over the past 500 years, examining just who was supporting whom. How many riches has Europe taken from the colonies? How much has the United States stolen from Latin America in raw materials and goods since that nation was founded. If we take a hard look we would conclude that it is they who owe a debt to the Third World and that we are the creditors. It is only from that perspective that we can have a historical and socially just viewpoint when the time comes to negotiate funding for development. The rest are just small changes designed to keep the world continuing down the path towards destruction. (c) 2002 Radio Habana Cuba, NY Transfer News. 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