War of words between Cuba and the US heats up

War of words between Cuba and the US heats up
Ray Sanchez | Direct from Havana
7:29 AM EDT, May 8, 2008
Havana

The rhetorical war between Washington and Havana has intensified –
again-- with Cuba accusing the United States of harboring terrorists and
the Bush administration dismissing Raul Castro's reforms as empty gestures.

With new leadership in place on the communist island for the first time
in decades and new faces expected soon in the White House, the bitter
politics between the neighboring enemies remains the same.

"The regime has made empty gestures at reform but Cuba is still ruled by
the same group that has oppressed the Cuban people for almost half a
century," Bush told the Council of the Americas, an international
business group, on Wednesday.

Bush said the United States would not change its policy until there were
free and fair elections, political prisoners released, and human rights
respected.

"Until there is a change of heart and a change of compassion and a
change of how the Cuban government treats its people, there's no change
at all," he said.

Since taking over officially as president from his older brother Fidel
in late February, Raul Castro has introduced modest reforms such as
raising pensions and salaries and allowing citizens to purchase cell
phones, computers and DVD players.

In a teleconference at the US Interests Section a day earlier, Bush
spoke with Martha Beatriz Roque, one of 75 pro-democracy activists
arrested in a 2003 crackdown by the Castro government; Berta Soler, the
wife of an activist jailed for treason, and Jorge Luis Garcia Perez, who
was released last year after 17 years in prison.

Roque asked Bush to ease travel restrictions for Cuban Americans to
visit family members on the island and to make it easier to send money
to their relatives. The president's response to her request was not known.

In Havana, meanwhile, relatives of the victims of reputed anti-Castro
terrorists Luis Posada Carriles on Wednesday blasted the U.S. for
allowing Carriles to live freely in Miami.

Posada Carriles, 80, a former CIA operative and Bay of Pigs veteran, is
accused of masterminding the 1976 explosion of a Cubana Airlines jet in
which 73 people died, as well as a spate of Havana hotel bombings in the
1990s that killed an Italian tourist.

"As a nation, Cuba has not had a moment's rest in over half a century,
shaken by the constant fear of enduring new acts of terrorism," the
relatives said in a statement.

Posada Carriles was jailed on immigration charges in Texas for two years
until his release on May 8, 2007. He now lives in Miami, where Cuban
exiles hail him as a freedom fighter and patriot.

"On May 8th, it will be a year since he was set free in the United
States, a country that claims to be the leader of a crusade against
terrorism," the Posada family said the statement . Posada Carriles is
wanted in Venezuela in connection with the 1976 plane bombing.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/cuba/sfl-0508havanadaily,0,3963477.column