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FIDEL CASTRO'S
DAUGHTER ON CASTRO
"...But you know, among
Americans, you use the word 'custody' and parental care
and stuff like that. It doesn't exist in Cuba. And then you're
forgetting, too, that the American legal system is not sending
back a boy to his father. The American legal system is sending
back a boy to a dictator who leads a regime that four years ago
sunk a tugboat, killing 11 children, in front of the Cuban harbor.
That's the point." -- ALINA
FERNANDEZ, FIDEL CASTRO'S DAUGHTER, Larry
King Live
IN
CUBA CHILDREN ARE PROPERTY OF THE STATE
The Cuban government said yesterday it will take custody of
6-year-old Elián Gonzalez once the Clinton administration turns
over the boy to his father, who is preparing to come to the United
States. "He [Elián] is a possession of the Cuban
government," said Luis Fernandez, a spokesman for Cuba's
unofficial embassy in Washington. Once the transfer takes place,
he said, "No other entity can remove this."
Critics have long complained that the Cuban Constitution gives the
state paramount rights in raising children, especially when there
is a conflict with the parents. A 1978 Cuban law requires that
parents and teachers raise children with a "communist
personality" and outlaws "influences contrary to
communist development." -- Elián
'a possession' of state, Cuba says -- THE
WASHINGTON TIMES
WHY CASTRO CARES SO MUCH ABOUT ELIAN
...The mutual accusations over the
little rafter's custody only consolidate the Cuban leader's
plan to raise a smoke screen to hide the repressive activities of
his political police, which have become harsher in recent days,
and the pathetic drama of Cuban prisons...The human-rights
monitoring in Cuba has been relegated to the background, and the
government has been given free rein to persecute and harass
dissidents, while the foreign news agencies concentrate on the
so-called open forums. Those propaganda-laden gatherings are
staged for the benefit of opportunists who wish to express their
unconditional support for the holders of power in Cuba, speak
whatever nonsense comes to their minds and parrot the slogans
learned as a child in school, as a worker and a member of the
Committees for the Defense of the Revolution.
The
issue of Elián has become a bore in Cuba. Most people couldn't
care less if the boy returns or remains in Miami or is given U.S.
citizenship by Congress. What one senses on the street is
unease over the way the government and the Central Committee
journalists are manipulating the case. The gossip on the
street criticizes the attitude of the boy's father; there's
always someone accusing him of being a coward and incapable of
defending his paternal rights. In a futile attempt to refute the
words that Elián shouted at a passing plane ("Don't take me
back to Cuba!"), the government's propaganda machinists
played a recording of the words on TV but said that the tape had
been edited. One hears what one wants to hear, but the viewers
clearly heard Elián's shout and saw his glee. -- The Miami
Herald "CASTRO CRUSHES THE DISSIDENTS, AND NO PASTOR
CARE" Friday, January 28, 2000
THE CAUSE OF THE CUSTODY DISPUTE
...this
much mustn't be forgotten: This custody dispute would not have
happened if Cuba allowed its citizens to leave and return; there
would have been no reason for Elián's mother to die. -- Miami
Herald, So Near Yet So Far
ELIAN'S SENTENCE
"A
revealing moment came last week when a Michigan judge sent a
13-year-old murderer to juvenile detention for a mere eight years.
In Florida, meanwhile, the nation's top law enforcement officer
told an innocent 6-year-old that he was being sentenced to life in
prison, by which we mean Cuba." -- The Investor's Business
Daily "Trying Our Souls"
HOW CASTRO TREATS WOMEN AND CHILDREN
Juan Garcia would have been 14 years old.
Instead, today is the fourth anniversary of his brutal death seven
miles north of the Cuban coast on July 13, 1994. Only 10, he was
among 72 people so desperate to flee Cuba's repression that they
boarded the 13 de Marzo, an old wooden tugboat, and headed north.
What happened
to them can be described only as cold blooded slaughter. Survivors
related how four newer, bigger Cuban fireboats chased the 13 de
Marzo as it left Havana harbor, used high-pressure water hoses to
batter them, then repeatedly rammed the crippled vessel with all
aboard to make sure that it sank. Altogether 41 lives were
lost, some dozen of them believed to have been children... Those
who lost loved ones still complain that no attempts were made to
recover bodies or to conduct an independent investigation. Not
only have none of the authors of the hei nous crime ever been
prosecuted, but crewmen of the attacking boats reportedly were
commended for their patriotic "heroics."
Yet the world
has been shamefully silent on the barbarity that happened on July
13, 1994. "The time is important because it wasn't all
that long ago, not, in other words, in the bad old days of mass
arrests and widespread executions," as Ted Koppel aptly noted
in an ABC News Nightline... Castro must show better his
intent to democratize, offer a better quid. Otherwise any United
States pro quo may give him only more resources with which to
tighten the screws anew. -- "An unthinkable slaughter: OF
FLEEING CUBANS Cuban fireboats sent 41 people to watery graves
four years ago today. (Monday, July 13, 1998, in the Miami
Herald)
WHAT
SOMEONE WHO WAS IN ELIAN'S SHOES THINKS
"The basic question here, as it was in my case,
remains: Should parents have the right to choose for their
children a future in which the possibility of freedom is
foreclosed? In my case, the federal courts ultimately held that
parental rights are not absolute and that children are entitled to
the same protection from persecution as adults.
"Elián celebrated his sixth birthday last week. As the father
of a six-year-old myself, I feel it is my obligation to do what is
best for my child. We need to remember we are dealing with a
communist country and that Elián's father is under a lot of
pressure, as my father was from the Soviets.
"Trust my experience. One day Elián will be as grateful as I
am for being allowed to stay in our great country. It is the best
decision I have ever made. I have no regrets, and I am certain
that Elián will feel the same." -- Walter
Polovchak,
"Commentary Let Him Stay -- As I. Did" (WSJ
14 Dec 99)
Comments: Walter Polovchak defected from the Soviet Union at age 12 in
1980, wherein his father tried to have him deported back to the
Ukraine. His father did not succeed.
REDEFINING
THE MEANING OF 'DEMOCRACY' AND FREE-SPEECH.
"The irony is that demonstrations by Cuban exiles in
Miami demanding that the United States not return this child have
been portrayed as spontaneous, democratic actions, while massive
demonstrations in Cuba calling for his return are cynically
characterized as merely more master manipulation by Fidel
Castro." -- USA TODAY Editorialist
Comments: The demonstrations in the U.S. were spontaneous
and 'democratic' -- as the U.S. government did not plan them,
but private citizens did. In Cuba if you hold a
demonstration not
approved by Castro government you can spend
five years in a brutal Cuban cell. What do you think would
happen if a Cuban -- in Cuba -- said the boy should stay in the United
States (as his mother wished)? The only irony is your why you
apply terms such as spontaneous and 'democratic' to a country
where if you attempt to do either you will be thrown into the
Cuban version of the Gulag.
MARCHING
TO A SINGLE DRUM, CASTRO STYLE -- AT GUNPOINT
"In the last week [Castro] has launched the kind of
saturating propaganda campaign only possible in a one party state.
On Friday the entire country was shut down with anti-US rallies in
which hundreds of thousands of people participated - filing past
the US Interest Section in Havana." -- BBC ['Shipwrecked Cuban
boy stirs mixed emotions', Tom Gibb reporting in Havanna for the
BBC
(13 Dec, 1999)].
Question to ponder: People who march to a different drum in
Cuba go to jail, so why does the US press treat this a march by
people in a free society? What would happen to pregnant mothers
who refused to march, since Castro owns all the hospitals?
FOR THOSE
WHO HAVE SHORT MEMORIES...
"Recall that [Castro] is the same man whose goons only five
years ago rammed a tugboat filled with desperate escapees until it
broke up and sank. One survivor would later tell The Washington
Post that Cuban officials continued to spray them with
water cannon and watch them go under even as mothers desperately
tried to keep their children's heads above the water. Does
anyone think a man who considers escape a criminal act has Elián's
welfare at heart?" -- WSJ
WHAT DOES
ELIAN WANT TO DO?
Meanwhile, Sen. Bob Smith, R-N.H., a member of the Senate
Judiciary Committee, which has INS oversight, met with the boy's
relatives in Miami. Smith said Elián told him in Spanish:
"Help me. I don't want to go back to Cuba." -- AP
WHO IS
REALLY PLAYING POLITICS?
"Who suggested on national television that the boy should
be sent back? Bill Clinton. Which group made a high-profile visit
to Cuba, where it endorsed the Fidel line? The National Council of
Churches. And which governmental body brought us to where we are
today by saying that its original decision leaving Elián eligible
for parole was a 'mistake'? -- WSJ
REPORTS
THAT FATHER LET BOY LEAVE FROM MOTHER'S RELATIVES
"This is a good family,'' Smith said. "I saw enough and
heard enough to know he wants to stay in America.'' He said
Elián's relatives gave him information that his father may have
known Elián's mother was bringing him to the United States and
supported that decision -- something Gonzalez has denied. -- AP
Comment: To see what Castro would do
if the father in Cuba did not deny it click
here.
THE CASTRO
PROPAGANDA MACHINE
"State TV blares out a continuous stream of vitriol about
child prostitution, abuse, drugs, and poverty in the United
States. Schoolchildren all over the country shout how Elián is
captive in a place with no schools or health
care..." -- BBC.
Comment: America has no schools or hospitals it seems. Then
why all the complaints in the U.S. over why we don't export enough
medicine to Cuba? As for the problems in U.S. education -- our
public schools follow the Communist Manifesto model (they are public).
WHAT YOU
WILL NOT READ IN THE AMERICAN PRESS
"Among the Cubans I know, however, there is little
enthusiasm. More than 500,000 adults, a large chunk of the
population, applied to emigrate to the United States last
year." -- BBC.
Comment: More then likely many of them are marching in the
so-called parade. They have no choice.
WHAT WILL
ELIAN THINK WHEN HE IS OLDER -- ASK YOUNG CUBANS (IN PRIVATE)
"Some younger people [in Cuba] even say Elián should stay in
Florida. One group told me that when he is their age he will hate
his father for bringing him back. They all want to
emigrate." -- BBC.
Comment: Ask the same older children in public and you will
get the opposite answer. Read If
Elián Returns To Cuba, Misery Awaits"
to learn why.
WHAT ELIAN MEANS TO HIS FATHER
"He represents something bigger -- the dignity of the
Cuban people." -- Elián Gonzalez's father quoted by AFP
Comment: Funny my dad never thought
me as the 'dignity' of the Indian people.
GONZALEZ
FREEDOM TO GO TO THE U.S. IS CONDITIONAL THAT THE BOY GOES
BACK
"Gonzalez and the Cuban government have said throughout the
controversy that he would consider going to Miami only if the U.S.
government assures him that he could pick up Elián. -- WASH POST
BIZARRE!
"The boy's maternal grandmother -- also in Havana -- said her
daughter will not rest in peace until her boy is back in
Cuba.". No comment necessary.
THE
BIZARRE EXPLAINED
''The reason why I'm in this is because the child has to have an
opportunity to be free, that's how his mother would have wanted
it,'' Lazaro Gonzalez said. -- MIAMI HERALD
ELIAN'S MOTHER WILL
"I always thought this was a place of liberty, and they
are not letting him keep that liberty,'' Ms. [Elián's cousin,
Marisleysis Gonzalez] Gonzalez said. "It's always about the
father. What about the mother? That was his mother's
will.'' -- TODAY SHOW
HOW THE
INS SCREWED UP
"Maybe Gonzalez does want his boy to leave America -- though
it is at least worth noting that he didn't really start insisting
on it until after Fidel did. But this is something the INS cannot
know, because it has allowed Fidel to compromise the investigatory
process. Had Fidel allowed Gonzalez and his new family to come to
America and answer these questions without a gun effectively
pointed to his head, the INS might have some claim to know what he
really wants for his son." -- WSJ
WHAT DOES
CASTRO CARE ABOUT RETURNING CHILDREN TO THEIR PARENTS?
"Like many Cubans living in Florida, Jorge points out the
contradiction between the Cuban government's intense interest in
securing Elián's return and its reluctance to allow children to
join parents who illegally left the country, in some cases even
blocking family reunions." -- AFP
SPOKEN LIKE A HARVARD LIBERAL ARTS GRADUATE
"And as for the argument that he'd have a better life in
America, that's pure speculation, not to mention cultural
imperialism." -- USA TODAY EDITORIAL
Comment: If
we say it is wrong for Castro to throw a man in jail and keep him
there naked for a month, because he disagreed with Castro-this is
'cultural imperialism'? But if we are Fidel Castro who throws the
man in jail we are 'cultural revolutionaries'. What happens to
Elián when he disagrees with his "educators" that his
mother -- who died for him (see the 20/20 interview with the two
other survivors on how she selfishly gave up her life for her
son) -- make him say that she is an evil "counter
revolutionary" and a "traitor to the state"?
WHAT
ABOUT THE SOUTH AFRICA EMBARGO?
Such speculation [about life not being better in Cuba] is
based more on the negative effects of the 38-year American
economic embargo and isolation of Cuba than it is on the alleged
evils of growing up in a communist country.
COMMENT:
As Cuba is free to trade with every country (except the
U.S. and Israel) -- are you trying to tell me that the only source
of goods is the United States? The real reason why Cuba is poor is
the same reason why Russia did so poorly -- that it does not have a
free-market (a corollary of a free-mind). Castro can end the
embargo any time by ending his rein of tyranny, and returning the
billions in property he looted from U.S. citizens when he
nationalized American citizen businesses that were located there.
Commentary
by Mark Da Cunha. Mark
Da Cunha is publisher and editor in chief
of Capitalism
Magazine.
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