Czechs were carrying CDs, diskettes from Miami to Cuban Counterrevolutionaries

Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit

Wednesday January 24 (via Yahoo)

DETAINED CZECKS CARRIED CDS, DISKETTES FROM MIAMI TO COUNTERREVOLUTIONARIES

By ONDREJ HEJMA, Associated Press Writer 

PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) - A former finance minister and a fellow Czech
detained in Cuba were carrying computerized instructions for dissidents from
an American pro-democracy group, a Communist Czech legislator said
Wednesday.

The pair had names and addresses of Cuban dissidents to meet, along with
computer diskettes and CD-ROMs that were to be turned over to them,
legislator Miloslav Ransdorf told The Associated Press.

He said the Czech Communist Party had received a letter from Cuba's
Communist government detailing allegations against Ivan Pilip and Jan
Bubenik, arrested Jan. 12 in Ciego de Avila, about 185 miles east of Havana,
after meeting with Cuban pro-democracy dissidents.

Havana accuses Pilip and Bubenik of acting as agents for its exile enemies
in the United States. But Cuba and the Czech Republic have no diplomatic
ties, and Prague still has not heard officially about the arrests, which
have led to the most serious impasse between the former Socialist allies in
recent years.

Pilip, 37, is a deputy in the Czech parliament's lower house and a former
finance minister. Bubenik, 32, was a student leader in the 1989 overthrow of
the Communist government in Prague.

In Havana on Wednesday, the Cuban Foreign Ministry suggested that the matter
could be resolved if Prague only apologized.

"Just honestly recognize what happened and offer our people an apology,"
said a statement published on the official Foreign Ministry Web site. "That
could do more than all the lies and falsehoods; more than all the pressures
in the world, more than NATO and all of its bombers and missiles; more than
the power of all the rich countries and their money combined."

In the Czech Republic, Ransdorf said the Cuban letter detailing the
allegations claimed that Freedom House, an American pro-democracy group, had
provided the material for the dissidents. Pilip and Bubenik each received
$1,500 for expenses, the letter alleged.

"The same letter was sent by the Cuban Foreign Ministry to all embassies in
Havana" and would be published by the Czech Communist Party daily on
Thursday, Ransdorf said.

Freedom House has condemned the arrests, expressing solidarity with the two
Czechs "for their efforts to advocate for human rights, democracy and
freedom."

Meanwhile, the two men sit in prison. Pilip's wife, Lucie, who visited her
husband there, said the two were in good spirits and health and were
awaiting a trial that should take place within 60 days.

There was no official information on potential sentences, but the Czech
Mlada Fronta Dnes daily said the two could face up to 20 years in prison if
convicted.
 
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