Mainstream Press on Fidel's Mexico Revelations Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit The Mainstream Press Covers Fidel's Revelations on Mexico [Ah, the Majestic United Nations, Protector of the Palestinians, (Former) Guarantor of the health of Patrice Lumumba, Arbiter of Conditions in Divers and Much-Improved Locales the World Over, from Cambodia to Rwanda. Now comes the United Nations to sit in judgement of the penal system in Cuba, in essence - to pretend that Cuba is not, in fact, in the midst of a forty years' war with the United States regarding the continued enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine even over *domestic* political movements not subservient to Uncle Sam, in essence. The commonest result of disputing President Monroe can be seen in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and for a few days just recently, in Venezuela. But, putting reality aside for a few hours, the human rights caucus at the UN came to meditate on Cuba and to consider - solely on its merits, of course - a US-sponsored resolution on Cuba. Traditionally, Mexico has abstained from this excercise in hypocrisy, which this year featured representatives from countries which have lately stopped raping, murdering and mutilating their political opponents for the most part (in Guatemala, though reports of political killings continue, Peru, Chile...) shaking their fingers about a country where people don't disappear and don't wind up in municipal garbage dumps. Meanwhile, sitting quietly on the sidelines rather than being able to even clear its throat on a topic such as this is a nation where the police have lately taken to killing poor children in large part simply because they can (Brazil.) This year, however, the vote came down to 21-23 -- with Mexico all of a sudden neither opposing nor abstaining, so as to guarantee Reich and Bush would avoid the embarrassment of a tie. In Chicago, when Mayor Washington died and a party hack was installed in his place, the people attending the aldermanic meeting went *ballistic.* (It was amazing - I hadn't been in Chicago more than a month when it all went down, and the local PBS affiliate broadcast it live, until 4 in the morning.) As the new guy tried to leave the chambers, the audience spontaneously began pelting him with pennies, screaming "how much did you get for your soul?" Not that I'm suggesting that everyone who has a chance to should throw pennies at Fox, mind you, but a man who just a week before saw what the US means when it says 'more political freedoms are needed in countries we just purely coincidentally are fundamentally ideologically at war with' and then instructs his UN rep to break the tie? Well, one wonders if the price was right, or if he's just gotten so accustomed to being una puta tambien para el EEEU que el quiero mas, mas, mas. --PB] Reuters - April 23, 2002 Cuba's Castro Calls Mexico's Fox a Liar By Marc Frank HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba's relations with long- time ally Mexico reached a new low on Monday after President Fidel Castro repeatedly called President Vicente Fox a liar, and made public a private conversation between them to prove it. Mexico reacted swiftly, with Fox's spokesman, Rodolfo Elizondo, decrying the playing of a recording of the two presidents talking confidentially as "unacceptable" but saying Mexico would maintain diplomatic relations with Cuba. Castro, speaking before a national TV audience, insisted Fox lied about the Cuban leader's hasty departure last month from a U.N. aid summit in Monterrey, Mexico. Cuba said at the time that Mexico, working on behalf of the United States, pressured Castro to either stay away from the summit or make himself scarce before President Bush arrived. Mexican President Vicente Fox and Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda both denied pressuring Castro to leave. "They were all lying left and right," Castro said. The Cuban president played a tape of a private telephone conversation he had with Fox on the eve of the summit, in which Fox clearly urged Castro to leave the meeting early and urged him "not to attack the United States or President Bush." On the tape Fox asks Castro to make his presentation at the summit and to return to Cuba on Thursday "so that you don't make Friday complicated for me." Bush was scheduled to arrive on Friday. Making public the tape was a clear break with presidential protocol. Castro said the aftermath "of telling these truths could be that diplomatic relations are severed." But Mexico did not react that strongly. "Independent of anecdotes and episodes like this one, the Mexican government will continue its diplomatic relations with the republic of Cuba," said Elizondo, reading a statement to reporters on Monday evening. The statement criticized the lack of democracy in communist Cuba and applauded Mexico's own democracy in words clearly directed at Mexico's pro-Cuba opposition, which has already criticized Fox for his handling of Castro's appearance at the Monterrey summit. CASTRO OFFERS RESIGNATION Castro said he would resign from office if the conversation proved false and challenged Fox to resign if it was not. "If anyone could prove that the conversation never took place ... I would firmly offer my resignation," Castro said. Mexico has been Cuba's firmest Latin American ally since Castro seized power in a 1959 revolution. But relations have cooled in recent years with Mexico's closer relationship with the United States and its criticism of the human rights situation in Cuba. Castro apparently held off releasing the tape until Mexico's vote last week at the U.N. Human Rights Commission hearings in Geneva to censure the island. Castro termed the move a "despicable betrayal" as Fox had promised him "that Mexico would never do anything against Cuba" at the U.N. forum. Cuba has said that Mexico and other Latin American countries voted at the behest of the U.S. government. "On the contrary, Havana was the only government that put pressure on Mexico regarding its vote in Geneva regarding the human rights situation in Cuba," Elizondo said. The motion, the first in which Latin America has taken the lead in criticizing Cuba at the commission hearings, was approved by 23 votes to 21, with nine abstentions. Cuba has been condemned by the 53-state Commission in past years but most Latin American countries, including Mexico, have abstained in the votes. (additional reporting by Fiona Ortiz in Mexico City) * Associated Press - April 23, 2002 Fidel Castro says Mexican president encouraged him to not to attend U.N.conference by Anita Snow HAVANA (AP) -- Calling Mexico's human rights vote against Cuba "the last straw," an angry President Fidel Castro on Monday insisted that Mexican President Vicente Fox had encouraged him not to attend a U.N. conference early last month - something Mexican officials have denied. "The aftermath of telling these truths could be that diplomatic relations are severed," Castro said after playing for a roomful of journalists and Cuban officials a taped telephone conversation between Fox and him before the conference in early March. In the conversation, Fox sounds tentative about Castro's last minute decision to travel to the U.N. conference in the northern state of Monterrey already underway, saying "this surprise, at the last minute, creates many problems for me." Ultimately, the tape has Fox agreeing that Castro has the "absolute right" to attend the conference. But the Mexican president asks Castro to leave immediately after lunch the day he was scheduled to give his speech - or before lunch if as called to speak before then. The day of his speech, Castro spoke before noon, then left the conference shortly afterward, creating a flutter among news media about his sudden departure. U.S. President George W. Bush arrived at the conference shortly after Castro's departure. Cuban officials at the time insisted that Mexican officials pressured Castro to leave early at the insistence of the Bush administration. Both Mexican and U.S. officials have denied that. During his two-hour presentation to reporters Monday night, Castro acknowledged that the men had agreed that the conversation would be private, but Mexico's decision to join the Friday U.N. Human Relations Commission vote targeting Cuba "was the last straw." "If anyone could prove that such a conversation never took place, and that those were not President Fox's words, I would firmly offer my immediate resignation to all my positions and responsibilities at the head of the Cuban state and revolution," Castro declared. "My honor would not permit me to continue at the head of this country," he added to the statement, which was broadcast live on state radio and television across the island. A spokesman for Mexican President Vicente Fox refused to comment immediately Monday night, but said officials were meeting into the evening to discuss Castro's declarations. Meanwhile, Interior Secretary Santiago Creel defended Mexico's decision to vote to censure Cuba for its human rights record during a meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Commission last week in Geneva. "A government can only truly be called a democracy if its leaders respect human rights," Creel said. The U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva on Friday voted 23-21, with nine abstentions, to invite Cuba to extend greater civil and political rights to its citizens. It also exhorted Cuba to allow a U.N. representative to visit the island -- an idea officials here have rejected. Almost all Latin American nations on the 53-member commission approved the human rights measure. The Cuban government was especially disappointed that Mexico, which historically has abstained during the annual exercise, decided to join the vote this year. Copyright (c) 2002 by The Associated Pres ================================================================= 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 ================================================================= nytcari-04.23.02-06:12:37-9312