[Marxism] Why three Cuban officials were purged

[Pat Costello <pt_costello@xxxxxxxxx>]

Spanish newspaper: Why 3 Cuban officials were purged

The following article was published June 28 in the Spanish newspaper El País. 
Written by the newspaper's Havana correspondent, Mauricio Vincent, it was 
translated by The Miami Herald. Words [in brackets] are the translator's 
clarifications. Word deletions -- [...] -- are in the original text.

BY MAURICIO VINCENT

''They didn't throw me the ball,'' complained former Cuban Vice President 
Carlos Lage, using baseball jargon, to Carlos Valenciaga, Fidel Castro's former 
secretary, after learning that it would not be him, but historic leader José 
Ramón Machado Ventura, who would join Raúl Castro as the nation's 
second-in-command. The conversation, recorded by the Cuban security services on 
the eve of Raúl's election as president, on Feb. 24, 2008, is one of the 
''proofs'' that appear in a videotape shown to Cuban Communist Party members to 
officially explain the removals of Lage, former Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez 
Roque, and the former director of International Relations for the Central 
Committee of the CPC, Fernando Remírez de Estenoz.

The three high-ranking officials had been investigated for more than a year 
before their ouster, according to the video, whose contents was revealed to El 
País by three sources who watched it. The tape has two versions: one 
three-hours-long; another, six. At first, it was shown only to Party leaders, 
but now is being shown to rank-and-file members of the CPC, who, in order to 
see it, must surrender their cell phones, pens and handbags, and give out the 
number of their identity card before they can enter the viewing room.

The tape shows the extended session of the Political Bureau presided by Raúl 
Castro on March 2, when it was decided to unseat Lage, Pérez Roque and Remírez, 
relieve several ministers from their posts and restructure some agencies of the 
government's central administration. The tape also includes recordings of 
telephone conversations and images -- shot by the security services -- of the 
three former officials and industrial engineer Conrado Hernández, a buddy of 
Lage's from their days in the university, who was a representative in Cuba for 
the Basque government's Society for Industrial Promotion and Reconversion 
(SPRI).

Hernández was arrested on Feb. 14 at Havana Airport as he prepared to fly to 
Bilbao and is one of the linchpins in the case against the three leaders. Raúl 
Castro says he did espionage work for the Spanish intelligence services, an 
accusation supported by a recording of at least one meeting by Hernández with 
agents of the National Intelligence Center (CNI) in a Havana restaurant. 
According to the videotape, Hernández was to pass on reports about the health 
of Fidel Castro and other Cuban leaders, about the energy program being carried 
out on the island, and on Cuba's relations with the United States and other 
countries, such as Russia and China....


full text:

http://www.miamiherald.com/948/story/1119883.html


      

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