U.S. pledges $80 million for Cuba opposition

HAVANA — U.S. officials announced a plan Monday to spend $80 million over the next two years to strengthen Cuba's struggling opposition movement as part of a series of measures aimed at ending Cuban President Fidel Castro's one-party rule.

The Bush administration also pledged to tighten existing sanctions, improve efforts to break Cuba's "information blockade" against its citizens and intensify a campaign to diplomatically isolate the country.

The measures are contained in a report issued by the Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba, the White House's top policy-making body for Cuba that is run by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, a Cuban-American.

"We are offering support for the efforts of Cubans to prepare for the day when they will recover their sovereignty and can select a government of their choosing through free and fair multi-party elections," Rice said as she unveiled the report.

There was no immediate response from Cuba to the 93-page document, which is a follow-up to the commission's first report in May 2004.

But Cuban officials last week denounced a draft report similar to Monday's final version as a U.S. plot to annex Cuba and reverse what they describe as the revolution's achievements in health, education and other areas.

"We are facing a true threat of aggression," Cuban National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon said.

Although the commission said it is "a time for bold, decisive action" against Castro, critics said the report offers little that is new and merely endorses ongoing U.S. measures that have failed to bring about change.

"This is about the U.S. trying to provide the illusion of activity to hide the fact that there has been no progress on their objectives," said Daniel Erikson, director of Caribbean programs at the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington think tank.

One opposition activist on the island said the measures outlined in the new report could provide Cuban authorities with a cover for intensifying the repression against them.

"It gives the Cuban government evidence to call us mercenaries and put us in prison," said Miriam Leiva, a prominent dissident. "The government is always looking for excuses to crack down on us."

Yet, while the report offers few new proposals, it adopts a more moderate tone than its predecessor on several key issues, experts said.

The report emphasizes the need for national reconciliation among Cubans at home and abroad while pledging the United States would not support "any arbitrary effort to evict them (Cubans) from their homes" in the post-Castro era.

Such a pledge is important because many island residents fear that returning Cuban-Americans would claim homes and other property confiscated by Castro after he seized power in 1959.

The commission made clear the United States would not provide humanitarian and other assistance to a post-Castro government unless it moved swiftly toward multiparty elections.

Since 2004, President Bush has intensified financial, travel and other sanctions against the island to weaken the Cuban government by denying it hard currency.

At the same time, U.S. officials have spent tens of millions of dollars supplying everything from food to clothing to fax machines and computers to opposition activists. Cuban authorities have imprisoned many activists who accepted the assistance.