The Obama administration has ordered private contractors to stop sending satellite communication gear into Cuba, the Miami Herald reported today. The paper added: “The government also prohibits contractors from traveling to Cuba more than twice a year, and the trips are now vetted by top administrators. The U.S. Agency for International Development began changing its [...]
Interview with Aleida Godinez, Part 2
Some Cubans join dissident groups in hopes of building a case for political persecution and obtaining a visa to the United States, former security agent Aleida Godinez said. For more of this interview, see 18-minute video on the Cuba Money Project’s Vimeo channel. Godinez, one of the Cuban government’s star witnesses against dissidents after the [...]
Interview with Aleida Godinez, Part 1
Aleida Godinez considers herself a Cuban patriot and didn’t hesitate when her government asked her to infiltrate the political opposition. Her testimony led to the conviction of dissident Martha Beatriz Roque in 2003. Godinez, whose undercover name was Agent Vilma, is unapologetic. She sees Cuba’s political dissidents as “mercenaries” who work on behalf of the [...]
Interview with John McAuliff
U.S. officials should respect the authority of Cuba’s socialist government rather than trying to undermine it, said John McAuliff, director of the non-profit Fund for Reconciliation and Development in New York. U.S. Agency for International Development programs in Cuba are “totally useless” for promoting democracy and “dangerous” for development workers who carry out government-financed work, [...]
Interview with Stephen Wilkinson
U.S. officials have taken a less aggressive stance toward Cuba under President Barack Obama. An old Bush administration position – that of “Cuba transition coordinator” – has been eliminated. And the idea of toppling Cuba’s socialist government “has kind of receded in the rhetoric,” said Stephen Wilkinson, a Cuba expert at London Metropolitan University. Even [...]
Interview with Arturo Lopez-Levy
Cuba expert Arturo Lopez-Levy contends that U.S. democracy programs paint the Cuban government as the “devil” and civil society as the “angel.” He said: Everything is against the (Cuban) government. A key problem with that approach, he said, is that opposition groups accept aid with conditions set by the U.S. government, which leads to a [...]