Top Cuba exile leader may have funded ex-CIA agent

<p style="text-align: justify;">Associated Press – Thu Mar 3. EL PASO, Texas – The bookkeeper for a New Jersey business mogul who was a director of the powerful Cuban American National Foundation retakes the stand in the perjury trial of an elderly ex-CIA operative from Cuba.Oscar De Rojas begins his second day of testimony Thursday and is expected to discuss efforts by Cuban-American exile leader Arnaldo Monzon to finance longtime anti-communist militant Luis Posada Carriles. Read More

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50-year tax holiday coming to an end in Cuba

<p style="text-align: justify;">Agence France-Presse.Posted at 03/03/2011 11:56 AM | Updated as of 03/03/2011. HAVANA, Cuba - For years, Cubans trying to eke out a living have had one small comfort: that whatever income they managed to scrape together was entirely theirs. That's about to change.With 50 years of government paternalism coming to an end, Cubans will soon be introduced to the tax man. Read More

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Varadero's Architectural Charm Threatened by Tourism

<p style="text-align: justify;">HAVANA, Mar 2, 2011 (IPS) - Important architectural works from the Modern movement in Cuba appear to be doomed as a result of the expansion of massive hotel complexes, which threaten to take over the landscape in Varadero, this country's most famous beach resort.The alert was first sounded in 2010 when rumours began to spread about the demolition of the Hotel Internacional and the Hotel Club Cabañas del Sol, two 1950s structures located in a prime area of Varadero, which is 140 km east of Havana, in the province of Matanzas. Read More

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Cuba and the internet

<p style="text-align: justify;">Mar 3rd 2011.HAVANA. ACCORDING to government figures, only 3% of Cubans frequently use the internet, making the Caribbean island the least connected place in the Americas. Those that do require patience: according to an industry survey, Cuba’s dial-up internet access is the world’s second-slowest, after Mayotte, a French territory in the Indian Ocean. Under the guise of rationing the use of bandwidth.For this sorry state of affairs, Cuba’s authorities have long blamed the United States’ trade embargo. They have a point. Read More

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Iconoclastic Young Filmmakers Look at Real Issues in Cuba

<p style="text-align: justify;">HAVANA, Mar 3, 2011 (IPS) - Lighting up dark areas of Cuban society with youthful vigour, Muestra Joven (the Young Cinema Exhibition), a local independent film event, reached its 10th anniversary characterised by experimentation and subjects that are both complex and invisible in the national media."The exhibition has earned a place for itself, against all the odds," Danae Diéguez, a member of the organising committee since 2006, told IPS about the festival that took place Feb. 22-27. Read More

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Castro condemns NATO's 'inevitable' war on Libya

<p style="text-align: justify;">By the CNN Wire Staff. March 3, 2011. Havana, Cuba (CNN) -- Cuba's former President Fidel Castro denounced on Thursday what he says is the inevitable U.S.-backed invasion of Libya by NATO to get its hands on that country's oil. Read More

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Piñón on Energy deals with Cuba’s petroleum demand and price elasticity

<p style="text-align: justify;">Economics 101: Demand is generally defined as the relationship between the price of a good or service and the amount or quantity the consumer is willing and able to purchase of that good or service. Simply stated, it is the relationship between price and quantity. The question in a centralized economic system is the responsiveness to price by consumers — price elasticity — due to the lack of substitute goods and or services. Read More

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Students allowed to study abroad in Cuba

<p style="text-align: justify;">President Obama opens country to college student.By Reid Davenport. Hatchet Staff Writer.Issue: 3/3/11.Students hoping to study abroad in Cuba this fall will be allowed to live in the island country, after President Barack Obama announced he would be relaxing academic travel in January.GW has no plans to launch its own Cuban study abroad program, but students can petition to study with programs offered by other universities such as American University, Central Michigan University and Northern Michigan University. Read More

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Over Half a Million Cuban Children to Receive Polio Vaccine

<p style="text-align: justify;">Havana, Mar 3 (Prensa Latina) More than half a million Cuban children will be immunized against polio during the 50 National Polio Vaccination Campaign which will take place in the country in the coming days. Reports from the Ministry of Public Health indicate that the campaign will run in two phases, the first from March 4 to 10 and a second from April 22 to 28.The second phase of the campaign coincides with the Ninth Vaccination Week in the Americas and aims to keep the Cuban population free of the disease. Read More

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Cuban hurdler Dayron Robles desires to meet U.S. rival Oliver

<p style="text-align: justify;">09:20, March 03, 2011. Cuban hurdler Dayron Robles expressed here on Wednesday his desire to face U.S. rival David Oliver after his return to competition next summer."I guess we can heat the track next season," said the Beijing 2008 Olympic champion.Robles, 24, holds the world record for the 110 meter hurdles, but he cancelled his European tour last month due to discomfort in his legs.Robles crashed on Feb. 5 against a hurdle during the 60-meter race in Stuttgart, Germany, while Oliver won the contest with a time of 7.37 seconds, the best of the current winter season. Read More

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