Caribbean

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• CUBA: Dissidents or government agents?

  24 April 2007 Hits: 2034

  Claims and counterclaims are par for the course in Cuba, but even by Havana's exalted standards the last few weeks have been wildly confusing. First, prominent dissident Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo returned to Cuba on 7 August after years of exile. Domestic dissidents received his return with froideur. Many suspect a government-inspired plot to undermine them. 
  
  Then, less than two weeks later, government journalists published a book labelling one of Cuba's leading human rights activists, Elizardo Sánchez, a double-dealing state secret agent. In a closed state like Cuba, it is impossible to corroborate sources and ascertain how much of this is false government propaganda. However, certain facts about both men are irrefutable.
  
  The known facts about Gutiérrez Menoyo
  Gutiérrez Menoyo was a former comrade-in-arms of Fidel Castro. He fell out with him in the mid-1960s. He was arrested and convicted of conspiring to overthrow Castro. He served 22 years in jail before being exiled after Spanish prime minister Felipe González interceded on his behalf. 
  
  In 1993, in Miami, Gutiérrez Menoyo founded an opposition organisation called Cambio Cubano (`Cuban Change'), which advocated a peaceful transition to democracy. On 7 August 2003, he visited Cuba. Before boarding his return flight to Miami, he announced to his family that he intended to stay to fight for democracy. Some leading dissidents criticised his move. One of these was Elizardo Sánchez, who reacted by citing government involvement: `It could be that this was a decision taken at the highest level within the island,' he said. 
  
  The known facts about Elizardo Sánchez
  Elizardo Sánchez was born in 1944 in Santiago de Cuba. He was a member of the anti-Batista resistance and a staunch follower of Fidel. He became a professor of Marxism before becoming disenchanted with the régime in the 1970s, since when he has been a vocal critic of human rights abuses. 
  
  He was jailed for four years in the early 1980s. In 1987, he founded and directed the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, which supplies international organisations like Amnesty International with summaries on human rights developments on the island. 
  
  Truth or fabrication?
  Gutiérrez Menoyo has had a fractious relationship with Cuba's domestic dissident movement from his exile in Miami, which could explain why he is distrusted amongst those seeking change on the island. He has accused dissident groups of being manipulated by the US Interests Section in Cuba rather than pursuing an independent opposition.
  
  It seems very unlikely that he has been working as a government informant, but his arrival in Cuba is bizarre. As Ninoska Pérez Castellón, leader of the Miami-based Consejo por la Libertad de Cuba (CLC) says: `This has to have been approved by Fidel Castro, who is the dictator in Cuba.' 
  
  The book, 'El Camaján' ('The Rogue'), written by government journalists Arleen Rodrí­guez and Lázaro Barredo, purports to describe Elizardo Sánchez's life from his initiation into the dissident movement in 1977 up to and including his role as a government spy, using the codenames Juana and Eduardo since 1997.
  
  The journalists argue that he informed on dissidents and foreign journalists and exposed CIA agents. They include photographs showing Sánchez apparently being decorated with the ministry of the interior (MINIT) distinguished service medal for his work by a Cuban intelligence service colonel, who he embraces. Given the notorious unreliability of photographic evidence, this should, however, be treated with considerable caution.
  
  Sánchez, 59, says the book is a malicious plot to discredit him. Cuba's most famous dissident, Oswaldo Payá, who has attended several high-profile international functions, dismissed the accusation against Sánchez as 'not worthy of comment'. 
  
  It could be that Sánchez, the president of the Cuban committee of human rights and national reconciliation, with his extensive links to the international press and foreign diplomats, was deemed 'too big' to arrest during Castro's March crackdown on political dissidents, so the book was considered the best way to sully his reputation.
  

• CUBA: Tracking events

  24 April 2007 Hits: 508

  * Tough sentences for hijackers.   Six men sent back to Cuba by US authorities after hijacking a government boat in an effort to reach Florida, have been convicted and sentenced to 7 to 10 years in prison.  
  
  Cuban exiles reacted furiously to the decision by the Bush administration to return the men. The influential Cuban American National Foundation (CANF) - normally a bastion of support for Republican governments - accused the White House of failing to meet its Cuba policy commitments made before the 2000 election, and said it would pay the price in next year's presidential elections.
  
  The governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, even entered the debate, criticising Washington's decision to repatriate the men: 'Despite the good intentions of the administration to negotiate the safety of these folks, that is an oppressive régime, and given the environment in Cuba, it's just not right [to have sent the Cubans back].'
  
  * Castro thunders at EU.   Fidel Castro marked the fiftieth anniversary of his abortive attack on the Moncada army barracks on 26 July 1953, taken as the symbolic origin of the revolution, by lashing out at the EU in a vitriolic 70-minute speech. Addressing thousands of invited guests from 20 countries at the site of the attack, Castro responded to the EU's recent criticism of Cuba's human rights record and the common position adopted by EU foreign ministers conditioning aid on economic and political reform.
  
  Castro rejected 'any humanitarian aid, or remaining aid, that may be offered by the governments of the European Union,' adding that, 'Cuba doesn't need the European Union to survive, develop and attain what you (Europeans) will never attain.'  
  
  * Central bank recalls US dollars.   Cuba's central bank has ordered state companies to trade in US dollars for 'convertible pesos'. It claims that the 'good performance of the economy over the first half of the year' has created 'propitious conditions' for this new measure. Far more likely is that the move is an indication of the government's increasingly desperate economic plight, signifying a need to take dollars out of circulation to bolster its foreign exchange reserves, and to assert more control over state companies.  
  
  The economy grew by just 1.1% last year, with tourism falling by five percentage points. The low world sugar price also led to the sugar industry being restructured.

• BELIZE: UK Privy Council refuses to halt Chalillo Dam

  24 April 2007 Hits: 2940

  The UK Privy Council announced this month that it will not order an injunction against the Chalillo Dam project.
  
  In July, a British-led legal team for the Belizean environmental organisation, Bacongo, asked the Privy Council, the highest court of appeal for Caribbean nations, to halt construction in advance of a further hearing on 3 December.
  
  The second hearing will consider the legality of the contract between the company building and operating the dam, Canadian power conglomerate Fortis Inc, and the Belizean government. 
  
  The Chalillo project has been at the centre of a fierce campaign since 1999. Newfoundland-based Fortis already operates another dam, Mollejón, downstream from the proposed site on the Macal River, which runs through a valley near the Maya Mountains on the country's western border with Guatemala. When Fortis built Mollejón, the company claimed that it would generate more than enough energy to serve local needs, but subsequently it was found that water levels outside the wet season meant that the facility was unable to generate sufficient electricity. 
  
  According to a power purchase agreement approved by the Belizean Public Utilities Commission in January 2002, Mollejón produced around 80 million kilowatt hours annually. If Chalillo came on stream, capacity would be doubled.
  
  The Belizean population has grown rapidly in the past few years, and the country currently has to buy in electricity from neighbouring Mexico during off-peak hours. An alternative method of generating power sustainably, using bagasse, a by-product of sugar cane, which Belize grows in abundance, was dismissed by the government. This lead to claims that the Belizean authorities had reached a beneficial deal with Fortis, who wanted to proceed with the project at all costs.
  
  Environmental impact
  The main argument from the anti-dam campaigners is that the area where the second dam is due to be built is more remote and has long been recognised as an area unusually rich in biodiversity; so much so that the US-based National Resources Defense Council designated it a 'Biogem'. Celebrities, including actors Cameron Diaz and Harrison Ford, have joined a public campaign to stop the dam being built.
  
  Scientists from the Natural History Museum in London, which maintains a research station in Belize, a former British colony which gained independence in 1981, told us that the wealth of animal, bird and plant species is so great that any building work should be put on hold until a complete study can be carried out.
  
  Researchers from the Belize Zoo say the area is unique in that it supports a particular variety of riverside vegetation which forms one of the main food sources for the population of the national animal of Belize, the Baird's tapir, a distant relative of the horse that is listed as an endangered species by the International Conservation Union. In addition to the tapir, which breeds in the area that would be flooded, the dam would threaten crocodiles, giant otters and one of the world's rarest parrots, a sub-species of the scarlet macaw of which there are believed to be fewer than 200 left in the wild.
  
  The dam has been dogged by problems for the past four years. First, Fortis's partner, troubled energy group AES, pulled out, and then the environmental impact assessment study has been discredited. The study was paid for by Cida, the Canadian International Development Agency. The resulting document - which ran to more than 1,500 pages - was project managed by the Canadian subsidiary of the British construction group, Amec, which is also involved in the controversial Three Gorges Dam in China.
  
  Amec subcontracted some of the research to members of the Natural History Museum's team, which expressed concern, not only over a risk to wildlife, but also to nearby Mayan archaeological ruins and to a small settlement which, it said, could be swept away if the dam was built - they believe that geological studies show that the dam as currently planned will be built on soft rock rather than granite. The Museum's final report, which recommended that for safety and research, the project be put on hold, was dismissed by Amec as a draft report and buried in an annexe to the 1,500 page document.
  
  Privy council hearing
  During the July hearing, the three-member board of the Privy Council expressed concern at the nature of the so-called `Third Master Agreement', which allows for the unimpeded progress of the construction phase by ordering the Belizean government to grant all necessary permits and permissions without delay.
  
  Godsman Ellis, a Belizean hotelier and leading opponent of the dam, says the deal between the government and Fortis is very suspicious. He cites the act passed in a single day in June, which said that any court ruling against the dam - for example, by the Privy Council - would be invalid. This legislation is, according to several legal experts consulted by this publication, unprecedented both in Belize and the UK, putting Fortis effectively above the law.
  
  The deal also places most of the risk of the project on the Belizean government. The Privy Council board, which happened to consist of contract specialists, said it had never before come across such an 'unusual' agreement.
  
  Even though it declined to grant an injunction in this instance, the board said it was aware of the sensitivity of the case, the first environmental issue to come before the court in almost 500 years. The board also criticised Fortis for not providing information when requested during previous legal hearings regarding the case in Belize. 
  
  In its reasoning, the Council stated that the main reason it did not consider it could grant an injunction was that Bacongo was unable to offer a financial guarantee to Becol, Fortis's Belizean subsidiary, which is managing the project. The Belizean government retains a 5% stake in Becol, whose president and CEO is Lynn Young.
  
  Recent reports say that a preliminary structure, called a coffer dam, has already been completed at the site.
  
  John Evans, chief engineer at Fortis, told us that the company was delighted by the latest decision of the Privy Council and that the next step will be to get some more of the main structure in place, hopefully before the next rainy season. This will be sometime in early 2004 and will include the concrete body which will be mixed and rolled on site. Mr Evans said the project would need a considerable quantity of concrete and that the company would probably have to bring a large amount in as he was not convinced that the amount required could be sourced locally.
  
  A spokesperson for Bacongo said that the ruling was by no means an end to the campaign to stop the dam, which is the second of three hydroelectric facilities planned by Fortis in Belize.

• TRINIDAD & TOBAGO

  24 April 2007 Hits: 3136

  Trinidad & Tobago's Prime Minister Patrick Manning entertained Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez earlier this month in Port of Spain to discuss enhancing bilateral energy agreements. The two countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the 'unitization' of cross-border oil and gas fields on the offshore Deltana basin, cross-bordering Trinidad's southern boundary limits with Venezuela. 
  
  The deal is important to both countries due to the planned development of the Deltana Platform, which contains an estimated 38tn cubic feet of gas. The five blocks to be explored are partly in or next to Trinidadian waters. 
  
  Chávez agreed that the findings would be sent to Trinidad & Tobago to be processed as LNG and exported to the US. Trinidad, with approximately 19.7tn cubic feet of natural gas reserves, is the world's fifth-largest LNG producer and the largest LNG exporter to the US.
  
  Venezuela, which sits on about 148tn cubic feet of proven gas reserves (expected to increase to more than 440tn cubic feet following new discoveries), is in the process of constructing an LNG plant that would produce 4.7m tonnes a year of gas for export, but this will not be completed until at least 2007.
  
  Chávez also expressed interest in becoming a partner with Trinidad in the construction of a proposed US$500m undersea pipeline to transport gas to the islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe, with branches extending to Antigua, Barbados, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic (RC-02-07). The pipeline is currently the subject of a feasibility study.
  
  Manning also mooted the idea of the pipeline running as far north as Florida. Venezuela's energy and mines minister, Rafael Ramí­rez, said that the country would be willing to participate in the construction of the pipeline and even make its own natural gas available.
  
  The daily paper Trinidad Express has rumoured that Chávez is working on persuading Manning to extend the pipeline to include Cuba. This would add a serious geopolitical angle to the project. While Trinidad maintains good relations with Cuba, the US is unlikely to countenance the construction of a pipeline that links it to Cuba.
  
  The Trinidad pipeline is the fourth proposal to supply LNG to Florida for power generation. There are three competing projects -AES and El Paso of the US and Tractebel of Belgium - to pipe LNG from the Bahamas to the Florida coast (see RC-03-04). These plans have run into heavy opposition from environmentalists.
  
  Florida's utilities plan to construct more than 11,000 megawatts in new gas-fired power generation facilities by the end of 2005. This demand would require more than two billion cubic feet per day of additional gas supplies.

• DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: IMF deal sparks controversy

  24 April 2007 Hits: 534

  The government has agreed a US$618m aid package with the IMF after two months of negotiations. The standby credit agreement should pave the way for further loans from the World Bank and the IDB. The government is keen to secure US$1bn of total aid from the multilaterals. 

  Complete details of the agreement, which should be approved by the board by the end of the month, have not been released, but the government has agreed to cap government wages and cut the fiscal deficit. It also agreed to impose a two percent import tariff and double the departure tax to US$20. 

  Business organisations have been highly critical of the government's decision to place a five percent tariff on Dominican exports, and are appealing to the supreme court of justice against the presidential decree that imposed it. They argue that only the national assembly is able to approve the imposition of fresh taxes. 

  Meanwhile, police have clashed with rioters on numerous occasions over the last few weeks. The rioters are protesting the IMF deal, rising prices and electrical blackouts.
  

• Tracking events

  24 April 2007 Hits: 447

  * New OAS envoy to oversee Haitian elections: The Organization of American States (OAS) has appointed a Special Envoy to Promote Dialogue in Haiti. Ambassador Terence Todman will have the unenviable task of increasing dialogue between the government of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the opposition Convergence Démocratique and civil society. 

  First up, Todman must establish a provisional electoral council (CEP) to pave the way for free and fair legislative elections for later this year. He will also need to persuade Aristide to establish a professional and independent police force. 

  The OAS does not have a great track record in Haiti. It has sent myriad missions there since the disputed legislative elections of 2000, with little to show for its efforts. It is now over four months since it sent a team of high-level diplomats to the country to deliver an ultimatum to Aristide: establish a provisional electoral council within ten days or face the consequences. 
  
  * New Turks and Caicos Chief Minister: Chief Minister Derek Taylor has stepped down after his government lost its majority in the Legislative Council only three months after it successfully retained power in general elections. The opposition Progressive National Party (PNP) won two by-elections earlier this month, giving the party eight seats in the 13-member Council. PNP leader Micheal Misick has been sworn in as the new Chief Minister. 
  
  * Out with the guilder in with the dollar: From 1 January 2004 Suriname will change its currency unit from Surinamese guilder (SRG) to Surinamese dollar (SR$), with an exchange rate of 2.8/US$ instead of the current 2,800/US$. This is the latest in a series of moves aimed at restoring confidence in the currency and making it easier to use in common transactions.
  
  Bermuda's Smith regains power, then resigns: Bermuda's governing Progressive Labour Party (PLP) clung on to power in uncomfortably tight general elections last month. Premier Jennifer Smith's centre-left PLP won 22 legislative seats to 14 returned by the opposition United Bermuda Party (UBP), but Smith stepped down in the wake of her poor personal performance. She managed to win her own St. George's North seat, a party stronghold, by just eight votes (423-415). PLP members chose Alex Scott, 63, former Works and Engineering Minister, to assume the premiership. 
  
  * Full marks for Barbados: Barbados has received a glowing report from the rating agency Standard & Poor's. S&P retained Barbados's A-minus credit rating, praising the government's 'very good economic management'. It said that the tourism industry was rebounding strongly and the island had emerged largely unscathed from the branding of so-called 'uncooperative tax havens' by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The report praised the country's 'social cohesion' but cautioned that Barbados was 'too heavily dependent on tourism and the official financial sector', and therefore 'vulnerable' to any downturn in those two areas.