U.S. Bristles at Cuba’s Arrest of Dissidents

The Bush administration reacted with outrage Wednesday after the Castro government carried out its largest mass arrest of dissidents in years and accused the top U.S. diplomat in Cuba of trying to foment counterrevolution.

The Cuban government also said it will put the dissidents -- whom it has called traitors -- on trial for allegedly working with James Cason, head of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana.

Alarmed at increasingly visible dissident activity, Cuba in recent days arrested between two dozen and three dozen activists, including nongovernmental journalists, organizers of independent libraries and advocates of economic and political reform, U.S. officials said.

Through a statement read on state-run television Tuesday evening, the Cuban government accused Cason of trying “to foment the internal counterrevolution.” It said that “no nation, no matter how powerful, has the right to organize, finance and serve as the center for subverting the constitutional order.”

The Cuban government may have acted now, as the U.S. invasion of Iraq began, in hopes of minimizing the reaction from a preoccupied American government, said U.S. officials and Latin American specialists.

The crackdown could make it tougher for U.S. lawmakers and business groups to gain support in Congress for further easing a 40-year embargo on trade and travel to the communist country, experts said.

Richard Boucher, a spokesman for the State Department, called the arrests “an appalling act of intimidation against those who seek freedom and democratic change in Cuba.”

He said the crackdown was Cuba’s response to growing opposition on the island and an increasing desire for change. “We call on the Cuban government to release them immediately and for the international community to join us in demanding their release,” Boucher said.

Cuban leader Fidel Castro has been pushing hard in recent years for a relaxation of U.S.-imposed trade and travel restrictions, hoping that increased commerce with the U.S. would provide financial support for his impoverished country.

Yet dissident activity has apparently worried Castro enough, experts said, that he is willing to risk his support in the U.S. and abroad by cracking down.

The arrests seemed targeted at dissidents who have met with Cason during his travels around Cuba since last summer.

Castro did not arrest highly visible dissident leaders such as Oswaldo Paya, choosing instead less-well-known mid-level reformists. The move was interpreted by officials and outside experts as Castro’s way of sending a signal to the Cuban people without stirring too much alarm from foreign countries sympathetic to human rights activists.

The detainees include Ricardo Gonzalez, editor of a magazine that publishes the work of nongovernmental journalists, and Efren Fernandez, who has worked on a reform effort called the Varela Project.

Cuba last week demanded that all U.S. diplomats receive advance approval for travel beyond the Havana province. The U.S. government responded the next day by requiring that Cuban officials receive advance approval before traveling beyond the beltway that surrounds Washington.

Cason has held high-profile meetings with dissidents, and last month he allowed a group of nongovernmental journalists to hold a meeting at his home.

Boucher insisted that Cason was doing no more than what diplomats usually do in foreign countries. “He has visited with Cuban people in their homes. He’s visited independent libraries, he’s visited with other independent voices,” Boucher said.

The group Reporters Without Borders said at least a dozen of those held were independent journalists and the detentions “ended a period of relative tolerance for the independent press.”

Dan Erikson, director for Caribbean Projects at the Inter-American Dialogue research group in Washington, said the Castro government may have seen Cason’s activism as a provocation -- “as the United States thumbing its nose at them.” He said it is unclear whether Cuba intends to detain the dissidents briefly or send a more serious signal by holding them longer.

Either way, “this is the strongest action against dissidents for several years, and it could be quite significant,” Erikson said.

Meanwhile, the White House prepared to seek congressional approval for its choice for chief U.S. diplomat to Latin America. It is expected to ask Congress for confirmation of Roger F. Noriega as assistant secretary of State for Latin America.

Noriega, a staunch Castro opponent, is U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States and was a top aide to then-Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms (R-N.C.).