Cuba blocks U.S. ticker with flags of mourning

Cuba blocks U.S. ticker with flags of mourning
Mon Feb 6, 2006 8:56 PM ET

By Marc Frank

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba hoisted 138 huge black flags bearing a white
star in front of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana on Monday,
blocking an electronic sign streaming news and political messages.

After the flags were raised, Cubans began a 24-hour vigil in front of
the mission, during which they vowed to hold huge posters with the faces
of victims of the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, a 1976 bombing of a Cuban
airliner, a string of Havana hotel blasts in the late 1990s, and other
events they blame on the United States.

President Fidel Castro sent hundreds of thousands of Cuban marchers past
the mission earlier this month soon after the sign was turned on.

The ticker flashes news headlines and also has included quotes from
Abraham Lincoln, Mahatma Gandhi and Lech Walesa, founder of the
Solidarity movement in Poland.

Castro had promised to respond to the sign, which he termed a "gross
provocation aimed at rupturing fragile relations" in a speech earlier
this month.

The two governments, bitter enemies since Castro came to power in a 1959
revolution, do not have formal diplomatic relations and are represented
by interests offices opened in each other's capital during the Carter
administration.

"The flags represent the nation's mourning for over 3,400 Cubans killed
by U.S.-sponsored violence since the 1959 revolution," said Carlos
Alberto Cremata, son of the co-pilot of a Cuban airliner downed by a
bomb blast, killing all 73 aboard.

"They are white stars over a black background, representing the light of
a people that are in pain and mourning for their children and families,"
Cremata said at the flag-raising ceremony, attended by Castro, other
leaders, families of the dead and selected young people.

The communist leader, who turns 80 in August, was dressed in his
trademark military fatigues and green cap, but did not speak. Others in
attendance wore black T-shirts.

The flags and ticker across the 25 windows of the fifth floor of the
Interests Section on Havana's Malecon waterfront are the latest salvos
in a decades-old propaganda war between Washington and Havana.

Last year, Cuba set up billboards with pictures of abused Iraqi
prisoners at the site in reply to a Christmas decoration put up by the
U.S. mission displaying the number of dissidents imprisoned in a
political crackdown in Cuba.

Monday's event included accusations the United States had supported
Cuban-American terrorism over the years and sheltered terrorists
operating out of south Florida, in particular former CIA operatives
Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles, accused by Cuba of being behind
the plane bombing, among other attacks.

Bosch lives in Miami, having received a pardon from other crimes by
George W. Bush's father during his presidency.

Cremata, and other speakers on Monday, denounced President George W.
Bush's government for wanting to free Posada, who has been held by the
United States since May for illegally entering the country.

U.S. authorities have rejected a Venezuelan extradition request for
Posada, who escaped from a Caracas jail in 1985.

http://today.reuters.com/news/NewsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-02-07T015641Z_01_N06164879_RTRUKOC_0_US-CUBA-USA-BILLBOARD.xml