US not stoking crisis in Cuba: Rice

US not stoking crisis in Cuba: Rice
by Stephen Collinson Sun Aug 6, 5:14 PM ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States pledged not to stoke political
crisis in Cuba as
Fidel Castro ails, but warned that the communist icon who has defied
Washington for decades must not be replaced by a new dictator.
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Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice urged Cubans to stay on the island amid the political
tumult but promised Washington would stand by them in a time of
political transition.

"We are not going to do anything to stoke a sense of crisis or a sense
of instability in Cuba," Rice said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"This is a transition period for the Cuban people, we are going to stand
with them for the proposition that there should not simply be the end of
one dictatorship and the imposition of another dictatorship," Rice said.

Rice spoke almost a week after Fidel Castro provisionally handed over
his presidential powers to his brother, defense minister Raul Castro, as
he reportedly recovered from surgery to stem intestinal bleeding.

She also renewed her appeal for Cubans to work for democratic change on
the island, rather than leaving en masse for the United States as
political uncertainty lingers.

"The United States really feels very strongly that their future is at
home and mass exodus is not to be expected nor would it be condoned,"
Rice said.

On Friday, Rice, on a message to Cubans on US-funded Radio and TV Marti,
urged the world to press for multi-party elections amid uncertainty over
Castro's fate.

"We will stand with you to secure your rights -- to speak as you choose,
to think as you please, to worship as you wish, and to choose your
leaders, freely and fairly, in democratic elections," Rice said.

Rice also repeated previous dismissals of the idea that the United
States would invade Cuba as "simply far fetched" and "not true" and also
said she was unsure how ill Castro actually was.

On Thursday,
President George W. Bush urged Cubans to work for democratic change and
pledged US support following the temporary handover of power.

Speculation in Washington's over the political turmoil in Cuba has been
fanned by the fact that Raul Castro has not so far appeared in public
since he was handed the reigns.

But National Assembly speaker Ricardo Alarcon told AFP on Saturday that
there was no power void in Havana.

"Who thinks that a person who is ill should appear before the media? ...
And the person who takes over for him temporarily, why should he have to
appear in the media?" Alarcon said.

Raul Castro "is not some kind of movie star. ... It is his job
constitutionally to take over for Fidel in the event of temporary
absence, and that is what he is doing," Alarcon said.

The Brazilian daily Folha de Sao Paulo reported Saturday that Cuban
sources told Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva that Fidel
Castro had cancer and that his condition was more serious than Cuba was
admitting.

Alarcon insisted Castro, due to turn 80 next week was "recuperating
favorably" from intestinal surgery, and physically and in terms of his
spirits, "He's better than I am," said Alarcon, 69.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a key Castro ally, offered assurances
Sunday that his Cuban counterpart was on his way to a full recovery.

Successive US governments have sought unsuccessfully to oust Castro
since he since he came to power in 1959, including an ill-fated invasion
backed by the
CIA in 1961.

However, Cuba's Roman Catholic Cardinal Jaime Ortega said after Sunday
mass: "Never would the church in Cuba support, nor even minimally
accept, any foreign invasion."

Officials placed Cuba under heightened alert with reservists called to
military duty and neighborhood watch groups prepared to defend the
country of more than 11 million.

Nicaraguan rebel Daniel Ortega also arrived in Cuba as a show of solidarity.

"I could not pass up this moment as president commander-in-chief Fidel
Castro recovers from his surgery," Ortega told the official Juventud
Rebelde newspaper on arrival Saturday.

Ortega, 60, led the Sandinista rebels in toppling the Somoza
dictatorship in 1985 and was president until 1990, with Cuba's help.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060806/ts_alt_afp/cubacastrousrice_060806210944