Cuba abuzz over news of US travelers program

Associated Press

HAVANA

News that the U.S. government quietly contracted young Latin Americans to travel to Cuba for political purposes under the guise of health and civic programs was the talk of the town in Havana and the Cuban diaspora Monday, eliciting both criticism and praise for the secret program.

In Cuba, some who heard about it from state TV called it objectionable, if not necessarily surprising.

“I don’t know what to tell you. It’s one of so many imperialist aggressions, so many years that they have been trying to bring down the revolution,” said Elio Morales, a 19-year-old refinery worker. “They’ve been trying all kinds of things for 50 years to bring down the revolution, and it hasn’t fallen.”

Other Cubans backed efforts by the U.S. Agency for International Development and its contractors to support civil society on the island.

“Good for USAID!” dissident writer and photographer Orlando Luis Pardo said via Twitter. “The world must foster the rights of the Cuban people, abolished by the Castro regime and their allies.”

An Associated Press investigation published Monday revealed that under the Obama administration program, nearly a dozen travelers were sent undercover to Cuba to try to identify and ultimately groom a new generation of political activists.

According to one document obtained by the AP, a goal was to put “pressure” on the government. In one case, a group of visitors organized an HIV-prevention workshop described as a ruse to conceal the political nature of their work, potentially undermining USAID’s credibility in critical health work around the world.

The head of an international nongovernmental organization in Cuba expressed concern that the revelations could jeopardize the work of groups that have spent years building trust with the government and local partners.

“It doesn’t bode very well for programs that are funded from external sources, because I think there’s going to be a higher level of scrutiny: Who’s the donor? Where are the funds coming from? What does the program propose to do?” the official said.