Castro's 40 Percent Censorship Premium

BY: CAPITOL HILL CUBANS



January 29, 2011

In 2009, the Obama Administration -- pursuant to its authority under the 1992 Cuban Democracy Act -- expanded the ability of U.S. telecom companies to provide services to Cuba.

Of course, in order to do so, U.S. telecom companies would have to enter into business arrangements with the Castro regime's telecom monopoly (ETECSA) and, thus, be subject to colluding in the censorship of the Cuban people.

Two years before --in 2007 -- the Castro regime and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez announced the construction of a fiber optic cable that would connect Cuba and Venezuela.

The purpose of this cable is to secure communication networks between both of those regimes and to more efficiently censor the Cuban and Venezuelan people.

Some telecom specialists have also suggested that this cable is meant to give the Chinese (who have partially funded the cable) greater capacity for the use of the old Soviet electronic espionage base in Lourdes, located just miles from Havana.

And that's essentially what autocrats do -- they help each other spy, censor and repress.

Yet, Reuters would have you believe that this fiber optic cable was a result of the U.S. somehow being "outfoxed" (that was their headline) by Castro-Chavez. (The article falsely claims that this cable undermines U.S. sanctions -- obviously they haven't read the Cuban Democracy Act).

And this week, Bloomberg absurdly reported that the Castro-Chavez cable was a "lost opportunity" for U.S. telecom companies (to censor Cubans) due to a pricing dispute in 2010 and to President Obama's 2009 telecom initiative not going far enough.

Note to Bloomberg -- the Chavez-Castro cable was announced four years ago -- in 2007.

Do these reporters do any research whatsoever? Or do they just print whatever spin is given to them by so-called Cuba "experts"?

However, it's also worth noting what the Cuba "experts" in the Bloomberg article are specifically upset about.

They're upset that the FCC has yet to authorize a 40 percent maximum rate hike (from 60 cents per minute to 84 cents per minute) for a Miami-based telecom provider, TeleCuba, to offer roaming services, in conjunction with the Castro regime.

In other words, they want to extend the Castro regime a 40 percent premium for the "privilege" of allowing U.S. companies to help censor the Cuban people, in conjunction with Castro's telecom monopoly, of course.

That's definitely not a price worth paying.