The Miami Herald
April 21, 2000

 Czech officials accused of aiding dissidents in Cuba

 HAVANA -- (AP) -- Cuban officials have accused Czech diplomats of taking
 money from anti-Castro groups and the United States to aid dissidents in Cuba --
 and they sneered at Czech President Vaclav Havel as a ``fabricated dissident''
 before the fall of communism in his country.

 The attack Wednesday night came in response to a resolution criticizing Cuba's
 human rights record that was approved the previous day by the U.N. Human
 Rights Commission in Geneva. The resolution was sponsored by the Czech
 Republic and Poland, with support of the United States.

 On Tuesday a government-organized protest march past the Czech Embassy in
 Havana brought out 200,000 people, according to Cuban news media.

 In Prague, a Czech Foreign Ministry spokesman called the Cuban allegations
 ``total nonsense.''

 ``We firmly dismiss the Cuban allegations,'' Czech Foreign Ministry spokesman
 Ales Pospisil said. ``Neither the Czech chargé d'affaires nor his deputy are doing
 any subversive action.

 ``The Cuban allegations are an obvious reaction to the Czech-sponsored U.N.
 resolution, which, however, was an offer for a dialogue from our side. It wasn't an
 act of hostility.''

 With President Fidel Castro in the audience Wednesday night, Cuban state
 television presented officials and reporters for official news media denouncing
 Czech officials as lackeys of the United States.

 It also portrayed close surveillance of Czech diplomats and dissidents on the
 Communist-ruled island.

 Manuel Hevia, identified as a legal expert, read summaries of security dossiers
 kept on Czech diplomats in Cuba since 1989, when the European country -- then
 Czechoslovakia -- overthrew its Communist government.

 Repeatedly citing names and dates, Hevia described meetings between Czech
 diplomats and Cuban dissidents, accusing the diplomats of passing cash,
 computers, propaganda and other supplies to ``anti-revolutionary ringleaders'' on
 behalf of anti-Castro activists in Florida.

 He claimed that some Czech diplomats were apparently paid by anti-Castro
 groups in Florida and said one made more than 20 visits to Miami.

 Some diplomats ``became paid mercenaries,'' Hevia said, describing it as ``a
 deliberate work of espionage.''