Cuba assails U.S. human rights record

The Miami Herald March 25, 1999 Cuba assails U.S. human rights record

             GENEVA -- (AP) -- The United States should clean up its own human rights
             record before pressing other countries to do the same, a top Cuban official said
             Wednesday during a U.N. meeting.

             The comments by Vice President Carlos Lage to the U.N. Human Rights
             Commission came as Cuba faces renewed criticism for a crackdown on
             dissidents.

             At last year's meeting, the 53-nation commission voted down a U.S.-backed
             measure to condemn Cuba and keep the country under special scrutiny. It was the
             first time since 1991 that such a motion had failed to pass.

             Lage said U.S. human rights failures include police brutality against blacks,
             Hispanics and immigrants. He also accused the United States of enforcing the
             death penalty ``quite easily'' but ``hardly ever against a purely Aryan blood white
             national.''

U.S. official Neal Walsh shrugged off Lage's accusations as ``vintage Cold War
rhetoric.''

             ``I think that the fact that thousands of Cubans continue to risk their lives to flee
             the current state of civil, economic, social and cultural rights underscores the
             unreality of the vice president's statement,'' he said.