U.S. seeks to break technological censorship in Cuba (El Nuevo Herald, June 23, 2012)

http://www.walterlippmann.com/us-state-dept-cuba-funding-2012.pdf
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EL NUEVO HERALD
Posted on Saturday June 23, 2012

U.S. seeks to break technological censorship in Cuba
Juan O. Tamayo
jtamayo@elnuevoherald.com

Google translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann.

The Department of State United States is increasing funding to the technological part of their program of $ 20 million to promote democracy in Cuba in the hope of expanding the flow of information free of censorship, despite the strong objections of the Cuban government.

"In spirit and in money, there is a spike" in technology spending to increase the flow of information, said Mark Lopes, assistant deputy administrator Latin America and the Caribbean Agency for International Development (USAID).

"From sports scores to the international headlines, the Cuban people should be able to satisfy their thirst for uncensored information, like any other citizen of the Americas. This is essential, and we are committed to helping whatever they can, "said Lopes.

Havana has banned the program as "subversive" and has sentenced Alan Gross, USAID subcontractor, to 15 years in prison for delivering satellite phones unregistered Jews from the island.

But Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has launched a campaign to support Internet freedom globally to accelerate "the political, social and economic" and defeat the dictatorship's efforts to control information.

The administration of President Barack Obama "will help people in an oppressive environment for the Internet to evade the filters, to be one step beyond the censors, hackers, and the thugs who beat them or imprison so say online, "said Clinton this year.

The increased funding of technology for Cuba was reflected in a letter from the State Department to Congress detailing how it plans to spend $20 billion approved for programs for democracy in Cuba during the fiscal year ending September 30. A copy of the letter, dated April 26, was obtained by El Nuevo Herald.

The letter shows that the money will be administered by three entities in the State Department's Office of Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) of the USAID Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL) and Hemisphere Affairs West (WHA).

The largest single block of money is the $4 million LAC spent on a program of "digital democracy" to stimulate the use of "innovative technology to increase the flow of information free of censorship to the island, from and within it" said the letter.

The communication did not elaborate on the program, and refused to disclose Lopes. Those details are usually not made public to protect programs from Cuba's efforts to stop them. For example, security officers in Havana blocked phones of dozens of dissidents during the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the island in March.

To avoid another incident like that of Alan Gross, the program will prevent sophisticated equipment like satellite phones and instead use only items available on the island, such as computers, DVDs, USB drives and mobile phones, said an employee of Congress aware of the case .

Six of the nine programs included in Cuba's letter also mentioned technology. Lopes said it was difficult to quantify the increase year over year in funding for technology because the programs are extended to several years.

WHA received a $1.53 million for a program to increase Cubans' access to uncensored information through "remote training on basic skills in information technology," said the letter. "In addition, funds will support the purchase of items of basic information technology, and give material support to human rights activists, independent journalists and independent libraries on the island."

The DRL has $1.05 million to provide training, equipment and software activists that collect information on abuses of human rights, according to the letter, and $ 750,000 for "training based on technology" on the use of social media to address issues such as human rights, impunity and corruption.

The DRL also given $700,000 for each of the two programs: one for young people includes "innovative uses of technology as social media," and another to educate Cubans in market economies and its effects on democracy, added letter.

Another $500,000 will be administered by LAC to support "research technology options to expand communications" between the Cuban and Internet connectivity as part of a program entitled "The Application of Technology in Promoting Democracy."

LAC also has $2.9 million to spend on food, medicine without a prescription and other forms of humanitarian support for political prisoners, their families and other "politically marginalized people." Cuba's government denies the jobs normally dissidents and their families, and accuses them of being "mercenaries" to accept help from Washington.

The DRL has already committed $4 million from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a Washington nonprofit that promotes democracy worldwide, the letter said. Requests for applications for funds from other programs will be announced soon.

The State Department said it will also spend $2.87 million of the $20 million to administer the programs for Cuba, which tend to generate a high volume of paperwork, compared with other U.S. aid programs overseas.

Another issue not detailed by Lopes or the letter is how can the U.S. programs increase the use of technology in Cuba, which has the lowest rate of Internet access in Latin America, and a tough national security system that is control all communications.

Gross, 63, was arrested in late 2009 after delivering three satellite phones to Cuban Jews, so they could have direct access to the Internet, bypassing government controls. Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee Senate blocked the funds to Cuba last year for months, arguing that democracy programs were ineffective and only served to provoke Havana.

The Cuba's telecommunications monopoly does not allow "smartphones" recorded on the island to access the internet, and is not entirely clear whether it is legal to have unregistered electronic equipment such as Wi-Fi transmitters and IPods.

A democracy activist in Washington who works on programs to Cuba, said that the "Holy Grail" of pro-democracy programs is a "stupid" cell phone that can be adapted to receive and send large files, such as mobile "smart ".

"One hears that some Israeli company has done it did, that some hacker California 16 years has it, that a genius in India did," said the activist. "But when we to and look, it is never what we really need in Cuba."