Washington Times Combined dispatches and staff reports.

    CUBA     Official criticizes European countries     HAVANA — Cuba lashed out at the European Union yesterday, accusing the 15-nation bloc of serving U.S. interests through recent criticisms of the Fidel Castro government.     Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque accused Spain's government of funding dissident groups that Havana claims are being organized by the United States.     Later, the government urged Havana residents to join a protest planned for today outside the embassies of Spain and Italy.          VENEZUELA     U.S. revokes visa of anti-Chavez general     CARACAS — The United States has revoked the U.S. entry visa of a former Venezuelan army general who was dismissed for taking part in a coup last year against Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the U.S. Embassy in Caracas said yesterday.     Gen. Enrique Medina Gomez, a former military attache at Venezuela's embassy in Washington, was also a ringleader of a nonviolent disobedience campaign in Caracas last October by more than 100 anti-Chavez military officers.

The Miami Herald Posted on Fri, Jun. 13, 2003 From Herald Staff and Wire Reports

LEADING THE CROWD: Fidel Castro and supporters march Thursday past the Spanish embassy in Havana. JOSE GOITIA/AP

After comparing the leaders of Spain and Italy to Hitler and Mussolini, Cuban President Fidel Castro led a massive march Thursday in Havana against European Union criticisms of his government's crackdown on dissidents.

While an announcer chanted ''Down with Fascism,'' Castro marched past the Spanish Embassy as supporters carried signs referring to Prime Minister José María Aznar as the ''little Führer,'' a nickname Castro gave him in a televised speech late Wednesday.

Across town, Castro's brother and designated successor, Armed Forces chief Gen. Raúl Castro, led protesters past the Italian Embassy, where placards referred to Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi as ''Benito Berlusconi'' -- a reference to former fascist leader Benito Mussolini.

Castro's outburst of bitter invective showed his willingness to alienate the 15-member bloc that is Cuba's most important source of trade and tourism. Spain is Cuba's second largest trading partner after Venezuela, and the Spanish-owned Sol Melia chain controls 21 hotels around the island, Larry Luxner, a Washington-based journalist who publishes the monthly newsletter CubaNews, told The Herald.

Italian investors own half of the country's telephone company, and Spanish and Italian tourists are two of the most important sources of hard-currency revenues for the island, Luxner added.

''I don't know if the tourists themselves care, but the countries he's attacking might,'' he said. ``It might put some obstacles in the way of investment.''

Castro referred to Berlusconi in his televised address Wednesday as ''a fascist clown,'' the French Agence France-Presse news agency reported from Havana.

Castro also warned that if European ambassadors in Havana carry out an EU decision to invite more dissidents to receptions, Cuban officials will not attend, and his government will respond by isolating the diplomats. ''If they limit their activities to meeting with the dissidents, they are not needed here . . . Let no one say that I have not spoken clearly here,'' the AFP quoted Castro as saying.

Castro lost patience with his allies after the EU issued a statement last week that it was ``deeply concerned about the continuing flagrant violation of human rights and of fundamental freedoms of members of the Cuban opposition and of independent journalists.''

Earlier this year, the Cuban government jailed 75 dissidents, journalists and artists, all of whom Amnesty International later named prisoners of conscience. European officials also unanimously agreed to reduce visits to Cuba by high-level EU officials and to invite dissidents to holiday celebrations at their embassies in Havana as a sign of support.

Castro called the statement a ''stupidity'' that must have been written in an ''act of drunkenness'' and accused the Spanish and Italian leaders of being behind the statement.

In Rome, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini on Thursday called Castro's words ''threatening.'' He said that he had summoned Cuba's ambassador, Angeles Flores Prida, ''to express the indignant protest of the Italian government over this behavior,'' The Associated Press reported. The march was ''a sad example of what a dictatorship is,'' Frattini was quoted as saying. ``In Cuba, demonstrations only take when they are called by the government.''

Herald staff writer Marika Lynch contributed to this report.

By Kristen Gerencher, <a href=cbs.marketwatch.com>CBS.MarketWatch.com Last Update: 12:01 AM ET June 13, 2003

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) - Americans looking for foreign getaways where their money goes far are hard-pressed this year-- even Russia and India's currency has gained on the greenback.

Few nations think enough of the relative state of the U.S. economy to pay more for the dollar than they did a year ago. Count out all the major tourist destinations in Europe, as well as Japan.

"Even the Turkish lira, which had been a substantially weak currency last year, actually appreciated against the U.S. dollar this year," said Tom O'Malley, head of currency portfolio management at Barclays Global Investors in San Francisco.

"Your dollar still will get you a lot in that country, but it won't get you as much as it did," he said, noting that at the end of last June, $1 USD would have bought about 1.6 million lira compared with today's slightly more than 1.4 million.

The same is true for India, where you'll get 46.5 rupees to the dollar, said Chuck Butler, president of Everbank World Markets in St. Louis, Mo. "A year ago it was at 49. Even countries that don't have economies worth a shake of salt are gaining against the dollar."

So where can you go to get a better exchange rate than last year? Mostly they're places that appeal to adventure and environmental tourists.

Nations trading lower against the dollar in the last 12 months include Nigeria, Colombia, Egypt, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Uruguay, Zimbabwe and Jamaica, Butler said.

"If you want to go to Zimbabwe, their dollar is down 93 percent against the U.S. dollar, but I don't know that they have huge caravans of people going over there," he said.

Americans can get 58 Jamaican dollars to one U.S. dollar this year compared with 47 a year ago -- a 17 percent discount, Butler said.

Mexico as exchange-rate star

While the U.S. dollar has slid against many foreign currencies in the last year, travelers itching to go abroad without paying a premium still have a few corners of the globe they can explore - and one is close to home.

Americans will find the biggest bang for their U.S. buck in the opposite direction of Canada, last year's premiere currency destination.

While the U.S. dollar has taken a plunge against that of its northern neighbor, the Mexican peso has slipped, offering Americans more than 8 percent off last year's exchange rate, O'Malley said.

"If last year was the time to go north of the border, if there's any place left where the dollar is still as strong as it had been, it's south of the border in Mexico," he said.

"Right now you get about 10.5 pesos to the dollar, which is near the all-time exchange rate high, which was about 11.25 in March of this year," he said. Last year Mexico offered 9.5 pesos to the dollar.

Canada, on the other hand, is now offering Americans 1.35 to the U.S. dollar compared with 1.5 to 1.62 last summer, O'Malley said. "Things will be at least 10 to 20 percent higher in Canada this year compared with last year."

Europe gets pricey

Travelers watching their pocketbooks may have to kiss dreams of visiting Paris and Rome goodbye this summer. The euro, the shared currency of 13 European nations, is up 24 percent since last year, and Scandinavian nations such as Sweden and Denmark are up 25 percent, Butler said.

Even the South Pacific has marked up its exchange rate, to the tune of 17 percent for New Zealand and 16 percent for the Australian dollar, he said. "There's a roll call here and it's pretty devastating."

O'Malley agreed. "Europe has gotten much more expensive due to the appreciation of the euro against the dollar. For much of the second half of last year, the euro and the dollar were at about parity."

It now takes $1.17 to buy one euro, he said. Meanwhile, South America's rise against the dollar has been less remarkable.

"From December to June of this year, the Brazilian real has appreciated 17 to 20 percent," O'Malley said. "This time last year it was at about the same rate as it is now -- about 2.9 real to the dollar."

"South America has always been a fairly inexpensive place as far as what the dollar will get you. That's still true today. The dollar just won't go as far as it did, say, six months ago." Kristen Gerencher is a reporter for CBS.MarketWatch.com in San Francisco.

Friday June 13, 2003 3:29 AM By CHRISTOPHER TOOTHAKER Associated Press Writer

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - A court ordered the government on Thursday to restore thousands of oil workers' protection against being fired - a decision that could force the rehiring or employees dismissed for staging a strike aimed at toppling the president.

Labor Minister Maria Iglesias rejected the ruling and said the government would not rehire some 18,000 employees it has fired at the state-run oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela S.A., or PDVSA.

There is no turning back in regard to these firings,'' Iglesias told the state-run television channel. A firing freeze for those (workers) has no value.''

The labor law in question had protected workers from being fired during the period when they were forming their union.

Last year the labor ministry stripped management level workers belonging to the Unapetrol labor union of that right, but the court temporarily reversed that measure as well to study its legality.

Unapetrol leaders, who claim to represent all of the 18,000 workers who were fired, said they would use the ruling to get their jobs back.

``This is excellent news, which tells us that we have (the right to) a firing freeze and that our dismissal was unjustified,'' said Horacio Medina, president of Unapetrol.

President Hugo Chavez said the workers were fired out of the need to cut a bloated bureaucracy and rid the industry of ``coup-plotting'' employees who were only interested in removing him from office by unconstitutional means.

In December 2002, executives at PDVSA staged a strike that caused severe fuel shortages and temporarily paralyzed Venezuela's oil industry - the world's fifth largest oil exporter - before it ended in early February.

Venezuela's largest labor union and business chamber joined the strike, accusing Chavez of riding roughshod over the nation's democratic institutions, scaring off foreign investment with left-leaning economic policies and dividing the South American country along class lines.

Chavez, a former paratrooper who is facing the worst crisis of his four-year rule, denied the allegations and accused his opponents of trying to grab power by any means possible. He said strikers should be punished for the hardships they caused among the population.

During the months since the strike, the government has succeeded in bringing oil production back to normal levels.

Venezuela's opposition is pushing for Chavez's ouster through a referendum, which the Constitution allows halfway through a president's term - in Chavez's case, August.

In a related development, ruling party lawmakers boycotted a parliamentary session Thursday to avoid what they said was planned opposition violence.

The boycott has virtually paralyzed the National Assembly at a time when it must ahead with organizing a referendum on whether Chavez should step down later this year.

Humberto Márquez* The spectre of international military intervention has cropped up again in Latin America, in the context of the debate between the region's leaders on alternative proposals for helping Colombia put an end to an armed conflict that has raged for over four decades.

CARACAS, Jun 12 (<a href=ipsnews.net>IPS) - The spectre of international military intervention has cropped up again in Latin America, in the context of the debate between the region's leaders on alternative proposals for helping Colombia put an end to an armed conflict that has raged for over four decades. Colombian President Alvaro Uribe himself has raised the possibility of a multinational intervention in his country, as a last resort. The Rio Group, made up of 18 Latin American nations and a rotating representative of the Caribbean Community, opened the door to possible collective action in Colombia during its May 24 meeting in the city of Cusco in southeastern Peru, on the suggestion of Ecuadorian President Lucio Gutiérrez. On that occasion, the Rio Group -- Latin America's highest- level forum for political consultation and coordination -- agreed by consensus to ask United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan to urge Colombia's guerrillas to declare a ceasefire, in order to restart peace talks. The Rio Group initiative, known as the Cusco Consensus, earned the backing of the Organisation of American States (OAS) general assembly on Jun. 10, which brought together all of the countries of the Americas with the exception of Cuba. But the leaders meeting in Cusco also stated that if Annan's efforts failed, ''the Rio Group, along with the U.N. secretary- general, and in coordination with the Colombian government, will seek alternative solutions.'' ''What are we talking about here? A military intervention in Colombia?'' Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez asked at the time, according to his own account. ''I was told yes, and I told them 'Don't even bother inviting Venezuela to take part in something so horrifying'. If we are going to unite, it is to wage peace, not war,'' he added. According to the Peruvian weekly Caretas, Chilean President Ricardo Lagos commented to Chávez, when everyone was getting up to go to a dinner in Lima: ''The only Latin American who organised a multilateral for.MDBO/ce .MDNM/was [independence hero Símon] Bolívar,'' whose ideas and values are frequently cited by Chávez. Lagos, a moderate socialist, said that if Latin America is incapable of resolving its regional problems -- such as the Colombian conflict -- on its own, it runs the risk of U.S. intervention. But, he added, that did not mean that a regional military force should be set up, reported Caretas. Chávez signed the Cusco Consensus, but did so reluctantly, he said on his weekly Aló Presidente radio programme, because ''never before on this continent has a proposal been advanced like the one set forth by the Ecuadorian president.'' Venezuela's populist left-leaning president said that ''inconceivable international military interventionism, which is sheer madness, is being spoken of very lightly, in a dangerous manner.'' Venezuelan Foreign Minister Roy Chaderton told IPS that ''if it is formally or informally brought up again, our position will be the same -- rejection of any military intervention in another country.'' ''As a sister nation and as a neighbour, we do not believe that is the solution. We want to be actors in peace processes, not wars,'' said the minister. Gutiérrez did not respond to Chávez's criticism, and Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Nina Pacari said Quito ''does not believe in any kind of interventionism,'' and that ''there will be no intervention by any country in the Colombian conflict.'' But the right-wing Uribe said that if the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the main rebel group, ''does not accept Ecuador's initiative, there could be another way forward, in which all of the countries could help the Colombian government defeat terrorism, militarily and with authority. ''We need support from the international community, because terrorism in Colombia is mainly financed by the international drug trafficking trade, and threatens to destabilise the entire region,'' he argued. However, when they reported the results of the meeting in Cusco, presidents Alejandro Toledo of Peru and Luiz Inácio ''Lula'' da Silva of Brazil insisted that the request for mediation by Annan ''does not imply intervention by foreign military forces'' in Colombia. Sources at Brazil's Foreign Ministry said the Lula administration, which took office on Jan. 1, continues to follow the country's traditional policy of non-intervention in the internal affairs of other countries, such as the Colombian conflict. They also said that Brazil will only support Annan's efforts, if they are requested and accepted by the Colombian government, and will neither propose nor support any other international plan of action. Plan Colombia, which was launched by Bogota and Washington to increase U.S. military aid to Colombia for combatting the drug trade, was expanded last year to the counterinsurgency struggle. Nearly 400 U.S. military advisers are already working in Colombia, the U.S. Defence Department told Congress. The increasing U.S. military aid, the growing number of advisers, and Washington's decision to include the leftist FARC on its list of international terrorist organisations has fed fears of a direct U.S. military intervention in Colombia. Uribe ''has realised that foreign military involvement is heavily criticised both within and outside of his country, and for that reason he is going back to the avenue of U.N. participation, which could perhaps lead to a peace-keeping operation, as occurred in the past decade in Central America,'' Venezuelan expert in international affairs Carlos Romero said in an interview. He pointed out that the Argentine government of Carlos Menem (1989-1999) had discussed the possibility of taking part in a multilateral force for peace-keeping missions within the framework of the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, of which the United States is a signatory. ''What worries neighbouring countries, and Brazil in particular, is that the relationship between the United States and Colombia in the fight against terrorism could turn into direct U.S. participation in the conflict,'' said Romero, a professor of international studies at Venezuela's Central University. Carlos Pérez Llana, a professor of international relations at the University of San Andrés in Argentina, told IPS that ''the aim is to 'multilateralise' a national conflict.'' ''The guerrilla movements in Colombia existed prior to the phenomenon of narcotrafficking,'' said Pérez Llana, who described Uribe as ''a young man who oversimplifies things.'' Referring to the new regional proposals, Romero underlined ''Brazil's concern for stability and governance in the region, as requisites for economic development, and in particular stability in the Andean area and Colombia. ''Making projections based on the current variables, it is very unlikely that a multilateral force would be set up to intervene in the region,'' he predicted. Pérez Llana, meanwhile, said the possibility that the United States would commit troops to the conflict in Colombia ''is very remote...especially given the country's geographic characteristics. ''In recent years, Washington has deployed its forces in wide- open spaces, not jungles,'' he noted. But Víctor Poleo, an economy professor at Venezuela's Central University who specialises in the petroleum industry, said ''the United States aims to control the Andean region for its wealth in hydrocarbons, and, pointing farther to the future, for its water resources and biodiversity. ''In that sense, Colombia is playing the role of a wedge in the region, like Israel in the Middle East.''

• Viviana Alonso in Argentina, Gustavo González in Chile, Kintto Lucas in Ecuador, and Mario Osava in Brazil contributed to this report. (END)