US Interests Section turns off the obnoxious LED ticker in Havana

[flamingdem]

It's hard to envision the surreality of this giant LED sign that
dominates the view from various central points in Havana. They
would run Martin Luther King quotes and sports scores! Some of
Cuba's hottest orchestras would perform in front of it, ignoring
it completely.



http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/74c651ba-7a04-11de-b86f-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1


Financial Times

Blank ticker sends signal to Cubans
By Marc Frank in Havana
Published: July 27 2009 01:01 | Last updated: July 27 2009 01:01

The US has turned off a Times Square-style news ticker – a source of
irritation for the Castro government – at its diplomatic mission in Havana
that since 2006 streamed propaganda and news into the night, western
diplomatic sources said.

The measure is the latest in a series of initiatives by the Obama
administration as it seeks to engage Cuba and to end 50 years of enmity
viewed in Latin America and the Caribbean as a relic of the cold war.

“It is a beginning – and it is encouraging. It has to do with the
atmosphere. It suggests that we are moving toward a more normal diplomatic
relationship,” said Wayne Smith, who opened the US mission’s Interests
Section under President Jimmy Carter.

The crimson ticker – five feet high and running through 25 windows of the
Swiss embassy building that hosts the US mission on Havana’s sea-side
drive – began to stream messages on January 16 three and a half years ago,
to mark Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday at the height of tension with the
Bush administration.

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up,” was the ticker’s
first message.

Then president Fidel Castro dug up the mission’s parking lot a few feet from
the front door in response, to replace it with 138 flag polls reaching 100ft
in the air to conceal the ticker. Mr Castro also marched a million people by
in protest and erected billboards around the building depicting the Bush
administration as linked to anti-Castro terrorists. All contact between
Havana-based US diplomats and the Cuban Foreign Ministry was declared at an
end until the ticker ticked no more.

It is believed the ticker was turned off late last month.

“That they turned off the ticker is important – and that nobody has noticed
is significant, too,” a western diplomat said.

“The Cubans could have howled victory – but said nothing, indicating
they are serious about improving relations.”

The diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said some local contact
may have resumed already. Easing of travel restrictions for US and Cuban
diplomats in each other’s capitals was expected soon. US diplomats stationed
in Havana and Cubans in Washington are currently restricted to a 25-mile
radius from the Interests Sections.

It appears the standoff about the US mission – an attraction for tourists
and a symbol of relations with the Bush administration – is winding down.
The Cuban government took the billboards down soon after Barack Obama took
office. There have been no marches past the building since Raul Castro took
over from his ailing brother Fidel in February last year.

The US broke off relations with Cuba in 1961 and declared a trade embargo in
1962. Interests Sections were established in Washington and Havana in 1977.
The US is the only country in the western hemisphere that does not have
normal relations with Cuba.

The Obama administration has lifted restrictions on Cuban American travel to
the Communist-run Caribbean island and the sending of remittances.
Immigration talks, called off by the Bush administration, resumed this
month. Cuba has expressed interest in broadening discussions to include drug
trafficking, human smuggling and disaster preparedness.

“We’re . . . seeing if, as we change some of the old approaches . . . we
movement on the Cuban government side,’’ Mr Obama told reporters.

Mr Smith was in Havana last week to lead a delegation on disaster
co-operation, particularly after hurricanes. Among its members were Retired
Lieutenant General Russel Honore, former commander of the Joint Task Force
Katrina, and Stewart Simonson, former assistant secretary for emergency
preparedness of the Department of Health and Human Services from 2004 to
2006.

General Honore, who advocates normal relations, said the delegation was
well-received: “Everyone should stop looking in the rear view mirror. A
failed state so near to home is not in our interest.”

He said turning off the ticker was a good thing and it would be better if
the two countries looked forward by working on a host of security related
issues from immigration to drug trafficking and coping with the hurricanes
that regularly pass over Cuba on their way to the United States.

“Peace and prosperity are in the interest of both countries as we are
neighbours and there are now many Cubans in the United States,” he said.

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[magbana]

1. Hallelujah! I wonder if the series of billboards facing the US Interests

Section that portray Bush as being like Hitler are still there. maybe with it being a new administration they have taken them down. But, Obama, beware, the Cubans can kick butt with billboards.

[flamingdem]

4. Those have been down since Bush left but I think Senor Imperialista is still around nt

[Judi Lynn]

2. James Cason, the porky guy who put up that brain stroke in the first place

clearly was taking advantage of the generosity of the Swiss embassy which has allowed the U.S. space in their building when he started running his filthy anti-Cuba crap 24/7 around the entire top of the building in letters so bright they could be seen from a distance, before Cuba checkmated _Bush's bright idea with the flag display.



His next assignment was making people sick in Paraguay.
To learn the current President has chosen to put that crappy sign aside is to hope it's a signal we might expect to see more mature, civilized behavior in the next 3 1/2 years regarding the citizens of Cuba who choose to REMAIN in their homeland.

[flamingdem]

3. You know who is fairly okay though - VIcky Huddleston ex Int Section Chief

who went in as a Republican and came out talking reform with Cuba and ending the embargo. She fell in love with the country as many do (flamingdem included) and her credibility helps Cuba for the most part.

[Judi Lynn]

5. She named her Afghan "Havana." n/t

[flamingdem]

6. That's cute, she is a major Cubaphile nt