MEDIA REACTION CUBA/ZIM/U. S. RELATIONS; HARARE

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SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION CUBA/ZIM/U. S. RELATIONS; HARARE


1. Under headline "Cuba, Zimbabwe lead the way" the
government-controlled weekly "The Sunday News"
dedicated its September 7 editorial to demonizing
the West, especially the United States and Britain,
for allegedly maltreating Cuba and Zimbabwe.
Excerpts follow:


2. "Newspaper pictures and television footage of
President Mugabe chatting with President Fidel Castro of
Cuba in Havana this week are some of the most potent images
of the anti-imperialist movement that the world has seen in
recent times. . .Today, the two nations have everything in
common because the United States has imposed sanctions on
Cuba while Britain has imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe. .
.There is now every indication that the U. S. and its
cronies have sought to isolate and demonize Cuba, not
because President Castro has no respect for human rights
alleged by warmongers in Washington DC, but because Cuba
has prospered socio-economically even under U. S. attack. .
.The Americans are baffled how a Third World country like
Cuba can brush off sanctions and actually develop
outstanding education and health delivery services.
Whether the world cares to believe it or not, the fact
remains that literacy and infant mortality rates are better
in this socialist nation than they are in the capitalist U.

S. . .Zimbabwe's Third Chimurenga (land reform program) has
captured the imagination of the world, not because this
country is the center of the universe, but because our land
reform program is the most intriguing example of an African
people confronting the hegemony of imperial powers in the
brave pursuit of social justice. Cuba, Zimbabwe and indeed
the rest of the Third World must continue to fight for
social justice in a world dominated by Western imperial
overloads who use globalization as an instrument of plunder
and oppression. . .And to think that Western countries are
always telling us that globalization has been a roaring
success and provides the only hope for civilization. This
propaganda is as treacherous as President George W. Bush's
outrageous claim that Iraq President Saddam Hussein
possessed weapons of mass destruction. . . ."

SULLIVAN