Radio Havana Cuba, NY Transfer News
March 12, 2001

Internet Café at Cuba's Capitolio Photo by Walter Lippmann (December 2000)

Although during the last few years the Cuban government has been making great efforts to improve telecommunications, the resources available for expansion of activities like international phone calls, Internet access, and e-mail are not as abundant as the demand requires.

The economic constraints of recent years have not prevented Cuba, however, from providing growing access to the Internet. Today the country's e-mail communications program meets 42 percent of the total demand, compared with 17 percent only a few years ago.

Cuba's Deputy Minister for Telecommunications and Electronics, Melchor Gil, explained recently that given current limitations, the more people connected to the Internet, the more difficult it is to achieve effective and quick communication.

The Cuban official noted that there are currently ten computers for every 1,000 inhabitants on the island, and that while there are 60,000 e-mail accounts currently, only a tiny proportion of these include full access to the Internet.

The problem could be greatly alleviated with a fiberoptic cable between Cuba and the U.S., something that Washington refuses to consider. Such a solution would tremendously increase Internet and e-mail traffic to and from Cuba. As it is now, Cuba has to resort to satellite phone channels for all its Internet and e-mail activity, which is very expensive.

Cuba is well aware that the Internet can and should be used to present facts about the island's reality, so that people in the world can have access to first-hand, undistorted information regarding life here. At the same time, Cuba has no fear of the slanders and lies that are frequently told about its reality in some of the world media, including via the Internet. In fact, this is nothing new: More than ten US-based radio stations have for years been broadcasting anti-Cuban news and propaganda, at the staggering rate of more than 2,400 hours a week.

Indeed, it isn't Cuba, but the enemies of the Cuban people, who should be worried. The World Wide Web has become a powerful instrument for Cuba, too. And there are also many friends of Cuba all over the world who use the Internet to spread the truth about Cuban reality, the Cuban people and their Revolution.