Senator - USAID's Cuba hip-hop project 'reckless'

Senator: USAID's Cuba hip-hop project 'reckless'
By DESMOND BUTLER, MICHAEL WEISSENSTEIN, LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ and ANDREA
RODRIGUEZ

HAVANA (AP) — A U.S. agency's secret infiltration of Cuba's underground
hip-hop scene to spark a youth movement against the government was
"reckless" and "stupid," Sen. Patrick Leahy said Thursday after The
Associated Press revealed the operation.

On at least six occasions, Cuban authorities detained or interrogated
people involved in the program; they also confiscated computer hardware
that in some cases contained information that jeopardized Cubans who
likely had no idea they were caught up in a clandestine U.S. operation.

"The conduct described suggests an alarming lack of concern for the
safety of the Cubans involved, and anyone who knows Cuba could predict
it would fail," said Leahy, a Vermont Democrat who is chairman of the
State Department and Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee.
"USAID never informed Congress about this and should never have been
associated with anything so incompetent and reckless. It's just plain
stupid."

The plan called for contractors to recruit dozens of Cuban musicians for
projects disguised as cultural initiatives but really aimed at stoking a
movement of fans to challenge the government. They filmed TV shows and
set up a social network to connect some 200 musicians and artists on the
island, who would be encouraged to start a social movement. Artists were
flown to Europe ostensibly for concerts and video workshops, but the
real aim was to groom them as activists.

The hip-hop operation was conceived by one of USAID's largest
contractors, Creative Associates International, using a team of Serbian
music promoters. The Washington-based contractor also led other efforts
aimed at undermining Cuba's communist government, including a secret
Cuban Twitter text messaging service and an operation that sent in young
inexperienced Latin American "tourists" to recruit a new generation of
activists.

The collection of USAID missions, which were all undertaken over the
same period and cost millions, failed.

"These actions have gone from boneheaded to a downright irresponsible
use of U.S. taxpayer money," Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, a longtime
critic of the USAID's programs in Cuba, said in a statement.

To keep their Cuban targets in the dark, Creative Associates contractors
used a front company in Panama with directors in Tortola in the British
Virgin Islands — and a lawyer in Liechtenstein to head it. Contractors
used codenames, encrypted email and cover stories to fool Cuban authorities.

A mountain of evidence is revealed in hundreds of pages of contractors'
documents obtained by the AP that detail the hip-hop project.
Nevertheless, in a statement, USAID said, "Any assertions that our work
is secret or covert are simply false."

Creative referred questions to USAID.

At a briefing Thursday, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said
Creative "provided USAID assurances that it had security protocols in
place" for "operating in a closed society and would strictly employ
those protocols for all professionals traveling to Cuba."

She said Cubans risk upsetting authorities by being involved in normal
community initiatives. But working for U.S.-funded groups is illegal in
Cuba and Cubans recruited for the hip-hop program were not told they
were partnering with American-backed contractors.

Aldo Rodriguez, the front man for Los Aldeanos hip-hop group, was
detained on at least two occasions, spending a night in jail. A Serbian
contractor was detained coming into Havana with equipment, including a
potentially incriminating memory stick that worried the contractors. He
cut his trip short just weeks before Alan Gross, a U.S. citizen working
on another secret USAID program, was arrested.

In 2011, a Cuban knowingly working for the U.S. program was detained in
Havana after a meeting with a Creative manager in Miami. Computer
equipment was seized with documents linking him to USAID.

In the end, the USAID program accomplished the opposite of what it
intended, compromising Cuba's vibrant hip-hop culture. When the program
started in 2009, it had already produced some of the hardest-hitting
grassroots criticism since Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.

In August 2010, Los Aldeanos took the stage at Rotilla, one of Cuba's
largest independent music festivals. Before a crowd of about 15,000
people, they lacerated government officials by name and taunted the police.

Within months, a USAID contractor told his handlers that the Cubans said
USAID had infiltrated the festival, and soon enough the Cubans took it
over. In the end, Los Aldeanos moved to South Florida after complaining
that the Cuban government made it impossible for them to work in their
own country.

Los Aldeanos former manager, Melisa Riviere, had suspicions about the
music promoters, and documents show that Creative considered recruiting
her, but thought she wouldn't play along. She says the manipulation
harmed rappers.

"I think they were exploited as a resource, they were used as a tool and
they've lost their authenticity," she says.

But in an interview Thursday in Tampa, where he lives, Aldo Rodriguez
said that neither he nor his partner, Bian Rodriguez, ever took money in
Cuba from anyone to sing and that he had no idea the Serbian who came to
invite him to the EXIT festival was working for USAID.

"I never sang anything because someone was telling me what to say," he
told the AP. "My songs, I compose. The most real thing in that country
were the rappers, and now they are trying to discredit us."

View gallery
In this Aug. 6, 2010, file photo, people enjoy the ocean during the 12th
annual Rotilla Festival in …
He said he was committed to speaking out against the government and had
been arrested "too many times to remember"long before he met people tied
to the USAID operation.

On his Facebook page, Bian Rodriguez also said he was never aware of the
USAID program and had pursued his artistic career without ever
compromising his beliefs. "It's unfortunate that we get pulled into this
type of situation, when art is being made from the heart," the statement
read. "The truth will never be tainted."

In a written statement Thursday, the organizers of the Rotilla festival
said they expected a "storm" in reaction to the revelations, one that
could severely damage Cuban artists unknowingly targeted by the USAID
program.

"The destruction that it will bring won't be seen in homes, structures
or property. The whirlwind will drag away names, reputations and even
history itself," the group wrote. "The events to come will transform or
extinguish independent art and culture in Cuba."

___

Documents on USAID program: http://apne.ws/1B2vAys

___

Associated Press writer Desmond Butler reported this story from
Washington and Belgrade, Michael Weissenstein and Andrea Rodriguez
reported in Havana and Laura Wides-Munoz reported from Miami.

Source: Senator: USAID's Cuba hip-hop project 'reckless' - Yahoo News -
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