Some headlines you might have missed

Via CubaNet:

Police target street peddlers

SANTA CLARA, Cuba – February 4 (Rigoberto González, Cubanacán Press / www.cubanet.org) – Police and inspectors from the commerce department targeted street peddlers in Santa Clara on January 30, imposing fines as high as 70,000 pesos and confiscating merchandise.

The largest number of peddlers were found on the front stoops of houses in the streets in the vicinity of the San Miguel market.

Among other goods, police confiscated eggs, garlic, onions, tomato paste, canned goods, candy, bicycle parts and vegetables.

No milk sold in Santiago for five days

SANTIAGO DE CUBA, Cuba – February 4 (Lisette Bravo, APLO / www.cubanet.org) – Government outlets did not have milk to sell under the rationing quota between January 25 and 30, explaining there was no milk in the province.

The milk at controlled prices is only sold for children up to age 7 and for the old and those with a prescription from a doctor.

Milk could be had at the dollar stores, so called because the operate only in hard currency. A kilogram (2.2 pounds) of powdered milk goes for 5.20 dollars, about half of the average monthly salary.

Retired lieutenant colonel closes street for his own

HAVANA, Cuba – February 6 (Odelín Alfonso Torna / www.cubanet.org) – Lieutenant colonel Ramón Guerrero, Revolutionary Armed Forces, retired, recently erected a steel gate on the street in front of his house, essentially appropriating part of the street for his own use.

According to neighbors, Guerrero did so with the connivance of the local government delegate Carlos Liranza.

Neighbors also charge that the steel door was made with materials stolen from a military construction concern that abuts the lieutenant colonel's property. The gate sports a metal sign, painted red, that reads: Keep out. Military zone.

Neighbors say they have complained to local authorities, to no avail.

Police target foreign broadcast antennas

HAVANA, Cuba -February 7 (Juan Carlos Linares Balmaseda / www.cubanet.org) – Police and telephone company employees are combing the streets looking for signs of home-made antennas designed to pull in TV programs broadcast from abroad and distributed by satellite.

Specifically, the dragnet is directed to Direct TV signals, from the US.

Neighbors of Luyanó described one such raid: "Two police cars and a dozen ETECSA (telephone company) employees were walking down Pérez Street and whenever they saw a suspicious cable they cut it," said Rafael Carlos Núñez and Nelson Herrera, both Luyanó residents.

Residents in other areas of the capital reported similar activities in their neighborhoods.

The Direct TV signal is only allowed in Cuba in certain hotels restricted for foreign visitors. Even then, the signal is cut off in the evenings during the Cuban TV broadcast of the "Round Table," a program with
heavy ideological content.

Many here have ventured that the dragnet was prompted by the U. S. government's announcement that TV Martí broadcasts are in future to be relayed by satellite and thus would become available to those who have the improvised antennas.