CASTRO CALLS FOR CRACKDOWN ON CRIME

HAVANA (AP) Fidel Castro is demanding a crackdown on rising crime in Cuba,
calling it a threat to the revolution and urging greater U.S. cooperation in
the fight against drugs, terrorism and human trafficking.

Crime has "internal political consequences," Castro told an auditorium full
of police this week in a long speech celebrating the 40th anniversary of the
National Revolutionary Police.

"On you depends internal order, and if we lose the battle for internal
order, then we lose everything," Castro said in the first part of the speech
broadcast late Wednesday on state television. The second portion was to be
aired Thursday night.

Castro said market-oriented economic reforms in Cuba which followed the 1991
collapse of the Soviet bloc had encouraged crime by bringing in dollars,
tourists and new foreign businesses.

He underlined the point by describing the case of two Spanish investors
accused of using a business in Cuba to help launder money and ship drugs
from Colombia to Europe.

Castro demanded tougher sentences and urged judges not to shy away from the
death penalty, which was common in the 1960s and 1970s but has been rare in
the past decade.

Noting that many people convicted of pimping had been let off with fines,
Castro said, "there was a need for stronger measures." He said the crime
should lead to at least 20 years in prison.

For armed robbery of a house he expected "a penalty of at least 20 years and
up to 30 if necessary, and even a life sentence if they repeat."

The Cuban leader also urged tougher sentences for drug traffickers, saying
the increase of that crime "pains me greatly."

He noted that 18 foreigners were arrested in November on charges of trying
to smuggle cocaine through Cuba to Britain. Castro also said 227 foreigners
had been arrested for drug violations since 1995, with 157 sentenced to
prison.

Castro said Cuba seized 7,745 pounds of cocaine and marijuana between
January and November 1998, almost double the levels of previous years.

Some drugs have leaked into domestic use, sometimes supplied by Cubans who
retrieved and sold errant packages of drugs dropped off the coast by
traffickers, Castro said.

More than 1,200 Cubans were arrested last year for drug offenses, he said.

Once remarkably free of street crime and violence, Cuba has seen a surge in
prostitution, robbery and theft. Many residents have installed security bars
on their houses.

Declining state rations have made it hard for many residents to live on
state salaries that average $10 a month. At the same time, new dollar-only
stores tempt Cubans with quality food, clothes and electronics that few can
afford.

Castro complained that the United States had failed to cooperate adequately
in fighting terrorism and the trafficking in drugs and people.

He said U.S. drug officials had failed to alert Cuba about a ship they had
been following that was detained in Cuba and found with cocaine.

He also accused the United States of failing to act against anti-Cuban
terrorists on American soil. "There is a considerable volume of extremists
and crazies in that country," he said.

Castro also complained that U.S. courts repeatedly freed air and sea
hijackers from Cuba and said the U.S. government encouraged the "grave,
repugnant" trafficking in migrants by granting Cubans who reach U.S. shores
automatic residence.

Castro said Cuba last year frustrated at least 90 foreign-aided attempts to
flee the country illegally, involving 660 people. Organizers charged as much
as $8,000 per person.

But he also criticized what he called "hypocrisy and cynicism" in foreign
reports about the crime and prostitution in Cuba, noting that many European
publications are filled with advertisements for prostitutes.