June 7, 1983

By LUIS FELDSTEIN SOTO

Leaders of four anti-Castro groups in Miami took credit Monday for creating a climate of general unrest in Cuba that, they say, has led to a growing militancy among internal dissenters and numerous acts of sabotage in the last few year.

But spokesmen for three of the groups - Abdala, Cuba Independiente y Democratica (CID) and the Brigade 2506 - stopped short of claiming direct links to the factory workers arrested in recent months in Cuba for allegedly trying to establish a Solidarity-style union in the island.

The head of the fourth militant exile group, Andres Nazario Sargen of Alpha 66, would not say whether the workers were acting under directions from his organization. However, he said, "All the activities of sabotage in Cuba - including those by these 33 [reportedly convicted on sabotage charges] - are carried out through the orientation, the participation of Alpha 66."

Pedro Pablo Rojas, spokesman for the Brigade 2506, an association of veterans of the Bay of Pigs invasion, said the Brigade is cooperating with Cuban groups involved in "sabotage, resistance, destruction of crops, equipment, etc. That's part of the work we've been carrying out."

He predicted "a steady increase in the actions against the Cuban government."

Rojas denied the Cuban regime's contention that U.S: based anti-Castro groups are acting in concert with the CIA. Such accusations, he said, are designed to mislead the island's population about the true source of the violence: "the people of Cuba."

"It's easier to say it's the CIA to fool the people," he said.

Huber Matos Jr., press spokesman for CID, said he had learned through sources in Cuba that the workers were spared a death sentence only after their family members "started mobilizing" against the government. The incident, he said, "is important because it shows the decomposition that exists in Cuba."

None of the Miami activists were surprised by Cuba's acknowledgment that a major sabotage ring exists on the island.

"There are some things they can't keep quiet," Rojas explained. "Many people come here and provide information about such events."

Matos saw the admission as a veiled warning to other labor organizers not to defy the government.

Gustavo Marin, head of the anti-Castro group Abdala, said the alleged sabotage ring is characteristic, of groups that have joined forces and adopted more sophisticated techniques to destabilize the Castro government.

"The regime is worried, because there's a new pattern" of violence, Marin said. "It's a different pattern and every day there are new incidents originating among the Cuban people, without external interference.".