Exiles

If it had happened elsewhere, it might have been dismissed as a teenage prank. A couple of 15-year-olds last year hung a Tibetan banner on the wall of their classroom next to portraits of Mao Tse-tung and Deng Xiaoping. They drew Xs over the faces of the former Chinese leaders and scrawled "Long Live the Dalai Lama" on the wall. But in China, the incident was taken dead seriously.

Deposed President Manuel Zelaya returned to the Honduran border Saturday and announced that he would set up camp there, even as foreign leaders urged him not to force a confrontation with the de facto government that ousted him in a coup last month. Zelaya arrived at a rural frontier crossing and immediately grabbed a megaphone, addressing a crowd of 150 supporters and about as many journalists. He said he would wait near the border and demanded that his family be allowed to meet him.

The Obama administration downplayed international fears about the safety of Iranian dissidents living at a camp in Iraq as recently as mid-July, days before a raid by Iraqi security forces killed 11 of the exiles and left scores wounded. The deadly clash has sparked public protests in Washington and around the world, with dozens taking part in hunger strikes to emphasize demands that the Obama administration provide better protection for the exiles. It also underscored some of the challenges of the administration's plan to wind down U.S. military involvement in Iraq and cede control to a government in Baghdad that may not adhere to U.S. commitments.

Re "Obama calls for new start with Cuba," April 18 It is interesting to note that President Obama never mentioned nor hinted at the need for the Cuban government to make reparations and indemnify U.S. citizens and corporations whose properties were summarily confiscated by the Fidel Castro regime. The same holds for those who are in favor of lifting the embargo and resuming relations with Cuba. How can there possibly be a "new start" unless this issue is resolved? I hope our president does the right thing and makes this point a priority in any future talks with Cuba.

Book review: A review in Thursday's Calendar of Dorothy Lamb Crawford's "A Windfall of Musicians: Hitler's Emigres and Exiles in Southern California" quoted a number of exiled musicians who had come to live in America. Among those quoted was Otto Klemperer, who fled Germany first for Switzerland and then for Los Angeles after being dismissed as director of the Berlin State Opera because of his Jewish ancestry. His name was given incorrectly as Werner Klemperer. Werner was Otto's son.

The U.S. House on Tuesday passed legislation authorizing the establishment of a memorial in honor of leprosy patients forcibly relocated to Kalaupapa in the 1800s and 1900s. U.S. Rep. Mazie K. Hirono (D-Hawaii), the bill's sponsor, told lawmakers from the House floor that the memorial should list the names of those exiled to the remote Molokai peninsula. She noted that many who died at Kalaupapa were buried in unmarked graves, making it difficult for their families to honor them.

For Cuban exiles and emigres who have been waiting for Fidel Castro's departure for decades, Tuesday's announcement that he was retiring as president was greeted with more cynicism than jubilation. "As far as I'm concerned, until they can show me a body in a casket, I'm never going to believe this is over," Eddie Lopez, an exterminator and U.S.-born Cuban American, said as he made his pest control rounds in Miami Beach.

Deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra returned today from 17 months in exile, and police immediately took him into custody on corruption charges at an airport where thousands of supporters awaited his arrival. Thaksin, a 58-year-old billionaire ousted in September 2006, could face a maximum of 15 years in prison on corruption charges in two cases that date to his time in office. "I have to restore my reputation, which has been tarnished by the coup," he said.

A few days before his 90th birthday, Bebo Valdes contemplates his memories and melodies on a hotel terrace with a view of waves dancing in an African breeze. Valdes puts aside the coffee he is nursing and examines two CDs. One is "Lagrimas Negras" ("Black Tears"), the surprise crossover sensation that made him an international star four years ago.

EIGHT-year-old Jorge de Cespedes was scared, lonely and heartbroken, but he was making a killing in wholesale. It was 1961, and the place was a sweltering, insect-plagued refugee camp on the edge of the Everglades. For Jorge and his 11-year-old brother, Carlos -- and 14,000 other Cuban children over the next 20 months -- the camp was their first stop in the United States after fleeing Cuba through a secret U.S. funded airlift dubbed Operation Pedro Pan.