Dissident Cuban website, once blocked, now accessible

Reuters
Cuba's best-known dissident, blogger Yoani Sanchez, speaks to reporters outside Havana's Jose Marti International Airport May 30, 2013. REUTERS/Desmond Boylan

HAVANA (Reuters) - An independent news website that had been blocked in Cuba since its debut on Wednesday became available to Cuban Internet users on Saturday. Dissident blogger Yoani Sanchez started publishing 14ymedio.com on Wednesday, only to have readers being redirected to another site that reflects the official line and is highly critical of her. Sanchez blamed the Cuban government, which said it was unaware who was behind the redirection. Sanchez's site had been accessible outside Cuba from the start, but remained blocked through Friday to the small minority of Cubans with Internet access. On Saturday, it could be accessed through Cuban servers. Cuba has tolerated greater criticism in recent years, but not yet from a website produced on the island as professional-looking as 14ymedio.com. The Cuban government has frequently tried to discredit Sanchez as a well-paid propagandist doing the bidding of the U.S. government. (Reporting Daniel Trotta; editing by Gunna Dickson)