Miami Publisher Quits, Rehires Staffers

MIAMI, Oct. 3 -- The Miami Herald's publisher resigned Tuesday, saying "ambiguously communicated" personnel policies had resulted in the firings of three journalists at its Spanish-language paper who were paid to appear on U.S. government broadcasts aimed at promoting democracy in Cuba.

Jesus Diaz Jr., the papers' publisher since July 2005, had dismissed two El Nuevo Herald reporters and a freelance contributor who had been paid by Radio Marti and TV Marti. Diaz said the company offered to rehire the three and that the company would not discipline six others it recently discovered also took payments.

The dismissals had caused a furor among members of Miami's Cuban American community, which responded with canceled subscriptions and attacks on Diaz and some of the newspaper's editors and journalists in letters and e-mails. Critics also said Diaz reacted too quickly and harshly.

"I realize and regret that the events of the past three weeks have created an environment that no longer allows me to lead our newspapers in a manner most beneficial for our newspapers, our readers and our community," Diaz wrote in a letter to readers announcing his resignation.

Diaz said he believed the journalists' acceptance of payments "was a breach of widely accepted principles of journalistic ethics." But he added "our policies prohibiting such behavior may have been ambiguously communicated, inconsistently applied and widely misunderstood over many years in the El Nuevo Herald newsroom."

He said no one would be allowed in the future to accept money from the U.S. government-run broadcasters and that conflict-of-interest policies would be strengthened.

The Miami Herald reported early last month, citing government documents, that 10 South Florida journalists had received thousands of dollars from the federal government for their work on radio and TV programming aimed at undermining Fidel Castro's communist regime.

Pablo Alfonso, who reports on Cuba and wrote an opinion column for El Nuevo Herald, was paid almost $175,000 since 2001 to host shows on Radio and TV Marti, U.S. government programs that promote democracy in Cuba, according to government documents obtained by the Herald.

Olga Connor, a freelance reporter who wrote about Cuban culture for El Nuevo Herald, received about $71,000 from the U.S. Office of Cuba Broadcasting, and staff reporter Wilfredo Cancio Isla, who covered the Cuban exile community and politics, was paid almost $15,000 in the last five years, the Herald reported.