WORLD IN BRIEF : CUBA : Leadership Slashes Party Bureaucracy

Cuba’s ruling Communist Party moved to streamline its bloated party bureaucracy, slashing national and provincial party posts by 50% and reorganizing the powerful Central Committee. In reforms aimed at revitalizing the island’s one-party political system, the Communist leadership said it will also introduce direct, secret voting and multiple candidates in coming elections for municipal and provincial party committees. Despite the moves, President Fidel Castro has made it clear that he does not intend to join the Soviet Union and its former allies in Eastern Europe in embracing multi-party politics and a market economy.