US intercepts Cuban boat

The US Coast Guard has boarded a Cuban boat heading for Florida and taken 15 Cubans into custody.

Coast Guard officials boarded the Cuban charting vessel in the international waters of the Florida Straits on Wednesday.

The Cubans are to remain on board until immigration officials can interview them, said Coast Guard spokeswoman Danielle DeMarino.

A Cuban boy says would-be hijackers tried to shoot him

Meanwhile, a teenager who survived an attempted hijacking of a fishing boat in western Cuba earlier this week said three men who died shot themselves rather than face arrest.

The US Coast Guard had been tracking the charting vessel after it left Bahamas waters and headed towards Florida.

The Coast Guard said the boat, which belongs to a Cuban Government marine surveying company, had been stolen and not hijacked as the Cuban Government reported on Tuesday.

'Suicide'

In Monday's botched hijacking, three men, accompanied by a woman and two children and armed with pistols, tried to hijack a small fishing boat in the western province of Pinar del Rio.

The three men initially tried to take the owner hostage but he escaped.

When the group found they could not start the boat's engine, they were soon surrounded by other fishing boats and Cuban security forces.

A 17-year-old boy who was with the hijackers said he, his mother and his brother had joined the three men, but said he did not know details of the plan.

When the hijackers knew they could not get away, the boy said one of the men shot his 10-year-old brother in the head.

Saying "this is over now" one of the men tried to shoot him too, but the gun jammed, the boy said.

He said the three men then killed one another and he fled with his mother and injured brother.

The 10-year-old's wounds were not life-threatening, doctors said.

The BBC's Stephen Gibbs in Havana says both incidents reveal that there are some who are prepared to take the risk of stealing or hijacking boats to leave Cuba, despite the very severe consequences they face if caught.

In April, three Cubans were executed by a firing squad for their part in a foiled attempt to hijack a ferry and head for the US.

That brought Cuba international condemnation. At the time, the Cuban Government said the extreme measure was necessary to prevent a wave of hijackings and that it would do the same again, if necessary.

Havana says the US policy of granting asylum to Cubans who set foot on US soil encourages hijacking. The US has stressed that its asylum policy does not extend to hijackers.