14ymedio – Page 135 – Translating Cuba

More than 60 Percent of Cubans Arbitrarily Detained in 2022 Were Women

The leader of the opposition women’s movement Damas de Blanco, Berta Soler, has been imprisoned on several occasions by the Cuban regime. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, 20 January 2023 — In 2022, Cuba reached the highest rate of women arbitrarily detained in the last four years. The figure is documented by the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH) in its latest report, published this Thursday, in which they attest to more than 5,500 repressive actions by the regime as of the end of the year.

Last year, the repression of the Díaz-Canel government was consolidated and even went further, adds the OCDH in its report, against sectors of the population traditionally not linked to politics. Imprisonment and exile continue to be a predominant pattern practiced by the regime against dissident voices, while police summonses, threats, and detentions in homes continue.

The organization has recorded that, throughout 2022, Cuban authorities carried out 1,354 arbitrary arrests, of which 832 correspond to women and represent 61.4%, the highest figure since 2018.

The organization has recorded that, throughout 2022, Cuban authorities carried out 1,354 arbitrary detentions, of which 832 correspond to women

There were 1,447 documented detentions of activists, opponents, or relatives of prisoners in their homes, and harassment against the independent press continued as well, with at least 697 repressive actions against journalists who suffered threats, surveillance, subpoenas and restrictions on mobile data and telephony. continue reading

Similarly, the report denounces that at the end of 2022 there are 976 political or prisoners of conscience jailed in Cuban prisons, the majority for participating in the massive protests of July 11, 2021 and other subsequent expressions of discontent, such as in the city of Nuevitas in August 2022. The Government applies the crime of sedition to prosecute the demonstrators, with sentences that average 10 years of imprisonment.

The Observatory reports that, despite multiple calls to the international community to intervene and verify the Cuban prison system, the Government maintains restricted access for agencies to its 293 centers, which have the highest prison population per capita in Latin America, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).

Approximately 72% of the Cuban population lives on the threshold of extreme poverty, and eight out of 10 cannot get medicines in pharmacies

The OCDH details that social indicators have deteriorated due to the deep economic crisis Cuba is experiencing, with a general shortage of food and basic necessities. This has led to 72% of the Cuban population living on the threshold of extreme poverty, and eight out of 10 unable to get medicines in pharmacies, according to the fifth report on the State of social rights published in October of 2022.

In its statement, the Observatory reiterates its call on governments and international organizations to “redouble” their support for activists and civil society in Cuba. It also calls for programs of cooperation with the government to be conditional on “real progress in terms of democracy, human rights and economic freedoms” in addition to the elimination of the new Penal Code.

Similarly, the organization recommends continuing with sanctions against human rights violators under the principles of the Magnitsky Act and other accountability programs in the United States, the European Union and other countries.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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Human Rights Group D Frente Highlights that the Cuban Constitution Allows Pardons and Amnesty for July 11th Prisoners

A protester is arrested during the 11 July 2021 protests in Villa Clara. (Screen capture)

14ymedio, Havana, 23 January 2023 — The opposition platform D Frente [D Front] thanked the European Union on Monday for having met with the Cuban Minister of Justice, Oscar Silvera, last Wednesday, and for having addressed the sentences of the protesters on July 11, 2021.

“We see this gesture of solidarity, not as a feeling of compassion for the misfortune of others, but as a firm and persevering commitment to respect human rights in Cuba,” says the organization in an open letter addressed to Josep Borrell, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

In this letter, the platform explains that the possible repercussions of the new Penal Code, which came into force last December, and which provides for tougher penalties for protesters, dissidents and activists, were also discussed. Instead, they note that the Cuban Constitution includes the possibility of granting pardons and amnesties.

Specifically, article 108 allows the National Assembly of People’s Power to grant amnesties, and article 128 empowers the President to grant pardons and to request the National Assembly to grant amnesties. This possibility is also implemented, continues D Frente, through laws No. 131/2019 and No. 136/2020.

The Island’s Minister of Justice maintained at the meeting, according to the EFE agency, that there is no “legal possibility” of an amnesty in Cuba and he did not commit himself to anything, although he noted “the request for pardon” from the European Union. continue reading

Similarly, Silvera described the meeting in a statement as a “sincere, open, respectful and profitable conversation.”

Cuba’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs explained that the meeting took place to “give continuity to the bilateral political dialogue” within the Political Dialogue, the “governing instrument” of relations between Cuba and the European bloc in force since 2017.

D Frente, born from a concentration of different dissident organizations, reiterates in its text its gratitude to the EU “for immediately and unconditionally releasing political prisoners,” despite acknowledging that the Cuban government “does not have the will to put an end to the political prison and uses these as a bargaining chip in its negotiations with other actors.”

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President of the Central Bank of Cuba Insists that the Lender CRF Did Not ‘Legally’ Acquire Cuba’s Debt

On the placards, demonstrators in favor of the trial in London classified the Castro brothers as terrorists. (EFE)

EFE (via 14ymedio), London, 25 January 2023 — During the trial in London on Wednesday, the president of the Central Bank of Cuba (BNC), Joscelín Río Álvarez, said that the CRF investment fund “did not legally acquire the Cuban debt,” according to the country’s legislation and does not appear on the institution’s registers.

As a lender, CRF, which was established in 2009 in the Cayman Islands, has brought a claim before the British court against BNC, with Cuba as the guarantor for payment of obligations totaling 72 million euros derived from loan contracts with European signed in the 1980s.

In a process that will take several days, Judge Sara Cockerill, of the Commercial High Court of London, will first determine whether the investment group is or is not a legitimate creditor to Cuba, which considers it a “vulture fund”, created only to accumulate unpaid Cuban debt and force payment through the courts.

According to procedural documents, CRF holds Cuban sovereign debt valued at 1.2 billion euros (which means they posses the contractual rights to collect it), which would make it the world’s largest debt holder.

Río Álvarez, who took charge in May 2020, maintained that CRF is not registered as a lender at BNC (only its application) and reiterated that the determination authorizing its status on November 25, 2019 by Raúl Olivera Lozano, a government official who has been convicted for accepting a bribe from agents of the fund and violating procedures, is invalid. continue reading

CRF alleges, for its part, that the determination of the contractual rights to the 72 million euro debt, which had previously been held by ICBC Standard Bank (the British affiliate of the Chinese ICBC bank), was legal. And stated that the accusations against Olivera and other colleagues sentenced to prison “are pretexts fabricated” by the Cuban state “to elude its obligations.”

Yesterday Olivera declared, also by videoconference from Havana, that CRF’s consultant, Jeetkumar Gordhandas offered him money to transfer the titles, which he did illegally, with only one signature (instead of two) and without consulting the Cuban government.

On Wednesday, Río Álvarez underscored that “no BNC employee is authorized to act on behalf of the Government of Cuba.” CRF states that it is not a vulture fund and highlights that for years it attempted to negotiate with Cuba to restructure its debt, without a response.

In parallel to the London trial, dozens demonstrated on Tuesday in Miami (USA) in support of the lawsuit brought forth by CRF. People gathered near the Versailles restaurant, on the emblematic 8th Street, the usual site for Cubans in exile to protest against the Government of Havana, shouting and insulting the Castro brothers, calling for a convinction before the Criminal Court in The Hague.

On the placards, demonstrators in favor of the trial in London classified the Castro brothers as terrorists and called for freedom for political prisoners being held in prisons on the Island by the Government of Havana .

The CRF I fund, the London Club’s largest holder of Cuban debt, initially sought 100 million euros for loans to the insular government by European banks Crédit Lyonnais and L’Istituto Bancario Italiano.

Translated by: Silvia Suárez

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Scrambled Powdered Eggs, a ‘Life Vest’ for Hungry Cubans

A package of powdered eggs from Argentina (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodriguez, Havana, 20 January 2023 — The the powdered eggs she bought last month are past their April expiration date. They also cost her 1,000 pesos for a one-kilogram package on the black market but Lucy doesn’t care. This is the only option for housewives who want to provide their families with this particular source of protein. When they are available, the cheapest price for fresh eggs is never less than 1,700 pesos for a thirty-egg carton.

Two tablespoons mixed with six tablespoons of water is the equivalent one egg. The unusual flavor, which Lucy describes as having a “packaged” aftertaste, can be corrected, she says, “with a lot of seasoning.” The Central Havana resident cooks it like scrambled eggs. She first sautés onion, chili pepper and rosemary, dissolves the powder egg in water and adds it to the pan, finishing it with a little tomato sauce. “It is delicious though I know some people only add a little salt.”

Powdered eggs are not available in any store — neither state-run nor private, neither for pesos nor for hard currency — because they are reserved for the Cuban processed food industry. Rather than an ingredient for omelettes, they are used in pastries or other preparations such as pancakes, croquettes and panetelas [cakes]. The goal is to prevent contamination from salmonella, which fresh eggs can carry.

Lucy points out that only the reason she able to get her hands on the Argentina-made product — the expired expiration date being a clue — was because someone “diverted” it to the black market, which provides some relief from the island’s endless shortages. To save money, she bought only half a package and split it with her sister.

“I remember there were eggs during the Special Period. People called them ‘life vests’,” she says. “Things have gotten so bad that now they come powdered and expired.”

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‘Chomy’ Miyar, the Cuban Who Knew All of Fidel Castro’s Secrets, Dies

His time as rector of the University of Havana coincided with the ’purge’ processes that ended with the expulsion of students and professors. (Twitter/Fidel Castro Center)

14ymedio, Havana, 20 January 2023 — José Miguel Chomy Miyar Barrueco, former secretary to Fidel Castro and one of the “historical” figures of the regime, died this Friday morning in Havana at the age of 90. Miyar was also rector of the University of Havana between 1966 and 1972, a position he held during the years of harsh purges against students and professors.

“He died at dawn at his home in Miramar, near the National Aquarium. He had been suffering from decompensated diabetes for years and was cared for by two nurses,” says a family source who requests anonymity. “The family was notified just after he passed away and many of them, who are based in Italy and Spain, are already traveling to the Island to be at the wake.”

The official press did not announce Miyar’s death until two hours after 14ymedio broke the news. After this delay, the Communist Party daily Granma reported that Miyar will have a wake at the funeral home at Calzada and K, starting at 6:00 p.m. this Friday. The burial will take place on Saturday morning, in the pantheon of the Armed Forces of the capital.

The relative reported that after Miyar’s death “a battalion” from State Security appeared to “collect” his belongings, because he was “the most important living archive that Fidel Castro had.”

Born in Siboney, Santiago de Cuba, in August 1932, Chomy graduated as a doctor and was a gray but very powerful presence in Cuban politics for half a century. However, “his last years, after Fidel Castro died, were difficult, they took him to a house, with a small room that looked like a movie set to give the idea of humility, but it was all a lie because he was a very rich man. He had hip problems and they operated on him at Cimeq,” adds his relative.

“He only had two children left here, who are in the business of selling products over the Internet on foreign currency sites. The rest of the children and grandchildren are living in Italy and Spain with changed names,” he details. “Chomy was very isolated at the end of his life because Raúl Castro did not hold him in good esteem and he was a man who knew too many secrets, he had to be kept away from everyone so that he would not open his mouth.” continue reading

The family fortune, impossible to put into figures due to the secrecy that surrounds the Miyar clan, contrasts with the austere image that Chomy disseminated in the 1960s and 1970s, when he donned a dark gray khaki jacket with a closed collar, imitating the one worn by Mao Tse-tung. With that “uniform” he walked through the university cloisters, official activities and partisan events.

His time as rector of the University of Havana coincides with the “purification” processes that ended with the expulsion of students and professors accused of being revisionists, homosexuals, and religious. At the head of that house of higher studies, when the Ministry of Higher Education did not yet exist, Chomy had total power to define everything from the study plan to the access policy to university classrooms.

Miyar also served as secretary of the Council of State between 1980 and 2009, a period when his single visit to an official institution was seen as the arrival of “the eyes and ears” of Fidel Castro himself. Later, after Castro’s illness, he was appointed Minister of Science, Technology and Environment, which he held from 2009 to March 2012.

“The whole family is very well placed financially, some are owners of companies and a publishing house in Spain, as well as powerful businesses in Italy and other countries,” the relative details. “At one point you had to count on him for everything, he distributed properties from houses to the gift of positions, and he continued to be, until the end of his life, a great fan of Fidel Castro.”

“He had the largest collection of photographs of Castro, which he took himself, and he kept many of his secrets, which is why in his last years he was an uncomfortable person, someone nobody wanted to be around. He was always [Castro’s] private secretary, even when he worked in other functions or in public office, he was still his right hand man for many things.”

“He was married to a very rich Italian woman, who later died and left him the entire fortune, which is why part of the family is based in Italy.” His daughter, María Elena Miyar Ibarra, also held a high position in Immigration, but no longer lives on the island. “They already took everything they had to take out of the country, many resources, money, works of art and valuable belongings.”

“He created several companies to launder money in Panama, he also had a thriving business selling guayaberas under the Panabrisa brand,” he explains. “He was not only the one who helped Castro in ’carrying and bringing’ information, he also organized meetings with women who caught his attention when he visited the university or any other place and was in charge of managing part of the family’s money.”

“It was enough for someone to receive a call from Chomy for them to feel that they were talking to his boss, you couldn’t say no to anything he asked for. He was super powerful.” The anecdotes of young women who, after a chance encounter with Castro, were contacted by his personal secretary were repeated in the corridors of ministries and universities. “He acted as Celestino, all with discretion and that smile that he always had frozen on his face.”

During an international fair, Castro became obsessed with a girl who was studying physics, says Miyar’s relative. It was Chomy himself who supervised the installation of a landline phone in her house, so that Castro could talk to her. “We’re talking about the years when there were very few fixed lines,” he says.

“Although he was a doctor, he did not practice that profession with Castro, he was his secretary but he did not treat him as a doctor.” His specialty “was other things, he was not there to help him with his entrails but to carry his secrets and be absolutely docile,” the source underlines. “That was his whole life, more than the right hand of Fidel Castro, the dark hand that covered and kept his worst actions safe.”

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Cuban Authorities Pressure Private Business Owners in Sancti Spiritus to Lower Their Prices

“Prices are through the roof and they have increased a lot since the beginning of the year,” said one customer. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Mercedes García, Sancti Spíritus, 21 January 2023 — Food prices continue to increase and authorities in the city of Sancti Spíritus try to put the brakes on inflation by pressuring private business owners to lower their prices. The official call, however, has not been echoed in the sector hit hard by the high cost of raw materials and taxes.

Susana and her husband sell crackers and on Thursday were in a meeting called by the local authorities. “They told us we had to lower our prices because it is a directive of the Communist Party,” they told 14ymedio. “But we can’t, until recently we were buying wheat flour from a mipyme [a micro or small business] that sold it for 135 pesos but now we must pay more.”

“We’re between a rock and a hard place, because if we lower the price we practically won’t have any income. Everything we earn we would need to invest in purchasing ingredients for the crackers, that is, we’d work for nothing,” she says. “Between the raw materials and taxes there is no margin for a discount.”

“It is not only about the products we must pay high prices for to maintain afloat, but also that this work requires a lot of sacrifice: waking up very early to knead, shape and bake the crackers,” she stated. “Then, the time we must devote to sales, hours and hours on our feet and in contact with customers, who many times are bothered by the prices.”

“They are having these meetings with all those who are self-employed in Sancti Spíritus and the tone is not one of a suggestion nor recommendation, but of an imposition,” bemoaned Susana. “They don’t address us like people who must go through a thousand and one difficulties to keep their business open and who, in addition, offer a service: our crackers are the snacks for many children in this neighborhood take to school.”

On Friday, Vicente’s shop, which mostly sells sweets and candy, was a hotbed of activity because many who are self-employed arrived there to talk about the meeting the day before. The discontent with the requested adjustment seems to be generalized among a sector in which many believe that they are being blamed for inflation. continue reading

“They tell us we must lower prices, but when I go to the MLC [freely convertible currency] store I am forced to pay high prices for products I need to make the sweets I sell here,” claims Vicente. “There are products I cannot find anywhere else and the so-called wholesale market they were going to open for business owners has been a complete failure.”

The customers feel caught in the middle. “Prices are through the roof and they have increased a lot since the beginning of the year, but if the government continues to pressure private businesses we will end up without the few cafeterias that remain open to sell something,” acknowledged a young man who paid 120 pesos for a small pack of cookies at a private shop, near the city center. “Of course I want to pay less, but we could reach a point when even if we have the money we can’t find something like this.”

The battle to regulate the prices of the private sector has been going on for several years and at time is reinforced, languishing before the reality of inflation or adding new official mechanisms to penalize those who do not adopt the price caps imposed by the authorities.

“We need to confront those prices that continue to rise for certain activities and by certain indiscriminate people so they obtain high profits,” the Minister of Finance and Prices, Meisi Bolaños Weiss, stated in January 2020 during an episode of the Mesa Redonda (Roundtable) program on State TV.

To ensure compliance with the measure, the government shared several telephone numbers for reporting vendors who do not comply with the order and also launched an army of inspectors to visit businesses and impose fines for merchants, but none of these practices have been fruitful.

Now they add local meetings and direct pressure on each merchant which, for the moment, seem to be causing more discontent among the entrepreneurs than beneficial results for the customers’ pockets. The next step for the authorities could be much more radical, in a context in which inflation seems to be out of control.

Translated by: Silvia Suárez

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Cuba Investigates the Deaths of Eight Premature Babies at the Diez de Octubre Hospital in Havana

The deaths occurred starting January 11, that is, in just five days. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 17 January 2023 — Eight premature and low-weight babies have died so far in January at the Diez de Octubre Gynecological and Obstetric Hospital in Havana, the Ministry of Public Health reported on Monday.

Four of these newborn children died “since this past January 11^th with presumptive signs of sepsis and the rest, of other causes related to the delicate state of their health,” according to the note released by the official press.

The Ministry assures that, in the hospital where the deaths were registered, “measures have been adopted to deal with this situation, and that it has the necessary resources to care for newborns,” although it has not specified what those resources consist of.

The Ministry assures that “measures have been adopted to deal with this situation, and that the necessary resources are available to care for newborns”, although it has not specified what they consist of

He also noted that a National Health Commission is currently investigating the causes of deaths and “based on the results, the pertinent measures will be taken.”

The event took place a few days after Cuba’s infant mortality data was released, which is bad again. The rate recovered only one tenth, compared to the very bad data for 2021, which was 7.6 deaths per 100,000, and stood at 7.5 in the year just ended.

The worsening of the infant mortality rate has been fast. Cuba exhibited some of the best data on the American continent until 2020, when the rate was 4.9 per 100,000, although the best figures come from 2017 and 2018, when it was only 4.0. continue reading

Compared to those years, the rate increased by 92% in 2021, when the authorities attributed the data mostly to the pandemic, both due to direct and collateral effects.

In addition, some provinces have data that is at the level of some countries such as El Salvador or Mexico. This is the case of Mayabeque, with 12.2 deaths per 100,000 births, Santiago de Cuba with 9.9, Guantánamo with 9.7, Havana with 9.5 and Camagüey, with 9.1.

The main causes of deaths have been perinatal conditions, mainly related to low birth weight, prematurity and intrauterine growth retardation, in addition to congenital malformations and sepsis.

Some doctors have warned that PAMI has lost priority over the years, partly due to the drop in funds allocated to it, but also due to the loss of many professionals

Some doctors have warned that the Maternal and Child Care Program (PAMI) has lost priority over the years, partly due to the drop in funds allocated to it, but also due to the loss of many medical professionals, who have been leaving medicine in recent years due to low wages and high work demands.

In 2021, two babies died in Guantánamo and two had to be admitted in critical condition after receiving treatment with Ampicillin in the neonatology service of the Dr. Agostinho Neto General Teaching Hospital.

In December 2021 there was also a case similar to the one now in Diez de Octubre, when two newborns died at a Havana hospital “despite receiving the maximum care,” according to the Havana Tribune. Although a report on what happened was announced, its contents did not change public opinion.

The news has generated a multitude of reactions among the readers of the official press, which call attention to the precariousness of the National Health System. Some of them point to the general malnutrition of the population, but also the lack of sterilization in hospitals and the shortage of medicines.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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The Rice Crop in Cuba Fails, Providing Less than 30 Percent of Domestic Consumption

In Cuba, at least 600,000 tons of rice are needed for the family basket and social consumption. (EFE)

14ymedio, Madrid, 16 January 2023 — Cuban authorities have not revealed the bad results of the 2022 rice production, but a note published on Sunday in Granma, the official daily, leads us to believe that is worse than expected. In February of that year, the harvest was 120,000 tons and they set a target for the following year of 180,000, a tiny portion of the nearly 700,000 needed for domestic consumption. Not even that was achieved, but official data are not available; an official stated that 2022 production was “a real sinkhole, the volume of food declined considerably.”

Oslando Linares Morell, director of the Rice Technology Division of the state run Agriculture Business Group, explains that in 2012, a program was created to develop this cereal which, in addition to being culturally a staple food in the Cuban diet, possesses several qualities which make it ideal for the situation on the Island, from its simple storage without processing to its high caloric value. The plan was to achieve complete self sufficiency in 2030 to suppress imports, but the failure has been monumental.

Cuba needs, the report states, 600,000 tons for the rationed food baskets and social consumption. The data are striking when in the last several years, including 2022, the amount required had been 700,000, which could suggest some relief following the exit of at least a quarter of a million people in the last 12 months.

To achieve self sufficiency, they’d need to sow 200,000 hectares annually, with a yield of six tons per hectare and 1,200,000 tons of wet cereal production, which would result in the desired 600,000. But, reality clashes with the dream. continue reading

“The plans created for 2023 are still quite low, with around 40% of what was expected at this stage of the development program. This means that we should sow 140,000 hectares, and this calendar year we’ve only managed to plant 68,000, a very poor number,” he said. With that they might manage to obtain, at best, 204,000 tons if we use official figures, which would still require importing at least 400,000 tons if everything turned out well.

The price of rice on the international market has increased in the past years and in Vietnam, the price per ton was at $437 the first week of 2023, which would require Cuba to spend $174.4 million to purchase the 400,000 tons from there. And this is if the expected results are achieved, which seems far from likely seeing that rice production continues to sink. In 2022, the Island should have used more than $300 million to purchase the product and to all these costs, one must add transport, since it “does not exactly [arrive] from nearby countries,” as Linares Morell reminds us.

In 2018, the national rice plans were marching along appropriately and although they were far from achieving the goal of self-sufficiency, the progress was good, until it reached an historic record that year of 304,000 tons. The collapse began in 2019 with 246,700 tons and later, with the pandemic, came the worst: 162,965 tons in 2020 and 120,000 in 2021.

The official spoke of the influence of COVID-19, the hardening of the embargo, the “spurious inclusion of Cuba on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism,” and the war in Ukraine as reasons for the thwarted plans. In addition, he highlighted that there are limitations on the Island’s ability to obtain pesticides, herbicides, fertilizer and fuel for the air and land machinery.

Despite all of this, Linares was optimistic and believes that in 2023 a new recovery could begin, especially if they use “science, technology, and innovation,” although when it comes to exposing what that would consist of, it did not go beyond the usual volunteerism and the “we must.”

“We rice growers have to get used to the new work conditions, use less chemical products and use a considerably larger number of bioproducts,” he added. The only tangible processes he explained were the development of four seed varieties, in addition to the 12 that exist with support from Vietnam and Japan — with shorter cycles that rely on fewer inputs.

In the Cuban markets, meanwhile, the price of rice does not cease to increase, when you can find it. The official inflation data indicates that in October the price of that product increased more than 4% and in November it once again increased more than 3.4.%

The so-called creole rice, domestically produced, does not have a good reputation among Cuban kitchens. The methods of harvesting, transport and storage make for a final grain product that is frequently broken and its cooking unsatisfactory. Consumers prefer products imported from Brazil or Uruguay, from where a more whole grain rice come, that expands when cooked and has a better flavor.

The rice from Vietnam is not very highly valued because it has been sold on the Island in the rationed markets and the percentage of broken grain is high and it is difficult to achieve a separated grain when cooked, one of the characteristics sought after in the Cuban culinary tradition, which rejects a product that is sticky or clumps.

Translated by: Silvia Suárez

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Nobody Understands the ‘Algorithms’ of the Cuban Peso Stores

She slides her hand along until she finds her designated shopping date, but then looks further to find that all she can buy is two packets of picadillo [ground meat]. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, Havana, 18 January 2023 – She traces along the notice board with her finger. “This one’s my store”, she whispers as her forefinger reaches the sales schedule of a shop in the outskirts, in Calle Galiano, Havana. She slides her hand along until she finds her shopping date and then looks further to find that she can only buy two packets of picadillo [ground meat]. After having figured out the complicated method being used, Nancy has ended up frustrated and without hope once again.

“You need to have a degree to be able to understand these Cuban peso stores*”, the woman complained on Wednesday morning after deciphering the convoluted process of getting basic supplies like frozen chicken, detergent or sausages. As the months have gone by, the mechanism for buying products and paying for them in the national currency has become more and more complex. “If a foreigner came up and read this he’d think we’d all gone mad, completely mad”, the lady moaned.

Five years ago it was convertible pesos that opened the doors to the best selection of goods, but today, as well as the money, you need also to pay with high levels of stress and time in order to get hold of whatever food ingredients you need. In the inexact science of the state market, very often there’s a lack of logic and too many corrupt employees, too many re-sellers, and too often the phrase “we don’t have any”. The rationing algorithm ends more often with hunger than with satisfaction.

With doctorates in absurd business practice and degrees in poverty, the Cuban people have studied an infinite number of courses at the university of misery. The qualification awarded brings them more shame than pride. There are days when, after hours of waiting and a hard mental effort to unscramble all the bureaucratic speak, one is limited to getting hold of maybe just a pack of sanitary napkins, or a litre of vegetable oil.

*Translator’s note: A “peso store” is a store that accepts payment in Cuban pesos — the currency in which Cubans are paid their wages. An “MLC” — also called a “dollar store” — is a store that accepts payment only in moneda libremente convertible (freely convertible currency) such as dollars or euros, which Cubans acquire be receiving remittances from family or friends abroad.

Translated by Ricardo Recluso

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The Cuban State’s Foreign Exchange Reserves Registered a Sharp Drop in Three Years

Headquarters of the Central Bank of Cuba. (Flickr/Maxence)

14ymedio, Havana, 18 January 2023 — Cuba’s international reserves have fallen at a dizzying rate, according to information published in recent days about what was until now a state secret. In the absence of data certified by an independent authority, economists estimate that the country’s foreign exchange resources have decreased by between 22% and 64% in just three years.

The news comes from the analysis by the British agency Reuters of extensive articles published by the Government in Cubadebate the first week of the year in which José Luis Rodríguez, former Minister of Economy and currently an advisor to the World Economy Research Center (CIEM), reveals that the reserves went from $11.528 billion in 2019 to just over 9 billion in 2021. The fall is about 2.5 billion, 22% of the reserves in just three years.

To identify both figures and connect them, you must carefully follow the series delivered by the official media, entitled “The Problems of International Insertion of the Cuban Economy through the Years” and published in three parts on January 1, 4 and 6. In the second part, in the penultimate paragraph, Rodríguez reveals that between 2015 and 2018, “it was possible to maintain (…) 11.528 billion USD in international reserves, which would be vital to face the last three years.”

Two days later, in the third part, addressing the economic context that emerged from the pandemic, the current status of those accounts is indicated. “In relation to international reserves, a reduction of $2.55 billion is estimated in two years, which covers only 76.9% of the reduction in current account income.”

An anonymous and “well-connected” Reuters source claims that the Cuban government’s reserves are now at about $8 billion. The agency, however, contacted other Cuban economists living abroad who consider the reality to be even worse. continue reading

Pavel Vidal, a former economist at the Cuban Central Bank and currently living in Colombia, does not dare to give figures but affirms that he expected reserves to be “much lower” and opens the possibility that the official numbers will contemplate, in addition to savings, other goods in strong currency.

“If they are talking about money saved by the State, that would be a very broad definition… because companies, commercial banks and non-bank financial institutions can be included and many things can be added. But what the data show is that reserves are shrinking, a bad sign for any country,” he says.

Omar Everleny Pérez, economist and former director of the Center for the Study of the Cuban Economy, who now resides in the United States, agrees that, whatever the detailed data, the important thing is the abrupt fall. “These data show that international reserves have decreased a lot, and that is very serious,” he told Reuters.

Pedro Monreal, an economist living in Cuba, puts on the table another figure, the one estimated by The Economist Unit for 2022, just $4.104 billion, 64.4% less than the reserves of 11.528 billion in 2019 indicated by former Minister Rodríguez.

In its note, Reuters, which tried unsuccessfully to contact official Cuban sources, explains that the regime’s usual argument for exposing its macroeconomic data or doing so with great delay is to prevent the United States from having more information about its finances that would allow it to modulate the embargo at its convenience.

The anonymous source of the agency says that last week, at the monthly meeting of economic aggregates of the members of the European Union in Havana, the data released by Cubadebate were on the agenda, although there was not enough information about how the calculations were made or why they had been disclosed.

“None of my colleagues had information to support Rodríguez’ statement,” he alleges.

The last time the authorities gave reserve data was in 2014, during the debt renegotiations. At that time, Cuba was alleged to have $10 billion that could be slightly increased in the following few years in which, after the thaw and with the cancellations of debt and renewals of payment agreements with other countries, Cuba experienced a relative bonanza.

In 2019, and after the tightening of US sanctions and the Venezuelan crisis, problems began to accumulate for the Government, which stopped payment on its debt to other countries. The pandemic and the war in Ukraine have finished putting Cuban finances in check, and reserves are running out at great speed due to the high cost of imports, especially food for the population.

Coinciding with the dissemination of this data, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, Granma, published on Wednesday an article entitled “Victims, Creditors or Embezzlers of the Wealth of the Nation,” in which it talks about the fall of reserves in the years of the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. “On January 1, 1959, Cuba’s gross international reserves, in gold and dollars, were less than 70 million, of the 509 million dollars that existed at the beginning of the decade,” it explains.

The official newspaper takes great care to note that, until 1959, the Cuban peso was on par with the dollar, which made it unnecessary to maintain a high level of currency reserve.

In any case, the purpose of the text is to accuse the United States’ Helms-Burton law of being the instrument to recover “the goods stolen from the people” who in the period of Batista used “the public funds to construct the buildings that the mafia would use for its nest egg and for the benefit of its members.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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In New Shop in Havana, ‘Thaba’, You Can Look at the Products but Not Buy Them for the Moment

Queue/line in front of Thaba’s shop in Havana on Wednesday. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 19 January 2023 — On the day following its opening, which was announced with great fanfare by the official press on Tuesday, the shop owned by the Thaba company in the Havana district of Cerro was already being subjected to an audit. This opening had brought with it much expectation as it was anticipated that there would be items such as gloves on sale, or masks, backpacks or caps — things that are very difficult to find on the Island — at low prices and in pesos.

“You can’t buy anything at the moment because they’re auditing the shop”, explained the man calling himself the administrator as he stood in the shop doorway on Wednesday and addressed the crowd that had gathered there since the early hours. And then he added, grumpily, in the manner of an official from the Ministry of the Interior, that: “You can come in and have a look but you mustn’t interrupt in any way what they’re doing in there”.

The majority of those who were waiting turned away, but others, curious, accepted the offer. Inside the tiny shop a number of them took out their phones to take photos of the products and their prices but they were sternly warned by an employee: “You can take photos but you mustn’t put them on social media”.

A modern electronic register stood out on the counter. Payments can’t be made in cash, the employees explained, but only by using the EnZona or TransferMovil apps.

The main attraction of the shop is, without a doubt, rubber gloves (at 70 pesos), unavailable in Cuba for a long time. Apart from that, the range is limited to several backpacks, a few caps — all with Cuban flags — and masks.

To the disappointment of those who entered, the facemasks weren’t the surgical type — despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of the nationally produced blue masks (azulitas) are piled up in state producer Gardis’s warehouse — but instead they are cloth ones, and priced at 30 pesos each.

In the shop, a leather apron reaches 1,400 pesos, whilst a belt, of the kind worn by dock workers and heavy goods handlers, costs 400, a bag 800 and a durable small suitcase, 2,000.

Everything comes from the state company Thaba, dedicated to the production, in different factories across the country, of “protective equipment of all kinds”, including gloves, aprons, wristbands, bags, sunshades and tents. The company has also been designated to produce baseball gloves.

“So many potbellies came here yesterday for this nonentity?” a woman commented as she left the shop, disillusioned, alluding to the high functionaries who inaugurated the shop on Tuesday, including the first secretary of Havana, Luis Antonio Torres Iríbar. “Soon they’ll even be inaugurating with big fanfares a state shopping trolly full of Slushie drinks”. continue reading

Located in Calle Suzarte, in the district of Palatino, the establishment’s objective is, according to Tribuna de La Habana, “to satisfy the population’s needs, looking for ways to make prices competitive”. The official statement emphasises this last point, reiterating that costs will be “overall lower than the informal market, those of the TCP (self employed workers) and the new types of non-state management”.

The opening of a new pesos shop in the middle of an economic crisis which is gripping the Island is an increasingly rare event. If we add the presence of the highest party leader in the city, the expectation created among potential customers was quite high, but it only took a few hours for any excitement to disappear.

The parade of officials didn’t end with Torres Iríbar: on Wednesday, the Minister for Communications, Mayra Arevich Marín, visited the shop “to test the use of electronic payments in Cuban pesos, facilitated via the platforms Transfermóvil and Enzona”, according to the Thaba company’s Facebook page.

On the same day that Arevich congratulated the employees on their skill with the payment technology, a dozen customers became frustrated outside the shop doorway because an audit was stopping the sale of goods inside. “What starts badly, ends badly”, concluded an elderly man who decided to retrace his steps and come back another day.

Translated by Ricardo Recluso

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A Cuban Teacher Destabilizes the ‘Roundtable’ TV Program With a Lesson in Patriotism

“I was not mistaken when I said it was a controversial concept,” Zamora Oria said nervously and hurried to take back the floor from Fernández Batista. (Captura)

14ymedio, Havana, 18 January 2023 — None of those attending the Mesa Redonda (Roundtable) program broadcast this Friday on Cuban Television could hide their astonishment when Professor Fabio Fernández Batista said, in front of the cameras, that “the pride of being Cuban has been lost.”

Fernández Batista began the debate by attributing Cuban patriotism to a “healthy” nationalism that can be verified throughout the Island’s history. His intervention initially followed the concepts that are navigated at the University of Havana, where he is a full professor. However, he quickly demanded a more “flexible” understanding of patriotism that is not reduced to the geographical.

The professor got up and explained that “there are people who lived all their lives in Cuba and are less patriotic than José Martí,” while others “are in Miami, and right now they are more patriotic than some of those we meet on the street. These are realities that can be shocking,” he admitted, before journalist Oliver Zamora Oria, host of the program, tried to tone down his words.

“I was not mistaken when I said it was a controversial concept,” Zamora Oria said nervously and hurried to take back the floor from Fernández Batista. The professor did not have the opportunity to speak again until the final minutes of the program, and he warned that he was going to be “undisciplined.”

“Patriotism cannot be connected exclusively to the idea of heroic resistance, ’here we are, resisting, like the mambises,’” he said sarcastically. “The homeland also means construction of the future, the crystallization of dreams, collective realizations,” he said, pointing out later that one could not live only from the “past” but that it is necessary to seek a future “of success and prosperity that we can make happen.”

Cuban patriotism is also being “challenged by the deep crisis that is currently marking the reality of the country,” Fernández Batista lamented. “Every day I have access to the WhatsApp posts of all my students,” he said, “and there are many jokes that they share. The central idea is ’how terrible to have been born in Cuba’ and ’how happy I will be when I’m not here’.”

That displeasure is the reason, he said, that “right now there are people crossing the Rio Grande heading north.” To avoid this escape we need to “design a successful country, one that is prosperous for its citizens and capable of understanding the plurality and diversity of the Cuban reality.”

The academic criticized the “allusions to the patriotic” Cuban Government, describing it as “distant from efficient communicative practices” and mentioning the film Inocencia (2018), by Alejandro Gil, as an example of an “effective” audiovisual product. “It’s not the rule, it’s the exception,” said Zamora Oria, trying to bring him back in line, but Fernández Batista did not let himself be interrupted and spat out: “Those ideas where the homeland simply means resistance or holding firm don’t win over the young.”

The host of Mesa Redonda contradicted Fernández Batista and stated that “patriotism has been fundamental when it comes to facing these moments,” alluding to the protests against the Government that have taken place since July 2021. The professor said he agreed but pointed out that he was also concerned about the “daily heroism” of someone who is “standing in line, resisting.”

Zamora Oria preferred to direct himself to the other participants and concluded the debate by stating that it had “lived up to” the concept they were debating. The discomfort of the panelists did not end until the credits of the program had finished.

Professor Nancy Chacón, Rebel Youth journalist José Alejandro Rodríguez, Lil María Pich, a specialist of the Martiano Program, and the graphic humorist Adán Iglesias, of the DDT supplement, who intervened through his cartoons, were also invited to the Mesa Redonda. Everyone admitted that “leaving the country” was a “paradigm” for Cuban youth and didn’t attribute the causes of the exodus to the Government but rather to “the situation” or “cultural factors,” “education” and even “religion and emotionality.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Siglo 21 Calls to ‘Checkmate the Regime’ Instead of ‘Rescuing the Dying’

Blanco believes that “in the short term” there will be a change in Cuba and that the military will play a fundamental role. (EFE)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, 18 January 2023 — The “governance system” in Cuba, an indebted Country, without credit or resources and with growing protests and an unending exodus, “could break at any moment” and it is not the time to “strengthen” the cause of the crisis, warns an analysis conducted by a new “ideas laboratory” in Miami and Madrid.

During a press conference on Tuesday, historian Juan Antonio Blanco and economist Emilio Morales, two of the members of Cuba Siglo 21, an organization founded last December, said, “In Cuba even the ideology has collapsed.”

Their objective, with this and other published reports is for those who have to deal with or negotiate with Cuba to know “the nature” of the system and “where the true power lies,” they said.

In their opinion, there has never before been an opportunity like the current one to “checkmate the Cuban regime” and stop playing games that end in a “draw,” as, according to them, has been happening internationally since the triumph of the Revolution in 1959.

Although he says that “the future is never predetermined,” Blanco believes that “in the short term” there will be a change in Cuba and that the military will play a fundamental role, unless what historians refer to as a “black swan” appears on the scene, a circumstantial event which could suddenly change everything.

If the military are the ones that lead the change, it remains to be seen whether they will impose an opening that is only economic, in the style of Vladimir Putin’s Russia, or also political to move toward democracy. “What is not viable is to rescue the dying,” he asserts. continue reading

Although Morales and Blanco maintain that the solution must come from Cubans, they exhort the US to consider what sense does it make at the moment to relieve the pressure on the Government of the Island for failing to meet the needs of the population.

A record number, over 300,000 Cubans entered the US through the Mexican border in 2022 and now the Government led by Joe Biden has established a quota of 360,000 visas for them and for Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Haitians.

“The crisis will not be resolved by strengthening those who have created the instability in Cuba,” says Blanco, the former President of the Cuban Foundation for Human Rights, based in Miami.

The preliminary analysis published today Cuba Siglo 21’s web site is based on the idea that Cuba is no longer a socialist state that tends to the needs of its citizens, but rather a “mafia state” in which an “opaque oligarchy” which surrounds the “Castro clan” controls the country’s resources, according to the report.

The true power in Cuba — states the report — is not the “bureaucratic, institutionalized” government, but rather the oligarchy represented by the Gaesa consortium, which, according to the data analyzed, has $8.2 million in capital and controls 70% of the economy and 95% of the finances.

Gaesa, which belongs to the Armed Forces, has its businesses registered outside the Island, in Panama, Luxembourg, and other countries and not as Cuban businesses, states the Cuba Siglo 21 report.

According to Morales, Gaesa is probably the company with most hotel rooms in all of Latin America, more than 37,000 distributed among 117 hotels, despite the declining number of visitors to the Island.

“Mafia state is not an epithet, it is a reality,” said Blanco, who during the press conference linked Gaesa with international organized crime and with illicit activities such as money laundering.

Morales stated that Gaesa also obtains resources from remittances worth millions, which Cubans abroad send to their family members, as well as the medical missions abroad.

According to Morales, who is a well-regarded consultant on the Cuban economy, Cuba is in “bankruptcy,” although the Paris Club forgave $42 million in debt in 2015.

The debt acknowledged by the government is $20 billion but that does not include the $15 billion and $18 billion it owes Venezuela and the $6 billion to Argentina, to mention a few, as he said.

To recover the sugar industry, which once was the largest producer in the world and now must import to satisfy the domestic market, they will need $10 billion and the same amount to transform the energy grid.

If the trial against the Cuban state in British courts for non-payment ends up in a conviction for Cuba, Morales predicts it will result in a long list of similar lawsuits and embargoes on Cuban goods in other countries.

Translated by: Silvia Suárez

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The Reform of Land Ownership in Cuba is no Longer Expected

A Cuban farmer plows the land with oxen (CC)

14ymedio, Elías Amor Bravo, Economist, 19 January 2023 — Without a doubt, the sector of the Cuban economy worst managed by communist leaders is agriculture. Communist recipes, applied from the first moments of the revolution, with the so-called “agricultural reform,” or the creation of the harmful INRA (National Institute of Agrarian Reform), caused the collapse of a sector that, before 1959, was competitive and produced enough to feed the population and export surpluses. The communist reforms of the land led to the current situation, in which leaders continue to develop one legal framework after another, convinced that laws, regulations and administrative provisions can achieve the miracle of increasing agricultural production. But they don’t get it.

This is illustrated in two articles published in the State newspaper Granma that try to justify the legislative activity of the Ministry of Agriculture and that formalize a balance of rules that, in no case, have served to increase production.

The results are in sight. The agricultural sector has been decreasing its GDP for three years, and it seems that 2022 will have closed with equally unfavorable results that question the rules and laws adopted in agricultural and livestock matters, since they do not serve to arrange anything, much less to stimulate the production and marketing of food.

The failure of the communist policy applied to the agricultural sector has many reasons, and all of them are well known. The leaders are busy in what they call “improvement of the processes of production and marketing of food” without going to the origin of the problem, which lies in the technical and legal conditions of land ownership and the means of production. If you want to adopt policies that eliminate obstacles to producers and that give incentives to agricultural activity in the country, there is no choice but to go to land ownership. continue reading

It’s not necessary to publish a myriad of legal norms, but to go to the origin of the problem that blocks agricultural production in Cuba. It is not a matter of applying partial solutions to “move the earth,” but of listening to and attending to the voices of the Cuban guajiros, who insist on producing food in spite of the countless obstacles, the main one being the availability of land and the dependence on communist political decisions for the viability of their production.

In essence, the problems of poor contracting with the productive base, defaults on payments or low prices that don’t serve to buy crops from peasants and cooperatives, and many more that affect the lack of food in the ration stores and markets, have their origin in the concentration of land ownership in the hands of the state and the weakness of the land delivery model, as a patch solution, to a structural problem. What’s needed is to modify the communist constitution of 2019.

If such access to private property is not regulated, and the appropriate legal guarantees not established, which requires a Basic Land Ownership Law, the rest of the legislative and regulatory activity of the Ministry of Agriculture will be worthless pieces of paper and won’t help resolve the conflicts arising from the existing legal framework since the land confiscations of the 1960s. The Vietnamese were the last to turn around the land rights framework with the Doi Moi reforms and in five years became the main exporter of cereals in Asia.

What has the Ministry of Agriculture been working on in 2022?

The list of topics gives an idea of how far the regulator is from the needs of the sector. The famous “63 measures” that have not served to boost agriculture and the “28 of livestock” have been a good example of failure. Little has been known about the update of Decree 225/1997 on personal violations of the regulations for the control and registration of livestock and purebred breeds through the approval of Decree 70/2022, except that they exist.

The Law on Promotion and Development of Livestock, which updates a 1974 regulation, approved at the last session of the National Assembly, has been in force for a short time, but there are serious doubts that it serves to produce more (the cattle are still owned by the state). The same goes for the approval by the Council of State and the Council of Ministers, respectively, of the Decree-Law and the Decree regulation, which implement the policy for the production, development and use of biofertilizers, biostimulants and biopesticides for agricultural use, or the new draft Decree-Law of Agricultural Cooperatives.

Also highlighted is the May 2022 Law on Food Sovereignty and Security and the subsequent plan of July, which is described as “a decisive step not only in the interest of the protection of the right of everyone to healthy and adequate food, but also to strengthen and perfect the processes that go from production to the consumption of food, based on the endogenous capacities of each territory.” But the fact is that food problems not only continue, but have also been exacerbated by prices that go far beyond the purchasing power of wages and pensions.

Likewise, work is being done on the updating of the Turquino Plan Policy, the development of the decrees that will implement the Agrarian Extension and Agroecology policies, which are on the Legislative Schedule for November 2023, and, as a highlight of this year, the drafting of the Land Law.

It’s good that the regime describes the norm that regulates the land as the “main course.” It is a pity, however, that this Land Law, the most urgent and necessary one, is the last of the projects that are intended to be undertaken this year. Although little or nothing is known about what is intended with this rule, its content could be essential to change the state of the agricultural sector and give it a boost, as long as the obsolete ideologies that prevent the economy from functioning better are left behind. If they miss the opportunity to turn the agricultural sector around by 180 degrees, as happened with the aforementioned Livestock Law, which left the crucial issue of cattle ownership undecided, everything will be as usual, and the problems will remain unresolved.

The Land Law must act, from the perspective of a new legal framework for land ownership rights in Cuba, as the core of reference of the policies and regulatory frameworks of the sector, even if it goes against the provisions of the communist constitution of 2019. Constitutions are born to be modified, and the Cuban government could start such a process.

The regime recognizes that its agricultural policies and legal norms don’t mean immediate food on the table for Cubans. And they are right, in view of the failures, but this is not because those policies are unable to remove obstacles to producers and give incentives and bonuses to agricultural and forestry activity, but because the land should be the property of those who really work it and make it productive.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A Naked Man in Front of Calixto Garcia Hospital, a Stark Image of the Chaos In Cuban Healthcare

“Is he sick? Has someone brought him to be taken care of?” inquired an old man without getting an answer. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 19 January 2023 — A half-naked man lying on the pavement was the first thing to be seen by those who approached the Calixto García hospital in Havana this Thursday afternoon. The sad “reception” was just a preview of what they would see inside a room packed with patients, with employees shouting rudely to try to organize the chaos, and doctors who can barely prescribe medicines as they are not available in any pharmacy.

“My China, you can’t be there!” A hospital worker warned an elderly woman who was on crutches and was waiting for the result of a blood test in a broken tone. “Get up because you can’t stay here if you’re not from this area!” The employee insisted the lady move from the waiting room of the urology clinic to the main area, where all the seats were occupied.

To one side, the hospital cafeteria made it clear on the menu that it is a “third category” service open 24-hours-a-day. “Give me an empanada because everything else is very expensive,” complained another patient who was waiting to be treated for fever and a severe headache. “Don’t even ask for the fried rice, it’s half raw,” advised another customer of the diffident business, who had been disillusioned having paid 100 pesos for the failed recipe.

The sad “reception” was just a preview of what they would see inside a room packed with patients. (14ymedio)

“Next!” yelled a young woman who had just come from seeing the ENT. A man helped an elderly gentleman up from his seat and two other patients ran for the position after several hours on their feet. After a few minutes, the boy and who looked like his grandfather left the consulting room. “They have prescribed him dipyrone [Metamizole], which is not available in any pharmacy,” the young man warned, “all this time here for nothing.”

When leaving through the main door, both had to avoid the naked man who was still lying on the ground, hindering the passage of ambulances and the movement of patients. “Is he sick? Has someone brought him to be treated?” inquired an old man without getting an answer. The sun beat down over the thin figure on the ground, who no one approached, while the bustle from the interior of the building was heard from outside. “I don’t want anyone in this area who doesn’t have a consultation here!” a rude employee yelled.

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