Hablemos Press

Hablemos* Press: Who We Are

Hablemos Press Information Center (CIHPRESS) is a Cuban non-governmental, non-profit agency, founded on 3 February 2009, by independent journalists and human rights activists, for the purpose of collecting and disseminating news inside the country, and for the rest of the world.

Our headquarters are located at No. 394 Santa Marta Street, Apartment 3 (top), between Franco and Subirana Streets, Centro Habana municipality, Havana. Our phone numbers: 879 93 31 or (mobile) 5 319 69 27.

Vision:

We aim to become the most important independent press agency inside the Island.

CIHPRESS maintains as its premise a respect for Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which establishes the right of every individual to freedom of opinion and expression. Given the entrepreneurial evolution of independent, alternative journalism–which began to gain strength since March 2003–CIHPRESS seeks to ensure that anyone who so desires can express what happens, from every corner of the country, so that what is read in Cuba and the world is not limited to the pro-government newspapers (official organs of the Castro regime, which monopolize and manipulate the national and international news scene to create a false image of the Island’s reality).

We know that in Cuba, the official communication media convey what suits them to society and public opinion, being that all information venues are in the hands of the Castro regime. Therefore, the members of CIHPRESS is today launching this site, www.cihpress.com, as a way to communicate to the world information that is gathered about events in Cuba.

With this in mind, we are also now beginning to distribute communication devices that contain alternative viewpoints, produced and edited by our members. In these devices, we are setting forth our vision of the Cuban reality.

We count on more than 16 correspondents and approximately 50 trustworthy collaborators across the entire country. We maintain informational relationships with international organizations, Web sites and digital publications. We collaborate on broadcasts with radio stations and news agencies throughout the world.

Objectives:

Our principal objective is to obtain information from within Cuba and distribute it to any part of the world, through any means, be it telephone, telegraph, radiotelegraph, radiophone, oral and graphical, and whichever media are available through our technical resources; and to cover all aspects of politics, culture, commerce, finance, art, literature, sports–in short, anything that constitutes information.

1- Maintain correspondents, or collaborators, in all provinces and municipalities of the country, including the special municipality of the Isle of Youth.

2- Provide information services to news agencies, newspapers, correspondents, radio and television stations, and Cuban civil organizations that are pro-democracy and defenders of human rights.

3- Advance collateral activities to support community development.

4- Contribute, through our work, towards the Government of Cuba immediately freeing political prisoners and prisoners of conscience, and ceasing to detain citizens for freely expressing themselves and differing from official policy.

Our Services Are:

News, commentary, reporting and communications, regarding society, culture, sports, human rights violations, politics, archival services; and various analytical reports for radio, Web sites, print media and television.

Reporting: Prepared for daily news media in the Information Bulletin: Weekly Summary, and in the monthly publication, Daily Bulletin.

Radio: Informational programs.

Television: Distribution of disks of protest music, social and cultural projects, and informational programs edited by our members.

Graphics: Daily information for the international network. Our archives include more than 50 disks containing photographs and videos.

Documentation: We have an archive of pro-democracy and newspaper literature dating back to January 1, 2009. Additionally, we have logged almost 1,000 microfiche records containing data which are continually updated about opposition members. Since May, 2007, our database includes more than 1,800 documents, which are accessed regularly by colleagues and other human rights organizations, and agencies that request information via the Internet and by telephone.

“The word is for speaking the truth, not for concealing it.”
–José Martí

*Hablemos = Let’s talk

Posted 28 August 2009

Translated By: Alicia Barraqué Ellison