English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Ana Luisa Rubio, a censored and dissident Havana actress, received a beating outside her home on the afternoon of Friday, 6 September, that caused multiple contusions on her face, head and the rest of her body. A few minutes later I received her telephone call in Artemesia: I heard her terrified voice trying to tell … Continue reading “About the Beating of Ana Luisa Rubio: An Obligatory Reflection”
Interview by Emilio Sanchez Cartas – from Los Andes Internacionales The restless, multifaceted Pardo Lazo graduated in biochemistry from the University of Havana, but left the field after 10 years. Since then he has been working as a photographer and writer. Pardo, who published several books in Cuba, is currently one of the leading independent … Continue reading “Orlando Luis Pardo : “I was afraid when I had no voice, when I started talking, I lost the fear.””
ARTEMISA, Cuba, 4 Septemver 2013, Moisés Leonardo/ www.cubanet.org.- An urgent call regarding the increase in violence against the Ladies in White and other defenders of human rights was presented today to the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights through its Office for Latin America and the Caribbean, through the organization Martí Current. The two-page … Continue reading “Urgent Call to the UN in Support of the Ladies in White and Other Defenders of Human Rights / Moises Leonardo Rodriguez”
The Cuban Legal Association, through several of its specialists, legally dismantle in this video the farce mounted against the writer Angel Santiesteban-Prats, who is currently serving a prison sentence in a high-security Cuban jail. Here are analyzed, from the perspective of the law, the numerous legal and procedural and police violations perpetrated by the Cuban … Continue reading “The Case of Angel Santiesteban: Legally Dismantling the Farce”
Dimas is second from right. Interview with Dimas Castellanos Marti, historian and journalist. From Havana, Felix Sautie Mederos Por Esto! asks: “Unravel the causes of the crisis our society finds itself in (…) The concept of race as a group of hereditary characteristics seems to lack foundation, as a social construction it has a damaging … Continue reading “Interview with Dimas Castellanos”
Photo: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo Owing to the lack of statistics and figures, independent Cuban reporters have to reinvent certain rules when providing information. We don’t have access to government press conferences and no minister gives interviews or comments. Nor can we rival the foreign agencies accredited in Havana. Not having technology, 24-hour internet access, … Continue reading “CUBA Journalism in the street / Ivan Garcia”
This past March 23, the prize-winning essayist, critic and literary investigator Roberto Zurbano, who up until this moment functioned as the director of the Editorial Fund of Casa de las Americas, was dismissed from the position. This measure was taken a few days after the US newspaper “The New York Times,” published an article under the … Continue reading “On Racism There is Still Much to Discuss / Dimas Castellanos”
We make available for anyone who wants to know the truth and have all the evidence of the judicial effrontery against Angel Santiesteban Prats, the complete record and all the documents that form part of this judicial farce behind which they incarcerated him in concentration camp 1580, El Pitirre, San Miguel del Padron, Havana, where … Continue reading “Official statement: We are publishing the complete record of the judicial farce mounted against Angel Santiesteban”
From left to right: Antonio Rodiles, Roberto de Jesús Guerra, Yaremis Flores, Jorge Olivera, and Manuel Cuesta. Photo by the author. HAVANA, Cuba, July 22, 2013, David Canela/www.cubanet.org — Last Saturday the independent Estado de SATS project sponsored a panel discussion among Cuban civil society activists. The participants included attorney Yaremis Flores, journalist Jorge Olivera (one of seventy-five … Continue reading “Cuba’s Civil Society Is Transnational Says Rodiles / David Canela”
Introduction by Tania Quintero On December 10, 2010, without resources, publicity, or fanfare, attorney and freelance journalist Laritza Diversent founded a modest office in her home to provide free, independent advice to Cubans and foreigners on national and international legal issues and human rights. She established the Cubalex Legal Information Center. Over time she was … Continue reading “Laritza Diversent Reports from Geneva / Laritza Diversent”
By Lilianne Ruíz HAVANA, Cuba, May, www.cubanet.org.- Rosa María Payá, daughter of the late leader of the Christian Liberation Movement, returned to Cuba after finishing a tour with the main objective of promoting an international investigation to clarify the circumstances that led to the tragedy on July 22, 2012 that killed Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero. … Continue reading “Interview with Rosa Maria Paya / Lilianne Ruiz, Rosa Maria Paya”
The first Cuban vice-president, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez visited the headquarters of the Cultural Yoruba Association of Cuba this past Monday, days after the Department of State published a document in regards to religious freedom, which alleges that there have been some advances as far as Cuba’s approach in these matters. While the second-in-line of the … Continue reading “Being a Dissident and a Practitioner of Santeria, a Difficult Path / Luis Felipe Rojas”
The German PEN Center for Writers in Prison has pronounced its satisfaction with the release of Calixto Martinez Arias but is now asking for a review of the trials of Jose Antonio Torres, journalist, and of writer and blogger Angel Santiesteban Prats. We call on the authorities to provide legal guarantees that have not been … Continue reading “PEN Writers in Prison Ask for a Review of Angel Santiesteban’s Trial / Angel Santiesteban”
While you slept Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo Ice is dead water. I smell bad, like a homeless person in a subway car in New York. Although my scent doesn’t please me, it belongs to me. Private property in my absolute state of biologisity. Exile is so exciting. All of us have been waiting for this … Continue reading “While You Were Sleeping / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
“Without a strong union there will be no economy,” said Salvador Valdes Mesa, vice president of the Council of State and member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) in the recently concluded plenary session of the National Union of Sugar Workers. An approach which clearly expresses the vision of unions as … Continue reading “Are There Unions in Cuba? / Dimas Castellanos”