Artist Tania Bruguera Files Defamation Complaint Against Cuban Television

The artist Tania Bruguera (left) filed the complaint at the ICRT headquarters. (Courtesy)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana | 15 January 2021 – On Thursday, the artist Tania Bruguera delivered a complaint against the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television (ICRT) for the content of a broadcast on Wednesday, in which “they distorted, defamed and created negative states of opinion” about her.

“They misrepresented my work, they misrepresented who I am, what my actions are about, and I decided to submit the complaint to the ICRT due to this discrediting campaign,” the artist told 14ymedio. “We cannot continue to accept that activists and artists in Cuba are defamed and lied about simply because they have a different way of thinking.”

In recent weeks, journalists, independent media and artists have been the subject of attacks and slanders broadcast on the Primetime News segment titled Cuba’s Reasons, and repeated in the official print media. Most of their targets are branded as mercenaries and linked to sources of funding in the United States. This Wednesday they were described as “new operators of the counterrevolution,” who are committed to “an openly anti-Cuban and annexationist agenda,” the latter implying they want Cuba to become a US state.

“We must use legal resources, because this is a government that is believed to be above the law and that constantly violates its own Constitution. We, the citizens, have to start using the laws in our favor and defending ourselves from their abuse,” said Bruguera. She also noted that she filed a defamation lawsuit against the Government in 2018.

Bruguera was one of the artists who stood on November 27 in front of the Ministry of Culture to demand dialogue after the arrests of Denis Solis and the strike by the San Isidro Movement, with which she is linked. Since then, she has been arrested and interrogated several times, for hours at a time. In addition, she has been prevented from leaving her home, which is why the artist has considered herself “under house arrest without any explanation” during this time.

The entire San Isidro Movement has suffered similar situations, with arrests, harassment and surveillance, while the government describes its members as “terrorists financed by the empire.”

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