14ymedio

Cristina Vives, Independent Art Curator in Cuba: ‘What We Do Is Seen With Suspicion’

Vives reports that in 2014 they realized that they had to be more “aggressive” publicly and decided to position themselves on social networks. (EFE)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Laura Becquer, Havana, 16 July 2023 — – Promoting art independently and privately in Cuba continues to be seen with “suspicion” and leaves those who are dedicated to that activity in a certain situation of “vulnerability,” says curator Cristina Vives, with 30 years of experience in the sector, speaking in an interview with EFE.

“Thirty years after being independent and successful, what we do is viewed with suspicion, and that is directly proportional to being controlled, observed and questioned all the time,” says Vives from her studio in Havana, a magnet in the country’s art world.

This family project, which began with Vives and her husband, the renowned Cuban photographer José Alberto Figueroa, arose in the midst of the deep crisis of the Special Period of the 90s in Cuba. Now it also includes their daughter, Cristina Figueroa.

For Vives, going beyond the framework of state institutions at that time, with the collapse of the socialist bloc in Europe and the economic, political and social bewilderment that it meant for Cuba, was a “suicidal leap.” But she has “never” regretted the decision.

“Since the end of the 80s there was a galloping crisis of cultural institutions in which many of the most prominent artists left the country looking for other paths, avoiding censorship and creative limitations. Everything was in decline,” she recalls. continue reading

It is in that panorama that Vives and Figueroa set up a studio in their apartment in the Havana neighborhood of Vedado, an initiative that is currently a benchmark for the private management of contemporary art on the Island.

“We surround ourselves with the most outstanding, novel, groundbreaking and curious of Cuban art of the 90s, and we fill the space with works of young creators such as Tania Bruguera, Belkys Ayón and Raúl Cordero, among others, who left the Art Institute between 1992 and 1994,” Vives says.

She emphasizes that the studio, later named Figueroa-Vives, also arose from the “frustration of a great attempt to collaborate with the cultural institutions. That’s when we said, ’no more’.”

“The years have passed, and it’s no surprise how we think and act. We can be uncomfortable, but now they’re used to it; there is more tolerance,” she continues.

Her trajectory, with a dozen exhibitions in Cuba and other countries, several explorations and a network of collaborators, does not guarantee anything. “We continue to walk a tightrope,” says this Cuban curator.

“We will always be vulnerable, as long as we are not a recognized, legally respected and supported institution,” laments Vives, who, even so, specifies that “if there is something to defend, it is the ability not to be afraid.”

Despite the three decades that have passed, Vives establishes comparisons between the current situation and that of its beginnings. Now, she points out, there are “sensitive loopholes in cultural leadership and in the strength of the institutions,” something that, together with the “almost massive exodus of a lot of artistic talent,” reminds her of the Special Period.

“Second acts (of a crisis) are impossible to resist,” comments the curator, who talks about the need to reinvent herself and the feeling of continuing to move in a “space of vulnerability.”

Vives feels that now “it is easier” for them to dialogue with the new generations who run some cultural institutions of the Cuban State because “they come with a spirit where ideological guilt does not touch them.”

They are not so contaminated,” says her daughter, who is in charge of the online shows of the family art studio.

In 2014 they realized that they had to be more “aggressive” publicly and decided to position themselves on social networks and manage a website so that their message reached many more people and could connect with more galleries on and off the Island.

“If you believe in art, you support it. And we have done that by trying to unite our ability to curate exhibitions with the help of entities like the Embassy of Norway and that of Spain, which have supported us a lot,” she explains.

This collaboration has allowed them to achieve visibility even outside Cuba and also to maintain the projects, says Figueroa, who points out the recent joint exhibitions between artists from the Island and the Spanish studio Nave Oporto.

Both have a very clear purpose 30 years after throwing themselves into this “suicide”: “To get the (artists) who are (in Cuba) to breathe and produce, and those who have left to return.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Have Patience, the Part To Fix the Water Pump ‘Is Coming by Boat’ and Will Arrive in Cuba in a Month

Havana residents in the municipality of Playa expect to be without water for a month. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 13 July 2023 — Some residents of the municipality of Playa in Havana have spent five consecutive days without water, this newspaper has learned. The suspension of the service adds to the long list of breakdowns suffered by the entire capital, and the government assures that work is being done to offer solutions.

“We have been without water for five days, and not even a single watertruck has made an appearance,” said one of the residents, who attributes the suspension of the water supply cycle to a break in the pump due to lightning. “After almost a week, we have almost no water left in the tank.”

The resident, owner of a private home full of Spanish tourists staying until the weekend, regrets that the restoration of the service will take between twenty days and a month, since the part that the pump needs is not available in the country and its replacement “is coming by boat.”

The discomfort of the residents of Playa, in the absence of ways to solve the water supply problem, contradicts the reports offered this Wednesday by the official media Granma, which says that the Aguas de La Habana Company has already taken charge of the situation. continue reading

“Extending the cycles” of water supply, spacing its distribution and temporarily alleviating the shortage with tanker trucks are two of the main measures adopted, the company reported.

It also recognized the poor situation of water supply services in districts such as Cerro, Plaza de la Revolución, Diez de Octubre, Centro Habana and Habana Vieja, which persists due to the deficit in the central system.

The populations west and south of Havana are recovering thanks to the installation of the necessary equipment, but the company has not been able to offer a solution to the eastern municipalities.

This insufferable situation inspired singer Luis Alberto Vicet Vives, known as “La Crema,” to upload a music video on his YouTube channel on Thursday that criticizes the deficient water and electricity services. He approached the subject matter with his usual humor, claiming that the services are stable and assuring that the hardships are not suffered by “the manager.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Giving Hotels and National Resources to Foreigners Will Not Pay Cuba’s Huge Debt

Ricardo Cabrisas, Deputy Prime Minister of Cuba, during the renegotiation of the debt with the Paris Club in 2020. (Cubadebate)

14ymedio, Juan Izquierdo, Havana, 15 July 2023 — The option of resolving Cuba’s external debt with the transfer of domestic resources to foreign companies, defended this Wednesday by the pro-government professor Juan Triana Cordoví, has been refuted by economist Pedro Monreal. Triana considers this option a way to refinance and “revitalize” socialism on the Island; for Monreal, it poses the risk of “being insufficient and undermining sovereignty.”

Triana, who teaches Economics at the University of Havana and writes a column in OnCuba, raises the need to renegotiate the Island’s debt and clean up the image of the country, which has become “one of the highest risks in the region” in terms of investment.

To do this, he suggests that, in a hypothetical negotiation, one could make use of the “assets” that in theory belong to the “people of Cuba,” although they are specifically managed by their “administrator”: the State. Triana refers, first of all, to hotels, which he prefers not to deliver completely to foreign companies but to turn them into owners of “part of the shares.”

He also alludes to the 2,417 state companies, of which – he calculates – only 12 (0.4% of the total) are really “strategic” and carry the weight of the national economy. Triana recommends that these companies that “decide the game” do not touch each other, partly because some of them are already shared with foreign entities: this is the case of the Canadian Sherritt International, whose debt to the Island is paid by the overexploitation of Cuban nickel and cobalt mines; Havana Club, managed together with the French Pernod Ricard; and Habanos, which is partly owned by Spain. continue reading

The negotiation would be done with the rest of the state companies, which could be saved from their financial mediocrity if they are shared with foreign investors, who would work, without intending to, to “save” socialism on the Island.

To these two elements, Triana adds idle lands and idle plots in cities, where there are already “several buildings built by capitalist real estate companies,” such as the Miramar Business Center. The formula of the exchange of assets, the professor acknowledges, could be questioned, but after all, he concludes, “it’s something that began more than thirty years ago when that first contract was signed with a foreign capitalist and in just a few months the first five-star hotel in Varadero was born.”

However, Triana does not place the key to taking the step in the will of the State, which conveniently blocks the economic movements of the country, but in “consensus” with the people, to whom he recommends “explaining” what is intended to be done.

Precisely from this erroneous argument – to assume that the Cuban people have some control over the management of the national economy – Monreal starts to refute Triana’s suggestion. In a series of Twitter threads, the economist explains not only why the massive exchange of assets to pay off the debt is impracticable, but also the serious political risk it entails for Cuba.

Affirming that the people own the state assets is, at the very least, a “controversial” budget when it comes to reasoning the possibility of an economic opening. “Power,” says Monreal, means the ability to “decide a difference” and have a specific “property.”

“It could be difficult to validate the exercise of the power of the people, specifically of the wage earners, within the framework of an economic package such as the ’arrangement’ that has ’compressed’ wages and that disproportionately puts the cost of the adjustment on the workers,” Monreal summarizes. “Explanations to the people are problematic when they are politically treated as a ’clay’ to mold and not as an active subject (citizens) with effective capacity to promote or stop public policy proposals.”

In addition, the Cuban people do not have “effective citizen spaces for criticism of the Government,” which makes it impossible for them to participate in decision-making.

The economic aspect of the problem is even more serious, and to analyze it, Monreal refers to the data that reflect the great “scale” of the Cuban foreign debt, whose “recent worsening” leaves very little room for action, even for the State.

The economist starts from a central and unquestionable argument: “Cuba’s accumulated external debt is today greater than the Gross Domestic Product,” and the hyper-devaluation of the Cuban peso in 2021, after the Ordering Task*, was the final blow to the country’s ability to assume reimbursement in the current situation.

The country had to disburse 1.606 billion dollars to pay for debt service in 2022, at the same time that it recorded a deficit of 1.629 billion in its current account, which reflects a total income (exports of goods and services) lower than expenses. These alarming data point to a “severe contraction of the resources” to confront the debt.

The increasing deterioration of the current account has an impact on the foreign exchange reserves that Cuba has, says Monreal. In addition – and although the official data offered by Havana are outdated – the current crisis precedes the coronavirus pandemic, one of the usual pretexts the regime uses to justify the impoverishment of the country, and it is related to a “sudden increase in short-term debt,” which complicated the conditions of payment to creditors.

That stagnation put Cuba between a rock and a hard place in front of international banks and their suppliers, including the Paris Club. The information published by this last body exposed the different renegotiations that the Havana regime has been forced to undertake with its creditors since 2020.

Looking for a payment solution based on the exchange of assets is dangerous economically, says Monreal, especially because, considering the scale of the problem, what Cuba can offer is “relatively small.” Therefore, he insists, the real balance of such a measure would be paid politically and would not free Cuba from its status as an “international pariah” for its economic discredit.

What is left for Cuba – which has already delivered, as Triana observes, its “crown jewels”: minerals, tobacco and rum – are health services, communications, the domestic market in dollars and its dominance over remittances from abroad. The Cuban State is limited, Monreal maintains, in negotiating these remaining assets, in part because it has always kept them under strict control.

The market remains in pesos, which would have to be “sweetened” to have some attraction for the foreign investor, through tax privileges. However, this process would be an obstacle, the economist considers, if you want to “privatize” state enterprises progressively, a process, Monreal says, that is characteristic of all the reform processes initiated by the communist parties in power, “with disparate results.”

The alternative could be, proposes Monreal, the agricultural sector: to promote private agricultural production to guarantee the supply of food in national currency and allow producers to carry out operations, even with large companies outside the Island.

This transfer of state agricultural assets to the national private sector – a system that Monreal calls “officially approved” – could be beneficial, if accompanied by other measures, to reduce the external debt. The result? A double benefit: to guarantee the food sovereignty that Cubans crave so much and, in short, to protect national sovereignty.

*The Ordering Task is a collection of measures that include eliminating the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC), leaving the Cuban peso as the only national currency, raising prices, raising salaries (but not as much as prices), opening stores that take payment only in hard currency, which must be in the form of specially issued pre-paid debit cards, and a broad range of other measures targeted to different elements of the Cuban economy.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cubans Will Be Without Hot Dogs until August

Maintenance work at the Sancti Spíritus factory forced the production of sausages to stop. (Escambray)

14ymedio, Havana, 15 July 2023 — Hot dogs, the great lifeline of the Cuban family table, will decrease in stores in the coming weeks after the temporary closing at the Sancti Spíritus sausage factory, the only one of its kind in Cuba. The industry stopped the engines in order to carry out “extensive” maintenance, which will last until the beginning of August, the director of the Business Unit, Luis Ignacio Sariol Maceda, told the Escambray provincial newspaper this Friday.

The official explained that since the inauguration of the plant, in 2019, machinery imported from Italy had not received maintenance and the deterioration was already reflected in production volumes. Initially, the technology had a capacity to produce eight tons, a figure that had been reduced to just two due to “technical problems”.

This problem had already been exposed in September 2022, when the plant managers indicated that they barely worked part-time due to the lack of spare parts for the machinery. The official press then assured that the necessary parts to restore capacity to factory levels had already been imported and that the only thing left to do was “resolve” the supply of meat in the face of the livestock debacle.

Nine months later, Sariol Maceda has indicated that they already have the “advice of Italian specialists” to review the production line of one of the foods most in demand by Cubans. The official explained that they have allocated 500,000 euros to obtain most of the pieces, “many of which are already in the UEB Perros Calientes de Sancti Spíritus itself and the rest are in the process of arrival”. The importing of the cooling shower and the purchase of special bearings for the vacuum pump are still pending. continue reading

Although national production depends on a single factory, American brands and, to a lesser extent, Brazilian brands, enter the market

The shutdown of this plant represents a hard blow to Cubans’ diet, who largely depend on this sausage, which can be obtained at relatively affordable prices. Nor does it require special conditions for its conservation, apart from refrigeration, and it can be prepared using several recipes.

Although national production depends on a single factory, American and Brazilian brands enter the markets, the latter ones to a lesser extent. The latest presentations shipped from the US are more similar to sausages, in larger packages of up to three kilograms. However, they are only available in networks of freely convertible currency (MLC) stores, or online sales sites designed for Cubans residing abroad to buy food for their relatives on the Island.

We are hoping that no setbacks occur, added the director, so that the repair schedule is not interrupted and the plant is reactivated at the end of July or the first days of August. To date, the work on the refrigeration system has been completed and the materials have been changed to meet the temperature requirements in the sausage manufacturing process.

At the moment, the factory is dedicated to the preparation of other foods, including salami and 60 tons of ground beef per month destined for medical and children’s diets and for the rationed ‘family baskets’.

The plant is the great meat consumer in Sancti Spíritus, leaving popular markets and even informal commerce without supply. However, due to the fall in the sector, they have sought raw materials to manufacture sausages, previously made with pork, minced chicken or beef. Last September, they detailed that the formula for this sausage includes 50% of these types of meat, plus 50% starch and water.

Translated by Norma Whiting
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A Little Dictionary for K

It was also a harmonic gesture that, at 91, Kundera has donated his books and papers to Brno, his native town. (EFE)

14ymedio, Xavier Carbonell, Salamanca, 16 June 2023 – Books. I have just read that, over the last few years, Milan Kundera has lost his memory. It’s dramatic that the only real tool that the novelist can count on is so volatile, it overflows and wears out, the years take it from us. I read Kundera for the first time aged 18 or 19. I remember the book itself perfectly – and it makes me sad to think that one day I will forget it – ripped apart, withered, a book whose pages I let fall out at one time by accident.

It was, of course, the story of the confused love between Tomás and Teresa, Franz and Sabina, and the mysterious crossings over of those lives – it was not their remoteness that made me feel less familiar with them.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being – very easy to read but very difficult to understand, according to its author – it was the first novel I bought after leaving my country. I wrapped it in newspaper, disguised the cover, so that when I returned no one would take from me this book that was finally mine. When I finally left my house, my city and my things for the last time, it remained behind. I’m not thinking of going back to get it. Ten years have passed since I last opened that book – as a youth, of whom only a ghost remains – when I came across a sentence: “The eternal return is the heaviest burden”.

Escape. After all the love affairs, the books swapped and lost, the conversations in which nothing much is said, the university evenings, the coffee and the pedantic clouds of smoke, what is left to the reader, of Kundera? It’s the feeling that the books have made an older person of them, they have offered them the memory of a man who aspired to have no biography and whose life itself was, in the end, the story of a century.

To read him in a communist country, where his books enjoyed the ’privilege’ of censorship, was to count upon having a manual for survival in this ochre, gelatinous world that produced communism. And nevertheless, the great lesson that I learnt from Kundera was to escape. To run away from all the leaflets and compromised literature, the parties and ideologies, to reject those who expect a simplistic narrative in black and white or in black and red, a pro or anti-government novel, a story through which the publishers can exploit you as exotic, combative, militant, a martyr of freedom. And even further: not to enter into anyone’s club where they have conveniently already received an audience and applause, on one side or another, or found people to whom they could sell the petty drama of the exile or of the conformist. continue reading

Dissident. I imagine that Kundera hated the word dissident more than any other. The perverse implications of this term – separate, unorthodox, Cain-like – sound like the uttered revenge of someone who remained, an insult from the ’right-minded’. No one wants to be defined as kind of tumour or a leper that was obliged to leave the country. No one wants their books to be marked out for their bitterness or neglect. Dissident no: I’m a novelist, said Kundera too many times. Opposition to communism isn’t dissidence, but individualism and autonomy. The price is solitude. Nothing more tempting.

Complexity. When a writer abandons the shell imposed on him by his environment – the regime, history, the goodbyes, other writers – only the fabric of memory remains. In this dark room, in the coldness of Paris or some other city, out walking with a woman or smoking alone in a cafe, the words come back to you again. “I want my literature to be united with life and for this reason I defend it from every possible attack”. That is the only true liberty, the only true homeland that a novelist can aspire to. All the rest are fictions that are much less useful than any you could invent, and that no one would read.

Music. To open oneself up to the infinite possibilities of a novel and live for months or years inside the world you’re creating – it can’t be compared with any other job. I find an example in the interview that Joaquín Soler Serrano conducted with Kundera in 1980. He remembers his musician father – the writer himself made a living by playing the piano in restaurants – and offers this lesson: have respect for ’form’ that can only be learnt from music: the changes of rhythm, counterpoint and motifs, the subtlety of composing a book to arrive at the echo, the only echo that remains when memory is gone.

Laughter and forgetting. “Optimism is the opium of the people” writes the protagonist of The Joke, in a postcard to his communist girlfriend. At one time I met a young Czech girl and asked her to pronounce the original title, Žert. It sounded – I wouldn’t know how to pronounce it today – like a gob of spit, a rebellious guffaw, which encapsulated not only that novel itself but also the whole of Kundera’s work and his attitude to austere authority. I demanded she repeat the sound over and over many times. She didn’t get, what for me was the revelation of that word, so elastic and remote, perhaps because to understand one’s own language one also needs to abandon it. I don’t know what happened to the girl, who went back to Prague shorty after.

Finale. You learn how to live and how to write from Kundera. You learn an ethic and a certain kind of healthy cynicism, a mistrust of power and its messengers – success, money, party membership card – and the vertigo of entering into one’s own solitude. The fact that, at 91 he has donated his books and papers to the city of Brno, his native town, was also a harmonic gesture. Or at least a way of saving his memory – the heaviest burden – before death came looking for him.

Translated by Ricardo Recluso

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The Cuban Film School Rejects the Imposition of a New Director and Asks for ‘Transparency’

The Academic Council refuses to recognize the new directive and warns about the violation of statutes. (Facebook/International School of Film and Television)

14ymedio, Havana, 17 July 2023 — The Academic Council of the International Film and Television School of San Antonio de los Baños (EICTV), in Mayabeque, expressed its disagreement with the imposition, by the Ministry of Culture, of Waldo Ramírez as the new director of the center. The measure, described as “abrupt, arbitrary and silent,” adds to the list of recent clashes between the guild of filmmakers and the cultural authorities of the Island.

“We didn’t know about the appointment because of the way it happened, and we demand a transparent decision-making process,” said the statement, which was signed by 13 members of the Council.

The arrival of Ramírez – founder of Televisión Serrana, in Santiago de Cuba, and representative on the Island of the Venezuelan multinational network Telesur – to EICTV is the indirect consequence of the dismissal of Ramón Samada from the presidency of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC) and the assumption of the office by the vice president of the Institute, Susana Molina, former director of EICTV.

Numerous filmmakers, teachers and students linked to the school have also expressed personally, on their social networks, their non-recognition of the new directive, protected by the statutes of the institution. They also demand that “the proper selection process” be carried out in a transparent and “consensual” way, with the opinion of the student body – which includes foreign students – and the workers. continue reading

The community of teachers, graduates and filmmakers linked to EICTV also opened a petition, so that all those involved with the School can express their support for the Academic Council with their signatures. “We believe in the possibility of restoring a useful and necessary art for our nations, as well as promoting it in the only way we believe possible: by creating a free cinema,” the statement concludes.

The Cuban Filmmaker Assembly also commented this Sunday on the decisions of ICAIC. In their statement they made it clear that “Cuban cinema does not belong to a ministry or an institution. They [the institutions] have to put themselves at the service of the artists and not the other way around.”

Critic and film professor Gustavo Arcos also shared his opinion regarding the debate on his Facebook account. “It is not Samada, it is the structure that puts and removes Samada that must be reviewed, transformed or, if necessary, deleted. Managers and officials make mistakes; no one is perfect, but there is a system, a model of order and command that has sustained, for too long, that institutional violence that we have once again just perceived.”

It is not the first time that EICTV has caused headaches for art officials in Cuba. Last May, some students, mostly foreigners, had complained about the poor conditions of the school by writing on the walls of the center “Down with the leadership. Thieves.” Cuban writer Wendy Guerra, a graduate of the center and currently residing in the United States, then warned that the film school “is a non-governmental institution” where Cuban students and “some young foreigners” receive scholarships or pay for their training, so it is natural that a “minimum of conditions” is required for their stay.

At the end of June, the discomfort of the filmmakers caused more than a hundred directors, screenwriters and actors to have a meeting with leaders of the Ministry of Culture and the Communist Party to face the controversy unleashed by the censorship and unauthorized dissemination of the documentary La Habana de Fito, by filmmaker Juan Pin Vilar.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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‘Cuban Film Institute President Is Released From Office’ After the Scandal Over the Censorship of ‘Havana de Fito’

Ramón Samada Suárez during his visit to Animados ICAIC in 2020. (Facebook/Animados ICAIC)

14ymedio, Havana, July 16, 2023 — The Board of Directors of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC) decided to “release from office” the president of that institution, Ramón Samada Suárez. According to the official statement published this Saturday on the entity’s Facebook page, his departure was due to a “personal request.”

Although the brief note details that in the meeting, where Samada’s end as president of ICAIC was decided, “acknowledgment was expressed for the results of his work in recent years,” the language of the text points to the official’s fall from grace.

The Assembly of Cuban Filmmakers reacted this Sunday to Samada’s departure, assuring that “he has been a valid interlocutor on this route and we know of the interest, energy and time he has dedicated to improving the ecosystem of Cuban cinema.” The creators added that “Cuban Cinema does not belong to a Ministry or an institution. [The institution] has to put itself at the service of the artists and not the other way around.”

The director of the Gibara International Film Festival, Sergio Benvenuto Solás, reacted along the same lines. “We all know that a ’personal request’ is has no value when it comes to pictures.” The artist specified that what happened to Samada was a “dismissal” that “at this political moment, it is an irresponsible act of the Ministry of Culture and of the authorities that have approved it.”

Benvenuto Solás considered that this is a “person who has been disrespected, because it is absolutely public that it was not his decision to show Fito’s Havana documentary,” alluding to the broadcast on national television of this material without the consent of its director, an act “unanimously repudiated by the guild and whose erratic decision does not culminate in generating rejection.” continue reading

But the official is also criticized for his repressive attitudes. In November 2015, during a meeting of the G-20 group of filmmakers, the then director of ICAIC, Roberto Smith and Samada tried to expel the activist Eliécer Ávila from the premises, alleging that he was a “counterrevolutionary.” Several filmmakers argued that the meeting was “open to the public” to which Samada replied: “Yes, but not for the counterrevolutionaries.”

Now, the dismissal of Samada occurs in the midst of a new turn of the screw in the censorship suffered by artistic creation on the Island. At the end of April dozens of Cuban filmmakers attacked the “cultural institutions” for suspending the screening of Havana de Fito , a documentary directed by Juan Pin Vilar, together with the audiovisual Existe by Fernando Fraguela and Yulier Rodríguez, and El encargado , by Ricardo Figueredo, at the headquarters of the theater group El Ciervo Encantado.

The filmmakers were criticized for “not offering public and satisfactory information about this decision,” in addition to the fact that “an unfinished copy of the documentary [La Habana de Fito ] was later presented on a Cuban television program, ignoring the refusal of its director and its producer, and with the explicit purpose of discrediting them.”

The filmmakers’ malaise made it possible for more than a hundred directors, screenwriters and actors to hold a meeting with leaders of the Ministry of Culture and the Communist Party at the end of June to address the controversy unleashed by censorship against Pin Vilar. Subsequently, the film director, Miguel Coyula, released recordings of various fragments of the meeting with officials, including Alpidio Alonso and Fernando Rojas, Minister and Vice Minister of Culture, respectively, as well as Vice Prime Minister Inés María Chapman and the head of the ideological department. of the Communist Party, Rogelio Polanco.

Along with the announcement of Samada’s departure from the presidency of Icaic, it was also reported that the vice president of Icaic, Susana Molina, will assume the direction of the institution. The official previously served as director of the International Film and Television School, located in San Antonio de los Baños.

The same statement said that Waldo Ramírez de la Ribera would take over as director of the Superior Council of the New Latin American Cinema Foundation. His past as founder of Televisión Serrana was highlighted, he served as Cuba’s representative on the multinational channel Telesur and, more recently, as first vice president of the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television.

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Cuba: The Violence of the 26th of June, the Peace of the 11th of July

The moment when several young people overturned a patrol car at the corner of Toyo, in Havana, during the protests on 11 July 2021. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Pedro Corzo, Miami, July 15, 2023 — We have reached the second anniversary of the peaceful protests led by young Cubans on 11 July 2021, and close to the 67th anniversary of the bloody attack on the Moncada barracks, organized and directed by Fidel Castro on 26 June 1953.

The protests of July 11th did not have the objective of seizing power, as was always the ambition of the Castro brothers and their acolytes, although it is fair to recognize that the demands for “freedom” from these young people, who have been imprisoned, imply a deadly demand to all tyranny.

The attack of July 26, 1953 was the starting point for the destruction of the Republic of Cuba. What seemed to be a new revolt in the convulsed history of the nation, was the beginning of a tragedy that has demolished Cubans, and the country, to its deepest roots.

In reality, it was another violent act in our history, perhaps the most poorly planned and worst executed under the command of a particularly ambitious gang member with messianic airs, who never spared any damages in order to achieve his goals. Undoubtedly, the attack on the military stronghold transformed Fidel Castro into a kind of star of the cult of violence on the Island and abroad. He vertiginously stopped being a university gangster with a pistol at his belt, to become the champion of all those who wanted to do justice, for themselves and in their way.

Unfortunately for Cuba and the hemisphere, Fidel Castro, although he failed as a ruler, succeeded in his intentions as a snake charming piper because he managed to get many people to follow him and even impose his political formula of taking power and keeping it until death. For examples, at least four: Hugo Chávez, Evo Morales, Nicolás Maduro and Daniel Ortega. continue reading

The seduction that Castro’s proposals exercised over his national and foreign supporters does not differ much from that achieved by his teachers Adolfo Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Leon Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin. Regardless of the ideology that each one of them promoted, they always found eager subjects to implement their delusions, which have always resulted in more violence, destruction and death.

It is true that the attack on the Moncada Barracks and the Granma expedition were a resounding failure. In addition, the guerrilla in the Sierra Maestra, the supposed invasion to Las Villas and the final attack on a falsely armored train, have been oversized feats, we must recognize that the survivors of the assault, particularly the Castro brothers, imposed a regime that is close to sixty-five years old and outlived its main builder.

It is a great truth that Castroism has nothing to be proud of, but unfortunately the history of Cuba cannot be written without making reference to the mandate of Fidel Castro, for many scholars, the most extensive dictatorial exercise in history.

Fidel Castro’s return to politics was the consequence of the lack of identity of purpose of another dictator, Fulgencio Batista, who decided to release the Moncada attackers a few months after their confinement despite having caused the death of 18 of his men and wounding 28 others. Nine of the assailants died and 11 were wounded, although, according to this information, numerous attackers were executed immediately after their capture, sparing Fidel Castro and his brother, Raúl, their lives, apparently, even to kill one indulged in indulgences.

Paradoxically, the protesters of 11 July 2021 without murders to their charge, received much higher sanctions than Fidel, who, being directly responsible for dozens of deaths, was sentenced to 15 years in prison, of which he only served 22 months, without limiting his human rights.

The results of the 2021 protests, the blood shed, was the work of totalitarianism, with several hundred prosecuted and sentenced, with at least 36 of them sentenced to between 5 and 25 years in prison for the crime of sedition, is another strong evidence. Since the dictatorship does not voluntarily give up its prerogatives, it must be wrested from it, as the Bronze Titan, Antonio Maceo, wrote: “Freedom is conquered at the edge of the machete, it is not requested; begging for rights is typical of cowards incapable of exercising them.” Honor to the youth of July 11.

Honor to the youth of July 11th.

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Panama Will Give Two-Year Residence Permits to Cubans and Other Irregular Migrants

A crowd of Cubans planted in front of the Embassy of Panama in Havana, in March 2022. (14ymedio)

14ymedio/EFE, Madrid, July 17, 2023 — Cubans who have been living in Panama irregularly for at least a year can, like other foreigners in the same situation, obtain a “temporary protection permit” beginning on Monday.

As announced by the Panamanian National Migration Service (SNM) on Friday, the permit will give immigration status for a period of no longer than two years.

“This temporary permit is intended to provide protection to the irregular migrant population that is in a vulnerable condition, subject to risks and dangers from the smuggling of migrants and the different forms of human trafficking,” said the SNM.

All foreigners, without distinction of nationality, who have remained in the country for a period of not less than one year will be eligible. Appointments to start the procedure can be requested from this Monday, July 17, through the SNM website.

“People benefiting from this permit will be able to reside in Panama for two years, complying with the tax, social security, health and legal obligations required,” said the official statement, which does not specify the cost of this visa. continue reading

Before the expiration of this temporary permit, beneficiaries must make the change of status for one of the migratory categories in force in the country, the letter added.

The official information also clarified that “every foreigner who maintains a valid passport and meets the requirements required by the rule will be able to opt” for the new permit.

Panama has 4.2 million inhabitants, and there are 249,000 foreigners, about 6% of the population, according to the results of the national census carried out in 2023.

The Central American country, economically strong in the last decade, received thousands of foreigners, especially Venezuelans fleeing the crisis in their country, who were able to obtain a temporary migratory status through the Crisol de Razas program, highly criticized by xenophobic nationalist sectors.

The country allowed the free transit of Cuban travelers until March 2022, when it announced the establishment of visas. In those days, the migratory exodus was beginning its peak, and Panama was one of the trampolines for the citizens of the Island on their route to the United States via Nicaragua, which four months earlier had announced a visa waiver.

Panama’s decision caused strong protests from those who already had purchased their tickets and could not change them without losing their money. After three days planted in front of the Panamanian embassy in Havana, hundreds of them who were traveling up to March 16 managed to be exempted from the visa requirement.

The cost of the visa is 50 dollars and allows a stay of 24 hours in transit.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Customers’ Disenchantment With the ‘State Methods’ of a Privatized Bakery in Havana

Some customers from other parts of the Cuban capital wait in line at the bakery on Carlos III and Castillejo streets. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 15 July 2023 — With a temperature of 33 degrees Celsius, this Friday morning the neighbors in Key West, Havana and customers from other parts of the Cuban capital waited in line for the bakery on Carlos III and Castillejo streets to start dispatching the customers who crowded in earlier.

“Since 4:30 am we haven’t had electricity,” the seller justified to the line, which now was starting to get uncomfortable with the midday sun. Holding umbrellas or taking refuge in the brief shadow projected by a nearby facade, the buyers wondered what had happened with that place.

The bakery, recently repaired, passed from the hands of the state-owned Cuban Bread Chain to a private company, as this newspaper confirmed. “They removed all the state workers and brought their own staff,” said a neighbor who had recently heard about the change in ownership.

The news that the central bakery, which brought customers from several municipalities, had reopened in private hands raised expectations and sparked fantasies. Some neighbors said that the bread was going to be “like before” but didn’t specify what moment in the past they were referring to. True or not, between curious people and buyers, the line on the outskirts of the store was extended in a short time.

A chubby man who blocked the passage of the curious explained that for now only two products were being offered: five small round loaves for a price of 20 pesos and a baguette for 70 pesos. “Soon there will be other varieties,” he said. Meanwhile, in the line, another seller began to check identity cards, and customers expressed their surprise that in a private store the “revolutionary method of sale” in force in state stores was being applied. continue reading

Rationing the amount that can be purchased, asking for identification to access the counter and regulating how many times a customer can stand in line are widespread practices in state stores. If anything distinguishes, so far, the private ones, it is to have eliminated these mechanisms in their businesses.

“These places have a bad vibe. Although individuals come to work in them, they maintain the state methods,” said a young man in the line who seemed skeptical at the hope that private companies will work better than those of the government. “In the end, they are always the same ideas and the same schemes,” he said.

But every rule has its trick, and the Cuban customer has been training for decades to circumvent the restrictions.

Despite the warnings of the sellers, a lady kept the newly purchased bread in her bag and went back to the end of the line. “Surely now she is calling some relative to come with his card to buy more,” a young woman said with suspicion. “I came thinking that this was going to be different, but it’s the same line, the same five loaves per person and the same socialism,” she added, disappointed.

As soon as we mention the concept of “private enterprise,” most Cubans already imagine a better assortment of products, much higher prices than in official shops, better treatment of employees and the freedom to choose, combine and carry as much merchandise as you want and whatever you want. But that perception could be changing in the face of the reality that is being imposed.

Some passers-by came this Friday to inquire about “the bakery that is now private,” but few overcame the difficulty of having to wait so long to take home a baguette, the so called “good bread.” “I don’t have the patience for this,” said one. Five minutes later, the man who controlled the door announced: “That’s it for the bread. You’ll have to wait another half an hour.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Closes the Semester with More Than 2,300 Protests in all Provinces

The residents of the town of Guatemala, in the municipality of Mayarí (Holguín), took to the streets to demand the restoration of the water service. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 7 July 2023 — The Cuban Conflict Observatory (OCC) counted a total of 414 public protests on the island in June. In total, there are 2,337 demonstrations in the first half of 2023. The index for June, which constitutes an increase of 60.46 % compared to the same month of the previous year, also exceeded the average of 384.6 monthly protests for the first records of the year, and increased by 22 events compared to May.

In Havana, a province designated by the Observatory as the most active territory, 172 “rebellious expressions” were found (ten more than the previous month), among which the Miami-based organization includes a musical staging of Los Misérables, on June 25 at the Martí Theater in the capital. However, although the work includes a song to freedom, it was not a demonstration, as reported by this newspaper.

The platform also assures that the conflicts spread throughout the 15 Cuban provinces and the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud, this being a sign of widespread disagreement with the state administration and “the abandonment of the population by the Government”. continue reading

Of the more than 400 events, 229 –55.3% of the total– were related to economic and social rights

Of the more than 400 events, 229 –55.3% of the total– were related to economic and social rights, 95 were generated by citizen insecurity and the rise in violence (robbery, begging, femicides), 44 were related to food insecurity and another 47 to deficiencies in health, water and electricity services.

The report includes, as an example, the complaints of the population after the heavy rains in the eastern part of the country due to landslides and power cuts, the so-called “downed rudders” strike in Havana –when the government tried to limit the prices of private carriers despite the scarcity of fuel and its high price in the informal market– and the “empty pallets” strike by vendors in agricultural markets in Sancti Spíritus.

For their part, protests related to civil and political rights totaled 188 events (45.4% of the total). Of these, 124 were triggered by repressive actions against opponents, independent journalists, and activists.

The Cuban Observatory for Human Rights, registered in its monthly report at least 291 repressive actions in the month of July

The Observatory registered within this category, in addition to the staging of Les Misérables, the protest of the Assembly of Cuban Filmmakers for the unauthorized transmission on Cuban Television of Fito’s Havana, by director Juan Pin Vilar.

Another organization, the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights, recorded in its monthly report at least 291 repressive actions in the month of July on the island. Nearly 80 were arbitrary arrests, according to the platform, and 211 were carried out against the civilian population, among them those that include common prisoners and relatives of opponents and activists.

The figure for June, grouped with the rest of the reports for the first five months of the year also written by the platform, documents a total of 1,940 government repression events in the first half of 2023 alone.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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Rosmery’s Murderer’s Threat to Her Relatives: “I Am Going To Kill Everyone”

"Estamos ahora todas en un cuarto, solas, trancadas porque él amenazó con matarnos", denuncia la familia. (Cortesía) — “Now we are all in a room, alone, locked because he threatened to kill us.” (Courtesy)

14ymedio, Yoani Sánchez, Havana, 15 July 2023 — Yesmely Peña Rondón’s voice sounds broken and fearful over the phone. She is locked in a room with her sister, her mother and her nephew trying to stay alive despite the death threat they all received. Her crime: being the aunt of Rosmery Ponce Peña, 23, murdered on July 10 by her ex-partner in Güines, Mayabeque province.

“He’s still on the run, they can’t find him,” Peña Rondón told 14ymedio about the alleged murderer, José Luis Domínguez Velázquez. The man, who seems to have coldly calculated the crime, waited until Ponce Peña was visiting a friend to shoot her in the head through a window. “She arrived at the hospital alive, but she was no longer conscious,” says the aunt.

“Now we are all in a room, alone, locked because he threatened to kill us,” details the woman who regrets not having received any police protection so far. In the vicinity of the Amistad sugar mill, the family fears that the young woman’s murderer will break into the house at any moment and shoot them. “Our house is isolated and people are afraid to visit us.”

The family reports that they do not know details of the weapon used to kill Ponce Peña, although they have heard rumors that it is a shotgun owned by Domínguez Velázquez. The day Rosmery Ponce Peña was murdered, her two-year-old boy “was not with her because he stayed with his grandmother. He has many problems, when he wants to attract attention he hits his head on the ground and doesn’t speak. We believe he is traumatized by the abuses he experienced with his father.” continue reading

“They are calling us from a number and when we pick up there is a man who laughs, he just laughs and does not say anything. We have reported it to the police but they do nothing,” she adds from the confinement to which they are forced by fear that the murderer will return for new victims.

Tired of the beatings and mistreatment, a few days ago the young woman decided to break off the relationship and called her family to get her out of the abuser’s house. Before they left there, José Luis Domínguez Velázquez issued a warning: “don’t worry, I’m going to kill you all.” The fateful prediction has begun to come true and the family fears that the murderer will complete it.

But before she was shot, Rosmery Ponce Peña dreamed of “rebuilding her life,” her aunt recalls. “She was looking for work, she hoped to work snack bar,” she details. She “wanted to focus on her son” despite the fact that the abuser had warned her that without him “she would never be happy.” The first thing that Domínguez Velázquez tried to kill was her hope and then he continued with her body.

Before she was shot, Rosmery Ponce Peña dreamed of "rebuilding her life," her aunt recalls. (Courtesy) — Before she was shot, Rosmery Ponce Peña dreamed of “rebuilding her life,” her aunt recalls. (Courtesy)

The moment of separation was hard, says the aunt. “He didn’t want to give us anything, not even the child’s crib. The child is now sleeping on a mattress on the floor and we don’t even have our clothes,” recalls Peña Rondón. The alleged murderer lives four kilometers from the family home and “his whole life has been dedicated to doing [informal] business.”

His good relations with local police, about which he bragged about in public, heighten the family’s fears that he will get away with it. Several reports, compiled from relatives and neighbors, point to Domínguez Velázquez as a “snitch” who reported on what the residents of the area were doing.

“He was always surrounded by policemen who, in addition, did business with him. The guy was a door in two directions, he played being ‘one of the people, but we all knew that everything that was said in front of him ended up being known,” adds a resident of Güines who prefers anonymity. “He was always bragging and the worst thing is that he fulfilled part of his bragging.”

Domínguez Velázquez frequently beat his wife, according to family reports. “Every so often we had to go to their house, we filed a complaint for mistreatment but we had to withdraw it because he told us that if he went to jail he would only be in jail for one year and he was going to kill us when he got out,” recalls the aunt. .

The alleged murderer is also considered a person “with many resources.” Domínguez Velázquez, 49, “had the money in bags, we have also learned that he had a criminal record of robbery, rape and car accidents with deaths.” That economic solvency could help him leave the island. The family has heard rumors that he is preparing his escape through Mexico, but this suspicion has not been confirmed.

Before that fateful day, Rosmery Ponce Peña dreamed of giving her son what she never had. “She wanted to be happy because she could never be happy with that man, during the three years they were together. He didn’t even let her contact her family, he pushed them away,” denounces the aunt. “They met at a party in the park in the town. At first it seemed like it was good, but it turned out to be nothing good.”

Now, locked in a room with her relatives, Yesmely Peña Rondón insists that the attacker calculated everything: “It was a planned murder, he said it on several occasions and he fulfilled it, unfortunately he fulfilled it.”

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Due to Pressure From Cuba and Its Allies, the EU Decided Not To Invite Zelensky to the Summit With Celac

Zelensky complained that several “regional presidents and dictators had truncated his trip.” (Presidency of Cuba)

14ymedio, Havana, 15 July 2023 — The veto of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua will prevent the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, from attending the summit of the European Union and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (EU-Celac), which will be held in Brussels on July 17 and 18. According to the Argentine media Infobae, a senior European official announced that the three countries, whose alliance with Moscow has been strengthened in recent months, blocked the invitation suggested by the head of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez.

“President Zelensky is not going to attend,” said the senior official, who hopes that at the EU-Celac meeting – which had not been in session for eight years – the “collateral damage in other parts of the world will be discussed from the Russian aggression, which has caused damage and fragilities, which has created food insecurity and increased inflation.”

“All this will probably be discussed,” added the official, who clarified that “there was already an opportunity to discuss the war and the position vis-à-vis Moscow at the EU meeting in Copenhagen, where Russian special representatives participated with an ’active participation in the discussion.’”

Now, however, Europe aspires for Latin America and the Caribbean to dialogue “on how to end this aggression,” and that means accepting the conditions of countries such as Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, such as the absence of Ukraine, which, he alleged, is not part of the EU or Celac. continue reading

Although Zelensky himself said that Pedro Sánchez, head of the government of Spain – the country that presides over the EU until December – had invited him to the summit, Infobae claims to have had access to anonymous statements from a Brussels spokesman who says that the Ukrainian president never had a formal request to attend.

In a brief press conference, Infobae points out, Zelensky complained that several “regional presidents and dictators had truncated his trip,” although he did not clarify which governments had opposed it.

The president, who leads his country’s resistance against the invasion of Vladimir Putin that began in February 2022, was able to attend the recent NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, although Ukraine was not given entry into this organization.

The suggestion by Celac to invite Zelensky to the summit was also made months ago by the president of Uruguay, Luis Lacalle Pou. At that time, the Argentine government leader Alberto Fernández – then president of the Latin American organization – was ambiguous about the issue but made it clear that the decision to allow Ukraine’s presence at the summit should be a prerogative of Celac.

Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua are fully aligned with Russia. The reception of diplomats, the commercial exchange – particularly in the oil sector – and the constant transfer of senior officials from these countries through Moscow have turned the governments of Miguel Díaz-Canel, Nicolás Maduro and Daniel Ortega into Putin’s stalwarts, and they are key points for Russia’s strategy in the region.

In the case of Cuba, the link has occurred at the highest level, and both regimes have starred in an unprecedented rapprochement since the Soviet era. The Island has clearly positioned itself in the international arena in favor of Russia, and the version of the conflict in Ukraine from the official Cuban press follows the dictates of the Kremlin.

Díaz-Canel, who is currently making a state trip to Portugal where he intends to negotiate that country’s hiring of 300 Cuban doctors, will attend the EU-Celac summit after the plenary of the European Parliament approved a resolution on Wednesday for the Government of the Island to put an end to “the policy of repression, intensified in recent times.” In addition, it demanded the “immediate and unconditional release of all detainees solely because of the exercise of their human rights, the withdrawal of abusive criminal charges and that the exiles be allowed to return.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Mexico Has Paid Havana About 10 Million Dollars for 718 Cuban Medical Specialists

Last week a group of Cuban specialists arrived in Guerrero. (Facebook/Salud Guerrero)

14ymedio, Ángel Salinas, Mexico, 15 July 2023 — The Mexican Government paid Cuba $9,667,115 between July 2022 and May of this year for a contingent of 718 doctors, according to a source from the Ministry of Health who requested anonymity. Of the specialists, 128 are still receiving training or processing the necessary documentation to practice, and the remaining 590 have already been distributed in 11 states of Mexico.

Among the 128 Cuban health workers who are in training, there are 18 specialists who were rejected in Morelos for not having a professional card. “These doctors are all in the same state, and their documentation is being expedited to be forwarded to another region.”

According to the official transparency portal – a publicly accessible information platform – the contract, which entered into force in May 2022, requires a monthly disbursement of 1,177,300 euros by Mexico for the services of 610 Cuban health workers. The payment was initially established under the name of the Comercializadora de Servicios Médicos Cubanos, but since September it was redirected to the company Neuronic Mexicana, which is a subsidiary of Neuronic S.A. Cuba.

Since 2018, according to the official, Neuronic Mexicana has been representing the products and services of the Island’s biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, and the president, Tania Guerra, is a Cuban. The company “is in charge of receiving the salary of the Cuban specialists.” In summary, it has “custody of and administer the funds that the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) allocates to the contingent,” he added. continue reading

In the Mexican state of Colima, Mexican doctors have questioned the fact that Cuban specialists are given accommodation and food. (Facebook/Government of Colima)

The doctors, who arrived in the middle of last year with the intention of establishing a base in the Montaña de Guerrero, one of the most troubled points in Mexico due to its high poverty rates and the presence of several cartels that dispute the drug transport channels, have been relocated to the states of Baja California Sur, Campeche, Colima, Michoacán, Nayarit, Oaxaca, Sonora, Tlaxcala, Veracruz and Zacatecas.

According to official data from the federal Ministry of Health, only 43 specialists in cardiology, otolaryngology and gastroenterology were sent, although they had also promised the arrival of pediatricians. Despite this, the state government, led by an ally of President López Obrador, proclaimed the increase in consultations and the improvement of medical services.

In the Ometepec region, located on the Costa Chica de Guerrero, three Cubans joined the Tomás Molina hospital in the last week of June. These doctors “cannot talk to the media,” a nurse from the medical center itself confirmed by telephone to 14ymedio. “Annel [the cardiologist] cannot attend to them; both she and the dermatologist and the other doctor need authorization from their coordinator,” Alfredo González Lorenzo, the nurse replied when this newspaper requested direct contact with the Cuban specialists.

As part of the Guerrero health project for this year, the deployment of four Cuban psychiatrists in mental health caravans, in addition to offering itinerant services, will collaborate in the hospitals of San Marcos, Tlapa, Coyuca de Catalán and Chilpancingo. The plan for mental health specialists has been questioned, because the main causes of death in the state are diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular diseases.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Cuban Government Once Again Uses Military Service Recruits As Firefighters

The photos published by the provincial media show the youth of the injured, in uniforms with the insignia of the Ministry of the Interior. (Facebook/La Demajagua)

14ymedio, Havana, 13 January 2023 — At least five people were injured, one of them seriously, as the result of a fire in a resin warehouse in Manzanillo, in the province of Granma. The accident occurred this Thursday around 5:00 in the morning in a warehouse of the state company Astilleros del Golfo, the official press reported.

By telephone with the Celia Sánchez Manduley Hospital, where the injured are being treated, this newspaper learned that the individual who is in serious condition is the head of the fire command, 35 years old. Of the rest of the wounded, who were also working to extinguish the fire, at least two of them, age 19, were recruits from compulsory military service. The other two were 20 and 21 years old, respectively.

The head of service for burn victims, Francisco Andrés Pérez Suárez, told La Demajagua that the patient in serious condition has 15% of his body affected. “We are assessing his progress due to the characteristics of the injuries, but vigilance must be maintained to avoid any complications. It all depends on the local evolution of the burns.” The article also clarifies that “the necessary supplies and resources are available for the care of patients.”

The provincial newspaper, which does not explain how the fire started, says that in the warehouse there were “more than a hundred tanks with resin, catalyst and over 88 pounds of cobalt, products with flammable characteristics that are used in the manufacture of boats.” Some social media commentators said that several explosions were heard in the vicinity and that the flames reached a considerable height. The depot is located in an industrial area where it was necessary to evacuate several work centers that store chemical materials such as ammonia. continue reading

The Gulf Shipyards, the text highlights, turned 60 in April, and “their collective is considered among the six most important in Cuba.”

The photos published by the provincial media show the youth of the wounded, in uniforms with the insignia of the Ministry of the Interior.

It iss not the first time that the Cuban government has used recruits to extinguish fires, a job that is highly specialized. The most tragic precedent is the disaster of the Matanzas Supertanks. Several of the fatalities, 17 in total, were young people who were on compulsory military service.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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