14ymedio – Page 205 – Translating Cuba

Cuba’s Central Bank Denies That it is Selling US Dollars

The depreciation of the dollar is linked, according to some experts, among other issues, to the announcement made by the Cuban Minister of Economy. (14ymedio)

EFE/14ymedio, Havana, 31 May 2022 — The Central Bank of Cuba (BCC) denied on Tuesday that it is selling, to individuals, U.S. dollars and freely convertible currency (MLC, the Cuban virtual currency backed by hard currencies). According to the official newspaper Granma, the monetary authority has thus responded to rumors that have arisen after an announcement by the Cuban Government that it would sell dollars to economic actors under certain conditions, a measure that has not yet been applied.

The BCC assured that this is “fake news” that is circulating “on social networks and digital media.” “Don’t be fooled, follow our official channels,” the BCC wrote on Twitter.

The newspaper criticized that “it is the second time this year that an attempt has been made to manipulate the issue.”

It argued that there are those who take advantage of the impact of inflation derived from the scarcity caused by the pandemic and the tightening of U.S. economic sanctions on Cuba.

The country temporarily suspended bank deposits of dollars in cash in June 2021 due to “obstacles” from the U.S. embargo, although banks continued to accept other cash currencies such as euros, pounds sterling, Canadian dollars and Japanese yen. continue reading

In mid-May, the Cuban government announced that it would sell MLC to some state and private economic actors, without specifying the conditions.

The Cuban Minister of Economy and Planning, Alejandro Gil, said that this sale would be “gradual and selective,” at a rate higher than the official rate (24 Cuban pesos, CUP) but without exceeding the informal rate (currently around 100 CUP).

For the first time since January, the dollar traded this week below 100 CUP in the informal market, a depreciation that some experts link, among other issues, to this announcement by the Cuban Government.

This exchange rate is the calculation made daily by the independent media El Toque, which weighs the figures of hundreds of ads for the sale of foreign currency on several websites in the country, and which many experts take as a reference value. For their part, the euro and the MLC maintained values of 110 and 106, respectively.

Alejandro Gil’s statements immediately aroused criticism from experts, such as the economist, Pedro Monreal, who called it “one more nail in the coffin of the ’Order’ and a possible source of illegalities.” In any case, the collapse of the MLC, since last week, seems to be a direct consequence of those statements.

Another factor that has influenced the fall in currencies is the new measures announced by the U.S. government of Joe Biden last week, on May 16, among which is the elimination of the remittances limit of $1,000 per quarter and per person.

This restriction had been in force since 2019, when it was promulgated by then-U.S. President Donald Trump along with other provisions that largely paralyzed the official business of foreign exchange, such as the prohibition of doing business in which the Cuban military was involved. This was the case of Fincimex, blacklisted by the U.S. Treasury in June 2020, which managed remittances up to that time.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Iberojet Will Launch a Direct Flight Between Madrid and Santiago de Cuba in November

The Iberojet flight from Madrid to Santiago will be direct and non-stop and will take place once a week on board an Airbus 330. (Avoris)

Europa Press/14ymedio, Madrid, 1 June 2022 — Iberojet, the Spanish airline of Ávoris Corporación Empresarial, has announced a new route beginning November 11 that will connect Madrid with Santiago de Cuba. The date coincides with the start of the high season in the Caribbean.

This flight, which will be direct and non-stop, will occur once a week on board an Airbus 330. The flights will be able to be booked as of Wednesday on the Iberojet website and on all official channels for sale to the public, and will cost from 283 euros each way.

This direct flight route to the second most important city on the island, by number of inhabitants, will be operational throughout the year.

In addition to operating this direct flight from Madrid to Santiago de Cuba, for travelers who decide to get to know the country in depth, Iberojet offers the possibility of combining the airports of Santiago de Cuba and Havana to enter and leave.

Last December, Iberojet opened its first office at the Miramar Trade Center in Havana. In addition, it has increased the number of flights planned for this summer from three weekly flights Madrid-Havana to five, plus one from Lisbon to Varadero, in high season. continue reading

The strengthening of the connectivity of Santiago de Cuba, made possible thanks to collaboration with the Cuban State, seeks to attract more travelers and promote the economic development of the destination, which hasn’t recovered from the harm it suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Despite the fact that Cuba received 313,908 visitors between January and March, the figure is very far from the 1,470,457 tourists that the island registered in the first quarter of 2019.

Just a few days ago, the British airline Virgin Atlantic decided to postpone the return of its flights to Cuba, scheduled for November 1. Without going into detail, through a statement, it argued that the decision was due to the “complexity of the operation.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Heavy Rains Leave Around 300 Buildings Collapsed in Western Cuba

One of the collapsed buildings in Havana after the rains. (EchezabalJD)

14ymedio, Havana, 5 May 2022 — The formation of Tropical Storm Alex has already left about 300 buildings collapsed with the main impact in Havana, where 148 of these were reported as of Saturday night, according to the State newspaper Granma. At least 53 building collapses have also occurred in Pinar del Río, 32 in Mayabeque, and another 47 in Artemisa.

This has led to the evacuation of more than 8,500 people; some 7,750 were placed in the homes of relatives, and about 800 are in evacuation centers. There are also 321 affected by the interruption of electricity service in Pinar del Río and more than 450 in Havana, where there are four primary and five secondary lines that are out of service. Meanwhile, in Artemisa, there are about 116 customers without power.

On Sunday, Minister of Economy Alejandro Gil pointed out that the main damage was to housing, agriculture and electricity, with about 750 houses affected and 3,200 hectares of tobacco, sweet potato, cucumber and pumpkin crops damaged. He also said that there are 158,000 customers experiencing power outages. Minister of Energy and Mines Livan Nicolás Arronte said that about 4,487 customers in Pinar del Río and Artemisa still don’t have electricity. continue reading

The areas most affected by building collapses in Havana are in La Polar, El Fanguito and El Pentón, all very poor neighborhoods with homes made of light materials.

So far, two deaths have been reported in Havana, a 69-year-old man in Central Havana, who died as a result of a building collapse, and a 54-year-old, who drowned in Boyeros.

A third death was reported in Pinar del Río, where the lifeless body of Yosvel Cabrera Álvarez, 44 years old, who fell into a swollen creek and drowned, was found near the ESPA in the Diez de Octubre neighborhood. Since Saturday night, another person has been missing In this same neighborhood.

Heavy rains have continued to cause flooding throughout western Cuba, and weather stations reported accumulations that exceeded a foot of water.

In the early hours of the morning, authorities pointed out the formation of Tropical Storm Alex, with winds of 80 kilometers per hour and located 1,110 kilometers southwest of Bermuda. Despite the departure of the first cyclone of the hurricane season, the rains will continue to affect the island.

By Sunday, the rains are expected to be more intense in the mountainous areas and on the south coast, while in the west, it will be cloudy with some storms in the afternoon. In southeast Cuba, there will be abundant cloudiness and rain.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Biden Government Officially Revokes Restrictions on Flights to Cuba

A flight of the U.S. company American Airlines during a commercial trip to Cuba. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, 1 June 2022 — The Biden administration announced on Wednesday that it is reestablishing commercial flights to Cuba, which until now could fly only to Havana. The U.S. Department of Transportation issued the order at the request of Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

According to Reuters, Blinken said that the action was “in support of the Cuban people and in the interests of U.S. foreign policy.”

Until now, U.S. airlines could only fly to Havana, leaving Cuban Americans with few options to visit their relatives in other parts of the island.

The measure is part of a policy change towards the island announced in the middle of last month, which includes the resumption of the family reunification program and the suspension of the limit of $1,000 per quarter on remittances, thus reversing some of the toughest measures of former President Donald Trump. It is not known when these last two measures will go into effect. continue reading

The Government of Cuba described Washington’s decision as a “limited step in the right direction.” The Ministry of Foreign Affairs regretted in a statement, issued just over an hour after the U.S. announcement, that the Joe Biden Administration hasn’t eliminated the economic embargo, in force since 1962.

In 2019, the Trump Administration banned commercial flights from the U.S. to all cities in Cuba with the exception of Havana and, in August 2020, went further by suspending private charter flights to all airports on the island, including that of the capital.

These charter flights were used by many Cuban Americans to travel to the island from Miami.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba and the Ninth Summit of the Americas

Cubans on the island love Joe Biden, but outside of Cuba, in large numbers, they love Donald Trump, says Montaner. (EFE)

14ymedio, Carlos Alberto Montaner, Miami, 5 June 2022 -The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has been unleashed and transformed into the Patron Saint of dictatorships – Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. He has threatened not to go to the California meeting if the three dictatorships are not invited. (Since ‘Andrés López’ seems vulgar to him, he uses all his names, to the despair of his American neighbors: Andrés Manuel López Obrador.)

He should be reminded that the first letter, from Clinton in 1994, clearly stated that “these are meetings of democratically elected Heads of State.” Or, at least, belonging to the OAS, and none of the three cases has remained within the organization.

In the Fifth Summit, held in Trinidad-Tobago, inexperienced President Barack Obama was harassed with the issue of the embargo on Cuba. He believed that the end of the embargo was a popular request. It was April 2009. He had started his first term on January 20. In 2014, relations between the two countries had been reestablished. But at the Seventh Summit, in Varela’s Panama, in 2015, Raúl Castro appeared, and they finalized the details for an Obama visit to Havana.

The visit took place in March 2016, very close to the end of Obama’s term. He gave a sensational speech in which he said many things that Cubans longed to hear. Raúl Castro almost accused him of trying to overthrow him and of having ‘hidden intentions.’ However, since that moment, Obama became an idol of Cubans on the island, but someone very confused and naive for the exiled community.

That dichotomy can still be seen today. Cubans on the island love Joe Biden, but outside of Cuba, in large numbers they love Donald Trump. Cubans on the island associate the Democrats with a period of hope and relief from economic misery, and they don’t care if the ultimate goal is to overthrow the tyranny. Simultaneously, Cubans outside the Island abhor any concession to the Díaz-Canel government, without stopping to think that it might lead to the end of the dictatorship.

The First Summit

I remember the First Summit of the Americas. It was in 1994. I was invited by Luis Lauredo, then the Bill Clinton administration’s ambassador to the OAS. There was the purpose of dealing with regional issues within that institution. Cuba was a “regional issue,” and Ambassador Lauredo, with a reputation for being very competent, had the mission of monitoring the movements of what was already called “Socialism of the 21st Century.” continue reading

His role went very well with something I heard him say to a person who knew the intricacies of the Democratic Party in relation to Cuba. In the eighties, Bill Clinton lost re-election as governor of Arkansas for compromising his government with the arrival of 125,000 Cubans through the port of Mariel. After the end of the three minutes assigned to Cuba, the only comment Bill Clinton made was, “I don’t want to be surprised again. I hope the CIA knows what is happening on that Island.”

Bacteriological warfare

They knew it. “The Cubans” were preparing an elaborate plan to make the US intelligence believe that they already had bacteriological warfare ready to face a hypothetical invasion. It was the poor man’s atomic bomb. Placed at the center of the universe by his own personality, Fidel could not believe that the least attractive thing for Bill Clinton was to land the Marines in Cuba.

He thought that this inexperienced young “Gringo,” who had gotten fewer votes than Michael Dukakis, and who was in the Oval Office thanks to the unexpected candidacy of Ross Perot, could not resist the old hypothesis of the “ripe fruit,” a kind of conspiracy theory from the 19th century, by which Cuba’s destiny was to be part of the American nation. Something that Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States (1801-1809), could believe in, but not Bill Clinton, the first president of the USA after 1945 who had not participated in World War II, and who had not even had to deal with the Cold War.

I was returning from a trip to the chancelleries of Eastern Europe, including Russia. They all saw – some more and others less – an opportunity to eliminate Cuban Stalinism, but they invariably asked me, “To what extent is the United States willing to commit itself?”

I took advantage of the visit to Miami to confirm what I already sensed – the United States did not want to take advantage of the obvious weakness of the Cuban government in those hazardous years to hasten the end of Castro’s absurd regime. The thesis of Republicans and Democrats alike was that the Island did not pose a danger to the United States, and it was much more beneficial to sit on the fence than to rush to depose the Cuban government. After all, the regime was totally “rotten,” and had no capacity (as they believed) to do harm.

“And time passed, and an eagle flew over the sea,” José Martí wrote.

We are in the Ninth Summit. There are already two Latin American dictatorships under Cuba’s orders – Venezuela and Nicaragua. Collectivist Marxism has disappeared from the face of the earth. In China in 1976, after Mao’s death, an accelerated return to private property began. But the most important event occurred in the USSR. After its implosion, in 1991, privatization towards “crony capitalism” began. Very soon it drifted towards the elites close to Putin, the so-called “oligarchs.”

In those years, Fidel Castro designed a hybrid compromise between Marxism and tyrannies – State Military Capitalism (CME by its Spanish initials). The CME did not leave investors’ hands or imagination free. Either they conformed to the previous development plans drawn up by the military, or they achieved nothing, thereby amputating the most productive feature of free economy.

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Cuban Independent Observatories Will Record ‘Vicarious Femicides’

With the registration of cases of “vicarious violence” they intend to make visible the lack of protection of the children of battered women. (14ymedio)

Rachel Cruz/14ymedio, Madrid, 2 June 2022 — The feminist Observatories of Alas Tensas (OGAT) and of Yo Sí Te Creo in Cuba have begun to include cases of “vicarious femicide” in their records of victims of sexist violence, a methodology that is applied in Spain and with which they intend to make visible the lack of protection of the children of battered women.

Ileana Álvarez, director of OGAT, says that a paradigmatic case of vicarious violence was the murder of Carlos Duviel Sánchez Estévez, 10 years old, at the hands of his father, in Caibairén, in April 2019. “He is a father who kills his 10-year-old son with the simple aim of inflicting harm on his mother,” she says.

In this case, reported by the journalist Pedro Manuel González, the father was serving a sentence for the attempted murder of the minor’s mother. The man had a history of sexist violence and was on probation when, after obtaining permission from the teacher, he took his son out of school, took him to a secluded place and murdered him.

“You realize that this death could have been avoided if the minimum protection protocols for victims of sexist violence had been complied with, since this man was in prison for having stabbed the mother of the murdered child several times,” says Álvarez.

According to Álvarez, since the independent observatories began to count victims of sexist violence, at least six children have been murdered solely for the purpose of harming the mother. continue reading

“Including other types of femicide in the observatories, such as the vicarious, is important to understand how sexist violence operates, how it is mainstreamed into other areas, and helps to implement effective public measures and policies that allow the prevention and eradication of violence against women,” says the activist.

The model they have taken as a reference is Spain, where there have been 47 murders of minors in the context of vicarious violence since 2013. The kidnapping and murder of the sisters Anna and Olivia Gimeno, aged 6 and 2 respectively, at the hands of their father in April 2021 once again put the spotlight on this type of violence. The Law for the Comprehensive Protection of Children, approved in 2021, has among its tasks the close supervision of the visitation regime in cases where it is determined that there is a risk to minors, as was the case of Carlos Duviel.

In Cuba, however, the public debate on vicarious femicides has not yet been opened. Álvarez points out that it is a difficult issue to make visible in the country, which until recently (2019) denied the existence of femicides.

“If you deny something, you cannot create laws and implement public policies to resolve it. In Cuba there is no law against gender violence and femicide is not criminalized in the Penal Code; there are no shelters, no education in feminism, neither in schools nor in public institutions such as the police, the health system, etc. that help to understand and prevent gender-based violence,” she comments.

Álvarez says that the femicides documented by OGAT and Yo Sí Te Creo are an underreporting, since being independent observatories they do not have the support of the government and must work clandestinely so as not to be criminalized. Cuba’s Regulations such as Decree Law 370, the Gag Law, and Decree Law 35 affect not only the work of the observers, but also discourage the families of the victims from denouncing on social networks or speaking to the independent press. For these reasons, Álvarez points out, “despite the great effort we make, it is impossible to guarantee that we can document all femicides.”

However, Álvarez is optimistic. “You can fight in multiple ways against femicides, and also against vicarious femicides, as long as there is a firm commitment to the fight against gender violence to mainstream all structures of society: it is important to name vicarious femicides, because what is not named cannot be prevented,” she concludes.

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Cuba and China Present the First Patent for Their Joint Pan-Corona Vaccine

Image of the presentation at the National Intellectual Property Office of China of the first patent for the Pan-Corona vaccine. (@EdMartBCF)

14ymedio, Madrid, 3 June 2022 — Cuba and China presented Pan-Corona this Thursday, the first patent for an anti-covid vaccine jointly developed between both countries. The project is located in a joint biotechnological R&D center in Yongzhou and is led by experts from the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB) and the Cuban Biotechnological and Pharmaceutical Industries Business Group (BioCubaFarma).

“Cuba and China present a patent for a Pan-Corona vaccine, developed for current and future variants of coronavirus,” the Cuban scientific institution said on Twitter.

Eduardo Martínez Díaz, president of BioCubaFarma, added that the goal is to achieve effective vaccines against coronaviruses through joint research, so that they transcend the one that causes covid-19.

“Not only would they have value in the current pandemic, but they could also be effective against the appearance of new pathogens belonging to this family of viruses,” says Martínez Díaz.

Gerardo Guillén, director of biomedical research at the CIGB, said that the Pan-Corona project arose at the request of the Chinese side and has the approval of the Cuban Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment. continue reading

Pan-Corona is a recombinant-type antigen, which is the vaccine development platform in which the CIGB has the most experience, with successful antecedents such as that of hepatitis B, in addition to two of the Cuban vaccines against covid-19, one of them Abdala.

This serum is still pending approval from the World Health Organization (WHO), after the necessary documentation was delivered in April to give the green light to the vaccine, whose administration on the island began more than a year ago, as it was endorsed by the Regulatory Authority for Medicines, Equipment and Medical Devices of the Republic of Cuba.

Soberana 02, for its part, has not yet delivered the dossier, although it has announced its intention to do so on an unspecified date. As long as they remain without authorization for emergency use, they cannot be included in the international Covax mechanism, which makes it difficult for them to be sold, sales which, until now, have been limited to a few friendly countries whose pharmaceutical authorities have supported them.

Cubans inoculated with Abdala or Soberana are still unable to fly to the US as they lack a vaccine accepted by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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In His Appeal Trial, Musician Abel Lescay Apologizes for his Offense to a Policeman on July 11th (11J)

The musician Abel González Lescay awaits the result of his appeal, to be announced in July. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 3 June 2022 — “The trial was the same as always. We have to wait for the result. Thank you,” said the artist Abel Lescay on Thursday, after his appeal hearing was held on Wednesday in the court of San José de Las Lajas (Mayabeque). But something did happen that was out of the norm: the young man had the opportunity to speak, something infrequent in this type of process in Cuba.

As revealed by his mother, Isel María Lescay Oliva, to Martí Noticias, the artist, sentenced in the first instance to six years in prison for offending a police officer during the 11J (July 11th) protests, admitted having exceeded himself and argued that his seven-day detention had meant enough punishment. “He said that he had already suffered all the rawness that implied that,” she said.

Lescay, whose hearing lasted until four in the afternoon, claimed not to be a criminal and not to have bad behavior, but to be a musician whose life is to play the piano, a way of life that he asked not to be deprived of.

“[He said that] he recognized that he had exceeded himself, that he had acted badly, that it was not right to offend people with words on the street, much less a policeman. But that what he had done was a rap, which is part of the things he studies and that rap is like that. That they require a certain marginality,” his mother said.

Isel María Lescay stressed that in appeals the defendants are not usually called – “It is something that happens between the lawyer, the judges and the prosecutor” – so her son’s case would be an exception.

The artist has received the support of the Higher Institute of Art (ISA) where he studies as well as from the musician Silvio Rodríguez — traditionally a supporter of the government — who asked from his blog for transparency in the process and for the sentence to be rectified in this instance, although he questioned whether the capacity for amendment in the governmental elite, which he described as a “sect,” exists. continue reading

According to Abel Lescay’s mother, the sentence will be announced in about a month, a long time compared to other appeals that are in court these days. In the same session as the artist there were 18 other people in an appeals trial that reviews the sentences of other 11J protesters from Bejucal, Las Vegas, Güines and Los Palos.

The judges of the Havana Supreme Court traveled to San José de Las Lajas to avoid having to move such a large number of prisoners on that same day.

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Floods, Landslides and Thousands Sheltered from the Rains in Western Cuba

Floods have left some communities incommunicado. (Cortesía)

14ymedio, Havana, 4 June 2022 — Havana reports the greatest damage due to the heavy rains associated with the large area of low pressure in the southeast of the Gulf of Mexico that affects western and central Cuba. The authorities of the capital describe the conditions in the city as becoming “complex” and report two deaths, 111 building collapses, of which two are total, more than 4,500 evacuees and 23 flooded areas.

In addition to “the heavy rains, the floods,” they said the damage was due to “the age of the city,” according to the Cuban Presidency’s Twitter account with a source at a meeting of the National Civil Defense General Staff.

The rise of the Almendares River, the main one in Havana, has forced the evacuation of almost 50 people in the communities of El Fanguito and La Polar, neighborhoods where most of the houses are made of wood and other light materials. The waters rose quickly, and when they withdrew they left a thick layer of mud and garbage, according to Tribuna de La Habana.

The president of the Municipal Assembly of People’s Power of Plaza de la Revolución, Osmani Arcia Peñate, reported that 48 people were evacuated from El Fanguito this Friday to the nearby Pioneer Palace, including six minors and two infants. Vicente Ponce Carrasco Elementary School was was also able to accommodate another 300.

In Pinar del Río, where the rains have caused flooding in several locations, the disappearance of citizen Yusiniel Cabeza La Rosa was reported yesterday afternoon. According to the state radio station Radio Guamá, the 21-year-old, resident of the Ojo de Agua farm belonging to the Santa Lucía popular council north of the municipality of Minas de Matahambre, was swept away by the strong currents of a river that he tried to swim across. continue reading

“Since then, combined forces of the Ministry of the Interior together with inhabitants of the surrounding communities are carrying out search work,” reported the Municipal Civil Defense, which added that “the spillage from the Nombre Dios dam makes it difficult to search.”

Provincial authorities also say that 11 communities continue to be incommunicado, and they ask the population to “maintain discipline” and not cross rising rivers to “avoid the loss of human life.” On Friday afternoon, the body of Yosvel Cabrera Álvarez, 44, who fell into a swollen creek hours earlier, was found.

In Pinar del Río, 4,480 people continue being evacuated, and there have been 302 reports of damage to the electricity service.

“In the provinces of Cienfuegos, Villa Clara and Sancti Spíritus, the rains have been beneficial and so far no major damage has been reported,” reported Presidencia Cuba, while noting that in Mayabeque 17 homes were damaged and the cucumber, melon and corn crops were affected.

On the Isle of Youth, four families were helped, and the biggest problem “is the leaks in buildings,” while in Matanzas the return to their homes of about 250 people who were evacuated began and, in addition, there are 14 homes damaged. In Artemisa, “a severe local storm occurred in the municipality of Candelaria, which affected the roofs of 22 homes,” the local authorities said.

The Institute of Meteorology of Cuba predicts for this Saturday that in much of the western and central regions it will continue to be largely cloudy “with showers, rains and some thunderstorms that will be strong and locally intense,” in some territories, although it predicted that the rains “will gradually decrease in the west in the afternoon.”

He also warned of tidal waves on the south-west and central coast and on the north west. “In the areas of showers and thunderstorms, both the strength of the winds and the height of the waves will increase.”

The heavy rains so far have left three dead in western Cuba and one missing.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Decrease of Protests in Cuba Coincides with Approval of the New Penal Code

Carlos Varela’s performance this Sunday in Havana, where cries of “freedom” were heard.

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, 2 June 2022 — Cuba registered 185 public protests in May, 108 less than in the previous month, according to the report of the Cuban Observatory of Conflicts (OCC) released this Wednesday. The report ties this “decrease” with the entry into force of the Island’s new Penal Code, with its “greater penalization of crimes.”

“Nine months after the popular uprising of July 11, 2021, the cries of ’Libertad’ [Freedom] were not extinguished in Cuba,” the OCC, an autonomous civil society project supported by the Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba, based in the United States, says in its monthly report.

According to the report, among the 185 public protests registered on the island, one occurred in the “largest coliseum in the country,” where the slogan Libertad “rumbled” for several minutes.

“The cries of ’Libertad’ chanted for several minutes at the Sports City Coliseum, during a concert by singer-songwriter Carlos Varela, revealed the mirage of supposed ’governance’ that was intended to be exhibited with the compulsory May 1 parade,” says the statement.

The OCC also attributes the 37% “decrease” in the protests in relation to the previous month to the reduction of prison sentences for some of the participants in the 11J protests, “which could have created positive expectations among family members and sympathizers of who are still awaiting sentencing.”

Other factors cited are the “migratory exodus that is equated to a new Mariel,” and “the measures of the Biden Administration making the sanctions more flexible, which create hope that tourist activities will resume” on the Island.

Among the May protests, which occurred in the 15 provinces of the country and the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud, those motivated by economic and social rights predominated for the first time (58%), while 77 protests (42% of the total) focused on political and civil rights, the report details. continue reading

May presents two new features. For the first time, the protests decreased to levels equivalent to those of March 2021 (184). Also for the first time, the number of economic and social protests (108) surpassed those motivated by political and civil rights (77),” it says.

According to the report, the “lack of transparency” by the Cuban government regarding the explosion that occurred on May 6 at the Saratoga Hotel, with a toll of 46 dead and almost a hundred injured, was also a reason for mistrust.

“The hasty and final official assessment — given by politicians, not by experts — that it was an unfortunate accident, was not well received,” the report finds.

According to the OCC, “the victims demand explanations and question why there were more police patrols in the place than the few ambulances that took time to arrive to attend to the wounded.”

“Cuba continues to be a social bomb with a short fuse, especially in the summer months when schools close and young people return to the streets, today fraught with serious economic and social tensions,” the report concludes.

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Central Bank of Cuba Prolongs the Death Throes of the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC) for 90 Days

Many Cubans have been unable to exchange their Cuban Convertible Pesos (CUCs) due to the pandemic, authorities say. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Madrid, 3 June 2022 — The umpteenth extension to change Cuban Convertible Pesos (CUCs) that are still in the hands of Cubans begins this Friday. The authorities have established a new term of 90 days to get rid of the currency, although the incentives are few, since the exchange rate of 24 pesos per CUC is maintained. In any case, there is no alternative for money that, otherwise, is dead paper or a collector’s item.

The amount of convertible currency that may remain on the Island is unknown, since the latest and scarce data available go back to May of last year, when Marino Murillo, then in charge of the Planning Task, stated that more than 80% had been collected. What he never said is the actual amount represented by the percentages he provided in the time that the process lasted, which, initially, should have been completed expeditiously, at least during 2021. However, the extensions have been constant, both for the cash and for accounts.

The Cuban economist Elías Amor wonders in a post on his blog this Friday what reason could push Cubans to hoard a currency that is worth nothing. “Undoubtedly, there is something dark that they do not want to recognize. Civil disobedience? Cubans district in their leaders?” he speculates.

As the expert, who lives in Spain, notes, inflation has devalued the already useless CUC. Although the currency — which was born in the 1990s and became the symbol of inequality on the island after creating two social classes based on its possession — had been dying for at least five years before its final death, there were still Cubans who maintained safe savings in CUC at the beginning of 2021.

If they had exchanged them at that time, with the same rate of 1×24, the purchasing power would have been much higher than today, when inflation has sunk the Cuban currency even further. continue reading

“The inflation that has occurred in the Cuban economy from that date until today, 98% in the inter-annual rate, reduces those 24,000 pesos in terms of purchasing power to only half, that is, about 12,000 pesos. What in January 2021 it could be bought with 24.00 pesos, now it is virtually impossible,” Elías Amor calculates based on a deposit of 1,000 CUC.

Following the same logic, the economist addresses accounts in dollars, the currency that Cubans really long for. Those 24,000 pesos that could have been obtained at the beginning of 2021 with 1,000 CUC, exchanged at the price that the US currency had at that time in the informal market, about 70 pesos, would have become 350 dollars; while now, even taking into account the devaluation of the last weeks, barely 240 dollars would be obtained.

The economist accuses the Central Bank of Cuba of ineffectiveness in the current situation, with the aggravating circumstance that its role is merely decorative because it depends entirely on the Party and the Government, a situation that leves monetary policy entirely in the hands of the political authorities.

Elías Amor asks Cubans that, in the face of the total abandonment of the institutions, they take charge of their savings and take an interest in listening to the experts to do what suits them best. “Cubans should know that today’s money is not worth the same as yesterday’s, but the important thing is that it will not be worth the same as tomorrow’s.”

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Freedom, Private Property Rights, Market and Profitability in the Cuban Countryside

Cooperatives are one of the forms of agriculture in Cuba. (Bohemia)

14ymedio, Elías Amor Bravo, Economist, 30 May 2022 — Cuban president Díaz-Canel wants to sound like Fidel Castro, but it’s hard. That way of approaching problems, as if he had a magic wand and the solution to everything, is leading him along the path to perdition. Castro did the same thing. Even when a threatening cyclone was coming, he became the television meteorologist to explain where it was going to go and where it was not going to go. Díaz-Canel has done the same with agriculture, and from there came a front-page report by the State newspaper Granma entitled “Producing food efficiently is the challenge,” which directly talks about how to feed Cubans every day.

Díaz-Canel met with agricultural producers to convey his impressions on what to do to “advance the processes of production, better use of land and promote the diversification of agricultural products; the objective is not to reduce production and planting but to do them in the most efficient way possible.” But you have the impression that he isn’t on the right track, that he’s not connected to reality. More or less like Castro, but look, it’s not the same. No one blamed Castro for his extravagances, like a deceptive cyclone that changed its trajectory and in the end went another way. Díaz-Canel should be careful.

No one at this point can have the slightest doubt. The Cuban communist regime may have two or three heartbeats left if it doesn’t find a solution to increase agricultural production. That is, so that a Cuban family can normally have three meals a day.

But any idea that occurs to the communists goes right in the opposite direction. With nothing better ahead, that idea of banishing food imports, because there is no foreign currency to pay for them, may end up creating more hunger problems and a terrible food crisis that blows everything up. In the short term, there is no choice but to import food and pay any price, no matter how high. The fault, as you know, lies with an ally of the Cuban regime: Putin, with his expansionist adventures in Ukraine.

Díaz-Canel speaks in an inappropriate way of “banishing the import mentality in an effort to meet the food needs of our population,” but he knows very well that, under current conditions, the agricultural sector is unable to feed the population. It may be very good to break that dependence in the medium and long term, but tomorrow, next month, things will be more complicated than ever.

And he doesn’t blame the bureaucracy and the obstacles that prevent the management of companies in this area, because he is solely responsible for that internal blockade, which we have denounced so many times in this blog. Freedom, private property rights, market and profitability are the principles that must be restored in the Cuban countryside, and in the economy as a whole, if it is to move forward.

But Díaz-Canel turns a deaf ear to these calls and remains silent on the subject of the application of science and innovation, which may be very good, and no one disputes it, but it must be raised over a longer time horizon. Tomorrow when they want to eat lunch and don’t have enough of what they need, Cuban families will not remember science and innovation at all. continue reading

He also spoke of “advancing production processes, better land use and boosting the diversification of agricultural products,” but this is impossible if the producers don’t own the land they cultivate. No one aspires to leave their mark on something that will never be theirs. Working for the communist state came to an end. Production and planting can only be increased and done in the most efficient way possible with private land-ownership rights, markets for the purchase and sale of plots and land, and private management of the agricultural sector. The land should belong to those who really work it. There is no other way; even the Vietnamese did it, and it was a wonder for them.

And then he talked nonsense at that moment, about “protein plants to increase the obtaining of animal feed, the production of feed with our own resources, or the development of mini-industries to take advantage as much as possible of agricultural production.” These are also things that don’t serve to solve the problem of tomorrow’s lunch.

The same is true of the use of bioproducts, even when the possible decrease in intermediaries between producers and agricultural markets is cited, and the speeding up of marketing in this area. No farmer supports the ideas that are included in the “63 measures.”

Díaz-Canel knows that there is no point in publishing a Law on Food Sovereignty and Food and Nutrition Security or the 63 measures, if the crops aren’t harvested and the population can go to the points of sale. Something so simple and so easy to achieve in Cuba becomes, thanks to the communist economic model, a thankless task.

Hence, in the face of such a difficulty, which could be solved with the aforementioned recipe of freedom, private property rights, market and profitability, principles that must be restored in the Cuban countryside and in the economy as a whole, Cuban communists start rehearsing other collectivist experiments to see what comes out. Díaz-Canel is irresponsible, getting into these types of stories that lead nowhere. I am referring to the 19 “productive poles” that have been created throughout the country.

According to Granma, these poles are made up of 86 basic business units, 54 basic cooperative production units, 45 agricultural production cooperatives and 190 credit and service cooperatives, with an arable land area of 151,829 hectares.

Can these poles really solve the problem of tomorrow’s lunch? They are clear about it. The estimated production at the end of 2021 reaches a total of 706,200 tons of agricultural items,, only a quarter of the planned production. Honestly, such a bureaucratic and organizational effort to achieve only that percentage of agricultural production is unjustified. If private tenants obtained from the communist regime the same amount as these collectivist-inspired poles, they would surely produce much more than that quarter, and they would also do so more efficiently.

But the communist regime is more interested in poles and municipalities, in the commitment to transfer to the local representatives the responsibilities that the central government is unable to achieve because it has failed again and again. The local authorities are not in favor. This strategy that can even be counterproductive, but it offers an idea of how lost they are for not giving up failed ideological principles.

Especially worrying was Díaz-Canel’s message to the attendees: “We are called upon to train and mobilize government structures from the municipal level so that they are in a position to lead this production process with popular participation in the local stages and, in addition, to promote an intense process that reaches all local producers, both state, cooperative and private, the state enterprise and even the last farm, the agroindustrial productive pole, each local development project, favoring agroecology as a necessary alternative for agricultural production in the current circumstances.” What does this sound like?

In the midst of all this, Díaz-Canel called for “increasing exports, achieving the linkage of all producers through a state company, or in other cases of cooperatives and new economic actors also closely linked to production.” Not a single reference was made to the values of freedom, private property rights, market and profitability in the Cuban countryside. As if he were talking about another country, at another time. You have the feeling that every day that passes he is further away from the reality in which he lives, and it is not known if it is his fault or the court of party and regime sycophants that surround him. The same as Fidel Castro.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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One Missing Person and Dozens of Residential Areas Flooded by Rainstorms in Cuba

The rains are linked to the low-pressure zone that moves slowly over the southeast of the Gulf of Mexico. (Social Networks/Collage)

14ymedio, Havana, 3 June 2022 — A resident of Pinar del Río fell into a swollen creek in the district of Diez de Octubre and is reported missing by local authorities after heavy rains that mainly affected the west and center of the country.

According to what neighbors told the official media, the man “didn’t manage to get out of the water,” and agents of the Ministry of the Interior and neighbors are searching for him.

Several residential areas, both in Pinar del Río, as well as in Havana, Sancti Spíritus and the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud, have been flooded with water by the rains associated with an extensive area that covers the northwest of the Caribbean Sea and western Cuba.

The climatic phenomenon is linked to the low-pressure zone that moves slowly over the southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and has caused the evacuation of families in several territories, falling trees, landslides and overflowing rivers. Interruptions in electricity service are also reported in Pinar del Río, large areas of Artemisa, Havana and other provinces.

In the Cuban capital, neighborhoods and areas near the Plaza de Cuatro Caminos have been affected, an area that normally reports flood problems and where neighbors, in the last few hours, are living with water above their knees. continue reading

The corner of Infanta and Amenidad is seriously affected by the rains, and the water even covers part of the vehicles parked nearby. The same panorama is experienced in the lower areas of Centro Habana, especially in the neighborhood of Los Sitios, very close to the El Pontón Sports Center.

According to the latest report from the Institute of Meteorology of Cuba, the territories with the highest record of rainfall are the weather station of Embalse Cuyaguateje in Pinar del Río with 176.0 millimeters, followed by the INRH Municipal Delegation of Isla de la Juventud with 160.0 and the Jarahueca Telecorreo station located in Sancti Spíritus with 156.5.

A month ago, the Institute of Meteorology recalled that June is considered the rainiest month of the year in Cuba. “A considerable part of the accumulated precipitation occurs associated with rainy events of several days duration, which occur mainly in the first twenty days of the month.”

He then anticipated that “the precipitation depends on the influence of migratory systems in the tropical zone, such as tropical storms and low pressure systems and their important interaction with mid-latitude systems,” while recalling that this month “the period of high thunderstorm activity” begins.

This Wednesday, June 1, the new tropical cyclone season in the Atlantic began, which will close on November 30, and in which up to 17 cyclones are expected to form, of which nine could reach hurricane status.

With this perspective, the Forecast Center of the Institute of Meteorology has predicted an 85% chance that one of these hurricanes could affect Cuba in the coming season.

The official institution called for attention to the persistence of rainfall, due to the saturation of soils mainly in low-lying and poorly drained areas.

The new cyclone season is favored by the presence of warmer than normal sea temperatures in the tropical strip of the North Atlantic and the Caribbean during the first months of this year, according to observations by Cuban meteorologists.

📸 La Habana bajo intensas lluvias este viernes https://t.co/tQiKYHN4yO pic.twitter.com/fWyAtspSFP

— 14ymedio (@14ymedio) June 3, 2022

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Court Confirms Sentences for Garrido Sisters for July 11th (11J) Protest in Mayabeque

The writer and activist María Cristina Garrido saw her sentence confirmed, a long with the other defendants in her case, during this week’s appeal. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Madrid, 2 June 2022 — The writer María Cristina Garrido Rodríguez and her sister Angélica, sentenced in March to seven and three years in prison respectively after their participation in the July 11th (11J) protests, had their sentences ratified after the appeal hearing held this Monday in the Provincial Court of Mayabeque.

According to Luis Rodríguez Pérez, Angélica’s husband, during the hearing the charge of attack was modified and the charge of contempt was maintained. However, the sentence did not undergo any change.

In the same case were Alexis Pedro Acosta Hernández, Osmany Hernández Rodríguez, Giorbis Pardo del Toro, Yanet Sánchez Cocho and Patricia Lázara Acosta Sánchez. The five, a married couple and their daughter who were in the main square of Quivicán drinking with two friends, had a fight and, according to Rodríguez Pérez, they were arrested and included in the same case and their sentences were also confirmed.

“Their case is also sad, there is a 14-year-old boy who, if his parents’ sanction is maintained as it is, would be left in the care of his sister who is very young and has a little girl. [And nothing they did was] related to 11J, nor with the Garridos. It is likely that they tried them together to smear them with politics, or to give the Garridos a criminal connotation more common than political,” Rodríguez said. continue reading

According to her account, the judge – whom she describes as an actress – indicated that the Revolution was generous with children and the sentence of the mother of the family was modified to six years of correctional work with internment. When the astonished lawyer pointed out that this was already the sentence she received in the first trial, the magistrate replied: “Ah, yes! Here it is! Apparently there was a mistake. Well, then it stays that way, as it is.”

This Thursday the appeals of Abel Lescay were also held and, according to the musician himself, those of 18 more people who were with him in court. In addition, Makyel Puig, who was already sentenced to 20 years for his participation in 11J, was facing a second trial for allegedly assaulting a guard at the Quivicán prison where he was an inmate.

As of today the results of these hearings have not been reported.

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The End of the Embargo in Exchange for Democracy in Cuba?

The singer Yotuel Romero, one of the architects of the anthem for change in Cuba ‘Patria y Vida’, opened a debate on Tuesday through his networks. (Screen capture)

14ymedio, Havana, 2 June 2022 — The singer Yotuel Romero, one of the architects of Patria y Vida, the anthem for change in Cuba, opened a debate on Tuesday through his social networks that has ignited Cubans, especially from outside the Island.

“And if we ask at the Summit of the Americas for the end of the embargo on the Cuban dictatorship, in exchange [for]: the release of all Cuban political prisoners and free elections in Cuba, multiparty [and] supervised by an international commission and let what the people choose win?” This is what the musician — who has been invited by the United States to the Civil Society Forum that will take place within the framework of the summit, between the next 6 and 8 June in Los Angeles — suggested on his Facebook wall.

Immediately, he received passionate comments, especially against. One of the harshest was that of Alex Otaola, who in his Wednesday program said that it could not be that “the face of Patria y Vida suggested the end of the embargo… What must be asked at the Summit of the Americas is that a dictatorship not be oxygenated,” the ‘influencer’ commented on Yotuel’s proposal.

“Were you invited to the Summit of the Americas or to the ALBA-TCP Summit? I don’t understand anything,” said independent reporter Héctor Luis Valdés Cocho, exiled in the United States.

The also independent journalist Iliana Hernández responded, from Spain: “The embargo is eliminated when the created conditions exist in Cuba, freedom for political prisoners, freedom of the press and free elections. The embargo is a law, they persecute human trafficking, in Cuba there is a slave system.” continue reading

Internet user Odalys Menéndez replied to Hernández: “Those who implemented the embargo and keep it active at half throttle do nothing to ensure that the conditions are met, rather they are accomplices,” to which the journalist replied again: “It’s that it’s not them [the US] that have to do it, it’s us.”

The controversy that arose was such that Yotuel himself deleted the original post and, instead, published a video clarifying his words. The singer explained before the camera that “there are some very basic and very important conditions for the freedom of Cuba” and that “if there is freedom of expression, if there is freedom of political prisoners, if there is freedom of elections supervised by a foreign body… that embargo ceases to exist automatically.”

The clarification generated enthusiastic sympathy, such as that of Estela Puertas Borges (“Very well said, brother! Now all Cubans on the island need to understand that it is like that!”) and that of Daimiry Ríos Valiente (“I don’t think that this time Otaola is right. We have to take off Cuba’s mask in front of all of Latin America”).

Also, there were some ironic comments in favor, such as that of Guena Rod: “It is incredible, but we have arrived there. Yotuel only showed the same conditions established by the Law of Freedom of Cuba (Helms-Burton) to lift the general sanctions against Cuba. Luckily he did not mention that in that same law, there is a significant part that stipulates a great “economic aid” for the island after the conditions, that is, muuuucho money for Cuba once the same thing that Yotuel asked for has been fulfilled. It is not going to be that they also accuse him now of wanting to give $ to the dictatorship.”

However, it has continued to arouse misgivings. “We are at a time where you have to be exact with each term that is used, especially when you represent a people without a voice. With the dictatorship there is nothing to negotiate, nothing to discuss,” expressed Heidy Pérez.

“You can’t negotiate with them, you have to remove them from power. Only that!” Esther García emphasized. Maga Noa was more forceful: “First dictators go to prison,” as was Zafiro Sony: “The embargo is lifted when the Freedom Law is fulfilled!”

Others, like Pedro Fechter, allowed themselves another critical nuance: “I think your idea is very good, only that it starts from the wrong premises. I also think that people did not understand your post well because in the text the first thing you say is: and if we ask for the end of the embargo… I advise you for the next one, first put the ultimate goal and then the means to achieve it.”

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