The usual crowds that gather in Cuba favor contagion, on the rise in recent days. (14ymedio)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 30 March 2022 — Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel called for extreme sanitary measures to prevent a new wave of COVID-19 infections despite the progress of the massive immunization campaign, the official press reported on Tuesday.
According to the official Granma newspaper, during their weekly meeting with Díaz-Canel, scientists advising the government predicted a progressive increase in confirmed cases and hospitalizations.
The Island has recorded between 600 and nearly 1,000 new daily cases in recent days, after they stabilized at around 500 at the beginning of the month, but far from the figures of the highest part of the last great wave in July and August of last year, when infections reached 9,000 per day.
Cuba has accumulated a week without deaths related to the disease during the month of March.
These results, the scientists pointed out, are due in part to the coverage of the immunization campaign with the three vaccines produced and developed in the country.
Nearly 10 million people, of the 11.2 million inhabitants of the Island, have received the complete immunization schedule with local vaccines. This is 95% of the vaccine-eligible population. In addition, 6.2 million Cubans have received the booster dose.
However, cases have been increasing in recent days and experts attribute this situation to the relaxation of precautions among citizens.
In this sense, the experts warned that “the provinces of Sancti Spíritus and Ciego de Ávila have remained the epicenter of the epidemic this year.”
Following the latest epidemiological reports, the authorities have sent teams of specialists to the most affected territories to assess the situation in order to avoid new strains on the health system.
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A group of demonstrators in Havana during the protests on July 11, 2021. (Marcos Evora)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 30 March 2022 — The opposition group Council for the Democratic Transition in Cuba (CTDC) presented a proposal this Tuesday for an amnesty law that would favor both those detained for the July 11 (11J) protests and Cuban public officials and officials.
The organization disseminated its proposal with the hope that the National Assembly would take it on as a popular legislative initiative — something contemplated in the 2019 Constitution — and approve it.
Neither the Cuban Legislature nor the official media have commented on the matter so far. In the exile and the opposition, the initiative has sparked controversy.
The Amnesty and Decriminalization of Dissent in Cuba Bill, provided to the media by the CTDC, seeks a “general and full amnesty” for anyone investigated or accused of counterrevolutionary activity, against State Security or the socialist system. continue reading
The proposal expressly refers to the anti-government protests of July 11, but calls for this measure of grace for all those prosecuted as “counterrevolutionaries” since 1959.
It also offers amnesty to “authorities, officials and law enforcement agents” who participated in the persecution of activities classified as counterrevolutionary, provided that they had not committed “crimes against humanity or serious violations of human rights.”
Officials and public officials and those of the Communist Party of Cuba who cannot be charged with crimes against humanity or human rights violations would also be covered.
The objective of the CTDC, according to the initial arguments of its proposal, is that this law be “a first step towards the national and political reconciliation of all Cubans.”
The proposal differs substantially from the one released last Friday on Telegram by the jurist Sergio Osmín Fernández on behalf of the Amnesty platform in Cuba.
Osmín Fernández’s petition calls for amnesty for the July 11 demonstrators and for all those imprisoned for “exercising the fundamental freedoms of human beings in opposition to totalitarianism” or for political activities since 1959.
“This law does not grant amnesty” to those who “perpetrated human rights violations and inflicted serious damages,” says article 2.2 of this proposal.
The two initiatives have sparked debate between dissidents and opponents, focused on the differences between the two proposals and their repercussions.
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The massive exodus of people leaving Cuba has increased the paperwork workload at notary services in recent months. (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, Havana, 29 March 2022 — It is half an hour before six in the morning and five people are already sitting on the stairs that give access to one of the most central notaries in Havana, a few meters from the Coppelia ice cream parlor. The massive exodus in recent months has increased the need for procedures in these places, all under the control of the Cuban State.
“This is the second time I’ve come in the same week because the previous time I was missing some documents,” explains Marianela, one of the clients who arrived at the place before dawn, speaking to 14ymedio. “What I want is get a power of attorney so that my son can sell my house when I am out of the country,” she details.
As the notary’s opening hours approach, dozens of people continue to arrive to join the line. Many of them will leave the place without even being able to enter, because the number of cases that are seen each day is very limited. “This is full from Monday to Friday and if it were to open on Sunday, it would also be full that day,” Marianela jokes.
The notary power that the woman seeks to make will give her son full power to sell or exchange his mother’s home when she has already emigrated. “I did everything to sell it before I left but I couldn’t because people are out of money so he’ll have to take care of it,” she explains.
In the line, most of the clients are for procedures related to housing: powers of attorney, transfer of rights over a property, donations or purchases. Many also have in mind to leave the country and “get their affairs in order” before getting on a plane. “This is like going to a better life but in a good way, that you have left everything arranged for those who stay.” continue reading
In the same municipality, on Calle 10 almost at the corner of 15th, another notary’s office shows the same panorama since dawn. On a wooden trunk resting on three stones, the clients have improvised a bench that is already full before the sun rises. With the first light of day people continue to arrive and when the place opens its doors they only let in five at a time.
But the long, slow line is not the only obstacle. “We lack the notary paper, we have to improvise,” admits an employee of the place. A few meters from there, a private business has the solution. “We have A3 format sheets on which we print the lateral stripes of the same color that the notary’s office requires,” promotes one of the employees.
“When people arrive and see that they need several copies of a document, they immediately shout to the sky because they say they don’t have paper for copies, that’s when we ’save the campaign’,” he explains. “They have had a paper problem for months because the demand for documents has grown a lot.”
“It is not only because of the issue of leaving the country, but because we were closed for a long time due to the pandemic,” adds Carmen, an employee of a notary’s office in the municipality of Cerro. “In mid-2021, all registry and notary services were suspended in Havana and that caused many cases to accumulate that we are now trying to process.”
The measures then included the suspension of the Property Registry services, foreign investment and commercial companies, as well as the Mercantile Registry. From the Civil Status Registry, only the registration of births and deaths remained operational.
“The cases postponed by the coronavirus have been added to the high demand for procedures from people who are leaving the country and want to sell their house, donate it or leave it in a power of attorney so that someone else can take care of it,” adds the worker. “To that is added that there are almost no resources coming to us for all this.”
Not only is the notary paper missing, but “the printer ribbons are very worn and there are times when we deliver a document that can hardly be read,” she admits. “People complain but notaries should be given a medal for continuing to work in these conditions.”
There is no shortage of those who make the high demand for notary processes a way of making a living. In the municipality of Diez de Octubre, Yaquelín and her brother dedicate themselves to the business of standing in the lines to enter the premises and selling their places to some desperate customer who arrives trying to get out as soon as possible.
“To be among the first five who enter when they open costs 500 pesos; places further back in the line can be about 300,” she explains to a troubled Havanan who has a flight date for next week and wants to “finish the paperwork as soon as possible,” for the sale of a house. The man doesn’t even try to haggle and they agree that this week Yaquelín will stand in line for him.
“Don’t waste time, I’ll do all the notary and certification paperwork for you, you only have to go to an office when you have to sign something,” a savvy merchant offers his services on various digital sites. His fees can exceed four figures but he says he has “a lot of clients.”
“People have to deal with everything at the end, they have the ticket to leave, they have to organize a lot of things and they don’t have time to stand in these lines since dawn. I make it easy for them not to spend their last days in Cuba standing outside a notary’s office,” he says. “I save them time and trouble.”
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14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 29 March 2022 — The recently announced Law of Expropriation for reasons of Public Utility or Social Interest has notorious differences with the abundant legislation on this matter. Here we no longer speak of confiscation as punishment or revenge, as in the laws enacted between 1959 and the mid-1960s. However, when the 18 causes that justify an expropriation include “ensuring internal order or interest in guaranteeing national defense and security” it is understood how far this concept can go.
The confiscation of property without compensation appears in the preliminary draft of the new Penal Code defined as an accessory sanction and can be applied to at least a dozen typified crimes. But this text does not speak of confiscation, but of expropriation.
The new law includes details on how to compensate those affected by a duly justified expropriation and establishes a process in which there is a right to refute the arguments of the State objecting to the reasons of public utility put forward.
But said objection does not proceed when the public utility is based on the execution of public works, the construction of low-income housing, the execution of programs for economic and social development, the sustainable management of the environment and, of course, also unobjectionable are reasons founded on the assurance of internal order or national defense and security. continue reading
What then is left? The affected party must demonstrate that it would be more convenient for the State to expropriate other properties than his own. However, what draws the most attention and has raised questions and disagreements is the difference in compensation for foreign investors, who can set the value of what is expropriated “by mutual agreement”; if no agreement is reached, the price is set “by an organization of international prestige in business valuation.”
One of the most striking details is observed in Chapter 10, where the possibility of reversing the expropriation is mentioned if, within a period of three years, the corresponding authority does not allocate the expropriated asset for the purposes expressed in the declaration of public utility. In that case, those affected can go to the same court where the expropriation was ruled and request reversion, paying “its fair price.”
If a clause like this had appeared in other confiscatory or nationalizing decrees, perhaps there would not be so many idle lands infected with marabou or so many commercial establishments turned into ruins.
Article 54 defines that when the interest in the expropriation derives directly from a public calamity or for reasons of ensuring internal order or national defense and security, and there is an urgent need to occupy the property, “the corresponding authority may take immediate possession of those necessary to satisfy that purpose, without prior formality or other diligence, regardless of whether the process to determine compensation is followed.”
Article 10 specifies who has the authority to declare the public utility or social interest of a property for expropriation purposes. Listed in descending hierarchical order it ranges from the Council of Ministers to the Municipal Administration Councils and the directors of the Offices of the Special Development Zones. It is specified that for the expropriation of foreign investments the declaration of public utility or social interest is the exclusive right of the Council of Ministers.
Every time a new law is enacted, citizens ask themselves what is their public utility, what is their social interest. It gives the impression that the State has an imminent compliance plan to carry out numerous public works, build hundreds of thousands of houses, or carry out programs for economic and social development, or for the sustainable management of the environment, which provoke the need to expropriate land, houses and other spaces. But the economic reality of the country shows no signs that these projects are on the State calendar.
In this law there is neither revolutionary passion nor righteous spirits. The exploitation of man by man and the recovery of our wealth are not invoked. This time it will not be rude men dressed as militiamen entering the offices announcing the nationalization, but young lawyers with good manners to discuss the terms of the indemnity.
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The fire occurred around 3:00 p.m. on Saturday in the bus parking area, burning four of the Chinese brand Yutong and one Diana. (Cybervat)
14ymedio, Havana, 29 March 2022 — The strong rumors unleashed by a fire that last Saturday burned five school buses in Cojímar, East Havana, have led the authorities of the Ministry of Transportation to publish a note in which they attribute the fire to an electrical failure that occurred while one of the buses was being repaired.
“Unable to put out the fire, due to the strong winds at that time, the flames spread, reaching four other buses that were parked in the area.
Work continues on the investigations, to delve into the causes that generated this unfortunate event,” says a brief statement from the Automotive Transport business group.
The fire occurred around 3:00 p.m. on Saturday in the bus parking area, four of the Chinese brand Yutong and one Diana. The event, published on Facebook, led to multiple speculations by those who considered it an act of sabotage and who questioned the effectiveness of the firefighters who did not arrive quickly enough to prevent the burning of five vehicles. continue reading
The assumptions have not stopped in the same forum, where a user has raised the possibility that more vehicles are burning lately. Although there is no real data to verify it, the dissemination of this information through networks can support the theory. Among the answers, some raise the poor quality or adulteration of the fuel, the shortage of fire extinguishers where there should be some, or poor repairs with cables spliced without much knowledge.
The explanations have not calmed the users of that page, which tracks all kinds of incidents related to traffic and vehicles, or the business group. In both there has been a crossover of accusations between users who defend the work of the company and those who question it, those who believe that the news is being managed with transparency and those who consider that the power failure is an excuse to hide attacks that put the government on the ropes.
What the majority seems to agree on is that the buses that were next to the one that burned initially could have been saved if they had had tires, but the fact of lacking them complicated moving them.
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The Police continued with the arrests, days after the beginning of the protests in more than 40 cities throughout the Island. (EFE)
EFE (via 14ymedio), London, 29 March 2022 — Cuba intensified “its machinery to control freedom of expression and assembly” during 2021, a year marked by the July 11th (11J) anti-government protests, Amnesty International (AI) denounced in its annual report on human rights.
The London-based organization emphasized what it called “repression” during and after the demonstrations. AI noted that, according to the NGO Cubalex, 700 protesters remained in prison at the end of 2021.
The document reviewed the reactions of the Government during last July. It says that in those days “the authorities interrupted the Internet service and frequently blocked instant messaging applications.”
AI went further and criticized the crimes with which some detainees have been accused — such as public disorder, resistance, contempt, incitement to commit a crime and damage — which it described as “incompatible” with “human rights standards.”
According to the Cuban Attorney General’s Office, 790 people have been prosecuted for the July 11 protests, of which 55 are between 16 and 17 years old. The minimum criminal age in Cuba is 16. continue reading
Cuba, as previously noted by AI, is the only country in the American continent in which it is not allowed to enter.
Since the end of 2021, different trials have been taking place for the anti-government protests of July 11 and hundreds of people have already been sentenced.
On March 16, one of the last sentences released, 127 people were sentenced to a total of 1,916 years in prison for acts related to the events of that date at the corner of Toyo and La Güinera, two humble areas of La Havana.
The defendants, investigated mainly for sedition and theft, were accused of “serious disturbances and acts of vandalism, with the purpose of destabilizing public order, collective security and citizen tranquility,” according to the Supreme Court.
In addition, AI denounced that the opponents were subjected to “physical surveillance” in front of their homes and, if they were arrested, they ended up in “incommunicado detention.” It also led to “widespread reports of ill-treatment.”
Finally, the chapter on Cuba in the NGO’s annual report covers the country’s economic crisis, aggravated by the pandemic, which has left behind “a shortage of food, basic medicines and other essential items.”
The NGO clarified that although the US “blockade” of the island violates “the economic, social and cultural rights” of Cuba, this did not “nullify the country’s obligation to guarantee” the basic rights of its population.
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In the Cupet gas station at 31st and 18th, in the Havana municipality of Playa, for example, the line of vehicles reached 42nd street this Wednesday. (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Madrid, 28 March 2022 — The Cuba-Petroleum Union (Cupet) justified this Saturday the shortage of gasoline and diesel by the 20% increase in consumption in March compared to January and February. The statement from the state monopoly adds that the demand grew up to 65% last week, which led the authorities to ration fuel in several provinces.
The oil company wanted to “update” the situation and affirmed that the “affects” have been reduced by more than 60%, but that availability will continue to be “complex,” officialdom’s euphemism for scarcity. Five days ago there were problems in 350 service stations, 26% of the total, according to the note, but Cupet and its workers are making an effort – “with the special motivation of the company’s 30th anniversary” – to restore stability in the service.
Users, however, have not seen the situation clearly, since the statement talks about a problem that is not resolved without detailing what the problem is. In the comments to the note in Cubadebate, the company has responded that the shortage has been due to several causes, including the already known one of reinforcing the electric generator and that “in the face of uncertainty, consumption has increased.”
Some users have noted that in recent days there have been rumors of all kinds about fuels, from that it was going to be marketed in dollars to that the price is going to rise or, of course, that the supply problems are aggravated by the global crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Western sanctions on Moscow. This accumulation of circumstances would have made the population fearful and triggered sales, although there is no shortage of people who mention hoarding. continue reading
Many commentators have lamented that the gas station workers commit irregularities in the sale and sometimes say that there is no fuel, and then they sell it ’under the table’, and other times they fill more than what is established in exchange for a bribe, in addition to charging improperly or being closed in hours when they shouldn’t be. In all these messages, Cupet has disregarded and asks complaints be directed to Cimex, which is responsible for the gas stations.
Cupet says in the note that thanks to the help “of the fuel distribution cars of the Organisms of the Central State Administration” they have been able to ensure 15% of the distributed volumes, filling between 30 and 50 daily teams.
But the messages on Cubadebate insist on supply problems that not only continue today but go back a long time. “I don’t know of other places, but the gas stations in the municipality of Mayarí, in the province of Holguín, have never had fuel, neither before nor after those inconveniences they speak of. There has been a shortage here for a long, long time,” says one commenter on social media.
“Well, I’m working and in Viñales there hasn’t been a special for more than 3 days. There isn’t in Los Palacios or Soroa either,” says another.
“I have acquired a gasoline electric generator, marketed in MLC [freely convertible currency] by the Cimex chain in Camagüey. When going to get 10 liters of gasoline from the Servicupet there is an directive that the sale in containers is not allowed and the only sale is allowed to motorcycles or vehicles. I don’t have a motorcycle or a car. I would like someone from Cimex to tell me what to do in my case, where do I go, who do I complain to, what do I do with the generator that cost me quite a lot and now I can’t use it,” protests another.
There are also those who have complained that the standardization mentioned in the note has not reached their locality. “The 60% is in Havana because here in Perico, Matanzas, five days ago not a single drop of gasoline was sold to individuals, only to rental and state cars.”
The breakdown in the Antonio Guiteras thermoelectric plant, the largest in the country, together with that of Mariel, which burned down on March 7, are part of the origin of the crisis experienced with fuel in the last week. The authorities affirmed that the exit of the plants from the National Electric System forced fuel to be rationed to ensure the public transport service and fill the generators, which are high consumers of gasoline. This could also spark fear in the population who prepared to fill their tanks.
However, the problem, as the comments to the note demonstrate, goes back a long way and already in 2019 it manifested itself with great crudeness when the US sanctions on Venezuelan oil were increased, making it difficult to send quantities from Havana’s main partner to the Island. This reduced availability, which had already diminished due to the crisis in Venezuela and its great drop in oil production in the last twenty years.
Cupet assured this January that the national production plan had been fulfilled in 2021, good news because it had been in decline for a decade. But no data was given on the amounts extracted or what the forecast was. Osvaldo López Corso, Cupet’s head of Exploration, said that the drop in the last ten years was around 3% to 7% per year.
Jorge Piñon, a Cuban expert in energy policy at the University of Texas, has told Agence France Presse that the drop is 20% compared to 2010 and the supply of crude oil and fuels from Venezuela exceeded 100,000 barrels per day, in 2016, with “an average last year of 56,000 barrels per day.”
Cuba uses domestic crude oil (44%) and its accompanying gas (8%) to generate the electricity it needs for the economy and domestic consumption, according to the authorities themselves. The largest deposit is in a strip located between Havana and Varadero, where 99% of the oil comes from, although they have been prospecting for years and seeking outside help to locate others.
It is estimated that Cuba can produce 22 million barrels a year, a tiny amount compared to the 130,000 barrels a day (47+ million a year) it needs for consumption.
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Dairon Labrada Linares, in the center of the image, with Iván Arocha on the left and Eduardo Reinaldo Machado Arocha on the right. (Facebook)
14ymedio, Havana, 28 March 2022 — Five protesters from the same family have been sentenced to prison for the protests in El Caney, Santiago de Cuba, on July 11. Along with them, there are three others convicted in the same case, with sentences of between 5 and 12 years in prison. Only one is released from jail and must pay a fine of 4,000 pesos, Radio Televisión Martí reported, after speaking with Dairon Yunior Labrada Linares, one of those involved, now on provisional release.
“Currently in prison are my uncle Iván Arocha Arocha, my cousin Iván Arocha Quiala, and like them are Eduardo Reinaldo Machado Arocha and Enrique Ferrer Echeverría,” said the young man, who has been sentenced to seven years in prison.
The latter, Enrique Ferrer Hechavarría, received the harshest sentence, 12 years in prison. He is followed by Iván Mauricio Arocha Arocha (10 years), Iván Arocha Quiala (10 years), Eduardo Reynaldo Machado Arocha (9 years), Dairon Yunior Labrada Linares (7 years), Abdiel Cedeño Martínez (6 years), Yusnaira González Pérez (5 years) and Luis Ibarra Hernández (fine of 4,000 pesos).
The group came out on July 11 to protest and has been convicted of the crimes of public disorder, attack, contempt, aggravated contempt for the figure of the president and the spread of epidemics. Those who have received the most years in prison are also considered guilty of prison escape, resistance and instigation to commit a crime. continue reading
“This process has been illegal, because they attribute non-existent crimes to me, and it was manipulated by the prosecutor, the instructor and the false testimonies of the police officers and witnesses of the Prosecutor’s Office. Like the other relatives and friends of mine to whom they impute crimes that they did not commit. When we protested, we didn’t think they were so serious, because we only asked for freedom, medicine, food, because of the scarcity that is affecting us,” Labrada Linares, 23, told the Miami-based television station.
At the end of January, Dairon had accused the police of having “violently” detained him along with Iván and Eduardo Reinaldo, “young people of 26, 23, 24 years, all useful to society because we have steady jobs,” in El Caney park while a peaceful demonstration was taking place due to “disagreements” with the social system.
“The violence was on the part of the authorities because the whole time we were being beaten, even with sticks and pepper spray. Only we know what we suffered so much abuse,” the young man lamented on Facebook. He also accused the courts of delay, since some of his friends and relatives had been deprived of liberty for more than 200 days.
The sentences with higher penalties for the events that occurred on July 11 have been coming out bit by bit since the beginning of the year. That day and the following, at least 1,500 people were arrested, although the figures are difficult to verify. The first summary trials were held at the time, and were mostly settled with fines and small prison sentences, but the cases considered more serious by the authorities, of people who are accused of generating violent altercations, have taken months of investigation.
According to data from the Prosecutor’s Office, 790 people will be prosecuted for the protests, 55 of whom are between 16 (criminal age of majority in Cuba) and 18 (legal age of majority).
In mid-March, the highest sentences to date came out, 1,916 years in total for 128 people who received between 6 and 30 years in prison for the demonstrations on the corner of Toyo and La Güinera, in Havana. Many of those accused in these files were exposed to penalties for sedition, the most serious charge faced by those prosecuted for 11J.
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The blame for the delays in the harvest in Ciego de Ávila is also due, says Azcuba, to the “interconnection” of the Ciro Redondo power plant with the bioelectric plant. (Invasor)
14ymedio, Havana, 24 March 2022 — Sugar production in Cuba this year seems unable to overcome the worst prospects. In Ciego de Ávila, the authorities have reported several “breaks” in two plants that limit “the parameters of efficiency and productivity.”
Eduardo Larrosa Vázquez, an official of the State’s Azcuba group in that province, declared to the official newspaper Invasor that 600,000 tons of cane remain to be harvested, which “makes compliance with the previously conceived harvest very tense.”
The blame for the delays is also due, according to the state director, to the “interconnection” of the Ciro Redondo power plant, known as “the Colossus of the Center,” with the bioelectric plant installed on the Island in 2020.
The authorities reported just a few days ago that the bioelectric plant was experiencing difficulties due to the lack of biomass from marabou and bagasse, precisely because Ciro Redondo, who supplies it with this material, does not have enough cane available.
Until the third week of March, 225,000 tons were milled in Ciego de Ávila and more than 60,000 were “linked” to Sancti Spíritus.
According to Larrosa Vázquez, the “technical flaws” in the boilers produced this month have caused the Ecuador plant to operate at 56% of its power and on January 1, at 63%. With this, the performance in the province is at 58% of its capacity. continue reading
Once the breakdowns have been resolved, the official assured, “an improvement in the efficiency parameters” is expected in April.
President Miguel Díaz-Canel spoke about the harvest this Monday. The hand-picked president described the current sugar harvest as “bad,” but stressed that the sector, historic for the country, “cannot disappear.”
Díaz-Canel chaired a meeting with regional leaders of the Communist Party in which, among other issues, progress in the sector was analyzed, and he said that the face of the harvest must be “changed,” for which it will be necessary to “over-perform” the planting plan.
Last February, during a visit to the province by the deputy prime minister, Jorge Luis Tapia Fonseca, a disastrous result in the sugar harvest was already predicted. The official then verified that the investment of more than 330 million pesos that was made at the beginning of the year to start grinding at the Ciro Redondo mill had not been of any use.
The authorities had scheduled 11 previous actions that had to be carried out to achieve the objective, but none had been carried out. Six of them, Invasor reported, “have no solution,” since they were in the hands of Chinese operators who should have arrived on the Island and did not.
The problems have accumulated in such a way that as of 2022 there is even a lack of marabou, a species that is characterized by being invasive. The province began a planting program to fill the gap, but the newspaper reported in February that there are 3,724 hectares planned for it, of which only 307 had been planted.
In 2021, Cuba closed the worst harvest in its history in more than a century, worse than the previous year, which had also set a negative record, and Ciego de Ávila barely met 11% of the forecasts, that is, a total of 200,000 tons of cane remained uncollected.
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The intoxicated children were taken from the municipality of Jovellanos to the Eliseo Noel Caamaño pediatric hospital. (Capture)
14ymedio, Havana, 22 March 2022 — Five children from Matanzas suffered poisoning this Monday that caused respiratory problems. The children were transferred to the Eliseo Noel Caamaño pediatric hospital in that city, and four were discharged on Tuesday afternoon, Periódico Girón published on its Facebook wall.
“There is still one girl who suffers from bronchial asthma. Her state of health is positive and without any complications, but it is necessary to keep her under observation for a little longer,” according to the director of the institution, José Hernández Hernández.
The children, from the municipality of Jovellanos, according to the local media, “entered with the diagnosis of obstruction of the respiratory tract.” The official Cubadebate site published that the minors had “ingested some strong chemical,” but without detailing the substance or the place of the incident, which caused numerous questions on social networks.
“Airway obstruction is not the same as inflammation or bronchospasm or spasm of the glottis due to inhalation or aspiration of toxic substances,” stressed Alberto Roque, who studied at the Faculty of Medical Sciences in Havana. “Finally, which toxins? Who was responsible? Was it accidental or intentional?” continue reading
Calixto Rodríguez Machado commented: “The truth is that the information is crooked, crooked. Are they from the same family or from different homes? Was it at school or another institution? What substance did they take or inhale, should we assume it was chlorine?”
The Cubadebate note does not answer any of these questions and limits itself to collecting the symptoms produced by intoxication with certain chemicals, “among which chlorine is included, difficulty breathing (inhalation), inflammation of the throat, pulmonary edema, sore throat, pain or burning in the nose, eyes, ears, lips or tongue, burns in the digestive tract, abdominal pain, vomiting, burns, irritation and hypotension (low blood pressure).”
In addition, the official website recommends, as a parent, to keep “chemical products out of the reach of children” and “do not mix chlorine products with other cleaning substances, acids, vinegar, alcohol, hydrogen peroxide and ammonia.”
Hours later, the hospital staff specified that “the children, between five and nine years old, were playing in the Horacio Rodríguez neighborhood when they decided to play the dangerous ’game’ of who could resist chlorine inhalation longer with a found bottle, which caused shortness of breath, as a result of which they were taken to our institution.”
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14ymedio, Havana, 26 March 2022 — Brigadier General Rafael Moracén Limonta died this Friday in Cuba at the age of 83, according to the official press, which did not give details about the cause of his death. The soldier served as a naval and air attaché in Angola and also participated in the conflicts in Syria in the 1970s.
Moracén was born in 1939 in Palma Soriano, then Oriente province, and at the age of 18 he became part of the forces of the Third Eastern Front under the command of Juan Almeida, where he was nicknamed Quitafusil. Starting in 1959, with the coming to power of Fidel Castro, he joined the Armed Forces and in 1965 he traveled for military training in the Congo.
With a false Angolan identification, he crossed the border with that country to support the Movement for the Liberation of Angola, and also collaborated in the training of soldiers. In 1967 he returned to Cuba and he left six years later for Syria to become involved in the Yom Kippur War against Israel.
Shortly after, he would return to Angola where he would be a key player in the Cuban regime’s military support for Agostinho Neto until his death in 1979, and then for José Eduardo dos Santos. In 1982 he returned to Cuba, but he would later return to Angolan territory in 1995 as military, naval and air attaché, a position he held for three years. continue reading
He was also a founder of the Cuban Communist Party, a delegate to the first, second, fourth and fifth congresses of the organization and a deputy to the National Assembly of People’s Power in the first and second legislatures. When he died, he was part of the Association of Combatants.
Moracén’s ashes will be exhibited this Monday at the Veterans’ Pantheon of the Colon Necropolis in Havana, where they will remain until they are transferred to the Third Front Mausoleum.
His death is added to a long list of high-ranking soldiers who have died in recent months in Cuba. Between July and October of last year alone, up to 17 died, all belonging to the historical generation. The first large group of deaths occurred in July, precisely after the protests on the 11th. Generals Agustín Peña, barely 57 years old, Marcelo Verdecia Perdomo, Rubén Martínez Puente, Manuel Eduardo Lastres Pacheco, Armando Choy Rodríguez, and Commander Gilberto Antonio Cardero Sánchez all perished in that month.
In August Arnoldo Ferrer Martínez, Reserve Division General Félix Baranda Columbié and Santiago Lorenzo Hernández Cáceres joined the list and in September Eladio Julián Fernández Cívico, who was in charge of GeoCuba, also joined the Reserve Colonel Eugenio Suárez Pérez and retired FAR (Revolutionary Armed Forces) Colonel Eduardo Morejón Estévez, a veteran of war conflicts in Africa and Asia.
The month of October also left numerous deaths, including that of Manuel de Jesús Rey Soberón, José Ramón Silva Berroa, Brigadier General Diego Cobas Sanz, Manuel Fernández Falcó at the age of 85 and, finally, Alejandro Ferrás Pellicer, one of the last assailants of the Moncada barracks, who was already 99 years old.
Even though all but one of them were united by their advanced age and the deaths occurred at the peak of covid, there was no lack of speculation, sometimes fueled by the official press itself, which was sparing in the information on the reasons for the deaths and hid other details.
The official media reported deaths, sometimes on the date of death, sometimes days later, sometimes revealing the cause (which in some cases was officially covid but in others not) and other times vague. In addition, some were paid a public tribute while others went unnoticed.
In particular, the July deaths aroused the greatest suspicion, as the bodies of the first five deceased generals were immediately cremated without honors.
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Armando Añel, author of the book “Secret Diary of the Cuban Revolution — Romances, crimes, intrigues and infidelities.” (Facebook).
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 26 March 2022 — “Exposing Castroism not only as a dictatorial system and as a regime, but also as a family,” is the purpose of the exiled Cuban journalist and editor in the US, Armando Añel, with his recently published “Secret Diary of the Revolution Cuban: Romances, crimes, intrigues and infidelities.”
Armando Añel, also the director of the publishing house Neo Club Ediciones, describes this book as “a work to coordinate everything scattered” about Fidel Castro and his family and “summarize” it.
“The idea for the book began years ago with a commission for a biography of Fidel Castro, starting with his father (Ángel Castro). I had already written three chapters when the project fell apart,” Añel explained in a statement to EFE.
“There are independent sources, other official ones, one source is even Raúl (Castro) directly, in the reports on the microfraction (dissident movement at the beginning of the revolution), which appeared published in the official press,” he details.
“Secret Diary of the Cuban Revolution: Romances, Crimes, Intrigues and Infidelities” (Neo Club Ediciones, 2022) chronologically links the historical moments of the Cuban Revolution with little-known passages from the private life of Fidel Castro. continue reading
Although apparently “everything” was said and written, collating the sources, contrasting them and incorporating new ones, offers another dimension of the man who marked the days of a country for more than 60 years.
One of the sources used by Añel is the memoir “The Hidden Life of Fidel Castro” by Juan Reinaldo Sánchez, who was a bodyguard for the leader of the revolution between 1977 and 1994 and died in Miami in 2015.
“I would say that of all that has been published about Fidel Castro and his family in 63 years, Sánchez is the one who has reached the most depth on the subject of intimacy, and the Castros do not forgive that, not just Fidel,” comments Anel.
In the book he dedicates space to the deaths in “strange circumstances” of people such as General José Abrahantes, ousted during the well-known “Ochoa case,” or the Venezuelan military officer Raúl Isaías Baduel, who “replaced Chávez and was betrayed by Fidel.”
Separate chapters are dedicated to the deaths of Camilo Cienfuegos, Fidel Castro’s right arm and popular commander at the beginning of the revolution, and of the opposition leader Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, which occurred 53 years apart.
A childhood episode that Fidel Castro told the Spanish journalist Ignacio Ramonet is one of the things that has most caught Añel’s attention during his task of soaking up information.
The leader of the revolution accused a primary school teacher, Eufrasia Feliú, of stealing the money that his father sent him to go on vacation.
“The first official repudiation rally of Castroism against dissidence occurs with this teacher. Ramón and Fidel Castro lay in ambush outside the teacher’s house and start stoning her. It shocked me a lot when I read it, and told by him,” he remarks.
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The activist Yoandris Gutiérrez Vargas, one of those prosecuted in Bayamo for the July 11 demonstrations. (Facebook)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 26 March 2022 — On Friday, the organization Amnesty International (AI) asked to enter Cuba to follow the trials against the demonstrators accused of the anti-government protests of last July 11.
In a statement, AI reported that it has also asked the Cuban government to let in other human rights observers to follow up on the trials.
The London-based organization called the proceedings “unjust” and “opaque.”
“The Cuban authorities have continued their campaign of criminalization with the sole purpose of reestablishing the culture of fear,” Erika Guevara Rosas, director of AI for the Americas, criticized in the document.
Since December, trials of July 11 (11J) protesters have been taking place in Cuba, with hundreds of defendants. Several NGOs – as AI is doing now – have denounced lack of guarantees, fabrication of evidence and very high penalties.
According to the NGOs Justicia 11J and Cubalex, a total of 1,442 people have been detained in relation to the protests. Of these, at least 756 remain in detention centers. continue reading
On the other hand, Prisoners Defenders points out that at least 842 people were in prison on the island at the end of 2021 for political reasons, mostly for the events of 11J.
The Cuban Attorney General’s Office reported that 790 people have been prosecuted for the July 11 protests, of which 55 are between 16 and 17 years old.
The defendants, investigated mainly for sedition and theft, were accused of “serious disturbances and acts of vandalism, with the purpose of destabilizing public order, collective security and citizen tranquility,” according to the Supreme Court.
According to Amnesty International, these types of accusations serve to “squelch dissent.”
The NGO also noted that Cuba is the only country on the American continent where it is not allowed to enter.
COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.
The long prison sentences that the Cuban courts have been imposing on the July 11th (11J) protesters in Havana are taking their toll on the courts’ public image, even there, where they preserve it. That some people from the ruling party’s orbit, among whom is troubadour of the Revolution, Silvio Rodríguez, who has publicly criticized the sentences, has encouraged the regime to start a campaign to justify the sentences.
This Friday, Granma, the official newspaper of the Communist Party published a piece, which, despite being titled Victimizing the Victimizers is the Enemy’s Strategy, is not included in the opinion section, which defends the thesis that people judged for the acts of July 11th “put the stability of the nation at risk.”
The article begins with three brief testimonies of people allegedly attacked in the maelstrom of the demonstrations, two of them, police officers from Havana, who were involved in the altercations. Two others are public officials who, according to Granma, were carrying out tasks related to the pandemic, although they were not injured in that context but rather for “defending the material assets of the people.”
The text also mentions the alleged attack on the Cárdenas hospital, of which there is no graphic testimony, only the statements of several people to Cuban television
One of them, Reynaldo Rosado Roselló, head of logistics at the University of Informatics Sciences and who suffered a wound to the forehead, reported in July that the events occurred when he went with several colleagues to the area of the disturbances, although Granma infers that the demonstrators were the ones who appeared before institutions that housed patients.
The article also mentions the alleged attack on the Cárdenas hospital, for which there is no graphic testimony, only the statements of several people on Cuban television.
According to the Granma note, on July 11th, “violence, disorder and vandalism prevailed” and they accuse “the enemies of the Revolution” of trying to “portray the Cuban people’s demands as just.” Although the article admits that there was a lot of discontent among the population, it argues that the people who peacefully expressed their discomfort withdrew when they saw that “that unbridled mob had no sincere demand, but rather responded to external interests that were not at all beneficial to the people.” continue reading
The ruling party defends itself by insisting that the people who have been severely penalized were violent and looters, not political prisoners
The ruling party defends itself by insisting that the people who have been severely penalized were violent and looters, not political prisoners. However, the highest sentences in the case of Havana recently, or in Holguín last month, have not been for those who were accused of committing violent acts, but for sedition.
This is one of the most serious type of crime in the legal codes of every country, because it involves standing up against the government in order to overthrow it. But the demonstrations against the authorities in democratic countries, in which slogans and insults are shouted against the leaders who are held responsible for the problems of the population, are part of freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate. In the event that they result in some act of vandalism or violence, the fine or penalty for that act is applied but the protester is not accused of sedition, as has happened in Cuba in these processes.
However, the Granma note insists: “Impunity, when order and citizens’ peace are at stake, is something that we will never allow, because no one is above the law in Cuba.”
The article emphasizes that the protesters actions were instigated from abroad, which aggravates the situation
The article emphasizes that the protesters actions were instigated from abroad, which aggravates the situation. “Those who provoked such acts, who incited chaos, were in many cases far from Cuba, calmly and coldly observing the result of their actions and, of course, counting the dollars they received as payment,” the newspaper says, before emphasizing that Cubans decide their destiny in their own way “with creativity, with depth of thought, with peace, with love and commitment… Anyone who thinks that it can be otherwise is guilty of being naive,” it warns.
The article is an extension of the podcast published hours earlier by Cubadebate in which statements by alleged witnesses and victims of the “violent acts that cannot be denied” are inserted. The prolific dissemination of audios of those who corroborate the government’s version is striking, compared to the absolute absence of those who deny it. In that program, they also show notable annoyance with the Spanish newspaper El País, which published an editorial this Thursday against the 11J trials entitled “Ruined Lives in Cuba.”
The interviewees do not explain that what bothers them is the journalistic approach but, curiously, that the newspaper is dealing with a topic that is outside its borders “given all the problems Spain has.” This same Friday, Cubadebate highlights the million deaths from Covid-19 in the US and the marches in Serbia on the anniversary of the NATO bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1999.
The interviewees do not explain that what bothers them is the informative treatment but, curiously, that the newspaper is dealing with a topic that is outside its borders “given all the problems Spain has”
The program also dedicates several minutes to accusing the United States of hypocrisy for asking Cubans on their social networks not to risk traveling illegally to the country, while the country fails to comply with immigration agreements, leaving those who intend to leave the country without the legal channels to do so. Adding that, of course, that people leave for economic reasons, “which they try to say is political exile.”
The message is in line with the umpteenth statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs this Thursday, highlighting that Cubans are traveling to Guyana to access US consular services in that country, because of the lack of measures aimed at reactivating services in Havana.
To counteract the effect of intellectuals, inside and outside of Cuba, critics of the 11J sentences, whose discontent was reflected in their Manifesto Against Silence, for justice, signed by more than 40 personalities from, among other fields, the cinema, the press and literature. The Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC) and the Hermanos Saíz Association have published their own articles.
“We can discuss any opinion about our reality, and we do so with total freedom. But we do not accept the maneuver of only using concerns to serve as an instrument for the enemies of the Homeland”
In it, they accuse the signatories of the Manifesto – “of different origins, of dissimilar professional results, most of them residing outside of Cuba” – of assuming the representation of Cuba’s intelligentsia, which, immediately afterwards, they attribute to themselves.
What they describe as a pamphlet turns out to be, in their opinion, “a condensed falsification in a few lines, without a hint of serious analysis” of the “riots of July 11th and 12th“, and they ignore “the embargo and the external aggression.”.
“We can discuss any opinion about our reality, and we do so with total freedom. But we do not accept the maneuver of using fair concerns to serve as an instrument for the enemies of the Homeland. They are not interested in the poor, nor do they intend, in any way, to solve the problems that affect the conditions of their material and spiritual life,” the article concludes.
Translated by Norma Whiting
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La Crema sings to the stampede of Cubans leaving the Island. (Screen capture)
14ymedio, Havana, 21 March 2022 — It hasn’t been a month since reggaeton singer La Crema wrote lyrics to the stampede of Cubans through Nicaragua and he already has a new song about the unstoppable wave of emigration that the Island is experiencing. The explanation, for the popular artist, is very simple: “The prices go up, while others fill their bellies.”
Luis Alberto Vicet Vives, the real name of the artist, released Se van [They leave] this Friday on his social networks, his most recent musical theme about the Cuban migratory phenomenon. In the video clip, comical images of people packing suitcases alternate with those of airplanes taking off and landing. The rapper appears in a large part of the video singing and dancing in an airport terminal simulated with the chroma key technique.
“They leave in search of opportunities, those who can sell their properties leave,” the musician sings. Among the causes of the mass departure, he cites criminal acts and “outbursts,” although above all he refers to the increase in the cost of living.
“The prices in the store triple like magic. We are living in Cuba with the prices of Dubai,” he says ironically at another time. In addition, La Crema considers that it is the only way to succeed in life. “Many people who have left already have their company. What you will have in the yuma [USA] you will never have in Cuba,” he points out.
This Tuesday, the US Department of Customs and Border Protection confirmed that 16,657 Cubans arrived in the country illegally in one month. Since October 2021, and in the last five months, the number has risen to 47,431, of which the vast majority, 46,752, made it through Mexican border points. continue reading
Every week, the US Coast Guard intercepts Cubans in boats in operations that the governments of both countries consider very dangerous. However, those who make the decision to emigrate prefer to ignore the warnings and risk their lives crossing the sea (or borders, in the case of those who leave by land) rather than live in the current conditions on the Island.
“They’re leaving because they’re going crazy here and at the rate we’re going, Cuba is going to be empty,” the artist sings.
The avalanche of emigrants, after two years with the borders shielded by the pandemic, also coincides with a worsening of the economic crisis, which includes a rise in the cost of living, the devaluation of the peso and an increase in uncertainty about the future financial state of the country in the short and medium term.
In addition, repression has intensified and some who protested against the government on July 11, more for economic than political reasons, have ended up suffering the consequences of complaining to the authorities, who are ready to interpret any criticism as an attack on the system.
But not only opponents flee; those who have been state spokespersons have also found a refuge in their escape to express themselves freely, such is the case of Radio Rebelde announcer and television presenter Alejandro Quintana Morales, who arrived this week in the United States, “a country where, at last, I can feel free,” he wrote on his Facebook profile.
Previously, and amid criticism, the journalist and official Cuban television presenter Yunior Smith revealed that he was on the southern border of the United States, trying to request political asylum, after having criticized, in his programs, Washington’s policies towards Havana, while praising the Cuban regime.
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EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 30 March 2022 — Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel called for extreme sanitary measures to prevent a new wave of COVID-19 infections despite the progress of the massive immunization campaign, the official press reported on Tuesday.
