The ship ’Augusto C. Sandino’, launched by Nicaragua for the first time in 2018. (Minrex)
14ymedio, Havana, 7 February 2022 — The ship Augusto C. Sandino is once again on its way to Cuba from Nicaragua with humanitarian aid. The ship, which set sail this Sunday from the river port of El Rama, carries 36 containers, 21 of which contain coffee and 15 of rice.
It is the fourth shipment that the Nicaraguan government has sent to Havana since last August, after the July 11 protests. That Sunday, thousands of Cubans took to the streets demanding freedom, but also food and medicine, in the midst of an economic crisis unprecedented since the 1990s.
The Sandino already made the same trip at the beginning of December, with a shipment of 50 containers, with a total weight of 1,007 tons, of coffee, beans and household goods. Before, in August and September, Managua had sent shipments of about 30 containers each.
The official press has touted this new donation, attributing responsibility for the economic crisis “to the intensification of the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed on the Island by the United States,” without mentioning that the Island buys large quantities of food and medicine from that country every year. In fact, the US is the main supplier of frozen chicken to Cuba. continue reading
The Nicaraguan government of Daniel Ortega, whose democratic deterioration has been condemned by the international community, including the United States and the UN, is thus consolidating itself as one of the main allies of the Cuban regime, as it was at the beginning of the Sandinista revolution, in the 1980s, when Fidel Castro sent troops and weapons to Managua.
Managua’s decision, last November, to establish “visa-free” entry for Cubans has been the spigot of the mass exodus that the Island is experiencing these days. Hundreds of Cubans take planes daily to Managua with the ultimate goal of reaching the United States by land.
____________
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 local medical team was reinforced with two experts from Havana and the minor underwent emergency surgery. (Granma)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 8 February 2022 — A Cuban medical team successfully removed a chest tumor that complicated the vital functions of a 49-day-old baby, official media reported Monday.
The intervention that saved the life of Annalie, who suffered a cardiac arrest due to the teratoma, was a “milestone for Cuban medicine,” according to the official digital media Cubadebate.
The problem was discovered when the patient arrived at the José Luis Miranda children’s hospital in Villa Clara due to possible covid-19 infection and respiratory problems were discovered.
Various tests, from X-rays to an echocardiogram and an ultrasound, showed that the baby had a teratoma that “compressed vital structures such as the heart, the respiratory tract and the large blood vessels located in the center of the chest.”
It was “a benign tumor that, due to the compression of vital organs, behaved like a malignant one,” summarized the neonatal surgeon and head of that service central Cuba, Abel Armenteros. continue reading
The local medical team was reinforced with two experts from Havana – since transferring the patient was too risky – and the baby underwent emergency surgery.
The operation, which lasted an hour and a half, was completed successfully and the postoperative complex, with antibiotics and “extreme care” in the intensive care unit, is evolving favorably.
According to the official Granma newspaper, the director of the children’s hospital, Jesús Sánchez Pérez, assured that the progress of the baby, fifteen days after the intervention, is “very positive.”
____________
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.
Cuban athletes in the Under-18 category will not see action in the World Cup scheduled for next September. (Twitter/@francysromeroFR)
14ymedio, Havana, 7 February 2022 — The fear of the flight of players, as happened last year in the Americas Qualifier held in Florida or the Under-23 World Cup in Mexico, has led Cuba to make the decision not to attend the Under-18 World Cup. Media pressure is another reason, according to journalist Francys Romero based on close sources, causing the authorities to decide not to participate in the competition, which will be held this coming September in Sarasota and Bradenton, USA.
This absence represents the Island’s second year out of the competition, as it was not present last year due to the covid-19 pandemic, according to what the Government told the World Baseball and Softball Confederation.
“Throughout history, these tournaments have represented a kind of motivation for youth players in Cuba,” Romero said. Traveling abroad means “a prize” and also an opportunity to emigrate for youth athletes who will now have to wait for future years.
In May 2021, the Cuban Baseball Federation (FCB) reported that César Prieto, Andy Rodríguez, Lázaro Blanco and the team’s psychologist left the Cuban nine and decided to stay in the United States. The federation still had not recovered from these “desertions” when, in September of the same year, 12 athletes dropped out, the worst figure in history.
Trying to avoid the “bleeding of players”, the Cuban Federation plans competitions with Under-23 teams, but while this does not materialize, the weekly abandonment of youth is a constant. On February 5, it was continue reading
announced that Luis Enrique González left the island without specifying the destination. A day before Roger Trench escaped to the Dominican Republic. Also on the list are Yunior Tur and Yosimar Cousín and Loidel Chapellí Jr.
In the first half of January, El Nuevo Herald published that at least 15 Cubans, at the age of 16, began to sign their contracts with one of the 30 Major League clubs, and made reference to Cristian Vaquero with the Washington team, Dyan Yamel Jorge with Colorado, and Oscar Luis Colás with Chicago.
The youth seek to be hired by teams from the United States, as well as Canada, and Japan, with whom the FCB has agreements has begun approaches for prospects who might exit. “It is one of the missions of the Cuban Federation, to manage the contracts of Cuban players,” declared the national director of Baseball, Juan Reinaldo Pérez, on the Bola Viva program last Tuesday.
Pérez spoke of “freedom” for athletes to seek contracts beyond MLB. However, these contractual relations must be “under the protection of the FCB.” The salary, he specified, is negotiated between the club, the federation and the athlete. The player “receives 100% of his salary” and for the training right between 10% and 25% is agreed with the club, and “this money is paid to the federation.”
____________
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.
On most of Alma Mater’s shelves the “educational texts” multiply, with the words “Che” or “Fidel” on their spines (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 7 February 2022 — The best-selling book in the Alma Mater bookstore, recently reopened in Havana, is not Capital or some title by Marta Harnecker, but Homer’s Iliad.
Located in a small corner of the premises, where most of the customers gathered on Monday, the Greek classic appeared with other greats of literature, such as Pere Goriot, by Honoré de Balzac, or La casa de Bernarda Alba, by Federico Garcia Lorca.
“Oh, but how has this book sold!” said the shop assistant to one of the young men who was carrying a copy of the Iliad under his arm. “Outside of that, there is very little of interest,” confessed the customer.
The price of these international titles, between 10 and 15 pesos, also favored their purchase, despite the fact that their edition is of very poor quality. “The other propaganda books have a more elaborate cover, and even then nobody buys them,” joked another buyer, in his 50s.
In the rest of the shelves, “educational texts” multiply, with the words “Che” or “Fidel” on their spines. “Don’t you have The Golden Age?” another young woman in her twenties asked about a title by José Martí. “We don’t have it yet but we are going to have it, at the end of the month or the beginning of March,” assured the shop assistant. continue reading
The bookstore, located on the corner of Infanta and San Lázaro, was reopened this Sunday, after being closed for more than a year and under construction. A chronic clogging problem, linked to the flow of sewage from the upper floors of the building, had flooded the basement and affected the structure.
Alma Mater, which owes its name to its proximity to La Colina university, has in recent years also been a navigation room for the national intranet and a hall for official events. However, for taxi drivers and those over 70, this business with the glass windows that serve as a reference to so many are still referred in the old way: Lámparas Quesada, the private business located on the site before 1959.
On the afternoon of January 27, shortly before a crowd passed by as part of the official March of the Torches, the residents of the area murmured that the opening was imminent and was destined to please the eyes of Miguel Díaz- Canel and Raúl Castro, both in the front row of the parade.
However it couldn’t even be made ready for the occasion. There was barely time to create a set of furniture and lights. “What they did was put some furniture in the middle of the salon, to make it appear that there was something, because there was nothing else,” says a local resident sarcastically. “In case el designado [the hand-picked president] arrived or looked through the glass when he passed by.”
During the reopening event, this Sunday, with the presence of several Communist Party officials and academic authorities, it was announced that 186 titles, 36 issues of academic journals and 300,000 copies of more than 22 Cuban publishers are for sale at the store.
Amanda García Roche, director of Academic Publications and of the University of Havana Publishing, which manages the bookstore, praised the “reunion with a space that we all profess much love for and missed” and assured that it “reopens completely restored,” although the haste to meet a date raises fears that this may not be the case.
The act, full of solemnity, included several speeches, dozens of chairs placed in the nearby Martyrs’ Park and a security operation that left the residents of the neighborhood without the chance of buying “not even a button” in the informal market until that the enchanted visitors left. The cutting of a white ribbon sealed the umpteenth reopening of the premises.
“Here they have given a few coats of paint, fixed the lights and started selling, but we have doubts about how long it will last until the shit comes out from under the door again,” questions a neighbor who lives above the nearby Cuban Post Office of and who passes every day in front of the bookstore.
The furniture that has been placed in the spacious living room seems to be a prop. “They are like the ones used in some television programs,” a young man who came to review the titles for sale sneered this Monday. The metal shelves, attached to the walls, and some in the center were few relative to the large room, whose floors had been polished so much that more than one person slipped.
From this February 6, the collective exhibition of posters of The Wild Swan, inspired by the verses of Luis Rogelio Nogueras Wichy, and carried out by Visual Communication students of the Higher Institute of Design, will also be exhibited in the bookstore .
Among the most repeated titles is the magazine Economy and Development, published every semester by the Faculty of Economics of the University of Havana, but it does not seem to arouse much interest in these times of crisis, inflation and the loss of purchasing power of thousands of Cuban families.
____________
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.
A man walks in front of a mural in Havana that features the Cuban Revolution and theUnited States embargo. (EFE/File)
14ymedio, Luis Zúñiga, Miami, 5 February 2022 — On June 5, 1960, Fidel Castro ordered the nationalization of the Texaco company’s oil refinery in Cuba. The following month, on July 5, he ordered the seizure of the two remaining US refineries, Shell and Esso. Castro let the owners know that there would be no monetary compensation for the nationalizations. The response of the president of the United States was to cancel the sugar quota of 3 million tons that the US bought annually from Cuba.
A month later, in August 1960, Castro ordered the nationalization without compensation of 38 US companies, including the 36 sugar mills they owned and the telephone and electricity companies. In addition, he imposed an extraordinary increase in tariffs on imports of American products. Washington then made the decision to suspend the export of merchandise to Cuba, with the exception of medicines and food. Two months later, in October 1960, Castro ordered the nationalization of all foreign banks and the confiscation of all remaining US companies in Cuba. The total value of those seizures was assessed at the time at just over $1 billion [translator’s note: roughly $9.4 billion today].
On January 3 of the following year, 1961, diplomatic relations were severed. A few months later, in March, the US Congress passed the Foreign Assistance Act and President John F. Kennedy, based on it, ordered a trade embargo on Cuba.
By excluding the United States from payments for nationalized properties and businesses while giving payment guarantees to the rest of the affected countries, Fidel Castro demonstrated that his action was based on hatred of that country and the desire to start a confrontation with it. The explanation given by President Kennedy to Congress for imposing continue reading
the embargo on Cuba was to defend the interests of US citizens arbitrarily dispossessed of their legally established companies in Cuba.
LEGALITY OF THE EMBARGO
With very small differences, all the legislation of the democratic countries of the world coincide in the definition, conception and application of the laws related to the nationalization of foreign properties and businesses. The classic definition states: “The nationalization measures entail an obligation on the part of the nationalizing State to pay fully for the damages to the injured foreign owner. The expropriation must be followed by a prompt, adequate and effective compensation to the owners.”
Numerous governments around the world have nationalized foreign properties, but generally those governments have compensated the owners adequately. Russia, Venezuela and Brazil nationalized the oil industries, Bolivia the natural gas industry and Chile the copper industry, just to mention a few examples of countries in the region.
CORRECT DEFINITION: BLOCKADE OR EMBARGO?
The Castro regime calls the embargo a “blockade” with the evident purpose of magnifying its impact and presenting itself as a victim, which, logically, arouses sympathy or pity in the world because Cuba is a small country and the United States is a large and powerful one. This propaganda manipulation has been used with remarkable efficiency and has been replicated by all the world’s leftist governments. But what is true and undeniable is that the aggressor was the Castro regime and the US embargo was the response to the confiscatory aggression, which, by the way, is still maintained to this day. Castro persistently refused to pay the Americans whose property was confiscated while he compensated all other foreign businesspeople.
In addition to false, the use of the word “blockade” is bombastic. Historically, the economic blockade of a country implies measures that have not been used in the case of Cuba, such as surrounding the country with warships and blocking the airspace to prevent goods and supplies from reaching that country. The United States did this against Haiti in 1993, seeking to force the Haitian military regime to return political power to the last democratically elected president in that country, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Cuba has no US ships or planes surrounding it.
A blockade also implies that the country cannot trade — that is all access to the country is blocked — and Cuba trades with the entire world. A blockade must include the impossibility of carrying out banking and financial transactions with other countries. Cuba conducts normal transactions with other countries. The only such transactions that are limited or controlled are those directly with the United States or those subject to restrictions for suspected links to terrorist groups, money launderers or their front people.
In short, the island of Cuba is not subject to any blockade.
THE EMBARGO BETWEEN 1962 AND 1991
In that nearly 30-year period, between 1962 and the disintegration of the USSR, Castro rarely referred to the US embargo in his speeches. From the beginning of 1960, Castro began to receive economic and financial aid from the Soviet Union and from all the communist countries of Eastern Europe. Politically, Castro mocked the sanctions, implying that they did not affect him and that they had no impact on his national or international decisions.
In addition to free economic and military aid, the Soviets extended extensive lines of credit to Castro. In 2015, the amount of the debt for these lines of credit with the former Soviet Union, today Russia, was officially known: just over 35 billion dollars. That figure confirms why Castro did not even mention the US embargo. With the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, the subsidies and credits that kept the regime afloat economically ended. From that moment on, the embargo became the subject of constant complaint by Fidel Castro and his regime.
RELAXATIONS TO THE COMMERCIAL EMBARGO
Some presidents of the United States have modified the restrictions imposed by the embargo, seeking with these incentives to get the Cuban regime to improve the situation of human rights on the island. In 1975, Gerald Ford issued an executive order that allowed foreign subsidiaries of United States companies to sell their products to Cuba. The volume of trade between the subsidiaries of the United States and Cuba reached, in 1991, the figure of 718 million dollars.
President Jimmy Carter also introduced changes to the embargo. In 1977, he authorized trips to Cuba by exiles who had relatives on the island. That change meant an important economic injection for the Cuban regime and Castro then allowed those trips that were previously prohibited for Cuban exiles. This Carter modification is what makes it possible for billions of dollars in remittances to reach Cuba every year. In 2018, the year before the coronavirus pandemic, exiles sent some $2.5 billion to their relatives in Cuba.
Bill Clinton, in 1992, increased the limits on sending of money remittances to Cuba up to 300 dollars per month and authorized the visits of groups of religious, students and academics to Cuba. The then president also authorized the Castro regime to buy any amounts of medicine and food if they were paid for in cash. The measure was later expanded to include clothing, shoes, and a wide range of items.
The figures of the volumes of food purchases that the Castro regime began to import from the United States varied according to the economic situation. The following are the rounded figures from the United States Department of Commerce regarding the values of food exports to Cuba between 2000 and 2021:
Some imports to Cuba are striking. In 2020, the Castro regime imported $70.6 million worth of beer from the United States. In 2015, it imported whiskey worth $61.3 million. In 2003, newsprint for $4.4 million.
The United States is Cuba’s fifth largest trading partner in terms of trade volume. In addition, according to the US Department of Agriculture, that country supplies about 96% of the rice and 70% of the poultry products consumed in Cuba. It also exports wheat, corn, soybeans and their derivatives on a large scale.
Additionally, between 2014 and 2020, the US authorized the sending to Cuba of donations of a wide range of medical products, special foods and medical equipment worth almost 36 million dollars.
With these exports and donations from the United States to Cuba, what blockade is the regime talking about? In reality, the remaining restrictions of the Act are not even consistent with the concept of a trade embargo.
OTHER AMERICAN COLLABORATIONS WITH CUBA
Due to the serious epidemiological crisis that the Island is suffering, in November 2021 President Joe Biden authorized the US airlines IBC Airways and Skyway Enterprises to carry out charter flights with humanitarian aid. The planes would transport up to 7,500 pounds of medical supplies, food, medicine, hygiene items and other supplies that cannot be purchased on the Island.
In August 1960, Castro ordered the nationalization without compensation of 38 US companies, including telephone and electricity companies. (Archive)
A revealing fact about the falsehoods of the Castro regime regarding the embargo occurred on July 15, shortly after the massive protests in Cuba. That day, the Prime Minister, Manuel Marrero, issued an order lifting, until the end of the year, the restrictions on the entry of food and medicine that travelers may bring to Cuba through the airports. That restriction on the entry of these products from the United States had not been imposed by the United States but by the Castro regime itself.
THE PROPAGANDA OF THE EMBARGO REGIME IS MASSIVE AND DISTORTED
The propaganda about what the regime calls the “blockade” is constant, identifying it as the cause of all the country’s problems, the shortages of both food and medicine as well as construction materials, buses, trains, electric light bulbs and even paper. Many wonder, what do things Cubans don’t have available to them — such as the raising of pigs, chickens and cows, the cultivation of potatoes and vegetables and the fishing of shrimp and lobsters — have to do with the embargo?
The propaganda is so intense that even educated Cubans who are not sympathetic to the regime say that “the embargo must be eliminated in order to remove the constant excuses that the regime’s officials use so as not to be responsible for their failure.” Unfortunately, these people do not understand that the regime does not sustain itself with “excuses,” but with terror and police repression. They do not understand that the communist dialectic is always looking for scapegoats to blame for the mistakes and failure of its centralized economic system. If a factory does not meet the production plans, the culprit is not the communist economic system, but the official in charge of fulfilling the plans. If the country does not progress, the cause is that other nations deny it loans, but they never mention that they do not pay their debts…
When Barack Obama restored diplomatic relations with the Cuban communist dictatorship, the regime began to prepare for the possibility that the US would lift the embargo. And what did they do at that time? Well, they carried out a “study” on the damage caused by the “blockade” to the Cuban economy. The calculated amount was $822.28 billion. Thus, if the United States lifted that sanction, the regime’s next demand would be that it compensate “Cuba” with that amount. Of course, the United States would not do it, and there they would have the next excuse ready for the economic and financial disasters that Cuba would continue to suffer under Castroism. Shortages would be “justified” then by alleging that the United States did not want to pay the damages and we have to work many years to ‘heal’ the economy… The dialectic capacity of communists to create excuses is infinite.
The economic, financial and productive disaster of the Castro regime is identical to the one that was suffered and is suffered by all the communist regimes that have existed. Their economic system simply doesn’t work, but the communists will never accept it. That is part of their dogmas. Whoever does not understand it, gets confused and may end up believing in those absurd excuses.
THE ECONOMIC SANCTIONS IMPOSED BY PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP
All of the above information supports the conviction that the US trade embargo on Cuba has been more theoretical than practical. The only prohibition that has had an impact on the Castro regime has been to give it access to credit in the United States.
This has prevented the Castros from plunging future generations of Cubans even further into debt. This reality becomes clearer to understand when we investigate the gigantic amount of money that the Castros have borrowed on behalf of the nation and that they have not repaid. The regime has never informed the people how those funds were used. The list of money (in dollars) received by the regime (and never repaid) is as follows:
– Russia : 35 billion. That country forgave 90% of the debt in 2014.
– Paris Club : 11.1 billion. The Club forgave 8.5 billion in 2015.
– China : 6 billion. That country forgave 100% of the debt in 2011.
– Argentina : 2.7 billion. Foreign Minister Felipe Solá demanded payment from Cuba at the last CELAC summit.
– London Club : 1.4 billion in commercial debts. They have already sued the regime in an English court.
– Romania : 900 million. None of it has been repaid.
– Brazil : 561 million. The Bolsonaro government has tried to collect the debt, but without success.
– Mexico : 487 million. That country completely forgave the debt in 2013.
– Spanish companies in Cuba : 325 million. They haven’t been repaid.
– Czech Republic : 276 million. They haven’t been repaid.
– Hungary : 200 million. They haven’t been repaid.
– South Africa : 137 million. That country completely forgave the debt in 2012.
A total of more than $59 billion dollars that the regime has received, that it has not returned to the lenders and that was not used to solve any of the multitude of needs that Cubans have suffered for decades, such as the lack of housing, transport problems, water supply and rural electrification, among others.
It is well known that the priority of the regime in the use of the country’s resources is what it needs to stay in power. Thus, for example, the last credit that Russia has granted the Castro regime for 50 million dollars, in October 2018, will be used, according to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, to acquire armored vehicles and helicopters. With the severe food crisis that Cuba is experiencing, this is one of the priorities of the regime.
Many will have seen the photographs that the Government published of the fleets of patrol cars that they bought for the Police and State Security, but they have not bought a single ambulance, despite the terrible lack of them. The Mercedes Benz agency in Cuba “took pity” on the people’s suffering and made a gift of 18 ambulances last March.
The priority is to strengthen the repressive and military apparatus that keeps them in power. For that indisputable reason, it is necessary to apply economic sanctions that cut off their income. Based on these premises, the ones that then President Donald Trump imposed on the Castro regime had the objective of cutting off the income of the regime’s military companies that, as we know, have appropriated businesses that produce dollars, including hotels, gas stations, hotel shops and restaurants, currency exchange offices, food markets taking payment only in dollars, rental cars, tourist taxis, etc.
The sanctions imposed by Trump were:
– Cancellation of cruise ship trips to Cuba: Each ship that arrives on the island must pay, on average, 13 dollars per passenger for the right to dock at the port and thousands of dollars more in supplies and services to the ship, including fuel. All this money goes to the coffers of military companies and it is money that is used, primarily, for repression (purchase of patrol cars for State Security and the Police, protection and attack equipment for Special Troops, electronic means for surveillance of opponents, to pay for high salaries and benefits for the police to help in the repression and for the enormous costs of the hundreds of prisons where opponents are imprisoned).
– Application of the Helms-Burton Law: This measure stops the unscrupulous foreign investors who are going to take advantage of the companies confiscated from their legitimate owners and that contribute millions of dollars in investments to the Castro military. In addition, those foreign investors will pay the regime directly for hired labor — and not the Cuban employees — the salaries in dollars, of which the military keep 90%.
– Returned Cuba to the list of countries that do not collaborate in the fight against terrorism: This sanction places the Castro regime in a fair place. In Havana, for example, there are living the leaders of the Colombian National Liberation Army (ELN), who organized the attack with a van loaded with explosives at the police school in Bogotá that caused the death of 21 people in 2020. Colombia has requested the extradition of the ELN commanders, but the regime protects them. The same is happening with the FARC, with members of Hezbollah and Hamas, and with so many other terrorist groups that found a safe haven in Cuba.
In addition, this sanction is what has prevented the Cuban military, through its company Fincimex, from taking control of remittances sent from the United States to relatives in Cuba. Fincimex is the main Cuban partner of foreign credit card companies and the Western Union money transfer company that processes the largest volume of dollar shipments to Cuba. The sanction included the recommendation to use non-military Cuban companies to send money to Cuba.
– Personally sanctioned several high-ranking Castro officials and soldiers linked to the repression against citizens who express some form of discrepancy with the regime: This includes individuals such as as the Minister of the Interior, Lázaro Álvarez Casas; General Romárico Sotomayor, head of the Political Directorate of the same ministry; and General Pedro Martínez Fernández, head of the repressive “red beret” troops. It also sanctioned Raúl Castro and his children Alejandro Castro, Nilsa Castro, Deborah Castro and Mariela Castro, as well as Raúl Castro’s former son-in-law, General Luis Alberto Rodríguez López-Calleja, president of Gaesa. The sanctions prohibit entry to the United States for them and their close relatives, as well as the freezing of funds and properties in that country. Many Cubans on the island do not know that several of those sanctioned people have traveled to the United States as tourists or as official and have purchased apartments. Many sons of those soldiers and officials of the regime even have bank accounts and properties there.
None of these measures increases the hunger of the Cuban people. None of them cause shortages of food or consumer goods. They are measures focused on taking income away from the repressive military apparatus that sustains the dictatorship.
____________
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.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko. (Kremlin)
14ymedio, Madrid, 7 February 2022 — Russia will have a digital attaché in Havana to promote its information and communication technologies in Cuba, according to Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko speaking on Monday.
The Island will not be the only one to welcome one of these envoys; up to 16 countries that will do so, including Brazil, Malaysia and Vietnam. The rest are considered candidates such as Germany, South Korea, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Singapore, the South African Republic, Thailand and Turkey.
“According to our forecasts, the ’digital aggregates’ will begin to work this year in 16 countries,” said the senior official, as published today by the Russian agency Sputnik. The position is newly created and is one of the novelties created by the Ministry of Digital Development, the Ministry of Industry and Commerce and the Fund for the Development of Information Technologies within a package of measures to support the area.
The goal of these digital ambassadors is “to encourage exports of digital solutions from Russia,” Chernyshenko added. But, in addition, they will help national companies in the technology sector with information, analysis, legal support and advice in the countries where they are posted. continue reading
According to the Deputy Minister of Digital Development, Maxim Parshin, “the digital attachés must be well oriented in Russian and foreign software, understand the competitive advantages of domestic products and know Russian and international laws in the commercial field.”
According to analysts, Russia is one of the countries that has most highly developed the strategy of hybrid wars, which include disinformation and cyber attacks to guarantee an advantage and generate opinions.
In recent years, Russia has been accused of interfering in some democratic processes, including the 2016 US presidential elections. Russia also appears behind cyber attacks and has developed the Internet Research Agency (IRA) to flood social networks through use of bots and trolls.
____________
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.
Images of the trial of J11 protesters in La Güinera broadcast on state television. (Capture)
14ymedio, Madrid, 3 February 2022 — The Madrid-based Cuban Observatory of Human Rights (OCDH), denounced the continuing “repressive spiral in Cuba,” amid the silence of Spain, the European Union, and Latin America. In its last report, the organization documented 643 repressive actions in January, of which 136 were arbitrary detentions and 507 other types of abuses.
Although Spain and the European Union have expressed concern over the repression, arrests, and the July 11th (11J) trials and have also demanded the right to protest, OCDH considers these expressions insufficient, “given the grave situation,” and interprets these as complicity, according to its executive director Alejandro González Raga.
The Observatory’s report includes the trials of July 11th protesters in the count of human rights abuses in the first month of the year. These proceedings, it affirms, are manipulated, with witnesses who favor the official version, and an inappropriate application of the law by judges who are not independent. “Of the 187 documented trials, at least 184 have been for the protests,” the report specifies.
These are followed by harassment, surveillance of homes, summons, and threats or fines, with the intent to intimidate. Seven activists were forced into exile, the OCDH confirmed.
“The situation in Cuba is worse by the day. The announcement of a new Penal Code, which even turns some rights conferred in the Constitution into crimes and maintains the death penalty, increases concern at this time. European diplomats as well as the office of Michelle Bachelet at the UN have placed much hope in the regime’s new laws. What will they do now?” said González Raga who thanked the artists who have canceled their participation in the San Remo festival in Havana. continue reading
Also this Thursday, Cuba Próxima, which is also based in Spain, published a statement in which the organization denounced that on Tuesday historian Leonardo Fernández Otaño, member of its Deliberative Council was summoned, interrogated, and subjected to demeaning treatment, by agents of the Department of State Security.
Fernández Otaño protested alongside Camila Rodríguez, Carolina Barrero, and Daniela Rojo at the entrance to the People’s Municipal Tribunal of Diez de Octubre on Monday, the first day of the trial for 33 of the J11 protesters. The three women were detained for several hours, but although he was not arrested he did have to appear before State Security.
“Why are Leonardo Fernández Otaño and other citizens being criminalized? For openly advocating for the release of hundreds of Cubans unjustly imprisoned,” the statement laments, in addition to commending the activist’s work at a time when moral support and solidarity were needed by those affected, who are mostly poor.
Cuba Próxima rejects the arbitrary summons and without the presence of a lawyer, experienced by many activists and opponents in Cuba, beginning with the case of Fernández Otaño and argues that their objective is to bend the will of the affected so they renounce their rights. Furthermore, they express solidarity with the most recently affected, specifically those who participated in the protest on Monday, among them Arián Cruz Álvarez Tata Poet, Leonardo Romero Negrín, and Alexander Hall, in addition to Saily González, arrested in Santa Clara.
Among the demands of the association are an end to the repression of activists and their family members, and the initiation of an investigation into who committed these abuses of power, specifically who tried to suppress the protests on July 11th.
Lastly, they denounced the long sentences faced by the defendants and confirmed their “commitment to fight for the release of all political prisoners, the construction of a pluralist Republic, democratic, based on and oriented toward respect and the exercise of all human rights, sociopolitical inclusion, rule of law and political agreements and seeking the welfare of the Cuban nation.
Translated by: Silvia Suárez
____________
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.
Moment of the arrest of Berta Soler, on January 30. (Capture)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 7 February 2022 — Several Ladies in White were arrested this Sunday, the third in a row, when they went out to protest demanding the release of the prisoners arrested for the anti-government marches of July 11, some activists reported this Monday on social networks.
Among those detained are the leader of the opposition group, Berta Soler, and her husband, Ángel Moya, who were arrested temporarily detained as they left the organization’s headquarters in Havana.
Moya denounced on Facebook that they were violently arrested, held in police stations for about eight hours and then released after a fine was imposed.
Other Ladies in White, including Caridad Burunate, reported similar situations on Facebook.
Two weeks ago, the Ladies in White announced that they would resume their Sunday protests to demand the release of political prisoners, after a break forced by the pandemic. continue reading
On the first Sunday, at least six women, including Soler, were arrested as they left the organization’s headquarters in Havana and released the next day. Last Sunday Soler was the only one detained.
So far, neither the Cuban authorities nor the official media have confirmed the events.
The Ladies in White movement emerged in 2003, following a wave of repression by the Cuban government that was called the Black Spring, when 75 dissidents were arrested and convicted with long prison sentences. Two years later the Ladies in White won the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament.
The European Union and NGOs including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International criticized that wave of arrests, calling them political. The Cuban authorities condemned them alleging that they acted against national sovereignty on orders from the United States.
____________
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.
Demonstration of activists and relatives in the Juan Delgado Park in Havana, in favor of the 11J prisoners tried in the court of Diez de Octubre this week. (Capture)
14ymedio, Havana, 3 February 2022 — On Wednesday the Prosecutor’s Office reduced this Wednesday its initial request for sentences for the six minors of 11J (July 11th) protests who are being tried this week in the Municipal Court of Diez de Octubre, in Havana. This was reported by Yudinela Castro, mother of the young Rowland Jesús Castillo, who now is one of 12 facing a request for 23 years in prison.
This decision comes when the protests of Cuban families multiply and, also, the international denunciations against the harshness of the regime towards the young protesters of last July 11.
The US Embassy in Cuba recently described the trials of the minors as “shameful,” and has repeatedly called for their immediate release. Likewise, last January the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights reported to the UN and Unicef that there are a total of 39 minors under 21 years of age detained for the 11J protests.
According to Yudinela Castro, in statements to Martí Noticias, speaking of Brandon David Becerra Curbelo, for whom they were asking for 18 years – one more year than he currently has – now weighs a request for five years of correctional work without internment. continue reading
The rest of the minors under 18 on trial have also seen their possible sentences reduced: Kendry Miranda Cárdenas and Lázaro Noel Urgelles Fajardo, 20 years and 13 years in prison, respectively, to 10 years, and Nayn Luis Marcos Molinet and Giuseppe Belaunzarán Guada, from 17 years and 13 years in prison, respectively, to 8 years.
Castillo’s mother also announced that this Thursday, the defense lawyers would request the elimination of the crime of “sedition” for which the young people are prosecuted and which is the one that supports these high sentences.
At the moment there is no additional information on the process, in which a total of 33 protesters are tried, some of them present on July 11 at the emblematic Toyo corner, where a police car ended up overturned.
____________
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 Cuban authorities withdrew the accreditations of all EFE personnel in Havana last November without justifying their decision and returned only two later. (Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 3 February 2022 — The Cuban government said this Tuesday that it is willing to “find a solution” with respect to the Spanish news agency EFE, after limiting the work of most of its journalists on the island.
The International Press Center (CPI) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs thus responded on Twitter to the statements made the day before by the Spanish Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, in which he asked that Efe be able to operate in Cuba as it works in Spain.
The CPI stressed that EFE “continues to work with absolute freedom in Cuba,” but demanded “unrestricted respect” for its constitutional order “for the exercise of objective, truthful, impartial and non-biased journalism.”
Of the seven journalists that Efe had in Cuba at the beginning of the year, currently only two can work, one of whom is required to renew their accreditation monthly. continue reading
In addition, the new head of the delegation, appointed in July, has not yet received their press visa and has not been able to enter the country.
The Cuban organization that manages the international media in the country also stressed “that it has been in permanent conversations with the directors of Efe and the Embassy of Spain” throughout this situation.
Albares said this Monday that “everyone, including the Cuban authorities,” are interested in the EFE agency being able to continue working in Cuba, which is why Spain continues to request that the withdrawn accreditations be restored.
“I think that all of us, including the Cuban authorities, have an interest in EFE being able to continue working from Cuba and not from other places,” he stressed in his speech at the Senate’s Ibero-American Affairs committee.
The foreign minister added that the ministry is “fighting so that Efe stays in Cuba, and for it to stay in Cuba they have to let it work just like it works in Spain.”
At the beginning of January, the president of Efe, Gabriela Cañas, affirmed that the agency did not want to leave Cuba and would not leave on its own initiative, but that the decisions of the Cuban authorities are forcing her to rethink her stay in the country.
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.
Luis Mario Niedas, 31, with his grandmother, before being arrested on July 11. (Family archive)
14ymedio, Havana, 3 February 2022 — Sunday was the last day that the announcer Luis Ángel Cruz Gómez presented his program A Very Different Sunday on Radio Vitral, from Sancti Spíritus. The space had not even been on the air for a month, the host’s wife, Mildrey Betancourt, said on the networks, but the directors, without giving reasons, announced that they would “stop for a while.”
As reported Monday by the religious and activist Mario Félix Lleonart, the suspension comes a week after Cruz Gómez received “direct threats from State Security” for “supporting his wife Mildrey Betancourt in providing solidarity to a July 11th (11J) prisoner: the brave young man from Sancti Spiritus Luis Mario Niedas.”
Niedas, 31, sentenced to three years for demonstrating on July 11 in Sancti Spíritus, is in the Nieves Morejón prison, in the same province, and nothing is known about him at the moment.
According to sources from Sancti Spiritus activist Néstor Estévez, who lives in the United States, Niedas could be isolated in a punishment cell, although “there is no way to confirm this… I do attest that Luis Mario has not communicated with his family since January 23,” he certifies to 14ymedio. continue reading
That day, part of a telephone conversation between the young man from the prison and a friend residing in Canada in which he denounced his situation in prison was made public. “They invented excuses to put me under a severe regimen for alleged indiscipline that I did not commit,” said Niedas. The first of them, he referred to, “is that I did not want to be vaccinated and we already know that it is a right to receive a vaccine or not, it is a personal decision.” The second, he claimed, is to present his written defense “so that my lawyer would keep those papers and then give them to my family,” and the third, to speak from prison to Canada.
In these audios, Niedas names his friends Luis Ángel Cruz and Mildrey Betancourt, who were prevented from entering prison on January 5, “for a visit that belongs to me by right,” protests the young man. “They provide me with peace, joy, support, affection and emotional shelter, in short, they are important in my life,” says the young man, who also laments the threats received by his grandmother from State Security.
That same January 5 was the last time that the woman, who was allowed to visit, saw her grandson. “My closest family is under pressure and threats for the mere fact that I am an opponent,” Niedas cried. “They have made my aunt and my cousin not want to interact with the people who want to support me, thus keeping the opinion of the only two people who witnessed my trial a secret.”
In the same call, the prisoner recounted the conditions in which he was transferred to the prison after his trial, held on October 1, in which he was prosecuted for contempt, spread of epidemics and instigation to commit a crime. “For 14 days they kept me in a cell that was stuffy, so I had to bathe with my own urine and had feces on my feet and slept with that bad smell.”
When he complained to the responsible officer, he was transferred to another cell “which was supposedly fixed and in the same condition.” He kept complaining, without success. The objective, according to Niedas, is “to have me there all the time under that psychological abuse.”
The young man, in addition, according to Néstor Estévez, has been isolated in prison most of the time. “His grandmother and aunt and his cousin managed to see him on October 1, his grandmother did not manage to see him until January 5,” he tells this newspaper.
In his call, the prisoner also indicated that he had requested that Mildrey Betancourt be allowed to enter during the next scheduled visit, on February 7, but he anticipated that they will try to prevent it. “Is it ethical, humane, fair and morally acceptable that another person decides for me who I can see, hear and hug? Am I a terrorist or am I no longer a human being?” he asked.
Niedas was arrested on 11J, but before that he had already been harassed and pressured for being politically active. He himself detailed it in a chronicle published by Yucabyte days before that Sunday of protests. “My activism, like that of many, began from the pressures of the regime,” he wrote. “It was enough for me to support the causes defended by the San Isidro Movement and the 27N group on social networks for the weight of the arbitrariness of this dictatorship to fall on me.
“Because yes, publishing a simple post on Facebook in Cuba that does not have the approval of the Government, implies almost the same as standing with a sign in front of the headquarters of the provincial Communist Party (PCC) asking for the resignation of the president. There is no freedom, not even in cyberspace.”
____________
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.
José Martí did not stop lashing out at those who, in the name of the workers, tried to put themselves on a pedestal and lord it over them. (University of Miami)
14ymedio, Ariel Hidalgo, Miami, 30 January 2022 — 19th-century English philosopher Herbert Spencer warned what the consequences of this kind of supposedly socialist project might be. In his book The Future Slavery, he described this conceivable future society as “despotism of an organized and centralized bureaucracy.” And indeed, a notable Cuban analyzed this book in an article of the same name. This Cuban’s name was José Martí.
To understand it properly, it is necessary to read – or reread – the critical analysis of his article. This way we realize that both Spencer and Martí are referring to a specific type of “socialism,” if it can be called that, later known as “real socialism,” based on the State as owner and administrator of the majority of production assets.
In his 1884 article, written several decades before these regimes began to be established, Martí warns about an economic-social system where officials would acquire disproportionate power over workers: “All the power that the caste of civil servants, bound by the need to maintain themselves in a privileged and lucrative occupation, would be gradually lost to the people.” In that system, he says, the worker “would then have to work to the extent, for the duration, and performing tasks that the State wishes to assign to him.”
This path led to a new form of social injustice, a new mode of exploitation of human beings by other humans. “From being a servant to himself, man would become a servant of the State. From being a slave to the capitalists, as it is now called, he would become a slave to bureaucrats.” And he concluded: “Autocratic functionaries will abuse the tired and hard-working masses. Serfdom will be unfortunate and generalized.” continue reading
Martí did not stop lashing out at those who, in the name of workers, tried to exalt themselves and lord it over them. Ten years later, in 1894, in a letter to his friend Fermín Valdés Domínguez, he spoke to him about “the dangers of the socialist idea.” What were these dangers? He warned him, above all, about “the arrogance and hidden rage of the ambitious, who in order to rise up in the world, start out pretending, feigning to have shoulders to stand on, as frantic defenders of the helpless.”
The other criticism is based on interpretations that could arise from “foreign and confused” theories. He was probably referring to the later misrepresentations given to the role of the Revolutionary State in the process of socialization of wealth: Should that State limit itself to fulfilling its role as an instrument of empowerment of the workers?
As we already know, the imposed interpretation, both in Russia and in the other countries that followed the same path, was different: to maintain control over that wealth indefinitely as the supposed representative of those workers, and consequently it led to that model that Martí feared and that he called “autocratic functionalism.”
Martí clarified to Valdés Domínguez that his criticism did not mean abandoning the ideal of social justice, because “an aspiration must be judged by what is noble: and not by this or that wart that human passion puts on it.” And then he concluded with his desire to carry out a future struggle of ideas in the Republic to avoid these dangers and finally be able to achieve what he called sublime justice: “explaining will be our job, and smooth and deep, as you will know how to do it… And always with justice, you and me, because the errors of its form do not authorize souls of respectable birth to desert its defense.”
The Active Calm
Martí rejected the path of violence and, in particular, the Marxist theory of class struggle, which is why, although he justified Marx’s indignation at “the bestializing of some men for the benefit of others,” he preached a “soft remedy to the damage.” For him, a process of development of civic consciousness was essential to achieve a just social order, convinced that social justice can be achieved through non-violent means: “Just rights, intelligently requested, will have to overcome without the need for violence.”
In another text he speaks of the “final triumph of active calm.” For this reason, he adds a criticism to his praises of Marx. According to him, Marx “was in a hurry and somewhat in the shadows, not seeing that children who have not had a natural and difficult gestation are not born viable, neither of a country in history nor of a woman at home.
Martí, heavily influenced by American transcendentalists, in particular Emerson and Thoreau, was convinced of the need to develop civic consciousness, and reiterated it in various ways, such as when he stated that what was important was not “the sum of weapons in hand but the sum of stars on the forehead.”
He spoke of an awareness that is not a “class consciousness,” as Marx preached in order to dissent and seize the means of production, but a much deeper radical transformation in human consciousness.
____________
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.
A line of passersby waits with their arms raised at the edge of the sidewalk: the taxis are unoccupied, but they don’t stop. (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 5 February 2022 — Most of the taxis that pass this Thursday through San Lázaro Avenue, in Havana, continue without stopping. A line of pedestrians waits with their arms raised at the edge of the sidewalk, unsuccessfully: the vehicles are unoccupied, but they don’t stop.
“Before I used to wait on this corner and in less than five minutes I was gone,” laments a woman who, with a violin case in one hand, tries to attract the attention of taxi drivers. “This is the third time I’ve been late for my rehearsal,” she says anguished.
The maximum price of 15 pesos per ’section’ — a defined link — set by the Government last year as part of the measures of the ’Ordering Task’*, is a rate for that few taxi drivers will accept to carry a rider. Most drivers prefer to cover a shorter route or agree with the passenger on a new payment to the final destination. continue reading
“Direct taxi, they tell you. And then get ready for the price: I was charged 350 pesos a few days ago from the Bus Terminal to the Bim Bom ice cream parlor.” (14ymedio)
“Direct taxi, they tell you. And then get ready for the price: I was charged 350 pesos a few days ago from the Bus Terminal to the Bim Bom ice cream parlor, which is on Infanta Street,” protests Carlos, a resident of Centro Habana, who explains to 14ymedio that this price for a journey of less than two kilometers seems like an abuse.
One only has to go out on the street to observe the complaints of Havanans. “20 pesos from Infanta to Galiano?” a man complained as he got out of an old American car that was packed with eight people. ”
It’s over, we are going to have to go out armed, because this is a robbery,” he was still angry.
The driver’s assistant, sitting on a rickety wooden bench, did not remain silent. “You better go rob a bank if you can, because when I go to buy malanga for my girl the farmer charges me 60 pesos a pound, so we can’t continue charging 15 pesos for one ’section’,” he snapped.
The inflation that affects all citizens has led these carriers to circumvent the rules imposed by the Government. (14ymedio)
Lucía, a clerk in a store located in Old Havana, describes the situation as a disaster. In her case, the journey has quadrupled, going from the 10 pesos she paid to go from 23rd Street, where she lives, to her work, to 40 pesos for the same route. “The car that I take daily pays a trip to the Habana Libre hotel, and they charge me 20 pesos until there,” but at the next corner it loads passengers to the Parque del Curita for another 20 pesos. “It’s abusive,” she says.
The inflation that affects all citizens has led these carriers to circumvent the regulations imposed by the Government, which insists that the price of fuel has not increased, ignoring that it is not the only expense faced by drivers.
“The situation is complex and at the same time very simple,” a private driver tells 14ymedio. “I’m not going to talk about the spare parts, I’m just going to say that the MLC (freely convertible currency) is currently at 103 pesos and yesterday I paid 9 for a package of sausages in La Época and 29 for a block of cheese. We’re 3,914 pesos”, he calculates quickly. “I cannot put a price on the package of sausages that the Government sells me, therefore, it seems cheeky to me that the Government does put a price on my route, because my children have to eat,” he says.
*Translator’s note: Tarea ordenamiento = the [so-called] ‘Ordering Task’ which is a collection of measures that includes eliminating the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC), leaving the Cuban peso as the only national currency, raising prices, raising salaries (but not as much as prices), opening stores that take payment only in hard currency which must be in the form of specially issued pre-paid debit cards, and others.
____________
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.
With a frequency of 25 minutes between the arrival of one vehicle and another, the A65 route arrived this Saturday at the Parque de la Fraternidad. (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 5 February 2022 — Expectations were rising but the Japanese buses did not appear until this weekend when they could be seen on the streets of Havana. The buses donated by Japan arrived on the island on January 13 and despite the optimistic headlines in the official press, they are only now picking up passengers in the Cuban capital.
With a frequency of 25 minutes between the arrival of one vehicle and another, the A65 route arrived this Saturday at the Parque de la Fraternidad, where a long line of people eager to travel were waiting for it. With their impeccable blue bodywork, the lighted signs fully working and the smell of new still inside, the Japanese buses caused a sensation.
“They are good but I don’t know how long they are going to last here,” explained the driver of one of these buses to a passenger who inquired about the novelty. “When too many passengers get on board, they beep because they have a safety mechanism for that,” the driver spoke. “You have to be careful also because they lean to the sides.”
“They have GPS and they are brand new but they are made for places where there are not so many people trying to get on,” he adds. “If the bus is very full, it becomes unstable when it turns and parks,” explains the driver. “They are too Japanese, we will have to see how they will be in a few days. For now, we have to enjoy them.” continue reading
The buses have begun to roll through the streets more than a week after January 28, coinciding with the birthday of José Martí, when the official press published an inaugural act of the long-awaited buses with the title Urban buses donated by Japanareready. At the event were Hirata Kenji, Japanese ambassador to the island, and the governor of Havana, Reinaldo García Zapata, who presided over the formal delivery of the Isuzu buses on the Tarará esplanade.
“They are Japanese, with that I tell you everything,” says an employee of a terminal where the new buses start to arrive every afternoon after covering their route. “It’s like the difference between sushi and claria mortadella, these buses are designed to travel through streets without potholes, arrive at the stops and have disciplined people get on. Even something as minor as the issue of ventilation is already a problem because it windows that open are small.”
“May Naruhito catch us confessed, but this is the beginning and we already know what the end will be,” he adds.
____________
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.
In the area surrounding the US Embassy, very close to Havana’s Malecón, life also seems to have come to a standstill and even regressed. (14ymedio)
14ymedio/EFE, Havana/Washington, 4 February 2022 — Several job announcements recently posted on the official website of the U.S. Embassy in Havana have renewed expectations for an early reopening of consular services on the island.
A U.S. official source privately told 14ymedio that “even before the events of July 11, they were already studying the reopening of part of the consular services in Havana.” Likewise, and regarding remittances, the same source said that they are trying to find “a different path than the one the Cuban regime wants to impose”.
The official did not specify when these services would be reestablished, but the offer of jobs for security personnel, cashier’s assistants and travel and transportation supervisors indicates that this could occur in the first half of this year.
On Thursday, Cuban-American congresspeople Mario Díaz-Balart, María Elvira Salazar and Carlos Giménez signed a letter addressed to President Joe Biden, in which they express the need for the full reestablishment of consular services on the island. continue reading
In the letter, the three Republican representatives from Florida also request that priority be given to Cuban human rights defenders and advocates for democratic change, and to those with urgent humanitarian or medical needs.
“It was particularly insulting to many in our districts when agents of the regime and their favorites, such as professional baseball players, were able to access consular services on the island, while the vast majority of the most deserving Cubans were forced to travel to a third country at considerable expense,” they say in their text.
Salazar, Diaz-Balart and Gimenez also suggest that applicants be carefully screened to ensure that no human rights abusers can enter the United States.
They also asked Biden to resume as soon as possible the management of applications for the Cuban Family Reunification Permit Program (CFRP), which was put on hold in 2018, following health problems suffered by U.S. diplomats and mission staff due to the so-called “Havana syndrome,” which so far is unexplained.
To remedy the situation, the congresspeople noted, they introduced the bipartisan Family Reunification Modernization for Cubans Act of 2021, which authorizes the State Department in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense, to resume processing CFRP applications.
The lawmakers also urged the president to carefully consider how security and other non-U.S. personnel are selected at the U.S. mission in Cuba.
The closure of consular procedures in Havana has forced thousands of people to travel to third countries to carry out their procedures there.
“My sister has been in Guyana for several weeks waiting for the interview to obtain her family reunification visa; that trip and the stay have already cost us $4,000,” Niurka Gómez, a Cuban living in Miami, explains to this newspaper.
“The closing of the consulate has mainly affected the Cuban people, made the whole process of traveling more expensive and separated families. I don’t think it has been positive for anyone,” Gómez adds.
Several dissidents and activists consulted by this newspaper agree that “never has U.S. diplomacy been more subdued on the island” in relation to civil society, cultural activities and other events. The two rooms that offered Internet access to Cuban citizens have been closed for several years and the library has not provided service all this time either.
In the vicinity of the Embassy, very close to Havana’s Malecón, life also seems to have come to a standstill and even declined. The private businesses in the area that used to sell snacks, watch over bags and fill out consular forms have closed down or are barely surviving, having been converted into other services.
Translated by: Hombre de Paz
____________
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.
14ymedio, Havana, 7 February 2022 — The ship Augusto C. Sandino is once again on its way to Cuba from Nicaragua with humanitarian aid. The ship, which set sail this Sunday from the river port of El Rama, carries 36 containers, 21 of which contain coffee and 15 of rice.
