EFE – Page 13 – Translating Cuba

Russia Will Continue To Strengthen Its Strategic Cooperation With Cuba After the Elections

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel with a Russian delegation in Havana. (Presidency)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Moscow, 30 March 2023 — Russia will continue to strengthen its strategic cooperation with Cuba after the recent legislative elections on the Island, which demonstrated the “maturity of Cuban society,” the spokeswoman of the Russian Foreign Ministry, María Zakharova, said on Thursday.

“We confirm our principled approach of continuing to strengthen the strategic interaction between Russia and Cuba,” said the representative of Russian diplomacy, highlighting the elections to the Assembly of People’s Power held on the Island last Sunday.

Zakharova celebrated “the successful completion of the electoral process in Cuba,” in which the 470 proposed deputies were elected.

“We value this as a new testimony of the support of the Cuban population for the Government’s efforts to solve the current tasks facing the country,” she said.

The Foreign Affairs spokeswoman added that “this process showed the maturity of Cuban society, its consolidation based on the line promoted by Havana in defense of the country’s national interests and sovereignty.”

Although Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel described the elections as a “clean home run” despite “the fierce campaign and the calls for abstention” of dissident sectors, the turnout was 75.92%, a historically low figure for what is customary in the country.

An abstention of 24.08% is low compared to other Latin American countries and some liberal democracies.

However, this is the largest abstention recorded in the parliamentary elections in Cuba since the triumph of the revolution in 1959.

Between 1976, the date of the first elections of the socialist stage, and 2013, it remained below 10%, and only in 2018 did it rise to 14%.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A Young Cuban’s Life Is Saved After He is Attacked by a Shark on a Beach

A (different0) shark caught on a Cuban beach by fishermen. (Screen capture)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 29 March 2023 — A young Cuban was seriously injured, although his life was saved, after a shark attack on the southern coast of the province of Artemisa, state media reported on Tuesday.

The incident occurred last weekend when the 17-year-old was fishing with some relatives a few kilometers from the coast, near the town of Majana.

After the attack, he was transferred to a hospital in the area where he received first aid, according to the local newspaper El Artemiseño.

“He arrived in shock, with a lot of blood lost; the first thing was to give him a blood transfusion. Then he went to the operating room for a complex surgery due to the serious vascular damage to the arm and forearm,” the director of the center, Niurka Larrionda, explained to the provincial media.

After the intervention, the young man was transferred to the Juan Manuel Márquez pediatric hospital in Havana, because “his situation requires the intervention of specialists in angiology, orthopedics and traumatology,” the doctor explained. continue reading

Shark attacks in Cuba are unusual, although some cases are remembered, such as the surprise that some swimmers received last November by the appearance of a trio of sharks on the shore of a beach in the province of Camagüey.

In 2017, a 22-year-old swimmer died after a shark attack on the shore of Guardalavaca beach, in Holguín.

According to statistics cited by the official newspaper Juventud Rebelde, between 1956 and 2014, 44 attacks on humans were reported (39 unprovoked and five provoked), with 22 confirmed deaths.

In the seas that surround the Island, there are some 54 species of sharks, and most of them do not pose any danger to humans, but the three most dangerous for people are also present: the white, the tiger and the bull.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Regime To Release the Political Prisoner Real Suarez, in Prison Since 1994

Two relatives of Real Suárez plan to come to pick him up and then take him to the family home in Matanzas. (America TeVé/Screen capture/YouTube)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 29 March 2023 — The political prisoner Humberto Eladio Real Suárez– condemned for disembarking in Cuba in 1994 in an armed anti-government expedition from the United States — will be released this Thursday having served his time in prison, according to family members who spoke with EFE on Wednesday.

The authorities have informed Real’s family that he can be picked up at 9:00 AM local time at Agüica prison in Matanzas. Real, age 54, has served 28 years and 5 months of the 30 years he was sentenced to. Two relatives plan to come to pick him up and then take him to the family home in Matanzas.

The prisoner’s mother, Graciela Suárez Díaz, explained to EFE that the Cuban authorities have urged Real to appear the day after his release at the local Migration offices to regularize his situation in the country.

Real’s objective, and hers, added Súarez, is to migrate to the United States as soon as possible, where a large number of his relatives reside, including Real’s brother and his daughter.

For crimes against state security and murder, Real was first sentenced to death, a sentence that was commuted in 2010 by the Supreme Court of Cuba to 30 years in prison.

Real was arrested in October 1994, at the age of 26, after disembarking in Cuba from the US in an armed expedition in which a civilian died.

He was subsequently convicted of the crimes of “acts against State Security,” “murder” and “discharge of firearms against a certain person.”

The exile group Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC), based in Miami, celebrated in a statement the possible release of this “valiant Cuban” and denounced that during his time in prison he was subjected “to countless mistreatment and tortures.”

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The War Over the Expropriated Brands in Cuba Extends to Beer

Born in Miami 56 years ago to Cuban parents, Portuondo considers himself to be the heir to the tradition and history of the Cuban brewery. (EFE)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, Jorge I. Pérez, 29 March 2023 — Cuban-American businessman Manny Portuondo was missing something when he inaugurated La Tropical brewery in Miami two years ago, a replica of the one that existed in Cuba with the same name: its most popular beer, Cristal, which in April will begin to be sold as Tropi Crystal, La Auténtica.

“It’s the authentic one, and we put the history of the beer on the label: ‘Made in 1928 by La Tropical brewery in Havana and now in Miami by its founders’,” Portuondo tells EFE.

The businessman says this while holding a can of Tropi Crystal, which lost the Latin “i” in the middle of the “war” to recover the brands that existed before the Revolution, which began with rum.

Born in Miami 56 years ago to Cuban parents, Portuondo considers himself to be the heir to the tradition and the history of the Cuban brewery La Tropical, which dates back to 1888.

He is the great-great-grandson of Federico Kohly, who sold the land to the Blanco-Herrera family so that, in 1888, he could build a brewery on the banks of the Almendares River. continue reading

The brewery was constructed with colorful gardens, several party rooms, a baseball field and even a castle, at the same time as Park Güell in Barcelona,” according to historian Yaneli Leal del Ojo, author of the book Los Jardines de la Tropical [Tropical Gardens].

Two years ago and after 25 years of research, including a trip to the Island, Portuondo inaugurated La Tropical de Miami, in the bohemian neighborhood of Wynwood.

Then he launched the oldest brand in the portfolio, the Tropical La Original, but he did not have the clear and refreshing Cristal registered in the United States.

“I like to do things well, and legally,” says this “lover of history, gardening and brewing.”

The can of Tropi Crystal La Auténtica, which comes to the US market on April 4, says on its back label, “Enjoy the refreshing and authentic flavor of Miami’s favorite beer.”

“It says that because we are no longer in Cuba. So, this beer is for all the exiles, all the Cuban emigrants who have had to come here since 1959 to make a new life. This beer represents the pride of all of us,” he says.

The Cristal beer that is sold in Cuba is made by the Bucanero brewery, whose factory is in the province of Holguín, and for Portuondo, it is not the authentic one.

“It can only be authentic if it is in the hands of those who created it in 1928, our family and the Blanco-Herrera family, who founded La Tropical and were in charge of managing the brewery until 1960, when the Cuban government took it at gunpoint,” he said.

Portuondo constructed gardens in La Tropical de Miami that are full of symbolism, like the two murals: one represents a “free” tocororo (the Cuban Trogon, Cuba’s national bird) outside an iron roundabout that acts as a cage and another by the artist Rigo Leonart, dedicated to the 11 July 2021 (’11J’) protests on the Island.

“The historical portfolio of La Tropical in Cuba consisted of three main brands of beer and a brand of malt. The beers are La Tropical La Original, which is the brand we launched two years ago and can now be found in more than 700 points of sale in South Florida; the Tropical 50 La Negra, from 1938; and I was missing the Cristal, which was the most popular,” he says.

The Portuondo label has the three royal palms, the original typography and the green, red and white colors of the Cristal, but there is a notable change with the Greek Y.

“We won the Tropi Crystal registration in the United States, where the Cristal brand cannot be sold with an “i” (Latin) because that registration belongs to a Peruvian brewery. We keep the logo and the association with La Tropical, which was the one at the beginning.”

“The recipe is the same, made in a more modern way with automated equipment. In Cuba they call it ’the favorite of Cuba’ and we call it ’the favorite in Miami,’” he said.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Amnesty International Denounces the Hundreds of Prisoners in Cuba for Exercising ‘Their Human Rights’

Hundreds of people participated in a multitude of spontaneous protests over last summer’s blackouts. (Captura)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 28 March 2023 — The NGO Amnesty International (AI) denounced on Monday in its annual report the “hundreds of people” in prison in Cuba for “the peaceful exercise of their human rights” — including “three prisoners of conscience” — and the “repression” of “dissidence” and protests.

In its document, which summarizes the most relevant violations of the year by country, it also notes that the new Cuban Criminal Code consolidates “limitations on freedom of expression and assembly as is customary” and represents “a disturbing panorama for independent journalists, activists and anyone critical of the authorities.”

It also highlights the social problems due to the “food shortage” suffered by the country and the “frequent” power outages. It says that the State has the “obligation to enforce the economic, social and cultural rights” of citizens.

The NGO points out that at the end of last year “hundreds of people who had suffered the repression of the July 2021 protests were still in prison,” the largest in decades. continue reading

The demonstrations were spontaneous and mostly peaceful at a time of serious economic crisis due to the concurrence of the pandemic, the tightening of US sanctions and errors in national economic policy.

AI also recalled that in September and October, after the passage of Hurricane Ian, “there were protests throughout the Island against widespread power outages,” in which “the authorities responded by deploying military cadets to suppress the protests and used arbitrary detentions.”

The authorities “interrupted access” to the Internet “deliberately,” said AI, which is an “increasingly common tactic to limit communication in Cuba in delicate moments from the political point of view.”

The NGO indicated that the Cuban president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, “undermined the importance of the widespread nature of the protests,” attributing them to a “minority of counterrevolutionaries with connections outside Cuba” and reducing them to acts of “vandalism” that would be confronted with “the rigor of the law.”

“Three prisoners of conscience remain in prison, a figure that represents only a tiny percentage of the total number of people who were detained for the peaceful exercise of their human rights,” the report adds.

AI was referring to the artist and activist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, the musician Maykel Castillo Osorbo and the opposition leader José Daniel Ferrer, for whom it denounced the periods that Ferrer passed in “solitary confinement” and “incommunication” in prison.

The document also mentions the strong migration that the country suffers, the approval in September of the Family Code — which legalized marriage and adoption for homosexuals — and the non-inclusion of femicide in the new Criminal Code.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Two Cubans Arrive in Key West on a Motorized Hang Glider

The motorized hang glider in which two Cubans arrived in the United States. (@mcsonews/Twitter)

EFE/14ymedio, Miami/Havana, 25 March 2023 — Two Cubans were arrested this Saturday at Key West International Airport, in southern Florida, where they arrived aboard a motorized hang glider, police sources confirmed.

Adam Linhartd, spokesman for the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, said that the two Cuban citizens, about whom he claimed to have no information, were handed over to the Border Patrol.

The arrival occurred around 10.30 am local time, and apparently the Cubans had not suffered any injuries during their flight.

The Border Patrol limited itself to reporting the detention of the two migrants without giving details and thanked the Monroe Sheriff’s Office for its support.

The tourist island of Key West is located 90 miles from Cuba and, like the rest of the Florida Keys, is an area where Cubans land in rudimentary boats.

Arrivals by air, like today’s, are unusual. On October 21, 2022, Cuban pilot Rubén Martínez Machado fled Cuba in a Russian-made Antonov aircraft and landed at the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, located in the middle of the Everglades. Originally detained, heis now free, after a judge granted him political asylum.

One of the arrivals was a 29-year-old pilot of the Cuban Air Services Company, belonging to the Cuban Aviation Corporation, and he left the Island from Sancti Spíritus.

Customs agents interrogated the pilot as soon as he landed, and he was immediately put in the custody of the authorities.

Translated by Regina Anavy
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The Cuban Chancellor Says That It Is in the Interest of the United States To Have the Island on the Terrorism List

Bruno Rodríguez believes that the position serves the United States “for its criminal policy of economic suffocation.” (Screen capture)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 24 March 2023 — The Government of Cuba affirmed on Thursday that the United States never intended to remove the Island from the list of countries sponsoring terrorism because it “is convenient.”

Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez declared on Twitter that the North American country has no plans to “correct Cuba’s unfair classification” since “it is convenient for its criminal policy of economic suffocation.”

Rodríguez echoed the statements this Thursday by the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, in which he said: “We are not planning” to remove the Island from the list.

During an appearance before the Foreign Relations Committee of the House of Representatives, Blinken said “if there is a review, it will be based on the law and the benchmarks it establishes, which, as I said, have a very high bar.”

The Cuban head of Foreign Affairs stated that Blinken “confirms, in fact, that the State Department’s qualifying lists are nothing more than tools of political and economic coercion, totally divorced from such sensitive issues as terrorism, religion, human rights, drug trafficking, corruption and other things.”

The inclusion of Cuba on the list in January 2021 was one of the last decisions made by the Trump administration before leaving office. continue reading

The United States then justified the measure, which entails several sanctions, alluding to the presence on the Island of members of the Colombian ELN guerrillas, who traveled to Havana to start peace negotiations with the Colombian government.

The Island was taken off the list in 2015, during the rapprochement promoted by US President Barack Obama. It was put back on by Trump, who during his term redoubled the sanctions against Cuba and paralyzed much of the “thaw” stimulated by his predecessor.

The current Biden Administration has made some gestures towards the Island, such as the elimination of the remittance limit for Cuba, but it is still far from Obama’s rapprochement.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba and the United States Cooperate on Infectious Diseases in a Meeting in Havana

This type of meeting has been taking place since 2016, as part of an agreement on health matters. (Archivo)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 24 March 2023 — Health officials from Cuba and the United States met in Havana to strengthen their cooperation in the fight against infectious diseases, including COVID-19, the Ministry of Public Health of the Island reported on Thursday.

The meeting was part of what was agreed in the Memorandum of Understanding signed in 2016 by the Cuban Ministry of Public Health and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to a statement.

Cuba reported that both parties agreed to “continue working on the implementation of the Memorandum.”

Specifically, they advocated “promoting technical exchanges related to research on arbovirosis (a group of diseases caused by viruses transmitted by arthropods), experiences of COVID-19 and other related topics.”

The visitors, members of the HHS and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), met with specialists from the Pedro Kourí Institute of Tropical Medicine (IPK) of Cuba, as well as directors and scientists from the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB) and the state pharmaceutical group BioCubaFarma. continue reading

The meeting was attended by the Deputy Minister of Public Health, Carilda Peña García, and the director of the Global Research Office of the IAID, Joyelle Kalei Dominique, according to the official report.

Despite the fact that Washington has on numerous occasions cooled the expectations of the Cuban side for a reissue of the thaw, the technical meetings have not stopped being held. They even continued during Donald Trump’s term.

At the beginning of March, the trip of Cuban officials to the United States unleashed a wave of protests among Republican politicians who rejected these meetings for security reasons. However, the Administration argued that the meeting was part of the International Port Security Program and that they have taken place in recent years, including, most recently, in 2019.

In November 2022, US officials traveled to Havana to hold a meeting on immigration, during which the Cuban side “highlighted areas of successful cooperation on migration, while identifying problems that have been obstacles to meeting the objectives of the Agreement.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Documentary ‘Dos Patrias’ About Human Rights in Cuba Is Presented in Miami

Frame provided by filmmaker Hilda Hidalgo where imprisoned activist Aymara Nieto Muñoz appears, during a scene from Dos patrias [Two Homelands]. (EFE)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, 18 March 2023 — The documentary Dos patrias [Two Homelands], a work by Costa Rican filmmaker Hilda Hidalgo that addresses the violation of human rights in Cuba based on the testimonies of three Cuban activists, was presented on Friday, 17 March, at Florida International University (FIU), in Miami.

Hidalgo, 52, said in statements to EFE that the documentary is based on the testimonies of three Cuban activists “who have in common that they were accused of crimes they did not commit.”

The filmmaker, who knows the current situation of the Island well after studying in the 1990s at the International School of Film and Television in San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba, said that people who reside in countries with freedom “do not really know what it is to live in a dictatorship.”

“The three cases are emblematic, and I discovered them after an investigation,” she explained.

Sebastián Arcos, associate director of the FIU Institute of Cuban Research, told EFE that they have organized, together with the International Institute on Race, Equality and Human Rights, based in Washington, the presentation of the documentary in Miami. continue reading

The work of Hidalgo, director of the feature film Del amor y otros demonios [Love and Other Demons] (Costa Rica-Colombia, 2010), based on the novel by Gabriel García Márquez, presents the stories of three Cuban activists born on the Island who reveal their problems after confronting the Government of Havana.

The activists are Aymara Nieto Muñoz, currently imprisoned, Xiomara Cruz Miranda and Eduardo Cardet, a doctor who is a member of the Christian Liberation Movement. “This is a very topical issue,” Arcos said, after the Institute of Cuban Research joined for the human interest of the documentary, to be presented today at the FIU’s Graham Center.

Together with Cardet, the documentary collects the testimony of activist Aymara Nieto Múñoz, who in 2018 was sentenced to four years of deprivation of liberty for the crimes of “attack” and “property damage,” to which was added a new sentence of 5 years and 4 months for the charge of “public disorder” in prison.

The third person is the Lady in White Xiomara Cruz Miranda, who lives in the United States and is waiting for the approval of her permanent residence in this country.

The program coordinator for Latin America of the International Institute on Race, Equality and Human Rights, Johanna Villegas, said in an interview with Radio Martí, from Miami, that the documentary “is an effort to highlight the situation of prisoners deprived of political liberty in Cuba.”

Villegas said that Dos patrias is part of the organization’s initiative to reach different audiences and publicize the human rights violations that occur in Latin American countries.

The documentary was supported by Producciones La Tiorba of Costa Rica, where Hidalgo works as a director and screenwriter.

Hidalgo’s career includes the feature film Violeta al fin [Violeta at the End] (Costa Rica-Mexico, 2017), along with television series and documentaries on social, gender and sustainable development topics filmed in Costa Rica, France, Italy and Bhutan, among others.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Is the Sixth Country With the Most Spaniards Living Abroad

After Argentina, Cuba is the country with the most Spaniards residing outside Latin America. (14ymedio)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Madrid, March 16, 2023 — The number of people with Spanish nationality residing abroad reached 2,790,317 as of January 1, 2023, which represents an increase in one year of 47,712 people, 1.7%, according to data published this Thursday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). Cuba is the sixth country with the most Spaniards: 160,833.

The foreign country where the most Spaniards live is still Argentina (477,465), followed by France (297,142), the United States (192,766), Germany (182,631), the United Kingdom (which despite Brexit has continued to rise, 2.9% in 2022, to 181,181), Mexico (155,543), Brazil (136.611), Venezuela (the only one of the first 10 that has decreased, by 2.8%, to 136,145) and Switzerland (132,384).

In addition to Venezuela, the Spanish population has decreased in Peru (–1.6%), Morocco (–0.9%), Chile (–0.7%), Argentina (–0.6%), Uruguay and Ecuador (–0.1 % in both cases). continue reading

The Census of Spanish Residents Abroad also reveals that of the total, 166,728 were new registrations in 2022, and that 43,593, or 26.1% of these were born in Spain; 98,428, 59.0%, in the country of residence; and 24,797, 14.9%, in other countries.

Almost nine out of 10 of the 43,593 new foreign residents born in Spain registered in European or American countries: 26,430, 60.8%, in European countries and 12,347, 28.4%, in the Americas.

Returning to the entire population of Spanish nationality residing abroad, 1,407,081 are women and 1,383,236 men.

In addition, 1,753,155, 62.8%, are between 16 and 64 years old; 616,798, 22.1%, are 65 or older; and 420,364, 15.1%, are under 16 years old.

Some 58.7% have fixed their residence in America, 37.7% in Europe and 3.6% in the rest of the world, although the largest increases in registrations during 2022 occurred on the European continent, with 32,589 more, ahead of the American, with 19,698 more.

According to this INE statistic, 844,660, 30.2% of the total of almost 2.8 million were born in Spain; 1,626,079, 58.3%, in the country of residence; and 314,532, 11.3%, in other countries (in 0.2% of cases that information is not recorded).

That proportion is similar in the case of those who live in Africa but changes for the rest of the continents: in Europe, Asia and Oceania, because there are more people born in Spain, and in America, because there are more born in the country of residence.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Prohibitions on Free Movement Inside and Outside Cuba are Denounced to the Human Rights Commission

The activist Anamely Ramos was not allowed to return to Cuba in February of last year, after a three-month visit to the US. (Captura)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Los Angeles, March 10, 2023 — Several Cuban activists denounced this Thursday before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) the violations of the right to movement of people on the Island, as well as the ban on the return of many citizens.

The complaints of these “forced expatriations” were made on the fourth day of public hearings of the 186th session of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), which takes place this year in Los Angeles (California, U.S.)

The testimonies presented agreed that the right to movement of people has been one of the most violated in recent years by the authorities of the Island and has been used to repress people who participated in mass protests such as those of July 11, 2021.

The activists highlighted that, despite the fact that this right is enshrined in the 2019 Cuban Constitution, several decrees on national security have been used to limit the free movement of people, including the prohibition of departure or entry into the country of Cubans who represent “a danger,” despite the fact that there is no legal accusation against these individuals.

“It’s a tool of control to prevent the work of defending human rights in the field,” said Cuban lawyer Laritza Diversent, director and legal advisor of Cubalex, about the decrees, which also deny the issuance of passports. continue reading

The proof of the extent of these violations was the physical absence, during the hearing, of Juan Antonio Madrazo, coordinator of the Citizens’ Committee for Racial Integration of Cuba, who was not allowed to leave the country to participate in the meeting.

“There is a permanent threat that the situation may worsen if we do not comply with the police provisions that would result in criminal proceedings,” Madrazo warned through a video. He also said that these travel bans are affecting the mental and physical health of activists.

The participants denounced practices of the Cuban government to force the banishment and exile of opponents and human rights defenders, as is the case of activist Anamely Ramos, who was not allowed to return to Cuba in February last year, after a three-month visit to the United States.

In her testimony before the IACHR, Ramos said that she is in the United States “contrary to her will,” and there is no reason beyond her activism not to be allowed to return to her country.

In this sense, Soledad García, a member of the NGO Justicia 11J, referred to the expulsion of 222 Nicaraguan politicians who were removed from their country by the regime of Daniel Ortega a month ago, and stressed that although this practice has been used by the Cuban Government for decades, in the “last years it has become visible.”

Ramos, who also presented the cases of writer Carlos Manuel Álvarez and professor Omara Ruiz Urquiola — who has tried to return to Cuba four times — also drew attention to the U.S. airlines that have executed these return bans.

“The protocol that exists between the airlines and Cuba is not public, so we cannot rule out that flights to Cuba go through a political filter commissioned by the Cuban State; this must be reviewed,” Ramos urged.

The commissioners of the IACHR, an autonomous body of the Organization of American States (OAS) based in Washington, highlighted the importance of the testimonies given at the hearing because it helps them to continue with the work they are doing in defense of human rights in Cuba.

They regretted the absence of the representatives of the Cuban State at the hearing. However, they assured that they will continue to demand answers on the complaints and to process the precautionary measures.

Commissioner Edgar Stuardo Ralón Orellana called for the creation of an international protocol to help people forcibly expelled from their countries.

This Friday, the IACHR concludes a round of 17 public hearings, covering human rights that affect migrants, the LGBTI community, women, indigenous peoples, human rights defenders and journalists in the OAS member countries and the Americas as a whole.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Will Host the Third Cycle of Peace Talks Between Colombia and the ELN

The members of the second cycle of negotiations of the Peace Dialogues Table between the Government of Colombia and the ELN pose for an official photograph in Mexico. (EFE/Jose Mendez)

EFE/14ymedio, Mexico, 8 March 2023 — Cuba will be the host country of the third phase of the Peace Talks Table between the Government of Colombia and the National Liberation Army (ELN), both parties reported this Wednesday, just a few days after the end of the current cycle that has been held in Mexico City since mid-February.

“The peace delegations of the Colombian government and the ELN deeply thank the Cuban government and its people for the unconditional willingness and fundamental support that, for more than four decades, they have given to peace building efforts in Colombia,” said a joint communiqué, which does not specify a date for the start of talks in Cuba.

They announced that “the third cycle will begin after a pause after the closing of the sessions that are currently taking place in Mexico City and that have produced substantial advances in the agenda of the conversations.”

During the talks in the Mexican capital, the key point has been to work to reach an agreement for a ceasefire by both parties, but mechanisms for the participation of society in the construction of peace have also been discussed. continue reading

It is expected that this Friday the delegations of the Government of Colombia and the ELN guerrilla forces will release a joint communiqué at the end of the cycle in Mexico City where they will present the achievements.

In an interview with EFE last Friday, the ELN’s chief negotiator, Pablo Beltrán, stressed that “confidence levels” had risen between both parties, but he was cautious about agreeing to a bilateral ceasefire.

“We aspire that in this cycle in Mexico we can at least mend the essence of the ceasefire. Not just an agreement, but the idea that each party puts on the table what the essential elements are and to come to a first package of consensus about that,” Beltrán said.

The Colombian government’s negotiations with the ELN began in 2017 in Quito, during the government of Juan Manuel Santos, and in 2018 they were transferred to Havana.

After the ELN’s attack against the cadet school in Bogotá in 2019, which left 22 dead and 68 injured , the Colombian government asked Cuba to hand over the negotiators, but the island invoked diplomatic protocols to not comply with that request.

Negotiations resumed in Caracas in 2022 under the auspices of Cuba, Norway and Venezuela as guarantor countries.

Mexico, together with Venezuela, Chile, Norway and Brazil are guarantors of the peace talks, while Sweden, Germany, Switzerland and Spain act as accompanying countries.

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US Senators Introduce Bipartisan Legislation to Lift Cuban Trade Embargo

U.S. businesses would derive significant benefits from exporting grains such as wheat and rice. (Cubadebate)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, March 7, 2023 — On Monday a group of Democratic and Republican senators introduced legislation that would lift the U.S. embargo on trade with Cuba and create new opportunities for American businesses.

The draft legislation, which was introduced in the Senate during the last legislative session but has yet to move forward, is being sponsored by Democrats Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren and Dennis Murphy along with Republicans Jerry Moran and Roger Marshall.

Klobuchar’s office issued a press release stating that the proposed legislation would eliminate legal barriers preventing Americans from doing business in Cuba but would keep in place laws that address human rights or property claims against the Cuban government.

The statement indicates that Klobuchar believes that putting an end “once and for all” to the six-decade-long U.S. trade embargo on Cuba would turn a page on “a failed policy of isolation” while simultaneously generating new economic opportunities.

Warren added, “This legislation takes important steps to remove barriers for U.S. trade and relations between our two countries and moves us in the right direction by increasing economic opportunities for Americans and the Cuban people.” continue reading

The legislators note that Cuba relies on agricultural imports to feed its eleven million citizens and foreign visitors.

According to the press release, the U.S. International Trade Commission has determined that, if trade restrictions were lifted, exports of products such as wheat, rice and soybeans could increase 166% in 5 years to a total of 800 million dollars.

Under current rules, Cuba must pay in cash, and in advance, for products it imports from the United States. Additionally, because it is not a member of the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank, the island does not have access to foreign credit. This, along with failure to pay its foreign debt, limits access to other types of credit.

The amount the island nation paid its northern neighbor for agricultural supplies and food products in 2022 totaled 328.5 million dollars, a 7.7% increase from the 304.7 million reported in 2021, according to the US-Cuba Economic and Trade Council.

Chicken is the island’s top food import. In 2021 it spent 295 million dollars on it, a figure 5.6% higher than the 280 million dollars it spent the previous year.

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So Far in 2023, Cuba has Received 2,724 Migrants Returned from Several Countries

The crew of Cutter Paul Clark repatriated 26 Cubans to Cabañas, Cuba this Friday. (@USCGSoutheast)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 11 March 2023 — Cuba has received a total of 2,724 irregular migrants returned by several countries in the region so far this year, including a group of 26 delivered this Friday by the United States Coast Guard Service, Cuba’s Ministry of the Interior (Minint) reported.

The last migrants deported by the US authorities — 23 men and three women — bring the total to 1,944 rafters deported to the Island in some twenty U.S. Coast Guard operations that intercepted them at sea after their illegal departure from Cuba.

In recent weeks, other groups of irregular migrants were returned to Cuba by the governments of Mexico, the Bahamas and the United States (41).

The Cuban government affirms that it maintains its commitment “to regular, safe and orderly migration” and insists on “the danger and life-threatening conditions represented by illegal departures from the country by sea.”

In the case of the United States, since last October 1 — which marks the beginning of the current fiscal year — the crews of the U.S. Coast Guard have intercepted more than 5,740 Cubans, a high figure compared to previous years.

At the beginning of 2023, the Washington implemented a policy to welcome 30,000 monthly migrants from Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba and Nicaragua.

In parallel, the United States will immediately expel, to Mexico, undocumented migrants from those countries who try to cross the southern border to the U.S. in an irregular manner.

Mexico, for its part, agreed to admit 30,000 migrants a month who are expelled from U.S. territory.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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More Than 2,600 Migrants Have Been Returned to Cuba This Year From Several Countries

The number of repatriations from the United States grows by the hundreds almost weekly. (Twitter/Chief Raul Ortiz)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 7 March 2023 — More than 2,600 Cubans who were trying to migrate have been returned to their country from different nations so far this year, the Ministry of the Interior of the Island reported on Monday after including the last 75 returned by the United States.

The United States Coast Guard delivered a group of rafters a day earlier — 54 men, 20 women and a minor, most of them residents in the provinces of Matanzas and Granma — to the Cuban authorities through the Port of Orozco.

These people, without documentation, had participated in six illegal exits from the country by sea and were then intercepted by the US Coast Guard, the note said.

It also specified that with this operation — number 25 of the US Coast Guard Service in 2022 — a total of 1,918 Cuban rafters had been returned.

One of those returned is under detention “for finding himself as an alleged source of serious criminal acts, which were investigated prior to his departure,” it added. continue reading

Last week, other groups of irregular Cuban migrants were deported by the governments of Mexico (22 people), the Bahamas (128) and the United States (41).

The Government of Cuba insists that it maintains its commitment “to regular, safe and orderly migration” and insists on “the danger and life-threatening conditions represented by illegal departures from the country by sea.”

In addition to the Bahamas, Mexico and the United States, so far this year migrants have also been deported to Cuba from the Cayman Islands and the Dominican Republic.

In the case of the United States, since October 1, U.S. Coast Guard crews have intercepted more than 5,740 Cubans, a high figure compared to previous years.

At the beginning of 2023, the Government of Washington implemented a policy to welcome 30,000 monthly migrants from Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba and Nicaragua. In parallel, it will immediately expel to Mexico migrants from those countries who try to cross its southern border in an irregular way.

Mexico, for its part, agreed to admit 30,000 migrants a month who are sent from U.S. territory.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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