EP – Translating Cuba

The European Parliament Approves Another Resolution To Suspend the Political Agreement With Cuba

It is the seventh time that the European Parliament has made this request in the past five years, and it received 374 votes in favor, 198 against and 19 abstentions.

Saylí and Félix Navarro have been nominated for the Sakharov Prize this year. / Collage

EP/14ymedio, Madrid, September 17, 2026 – The European Parliament called on the European Council this Thursday to suspend the implementation of the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement that structures relations between the European Union and Cuba, citing “systematic violations” of Human Rights by the Island’s authorities against political prisoners and their relatives.

The resolution, approved by the European Parliament with 374 votes in favor, 198 against and 19 abstentions, focuses on the case of 72-year-old Félix Navarro and his daughter Saylí Navarro – co-founder of the Ladies in White, awarded the Sakharov Prize in 2005 – who were detained in 2021 and subsequently sentenced to nine and eight years in prison, respectively.

This week, the Cuba Siglo 21 platform and its management committee of former political prisoners formally proposed the candidacy of both for the Sakharov Prize.

Members of the European Parliament denounced “the absence of fair trials, the use of torture during detentions and the systematic use of forced exile as a condition for the release of opponents,” while expressing concern over Navarro’s deteriorating health and calling for his release, along with that of “all other political prisoners.”

The resolution focuses on the case of 72-year-old Félix Navarro and his daughter Saylí Navarro

“In the absence of concrete and verifiable steps by the regime toward multiparty democracy, Parliament reiterates its call for the immediate suspension of the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement and for sanctions to be imposed on those responsible for repression in Cuba, beginning with President Miguel Díaz-Canel,” the resolution states.

The document approved by the European Parliament notes that Cuba keeps “1,339 political prisoners” in jail, including 38 minors. The text also points out that among these people are 463 who suffer from “serious physical illnesses” and 54 who “suffer from serious mental disorders,” despite which they “do not receive adequate medical care.”

In the past five years, the European Parliament has voted on at least seven resolutions of this kind, the most recent last June. However, these acts are legally non-binding, since the authority to make the decision rests with the Council, through a complex procedure that must be initiated by the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy or by the European Commission.

The resolutions, however, have a symbolic character, and their pressure could ultimately motivate action by the executive bodies, although to date this has not happened.

Translated by Regina Anavy

______________________

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.

Close to 40,000 Cubans Applied for Spanish Nationality at the Havana Consulate

As of April, the majority – some 40% – of the 301,121 applications were from Argentina. The Council of Ministers extended the deadline for the procedure by one year.

Cubans line up in front of the Spanish Consulate in Havana. (14ymedio)

EP/14ymedio, Madrid, 9 July 2024 — Consulates in Argentina and Cuba account for 50% of the 300,000 applications for Spanish nationality submitted between October 2022 and March 2024 under the Democratic Memory Law, which allows descendants of exiled Spaniards to enjoy this benefit, according to data revealed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation. As explained by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement, since the law entered into force on October 22, 2022 and until March 31, 2024, the Consular Civil Registry Offices had received 301,121 applications for the option of Spanish nationality by origin. In the first year of the measure, according to the data collected at the time by Europa Press, more than 102,000 Spanish nationalities had been granted.

More than 95% of these applications were received at the consulates in Ibero-American countries, as well as at the Consulate General of Spain in Miami. In the specific case of Argentina, the five consulates general in the country accumulated 40% of the applications, and if those received by the Consulate General in Havana are added, the figure rises to 53%. This puts the petitions on the Island at 13% of the total; that is, 39,145 up to that date.

The Council of Ministers authorized this Tuesday, as already announced in February by the Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, the extension by one year of the period to exercise the right to qualify for Spanish nationality contained in the eighth additional provision of the Law of Democratic Memory, which gave two years. continue reading

In all consular offices “there are a number of applicants who can’t be summoned and attended to before the end of the planned two-year period”

The Department of Foreign Affairs, headed by José Manuel Albares, has explained that in all consular offices “there are a number of applicants who can’t be summoned and attended to before the end of the two-year period provided for” by law.

For that reason, the Government has decided to extend the deadline by one year “in such a way that all appointment requests already submitted and pending requests can be met, as well as all applications that are submitted and cannot be met in the first two years of application initially provided for in the law,” said Albares.

Specifically, the aforementioned additional provision of the Law of Democratic Memory guarantees that Spanish nationality can be applied for by those born outside Spain to a father or mother, grandfather or grandmother, who would have originally been Spanish, and who, as a result of having suffered exile for political, ideological or reasons of belief or sexual orientation and identity, would have lost or renounced Spanish nationality.

It also includes sons and daughters born abroad of Spanish women who lost their nationality by marrying foreigners before the entry into force of the 1978 Constitution as well as the sons and daughters of legal age of those Spaniards who were recognized for their nationality of origin by virtue of the Historical Memory Law of 2007.

Translated by Regina Anavy

____________

More Than 600 Residents of Cuba With Spanish Nationality Ask for Financial Aid From Castilla y Leon

Cubans in line in front of the Spanish Consulate in Havana. (14ymedio)

EP (via 14ymedio), Valladolid, Spain, 21 December 2023 — More than 600 Cubans who are nationalized Spanish residents on the Island have received the help of the Junta de Castilla y León, in Spain, for being in a situation of special need, and 226,000 euros have been allocated to them, almost 90% more than in 2022.

The Official Bulletin of Castilla y León has published the Order of the Ministry of the Presidency by which the call for these individual grants is resolved, whose beneficiaries are people registered in a municipality of Castilla y León in the Register of Spanish Residents Abroad (PERE), and who allege a lack of sufficient resources to cover their basic subsistence needs.

The amount of aid depends on the level of income of the different family units and the members that make up these units. All the aid requested has been granted, provided that the conditions set out in the official announcement were met. continue reading

The amount of aid depends on the level of income of the different family units and the members that make up these units

All of the aid has been allocated to Castilian and Leonese citizens or their descendants residing in Cuba. In fact, of the 816 applications received, 812 corresponded to citizens on the Island.

The amount of aid has been 360 euros per application. To assess the data, it must be taken into account that the minimum pension in Cuba stands at 1,528 pesos per month; that is, less than 60 euros, and the minimum wage at 2,100 (80 euros).

The amount of 360 euros is, therefore, the equivalent of the remuneration received by a resident in Cuba who receives the minimum pension for half a year, and the salary of a worker who receives the minimum wage for more than four months.

Of the 627 beneficiaries, 400 are women and 227 are men; 15 are under 35 years old; 164 are between 35 and 65 years old, and 448 are over 65 years old.

The most abundant profile of a person who has received this help responds, therefore, to a woman of Castilian and Leonese origin residing in Cuba, over 65 years of age and with serious survival problems.

As of January 1, 2023, according to data from the Spanish National Institute of Statistics, 9,719 Castilians and Leonese registered in the PERE reside in Cuba.

Translated by Regina Anavy

____________

Biden Applies ‘Trump’s Policy of Maximum Pressure,’ Reports Cuban Foreign Minister

The Cuban authorities expected much more from the Biden government than they are getting. (14ymedio)

EP/14ymedio, Madrid, June 21, 2022 — Cuba’s Foreign Minister, Bruno Rodríguez, has reproached the U.S. President, Joe Biden, for not having a policy of his own towards Cuba and for maintaining the “maximum pressure” of his predecessor, Donald Trump.

“President Biden doesn’t have a policy of his own towards Cuba. It shared elements of the previous Democratic government’s policy. If you read the Democratic electoral platform, it contains another policy towards Cuba,” Rodríguez said in a video posted on social networks.

Rodríguez also recalled the electoral promises “in his own voice” of now-President Biden. “He promised U.S. voters and also Cubans living in Florida, but unfortunately the policy applied by President Biden is President Trump’s maximum pressure policy,” he said.

“It’s a policy that not only causes harm and suffering to the Cuban people, that prevents the development of our economy, that encourages irregular emigration to the United States, but it’s also a policy that damages the national interest of the United States,” he said.

During the election campaign, both Biden and Kamala Harris, the current Vice President, announced that they would reverse some of the measures taken by their predecessor in office with respect to Cuba, including limits on remittances, flights and consular services. Those announcements encouraged Havana, which thought that a second thaw would take place, similar to what happened in Barack Obama’s term, in which Biden was Vice President.

However, the White House has strictly complied with its commitment and, in mid-May, it announced the reestablishment of commercial flights to Cuba, which until now arrived only in Havana, the resumption of the family reunification program and the suspension of the $1,000 per quarter limit on remittances. continue reading

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has argued that these actions are “in support of the Cuban people and in the interests of U.S. foreign policy.”

However, the Administration has maintained the bulk of its policy towards the island, spurred by the repression after the 11J protests, according to senior U.S. officials. The clearest demonstration of that position was the refusal to invite Cuba to the recent Summit of the Americas held in Los Angeles.

Last Thursday, Washington announced that it has taken measures to impose visa restrictions on five unidentified Cuban officials due to their links to the trials and the imprisonment of 11J protesters.

These sanctions, according to the statement, are linked to “unfair trials” and the sentences and imprisonment of protesters. According to the U.S. Government, the Cuban authorities “deny citizens their basic human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

____________