TRANSLATORS – Page 214 – Translating Cuba

Artists Denounce Decree 349 for "Criminalizing Independent Art"

Addressed to President Miguel Díaz-Canel and Minister of Culture Alpidio Alonso, the letter insists that the decree “not present a vision of the future of culture in Cuba.” (Facebook)

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana | 27 August 2018 — A group of artists who have been promoting an intense campaign against Decree 349 since July are continuing to pressure the country’s authorities not to implement this law that demands that “commercial spaces for plastic arts” have prior authorization and be registered in the Creators’ Registry.

Last Thursday a representative of the group presented a letter with their demands to the office of the Attorney General and the National Assembly of People’s Power, as reported to 14ymedio by Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, one of the visible faces of this initiative. The text, which details several demands and the reasons they are against this regulation, was sent as well to the Council of State and the Ministry of Culture.

Addressed to President Miguel Díaz-Canel and Minister of Culture Alpidio Alonso, the letter insists that the decree “not present a vision of the future for culture in Cuba.” It also denounces the law for “criminalizing independent art” and limiting “the ability of defining who can be an artist to a State institution.” continue reading

Another criticism made by the group of artists to this new law, which will enter into full force in December, is that creators weren’t consulted during its development and that they won’t have the ability to access “resources” or “independent arbitrators” in the case of a legal dispute.

The conceptual vagueness of the text is another point addressed in the letter, a matter that has worried the artists since they learned the content of the law after its publication in the Gazette Special Edition on July 10. One of the examples cited is the expression “contents harmful to ethical and cultural values,” a point that can take different interpretations that are not made explicit in the law. In response to this, the letter insists that art history demonstrates that “questioning the established systems of thought is the driving force of aesthetic development.”

They also mention that the government has dedicated itself to demonizing different mechanisms of independent art financing like crowdfunding. “The fact that a Cuban artist can finance his creations by his own means does not make him an opponent,” and they urge that the state to stop “confusing these platforms with the direct financing of a hostile organization or government.”

The document also announces that Decree 349 “authorizes the Ministry of Culture to designate inspectors” with the ability to “censor and suspend artistic performances, as well as impose fines and confiscate instruments, equipment, self-employment authorization, and goods like property from the house.”

According to the artists, the aim of Decree 349 “is the impoverishment of Cuban culture” and they warn that culture and art “can exist without a ministry, but the Ministry of Culture and the nation cannot exist without the creativity of its citizens.”

The letter that the group has delivered to these institutions is the same one attached to a petition that they are promoting on the platform avaaz.org, which already has 777 signatures. Among the artists who presented the letter are Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, Yanelys Nuñéz, Iris Ruiz, Nonardo Perea, Amaury Pacheco, Soandry del Río, Yasser Castellanos, and Michel Matos.

Otero Alcántara makes clear that they were “well looked after” and that they received an acknowledgment of receipt but he emphasized the scarce information they received after the delivery of the letter and that only the Council of State communicated to them that the term to receive a response in this case is 60 days. “In the Capitol they told us that there were only three people working and that they didn’t know when they would have a response to give us because there were many cases pending,” he said.

The organizers of the campaign against the decree have claimed that this law is directed toward eliminating the work of independent artists who in recent decades have gained their space working at the margins of institutions.

The campaign #NoAlDecreto349, which has carried out various public actions to make the situation visible, has had the solidarity of numerous Cuban artists on social media, both on and off the island, who practice different artistic disciplines such as cinema and music. Writers, actors, and well-known plastics artists have also shown their support.

On at least two occasions the artists of this group were suppressed by force by State Security agents and the police during public protest acts. The most recent took place when they tried to hold a concert at the venue of the Museum of Politically Uncomfortable Art. Previously they tried to hold a performance on the steps of the Capitol.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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Court in Cienfuegos Sentences Two of Leidy Pacheco’s Murderers to Life in Prison

Leidy Maura Pacheco Mur. (5 de Septiembre newspaper)

14ymedio, Justo Mora/Mario J. Pentón, Cienfuegos | 23 August 2018 — Justice came to Cienfuegos but in the deepest silence from the Provincial Court, which has kept secret the sentence of life imprisonment for two of the three men accused of raping and murdering Leidy Pacheco Mur, 18 years old and mother of a 10-month-old baby.

The information came to the public light this Thursday because the victim’s family told the local weekly 5 de Septiembre that Enrique Campos, 32, and Darián Gómez Chaviano, 25, had been sentenced to life imprisonment. The third man involved in the crime, Henry Hanoi Tamayo Hernández, 19, was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

The trial lasted two days, August 7-8, during which the population gathered in front of the court, which was protected by the police. The crowd rebuked the men with cries of “To the firing-wall” and “murderers.” continue reading

The sentence of the court can be appealed to the People’s Supreme Court.

“The truth is that those men got off easy. They should be shot after causing so much pain,” Margarita Fuentes, resident of the Junco Sur suburb on the outskirts of the city, told 14ymedio.

Yesenia Oliva, who planted herself outside the court during the trial, says that it’s an “exemplary sentence.”

“People don’t realize that there is a moratorium on the death penalty. The most that they can do is give them life imprisonment. The prisoners in Ariza will take care of those bastards,” she added.

Leidy Pacheco Mur was murdered September 26 of last year. At 2:56 PM, when she was a block from her home, she called her husband so that he wouldn’t worry about her, but she never arrived.

Enrique Campos, Henry Hanoi Tamayo, and Darián Gómez covered her mouth, took her to Plan Mango, a grove on the outskirts of Cienfuegos, raped her, killed her, and buried her at the bank of a small dam, according to the testimony of her father, Pedro Valentín Pacheco Alonso.

The three murderers lived in the same neighborhood as the victim. The next day the family notified the authorities of the young woman’s disappearance.

Family members, neighbors, and even one of the rapists participated in the search for the young woman, which lasted six days.

The death of Leidy Pacheco moved Cienfuegos, a city that in barely a year has suffered various murders. On February 14 Luis Santacruz Labrada was murdered with a knife and in May a double murder of women shocked the city, which in the past counted safety as one of its biggest appeals.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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The US Resumes Consular Services for Its Citizens in Cuba

The US embassy staff in Havana continues working at minimum levels after the evacuation of its non-essential personnel. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana | 24 August 2018 – The US embassy in Havana announced Friday that it has resumed consular services for American citizens. Renewal of passports, notary services, authentication, consular reports of birth abroad and emergency assistance are available as of today in Havana, without the need to travel to another country, as had been the case.

The diplomatic headquarters published this decision in a statement released on their social networks. Many Cubans took the opportunity to request the restoration of the family parole reunification program, which has been postponed for nearly a year.

Some people also demanded the return of consular services for family reunification currently taking place in Guyana. Residents on the Island who are interested in visiting the United States must obtain their visa in a third country. continue reading

In September of last year, the United States reduced by 60% the diplomatic personnel in the Island, after twenty-six of its officials were allegedly attacked with a “sonic weapon” which affected their hearing and caused other related problems. Relations between Washington and Havana deteriorated rapidly after the arrival of Donald Trump as president. The United States accuses the island of knowing who is behind the alleged attacks on its diplomats, while Cuban authorities say it is a pretext to derail the process of reestablishing relations undertaken under the previous administration.

Recently, the US Congress published a report questioning the embassy’s ability to keep abreast of Cuban affairs. “The ability of the United States to follow the situation in Cuba, defend human rights, carry out consular activities and comply with bilateral agreements is being undermined by a drastic reduction in the staff of the embassy in Havana,” reported Reuters, which had access to the document.

The document, issued by the Congressional Research Service, affirms that the decision to reduce the number of diplomats from 50 to a maximum of 18 on the Island due to the mysterious ailments that affected 26 US and 10 Canadian officials since 2016, has resulted in there being more work than those who remain on the island can complete.

According to Reuters, not a single refugee visa has been processed this year because the office responsible for doing so remains closed. Last year there were 117 people who benefited from receiving these visas in Havana.

The Cuban government has expressed its concern that the minimum 20,000 visas for Cuban migrants will not be reached this year, an agreement that both countries signed in 1994 to end the crisis of the rafters.

This Thursday, the United States lowered the level of alert for those who intend to travel to the island. The State Department placed Cuba in category 2, which recommends exercising caution due to the acoustic attacks against employees of the US embassy. At the end of September, the State Department had placed the island in category 3, recommending that the Americans “reconsider” a trip to the the greater of the Antilles.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Judge Denies Bail to Cuban Independent Journalist Serafin Moran Detained in Texas

Cuban freelance journalist Serafín Morán Santiago, 40, has been accused in the island of spreading propaganda and being a paid agent of the United States government. Now he is in an immigration detention center in Texas waiting for a response to his asylum application. (Courtesy of Serafín Morán Santiago)

14ymedio, Miami | 24 August 2018 — An immigration judge from the State of Texas denied bail to independent journalist Serafín Morán Santiago, who has been detained in that state since last April after requesting political asylum at the border with Mexico.

Morán must remain in custody until his case is decided at an asylum hearing in October, journalist María Fernanda Egas, of the Fundamedios organization, which monitors freedom of the press in the United States, said via telephone to 14ymedio.

Both Fundamedios and Reporters Without Borders launched an alert on Morán’s situation, who in their opinion must be “immediately released” and under no circumstances repatriated to Cuba. The reporter, according to both organizations, would face on the island “a real risk of death,” denounced María Fernanda Egas. continue reading

Serafín Morán Santiago turned himself in to the agents of the Border Patrol on April 13, after traveling a complicated route from Guyana, the first country he visited after leaving Cuba. This passage is made daily by dozens of Cubans in order to reach the southern border of the United States.

After the implementation of President Trump’s policy known as “zero tolerance” for undocumented immigration, asylum seekers can remain detained until an immigration judge determines whether or not their case is eligible to receive this status.

In the current fiscal year, which ends in September, 364 Cubans have been returned to the island, most of them after being detained in facilities of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Cuba pledged to the United States that it would accept all of its nationals with deportation orders starting with the new migratory agreement signed by both countries in 2017.

According to Morán’s complaints, agents of State Security (Cuban) “kidnapped” and “punched” him in June 2016. On September 2, 2017, he was again arrested and his work equipment confiscated. The journalist says he tried to seek refuge through the US embassy in Havana, but his case file was rejected twice.

In the event that Morán fails to prove that he is being persecuted by the Cuban government, he could be repatriated to the island. The journalist, 40, has collaborated as an independent reporter for media such as Univisión 23, Telemundo, Hispano Post, Primavera Digital, Cubanet and TV Martí.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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United States Reduces the Alert Level for Travel to Cuba

The US embassy in Havana continues to staff at minimum levels after the evacuation of its non-essential personnel. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana | 23 August 2018 – The United States on Thursday reduced the alert level for travel to Cuba, a surprise decision after relations between both countries were frozen after the mysterious “sonic attacks” suffered by 26 US diplomats in Havana, reports the Nuevo Herald.

Cuba is now found in category 2, which recommends exercising caution due to attacks directed against employees of the US embassy in Havana. At the end of September, the State Department had placed the island in category 3, recommending that Americans “reconsider” a trip to the Greater of the Antilles.

After the departure of 60% of the US diplomatic personnel deployed in Cuba and the reduction in the services of the embassy, relations between Washington and Havana deteriorated rapidly. The United States accuses the island of knowing who is behind the alleged attack on 26 of its diplomats, while Cuban authorities say it is a pretext to derail the process of reestablishing relations undertaken under the previous administration. continue reading

The Cuban economy has been affected in the past year by the fall in the number of tourists visiting the country, which dropped by 5.67% according to official figures. President Donald Trump in June of last year toughened the conditions for Americans visiting the neighboring country, so that their travel to Cuba fell by 23.6%.

The Havana Consulting Group, a company specializing in analyzing the Cuban economy, considers that the first half of 2018 has been “traumatic and devastating” for the Cuban tourist industry due to the combination of “countless accumulated unresolved problems,” among them the low influx of tourists from the USA.

According to Orna Blum, spokeswoman for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs of the US State Department, the change to level 2 was due to a new assessment of the risk of traveling to Cuba.

“The Department conducted a comprehensive risk assessment for US private citizen travelers in Cuba and decided that a Level 2 travel alert was appropriate,” the spokeswoman told the Nuevo Herald.

The United States reiterated that it does not yet know the weapon used to harm its officials or what country or group is behind the alleged attacks.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Every Effort Against the Dictatorship Seems to Me Appropriate and Inevitable / Ángel Santiesteban

Ángel Santiesteban, 12 May 2018 — Every effort against the dictatorship seems appropriate and inevitable to me. I believe fervently that in all of them is the pushback on the wall of dictatorship; but the actual reality does not lie there, at this stage of the championship contest we can’t believe in siren songs.

In particular, I believe in all of the opponents, in the Ladies in White, in Rosa María Paya, whom I respect and admire, in Antonio Rodiles, in Guillermo Fariña, UNPACU, Antúnez and all the others, just to mention those that come to mind now. continue reading

What I don’t believe is in the regime, in that some opponent can count on the Castros and his minions compromising and accepting any exigency that does not include them.

It is simply about agreeing or not, with one or more projects. I think it is unnecessary that five years can pass by only for them to tell us, this is not the way, we better rectify it.

From now on, and we see it in the example of Venezuela where Cuba is the ideologist, they won’t permit anything. The demand it seems to me, must be direct: that the regime abandon power and allow the road to a democracy where the people are the ones who govern. Accept that they will not be actors in that transition, and that it can only be achieved, of course, with pressure from the concert of nations.

By then we will have saved several years, that our generation has already missed, to see if we can have the experience of freedom in our beloved islands that make up the Cuban archipelago.

Hopefully the opponents who are leaders of projects will sit down to talk and find a roadmap, between all of them, the best path, the most united, in time and in form, as to what the dictatorship needs in order to leave power. This is like religion, each one contains a little bit of truth, of reasons and needs, none alone has all the answers and all the knowledge.

And for that I think that the artists and intellectuals should have an active role. As you well know, no political movement has been achieved without a prior cultural movement of art and of developed thought. I lend my voice so that it can be achieved.

About the author

Ángel Santiesteban

(Havana, 1966). Graduated in Film Direction, resides in Havana, Cuba. Mention in the Juan Rulfo contest (1989), National Prize of the Writers Guild UNEAC (1995). The book: Sueño de un día de verano [Dream of a Summer Day], was published in 1998. In 1999 he won the César Galeano award. And in 2001, the Alejo Carpentier Prize organized by the Cuban Book Institute with the set of stories: Los hijos que nadie quiso [The Children Nobody Wanted]. In 2006, he won the Casa de las Américas prize in the story genre with the book: Dichosos los que lloran [Blessed are Those Who Mourn]. In 2013, he won the Franz Kafka International Novels of the Drawer Prize, organized in the Czech Republic with the novel El verano en que Dios dormía [The Summer God Slept]. He has published in Mexico, Spain, Puerto Rico, Switzerland, China, England, Dominican Republic, France, USA, Colombia, Portugal, Martinique, Italy, Canada, among other countries.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

ETECSA Performs Another Test of Mobile Internet but Limits it to 70 Megabytes per User

Two women connecting to the state WIFI network. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, 22 August 2018 – The Telecommunications Company of Cuba (ETECSA), this Wednesday, is carrying out another test of Internet browsing on mobile phones but, unlike the prior one that was unlimited, this time users can only consume one package of 70 non-renewable megabytes, according to the state monopoly.

From eight in the morning until midnight today, customers have “access to the Internet for prepaid cellular services,” a statement from ETECSA indicated. “During the period of time foreseen for the test, it may be partially or complete stopped depending on the behavior of the network and the adjustments of technical parameters that are being evaluated,” the text adds.

In the first test, this past week, customers complained about the excessive slowness of web browsing from mobile phones, the constant crashes and the lack of prior notification. continue reading

The company clarifies on this occasion that “those customers who use email from their cell phones should consider that their use of the email will count against any remaining limits in their active accounts.”

The connection this Wednesday has been marked by slowness, frequent loss of the data signal and congestion in the service, despite the fact that, like the prior test, a pre-announcement was not made in the national media. Users can barely check their email accounts, use chat services and social networks such as Telegram or Facebook but are unable to play videos online or download applications.

On August 14 ETECSA ran the first public test of internet access from mobile phones, which includes some 800,000 users. The prices for connecting at public wifi points (equivalent to one dollar per hour) and in homes (between 15 and 70 dollars for a 30-hour package) are still very expensive for Cubans, whose salaries average the equivalent of 30 dollars a month.

Results of an internet “Speed Test” during Etecsa’s test on Wednesday of internet-by-mobile connections. (14ymedio)

As information about the test spread and a larger number of people began using the data package, the connection became slower and access to the MiCubacel portal became almost impossible. “In the middle of the morning I was able to download a small app from the Google Play store but after noon I couldn’t even open my Gmail account,” lamented Brandon, a 17-year-old who found out because a friend called him from Trinidad and Tobago to tell him that he had read about the test on the internet.

Some users in Sancti Spíritus told this newspaper that they had been able to make video calls through the IMO in the morning and others in Havana also confirmed the information although “with avery low quality image.”

The 70 megabyte package can be acquired by dialing *133 #, then following the menu and selecting the appropriate option number: Data (1), Daily Use (2) and Send (1) and also by accessing the MiCubacel portal (https://mi.cubacel.net) after registering as a user.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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The Essence of Decree 349/2018: subparagraph a) of Article 2 / Cubalex

In the foreground, Vice President Miguel Díaz-Canel. Beside him, Miguel Barnet, president of UNEAC, and Abel Prieto, Minister of Culture (Photo: Leyben Leyva / Juventud Rebelde)

Cubalex, 27 July 2018 — Details of Decree 349/2018, dictated by the Council of Ministers, which establishes the “Violations of the regulations in respect to the cultural policy and concerning the provision of artistic services”: In accordance with subparagraph a) of Article 2.

Possible behaviors that violate this provision:

That you approve or permit the realization of artistic service without said service having been approved and contracted for by the cultlural institution responsible for that artistic service.

That you approve or permit the realization of artistic service with the use of media and installations belonging to an entity, without said services having been approved and contracted for by the cultural institution responsible for that entity. continue reading

That you approve or permit the realization of artistic service with the use of those associated with the commercial activity which has authorization, without said services having been approved and contracted for by the cultural institution responsible for its authorization.

Applicable sanctions:

These behaviors are considered very serious and the amont of fine imposed is 2,000 Cuban pesos.

If in the period of one year the same person incurs more than one violation or is warned, this is considered another incident and a single fine of 4,000 Cuban pesos is imposed.

In addition they can seize the equipment, computers, fixtures and other property, suspend immediately the performance or the showing of material.

They also can cancel the authorization to show it, based on self-employed work activity.

Commentary and doubts:

The non-specified norm that is understood by artistic services allows a wide margin of discretional activity to those charged with its execution. It’s a form of advance censorship because it doesn’t allow the realization of artistic activity without authorization from the Ministry of Culture.

You have to be approved and contracted by a cultural institution, but not just any, only the one responsible for the provision of artistic services. Can’t they give an example of the cultural institutions that provide artistic services?

Here it’s not clear to whom this rule is directed, to the owner of a business or a director of an entity belonging or subordinated to the Ministry of Culture? Please inform us if you know of any business that can be affected by these rules.

Is the fine of 2,000 pesos commensurate with the income artists receive?Make this calculation taking into account that many times their works require investment in raw material or high-cost equipment, in specific markets.

Comment and share! Send your responses to info@cubalex.org.

The entry The essence of Decree 349/2018: subparagraph 2) of Article 2 first appeared in Cubalex.

Translated by Regina Anavy

An Alliance is Created to Denounce the Violations of Human Rights in Cuba

Tomás Regalado, Director of the Office of Transmissions to Cuba, during a press conference this morning in Miami. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Mario J. Pentón, Miami | August 14, 2018 – Radio and TV Martí together with the non-governmental organization Freedom House launched a campaign on Tuesday that will aim to disseminate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as setting up a telephone number to receive complaints from Cuba.

“If you feel that your rights have been violated, denounce it on our human rights line. Call +1 305 437 7301. You’re not alone” says one of the promotional messages that will be broadcast on Radio and TV Martí, presented by Tomás Regalado, former mayor of Miami and current director of the station.

“We have seen an extraordinary upsurge in the violation of human rights,” added Regalado, who directly ordered Los Martí journalists to process the complaints received from Cuba. continue reading

“Through our network of correspondents on the island, those of the opposition and this hot line, human rights violations will be exposed. The News Department will dedicate itself to verify in a reliable way the denunciations and then present them to Freedom House”, explained the official.

Carlos Ponce, director of Freedom House for Latin America, considered the alliance with Los Martí “a golden opportunity” that will promote the “Cuban, know your human rights” campaign.

“Every time the regime feels weak, it increases the repression of human rights,” he said.

For Ponce, the Cuban government infringes on their citizens “most basic rights”, such as educational freedom and political rights. “It is time for people to open their eyes so that Cuba not continue being the same old story that people no longer want to see,” he added.

“With this strategic alliance we will be able to bring a number of significant complaints to international organizations and give visibility to what is happening on the island,” he said.

In statements to 14ymedio, Ponce lamented that media coverage of human rights violations often focuses on Venezuela and Nicaragua, with no references to Cuba.

“Unfortunately the media has turned a blind eye to the situation in Cuba. The root of evil in Latin America is a dictatorial regime that with impunity continues to operate in the region,” he said.

“Cuba is a dictatorship that influences other countries, such as Venezuela and Nicaragua, in order to leach on them, prop up their regimes and destroy democratic systems. We call on all Cubans to denounce the violations of their rights,” he added.

Radio and TV Martí bet on reaching more Cubans with new technologies

According to statements from Tomás Regalado, director of the Office of Transmissions to Cuba (OCB) of the US Government, the coming months will see a substantial increase in the number of Cubans who can listen to the station or watch the television programs of Los Martí.

Regalado recently announced the addition of a new frequency for radial transmissions at 11860 kHz. “In short wave we had three frequencies and the regime managed to block one or sometimes two frequencies. With three we have the means to be immune to their blockade,” remarked the newly appointed director to 14ymedio.

For its part, a new type of technology, whose technical details have not yet been made known, will make it possible for TV Martí to be seen on the Island, according to its directors. “It is a novel technology that will allow what we call the Martí Communities to establish themselves,” explained Regalado.

At the moment there are more than 200 of these devices on the island and several communities of neighbors who can watch the TV Martí signal, the former mayor told the local media in Miami. According to him, it is impossible for the Government of Havana to track the signal of the devices, a concern of many activists who fear the sentences that can be faced by “counterrevolutionaries.”

“In the Cuban penal code there are criminal forms that put these people (who are part of the Martí communities) in danger, but the people defy it. The most important guarantee is that the Government does not know where the signal is shared,” explained Regalado.

“The regime can interfere with the output signal of the equipment but not the one that enters (input). It is immune to being detected,” he said.

The appliance that will allow TV Martí to be seen on the Island was designed by Cuban engineers on the Island and in South Florida. Regalado will present the results of this new technology at the beginning of September at an event of the Board of Governors of Radiodifusión, the federal entity in charge of Radio and TV Martí.

The Cuban Government has made a particular effort to block the Marti signal and accuses the United States of violating international radio broadcasting agreements by allowing and financing the stations. During the administration of Barack Obama, which promoted the thaw with the island, Cuba took the opportunity to demand the dismantling of these communication media.

Radio Martí began broadcasting its signal to Cuba in 1985 under the government of Ronald Reagan. In the early nineties, TV Martí followed and the Martí Noticias portal appeared with the digital era. This year the budget allocated by the US Congress to both broadcasters will exceed 28 million dollars.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Dead Animals, Feces and Plastics Envelop the Quibu River as it Passes Through Havana

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 17 August 2018 – “River Quibú, nobody washes on your shores,” the singer Frank Delgado chanted in the eighties. Three decades later the panorama has not improved around the river that crosses the western neighborhoods of Havana.

The neighbors denounce a delicate epidemiological and ecological situation caused by the great accumulation of solid waste that washes down the river.

“You can find anything from a floating dead pig to cupboards, chairs, tables or feces when there is flood,” says an inhabitant from the lower part of the basin, very close to the coastal area. continue reading

Along its route, the locals tell 14ymedio, the river collects several drainages and the garbage that people throw in. In addition, they assure that a project that began in 2006 to expand the mouth of the river and avoid floods “has not been finished” and is no longer talked about.

Some of the neighbors insist on the need to return to the idea of dredging to avoid the accumulation of garbage and assure that each year this matter is brought up to different institutions and responsible bodies, as well as being a recurring issue in the community’s “accountability assemblies” where the elected deputies offer residents a report on the year’s accomplishments.

The biologist Isbel Díaz says that “there is no project to sanitize the river in an integral way” and, although in some places sanitation works are carried out, this does not “mean anything when the river enters the city.” For Díaz, the fact that there is no project with this objective has to do with the fact that the waters flow “through a place that is one of the least privileged” and that “are further away from the tourist’s eye.”

The Quibú river basin is located within the City of Havana and passes through the municipalities of Marianao, Playa, La Lisa and Boyeros, including 16 People’s Councils which, in most cases, are made up of populations in very precarious economic situations, like the neighborhoods of Siboney, Buena Vista, Zamora, Santa Felicia, Pogolotti, Balcony of the Lisa, San Agustín, Heights of the Lisa, El Cano and Wajay.

In accordance with some scientific studies undertaken in the last decade, the main economic activities carried out in its surroundings are related to agriculture and scientific research. According to several university studies by the University of Havana, the environmental problems of Quibú have been evaluated as “of great importance” and the river is considered one of the most polluted in the city.

A UH master’s thesis on coastal zone management, published by Edgar Alexander Amaya Vasquez in 2015, argues that the origin of pollution in the Quibú basin is of both domestic and industrial origin, among the latter it mentioned the presence of heavy metals, detergents, pesticides, oils and petrochemicals. The contamination of the river, whose level is higher than that established by the Cuban Standard of Sanitary Quality, extends to a large part of the coastal zone, frequently used by bathers.

Inhabitants of the river bank tell of frequent mosquito outbreaks and that many people have already been infected with diseases such as zika or dengue. “The patios are full of mosquitoes and mice, you have to always have poison traps because if you don’t they get inside the house,” they say. Near the mouth of the river, all kinds of solid waste, jars and plastic bags, as well as old shoes accumulate on its shores, an ideal scenario for the proliferation of insects and rodents.

Díaz warns that, although the river water is not potable, it is used for other purposes such as agriculture, so that pollution can reach “the digestive system of the human being in an indirect way.”

In February 2017, the Law on Terrestrial Waters in Cuba came into effect, regulating, among other issues, the dumping of liquid and solid waste in the waters of the country, but the impact this legislation has had on the environment has yet to be evaluated.

This newspaper has not found a single person or company that has been fined for dumping waste or untreated waste into the river, which has contributed to creating a situation of impunity for those responsible for the contamination.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Informative Note about Detained Members / Somos+

Somos+, 18 August 2018 — The Executive Council has been able to contact the six members of our movement who had been arbitrarily detained by the State Security in Puerto Padre, province of Las Tunas. All have been released and are in their respective homes.

We are deeply grateful to all our members for their solidarity, and to the honorable and exceptional instances of journalists, influencers and members of other political projects that responded on behalf of our representatives during these days. continue reading

In our initial contact, these brave men and women have expressed firmness in their decision to stay in our movement and the certainty that nothing will make them bow down.

As we have already reported, their phones, a video camera, as well as the money provided for their travel expenses and performance of their duties, were confiscated

Repressive actions against Somos + is increasing, but no obstacle will stop us.

Executive Council

Political Movement S+

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

Another Another Cuban Physician from the Mais Medicos Mission Dies in Brazil

The Cuban doctor Ramón Domínguez Rivera. (Facebook):

14ymedio, Miami, August 18, 2018 – Cuban doctor Ramón Domínguez Rivera, originally from the province of Pinar del Río, who was on assignment in Brazil, died on August 16, as reported by his Medical Brigade. Dominguez Rivera worked in Melgaço, Pará state. His body was found three days after he disappeared, according to the local press. One of the heads of Mais Medicos, Lizander Rubio, said on Facebook that the cause of death could be “a cardiovascular condition.”

Some of Dominguez Rivera’s colleagues expressed their grief on the loss of the doctor in social networks. Guillermo Fernández Maqueira stressed the generosity of the deceased. “I know that many of us will remember you, those of us who shared a meal with you, those of us who shared clothes and shoes in the dormitory in order to go out with our girlfriend at night,” he wrote. continue reading

According to data compiled by 14ymedio, this is the fifth Cuban doctor that has died in the last four months in the mission deployed in Brazil. In April, Guantanamo native Adrián Reyes Valverde was killed in a motorcycle accident in the municipality of Babaçulândia. A few days later physician Jorge Alberto Borrego died in the crash of the Cubana de Aviación flight last May in Havana.

Luis Alberto Martínez Vila, 29, died last month in a car accident near the city of Redenção, in the state of Pará, and Yanier Samón De Hombre, 32, died after a bout of severe abdominal pain two weeks ago.

Official media rarely report the deaths of any Cuban aid workers abroad.

More than 18,000 Cuban doctors have passed through Brazil since the two governments created the Mais Medicos program in 2013 to increase the presence of health personnel in municipalities and rural areas. After the impeachment of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, the number of Cuban doctors in the program has decreased. However, the figure still exceeds 8,000.

Brazil pays Havana around $3,600 per month for each doctor, who, in turn, receives only $900 from the Cuban government. Cuban professionals or their families do not receive compensation in case of accidents or death at work.

The export of medical services is one of the main sources of revenue for the island government, which maintains tens of thousands of health professionals deployed in more than 60 countries, from which it annually derives more than 11.5 billion dollars according to official figures. Human rights activists have criticized this work activity as a form of “modern slavery.”

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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In Camaguey, Neglected Beaches in Cuban Pesos, Beautiful Beaches in Hard Currency

The most ‘democratic’ of Camagüey’s beaches suffers from a chronic neglect. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Ricardo Fernández Izaguirre, Camagüey | August 18, 2018 – The sun rises and dozens of bathers start to arrive at the beaches of the Bay of Nuevitas, on the north coast of the province of Camagüey. They are equipped as if for battle: food, water, sturdy shoes to deal with stones and even an improvised kit for the possibility of cuts on pieces of glass or cans. The poor conditions of the coast do not manage to cool the desire to take a dip.

The province of Camagüey has 25% of all the beaches in the archipelago but the state of the coast has been getting worse in recent years due to climate change, lack of maintenance and deterioration of infrastructure, to which is added the discharge of industrial or domestic waste. Some areas that were once a haven of peace and beauty today seem to come out of a post-war scene.

Among the extensive coastline, Nuevitas is the busiest resort because it is cheaper thanks to the “beach train” that runs in summer, from Friday to Sunday, from the city of Camagüey and arrives a few meters from the sea. continue reading

The beach train runs in summer, from Friday to Sunday, from the city of Camagüey and reaches a few meters from the sea. (14ymedio)

For low-income families this is one of the few possibilities of having a day sunbathing in front of the waves, because the most beautiful and well-kept areas, such as Santa Lucía beach, have been filled with hotels where mainly foreign visitors stay.

Getting there is expensive and complicated, so Nuevitas is a more accessible option. However, the most democratic of Camagüey’s beaches suffers from chronic neglect. The ruins of old buildings destroyed by hurricanes or abandonment dot part of the coastline and holiday makers are forced to bathe in the middle of concrete fragments, metal beams and other types of rubble (debris).

Among the beaches with the highest number of visitors Las Piedras, La Colonia and the others that extend close to the old railway line stand out, although some opt for the more distant ones such as Santa Rita and the one with better seabeds such as Varaderito, about three kilometers from the city, but which can only be accessed by a road in poor condition.

“Here it has been years that no repairs have been made nor the beach dredged,” laments Mily Marín, a local resident who takes her children to the beach. “These places do not look like the beaches I knew as a child, my children leave with wounds on their feet,” laments the mother, who recalls a childhood with a maintained coastline and denounces the institutional abandonment that the area has reached.

The industrial growth that the zone experienced during the years of Soviet subsidy made industries proliferate, among them some very polluting ones like the 10th of October Thermoelectric Company and a fertilizer factory. The damages left by strong hurricanes, such as Irma last September, have exacerbated the situation.

The rising waters have also taken space from vacationers. During the last century an increase in the average annual temperature of 0.6 ° was registered in Cuba and the average sea level has increased at a rate of 2.14 millimeters per year. At least 291 beaches in the country (84% of the total) have already been affected by these changes. The climate changes and industrial discharges are compounded by the problem of domestic waste carried to the sea by the waters of the Saramaguacán River and from places as far away as the north of the municipality of Camagüey and the plains of Sibanicú.

The neighbors of Nuevitas remember the beautiful beach before industrial waste and neglect appropriated their coastlines. This is the case of Juan, a retiree who makes a few pesos selling corn chips to holidaymakers and regrets that the bay is now invaded by a “fetid mud.” He only has one word to define the situation: “It’s a disaster.”

The authorities have been working on a project supported by the United Nations Development Program that seeks to alleviate the environmental impact in the area. “A series of results has already accrued that have repercussions not only on biodiversity, but also on the economic development and good social living of the territory,” assured the local newspaper Adelante.

The signature work of this collaboration is the so-called Malecón-Patana Rosa Naútica Complex, inaugurated at the end of last year, which includes a seawall on the coast with various recreational opportunities nearby. The work, 320 meters long, was erected partly over an old pier.

The Malecón-Patana Rosa Naútica complex, inaugurated at the end of last year, includes a wall on the coast with various recreational offers around. (14ymedio)

“It turned out very good, but the vacationers of Camagüey do not come to these places,” clarifies Pastor Yilber Durand. “They want to enjoy the beaches, which are in terrible conditions. I think it would have been better to invest all that money by improving them.”

The difference between “the beaches of the people,” as many call the coast where the Camagüeyans dip and “the beaches of the tourists” does not only lie in the quality of the maintenance they receive, in the cleanliness of their waters or in the number of houses that rent rooms for vacationers. The gastronomic offers also mark a great difference

While in Santa Lucia you can buy “almost anything […], in Nuevitas the offerings are poorer,” says Roxana, mother of two girls and resident in the city of Camagüey, who frequently visits the north coast. She has no doubt that “many sellers prefer to go to those places where customers can pay better for a sandwich, a soft drink or a fresh fruit.”

However, Roxana is happy that some private businesses remain in Nuevitas. If they were not here, “there would be very little left to enjoy, because between the dirty waters and the attention that you have to take with the garbage on the coast, at least drinking a cold juice in front of the sea is worth it.”

“We are the ones who guarantee food and drink to those who arrive from the main city, because the state offers are very scarce,” the owner of a restaurant that operates in a place leased to the State confirms to 14ymedio. The small businessman and some others plan to stay, waiting for good luck and care to return to the beaches of Nuevitas.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Without Guarantees of Due Process, Detentions Always Appear Unjust / Cubalex

Cubalex, M.sc. Laritza Diversent, 3 August 2018 — The constitutional reform will recognise Habeas Corpus, as it is applied in domestic law. An obviously ineffective procedure. It does not provide protection against arbitrary detention or enforced disappearance. Nor does it comply with international standards in terms of due process.

“No-one who is imprisoned considers that it is in order,” was José Luis Toledo Santander’s cynical comment. “Everyone detained by the police considers himself innocent and to have been unfairly detained,” adds the deputy and member of the editing commission of the constitutional text. “That implies,” he concludes, “that every person detained by the police would be able to seek a writ of Habeas Corpus.”

Abuse of power and excess of discretional authority

The agents of police and security (Ministry of the Interior) have minimal training and excessive authority. After being recruited and a 6-month course, they are ready to exercise power and enjoy the impunity guaranteed by their uniform and their licence. continue reading

Whether on the orders of a superior, personal dislike, or a battle for territorial control — it’s all the same. No-one who has a business escapes the payment of tribute to the authorities. The evidence presented and declarations to a tribunal, whether true or not, carry more weight than the law itself.

In such circumstances, it is logical that everyone detained by the police considers himself unfairly detained. That’s the logic in a country where guarantees of due process do not exist.

Do you know that the police can interpret and apply, acting as judges, 27% of the offences in the Penal Code?

Without remission of the case to a tribunal, they are authorised to judge it, and apply a fine. When they exercise this power, they do not inform the detainees that, in the event of their accepting it, they are recognising their guilt (loss of the presumption of innocence) and abandoning the right to be judged by a tribunal.

Absence of independent, impartial tribunals

Do you know that the Committee against Enforced Disappearance (an office of the United Nations) is concerned that the subordination of the tribunals to the National Assembly and the Council of State affects the independance of the judiciary?

Yes, judges are subject to all types of political influence. Both of these state organs are charged with appointing, promoting, suspending, and dismissing them. A judge can be dismissed from a tribunal, for not being willing to join the Cuban Communist Party, which subjects them to conflicts of interest and intimidation.

Total absence of the right to defence and therefore the presumption of innocence

Did you know that the national tribunals only accept legal service contracts issued by the Collective Law Firms (Legal practices supervised by the Ministry of Justice)?

Yes, in practice they are obliged to contract defence lawyers from an organisation which is unique in the country and ideologically committed to the political group holding power in the country. This situation affects the right to freely select your lawyer.

Nor are the ONBC lawyers are not independent. They are subject to interference, pressure and undue influence from the authorities who intervene in the penal process, which prevents them from performing dilligently and fearlessly, acting against the interests of their clients.

First published in Cubalex

Translated by GH

Cuba: Without a Real Transition There Will Be No Winners / Miriam Celaya

Cubanet, Miriam Celaya, West Palm Beach, 16 August 2018 –With its lights and its shadows, the virtual debates surrounding the constitutional reform undertaken by the Cuban government have created the benefit of uncovering a host of non-conformities and claims long repressed by Cubans from all corners of the globe, and at the same time, stirring the polarization around the issue that operates as a turning point: to participate or not in that which, from the outset, is perceived as the leadership’s farce.

So much reluctance is not by chance. Sixty years of scams by the dictatorial power has developed in Cubans a natural distrust of everything that flows from it. However, this has not been an impediment to breaking the silence. Demands are overflowing the virtual spaces of some websites and social networks, where they have been creating discussion groups on constitutional issues, and in which very interesting analyses and discussions are taking place.

However, the truth is that certain uprisings of civic rebellion are taking place in Cuba, either because of the uncertainties generated by a reform project clearly designed for the benefit and consecration of the top leadership or by the feeling of general frustration among a population that had pinned its hopes on improving its living conditions. The population also had its hopes pinned on true participation in the national economy and politics from the “transition” of power, from the hands of the historical generation to a new younger president, supposedly better linked to “the people.” They are not seeing such hopes expressed in the lapidary constitutional proposal that only reaffirms and prolongs the demise of citizen rights. continue reading

The motives may be apparently disconnected and disengaged from the strictly constitutional issues – such as Decree 349, which affects the artistic sector; marriage between LGTBI couples; the censorship of an art show or of one in a theatre scene; the arbitrary detention of a citizen; etc. – however, protests are focused on and related to the same basic problem: the boredom of a nation in which all individual rights have been violated for too long. The general feeling of malaise inside Cuba is palpable.

The trigger that would spark the delicate political and social balance could be both the enforcement of certain decrees and laws that further limit citizen rights and the arbitrary detention of an artist or a group, the censorship of a film or a play, the confiscation of the means of work of any business owner or independent professional, the shortages in the markets, the high prices of food, the eternal problems of transportation or any eventuality within the endless accumulation of setbacks and limitations that characterize the days of the common Cuban.

Authorities are aware of this. That’s the reason there has also been a rebound in the repression and surveillance against the “disaffected” sectors, that is, the dissidence, the opposition groups, the protest artists, the independent journalists and against any hint of demands, even within the “socialist” ranks themselves.

These demands are growing in their number and in their intensity, as reflected in the great variety and quantity of independent and “alternative” journalism that is currently taking place in Cuba despite the censors, and to the chagrin of the power elite, in hubs of disobedience of several young filmmakers; in the gradual but tangible process of loss of fear, especially among the younger intellectuals and artists sectors. It is the spirit of the generations that distance themselves from the “zombie effect” that still afflicts their parents and grandparents.

At the same time, this other sector of the dissatisfied is increasing. It is much larger and more dangerous, and is composed of the poorest individuals, those who depend on insufficient wages, who lack other means of making a living, a decent home; who see their children grow up among material shortages of all kinds and who, when the time comes, and in the absence of a leadership that will channel their demands peacefully, could become a violent and uncontrollable force, with unpredictable consequences and at an incalculable social and political cost.

And just as the rupture of the so-called “revolutionary social pact” between the un-government and dis-governed is becoming evident, also palpable is the leadership’s fear of things getting out of control if the usually meek flock turns into an ungovernable mass. The agents of the State (in)Security have threatened – not just by chance – a small group of popular artists after their arrest for protesting against an official decree, telling them that they would not allow another “Nicaragua” in Cuba. If there is something the Castro hound pack fears it is people without fear.

Without a doubt, “they will not allow it,” just as they are not allowing it in that Central American country where, according to witnesses, the repression is directed and monitored by Cuban troops. A “constancy” that has also been reported by numerous sources from Venezuela, where elite Castro troops have played an important role in the tenacious repression against the opponents of the dictator Nicolás Maduro.

Consequently, following the dictatorial logic, everything points to an eventual increase in the repression in Cuba, in direct proportion to the increase in citizen protest demonstrations or any spontaneous popular protest. Obviously, the so-called “debates” of the constitutional project that will only consecrate the rights of the power caste will also be jealously guarded by the agents of the political police, supported by the everlasting neighborhood snitches. The regime will try to keep everything on an even keel, but it knows that nothing is the same anymore. Especially when it does not even have the supreme resource: to release the pressure through a massive migratory wave.

Without the Mariel boatlift, without the “maleconazo“*, without fleets of rafters and without the land migrations toward the US borders of thousands of Cubans through South America, Central America and Mexico, the pressure stays in Cuba. It’s all about seeing who and how they will release it. If there is no economic reform and no real democratic transition in Cuba, this time there might be no winners

(Miriam Celaya, resident in Cuba, is visiting the United States)

*Translator’s Note: Uprising that took place in Havana August 1994, to protest government policies.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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