Translator: Regina Anavy – Page 128

In One Week, Two Healthcare Professionals Die from Dengue Fever in Cuba

Nurse Nelly Sánchez Espinosa worked for 30 years in the delivery room of the Maternal and Child Hospital. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 16 September 2022 — Nurse Nelly Sánchez Espinosa, an employee of the Maternal and Child Hospital in the municipality of Cabaiguán, in the province of Sancti Spíritus, died this week after complications arising from her dengue fever infection.

Her death was confirmed by co-workers on social networks, without the local directors of Public Health having offered an official version. Some comments on social networks allow us to reconstruct the circumstances in which Sánchez Espinosa died.

Social media user Javier Raúl López González offered his condolences for the nurse, whom he described as “indispensable” to the hospital, and confirmed that the cause of death had been dengue fever.

For his part, Manuel Rivero Abella, Provincial Director of Health, said in a note that Sánchez Espinosa had left “her mark” on the delivery room where she worked for three decades, but he didn’t mention the disease that led to her death. The nurse was also part of a Cuban medical brigade in Angola.

The patients who were treated by Sánchez Espinosa also expressed their condolences. “Very professional and affectionate, I have to thank her for helping me so much, at that difficult time that all mothers go through,” Mabileydi Rojas Montes de Oca wrote. continue reading

“Nelly wasn’t just any person in that nursing room of the Maternal and Child Hospital. We felt safe. We didn’t need a gynecologist; she was everything,” added user Odalis Suarez.

This is the second health professional to die of dengue this month. On September 9, physiotherapist Elba Rosa López Nápoles died in the province of Santiago de Cuba. López Nápoles presented complications that couldn’t be treated in time, due to the lack of ambulances in the area.

Her sister, Mercedes López Nápoles, reported at the time that despite having asked for help through the Integrated System of Medical Emergencies (SIUM), the staff of the hospital in the province replied that there was no availability of ambulances and also that she was not registered as a patient in “serious” condition.

Cuba is facing a severe outbreak of dengue, but the government hasn’t revealed exact figures of infections, beyond stating that the Island “is in the context of what is happening in the region,” according to statements by the Deputy Minister of Public Health, Carilda Peña García, released on the same day that the death of physiotherapist López Nápoles was confirmed.

The deputy minister did confirm that Cubans will face a difficult time in the coming months, “the most complex of the disease,” in her words, “because the cycle shows its highest peaks from the end of October and the beginning of November.”

Meanwhile, the BioCubaFarma business group continues its research for a dengue vaccine that can be distributed on the Island. The president of the pharmaceutical company, Eduardo Martínez Díaz, acknowledged that the research process lasts 10 years due to the complexity of the disease. “Today there really is no effective and safe antigen,” he said.

In fact, there is an approved vaccine against dengue with the trade name of Dengvaxia, manufactured by the French company Sanofi Pasteur, but it’s not available in Cuba. This serum is only recommended for people who have already had dengue fever and is used for all four variants of this disease.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Private Businesses in Cuba ‘Are For Sale With Everything Inside’

The number of premises for sale or rent has multiplied in recent months. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, Havana, 16 September 2022 — With the doors closed, the interior empty and a “For Sale” sign in the window, a private restaurant on Infanta Street, in Central Havana, is one of the many businesses for sale in Cuba, where the economic crisis and mass exodus have made entrepreneurship an almost impossible path.

The place, where a restaurant was planning to open, never served a single dish because its owners gave up the effort, and they now have put it up for sale for $400,000. “You can rent the whole space for $3,000 per month,” they add via WhatsApp, when a potential buyer is interested.

The closure of the paladar (private restaurant), which didn’t even have a sign with its name, affects the neighbors who were waiting for its opening to see tourists and hard currency arrive in the neighborhood, the money it takes to get out of the hole in which most families have sunk, in an area that doesn’t have the glamour of El Vedado or the attractions of the historic center of Old Havana.

“They didn’t even manage to sell a frying pan, but they spent a lot on the investment, because before this was it very deteriorated,” Pocholo, who lives some doors away from the failed restaurant tells 14ymedio. “They even built a mezzanine to enlarge the space. Then came the ’monetary order’*; tourism didn’t return as expected, and having a paladar is crazy right now.”

Getting the raw materials, paying for what a place open to the public consumes — from toilet paper to electricity — and paying employees has become a chimera for many private business owners on the Island. To this is added the fact that, given the situation in the country, the sale of any possession can help in the extended project of emigrating. continue reading

I’m selling a hair salon with everything inside,” announces Dayana, a 38-year-old Habanera who until a few months ago offered her services in a small space on San Rafael Street, near Galiano Avenue. “I know I’m not going to recover my investment, but I need the money urgently,” she tells this newspaper. “I’m selling for $25,000, and it’s worth almost twice as much.”

Dayana’s living room was equipped as a hair salon and beauty center. “Everything is new, from the bathroom tiles to the water installation. I have put in a heater, a kiwan safety system for water pressure; everything is freshly painted, and I have two floors,” she says. “I’m offering it with all the accessories needed to keep it running and with a very loyal clientele.”

Dayana says she began to transform her house into a private business five years ago. “If someone had told me at the time that I was going to end up selling all this and buying a ticket to Nicaragua, I would have laughed in their face.” But her husband took “the route of the volcanoes” a few months ago, and the rigors of the couple’s separation have been added to the crisis that Cuba is going through.

Interior of a paladar (private restaurant) for sale in Havana. (14ymedio)

“I no longer know how much I’m going to charge people who come to remove hair or have a facial, because I have to buy all the products in dollars or MLC ( freely convertible currency), but I have to charge for the services in pesos. So I can’t work.” She regrets having to shut down what she considers to be “the greatest pride” of her life.

“I’m selling a working cafeteria, located in El Vedado, because I’m leaving the country,” Suselle says emphatically in an ad that she has posted on several classified sites and that she has also sent to friends and acquaintances on Telegram and WhatsApp. “The payment is in dollars to be deposited in the United States.” Since she disseminated the offer, she clarifies, she has received only a couple of calls.

“I understand that there are few people interested because many Cubans want to leave the country, and buying a business of this type is not among their projects right now,” Suselle admits. “But it’s also a good time to invest, because I’m selling this same business for a price well below what it cost.”

On the buying and selling sites, there are ads that are repeated for several weeks or months, and from time to time the price drops a little more. “Reduced to $17,500, take advantage now,” says one that has appeared again and again on the digital sites for more than half a year. “Two in one: house and business of photocopying, printing of documents and copying of movies and series,” it adds.

“I have 24 hard drives full of audiovisuals and two Canon computers.” The salesman emphasizes what so many others say about their businesses: “it’s working and making money,” but few seem interested in the “bargain” that is advertised. “Half of the money here in dollars and the other in the United States,” the announcement ends.

Next to the premises there are also complete kitchen sets, display refrigerators, large capacity fryers, dishwashers, banknote counting devices and cash registers, all the furnishings that accompany restaurants and cafes. “I’m selling more than a business; I’m selling a dream,” says the owner of a rental house for tourists in the city of Holguín.

“Five bedrooms, five bathrooms, garden and swimming pool,” the announcement details. “I’m in a hurry so I’ll listen to proposals, but don’t call me if you don’t have dollars.” In the photos he has posted next to the ad you can see a ranch in the yard, a pool table and a spectacular view of the city. And the message concludes: “The villa is delivered with everything inside.”

*Translator’s note: A reference to elements of the ‘Tarea ordenamiento’, the [so-called] ‘Ordering Task’ which is a collection of measures that include eliminating the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC), thus leaving the Cuban peso as the only national currency, raising prices, raising salaries (but not as much as prices), opening stores that take payment only in hard currency which must be in the form of specially issued pre-paid debit cards, and a broad range of other measures targeted to different elements of the Cuban economy.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Official Cuban Press Predicts the Dollar Will Soon Reach 200 Pesos

Deployment of official media on August 23, when the sale of hard currency in cash in the Cadecas (currency exchanges) went into effect. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 16 September 2022 — “You don’t need to be a guru in the sector to infer that the trigger of emigration via Nicaragua will lead to the dollar reaching 200 pesos in a few weeks.” The quote doesn’t come from any independent page dedicated to tracking the foreign exchange market or from any economic analyst, but from an article in the official Cuban press.

Published this Friday in the newspaper 5 de Septiembre in Cienfuegos, the text doubts the “exchange rate strategy” of the government, which on August 23 established the purchase of cash through exchange houses (Cadecas), and believes that the measure, for now, is performing “below expectations.”

Its author, Julio Martínez Molina, recalls that in a previous column, he pondered the government’s decision, calling it “backed by the citizens,” and warning, at the same time, that its success depended “on the Cadecas’ levels of operations and the daily existence of freely convertible currency in these establishments,” because otherwise, “we wouldn’t be in them.”

After this presentation, he lashes out: “Although it may be too early to evaluate, everything happened as planned, even for those of us who know little about the economy: in the face of the emergence of an exchange rate strategy born seven months ago (because there isn’t enough currency to sell, in total quantity and, throughout the day, in the designated units), the urgent counter response of the informal market would be the elevation, even more, of the burdens on the hard currency.” continue reading

Thus, the article continues, as of Friday, those currencies, which in official establishments have not risen from 123 pesos, are around 165 pesos in the informal market, where they are expected to continue to rise in the coming weeks to 200 pesos. The conclusion is that “the benefit of the measure, up to now, has been quite limited.”

To solve the situation, the author hopes “vehemently” that there will be “some institutional tricks pulled out of the bag,” because “if the schism does occur between the state option, the most favorable by far to the buyer although very small, and the informal one, there will be unimagined distances between them.”

On the same day and the days following the implementation of the measure, this newspaper noted in several places the results predicted by the official writer: the dollars were running out quickly, and the hard currencies began to rise like foam on the black market. But there was another reality, which the Cienfuegos newspaper didn’t mention: the long lines to acquire dollars in the Cadeca, strongly guarded, which have come to join the so many other lines for chicken, bread or a hygiene product.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Two Seriously Injured in Luyano, Cuba, in Fire of Two Motorbikes and Gas Cans

The flames reached a second motorbike and several fuel cans, which quickly reduced the interior of the house to ashes. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 13 September 2022 — Two people were seriously injured in the fire at a house in Luyanó, in the Havana municipality of Diez de Octubre, in the early hours of Tuesday.

According to the neighbors, who spoke to this newspaper, the fire began at four in the morning when an electric motorbike that was charging caught fire. The flames reached a second motorbike and several fuel cans that the family had stored, which quickly reduced the interior of the house to ashes. “Even the floor rose,” a neighbor said.

Inside the building, located on Arango Street, between Manuel Pruna and Rosa Enríquez, were the owner, Fidel González, well known in the neighborhood for working at a nearby carpentry shop, his three children, Denny (15 years old), David and Daniel (twins) and his wife, a Cuban-American visiting Havana.

The accident occurred when Daniel, who works as a taxi driver, was taking a bath after getting home from working. “The boy felt an explosion, and when he went outside, one of the motorbikes was on fire,” says another neighbor. “He alerted everyone in the house who were inside their air-conditioned rooms.”

One of the family’s two dogs, Floppy, stayed in the house and had to be rescued, with injuries, by a firefighter.

Daniel himself was the one who ended up with serious burns. Both he and his wife, who inhaled too much carbon dioxide, were admitted to the Miguel Enríquez hospital, known as La Benéfica. continue reading

Relatives of the family sent a petition via Facebook to all acquaintances to collect aid, because, they regret, they lost “everything: TV, washing machine, refrigerator, kitchen.”

Daniel González, according to the neighbors, was planning to go to the United States by the “route of the volcanoes” (Nicaragua).

Fires due to the explosions of electric motorbikes are frequent in Cuba. One of the latest reported occurred last June in the municipality of Cerro, also in Havana, and destroyed 12 motorbikes and two cars.

Last year, a 60-year-old woman and one grandchild, age 7, were killed in a fire caused by the explosion of a motorbike in Sancti Spíritus, and, months later, another 19-year-old girl died in a similar accident in the city of Matanzas.

Also, fuel storage, which in the case of Luyanó aggravated the accident, is also common on the Island. In many cases, it’s used for the operation of electric generators, some families’ alternative to the everyday blackouts.

In this case, the González family was storing it for the taxi operated by Daniel, in view of the increasingly frequent shortage of fuel in the gas stations.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Official Cuban Press Points Out the Social Discomfort Due to the Scarcity and High Price of Bread

The publication notes that last month the government of Havana recognized that there was a shortage of flour that affected the production of bread. (Cubadebate)

14ymedio, Havana, 14 September 2022 — The scarcity and high price of bread in Cuba are so evident that the official press once again dedicates ample space to the subject this Wednesday. In a report that paraphrases “Our father, Our bread… every day?” Cubadebate criticizes the fact that the product is not even guaranteed in the ration book, the “basic basket.”

To “clarify the doubts of the population on the subject,” the media claims to have sent a request for information to the Ministry of Food Industry on August 31, which hasn’t been answered. “Although we’ve insisted on several occasions, at the time of writing this report, they were still ’processing the request.’ Meanwhile, the discomfort in the population persists, and bread appears less and less and is more expensive,” says Cubadebate.

The publication recalls that last month the government of Havana recognized that there was a shortage of flour that affected the production of bread, but said it would be guaranteed in “the normal family basket,” prisons, hospitals, orphanages, nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals, as well as for the Cuban Bread Chain.

Faced with the numerous comments on Cuban networks, Cubadebate reached a conclusion confirmed for weeks by 14ymedio: “Bringing this food to the table has become an odyssey for Cubans, once again.”

“Several of those interviewed for this report and the readers of Cubadebate agree that not only is the quality of the product bad, but sometimes they don’t even manage to buy the quota of bread assigned per family nucleus in the bodegas (ration stores), something that should be guaranteed,” the article states. continue reading

The media also regrets the high cost of food: “In a quick tour of several non-state bakeries in Havana, it can be seen that the price of a bag of bread costs between 150 and 200 pesos, as does a package of cookies. And the worst thing is that it happens right in front of the decision makers. Is the lack of flour and wheat a reason to exorbitantly raise prices?”

The problems aren’t limited to the capital, the official website emphasizes, but spread “at the national level.” This newspaper, for example, testified that in Sancti Spíritus, due to the deficit of wheat flour, state bakeries are adding up to 20% of rice husk residue to the dough, a mixture that makes it sour and gives it a sandy texture.

Just for Sancti Spíritus, without mentioning the information in this newspaper, Cubadebate brings up the statements given to the Escambray newspaper by an official who said that “there is no justification for private businesses to continue raising the price of a package of cookies and a bag of bread,” and that “the self-employed or the small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) must have documentation that certifies or endorses the legal origin of the raw material used in the manufacture of such products.”

And, despite its criticism of the authorities, Cubadebate distributes blame to the private sector and the “resellers,” who “wake up in the bakeries and take almost all the product.”

In this regard, they cite an angry customer: “The private bread is from the state bakeries that make the standard bread. How? By taking the bread out of the basic basket. That’s why it doesn’t have the weight, no fat and turns black in 24 hours. It’s a lucrative business.”

The commentator doesn’t mention the many private businesses that buy flour online or the individuals who import it. Or the SMEs that have denounced the Government’s obstacles to importing flour independently, as a group of Sancti Spíritus bakers told 14ymedio at the end of August.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A New Breakdown in the Antonio Guiteras Power Plant Causes Another Day with a More than 40 Percent Electricity Deficit

It will take 30 hours for the boiler to cool down before repairs can be made at the plant. (Cubadebate)

EFE/14ymedio, Havana, 13 September 2021 — The state company Unión Eléctrica de Cuba (UNE) announced on Tuesday that the energy deficit will be around 41% of the maximum generation capacity in the afternoon-night schedule of highest consumption.

The high deficit occurs a day after the departure from the national electricity system of the country’s main thermoelectric plant, Antonio Guiteras, located in the province of Matanzas. According to the UNE, the plant suffered a new “blowout” in one of its boilers. It will take 30 hours for the boiler to cool down, before performing any repair of the breakdown.

With this scenario, a day is expected with power cuts, a situation that has affected the entire national territory for several months, including Havana.

The blackouts can exceed 10 consecutive hours, which has a negative impact on Cuba’s economic and social life, in the midst of the crisis it is experiencing. The UNE calculates for today a generation capacity of 2,206 megawatts (MW), a maximum demand of 3,100 MW and a deficit of 894 during peak hours. continue reading

The company, which reports to the Ministry of Energy and Mines, also estimates a maximum impairment during the evening of 964 MW. Power cuts, due to breaks and failures in outdated thermoelectric plants, lack of fuel and scheduled maintenance, are increasingly frequent in the country.

In 60 of the 62 days of July and August, blackouts were recorded on the Island, according to UNE data collated by EFE. The Cuban government has expressed its intention to reduce them before the end of the year, through repairs and new investments, but it’s not the first time that they have planned improvements that they do not meet once the date has arrived.

The blackouts affect all areas of the economy and notably the daily life of Cubans, which is increasingly inciting social discontent. This was one of the main causes of the protests on July 11, 2021, the largest in decades, and also of those that have occurred this year throughout the national territory.

Cuba relies heavily on foreign oil to produce energy (thermoelectric plants generate two-thirds of electricity), and its main supplier, Venezuela, has significantly decreased its shipments.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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BioCubaFarma Attributes its Financial Difficulties to Investment in Vaccines Against COVID

Cuban pharmacies have looked like this image for a long time, but in the last two years the situation has worsened. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Madrid, September 15, 2022 — The directors of BioCubaFarma said, on Wednesday, that the state-owned company hasn’t been able to collect most of the $200 million profit allegedly obtained from the sale abroad of the Soberana and Abdala vaccines. In 2021, BioCubaFarma said, it spent half of its resources on the production of COVID vaccines but so far has been unable to recover its investment.

“At the end of last year. we managed to export a good quantity of vaccines, for more than $200 million. Today, nine months later, we haven’t been able to receive much of that income, because there is no way for the money to get here. The income was intended for buying medicines,” Eduardo Martínez Díaz, president of the pharmaceutical business group, said on Wednesday.

The doctor did not give details about the countries where the vaccines were sold or at what amounts, although it’s known that Vietnam bought five million doses. Mexico announced the acquisition of nine million Abdala doses, which would not yet enter the account. The Island also exported Soberana to Iran, the country with which it jointly developed the serum, and Venezuela, in addition to a small batch to other Central American countries. Finally, Nicaragua bought seven million doses at a unit price of seven dollars, according to a document released by the newspaper Confidencial that referred to the request for a loan to the World Bank to pay the amount.

The origin of the “retained” money, according to the Cuban authorities, was not revealed, although the president of BioCubaFarma indicated that the banks refuse to transfer money to the Island due to the U.S. embargo and Cuba’s inclusion in the list of countries that sponsor terrorism.

This is another of the reasons that the official pointed out as a fundamental cause for the shortage of medicines on the Island, discussed this Wednesday on State TV’s Roundtable program. continue reading

Martínez Díaz explained that BioCubaFarma manufactures 996 products, of which 369 belong to the ‘basic table’ (composed of a total of 627 items). He calculated that this saves the country, 1.5 billion dollars. However, the accounts still don’t balance, because that production is in serious trouble.

The situation, according to the pharmaceutical directors invited last night, has been aggravated by the scarcity and increase in the prices of raw materials and logistics in the international market, which also affects, they said, other countries, such as Mexico and Brazil. In addition, they assert that the embargo makes some raw materials more expensive because of the distance from which they must be brought, although that explanation is misleading since the U.S. also imports from China and India the same active ingredients that it uses in its pharmaceutical industry.

Among the missing medications, the list provided was extensive. Antihypertensives, which are taken by up to three million Cubans, antiarrhythmics, cytostatics, contraceptives, antibiotics, antiparasitics, psychopharmaceuticals and antiallergenics were cited.

The situation is such that the vice president of BioCubaFarma, Tania Urquiza Rodríguez, indicated that priority levels have been established for the 369 drugs manufactured by the pharmaceutical company (MediSol takes care of the rest): 262 with level 1, 81 with level 2 and 26 with level 3.

“However, the situation is so complex that we have had to establish a priority within priority 1, which is the majority of medicines. We are giving priority to hemodialysis, because it”s a medicine that, if the patient who needs dialysis doesn’t get it, he loses his life,” said the official, who added serums, dextrose, sodium chloride, Ringer with lactate, and control card products to the list, which are the ones that guarantee the treatment of chronic diseases.” To produce these 63 medicines, it takes $43 million a year,” about 10 or 12 million quarterly, and if a component is missing, manufacturing is impossible.

If the situation has been complex so far, it was clear last night that it can get much worse. Urquiza Rodríguez said that there are almost six million people registered on cards with one of the 12 most widely used drugs in Cuba (five antihypertensives, two diuretics, one anticoagulant, metformin for diabetes, isosorbide dinitrate for heart failure and two aerosols for asthma: salbutamol and fluticasone).

“An attempt has been made to maintain the stability of these 12 medicines during the year, but we worry that by the end of the year the raw materials will be running out. We are working hard with suppliers to ensure the arrival of raw materials in the country,” he said.

Meanwhile, the biopharmaceutical industry is still engaged in a new research task: the dengue fever vaccine. Eduardo Martínez explained that the process has been going on for ten years. “It’s a very complex vaccine, and today there really is no effective and safe immunogen, in addition to the fact that there are four dengue serotypes,” he said.

In Cuba, work is being done on a serum aimed at inducing a cellular response against one of the dengue variants, although he did not specify which one. “We have a vaccine possibility with which we plan to move forward quickly, although we don’t yet have a prognosis of when we could be evaluating it in humans; but we are progressing fast,” he said.

The only vaccine approved against dengue, with the trade name of Dengvaxia and manufactured by the French company Sanofi Pasteur, began to be sold in 2021, after approvals in 2018 and 2019 by international regulators, including from the U.S. and Europe. The vaccine is only recommended in countries with a high prevalence of the disease or for people who have already had dengue before, and is suitable for all four variants, but it is not available in Cuba.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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In Las Tunas, Cuba, Drought Forces Water to be Brought to 31 Villages by Train

On September 13, workers from Communal Services in Las Tunas brought tanks of water to the affected families in the province. (Periódico26)

14ymedio, Havana, 15 September 2022 — Some 100,000 inhabitants of the province of Las Tunas face a severe drought. The water deficit affects 450 communities, especially the municipality of Manatí, which is located in the northwest of the area.

Faced with this situation, the inhabitants have had to be supplied with tanker trucks sent by the Provincial Directorate of Communal Services. Jorge Luis Cruz Cuello, spokesman for the institution, told Periodico26 that in the urban area alone, the lack of water limits them to filling 7 to 10 tanks a day, instead of the 30 required to cover the basic needs of the inhabitants.

Every day, he said, 27 tank shipments are held for Las Tunas with 130 teams contracted to cooperatives and state organizations. Railway line workers have also been called on to transport water by train to 31 towns in the municipalities of Puerto Padre and Manatí.

The supply is delivered two or three times a month, to cover areas up to 60 miles away. To make it all more complicated, this depends on the availability of fuel, which is increasingly scarce at this time.

Cruz Cuello said that in the communities of the province that don’t have aqueduct service, they can only manage to supply water every 15 or 16 days. continue reading

Las Tunas is one of the driest provinces in Cuba, and the rains don’t usually fill the basins and reservoirs. A 2017 article published in the Caribbean Journal of Social Sciences revealed that since 1960, there have been 20 cycles of rainfall deficit in the area, which has harmed agriculture and livestock.

About 75 miles from the city of Las Tunas, the Camagüey reservoirs, the largest in Cuba, were below their historical average on September 5.

The Cuban News Agency reported that the reservoirs of this province stored 42.3% of a capacity of a little over 135 billion gallons of water. Five of those destined for the water supply of the population were more than half full, and in seven the water didn’t reach 50%.

In March of this year, some 400,000 Cubans had no water due to a severe drought that mainly affected the provinces of Guantánamo, Santiago de Cuba, Holguín, Camagüey, Havana and Las Tunas. At that time, the National Institute of Hydraulic Resources predicted that the rains would be below average until May.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A Fisherman Points to Cancun as the Route used by Cuban Coyotes and Rafters

In this fishing boat, several Cubans arrived at Delfines beach in Cancun. (Facebook/Goal Journalism)

14ymedio, Ángel Salinas, Mexico, 9 September 2022 — The escape route for Cubans through Cancun, in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, has been reactivated. In 15 days, Navy personnel “rescued” 27 rafters and handed them over to the National Institute of Migration for deportation. In the same period, two boats were abandoned in the Caribbean, the last one this Thursday on Defines Beach, a tourist area with close surveillance.

“The Cubans who arrived at Mirador beach were brought by coyotes,” Javier Robles, a fisherman who rents a catamaran to tourists to snorkel, explains to 14ymedio. “It’s an area monitored day and night by tourist and municipal police, and if no one detected a motorboat, there’s no other explanation.”

Robles, who knows the area, was informed by his friends on patrol before five in the morning on Thursday that “by that time the boat was already on the beach,” but it wasn’t until after 7 a.m. that the tourist police showed up. “They arrived, saw and left, and several hours later naval personnel arrived to secure the boat.”

At the place they found some tennis shoes, life jackets, a large empty plastic bag with the “Mary” brand, which migrants normally use to protect something like food or documents, and two drums of fuel. “In Cancun there are many Cubans with legal residence who have set up businesses, so I doubt that these rafters will be found by the authorities,” explains the fisherman. continue reading

Up to the first half of August, local authorities recorded 53 rescues of rafters, and with those reported in the last 15 days, there are already 80. “They’re desperate to leave Cuba; at this point many people are going to start coming here,” says Graviel García, a Cuban originally from Havana who is waiting for a response to his asylum request in Mexico.

Before the pandemic, says García, “there were departures through Pinar del Río”, which is 220 miles from Cancun and 211 miles from Isla Mujeres, two of the points that coyotes use and that are mentioned in the report Mar adentro, migrants and shipwrecked at sea, prepared by the United Nations. “I never contacted the coyote; I do know they charged $7000, a lot for that danger.”

In November 2020, a group of 22 Cuban rafters, including three minors, decided to leave the Island and take the Cancun route. They left for Isla de la Juventud, and their whereabouts were never known, nor were the three boatmen who carried them ever found.

Robles, who has been fishing for 27 years, knows that people can quickly transfer from a fishing boat to a speedboat. “We’re hurried, and if we do it, we’re not going to confess, but there are guys who fish at night, right? Needless to say. Suddenly fishing boats from Cancun appear in Cuba, and no one knows anything.”

At the end of June, the captain of the port in Cancun reported as missing a fishing boat called La Perruna, whose destination was Playa del Carmen. Ten days after the report, the boat and its crew appeared on the Island, as confirmed by Captain Daniel Antonio Maass Michel in a nautical report, 019/2022, but no details were given.

Robles showed another point of arrival for rafters in Quintana Roo: “The mafia is exploiting the route through the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve. There’s no surveillance in that area.”

Meanwhile, the sea route most used by Cubans to reach the United States is Florida. On Friday, the Coast Guard returned 163, including three minors, who were trying to illegally reach Florida by sea.

The Cuban Ministry of the Interior confirmed that the migrants were returned through the port of Orozco, in Bahía Honda, Artemisa, last Sunday, “as a result of a group of illegal departures through the maritime border.” Since the beginning of the fiscal year in October 2021 to date, 5,421 rafters have been repatriated.

This Friday, the Coast Guard reported that a raft with five people was intercepted before reaching Key West, and the Border Patrol reported that 15 Cubans were placed in custody after landfall in Islamorada.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Putin’s Buddy Requests Volunteers from Cuba and Other Allies to Fight Against Ukraine

Vladimir Solovyov, right, with Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Kremlin)

14ymedio, Havana, 15 September 2022 — Russian television presenter Vladimir Soloviov, one of Vladimir Putin’s “unconditional” friends, considers it essential to form an “international coalition” of Russian allies to fight against Ukraine. Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Iran were some of the nations to which Soloviov alluded.

“I don’t understand why Americans, even if they’re fighting in Grenada, always improvise an international coalition,” he said on Wednesday in his program “Night with Vladimir,” alluding to the US military intervention on the small Caribbean island to reverse a coup d’état supported at that time by Cuba and the then-Soviet Union.

During the landing in Grenada, the Americans were backed by Barbados, Jamaica and other Caribbean nations.

“Why do we deny ourselves that pleasure?” he added, while assuring that the “allies” would be willing to send their troops to support Russia in a counteroffensive against Ukraine in Donetsk. “There are units in Syria very well trained by us, there are people in Africa who support us, there is Venezuela, there is Nicaragua, Cuba, Iran and North Korea,” said the man, whose program is broadcast by the state television station Russia-1. continue reading

Soloviov said that the “coalition” method was being practiced by Ukraine, which now has help and troops from other European countries and the United States.

“If volunteers from all over the world go and fight in Donetsk, why shouldn’t we give them the opportunity to organize and create an international body?” he said, before referring to the International Brigades made up of fighters from several countries, including Cuba, that supported the Republican side during the Spanish Civil War.

He added that “our Serbian brothers” are already in Donetsk anyway, so he saw no impediment to “people who want to take up arms” and join them.

Considered one of the main propagandists of Putin’s government, Soloviov is one of the people sanctioned by the European Union after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In his call for a coalition for Russia’s “allies,” the ideologue forgot to mention that Cuba, unlike North Korea, Belarus, Syria and Eritrea, didn’t vote against the UN resolution condemning Putin’s aggression, but only abstained.

In the face of the advance of the Ukranian forces from Kiev, which claim to have liberated over 5,000 square miles, 388 localities and 150,000 people since September 6 in the eastern region, Russian troops have hastily withdrawn from dozens of villages in eastern Ukraine, abandoning large quantities of military equipment on the ground.

According to data provided by the United States, the Russians have suffered 75,000 combat casualties in seven months. The war, described by Putin as a simple “military operation,” has not gone as the Kremlin expected, and there are more and more voices critical of the lack of preparation of the Russian Army.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Jesuits Denounce ‘The Dictatorial Power’ that Forced the Order’s Superior to Leave Cuba

The Jesuit priest David Pantaleón. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Juan Izquierdo, Havana, 13 September 2022 — The Dominican priest David Pantaleón, a superior of the Jesuits in Cuba, left the island on Tuesday due to the Government’s refusal to extend his residence permit. The Jesuit is already in his own country, according to a source.

The also former president of the Cuban Conference of Religious Men and Women was known for his critical assessment of the Regime and for promoting solidarity initiatives with the artists of the San Isidro Movement and, later, with those arrested during the July 11, 2021 protests.

The community celebrated a farewell mass for Pantaleón this Sunday. One of the nuns participating in the ceremony, Ariagna Brito Rodríguez, lamented on Facebook that the priest suffered in his own flesh the “faculties of dictatorial power, without principles or values.”

“They fear the truth; they fear the faces of good and get rid of what bothers them,” denounced Brito, who also said that “those who must be expelled from the country” are those who make up the government, who govern with a heavy hand a people who are “enslaved, punished, whipped and forced to flee.” continue reading

The source consulted by this newspaper specified that, as was said during Mass, Pantaleón was forcibly withdrawing from Cuba, due to the impediments of the Government, which made it clear that “he was no longer well received” on the Island.

He adds that, following, the directors of the Society of Jesus and other ecclesiastical authorities will issue a statement about the situation, which they have wanted, out of respect for the priest and his faithful in Havana, to handle with discretion.

The repression against members of the Cuban clergy has intensified in recent months, through surveillance, blackmail and regulation of travel permits.

From Camagüey, the Catholic priest Castor Álvarez confirmed to this newspaper that he had received the news that a group of nurses from that city had been summoned by State Security, after having taken a photograph with Pantaleón after the Mass of the Virgin of Charity, last Wednesday.

“One of the nurses is a neighbor of the priest,” Cuban layman Osvaldo Gallardo said on Facebook. “At the end of the mass she went with her colleagues to greet him. He blessed them, and then they took a picture.”

Gallardo adds that the headquarters of the political police in that city is located in front of the sanctuary of the Virgin of Charity, where Álvarez celebrated Mass. In addition, it provides an image where you can see an agent recording the procession from the second floor of the building. The priest is still waiting for information about the outcome of the meeting.

Catholics on the Island fear retaliation after the message published on Monday by the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Cuba, which recommends voting no in the referendum on the new Family Code.

The statement, which opposes several traditionally problematic points between the Church and the State in the family sphere, also contains a criticism of the Regime’s propaganda.

“The information, flowing in one direction without other checks and balances, operates as a conditioning factor, and the vote that derives from it will express, necessarily and inevitably, a conditional will,” the prelates said.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Even the Cats Won’t Eat the ‘Shrimp’ Croquettes from a Fish Market in Central Havana

Customers who lined up at the doors of the state fish market in San Lázaro, in Central Havana, could barely believe the product that had been put out for sale. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 7 September 2022 — “Shrimp croquettes at 57 pesos a pound!” Customers who lined up at the doors of the state fish market in San Lázaro, in Central Havana, could barely believe the product that had been put out for sale this Wednesday.

Since crustaceans have been a luxury at Cuban tables for decades and their production — ironically controlled by the State — is mostly destined for export, the supply immediately aroused suspicion.

“This is enchanted shrimp, because you need to know what it is,” a man commented sarcastically as he left the establishment with his pound of croquettes. Another woman preferred to pass by: “At 57 pesos? That’s just broth that they add to the flour. Show some respect!”

She wasn’t wrong, as those who have had the misfortune to taste them can testify. “They’re pure flour; they absorb oil like sponges, and from time to time you have to take things out of your mouth that don’t seem to belong to a shrimp,” says a resident from Central Havana. “They look like water in which they boiled some shrimp heads and at best threw in a little flour to hold it together.”

The woman was given the croquettes by a relative and at first she was excited, but the joy lasted only until as she took a bite: “I ended up giving them to the cats, but even they wouldn’t eat them.” continue reading

You don’t need to put them in your mouth to see that they’re not even fit for animals. Their color is grayish brown, similar to the play dough used by preschool children, in part because of the cornstarch they seem to contain.

However, many did buy the croquettes, especially older people. “Aren’t you going to take them?” the clerk insisted to a young man who looked disgusted: “No, thank you.”

Just around the corner, another refusal was presented in the form of a movie scene. From a balcony, an old woman stretched out her arm and threw all the contents of a nylon bag into the street. On the asphalt was what she had rejected categorically and with rage: a dozen shrimp croquettes.

On the asphalt was what she had rejected categorically and with rage: a dozen shrimp croquettes. (14ymedio)

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Government Raises Fines for Not Declaring Livestock From 50 to 20,000 Pesos

The fines increase in percentages approaching 40,000%. (Vicente Brito/Granma)

14ymedio, Havana, 30 August 2022 — Farmers who don’t declare their large livestock face much higher fines than the current ones, since the sanctions rise sharply, increasing from a 50 peso fine for not declaring an animal, to 20,000 pesos. The amount had been stagnant since the approval of the 1997 decree that regulated the control and registration of cattle and horses. The authorities said that the fines currently were too low and “didn’t fulfill the purposes for which they were planned.”

The new decree, which updates the previous one, includes up to 15 types of violations that must be punished. Among them, the 10,000 pesos fine stands out, compared to the current 20, in case of not identifying an animal and its confiscation, if it’s demonstrated that the information has been doctored. For years, many Cuban ranchers have declared males and not females to avoid recording milk production and births.

Failure to update deaths, births or shortages of livestock is also penalized with 10,000 pesos, while sales, transfers and other unrecorded operations that involve a change of ownership involve a fine of 5,000 pesos per animal.

The highest penalties, of 20,000 pesos, are intended for those who allow the presence of livestock of any kind on the roads. In this case, the confiscation of the animal is included, another sanction intended for the cases of owners who drive their cattle onto roads or railways so that they are killed, apparently accidentally. This allows them to eat the meat, without having to give explanations to the State.

Giving false information and hiding it, or not counting their animals also carries a 20,000-peso fine. continue reading

Fines of 10,000 pesos will be applied to those who buy or receive large livestock without State authorization, as well as to those who sell or transfer it. The same applies to those who, having authorization to slaughter the cattle, don’t do so in accordance with the rules of execution and the destination of the meat. Allowing grazing on other people’s land is also fined with this amount plus the confiscation of the animal in the case of recidivism.

In addition, there will be fines of 5,000 pesos for those who move livestock from one farm to another if they belong to different livestock registers and don’t have permission to do so. Also for those who have more livestock than what is authorized and those who “are forced to buy animals in excess from landless livestock holders, not to do so.”

The decree was published on August 24 and released by the official press on Monday. Although, according to the authorities, the purpose is to promote agricultural production, it’s still a mere increase in the sanctions that already exist and have been flouted with a subterfuge on the Island for decades.

The obligation to declare cattle was established in Cuba in 1964, and the results have not been exactly successful. Beginning in 1967, a drop in beef production began that has been unstoppable. That year there was 7.1 million head of cattle and since then the fall has been sustained. Since 1986, it hasn’t reached 5 million, and in 2021 only 3.7 million were declared.

The 63 measures launched in April of that year to stimulate food production included the liberalization of the slaughter, consumption and sale of beef, in addition to milk, but few have obtained the required permit, and most prefer to continue selling on the black market, since the dividends are higher.

The authorities also announced the payment in foreign currency for those who exceeded the deliveries over the contracted amount, but the banking problems and the lack of foreign currency, which producers need to buy supplies, have made it practically impossible for them to collect what was promised.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Shortage Reaches the Famous Canteen of the Ministry of Agriculture in Cuba

Ministry of Agriculture, located on the corner of Conill and Rancho Boyeros, in Havana. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, 13 September 2022 — “We spent days eating saltines because there’s no rice or food,” complains an employee of the Ministry of Agriculture. The man is considering leaving his job if “lunch continues being so bad” in the institution that governs state production of the Cuban farms, located in a 17-story building on the corner of Conill and Rancho Boyeros, in Havana.

“People believe that since this is the Ministry of Agriculture we must be swimming in abundance here, but there is none,” advises one of the entity’s workers who prefers to remain anonymous. “The last few months have been very difficult, and the cooks have to be inventive in order to serve something.” The greatest deficit is from the products that arrive from the fields.

Although from 2009, then-president Raúl Castro promoted a process of eliminating lunch in state centers, many of the ministries and institutions of the major hierarchy maintained that practice. At a subsidized price, but with little variety and low quality, the employees of these entities receive a daily portion of food to continue their working day.

Now, the economic crisis, which has deepened in recent months, together with inflation and the low productivity of Cuban farms, have put at risk the lunch of these workers, who, until recently, were privileged within the state sector. Guillermo was a cook for many years in a unit of the Union of Young Communists in Havana, and he confirms it.

“When the shortage was already affecting everyone, in my workplace the UJC cadres were still allowed to have a snack, coffee in the mornings and lunch with a protein every day,” he tells this newspaper. “But since the beginning of this year, everything has gone downhill.” continue reading

“Sometimes I thought that they invented meetings, even if they had nothing to say, in order to justify the consumption of rolls, coffee and soft drinks as a snack,” Guillermo explains. “The same day I found out that no more lunch was going to be served, I asked for leave, because what’s the point of being a cook in a place that isn’t cooking.”

In the Ministry of Agriculture, the rigors of the employees’ canteen reached the ears of the head of the branch, Ydael Pérez Brito. “He said that this had to be solved, and how was it possible that there wasn’t any cassava, malanga or sweet potato here to give to people who go to the canteen,” says an employee of the security area of the institution.

The canteen, located on a side wing of the building, which faces Santa Ana Street, is a huge room that for years has been large for a Ministry that has seen its workforce decrease as the state salary is devalued and the prices of basic products rise. “This was built at the time when the Soviet Union sent money, a lot of money,” the source says.

“In this place, food was served that was the envy of any restaurant. The food, vegetables and fruit were plenty, not to mention pork and chicken.” But those trays with varied food options remain only in the memory of the workers who have been in the institution for more than three decades.

“Most people now bring something from home to last all day because many times it’s not worth going down to the canteen,” the worker explains. “But with the bread situation, there’s no guarantee of bringing a snack, so the only choice is to go and see what they serve.”

In recent weeks, the huge room has been emptier of diners and food. “This looks more like a funeral home than a Ministry of Agriculture, because lunch is dead, dead.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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At Least 20 of the 277 Cuban Doctors in Mexico Don’t Have a Defined Specialty

A group of Cuban health workers already in the Mexican state of Sonora. (Facebook/ValledelMayo)

14ymedio, Havana, 13 September 2022 — The Mexican Government published on Tuesday a list of the specialties into which the 277 Cuban doctors are divided from the more than 600 that it intends to import to fill places in remote areas of the country. Of these, 20 don’t appear with a specialty, but with the word “other.”

There are many denunciations claiming that part of the Cuban ’missions’ are composed of agents of State Security, who monitor compliance with the rules to which the rest of the delegation must follow, considered as forced labor by various international organizations.

According to the list released by the director of the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), Zoé Robledo, the 277 doctors are distributed in medical units in seven Mexican states, and “this month another 333 will arrive.”

The Mexican official did not detail the reason why 20 of these health workers don’t have a defined specialty. He only showed an image in which it was indicated that 75 are internists, 73 pediatricians, 59 general surgeons, 14 emergency intensivists, 8 gynecologists, 8 specialists in imaging, 5 anesthesiologists, 5 nephrologists, 5 ophthalmologists and 5 orthopedic specialists.

Last August, Prisoners Defenders, an organization based in Madrid, presented a report alleging that the latest health workers hired by López Obrador are military, some from State Security, and that none are specialists. continue reading

The former deputy and director of the magazine Siempre, Beatriz Pagés, agrees, and she says that doctors’ mission is “more political, more military and more indoctrination than health,” and is based on the objective of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, “to consolidate his autocratic project and guarantee the presidency in 2024.”

About the 277 health workers, on Tuesday the director of the IMSS said that they are already “providing services in 35 municipalities in the states of Nayarit (92), Colima (57), Campeche (49), Baja California Sur (10), Zacatecas (11), Sonora (15) and Oaxaca (43).”

Of the 333 that remain to arrive, he mentioned that they will be incorporated into hospitals located in the states of Oaxaca, Veracruz and Guerrero. The sum would be 610 health workers; that is, 31 doctors would still be missing, since on August 9 he announced the hiring of 641 “specialists in high demand.”

Sources from the Institute of Health for Wellbeing (INSABI) told 14ymedio that Mexico would pay the Government of Cuba $1,308,922 per month, managed by the Cuban Medical Services Marketer.

On Monday, the president of Prisoners Defenders, Javier Larrondo, returned to the attack against the Cuban missions and reiterated, in an interview with CNN, that the regime was left with 94% of the salary of each of the doctors who traveled to Mexico during 2020. “Andrés Manuel López Obrador paid $10,750 for each of the doctors hired for three months,” Javier Larrondo said.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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