Translator: Regina Anavy – Page 129

The Latest Invention of the Cuban Government in the Face of the Egg Shortage: Raising Quail Instead of Chickens

Informal seller of quail eggs in Havana. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 12 September 2022 — The Cuban government intends to “incorporate” quail meat and eggs into the Cuban diet, according to official television on Monday. The goal, in its words, is to achieve “food sovereignty,” the euphemism that they usually use as a synonym for scarcity, which is growing every day.

A few days ago, a report on Perlavisión announced that the production of this bird is increasing in Cienfuegos. Specifically, in the First of January Base Business Unit, in the Cienfuegos municipality of Palmira, they claim to have 39,000 quails at the moment, and they expect to reach 60,000 before the end of this year.

Employees of the provincial Poultry Company explain that each quail lays between 280 and 300 eggs a year, while a hen lays between 240 and 250 eggs in the same period.

Likewise, they emphasize that quails grow quickly and can lay eggs from 45 days of age, while for chickens you have to wait six months. “They are easy to breed, with a good temperament,” and feeding them is cheaper: for one hen that is fed, three quail are satisfied. continue reading

Cubans have been seeing for some time, not without surprise, that both on the black market and on online home delivery sites these eggs are being sold, while the chicken eggs disappear. “Small but tasty, ideal for boiling and placing in a salad, but of course impossible for a tortilla,” says a neighbor of Centro Habana who has bought them at 300 pesos a carton with 30 quail eggs.

The official media praise the product: “Although a third smaller, it has the same kilocalories, the same fat and more protein.” In addition, it has lower cholesterol, “more nutrition, greater digestibility and increases hemoglobin.”

In the face of this, Cubans on the street continue to object. A young man from Havana decided: “It doesn’t produce enough; it’s very small.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The U.S. Embassy in Cuba Publishes on Social Networks a Poster Alluding to ‘Patria y Vida’

Poster by the Cuban artist Armando Tejuca published by the US Embassy.

14ymedio, Madrid, 12 September 2022 — The Cuban artist Armando Tejuca has designed a poster entitled You five nine, Me double two, sixty years of deadlocked domino in reference to one of the phrases of the song Patria y Vida [Homeland and Life]. In it you can see the poster with the five-nine dark and cracked, while the double two has the colors of the Cuban flag and rises brightly over the other. The image, disseminated by the Facebook and Twitter accounts of the U.S. embassy on the Island, has generated a wide debate among detractors and defenders of the regime.

“Diplomats of the United States, I feel bad for you, you continue to highlight four cats that meow from exile, but without taking them… to come and fight here. On the other hand, your government bets on another group of losers, the dissidents. Here, Revolution takes a while. Homeland or Death, we will win,” writes one user. “It would be an excellent idea for every free Cuban to post and replicate this work so that it can be seen as the wonderful song that inspired it,” another responds.

Among those who have commented from the regime are Oni Acosta Llerena, a very popular music critic on national television, who has asked the embassy to “improve and elevate” its tastes “as soon as possible.” Eduardo Palomares, Granma’s correspondent in Santiago de Cuba, has urged the diplomatic headquarters to give its opinion on the deaths of children by firearms produced in the U.S., the secret documents that Donald Trump had at his Florida residence in Florida or “the imprisonment of Latino children in cages,” among other things.

Many comments accuse the U.S. of being guilty, however, of “boxing in” the Island, which has provoked many responses as well. “Everything comes from the U.S; do you ever see online stores with products from [Cuba] and other countries? Equipment and items of all kinds enter through the shipping agencies, shipments of dollars, the chicken that the people eat is American…. Don’t deceive us anymore. Marxist-Leninist demagoguery is over. Communism is a utopia,” says one reader. continue reading

And although some think it’s wrong for a diplomatic seat to position itself like this in front of the government of the country where it’s located, others have thanked the opposition for its support, as they leave messages like this: “That’s right, that song is an anthem for the vast majority of Cubans who fight for a Cuba free of dictatorship.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Three Cuban Players Resign Due to the Lack of Opportunities and Their Low Salaries

Cuban baseball players Reilandy González, Tony Guerra and Lázaro Emilio Blanco will no longer continue with the Vegueros team. (Collage)

14ymedio, Havana, 12 September 2022 — Players Reilandy González, Tony Guerra and Lázaro Emilio Blanco resigned from Cuban baseball for various reasons. According to journalist Ernesto Amaya Esquivel, the three athletes were key in the results obtained by Pinar del Río, and “they always stepped up; they showed commitment and dedication to their people.”

González’s absence as a player in the Elite League, which is expected to begin on October 8, was the preamble to a farewell marked by the lack of opportunities. “I decided not to play anymore. I’ve been having results for three years, sacrificing myself, and they didn’t even take me to Curaçao,” the reliever said last Friday.

This player experienced his best moment in the 60th National Series with a balance of 3-1: he saved six games, struck out 45 batters (49 innings), and his clean average was 1.82. With these numbers, González told the reporter, they didn’t call him for any of the pre-selections that year. “I’m not going anywhere to launch the Elite Series or the other National Series,” he lamented.

Another factor that discouraged González was the low salary and the limitations. “We looked at the figures, and in a pre-selection we win more than in the series,” the athlete said. continue reading

Tony Guerra lives in a similar situation. The 24-year-old pinareño formed the team that won the bronze medal in the First Junior Pan American Games that took place in Calí, Colombia (2021). The decision of this athlete, who made a difference with his home runs and gave several victories to the Vegueros team, is surprising.

“We looked at the figures, and in a pre-selection we win more than in the series,” said Reilandy González.”

González and Guerra were joined by the veteran Lázaro Emilio Blanco, the 37-year-old outfielder, who with this decision seems to end his career as a player. In addition to being an active athlete, Blanco has studied automotive mechanics and has a bachelor’s degree in Physical Culture.

These players’ request to leave baseball comes while others continue to leave the island. That exodus to the U.S. doesn’t stop. “In this phenomenon, more than thirty players have arrived in the U.S. from the Mexican border during 2022,” said journalist Francys Romero.

On Saturday, Matanzas’ natural right-handed pitcher, Alain López, arrived in the U.S.. The reporter said that this young man was able to achieve his dream thanks to the fact that he resorted to the “family claim” option and will set himself up in Florida.

López was then “leader in effectiveness of the 2019-2020 National Youth Championship with Matanzas. He participated in nine victories of his Matanzas team in the last National Youth Championship,” according to the portal Béisbol FR!

One day before López set foot on U.S. territory, it was confirmed that the Cuban Juan Carlos Hernández had arrived in Miami. The former Mayabeque player left the Island and took the route of Nicaragua, from where he began his journey until he reached the Mexican city of Piedras Negras, in Coahuila, where, after 25 days, he was able to cross the Rio Bravo.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Communists are Reluctant to Absolve Mikhail Gorbachev

During his trip to Cuba in 1989, despite the show of diplomacy, Gorbachev and Castro couldn’t hide the abyss that separated their ideas. (EP)

14ymedio, Madrid, 31 August 2022 — “We have seen sad things in other socialist countries, very sad things.” In 1989 Fidel Castro used these words to refer to the process he didn’t want to name: perestroika. More than 30 years later, the official Cuban press has once again ignored, in its report about the death of Mikhail Gorbachev, the word that marked the political trajectory of one of the most relevant men in the history of the twentieth century.

Granma, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, reduces the news of the death of the last president of the USSR to a short 14 lines on page two of its printed edition. On its website you have to scroll up to five times to find a brief obituary in which Gorbachev is defined as “the last president of the Soviet Union,” “supreme leader of the country” and “secretary general of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.”

There’s no space for the mere mention of his role as a promoter of the reforms that changed the Soviet system and ended up putting an end to the USSR. Just one line to call him a “notable and at the same time controversial” figure of the last century. Are there reasons? They must be sought in Prensa Latina, the only state media that mentions the banished word and affirms that the Soviet leader “has legions of supporters and detractors. The former consider him a reformer who brought freedom and democracy to a hermetic country and created the concepts of glasnost (transparency and freedom of expression) and perestroika (reconstruction, reform). For the latter, he is simply responsible for the end of a superpower.”

In Cubadebate, the version is even shorter than Granma’s, although readers have taken charge of stoking the debate. “A great statesman, of enormous courage and honesty, who tried the impossible: to reform the system in the direction of pluralism of opinion and freedom of expression and the press,” says a user of the group, one of those who believe that the USSR was already beyond salvation when perestroika arrived, or point out that it avoided a third world war.

In the face of these, there are contrasting opinions that describe Gorbachev as naive for trusting the United States or — directly — as a traitor. “He forcefully collaborated to stab socialism in the back. May he not rest in peace. He doesn’t deserve it.” continue reading

The division that is reflected today in the media is a mirror of what happened in 1989, when the then-leader of the USSR visited Cuba, his first destination in Latin America. At that time, several opponents received the man of the reforms in Moscow with hope. Elizardo Sánchez, of the Human Rights Commission; Samuel Martínez, of the Pro Human Rights Party; and Hubert Jerez, of the Martí Committee for Human Rights issued a letter in which they described Gorbachev as “one of the great social reformers” of their time and said that “the vast majority of the Cuban people also want democratic changes.”

The Cuban authorities had taken great care in a visit that was as uncomfortable as it was necessary. Castro despised the Soviet change of direction, but he couldn’t afford to snub the head of the Island’s main economic support. Gorbachev was in a similar situation: although he was bothered by the Cuban’s orthodoxy, he was aware of the influence he maintained throughout Latin America, and his enormous symbolic and real power throughout the region.

Gorbachev spoke of the pressure to which the Island was subjected by the “imperialist neighbor,” but he didn’t hesitate to praise the benefits of the reforms carried out in his own country. With “the democratization of all aspects of national life, people feel freer; they want to participate more directly in political problems,” he said.

“We don’t see our approaches as a universal recipe,” he added, a few words that were a respite for Fidel Castro, whose defense against those who insinuated that following in Moscow’s footsteps was a good idea was to say that the same solutions don’t work everywhere.

In the presence of Gorbachev, the commander-in-chief proclaimed that “the unrestricted principle of the sovereign will of each people and country is a golden rule of Marxism-Leninism” and called it “arbitrary, capricious, absurd” to be asked to “apply in a country of 10 million inhabitants the formulas that are applied in a country of 200 million. It’s crazy,” he said.

Despite the evident abyss that separated them, Castro affirmed that “Our relations are going extraordinarily well,” while Gorbi nodded.

In November 2016, when Castro passed away, the Russian was full of praise. “Fidel stood up and strengthened his country during the cruelest moments of the American blockade and with colossal pressure on him. Even so, he was able to get his country out of this blockade to guide it on the path of independent development,” he said. And although he acknowledged that the restructuring of the USSR made Castro “suffer,” he added: “He was an exceptional, unique personality. We have been friends and we remained friends until the end.”

For now, at the hour of Gorbachev’s death, the Palace of the Revolution keeps silent.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Sugar Cane Workers are Barely Surviving in Camajuani, Cuba

The La Julia cooperative, which must now assume all the local production for the harvest in Villa Clara, is also in full decline. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Yankiel Gutiérrez Faife, Camajuaní (Villa Clara), 10 September 2022 — The inhabitants of the Camajuaní valley, in the province of Villa Clara, have known better times for the intensive cultivation of sugar cane. Today, many of the characteristic towers of the sugar mills that gave prosperity to the settlements of Carmita, Fe, Rosalía, La Julia and Vega Alta are in ruins.

A few continue to barely produce, and the workers don’t receive their salaries for months. This is the case of Rosalía’s macheteros, the cane cutters, who saw their cooperative close fifteen years ago. There, enough cane was cleaned and cut to fill a dozen wagons, and it was then transported for processing to the Fe sugar mill, officially renamed in 1960 as the José María Pérez Sugar Agroindustrial Complex.

Now, in Rosalía, the ruins of the old collection center are piled up, and the government has ripped out the railway line. The locals have been taking everything, from fiber cement tiles to metal beams. There were only the walls left, but the neighbors also chopped up the concrete blocks to take them away.

The sugar plantations of La Julia, which must now assume all the local production for the harvest, are also in full decline. The cows and horses of the farmers continually enter their fields to feed.

The damage further delays the poor cultivation of the cooperative, which, of the 20 tons that it cut before 2018, will only be able to contribute five this year. continue reading

About 320 people work in the La Julia cooperative. Mechanical engineers receive a salary of 5,000 pesos; technicians earn a little less; and workers, who must use their machetes in the heat under deplorable conditions, earn only 2,500 pesos a month, equivalent to about twenty dollars at the official exchange rate.

“The Fe mill buys the cane from us at 700 pesos a ton, but the cooperative must maintain its autonomy,” José Luis, a worker at La Julia who prefers to use a fictitious name, tells 14ymedio. “That means that our salary depends on the income we can get.”

They are rarely paid on time. The sugar cane bureaucracy is indebted to the max to the Central Bank of Cuba, and that delay is directly reflected in the payment of workers.

Margarita, a worker who is transported by cart every day, from Taguayabón to La Julia, explains to this newspaper how the counterpoint of credits and debts works. “The industry has been a disaster for years,” she says.

The credit offered by the bank, she explains, “has an expiration date,” so that, if it’s not paid back on time, there’s no way to pay the macheteros. The possibility of offering land to the workers is being analyzed, but these individuals will face the same problems as the cooperative: shortage of fuel, lack of supplies, machetes, gloves, clothes, shoes, water backpacks.

“If there’s no pay for the workers there, there will be much less for the individual,” she adds.

It’s a vicious circle, José Luis clarifies. The mill also has debts, “which three million pesos must go to,” he calculates, “and without a detailed report of what is going to be done, the bank won’t provide the necessary credit to start the operation.”

Ruined by bureaucracy and malfunctions, no one could imagine today that the Island’s sugar industry was once the first in the world. (File, Archive)

Each step hinders the next, and the most affected is always the humble worker, who has no other remuneration. “On more than one occasion they stopped paying me,” laments Eliecer, a machetero from La Julia. “They told us that there was no money that month, but the truth is that it happens all the time. That’s why many have asked for leave, but life is very hard and we’re all stuck with whatever we get,” he says.

“Not to mention that workers waste a lot of time trying to get to the cooperative,” adds José Luis. When there’s no fuel to bring them from home, the work day is lost, or the worker himself has to figure out how to get there.

“Last week only 160 liters of fuel were available for transporting the workers,” he says. When they were used up, we had to wait and declare the work as “interrupted.” Nor is there enough fuel for the tractors, the plows or the cultivators. Insecticides and fertilizers are in the same situation.

The man admits that “when things are under private administration, people respect it.” However, “when it’s from the state, no one cares.” That explains why the local farmers bring their animals, day or night, to eat the cane. “Fines have been imposed on them,” he says, “but it’s no use at all. It doesn’t stop anyone.”

In addition to the precariousness with which the macheteros of La Julia live, there are several rumors, which are passed on by word of mouth in the workers’ settlements. Although no one has confirmed it yet, the farmers believe that the mills will no longer produce sugar for export, and will be able to provide barely a portion of the sugar needed for the island.

They believe that, instead, the government intends to sell the molasses to China, at a very high price. In that country, they say, they will use it to manufacture alcoholic beverages and purgative honey, which has a medicinal use, in addition to using it as fertilizer and feed for livestock.

Ruined by bureaucracy and malfunctions, no one could imagine today that the Island’s sugar industry was once the first in the world. This year, the government has reduced the number of mills that grind sugar during the harvest to 23. Small but “efficient,” as Miguel Díaz-Canel described it, this season’s production will not reach even half a million tons of sugar.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cohiba’s goal of 2 Million Cigars in 2022 Recalls the Failure of Cuba’s ’10 Million Ton Harvest’*

The factory has mobilized its 252 workers, most of them women, to manufacture the planned amount at a rate of 9,000 cigars per day. (Granma)

14ymedio, Juan Izquierdo, Havana, 9 September 2022 — While the quality and distribution of cigars in Cuban shops are at their lowest point, the directors of the famous El Laguito factory, in Havana, promise to make and export two million cigars of the Cohiba brand before the end of this year.

The goal will be met “despite the difficulties,” said the director of the cigar company, Oscar Rodríguez Carballeira. Attracted by the 55th anniversary of the Cohiba label, invented by Fidel Castro to entertain foreign leaders and diplomats, almost 700 cigar fans, including journalists and buyers, attended El Laguito on Thursday.

The manager indicated that the factory has mobilized its 252 workers, most of them women, to manufacture the expected quantity at a rate of 9,000 cigars per day. According to Rodríguez Carballeira, not even two years of pandemic managed to interrupt production at El Laguito.

Although the cigar is fabricated in the old republican factory , the leaf that is processed in El Laguito comes from the highest quality plantations in the country: those of the towns of San Juan y Martínez and San Luis, in Pinar del Río, both located in the tobacco growing region of Vueltabajo, the mecca of the Cuban puro (cigar).

El Laguito, since 1966, has been a factory of excellence, once supervised directly by Fidel Castro and Celia Sánchez. For more than five decades it has produced, in addition to about twenty well-known brands such as Montecristo, Romeo and Juliet, Partagás and H. Upmann, the range of Cohiba premium puros, whose anniversary the Government has decided to celebrate in style. continue reading

This Friday, a gala dinner is planned at the Pabexpo fairgrounds, in which the Habanos awards for 2020 and 2021 will be presented, in the categories of Production, Business and Communication. That same night, the traditional humidor auction will be held, where millionaires from various parts of the world bid to obtain a specialized container to store their cigars, probably signed by Fidel Castro before his death.

Without being in the same category as the noisy Festivals of the Habano (the Havana cigars), which are based at the Convention Center, the celebration for the 55th anniversary of Cohiba will avail itself of the opportunity to raise as much hard currency as possible.

Under the tutelage of the Spanish investors, who finance and distribute the product of the Cuban corporation Habanos S.A., the cigar industry continues to be fundamental in the Cuban economy.

Anticipating these celebrations, the Government planned a luxurious hotel facility in Pinar del Río, which is scheduled to open this month. The delegate of the Ministry of Tourism in that province, José Antonio Aguilera, explained that the hotel, located in San Juan y Martínez, will have only eight exclusive rooms, managed by Islazul.

Customers, who are the same anonymous millionaires who come to El Laguito this year, will enjoy a bar, humidors, specialized shops and a smoking room. “We want tourists to come and share with the community, and local development will benefit,” said Aguilera.

In 2021, Cuba reported $568 million in cigar sales. The main and most stable buyers are still Spain, China, Germany, France and Switzerland.

With the issuance of limited-edition cigar bands, the prices for the Cohiba brand, the former Indian name for the cigar or the smoking ceremony, have skyrocketed internationally. A pure Cohiba of small or medium caliber can reach 25 euros per cigar in Spanish tobacconists, while cigar bands of the highest quality such as the Pirámides Jar exceed 500, and the Special Reserve Selection, one of the most expensive, exceed 730. In the European informal market, these cigars reach 1,000 euros apiece.

Meanwhile, the cigar stores in Cuba, where you need to pay with foreign currency, have definitively closed their doors for the Cuban, who cannot and does not want to pay the overwhelming prices for the best cigar in the world.

*Translator’s note: See here for the Ten Million Ton Sugar Harvest

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban and U.S. Authorities Talk in Havana About the Smuggling of Migrants

Boat in which four undocumented Cubans were traveling, intercepted by the Coast Guard on March 12, approximately five miles east of Isla Morada, Florida. (Coast Guard)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 10 September 2022 — Authorities of the Cuban Border Guard Troops and the United States Coast Guard Service met in Havana on Thursday and Friday to talk about migration.

The meeting discussed ways to increase cooperation between the two services to deal with the smuggling of migrants, according to an article published this Friday by the Ministry of the Interior.

Illegal departures, illicit drug trafficking and maritime search and rescue operations were also discussed.

“The delegations of both countries highlighted the usefulness of these meetings and agreed on the importance of advancing cooperation in this area,” the article adds.

It also points out that the meeting took place in a “respectful and professional” atmosphere. continue reading

The article, published by the official newspaper Granma, says that according to reports, “both parties agreed to continue these technical meetings in the future.”

These conversations have taken place at a time when the exodus of Cubans has skyrocketed, both those who take migratory routes through Central American countries and those who launch themselves into the sea in precarious boats — all with the aim of reaching the United States.

The U.S. Coast Guard has arrested about 4,500 Cubans off the coast of Florida since October 1, 2021, when the current fiscal year began, according to data from the Customs and Border Protection agency (CBP).

The CBP has recorded the arrival of 177,848 Cuban migrants in the United States.

The figure exceeds the largest flow of Cubans so far, reported in 1980, when 125,000 people left through the port of Mariel in just seven months.

Last April, delegations from Cuba and the United States resumed their bilateral dialogue on migration issues in Washington, the first high-level meeting since the arrival of President Joe Biden at the White House in January 2021.

These meetings had been suspended in 2018 during the Presidency of Donald Trump (2017-2021), who reversed the historic process of rapprochement with the Island launched by his predecessor, Barack Obama (2009-2017).

The Cuban government called it a “positive sign” that the United States held a meeting on immigration issues with a delegation from its country, and, for its part, the Biden Administration considered that these immigration talks between the two parties were “productive.”

The United States has recently implemented several measures, including the increase in the consular services of its embassy in Havana and the reestablishment of a family reunification program that had been suspended since 2017.

However, the Cuban government blames Washington for the irregular flow of Cuban citizens and the illegal departures by sea and other routes, and also for the breach of the bilateral agreement that stipulates the delivery of 20,000 visas per year for Cubans.

In addition, it attributes the increase in migration to the still-in-force Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, which allows Cubans to apply for permanent residence in the United States after one year and one day of being in the country.

Cuba is going through a serious economic crisis due to the combination of the pandemic, the tightening of US sanctions and internal errors in macroeconomic management.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Independent Media ‘El Toque’ Describes the Pressures on its Journalists as ‘Bullying and Psychological Torture’

According to the coordinating team, headed by José Jasán Nieves, ’El Toque’ has lost 16 journalists since the beginning of September. (Facebook/El Toque)

14ymedio, Havana, 10 September 2022 — The directors of the digital platform El Toque denounced, this Friday, new pressures from State Security against their team on the island. The public resignation of Wimar Verdecia and Iran Hernández, director and illustrator, respectively, of Xel2 graphic humor supplement led to the shutting down of this feature, which has been published since 2019 and already has had 190 issues.

With the resignation of both artists, there are now 16 members of El Toque whom State Security has forced to abandon their work since the beginning of September, through a “script of interrogations and blackmail.” This was reported by the directors of the newspaper in an article bemoaning the “sickly insistence” of the Cuban political police to obtain “confessions” on video from the journalists.

The public statements of those involved, filmed in “protocol houses of the Ministry of the Interior,” have been a characteristic of this raid against independent journalism, which José Jasán Nieves, director of El Toque, has defined as “psychological harassment and torture.”

In these recordings, State Security indicates to journalists that they must “’confirm” the central ideas of a fallacy, which is that the publication is financed by opposition organizations, and “this mercenary entity” proposed the destabilization of the Cuban government.

According to Nieves, such videos will be part of a “propagandistic attack” plan, which will serve to discredit not only the reporters, but also the general project of El Toque. continue reading

“It’s very obvious that they’re preparing to use manipulated videos, taken out of context, and statements obtained under pressure, to ’build’ one of those ’complaints’ presented as ’reasons’ of a country to ’defend itself,’” the team of coordinators points out in the article, alluding to television spaces such as Hacemos Cuba, Con filo and Razones de Cuba, which have also carried out constant attacks against this newspaper.

The directors regretted the “closure of one of the most challenging creative experiences we have ever experienced,” and recalled that Xel2 took care, during its activity, to explore the ups and downs of Cuban citizens and their competition with the Government. They also promised the management of a new graphic humor project that “continues the commitment to political satire.”

The campaign against independent journalism, which has always been a priority for Cuban State Security, has spread more strongly since the protests of July 11 of last year and especially after the wave of popular demonstrations against the blackouts that the Island has experienced.

Arbitrary Internet cuts, regulations to prevent travel and constant harassment of journalists and their families have been increasing in recent months.

This Friday, activist Raúl Soublett López, founder of the Afro-Cuban Alliance, was forced to close his project, “In defense of the rights of AfroLGBTIQ+ people,” active since 2017, to concentrate on taking care of his “physical and mental health.” The same thing happened with journalist Jancel Moreno, forced to cancel his Dame la mano [Give me your hand] project and declare that he had not been working “actively” for any independent media for more than a year.

For their part, some human rights organizations have spoken out against the hunt for independent reporters. In an article published this Friday, Cubalex states that “public statements of resignations are not spontaneous,” and that they therefore violate the Cuban Criminal Code itself.

According to this legislative body, “the Cuban authorities commit the crimes of abuse of authority and regulated torture,” since they “cause mental suffering, intimidate and coerce journalists in order to obtain a confession.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Rice Waste is Used to Stretch Rationed Bread Dough in Sancti Spiritus

“We can’t do anything; we’ve been told to add up to 20% of rice straw and husks to the bread.” (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Mercedes García, Sancti Spíritus, 9 September 2022 — “No one has eaten it in two days,” laments Luciano, a resident of the San Luis de Sancti Spíritus neighborhood, while showing some neighbors on Friday morning the rationed bread. In the midst of the wheat flour deficit, state bakeries in several areas of this city must add up to 20% of husked rice waste to the dough, a mixture that gives it a sandy texture and sour taste.

“They’re even using it in cakes, and they are hard, very hard,” adds the retiree, who, after shopping last Thursday at the standard bakery, returned to complain to the employee about the poor quality of the product. “We can’t do anything; we’ve been told to add up to 20% of rice straw and husks,” the worker explained. However, nowhere in the store is there a sign alerting customers to the new recipe.

“She told me because she has known me all her life, but they haven’t been told that they should inform consumers about this change,” says the retiree. The employee confessed to Luciano that “when they make the new formula, they have to increase the amount of rice, and it’s very difficult to mix in. The bakers are very upset with this, because they’re the ones who have to face the customers.”

Another worker at a bakery in the Viento Negro neighborhood confirms to 14ymedio the change in the manufacture of bread. He says that it began to be implemented this week, although it’s not the first time that other products have been added to the flour to stretch it. “They bring the bags of waste from the mills on the Jíbaro road, where the rice is husked,” he explains. continue reading

“It has usually been used as feed for pigs, because it includes rice straw and also the husks. As animal food it’s not bad, but it doesn’t help much to make bread.” The man says that “before this ’invention,’ the guajiros who raise pigs paid about 250 pesos for a can of this waste; they cooked it and then had something to give the animals to eat.”

However, in the mixture with wheat flour for human consumption, the state employee says that “the final dough dries out, and that’s why the bread crumbles as if it were sand. It also gets dark, and what doesn’t look good to the eyes doesn’t enter the mouth: people buy it and return it. As soon as they cut it, they see that dark, yellowish color and get scared.” On top of that, “it tastes bad, like a sack, like straw.”

Mixing other ingredients with wheat flour to make rationed bread is nothing new. In the crisis of the ’90s and also in recent months, state bakeries have used sweet potatoes, cassava and bananas to meet demand. But these mixtures haven’t managed to convince customers, who claim that with these additions the bread can be kept for less time due to the heat, and, to top it off, it quickly takes on a sour taste.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A Physiotherapist With Dengue Fever Dies Due to Lack of Ambulances in Santiago de Cuba

The Provincial Health Directorate remembered Elba Rosa López as a professional dedicated to her work, and as a loving mother. (Facebook/Elba Rosa López)

14ymedio, Havana, 9 September 2022 — Physiotherapist Elba Rosa López Nápoles, infected with dengue, died in the province of Santiago de Cuba after she couldn’t be transferred to a care center due to a lack of ambulances, her sister reported.

The Provincial Health Directorate of Santiago de Cuba sent condolences for her death and recognized her work in a Facebook post shared this Tuesday, accompanied by several photographs of the professional along with her colleagues from the Carlos Juan Finlay polyclinic, in the Songo La Maya municipality.

In a comment to the post, her sister Mercedes López Nápoles reported that they asked for an ambulance to take her to a provincial hospital but were told that she wasn’t reported in serious condition with dengue fever, nor did they have vehicles available.

“After she died, those words meant nothing, since no arrangements were made to transfer her to the provincial hospital. From my municipality, I called the SIUM (Integrated Medical Emergency System), and the coordinator replied that there was only one vehicle, in poor technical condition, and that it had to go to Los Reynaldos to locate a child who had dengue,” she wrote online. continue reading

This is the second member of the López Nápoles family to die in less than a month due to not receiving medical assistance. According to Mercedes López, the same thing happened with her brother, on August 19, although she didn’t specify if he was a victim of dengue. “Now, they can use all the words they want, but the fact is that they let them die,” she wrote.

For its part, the Provincial Health Directorate remembered Elba Rosa López as a professional dedicated to her work, and a loving mother. “If I kept talking about you, it would never end. It only remains to be said that the Carlos Juan Finlay La Maya polyclinic lost a warrior.”

Dengue, a highly contagious disease, once again tests the Cuban health system with hundreds of infections, and the Government still hasn’t confirmed exact figures.

In the State television program Roundtable on Thursday, the Deputy Minister of Public Health, Carilda Peña García, chose to refer to the Latin American figures provided by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), which reveal that between the first and the 32nd weeks of 2022, there was an increase of up to 300% in dengue infections.

In its records from last year, the Ministry of Public Health reported that dengue was circulating in nine Cuban provinces but that, as of September, infections were reduced by 29.3% compared to 2020.

While hundreds of Cubans with the disease prefer to stay at home, “exported” infections have also skyrocketed: of the 100 cases of dengue reported this summer in Spain, two thirds were people who had traveled to Cuba; of the 123 positives in France, 44 came from the Island; and in Florida there were 193 cases out of the total of 216 with the same origin.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Government Warns of the Brutal Rise of Dengue on the Island, but Hides the Figures

According to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), cases of dengue have increased by 300% in the first half of the year. (Granma)

14ymedio, Madrid, 9 September 2022 — In the hour and a half that the State television Roundtable program lasted, dedicated this Thursday — in its own words — to “provide comprehensive information about the dengue fever virus,” no one was able to learn the number of cases that have been diagnosed in Cuba.

The Deputy Minister of Public Health, Carilda Peña García, avoided giving exact figures and said that Latin America, between the first and the 32nd weeks of the year, an increase of 300%, and an increase of 165% compared to the figures of 2021, according to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO). “[Cuba] is in the context of what is happening in the region,” she added, resolving the matter.

Determining the number of patients in Cuba seems impossible, since the Island has been talking about percentages and rates for several years. The Ministry of Public Health already indicated in its balance sheet last year that dengue had circulated in nine provinces and that “from the month of September, cases of dengue were reduced by 29.3% compared to 2020.” Without specific numbers, the dimension of the problem is unknown.

Despite the secrecy, the deputy minister did drop three important details. On the one hand, that the problem has only just begun, something she made clear when she warned that complicated months are coming. “It’s a difficult time, and we are moving towards the most complex period of the disease, because the cycle shows its highest peaks starting from the end of October and the beginning of November.”

A bad omen for the start of the high season for a tourism that is already on alert, after it has been revealed that, of the 100 cases of dengue reported this summer in Spain, two thirds had traveled to Cuba. In addition, of the 123 positives in France, 44 came from the Island, and in Florida there were 193 cases out of the total of 216 with the same origin. continue reading

The second news that came out in the middle of the extensive program was the severity of type 3, which predominates in Cuba, with 60% of the cases, something that the medical guild had already warned about. Guadalupe Guzmán, head of the Center for Research, Diagnosis and Reference of the Pedro Kourí Institute of Tropical Medicine, offered a whole historical and scientific class on the four types of dengue virus — all of which circulate on the Island — their combinations and which ones have been responsible for the worst epidemics in recent history. But the important fact was in a single sentence.

What the laboratory detects is not that all four are on an equal footing, but that dengue 3 is being detected in more than 60% of cases. This is the serotype of the virus that is causing the serious cases — even deaths — because we have had deaths from this disease,” she said. And again she left out the fundamental data, the number of deaths, which is broadcast only, with greater or lesser reliability, through social networks and is impossible for the independent press to verify.

The expert specified that young age, along with other pre-existing diseases, is a risk factor for dengue hemorrhagic fever, a figure consistent with the number of children who have been reported as deceased through Facebook.

The third piece of information that can be rescued from among so much verbiage was also given by the deputy minister, who unambiguously acknowledged that the Government has not been able to prevent the epidemic. “What really had to be done inside homes was not possible,” she said. And in a second and unusual gesture between the authorities, tending to accuse citizens of irresponsibility, she affirmed that the population “yes, showed signs of eliminating outbreaks of the vector in their homes. We know that it’s our responsibility and that it didn’t go as it should have,” she said.

Peña García specified that the highest infection rates — once again without data — are in Santiago de Cuba, Havana, Las Tunas, Guantánamo, Camagüey, Matanzas and Isla de la Juventud. And they are followed by Holguín, which has had the highest numbers in previous weeks, Sancti Spíritus and Villa Clara.

In addition, she indicated that there are many infested workplaces, about 53 cases per week and that, if this trend continues, “the year will close with more than 300 where a focus was found due to the responsibility of the entire group,” she said, after recalling that water tanks are the main places of concentration of the mosquito.

“Today we are fumigating in 71 municipalities of the country, belonging to the provinces mentioned above,” she added. Resources, she pointed out, are imported and therefore scarce, but in addition, and as has been said in previous weeks, fuel is lacking and personnel are needed for the campaign to be carried out correctly.

Health deficiencies, in addition, are aggravating the situation, despite the fact that they were not mentioned yesterday by specialists. Many Cubans have reported through their social networks about the difficulties they go through to be diagnosed due to lack of reagents, and patients who arrive at the hospital often lack adequate treatment, not to mention those who don’t even want to go for fear of ending up admitted to centers where hygiene and good conditions are conspicuous by their absence, aggravating the risk of contagion.

While dengue keeps the population on alert without its real scope being known, the population continues to have access every day to information about the total number of people infected in Havana and the provinces, hospitalized, recovered and killed by Covid-19, a disease that continues to circulate, but that has lost its initial virulence.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba: In Defense of Radio Martí

Radio Martí has reduced its transmission hours due to financial difficulties. (Archivo)

14ymedio, Pedro Corzo, Miami, 10 September 2022 — The Cuba Broadcasting Office (OCB), which groups together Radio and Television Martí and its website, Martí Noticias, is facing serious problems to survive, since the administration of President Donald Trump drastically reduced its budget. President Joe Biden has not considered increasing it and, according to some, would welcome its closure, as the Cuban dictatorship has always demanded.

Due to the lack of resources, the transmission has been reduced to 12 hours a day and it is unknown to what levels it will decrease after planned Reduction in Force (RIF) has been implemented, which would drastically affect the already small workforce, of just over 60 people, possibly affecting 23.

At a time when the situation in Cuba is especially convulsive and the population, particularly activists, need to communicate with each other, the decrease in the operations of these media is harmful, because their listeners have a high confidence in what they hear from them, which protects them from falling into provocations, a common practice of the dictatorship.

Beyond any other consideration, the work carried out by the OCB has been highly beneficial for the people of Cuba and in particular for the opposition to the totalitarian regime. I confess to being proud of having had the opportunity to work for 23 years at Radio Martí. continue reading

I joined leading the station with Herminio San Román and Roberto Rodríguez Tejera. Two notable journalists were directing news, Gilberto Rosal and William Valdez. The four were committed to truthfully informing the Cuban people, to assisting all the opponents on the island, and to ensuring that the news and analysis were based on reality. Everyone was deeply hurt by the situation in Cuba and we were striving to get truthful information to the island.

The stations have always worked according to the guidelines of the federal government, which are very rigid as far as information is concerned, measures that we may or may not like as Cubans, but that are established for all the media controlled by the Government.

Unfortunately, there has been no shortage of people who for different reasons have severely criticized the station. It is true that there have been mistakes and mismanagement, that it has been possible to do things better, but that does not detract from the OCB’s many achievements in favor of informing the Cuban people and serving as a liaison to those who fight for freedom in the interior of the island. We must not forget that the iron Castro censorship makes it practically impossible for what happens at one point on the island to be known a few kilometers away.

The vast majority of workers are talented, information professionals who take their work very seriously, and are governed by very strict reporting standards that must be faithfully adhered to. I assure you, without any reservation, that objectivity in the information is fundamental, and editorializing in a news story, regardless of the orientation, is rejected. I learned about cases of colleagues separated from their duties, in my opinion, after no serious transgressions, because a supervisor in Washington interpreted a report or a program with too much zeal.

Periodically, from the central office in Washington, which coordinates all the communication offices of the federal government, officials travel to give seminars to refresh old guidelines or point out new provisions. It should not be forgotten that the OCB is an agency of the United States Government, which acts on the basis of the provisions of the officials designated to direct it, and these do not always support the existence of the station, or simply do not sympathize with its programming.

The OCB, in my opinion, is in danger of dying from consumption. If the readjustment takes place, they will have to reduce more hours, so I wonder: will the organizations in exile continue to remain silent in the face of the slow death of Radio Martí? More importantly, will the Cuban-American congressmen who defended these entities for decades simply attend their funeral without striving to resurrect it, as Ileana Ros-Lehtinen would without even being a representative of the House? I repeat, there have been bad officials, but repeating to the late colleague Cristina Sansón: “Where is the mission and commitment to Cuba?”

The OCB is an important instrument to help totalitarianism disappear on the island, in addition, it is very useful to continue defending freedom and democracy throughout the hemisphere. Let’s do something.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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‘D Frente’: A New Effort to Find Solutions in Cuba

Those wanting a change or perhaps “the change” that opts for moderation and prudence can join the project. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 9 September 2022 — The document announcing the constitution of an entity called D Frente [D Front] is part of the civilized tradition of using words to call for action, as opposed to the revolutionary practice of executing actions that are then justified with words.

The text complies with three indispensable rules: relevance, precision and correctness.

It is relevant because the Cuban nation needs immediate and profound transformations; it is precise because it includes the essential conquests worth working for at this time; it is correct because it is inclusive and peaceful, renounces offenses and shows respect for those who want the same thing but choose different paths.

D Frente will surely be seen from the official viewpoint as “another attempt to destroy the conquests of the Revolution,” and from the most radical environments of the opposition will probably be described as a “dialogue,” an accomplice of the dictatorship or a promoter of “fraudulent change.” The spokespersons of the regime will cite the nefarious articles of the new Criminal Code to threaten its signatories; those who refuse to renounce violence will be reproached for the absence of a clear purpose to overthrow the dictatorship.

There will be reproaches of another kind, such as that the new attempt aims to supplant existing efforts, that there is talk of reconciliation without mentioning justice, that it was no longer alluding to this or that matter or that “if so-and-so signed it, I won’t,” and whoever complains of not having been invited to write the document will always appear.

However, if it’s not violently crushed by the repressive forces, D Frente can win the approval of anyone who is looking for a civilized space of civic participation. Those who wish for a change or perhaps for “the change” that opts for moderation and prudence can join the project.

D Frente is not the first attempt of this type. Hopefully it won’t be the last!

Translated by Regina Anavy

The School Snack Is The Most Recent Victim Of The Economic Crisis In Cuba

The school snack, which began to be distributed in 2003, included a glass of soy yogurt and a bread roll that could contain sausage, cheese, ham or a croquette. Photo is of a ‘morning assembly’ at an elementary school. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, Havana, 5 September 2022 — A kiss at the door of the house and his mother’s gaze following him until he turned the corner was part of Jeancarlos’ routine this Monday. The eleven-year-old boy resumed school on September 5, and, unlike a few months ago, he will no longer be able to have even half a bread roll for a snack.

Since school stopped for the summer holidays, a lot has changed on the Island. The blackouts were prolonged, the Cuban peso sank in the face of foreign currency, and flour became an increasingly scarce product. The cookies and rolls that underpinned the students’ snacks have practically disappeared.

“In order for him to take a roll with something in it to school, someone in the house has to stop eating their own,” explains Jeancarlos’ mother, referring to the rationed products. But the sixth grader is not the only student in the family. “My daughter started first grade, and I gave her my roll because she’s small and doesn’t understand why she can’t have a snack,” she explains.

Days before restarting the school year, she investigated possible solutions. “A small package of cookies costs 100 pesos at a minimum, and there is nothing to give my son, so I won’t even tell you about that option because it doesn’t solve the problem,” she explains to 14ymedio. An informal merchant sold her “a soda extract that guarantees that at least he doesn’t bring just water to school.” continue reading

Recently, the young Trilce Denis launched a sour diatribe against the ruler Miguel Díaz-Canel through a video posted on her Facebook page. “Now I want to know, when school starts, what snack will be given to the children; I’m already sick from nervousness,” she said.

Denis complained that even when she could arrange a snack for her son, he would have to eat it next to other children who couldn’t bring any food. This concern is shared by many parents who fear an increase in social inequality expressed in the economic inability of families to offer bread to their children.

The contrasts are seen not only in the quality of footwear or the backpack in which students carry their books, but also in the mere fact of having some cookies, sandwiches or bread, which means belonging to a certain social class that has access to stores in freely convertible currency or receives remittances from abroad.

Ulises, 43, landed this Saturday in Havana from Miami. After arriving in the United States six years ago, it’s the third time he’s returned to the Island to visit his sister and two school-age nephews. “Most of my suitcases were full of food,” he tells this newspaper. “Drinks of all kinds, flour, cookies and bread,” he says.

“I brought her everything they need for next month’s snack. Then we’ll see how to manage so that they can bring something to eat to school, but for the moment at least they have solved the first month.” Instant soda powder, milk powder and some jams were part of the “family rescue,” as Ulises called his luggage.

“With the flour I brought, my sister has already started making her own bread because no one can eat the bread from the ration book: it’s acidic and hard.” But the first days of school won’t be the most difficult test for families with children and teenagers. “Normally, during this first week of September, everything is more relaxed. The worst will come later,” admits Ulises.

On the site for classified ads, there’s an abundance these days that promise “packages of cookies ideal for school snack” or “assorted jams in independent envelopes, perfect to take to school.” But prices deter many potential buyers. A package of four sweet cookies with “chocolate chips” at 200 pesos shows the increase in inflation.

“It’s not just about putting something in your mouth; at this age teenagers are very sensitive,” said a father outside the ’Protesta de Baraguá’ Junior High School in Central Havana. “My son tells me that he doesn’t want to bring anything because he feels sorry for his friends who don’t have anything, but that means he goes all morning without eating anything, which can’t be good.”

Outside the school, while the students were getting ready for the first morning, some parents recalled that there was a time when “a hearty snack” was implemented for secondary school students. “The government didn’t want the kids to be wandering the streets, so instead of going out at lunchtime they were given bread with something inside and yogurt,” one mother said.

That school snack, which began to be distributed in 2003, included a glass of soy yogurt and a roll that could contain sausage, cheese, ham or a croquette. This was so the students didn’t have to go home at lunchtime, because many didn’t return to school. But the initiative, supported by the economic comfort that Venezuelan oil allowed, barely survived a decade.

“I’m one of those teenagers who threw bread around the school and played ’throw the sausage’,” said one of the parents outside the Centro Habana Junior High school. “Who would have thought that I was going to be here now dreaming that at least my nephew would have something like that?” Times have changed, and now the snack is a luxury that few can afford.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Price of Chicken Imported From the U. S. Rises, and Cuba Purchases Less

Chicken became visibly more expensive this July, and Cuba bought less from the U.S. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Madrid, 8 September 2022 — In July, Cuba paid the highest price in the last three years for a pound of chicken. According to the latest data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, published by Cuban economist Pedro Monreal, the product reached $2.2/pound that month, a record in the monthly statistics available, which begin in January 2019.

To date, the highest value reached was $1.04, in May 2021. A month later, in June of last year, the cost dropped to $1.02. Since then, it was only in May of this year that it increased again.

This July, Cuba bought 20,832 tons of chicken from the U.S., 10% less than last month, when the amount exceeded 23,000, compensating for the scarce amount acquired in May 2022, which, at 14,248 tons, was the lowest since November 2020.

Despite the reduction in its purchases, Cuba had to pay 2% more this year, reflecting the increase in unit value. In Monreal’s opinion, this increase is due to “the combination of high demand for a cheap protein source, the increase in supply factors and greater operational risk.”

Since the beginning of the year, Cuba has already paid $152.3 million to the United States for the meat of this bird alone. According to data from the U.S.-Cuba Economic and Trade Council, Cuba’s purchase volume from the U.S. amounts to $167,653,569, reflecting the fact that chicken accounts for 90.8% of total spending.

According to July data, U.S. exports of agricultural products exceeded $23 million, compared to almost $20 million in the same month in 2021 and $12.8 million in July 2020. continue reading

However, annual sales have fallen by 6.2% compared to the previous year, when they reached $178,774,363.

Among the products that the Island acquires from the U.S., in addition to chicken which accounts for the largest share, are coffee, butter, cocoa, vegetable juices, olive oil, wood pulp, popcorn, corn chips and non-alcoholic beverages, as well as deodorant, soap, disinfectant and insecticide.

Despite the multi-million dollar amounts, which largely belie the regime’s discourse on the U.S.blockade — Cuba is exempt from the embargo on purchases of agricultural, pharmaceutical or basic necessities as long as it pays in advance and in cash. Cubans continue to rebuke the Government for the shortage of chicken meat, whose domestic production is rock bottom (19,700 tons in 2021) and, meaning 90% of consumption depends on imports.

On September 1, the Ministry of Internal Trade, in an article published in the official media, said that the family basket was ensured for that month. However, many responses addressed to the entity showed that chicken has not reached many people for months.

“If all that is guaranteed, how is it possible that we are in September and all the chicken of the month of August hasn’t yet been distributed; what explanation is there for that?” one user demanded to know.

Although the ministry’s spokesman replied that there were delays and that the August chicken would be distributed in September, mistrust and weariness are no longer hidden.

“Where is the August chicken, where is the meat for people with special diets, where is the children’s picadillo, where is the August coffee, where, where, where is your truth, you managers of internal trade?” asked another commentator, indignant.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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