English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
14ymedio/EFE, Havana, 9 September 2015 — The tourism industry in Cuba showed a growth of 17% at the end of the first half of 2015 with the arrival of two million 194,134 visitors to the island. Manuel Marrero, Minister of Tourism, reported the information in a meeting with national press during the opening of the … Continue reading “Tourism In Cuba Grew By 17% During The First Half Of 2015 / 14ymedio”
14ymedio, Fernando Donate Ochoa, Holguin, 2 May 2015 – The capital of Holguin received one-and-a-half inches of rain this Friday after months without rain. The city’s residents received the precipitation with hope that the drought in the territory would be alleviated, but expect a brief respite for agriculture and the consumption of water by the population. … Continue reading “Rain comes to Holguin after months of drought / 14ymedio, Fernando Donate Ochoa”
Fernando Damaso, 30 April 2015 — Looking over some documents from different eras, I have determined that, when it comes to renaming things, our authorities have broken all records. Victims of their frenzied efforts have included numerous streets, public plazas, parks, virtually all sugar refinery factories, businesses and outlying buildings, towns, cities, provinces, commercial and service establishments, … Continue reading “Give It Time / Fernando Damaso”
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 18 March 2015 — Twelve years after the Black Spring, 14ymedio chats with some of the former political prisoners currently living on the Island. Two questions have been posed to those activists condemned in March 2003: one about their decision to stay in Cuba, and the other about how they see … Continue reading ““No matter where I live, I will keep working for the freedom of Cuba” / 14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar”
Cubanet, Ernesto García Díaz, Havana, 19 February 2015 — On the morning of Saturday, February 14, in the town of Colón, Matanzas, CubaNet visited with Caridad María Burunate Gómez, a member of the Ladies in White. To learn more about this dissident who is also a member of the clandestine Pedro Luis Boitel Party for … Continue reading “The People Speak Very Well of Us / Cubanet, Ernesto Garcia Diaz”
14ymedio, Havana, 15 January 2015 — The new regulations on travel, insurance, the import of goods, remittances and telecommunications that the United States will put into effect with respect to Cuba as of Friday, have already provoked the first reactions on the Island. Although the evening news barely mentioned it at the end of the show, the … Continue reading “Cubans Euphoric Over the New Regulations / 14ymedio”
During the summer of 1994, death ruled with impunity in my country. During that period, Cuba, which had been a civilian graveyard for decades, more closely resembled the gallows. In the early hours of July 13, the whirlwind of violence to which the Cuban state was subjecting its citizens came to its criminal climax. The … Continue reading “Remembering the Tugboat Massacre of 1994 / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
On the morning of Sunday August 25, 2013, members of different organizations met at the home of Rolando Pupo Carralero, President of the Committee of Free Peasants of the Independent and Democratic Cuba Party (CID), at the headquarters of this organization home to celebrate the third anniversary of its founding. Several days earlier, it had … Continue reading “Celebrating the Third Anniversary of the Founding of Free Peasants Committee of CID / CID”
“Look! Look how the people support us! You say that the people condemn us…look how the people support us.” This is what Zuleidys Perez Velasquez repeated on Monday, August 5th to the members of the State (In)Security when the bus that carried 14 detained opponents passed through the center of Holguin. The opposition leaned their … Continue reading “Look! Look how the people support us! / CID”
Tomorrow, May 1, the United Nations Human Rights Council will meet in Geneva, where Cuba will present a report with notes on its prison policy. “Dressing up” for the occasion, for the first time in nine years the Castro regime opened its jails to the national and international press accredited in Cuba. It is public … Continue reading “The United Nations Human Rights Council and its Great Challenge With Cuba / Angel Santiesteban”
Just days before Angel was moved illegally and by force from La Lima prison, where he was incarcerated for crimes he did not commit, and when we are still without news of him except that he was locked in the 1580 Prison, or The Pitirre, in San Miguel del Padron, on a severe regime, well … Continue reading “Prison Diary XII: The Birth of a Dissident / Angel Santiesteban”
Citizen Demand for Another Cuba As Cubans, legitimate children of this land and an essential part of our nation, we feel a deep sorrow at the prolonged crisis that we are experiencing and the demonstrated inability of the current government to make fundamental changes. This obliges us, from civil society, to seek and demand our … Continue reading “Citizen Demand for Another Cuba – 536 Signatures and Counting”
Citizen Demand for Another Cuba As Cubans, legitimate children of this land and an essential part of our nation, we feel a deep sorrow at the prolonged crisis that we are experiencing and the demonstrated inability of the current government to make fundamental changes. This obliges us, from civil society, to seek and demand our … Continue reading “For Another Cuba – Citizen Demand for Another Cuba”
In politics, all isn’t what it seems. Considering that there is no way out, a solution always looms. Above all and more than ever, dictators desire power. But when this isn’t possible, they negotiate the future. Not so much for love of their country or her people. Simply to preserve their lives and their perks. … Continue reading “Could the dissidence become a valid interlocutor for the Cuban regime? / Iván García”
Not even an enormous Persian magic carpet would be big enough to bring to the Havana Book Fair, running from February 9th to 19th at La Cabaña, a sample of the extensive work of fiction, poetry, essays and historiography of exiled Cuban writers and those excluded from within the island for reasons other than literary. … Continue reading “Absent from the Book Fair / Miguel Iturria Savón”