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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Tue Oct 19, 2021 2:26 pm

Juliana Marino: “The Cuban Revolution is Trying to Find Within Itself the Keys to Advance in Freedom, Equality and Prosperity Through its Socialist Model.”
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on OCTOBER 18, 2021
Alejo Brignole

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The country where security forces violently repress social protests and kill people, especially blacks, with their knees on their necks, and which considers itself imbued with the moral authority to question other nations, their democracy and their freedom, continues to test the island and its history of dignity.

The former Argentine ambassador to Cuba, Juliana Marino, gives us here her vision on Cuba today and the challenges it must face in the present international context and the tightening of the US blockade reactivated by Donald Trump and continued by Joe Biden.

From the ranks of Peronism since the 70s, Juliana Marino held party positions and was an active militant in the Women’s Movement, legislator for the city of Buenos Aires, national deputy, promoter of laws related to health, education and the rights of women and children, in addition to a long etcetera that includes her work as a diplomat in Cuba, representing Argentina at the request of the then President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.

Juliana Marino, a member of the Network of Intellectuals in Defense of Humanity and the Instituto Patria, is a committed observer of Latin American processes, to which she usually contributes constructive, but not complacent, critical views. Correo del Alba wanted to know her views on Cuba, which is now (and for the umpteenth time in its recent history) at the center of the world’s attention for the same long-standing reason: its stubborn resistance to the U.S. obsession with destroying its sovereign socialist project. The struggle of an entire people that the former diplomat analyzes here from her experience on the island and with her usual historical rigor, respecting the sovereign decisions of the Cuban government and people.

You were Argentine ambassador to Cuba from 2008 to 2015… Obviously you will have undertaken your own analysis of the reality of the island. What could you tell us about the delicate balance between the brutal blockade that the United States has been systematizing as a silent genocide for 60 years, and the Cuban socio-economic structure itself? What should be changed in Cuba in the face of the new challenges?

Since its inception, but fundamentally since the third decade of the Revolution, the Republic of Cuba has been seeking its course in a socialist scheme that would guarantee stability, development, growth and justice. That is why it has always been so observed and measured by left and right and its system has been questioned, especially when it had to embark on its own destiny in solitude and perhaps – fortunately – because of this, without dogmatism.

The first great Latin American socialist experiment had to be adaptive, I suppose. Any dogma would have been dysfunctional perhaps?

Very probably, no doubt. The Cuban Revolution defined the socialist character of its project on April 16, 1961, through Fidel Castro’s speech at the funeral honors of the victims of the bombing of different parts of the country by U.S. airplanes. Indispensable for its detailed revelation, the story gives an account of the savage aggressions suffered by the island since the beginning of its revolutionary government and of the defamations and fake news (even in those times) that conditioned from the beginning the unified decisions achieved by the heterogeneous political forces and popular militias. For Cuba, unity was a hard and painful road, with costs, but desired and inexorable. As inexorable as the choice of its socialist model, the only one capable of guaranteeing its independence, sovereignty, reconstruction, development and distributive justice.

That historic speech in which Fidel made it clear that the American hatred was not being able to support a socialist revolution “in their own noses” (more or less were Fidel’s words, I seem to remember).

That same speech… a historical speech that I always recommend returning to and if you like I will read you two eloquent paragraphs that illuminate the heroic history of national unity, anti-annexionist, sovereign and humanist.

Please…

Fidel said in Havana that day…

“That event (explosion of the ship La Coubre) placed our country in a special situation: in the middle of the 20th century, it brought us to the same situation as the towns and villages in this continent were forced to live in the 16th and 17th centuries, as the cities and towns were forced to live in the times of pirates and filibusters. It placed our country in a unique situation in virtue of which our factories, our citizens, our towns, had to live at the mercy, if not of an airplane that burned our sugar cane fields, an airplane that tried to drop a bomb on our sugar mills, an airplane that caused victims among our population, a ship that entered our ports and made a brazen cannonade – something that had never happened before, something that has never happened so far in this century on this continent.

“Comrades, workers and peasants, this is the socialist and democratic Revolution of the humble, with the humble and for the humble. And for this Revolution of the humble, by the humble and for the humble, we are ready to give our lives.

“Workers and peasants, humble men and women of the homeland… Do you swear to defend to the last drop of blood this Revolution of the humble, by the humble and for the humble?” [1].


Nothing better than passages from the history of Cuba for the facts with their eloquence to give an account of the epic of a small nation defiant in the defense of its self-determination and to understand the dynamics of its political representation and organization and its social cohesion in spite of the internal crises and discomforts.

Harassment, defamations, the promotion of emigration (Peter Pan Campaign, “wet foot, dry foot” laws and the Cuban Adjustment Act), terrorism and mercenary sabotage of economic production and the application of the Trade with the Enemy Act of 1917), not to mention the successive Torricelli and Helms-Burton laws on extraterritoriality, which have supported the blockade for more than six decades now, did nothing more than confirm that the only possible path for Cuba was and is the socialist Cuba, at the beginning integrated into the CAME (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance – Socialist Common Market) and which, faced with the fall of the socialist camp, suffered what is known as the “special period”. A very hard period in which the Cuban people suffered unspeakable hunger and deprivation, with serious consequences on the health of the population due to the lack of basic foodstuffs and all kinds of restrictions.

“The Revolution had to allocate substantial resources to national defense and security, postponing investments linked to development needs. This has been and continues to be a motive for internal debate”.

A gradual genocide in the 21st century and with the silent consent of all world powers….


The United Nations (UN) annually condemns the blockade -and this is very important- but the condemnation is not binding, therefore it has no concrete effects and leaves such a transcendental support on the level of rhetoric. What is internationally repudiated are its genocidal consequences. I will not dwell on this condition because it is well known, although I will say that I had the opportunity to verify it on a trip I made in 1994 as a councilor of the City of Buenos Aires, a time when, for example, Havana was totally in the dark and instead of “blackouts” with great sense of humor they called “alumbrones” to the very few hours with electricity. Of course, there was little water due to the same shortage and no gasoline at the pumps. There were no medicines in hospitals, no pencils in schools, no toilet paper in homes.

On the other hand, since the beginning of its government, especially after the landing and attack on Playa Giron and the decade of terrorism suffered in its own territory and in its pork and sugar production, the Revolution had to allocate substantial resources to national defense and security, postponing investments linked to the needs of development. This has been and continues to be a matter of internal debate.

Until the 1980s, the economy was directed towards electrification, the construction of industries, housing, hospitals, polyclinics, educational centers, cultural and sports facilities, water, agricultural, port, road and airport infrastructure and, of course, literacy. The growth and development of access to education at all levels was a matter to which Fidel devoted an impressive effort and which he managed to transmit to the Cuban people. It was an unusual impulse that lasted through the 1990s, despite the special period. He was convinced -and he was not wrong- that only culture and scientific development, especially in the field of health, would offer a viable path.

You will agree with me that the Covid-19 pandemic put Fidel’s postulates to the test and that they passed the test.

Absolutely. In this sense (and in many others) Fidel was a singular visionary. For this very reason, the viability of the Cuban socialist model has always aroused the curiosity of the “western world” and Cuba has suffered the interference for its failure. The economic history of socialist Cuba has been permanently debated both internally and externally. Che himself has written about the Cuban economy in the context of its Revolution. Many have asked themselves…

Is it that Cuba is not on the right path?
Is it that productive statism is neither efficient nor viable?
How much does the blockade impede the development of the productive forces?
How much does the bureaucracy hinder it?

Surely many who are reading this interview are studious and more knowledgeable than I am about the alternatives mentioned, the theoretical debates and the comparison between management and measures. Some of them misguided and extravagant, according to the Cubans themselves, who do not lose their sense of humor when they relate them with mischief.

What I can talk about -since I lived the Cuban reality as an ambassador and lived on the island- is the important stage initiated around 2006 to discuss among the whole population the updating of the model through the elaboration of the so-called “Party Guidelines” to reach a consensus and decide on measures that had been long demanded. I was able to see groups of workers in their work centers, in the neighborhoods, in the mass organizations, debating for hours an infinity of points and methodically recording all the positions, corrections, proposals and acceptances of society. For example, the question of the “libreta” (subsidized food/maintain it or eliminate it), the double currency and self-employment (not state). It is not like the bourgeois democracy we are used to in Argentina, but… Who can say it is not a democracy? A direct democracy with broad popular participation.

However, the media and the created imaginary point out that Cuba is ruled by a dictatorship?

That is a construction totally removed from reality. In Cuban society, there are permanent analyses, criticisms and self-criticisms about the timing of the application of the measures, the progress and setbacks, the frustrations and social expectations and the lack of solutions to serious and historical inefficiencies, bureaucratization and corruption denounced at the highest level by the Cuban authorities themselves.

If I have any certainty, it is that the blockade ruthlessly hinders Cuba from opening up more and at the same time verifying the efficiency of its model and its socialism of a planned and state-run economy. But at the same time, counterfactually I say, how could it have resisted the conditions created by the blockade without a socialism with popular consensus, with a State that protects and promotes science as an engine of economic and productive development, a humanist tool and of solidarity among peoples, where health, education and science do not constitute a commodity and are within the reach of all people and all social segments? Cuba has managed to create productive science and at the same time an ambassador of solidarity, which has undoubtedly allowed it to break the isolation to which it is subjected by the United States.

I emphasize… the Covid-19 pandemic revealed many exceptional Cuban achievements, while at the same time exposing the contradictions and neglect that capitalism incurs when it comes to caring for its citizens.

Look… I had the privilege of witnessing the Cuba that made progress in discussing its model of society and its economic scheme. This debate took place during the first decade of the 21st century.

In relation to the economic issue, one of the issues that afflict your system is the high level of external openness and the incidence of the blockade due to the weakness produced by the fall of the socialist camp. On the other hand, it has been trying for years to get out of the crisis that affected it in 2008-2009, whose growth rate went from 6.4% in the previous five-year period to 1.4%.

This situation led it to undertake a profound reform, which was the updating of the Cuban socialist economic model that began with the Party’s guidelines and continued with the “conceptualization” of the model itself. In April 2011, after the massive social debate process I referred to, the VI Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba defined what is known as the Guidelines of the economic and social policy of the Party and the Revolution [2]. Concepts such as “market”, “self-employment”, FDI (foreign direct investment) were included. And although the central productive scheme based on the “socialist state enterprise” was ratified, the field of development began to open up to a private economy.

The strategic objective of the guidelines and the conceptualization of the model was, in its own words, “to promote and consolidate the construction of a prosperous and sustainable socialist society in economic, social and environmental terms, committed to strengthening the ethical, cultural and political values forged by the Revolution in a sovereign, independent, socialist, democratic, prosperous and sustainable country”.

It is important for me to highlight the transcendence of the term “prosperous” and its significance and resonance for Cuban society in terms of the creation of national wealth and greater development in areas with reversible backwardness, reduction of dependence in essential items, normal and continuous self-sufficiency of goods, greater purchasing power, improvement of basic conditions related to transportation and housing and general infrastructure.

“If I have any certainty, it is that the blockade ruthlessly hinders Cuba from verifying the efficiency of its model and its socialism of planned and state economy”.

This very important period, antecedent of the last constitutional reform, had a core legitimacy in the definition of Revolution oriented in the year 2000 by Fidel Castro. On that occasion Fidel expressed: “Revolution is a sense of the historical moment; it is to change everything that must be changed; it is full equality and freedom; it is to be treated and to treat others as human beings; it is to emancipate ourselves by ourselves and with our own efforts; it is to challenge powerful dominant forces within and outside the social and national sphere; is to defend values in which we believe at the price of any sacrifice; is modesty, selflessness, altruism, solidarity and heroism; is to fight with audacity, intelligence and realism; is to never lie or violate ethical principles; is a deep conviction that there is no force in the world capable of crushing the force of truth and ideas. Revolution is unity, it is independence, it is fighting for our dreams of justice for Cuba and for the world, which is the basis of our patriotism, our socialism and our internationalism”.

There are very powerful central ideas loaded with revolutionary mysticism, but the economy is a technical problem that, although it can and should be approached from ethical bases, as proposed by Fidel, it is solved with factual and novel measures for social custom.

Of course, for this very reason, the diagnosis and lines of work shared by the “Guidelines and the Conceptualization of the Model” incorporated controversial economic concepts, desired and at the same time feared by a population very much protected by the State despite its shortcomings.

For example?

The need for the expansion of foreign investment, the extension of self-employment (non-state) in selected activities and also the increase and availability of foreign currency and the elimination of monetary and exchange duality were confirmed.

The creation of taxes and their obligatory nature were not part of the economic culture of Cuban society, an issue of relevance to which Raúl Castro repeatedly referred during his presidency.

The blockade also caused in a terrible way many shortages that could not have been hidden anyway….

It was more than urgent to remedy the insufficient supply of goods and services, to solve the negative trends between imports and exports and to correct the low productivity and inefficiency in many sectors, especially in agriculture, and to repair the technological obsolescence of the industrial plant. In this dialogue with the social agents, there was also talk of correcting the lack of organization, discipline, demands and control of productive and service activities. It was necessary to correct behaviors such as disinterest, individualism, bureaucratism, indiscipline, crime, corruption and other deviations and forms of social marginality.

Was this diagnosis shared?

Yes, it was shared, and the criticisms were very clear. Therefore, in order to modify these economic imbalances and their social consequences, the documents referred to -which also constituted a succession of debates and social mobilization- included reforms of great resonance for the socialist model. Among them, in addition to maintaining socialist planning and state enterprise and defense and security as essential objectives, the objective existence of market relations was recognized, over which the State exercises regulation and influence, the forms of property were expanded and its regulation and that of the material and financial wealth of natural and legal persons were specified; privatizing” reforms emerged, were accepted and legitimized, among which those related to foreign direct investment, different forms of management, creation and progress of business organizations, self-employment, creation of non-agricultural cooperatives stand out.

But the changes did not come in time to face the worsening of the blockade by the new U.S. government at the time, the Trump administration. And of course the pandemic exacerbated the shortages in the living conditions of the population and revealed a growing inequality.

Poverty grew in sectors of Cuban society. More in some provinces than in others (the facts themselves show that the mobilization was not uniform in the island) and exposed wounds, postponements, neglect and aspirations recognized by the authorities when they immediately summoned the social group to reflection and protection. For all those who are interested, it is very enlightening to follow the dialogues held publicly by President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez himself with the main actors of Cuban society such as journalists, intellectuals, social scientists and members of the people’s power in neighborhoods and provincial towns, about which the recent map of situations of poverty, neglect or marginality has been extremely important.

Could we say that President Díaz-Canel remained faithful to Fidel’s premise of dialoguing with the people without concealment?

Undoubtedly… But let us bear in mind that there are sectors of the population and age groups that have not lived and appreciated the differences between the history of Cuba and the history of the Revolution. Sectors that have been able to be included in the advantages and possibilities of digital culture and from there they are summoned, attracted, often captured or confused. But I believe that the Government has assumed these changes with the certainty that there are moral, political and ideological reserves and that it has the conditions to face each new attack from the baddest in the neighborhood.

The United States?

The United States does not admit the existence of an insubordinate island in its shantytown and that it is exporting another example to the world. And this rebellious condition, tremendously dignified, has achieved that the majority of the population maintains its adhesion to the revolutionary ideology. So… what social reproaches are there? Personally, I believe that there is an aspiration for new forms of participation in decision making and control and that this rejuvenation should reach the Parliament and all the mass organizations and the Party itself. This demand has been recognized and has set in motion a fruitful and renewed social dialogue.

However, during the protests there were accusations of quietism, of stagnation of the dynamic mechanisms that the Revolution always defended or tried to exercise….

Criticisms are there, but look… Even the most critical sectors could not argue that there have been no changes in Cuba. There have been important changes and those same economic changes have reconfigured the Cuban socio-classist structure with consequences that must be addressed. It should also not be ignored that the Revolution went through the process of transfer of the historic generation, of its charismatic leadership, the physical disappearance of Fidel, with an exemplary political stability, worthy of being imitated by so many other countries.

Above all, in a context of enormous external pressure. No small achievement, if we review different processes of the 20th century where the U.S. threat was present.

Undoubtedly… The impact of the blockade on Cuba’s reality can be discussed. It is impossible to avoid it. A country that is capable of creating and manufacturing its own vaccines – due to its scientific and human development – but needs international solidarity for the supply of syringes, confirms Cuba’s difficulties in the supply of raw materials which it lacks, equipment and/or spare parts which are denied every time a company, be it European or from any other part of the world, has more than 10% U.S. capital.

“The United States does not admit the existence of an unsubmissive island in its shantytown and that it exports another example to the world. And this rebellious condition, tremendously dignified, has made the majority of the population maintain its adherence to the revolutionary ideology.”

Then I would like to come back to the blockade, but since you mention the United Nations, give us your perspective as a diplomat on this new international onslaught against Cuba… What are your reflections on the current state of what we call “International Law” in the light of these organic aberrations against an entire population and a sovereign country? Are we not facing a clear setback in the humanist parameters that, at least in formality, the world had conquered?

In the case of the blockades and sanctions against different countries, it is indisputable that the ethical principles established by International Law are being mercilessly and mercilessly violated in practice with impunity. Only considering the weakness of the UN with its non-binding resolutions and the lack of democratization of the Security Council with the veto power of its permanent members – powerful nations – can we understand the tolerance of the more than 180 countries that vote every year against the blockade against Cuba and that not only see every year how the universal demand is ignored and disregarded, but also witness helplessly the application of economic sanctions and the plundering of genuine funds of several countries and the worsening of the blockade measures against the island and other nations. And as an aggravating factor, in the midst of a pandemic, which is a world social fact of unprecedented magnitude. Undoubtedly, they are part of the matrix and the arsenal of the fourth and fifth generation wars that ravage our peoples in order to guarantee themselves -imperialism-, natural resources and domination within the framework of what they call “issues affecting their national security”.

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner personally commissioned you to represent our country before Cuba… What were the instructions for the relations between our two fraternal nations, such as Cuba and Argentina?

Cristina’s respect for Argentine and international institutionality has been demonstrated throughout her foreign policy, so there was no need for her to explain to me her respect for the principle of non-interference. It is also well known her attachment to the Latin Americanist ideas of our heroes and her adherence to the Peronist ideology “united or dominated”, which General Perón confirmed in his return and whose imprint is maintained in the surviving comrades of my generation. Already in 2005, Néstor had already clung this line to the political work of our region together with Chávez, Lula, Fidel, when in May 2008 the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) was created.

Cristina was clear in reinforcing the idea of strengthening ties and bonds, not only commercial, but above all political, cultural and of brotherhood. For this, it was necessary to leave behind some misunderstandings and help resolve a couple of issues that disturbed the relationship, such as the authorization of Dr. Molina’s emigration, which took place in June 2009, in a gesture of détente and trust that Cristina thanked Raul Castro’s government and that sealed a personal relationship of respect and friendship between the leaders Fidel, Raul and the then president, who traveled four times to the island during her two terms in office.

Cristina’s position denouncing the blockade has been vibrant in all international forums and summits, that is why I dare to recommend you to read the book Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. A Sovereign Foreign Policy, published by the Instituto Patria and edited by Colihue, in which you can read her thoughts through her speeches. In relation to Cuba, I recommend his speech at the VII Summit of the Americas on April 11, 2015 in Panama.

You previously gave us your view and analysis on Cuba’s economic and social challenges… How do you interpret the recent protests on the Island? How much is there of U.S. intelligence operation and how much of genuine claim to improve the Cuban economy within the narrow margins allowed by the blockade?

The recent social events in Cuba were clearly triggered by an operation orchestrated from the United States, through a cyber-attack, trolls, fake news and internal activists “subsidized” by the USAID and the NED, according to the destabilizing designs of the CIA. And I accompany this statement with two serious sources [3] that I have personally been able to confirm with Cuban friends and comrades, often critical of the measures being taken (as happens in any country, naturally), but loyal to the Revolution and to the need to advance more quickly in the changes that the Cuban people themselves have set for themselves, as I have already explained, in order to make the “National Economic Development Plan” until 2030 a reality.

The international media and many in our country only recorded the vandalism produced by marginal sectors and not the massive acts of support for the government presided over by Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, of great personal prestige as a historical figure and very popular for his constant presence in towns, companies, neighborhoods and with his closeness and listening to the popular sectors.

In any case, I must point out that there are levels of discontent in Cuba. Did this discontent start the revolt? No. Was it part of it? Some joined in at the beginning, but they immediately denied their support because violent mobilizations, the destruction of State agencies, especially schools and hospitals, have not been part of the political culture of Cuban society, at least the one I have known, facts that immediately warned the people about the spurious and opportunistic origin of the “protests”.

We should call things by their name: it is not discontent, it is social fatigue due to what is known in Cuba through the saying “there is a lot of work going on”, which, thus tersely and without dramatization, eloquently describes the daily hardships of “the daily grind” to travel, get food, medicines, spare parts, hygiene items, study, clothing. A situation to which they are subjected by the undaunted imperial United States.

If to this situation, which has been going on for decades, we add the impact of the effects of the pandemic that closed down tourism and the worsening of the blockade imposed by Trump-Biden, the social stress is logical, which, on the other hand, was increased by the shortage of medicines. The panorama was also darkened by the statistics of contagion and deaths, which are alien to the extraordinary statistics of life expectancy and access to health that is customary for the people, without discrimination and with great scientific development. The right to health is so transcendent for Cuban society that it has insisted on procuring it for the rest of the world in what we can truly consider an international feat.

Should the blockade always be a central issue when analyzing Cuba? What does it imply in human and social terms a coercion such as the one that this country has been suffering for more than half a century?

For many outside Cuba, the issue of the blockade is a pretext to mask the alleged weaknesses or anomalies of the model, its anachronisms and delays in carrying out the changes promoted by the government itself. Is it true that the blockade should not determine socialism as it does, as some people inside the island maintain? I think that the external restrictions that the blockade imposes and the affectation of Cuba’s international insertion clearly hinders the course towards the socialism to which Cuban society aspires.

It so happens that the blockade has not only been maintained. It has certainly increased and has extended its extraterritorial domain to countries with which Cuba has had close ties of all kinds for decades, but especially commercial ones. And the purpose is to hinder its normal development and continuity and restrict its capacity to handle the different crises of world capitalism and its own. Not all responsibility can be assigned to the blockade, but it does play a crucial role.

Among its structural characteristics, Cuba has limited material and financial resources, a high dependence on external economic relations and little exportable supply. Let us not forget that one of its main sources of foreign currency income -tourism- was practically paralyzed during the pandemic. In the years of Donald Trump, 243 measures were added and many were reinforced to complicate the supply of fuel and to persecute and affect financial institutions and countries that maintain normal relations with the island. Even emergency medical supplies already in the port were prevented from being unloaded. Then, if we take into account that the sending of remittances by the Cuban diaspora in the United States was also prohibited and hindered and that the blockade was dedicated to discrediting the quality and preventing the sale of Cuba’s professional services abroad (health and education among others), we could, without a doubt, assign the blockade a central role in the economic situation of the country, with its consequences in the economic, political and social aspects.

In any case, the Cuban leadership itself – President Miguel Díaz-Canel or Raúl Castro Ruz as first secretary of the Party at the opening of the National Assembly of People’s Power (Cuban Parliament) – on countless occasions have loudly denounced the design errors, the shortcomings and delays in the application of the measures and the need to banish the bureaucracy and corruption of the State and the lack of commitment on the part of the leadership. They also repeatedly stressed the need for reforms in the productive and technological areas, supply chain and logistics, together with the need to increase proximity to the population and reduce inequalities unbecoming of a Revolution.

Cuba has proven to be a power in various aspects: education, health, medical research and international solidarity. In fact, it ranks high in the UN Human Development Index (HDI), at position 70, only 24 places lower than Argentina. How do you imagine a Cuba without a blockade and without external coercive pressures?

I imagine it as the great little nation it is in spite of adversities, among which I include the unaccounted punishment of natural catastrophes. In the hurricanes of 2008, close to 10 billion dollars were lost and in the one in Santiago de Cuba, a few years later, more than five billion, all its infrastructure, all its forest wealth and its coffee production. I have witnessed the devastation, but also the miracle of recovery due to the mystique and strength of a population that does not give up. It has such accumulated experience in crisis management and such a predisposition to face and resolve the conflicts of humanity that, in addition to making a qualitative leap in its national development scheme, it could maintain and increase a relevant role in the solution of the serious post-pandemic world crisis.

Cuba’s educational and cultural apparatus, the excellence of its universities and the training of its professionals have allowed it to show a solvency that could increase enormously if it had the conditions to deploy its productive and creative forces. When you are in Cuba you witness the international respect it has achieved, the relevant relations it maintains with all countries and regions of the world, without ideological corsets, sectarianism or dogmatism and without losing its self-esteem and its vocation for self-determination.

Finally… Is the United States afraid of Cuba?

I think it is afraid of its moral leadership and its humanist ethics. It is afraid of its capacity to stand up as a civilizing example, as a pacifist, anti-consumerist and ecologist paradigm. And it is already afraid of its political and integrative leadership in continental Latin America and in the Caribbean itself. The mirror of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), even with its temporary paralysis, gives a more hopeful and fairer image than the outdated and irremediably discredited Organization of American States (OAS). Let us remember that Celac is a space where the United States is not invited. Neither is Canada.

Geographical determinism geopolitically links the United States and Cuba, but their ideologies – one of domination and the other of brotherhood – leaves no doubt in the minds of the governments and peoples of good faith in our Region as to whom to fear and whom to embrace.

Probably, come to think of it, the maintenance of the Guantanamo base may not just be whim and regional domination, but fear. As we have seen recently in Afghanistan, this is not the first war that the United States has lost and so far Cuba is undoubtedly winning the moral battle of the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean.

But this whole cultural, journalistic, cybernetic attack, amplified internationally, is not only not over but will intensify. It continues to be an attempt to create an internal opposition -which is what the United States alleges-, but which seeks to overthrow the Government and generate chaos in its model. In view of this, what is the challenge of the Revolution, of the Cuban Government and State? How can we ensure that the future does not mean going back to capitalism and continue the emancipation process that was never said to be easy, fast or permanent?

Undoubtedly, as I have recently read in an interesting and very sincere article:

“We have the duty to formulate a better, more complex, committed and lucid question: how to satisfy the desire for protest, for rebellion, for insubordination from the field of the Revolution and in favor of socialism? How to ensure that this political flow, far from threatening the revolutionary power, strengthens it? These questions, of course, cannot be answered with legal sanctions or police dispositions, nor with economic improvement or communication campaigns: this historic mission that the Revolution imposes on our feeble shoulders requires a broad and excessive deployment of revolutionary politics”.

“Therefore, there is an urgent need for answers that emphasize the recomposition of hegemony, of the consensus of the Revolution and of its socialist project”.

What can be seen in the immediate future?

In this regard, the dilemma continues to be of a challenging magnitude. I read in Infobae of Argentina how the crisis to be unleashed by imperialism in November is being prepared. The political discussion group Archipiélago has called for a mobilization to march “civically and peacefully for our rights” on November 15. A 60-year history of destabilization authorizes one to think that it is not the defense of more rights within the framework of the Cuban socialist model that is being sought, but the clear intention to replicate the “spring” models of protests that end with the death and collapse of popular governments independent of the empire.

In this regard, the Cuban Government has denied authorization and has clearly defined that the Constitution and the laws of the country do not authorize and consider illegal demonstrations that seek to change the socialist system established by those same laws.

The call is accompanied by denunciations about the “repression” of last July, the existence of political prisoners and even dares to speak of missing persons and other slanderous and false news.

The country where security forces violently repress social protests and kill people, especially blacks, with their knees on their necks, and which considers itself imbued with the moral authority to question other nations, their democracy and their freedom, continues to test the island and its history of dignity.

The Cuban Revolution is trying to find within itself the keys to advance in ranks of freedom, equality and prosperity through its socialist model with heterodox and creative reforms, while sincerely assuming the need to get closer to its people. Just as it has always done for its resistance.

Notes:

[1] To read Fidel Castro’s full speech on April 16, 1961, go to the link: http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/1 ... 0461e.html

[2] See: http://www.cuba.cu

[3] https://capac-web.org/ong-de-revista-an ... ar-a-cuba/

http://www.juventudrebelde.cu/cuba/2021 ... o-completo

Translation by Internationalist 360°

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2021/10/ ... ist-model/

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Cuba’s Soberana 02 Vaccine, Recognized by US Medical Journal

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The Cuban vaccine Soberana 02 against #COVID19 has been recognized in the prestigious U.S. medical journal Annual Review of Medicine, which means an important step towards its international recognition. | Photo: Twitter @CVInternacional

Published 18 October 2021 (15 hours 23 minutes ago)

In an article by key opinion leaders, the authors considered that the fast development and deployment of mRNA vaccines and adenovirus vectors against the disease continues to astound the global scientific community.


Cuba's Soberana 02 anti-Covid-19 vaccine has been recognized today by the prestigious U.S. medical journal Annual Review of Medicine, a step forward towards its possible international homologation.

In an article by key opinion leaders, the authors considered that the fast development and deployment of mRNA vaccines and adenovirus vectors against the disease continues to astound the global scientific community.

However, these drug platforms and production approaches have yet to achieve global equity for the anti-Covid-19 vaccine, warned Peter J. Hotez and Maria Elena Bottazzi, creators of the Corbevax technology, manufactured in India under the ownership of Baylor College of Medicine, Texas, Houston.

Whole inactivated virus (WIV) and protein-based vaccines offer enormous promise to fill gaps in access to the anti-Covid-19 biologic, especially for the world's low- and middle-income nations in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia, they warned.

An attractive feature of these is their processing capacity in low- and middle-income countries, especially in Brazil, Cuba, Mexico, South Africa, China, India, Indonesia and elsewhere, they said.


Regarding the Cuban Soberana 02, from the Finlay Vaccine Institute, they pointed out that it is also an RBD candidate. Soberana 02 has been authorized for emergency use on the Caribbean island, where it is also approved for children over two years of age. In addition, they pointed out; it was authorized for emergency use in Iran, where it is known as PasteurCovac.

There is an urgent need to continue speeding up the production of these drugs for low- and middle-income countries in time to fully vaccinate these populations by the end of 2022 at the latest, they noted.

Achieving these targets would also serve as an essential reminder that we must continue to maintain expertise in producing multiple vaccine technologies, rather than relying on a single platform, the authors asserted in the Annual Review of Medicine.

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Fri Oct 22, 2021 2:55 pm

Cuban workers denounce poorly concealed objectives of mercenary ruckus

The trade union movement will mobilize alongside the entire people against those who are determined to undermine Cuba’s sovereignty and the conquests we have collectively achieved, wielding its most powerful weapons: unity and patriotism

Author: National news staff | informacion@granma.cu

october 20, 2021 10:10:15

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Photo: Prensa Latina

Given the latest escalation of subversive campaigns against the Revolution, the Federation of Cuban Workers (CTC) issued a statement outlining the national proletariat’s intransigent position rejecting the most recent maneuvers orchestrated by "internal political operators, led and encouraged from abroad," who have announced “the intention to conduct a march which they present as peaceful and lawful, invoking the Constitution."

In reference to Articles in the Magna Carta, the CTC recalled that no legal demonstration can disturb citizen tranquility, incite overthrowing the established order, infringe on the rights of others, affect collective security, general welfare or the public order, and must always be conducted with respect for the law.

On the contrary, the statement asserts, the poorly disguised objective of the mercenary ruckus is to provoke a change in Cuba’s political system and a return to capitalism; noting that this is made clear by "the decisive support, evident in the avalanche of messages on social networks, by figures abroad clamoring for a U.S. military intervention, notorious terrorists, counter-revolutionary figures in Florida and even the remains of the defeated mercenary Brigade 2506."

In the face of such aggression, the statement reaffirms that "Cuban workers, united around the Federation of Cuban workers and its affiliated trade unions, are advancing in the construction of a new society and updating our economic model to build a better country, strongly condemn those who promote destabilization. We are convinced that no provocation will succeed in demoralizing or intimidating those of us struggling here for the present and the future of the nation."

The statement reiterated that the Cuban trade union movement will mobilize alongside the entire people against those who are determined to take away our independence, our sovereignty and the conquests achieved with collective sacrifice. In this exercise of legitimate defense, "We will wield our most powerful weapons: unity and patriotism."

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-10-20/cu ... ary-ruckus

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Cuba: AG Warns March Organizers of Potential Repercussions

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The playwright Yunior Garcia, main promoter of the illegal march called for November 15 received a warning in the Havana Prosecutor's Office that if he persists in the act he would be guilty of disobedience and instigation to commit a crime, says the law. | Photo: Twitter/@FabiolateleSUR

Published 21 October 2021 (14 hours 55 minutes ago)

Playwright Yunior Garcia, one of the organizers of a march denied by Cuban authorities, was warned by the Attorney General's Office on Thursday of criminal consequences if he persists in carrying out the public protest.

Garcia and several members of his digital platform Archipiélago asked the authorities for a permit to hold a "peaceful" demonstration under the rights explicitly stated in the new constitution. However, their demand was turned down by the government, which described it as an "illicit" way of destroying socialism, which is signed as "irrevocable" in the Constitution itself.

Subsequently, the media outlet Cubadebate published a note from the Attorney General's Office informing that similar warnings were issued in the provincial localities of Villa Clara, Cienfuegos and Holguin and specified that the demonstrators would incur in the crimes of "disobedience, illegal demonstrations, instigation to commit a crime," among others.

In September, García and a dozen other people presented a request for authorization for a demonstration -which they described as civic and peaceful- on a central avenue of the capital for November 20, demanding political changes and the release of prisoners. Others did the same in eight cities of the country.

One of the government's responses was to establish for that day a National Defense Day—rescue exercises that mobilize civilians and the military—so the group moved the date to November 15.

On Wednesday, the governor of Havana informed of a popular plan to commemorate the 502nd anniversary of the capital with street activities precisely for November 15 and 16 and within the framework of a growing relaxation of the social isolation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The Havana prosecutor's office warned of criminal consequences against Yunior Garcia, organizer of a march in the Cuban capital on November 15."

"Taking into account the manifest decision of some of these citizens in the desire to maintain their intention to carry out these marches and therefore disregard the denial...(the Prosecutor's Office) initiated warnings to several of these citizens of the criminal legal consequences," said the deputy chief prosecutor of Havana province, Yaimara Angulo, in a statement to journalists in which she did not accept questions.

The march proposed by Archipelago seeks to be a sort of continuity of the July 11 demonstrations, when some took to the streets in a disorganized manner in various parts of the country - in protests not seen on the island since the 1990s - with demands as diverse as an end to blackouts, rising prices and shortages to political changes, and instigated via Florida.

One person died and an undetermined number were detained - the government only reported a few indicted - precisely those whose "freedom" Garcia and Archipelago are now demanding. Many of the demonstrations ended in acts of vandalism with shattered glass, damaged patrol cars and injured people.

The government in turn called on its supporters to take to the streets and, while recognizing many of the needs and criticisms, proved through concrete evidence that the demonstration was fueled through social networks by U.S. interest groups.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Cub ... -0015.html

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Eyewitness report: Cuba’s scientists, medical workers advance fight vs. COVID

Originally published: Liberation News by Gloria La Riva (October 15, 2021 ) | - Posted Oct 21, 2021

After a serious rise in Cuba of illnesses and deaths from COVID-19 during the summer, there are encouraging developments with a steady recovery and downward curve in illnesses and deaths. Similar to the worldwide “third wave” of COVID, the Delta variant quickly became the dominant mutation in Cuba and swept through the island.

Now, people are breathing a sigh of relief this month. Workplaces, restaurants, beaches and public spaces are opening up and tourism is soon to be welcomed on Nov. 15. Of course, health experts still urge continued caution to avoid a new outbreak.

Massive vaccination of the population means that by Nov. 15, an astounding 92% of the whole population will be fully vaccinated thanks to Cuba’s development and production of its own vaccines: Abdala, Mambisa and Soberana Plus. In fact, Cuba’s vaccination rate is the fastest in the world, and the only country whose children as young as two years are being covered.

On Nov. 15, all children will return to school in person, fully vaccinated. Compare that to Texas and Florida, where both governors have banned mask mandates in public schools.

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Life begins to return to normal at an outdoor cafe in Old Havana following a highly successful vaccination campaign, Oct. 10

Cuba’s vaccination and its early medical intervention in positive cases are the two factors responsible for Cuba’s recovery rate of 97.5% of those who have fallen ill, compared to the world rate of 90.46% and 85.3% in Latin America and the Caribbean. These statistics were conveyed in a national meeting of scientists, medical experts and statisticians together with government leaders that was headed by President Miguel Díaz-Canel on Oct. 12.

For people who are allergic to the ingredient thiomersal in the vaccines, a thiomersal-free vaccine was released on Sept. 25.

From a high of new COVID cases that reached more than 9,000+ per day in August, October’s new cases are showing a major decline. Oct. 14 saw 2,138 new positive cases, with a 2,488 daily average the last five days.

From hospitals to famed biotechnology centers to production of medical equipment, Cuba’s heroes in these fields are essential actors in the country’s resistance to the blockade and pandemic. They are achieving great feats in the midst of the most severe economic measures the U.S. government has ever imposed on Cuba. Trump signed 243 measures to strangle Cuba’s economy. Biden has not only maintained Trump’s anti-Cuba acts, but added new sanctions. The CIA and its front groups are fueling new subversive aggression.

| San Miguel del Padrón Pediatric Hospital Head nurse Intensive Care Dept Liliana Vaillant nurse Marcia Marcial nurse Yusliana Bustamante Hernandez anesthesiologist Angel Labadid head of the Intensive Care Dept Dr Elizabeth González | MR Online
San Miguel del Padrón Pediatric Hospital: Head nurse, Intensive Care Dept. Liliana Vaillant, nurse Marcia Marcial, nurse Yusliana Bustamante Hernandez, anesthesiologist Angel Labadid, head of the Intensive Care Dept. Dr. Elizabeth González.

The improved health indices and scientific advances are part of Cuba’s immunity to U.S.-backed counterrevolutionary efforts.

Witnessing Cuba’s frontline workers

I visited the Pediatric Teaching Hospital of San Miguel del Padrón this week, which was designated early in the pandemic to care for children with COVID who have high-risk factors, like heart conditions. The doctors and nurses say proudly that not one child at this hospital has died from COVID during the whole pandemic.

Dr. Yaima Rodríguez Espinoza, director of the hospital, said,

In the peak of the pandemic from May to August, the 200 hospital beds were filled with vulnerable children. Today we have only 42 patients, which speaks to the recovery of the country’s epidemiological situation.

The latest development in Cuba’s vaccines
Cuba’s biotechnology industry is at the heart of the COVID fight. The government and scientists knew from the start that Cuba would have to depend on its own solutions to the pandemic and not fall victim to the world’s pharmaceutical giants and the blockade.

Cuba’s scientists have produced five vaccine lines with new advances underway.

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L to R: Dr. Miladys Limonta Fernández, COVID Vaccines Coordinator; Gilda Lemus, Master of Sciences, head of the Analytic Clinic Laboratory, both of the Center of Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology; Gloria La Riva, center, Oct.12.

Miladys Limonta Fernández of the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB) spoke to me to explain CIGB’s latest development this past week. As she explained, for over 30 years Cuba has used a time-tested process for development of other vaccines. Test studies showed that CIGB’s Abdala vaccine is safe for children two years old and up. Compare that to the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which are based on a new platform based on mRNA. This the first time that a product based on the mRNA platform is used in human beings.

And with just-completed major clinical studies, a special nasal vaccine of the Mambisa line has now advanced to Phase 2. Limonta said, “This is most advantageous because the virus enters through the nasal passage. Of all the vaccines in the world, there are only five that have nasal application. Cuba is one of them.” She says that recently some AstraZeneca´s researchers knew of Cuba’s successful clinical studies and “they are interested in discussing with us to exchange more about Cuba’s and AstraZeneca findings.”

The science centers have all jumped into the urgent tasks needed for the anti-COVID fight. Recently, engineers and technicians at the Neurosciences Center (CNeuro) began producing ventilators to overcome the blockade, spare parts and PPE items. Yanet Gárriga, a resourceful young engineer and engineer Lian González designed the mold for small plastic “Y” connectors to double the capacity of the ventilators.

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Technician Alexis Hernández and Engineer Yanet Gárriga, Cuba’s Neurosciences Center, Sept.

She showed me many of the items that the Neurosciences Center has produced in this time of pandemic. It is not the typical work of the center, but as Dr. Limonta says of CNeuro, “we all work together among our centers.” In Cuba, the people’s health, not profits, is the driving motive.

In Havana and other provinces where cases are lower, the government has allowed restaurants, cafes and beaches to open. And there is great anticipation for the opening up of the country to international tourism on Nov. 15.

It is no accident that the coordinated protests which broke out in Cuba on July 11 were timed by U.S. imperialism to take advantage of the especially difficult circumstances of Cubans as the COVID crisis was reaching its peak in July. Now the same counterrevolutionary forces, small in number but magnified in the U.S. media, have called for demonstrations on Nov. 15, just when tourism is due to open up and school is in full swing. But as the Cuban people have shown time and again, they will overcome and defeat the next aggressions as well.

https://mronline.org/2021/10/21/eyewitn ... -vs-covid/
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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Tue Oct 26, 2021 1:09 pm

The socialist state enterprise is our principal source of wealth, well-being and prosperity
The First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Central Committee and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz Canel Bermúdez, held another meeting mid-October with executives of the state enterprise system, during which an analysis was conducted of implementation of the Reordering Task and results of measures adopted to strengthen these entities.

Author: René Tamayo León | internet@granma.cu

october 25, 2021 12:10:43

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"If we are not developing the socialist state enterprise, Díaz-Canel insisted, we are not building socialism."Photo: Estudio Revolución

The First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Central Committee and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz Canel Bermúdez, held another meeting mid-October with executives of the state enterprise system, during which an analysis was conducted of implementation of the Reordering Task and results of measures adopted to strengthen these entities.

The state enterprise, as the main actor within the Cuban economy, is undoubtedly the principal source of wealth, wellbeing and prosperity in our society, and has therefore undergone major changes, economic and organizational adaptations in the most recent stage, as is appropriate for the operator of the fundamental means of production and services in our socialist system, which are the property of the people.

Beyond the U.S. government’s tightening of the economic, commercial and financial blockade of Cuba, the 243 measures imposed by the Trump administration and maintained intact by his successor Joseph Biden, as well as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the fruits of these transformations are far from what was expected.

The socialist state enterprise has been the object of the principal policy transformations and measures adopted, but in many, neither managers nor workers have assumed their role as the main protagonists of these changes.

This fact was critically addressed by President Miguel Díaz-Canel; Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz, and Deputy Prime Minister Alejandro Gil Fernández, Minister of Economy and Planning.

Also leading the exchange were Salvador Valdés Mesa, Vice President of the Republic, and Joel Queipo Ruiz, Party Central Committee Secretariat member and head of its Economic Department. Deputy Prime Minister Ricardo Cabrisas Ruiz, several ministers and other authorities also attended.

The centerpiece of the meeting was a presentation by Marino Murillo Jorge, head of the Permanent Commission for Implementation and Development of Policy Guidelines, who pointed out that in the months that have elapsed since the monetary reordering began, more than a few changes have been made.

During this period, he explained, more than 250 decisions have been adopted and 145 legal norms issued or modified as part of follow-up to implementation of the Task. These include measures linked to processes of adjustment and rectification of problems in the design and implementation, and address deviations derived from the difficult economic context caused by the tightening of the blockade and the pandemic.

Explaining the impact of the reordering on the enterprise system through the month of June - August in some cases - he reported, along with other information, that 488 companies had experienced losses.

Eighty-two percent are concentrated in the agricultural sector, the sugar industry (AZCUBA), provincial commerce, companies subordinate to territorial governments, the metallurgical group (GESIME) and the food processing enterprise group (GEIA).

Murillo Jorge commented that one of the fundamental problems in implementation of the reordering has been inflation, much higher than what was designed, which has meant that the population’s central complaint about the measure implemented January 1, this year, is the salary/price ratio.

The Implementation Commission’s analysis was followed by comments from several heads of enterprise groups regarding a "detail" which is not at all minor: Very comparable companies can be found among both the "losers" and the "winners" - which were the majority during the period. Why then, do some report earnings and others not, despite their similarity?

Referring to the positive results (including earnings) of the Cuban furniture industry, which has been able to manufacture a good portion of the furniture required by tourist facilities, given prior financing of the sector, the President stressed the need to produce furniture of this type for the population and sales in Cuban pesos (CUP).

The income generated in freely convertible currency (MLC) that this industry receives to re-provision itself should also serve to finance the manufacture of a variety of products for the domestic market, which could even involve utilizing by-products of the entity’s current operations.

Outlining a general concept for the entire state enterprise system, Díaz-Canel insisted, "The essences cannot be lost." He clarified, “Measures adopted to provide socialist enterprises access to more foreign currency, including what is sold on the domestic market in MLC, are intended to support their provision of more goods and services to the population.

The President expressed the conviction that profitability and meeting the population’s needs of the population are not mutually exclusive. We must think about the future and also about the present, and reorganize ourselves to produce more for the market in national currency, he stated.

Going further into this thesis, he noted that exports are a necessity, but they must be viewed as a means to acquire foreign currency to increase national production for the domestic market.

These companies must, at the same time, he said, create productive chains within the economy to replace imports.

“This, however," he continued, "requires that innovation be a priority within our companies. The strength of socialism lies in the socialist state enterprise, and we must set the tone, we must be inspiring.”

Who generates the most jobs in our system? State enterprises. Who makes the largest investments? State enterprises. Therefore, we must do more research, more development; we must be more innovative.

And the principal innovation that the socialist state enterprise needs is an organizational innovation. All this, he added, is outlined in the nation's governing document, in the Constitution of the Republic, because the socialist state enterprise is part of our political system.

"We need to shake up the state enterprise sector," stated Prime Minster Manuel Marrero Cruz, referencing the Central Report presented by Army General Raúl Castro Ruz at the 8th Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba and the closing speech by First Secretary Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez.

He stressed that measures adopted giving state enterprises more autonomy and decision-making authority have provided their executives and workers with sufficient tools to move forward, but the process is not advancing as rapidly as needed.

The enterprise system has been provided the means to make profound transformations, but many of the decisions adopted are not being implemented, he acknowledged. We need to do things differently, Marrero insisted, and make sure that workers play a leading role in these changes, listen to them more, but we are not creating these opportunities, we continue with the bureaucracy, with the old methods.

Concluding the meeting, the First Secretary described the meeting with enterprise leaders as another step forward in meeting the objective of transforming, consolidating and strengthening the state enterprise system as the principal actor in the socialist economy.

Strengthening its role as a fundamental actor is a constitutional obligation, the President reflected, reading and commenting on four articles in the Magna Carta which establish guidelines for the functioning of the national economy, the property regimen, the participation of workers, the role of science, technology and innovation, and the economy’s prime mover.

Citing Article 18 of the Constitution of the Republic, which establishes that in Cuba "a system of socialist economy reigns, based on the entire people’s ownership of the fundamental means of production as the principal form of property," he recalled that state enterprises represent the people in administering these fundamental means of production, and emphasized that we must internalize this article, seek and assume the implications it bears and means.

With regard to Article 20, which states, "Workers participate in the processes of planning, regulation, management and control of the economy," and the law "regulates the participation of the workforce in administration and management of state enterprise entities and budgeted units," the President commented that, if there is to be democratic participation and a contribution - which are very much needed - we must create adequate spaces for debate, in which workers can state their opinions, proposals, and dissatisfactions.

Once these spaces are created, Díaz-Canel continued, we must create others to implement what has been discussed, which cannot be accomplish with purely administrative decisions, but rather requires consciousness on the part of workers that what has been agreed upon, by all, must be carried out, and that everyone’s role in the process is clear.

A third condition necessary to ensure participatory management of a company, the First Secretary added, is that in these processes must be transparent, and transparency implies accountability, for those who direct a company and for the workforce, alike.

He added that these accountability processes also require transparency in terms of economic data and in the decisions that are made. When we articulate these three types of spaces (for debate, implementation and accountability) within a company, then, yes, participation exists.

Regarding Article 21 of the Constitution of the Republic, which establishes that the "State promotes the advancement of science, technology and innovation as essential elements of economic and social development," Díaz-Canel argued that promotion and use of scientific research and innovation to solve problems continues to be insufficient in the state enterprise system.

The first person in a company to defend science and innovation, and the policy that exists on this matter, must be its director. To have a culture of innovation implies, in the first place, knowing what qualified personnel the entity has to take on the task, including young staff members, who arrive well trained and with plenty of enthusiasm, but sometimes, because of the way we treat them, they leave the company.

The second prerequisite is the creation of a technical-advisory council that has autonomy, that puts the contradictions existing within the company on the table and makes proposals, but to do so, audacious individuals must be included, people who are "uncomfortable," as we say, people who question me as a company director, not just "saying yes" to everything I utter.

Research and innovation in a company also require financing for this activity, which is what will provide us with many solutions, he added.

With respect to Article 27 of the Magna Carta, which states, "The socialist state enterprise is the main subject of the national economy. It has autonomy in administration and management; plays the principal role in the production of goods and services, and fulfills its social responsibilities," Díaz-Canel insisted that participants in the meeting conduct analyses of how their enterprises are complying with these precepts.

Referring to the concept of "social responsibility" and to the transformations taking place in neighborhoods, led by their own inhabitants with the support of government entities, he stressed that no company can be oblivious to the problems that exist in the communities where they are located.

Díaz-Canel asked: Can you be indifferent when many of the workers in your company live in these neighborhoods, near them or in others that have the same problems, and when many of your workers may be vulnerable? Can you be indifferent to problems when the company could support the community without violating anything established, projecting in your budgets actions that could improve the community? State enterprises are also representing the Cuban state in these places, he recalled.

Referring to the constitutional precept that "the socialist state enterprise plays the principal role in the production of goods and services," the President asked exactly where everyone stood in fulfilling Article 27, regardless of the limitations, when the country faces a serious shortage of goods and services for the population.

Addressing the issue of autonomy for socialist state enterprises, another constitutional mandate, he pointed out that decisions have been made to favor this, but some elements are not functional since a adequate relationships between central state administration agencies, superior enterprise management organizations and enterprises have yet to be developed, but also - he said - because there are enterprises which are not taking advantage of the autonomy they have been afforded and are still waiting for guidance from "above."

At the beginning of his closing remarks at the meeting with state enterprises system leaders, Díaz-Canel recalled that these gatherings have been conducted quarterly in other formats, but now they will be held at least monthly, with different compositions and addressing different topics.

If we are talking about the economy’s main actor - he said - everything we can discuss, all the consensus we can establish on the basis of everyone's experience, with everyone's opinions, is very useful and necessary, in order to make decisions that allow us to move forward in meeting the objective of continuing to transform, consolidate and strengthen the state enterprise sector.

Strengthening the state enterprise as the fundamental actor of our socialist socio-economic model - he added - is not only an economic principle, it is a political principle. Strengthening the role played by an actor that represents an important part of the concept of socialist state ownership of the basic means of production.

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-10-25/th ... prosperity

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Party evaluation process to begin in November at municipal and district levels

Assemblies will be conducted with a limited number of participants, given the current epidemiological situation, but the entire membership will be represented by local general secretaries, candidacy commissions, and current members of committees at different levels, among others

Author: Yaditza del Sol González | yadidelsol@granma.cu

Author: Maby Martinez Rodriguez | informacion@granmai.cu

october 20, 2021 10:10:38

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Photo: Granma Archives

The focus of evaluation assemblies that will begin in November, at the municipal and district levels, is to analyze, amongst all and getting to the roots, the work of the Communist Party of Cuba (CCP) in strengthening direct links with the people, as well as the impact of its political/ideological work and in the nation’s economic development.
This process, which began last May, is a continuation of the 8th Congress, of the fundamental pillars that were established for the transformation of Party work and the democratization in its methods; revitalizing the role of the membership and integration with other bodies and organizations, in order to analyze realities in line with the particularities of each territory, emphasized César Joel Suárez Pellé, deputy chief of the Central Committee’s Ideological Department.
The discussion of these directives, along with the renewal or ratification of those holding leadership positions, will take place in the municipal and district committees between November and December this year, and in provincial bodies between January and February of 2022, reported Emilia Acuña Lemes, deputy chief of the Central Committee’s Department of Organization and Cadres.
She emphasized that, although these assemblies will be conducted with a limited number of participants, given COVID-19 preventative measures in effect, the entire membership will be represented by general secretaries of locals, candidacy commissions, and current members of committees at the different levels, along with other selected militants.
These assemblies, she said, represent an opportunity to debate and review what has been done and what has not been done, in "an analysis that reflects the people, their problems and concerns, what is happening in our society," providing concrete continuity to the Congress.

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-10-20/pa ... ict-levels

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Although not immediately, the Cuban economy will recover
Alejandro Gil Fernández, Deputy Prime Minister and head of Economy and Planning, notes that inflation is the economic issue that has generated the most dissatisfaction within the population and must be confronted

Author: Gladys Leydis Ramos López | internet@granma.cu

october 21, 2021 12:10:44

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Alejandro Gil Fernández emphasized that the best way to control inflation is to increase supply, so that prices are in line with the resources in the hands of the people. Photo: Ismael Batista

The Cuban economy is entering a stage of gradual recovery, based on control of COVID-19, thanks to our health system and progress in vaccination, stated Alejandro Gil Fernández, Deputy Prime Minister and head of Economy and Planning, during a meeting with the media in Havana’s International Press Center.
He indicated that control of the epidemic “puts us in better conditions to reopen fundamental activities; although there can be no unfounded expectations, since significant results cannot be determined in only a few months’ time.”
Advancing toward this end, he reiterated, will require opening certain services, including tourism and concretizing all the measures being implemented by the country’s leadership to address the negative effects of the pandemic.
He recalled that 2021 has been a year with many limitations, even more so than 2020. Expenses required to confront the pandemic and the consequent shutdown of our principal activities, the economic blockade and related measures meant to choke the country’s development, as well as the necessary transformations we ourselves are undertaking in the monetary arena, have been determinant factors in the current situation of the Cuban economy.
He noted that the tension is evident, since in 2020 the economy lost 240 million dollars in income, as compared to 2019, “leading to a contraction of the gross domestic product of almost 11%. While, income during the current year is 500 million less than that generated by this date in 2020.”
Deputy Prime Minister Gil Fernández recalled that transformations have been made in the functioning of the state enterprise sector, as the economy’s principal actor, along with significant changes in the private arena. He cited as examples, increased flexibility for the self-employed, as well as the broadening of projects this sector may undertake. Likewise, the first steps are being taken in the establishment of micro, small and medium sized companies, along more options for non-agricultural cooperatives.
In an initial stage, the Minister continued, we focused the priority of transformingself-employmenton establishing a legal framework, since small businesses were operating under these norms. We decided that all operations with more than three hired workers would become micro, small or medium sized companies, or a non-agricultural cooperative. “The platforms for this were then created, but, in addition to these conversions, 67 other projects have been approved, as new endeavors," he noted.
Regarding this new format, he said, no limitations or goals to meet have been established. These companiesconstitute another economic actor, which will play a complementary role, without time or quantity restrictions. The idea is open to all enterprises that comply with the policy design approved by the government.
He also pointed out that one of the recent innovations is the creation of state-owned micro, small and medium sized companies. There are already four in the country, including aForeign Trade company, which will devote its efforts to meeting the small quantity needs of the state and private sectors.
The Minister added that, in another arena, there are more than 60 state enterprises which have begun the process of restructuring workers’ compensation, without the obligation to followa salary scale that has limited the autonomy of the state sector,as compared to thatof non-state economic actors.
All these concrete accomplishments, Gil Fernandez insisted, mean that, despite the exceptional situation of tense liquidity the country has faced, and although restrictive U.S.measures against the Cuban people remain in place, we are achieving diversification of our productive fabric, providing economic actors more flexibility and gaining greater participation on the part of entrepreneurs. All this will lead, little by little, to the recovery of supply available to the population and of activities that have been absent these last two years.
Giventhe current context, there are priorities that are key to advancing toward recovery, albeit gradually, of the economic and social life of Cubans.
In this regard, the Deputy Prime Minister stated that the first priority is to confront inflation, the phenomenon that has generated the most complaints from the population, the most controversial and the most difficult to address.
This is an issue that is seen on a daily basis in prices that continue to rise, the causes of which are dissimilar, but which must be resolved, he stated.
On another level, he noted that he sustainability of our National Electric System is a clear objective, an issue that not only affects the population, but also productive activity. "We have been obliged to shut down a series of activities of great impact to minimize the negative effects of the energy situation on the people, and this is a contradiction given the need to recover the economy," he said.

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-10-21/al ... ll-recover

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US Threatens Sanctions if Cuba Prosecutes 15N March Organizers

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"Juan Gonzalez reiterates his ignorance on Cuba, its history & political culture. He had just a lucid moment when he said that the future of Cuba will not be determined from Washington. We already knew that." | Photo: Twitter/@IsmaraWalter

Published 22 October 2021

The Havana's Prosecutor Office cited this week the organizers of the opposition march and reiterated that the march had not been authorized and was declared illegal. Authorities stated that if the march took place, promoters, and participants would be violating the Cuban Constitution and potentially facing criminal charges.


The United States issued a warning today to impose further sanctions on Cuba if the promoters of the opposition march called for November 15 in Cuba are prosecuted, according to statements by Juan González, Biden's main advisor for Latin America, reported Spanish agency EFE.

Biden's advisor was responding to whether Washington will sanction Cuban officials in the event that the organizers of the November march are prosecuted for carrying out the announced march despite the government's permit denial.

The Havana Prosecutor Office cited this week the organizers of the opposition march and reiterated that the march had not been authorized and declared illegal. Authorities stated that if the march took place, promoters, and participants would be violating the Cuban Constitution and potentially facing criminal charges.

A recently created online platform named Archipielago, which promoted and organized the march, issued a statement after the government citation, insisting on their decision to march on November 15, despite the government's refusal to allow it. The purported aims of the protest are to demand respect for human rights and to release what they call "political" prisoners arrested previously in July.


The United States immediately criticized the Cuban government's decision to prevent the march from taking place, with Gonzalez alleging Friday that the island's leaders are “afraid to have a national conversation with the Cuban people.”

Gonzalez claimed that "the future of Cuba is not going to be determined from Washington...we are fully committed to supporting, backing and strengthening the voice of the Cuban people who want change."

González also referred to the tougher line followed by Biden toward the island, which include new sanctions on high-ranking Cuban military and police officials for their purported role in arresting July protesters, in a clear departure from the path of de-escalation and normalization carried out former President Barack Obama (2009-2017).


The Biden administration has also maintained in place over 240 additional measures adopted under the Trump period, which reinforced the 60-year-old blockade imposed and maintained by successive U.S. administrations on Cuba. The advisor declined to comment on Biden's position on the blockade, saying that this is “a matter for the U.S. Congress,” which has the power to lift it.

Responding immediately to the statement by the Biden administration's top official, the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in his Twitter account: “A U.S. government high official, in an open interventionist move, once again makes the mistake of threatening Cuba. Besides being an act contrary to the UN Charter, history has shown that we Cubans do not feel threatened nor are we impressed by them.”

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Mon Nov 01, 2021 1:33 pm

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Cuban Leader: The US Government is the True Organizer and Promoter of the Provocation Planned for November in Cuba (+Video)
October 31, 2021

The program La Mesa Redonda transmitted a special presentation by compañero Rogelio Polanco Fuentes, a member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), as part of the public complaint made by the First Secretary of the Party at the closing of the Second Plenary Session of the Central Committee on the plans of the US government and its political operators in Cuba to try to overthrow the Revolution.

At the beginning of his statement, he recalled the words of the First Secretary of the Party in the conclusions of the Second Plenary of the PCC:

Now they appear with a supposedly peaceful march. It is nothing more than an escalation in the way of acting against the Revolution and a challenge to the authorities and to the socialist rule of law endorsed in our Constitution… It is a provocation as part of a “soft coup” strategy. Its purposes coincide with the main lines of attack, slander, lies and threats used by those financed by the United States Government who oppose the Cuban political system and try to destabilize it and restore capitalism.

We are not going to legitimize the imperialist actions in internal politics or give way to the desire for neocolonial restoration that some have accumulated and that are reinforced in crisis situations. It is not an act of civility, it is an act of subordination to the Yankee hegemony.


The head of the Ideological Department of the Central Committee of PCC recalled that between September 20 and 27, a small group of citizens delivered similar texts to the headquarters of the municipal or provincial governments of eight provinces of the country announcing the decision to hold a supposedly peaceful march.

“They underlined ‘the decision to hold a march’ because it was not a request: the holding of this march was being taken for granted. The action was conceived with a national scope in evident coordination by its promoters,” emphasized Polanco Fuentes.

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Later, on October 12, the authorities of the municipalities where the aforementioned documents were delivered, gave a personal response to the senders. “On that occasion, precise arguments were offered on the illegal nature of the march according to articles 56, 45 and 4 of the Constitution,” Polanco Fuentes highlighted.

“Among the reasons expressed, it was clearly established that the public projections of the promoters and their links with subversive organizations or agencies financed by the United States government have the manifest intention of promoting a change in the political system in Cuba, so that the the announced march constitutes a provocation as part of the regime change strategy tested by the United States in other countries,” he said.

Polanco Fuentes drew attention to how as soon as the march was announced, it received public support from US legislators, political operators and the media that encourage actions against the Cuban people, try to destabilize the country and urge military intervention. “It is something recurrent and permanent as these media and political operators from the United States urge military intervention in our country,” he said.

The member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba said that from the beginning it was evident that it was a destabilizing plan orchestrated from abroad through internal political operators with violent intentions.

“Faced with the challenge of the promoters of the provocation in their attempt to ignore the refusal of the authorities,” continued Polanco Fuentes, “on October 21 the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic at its headquarters in several provinces began a process of warning these citizens; stating that if they did not comply with the authorities’ decision, they would incur the crimes of disobedience, illegal demonstrations, instigation to commit a crime, and others provided for and sanctioned in current criminal legislation.”

In this sense, he explained that the action of the Prosecutor’s Office was based on article 156 of the Cuban Constitution, which establishes that “it is the State organ whose fundamental mission is to exercise control of the criminal investigation and the exercise of criminal action on behalf of the State, as well as ensuring strict compliance with the Constitution, laws and other legal provisions by State bodies, entities and citizens;” as well as Law 83 of the Article 7 of the 1997 Law of the Attorney General of the Republic.

A new chapter in the Unconventional War against Cuba

It is evident that Cuba is facing a new chapter of the unconventional war, the soft coup or the manual of non-violent struggle that the United States has carried out during contemporary times in several countries, Polanco Fuentes pointed out.

“Yugoslavia, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Nicaragua, Venezuela are some of the examples where these unconventional war actions have been carried out,” he said. “There is sufficient documented information on how the United States has carried out these actions “

As explained, circular TC-1801, one of the main documents of the United States Special Forces, urges taking advantage of the possible vulnerability of the government to overthrow, distance itself from the population, displace the portion of the citizenry that acts in a neutral manner to positions against them, to exploit these elements through subversion and when this does not lead to the desired strategic results, resort to armed conflict, through the promotion of the insurgency.

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Rogelio Polanco Fuentes, Member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of PCC, delivering his special remarks. Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla / Cubadebate

“For that they use all the elements of the model, the economic and psychological point of view, actions of subversion, as well as the massive use of information and communication technologies with the aim of overthrowing those governments with a lower economic cost, political and military,” Polanco Fuentes explained.

In his speech he referred to his personal experience in Venezuela, a country where he served as a diplomatic official. He recalled that in 2013, 2014 and 2017 the so-called guarimbas were deployed. These were violent actions by representatives of opposition sectors in Venezuela to overthrow the Bolivarian government, leading to immense economic and human damage to society:

There is a report from the Venezuelan state, “The truth of Venezuela against infamy: data and testimonies of a country under siege” published in September 2020 that has elements that are related to the actions that are intended to be carried out in our country. This report states that the total number of deaths during the violent protests in February 2014 in Venezuela was 43 people, while in the protests from April to July 2017 the Public Ministry registered 121 deaths and 1958 injured, however, in relation to the protests of 2014 the then secretary of states of the United States John Kerry issued a statement in which he affirmed that the demonstrations were peaceful and accused the Venezuelan government of confronting peaceful protesters by force.

A detailed examination, says the report, of the events that occurred reveals that most of the demonstrations provoked and promoted by opposition leaders between April and July 2017 were carried out in violation of current national and international legislation. These demonstrations led to actions of extreme violence characterized by the use of firearms, Molotov cocktails, mortars and homemade weapons, the placement of barricades, death traps on public roads, damage to institutions, schools, health centers, and siege against military and police facilities. There were three unprecedented practices in the recent history of the country: setting fire to people designated as supporters of the government, using children and adolescents to prepare firebombs,guarding barricades and attacking the security forces, as well as the combination of high levels of violence with religious and patriotic symbols.


The official also highlighted how the report itself acknowledged with concern the fact that the media intended to present these events as peaceful demonstrations. “Some here are beginning to look for so-called non-violent methods of struggle to obtain advice and carry out some of these actions in Cuba,” he said.

Abundant funding for subversion

Regarding financing for subversive actions in other countries, Polanco Fuentes warned that it has been a systematic practice of the governments of the United States, which is why a network of institutions with multimillion-dollar funds has been created.

He emphasized that among the emblematic institutions are the NED and USAID. Polanco recalled that the first was born in 1983 within the so-called Democracy Project to openly do what the CIA had been developing for decades in a covert manner. “The objectives of the NED have always been political subversion and the so-called regime change from a network of organizations that promote courses, events, awards, scholarships, the foundation of NGOs, think tanks, foundations and university centers.”

In his presentation, he explained that among those organizations born in Latin America is Center for Democratic Aperture in Latin America (CADAL), which is part of a wide network of non-governmental organizations that the United States uses to finance and channel financing. for its political operators through the NED and USAID.

Polanco Fuentes said, “There are many public references to the financing of the NED to CADAL as part of the tentacles for the framework against progressive processes in Latin America and other parts of the world. The NED awarded CADAL $107,000 in 2017 and $ 100,000 in 2021 for the project called ‘A regional approach to promote democratic values ​​in Cuba.’”

The links between the United States and its political operators in Cuba

He revealed that two Cuban citizens are part of the generous beneficiaries of the funds of these US organizations: Manuel Cuesta Morúa and Yunior García Aguilera, signatories of the documents delivered to the Cuban authorities regarding the intention to carry out marches in various cities of the country.

Both, he explained, traveled to Argentina in 2018 to participate in an event of this CADAL organization coordinated by the project “Times of change and the new role of the Armed Forces in Cuba.”

Among the objectives of this course, Polanco pointed out, were to give continuity to the FAR stadium to transmit possible scenarios and supposed future allies to activists, cooperate with Cuban actors in order to link with members and former members of the FAR open to change processes. “The subversive, conspiratorial and coup intentions of these projects are clear. You have to be delusional to make a dent in the dignity of our undefeated Revolutionary Armed Forces,” he stressed.

The Cuban politician denounced that both CADAL and its director Gabriel Salvia have been very active in supporting the provocations that are being planned for next month in Cuba.

“In 2019 Cuesta Morúa and García Aguilera continued their training in a workshop sponsored by the San Luis Campus Madrid University,” informed Polanco Fuentes. “There they received lessons from Richard Youngs, an expert on public protests as a method of political change.”

According to Richard Youngs, riots are increasingly a major route through which ordinary people seek to achieve social, political and economic transformation. “Protesters must make tough decisions, do they just disengage from politics or build new kinds of civic campaigns? Do they join existing political parties or do they move away from mainstream politics altogether?” says Youngs in his speeches.

Among the new types of civic campaign, Polanco Fuentes listed the so-called political prisoners, violence, the formation of organizations, as well as the creation of conditions to carry out new demonstrations and the proclamation of new dates for these mobilizations. Actions are also promoted to evade police control and prevent police forces from preserving peace in the country.

He added that the Cuba Money Project website revealed that the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) awarded at the end of September about $6,669,000 for subversive projects in Cuba, out of a total of $18,000,000 that it can allocate until 2023. for these purposes.

“Among the main beneficiaries,” he explained, “are the Cuban Democratic Directorate, led by Orlando Gutiérrez Boronat, which has received $617,500, as well as the media created for the media campaign against Cuba, including ADN Digital with $2,031,260 and Cubanet $783,000. There are more than 70 million dollars that were dedicated during the Trump administration for subversion, to which should be added the more than 100 million the broadcasting office for Cuba of the badly named Radio and Television Marti.”

These organizations, he said, have served as financing for politicians and mercenaries living under the generous spill in Washington. He also recalled that these organizations continue to receive support and funding from the United States authorities, the State Department, the National Security Council and the Embassy in Havana, as denounced by the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba in the recent plenary session of the party organization.

The United States is the organizer of the provocation

“The United States government is the true organizer and promoter of the provocation mounted for November, the facts and statements prove it,” Polanco Fuentes stated. “They have not taken care to hide it. Senior government officials participate directly in its conduct.”

He added that recently the US government threatened new measures against Cuba, if the local operators of its anti-Cuban strategy are not allowed to act with impunity in the country, as stated in an interview by Juan González, director for Western Hemisphere affairs of the National Security Council. He insisted that the administration will act if Cuba processes the organizers of the march:

Cuba does not accept threats, nor is it intimidated. Our history of resistance and dignity confirm this. Save your threats as our people say. Nor are we surprised by the support for this alleged march by violent organizations and notorious terrorists of the anti-Cuban mafia and the hate-generating media center in Miami. We have all witnessed that since it was announced by its organizers, the march received the public and notorious support of US legislators, political operators and the media that encourage actions against the Revolution.

The enthusiastic support of Miami’s anti-Cuban mafia

Polanco stated that tweets, statements, resistance assemblies and other frenzied actions that have occurred these days in Miami, as if the actions were to take place in that city. “Regime change, government overthrow and military intervention”are once again the prevailing narrative in South Florida. Among the most fervent have been some of the congressmen, already known, as active promoters of the blockade and its subversion against Cuba and defenders of the violent riots of July 11.

Among the first to speak is the reconverted terrorist Orlando Gutiérrez Boronat, who has declared that this action will serve to overthrow the regime. This is the head of the so-called Cuban Democratic Directorate, leader of the self-styled Assembly of the Resistance. On December 4, 2020, after the events of November 27, he advocated an armed intervention in Cuba to overthrow the government. After July 11, he has repeatedly called for military intervention in the country.

The USAID and the State Department have awarded the organization at least $6,970,979 from 2006 to 2019, public records show. This character coincides in some platforms for the capitalist restoration in Cuba that have a certain academic profile with one of the promoters of the supposedly peaceful march

Another of the march’s enthusiasts is the Cuban-American National Foundation (CANF), the spearhead of anti-Cuban policies since the 1980s. Besides being the organizer of numerous terrorist acts against Cuba and several attempted attacks against Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz. In 2019, this foundation received $1,385,637 dollars of US taxpayer money to “empower Cuban civil society to build a lasting democracy in Cuba that is free from human rights violations, by improving awareness, the effectiveness of civil society on the island, in non-violent activism and facilitating training materials, communication equipment and technical knowledge ”. These days on its Facebook page, the foundation is giving guidance—he pointed out—on how to go and what to do in the supposedly peaceful and independent march.

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Attendants at Rogelio Polanco Fuente’s special remarks. Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate

Another of the promoters of the violent provocation, Polanco added, is the Cuban citizen Saily González Velázquez who recently recognized the support of the Cuban-American National Foundation through its human rights director, Omar López Montenegro.

The alleged marchers also have the encouragement of the mercenary network of Brigade 2506, whose president on duty declared in Miami that “with these steps, an explosion will be promoted within Cuba, so that our brothers once again take to the streets and this would lead us to the collapse of the regime.” These are the external political operators who call for overthrowing the Revolution, violence and chaos.

The head of the Ideological department in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba warned that another of those whose names appear among the promoters of the provocation is the terrorist Ramón Saúl Sánchez, whose violent record is such that he has not even been able to receive official asylum in the United States, although he has never stopped having the protection of its authorities.

“He has been linked to a dozen terrorist organizations since he was 16 years old, including the Organization for the Liberation of Cuba, Omega 7, Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations (CORU), Alpha 66, National Front for the Liberation of Cuba, Youth of the Star and the Democracy Movement. With Alpha 66 he participated in more than 20 terrorist acts, mainly against ships and diplomatic missions,” denounced Polanco Fuentes.

It also indicated that Ramón Saúl Sánchez was the second head of CORU, an organization that carried out more than 90 terrorist attacks against Cuban facilities in various countries, including within the United States. The most notorious was the bombing of the Cubana de Aviación plane in the airspace of Barbados, where 73 people died.

Documents dated during 1979-1982 link this terrorist to the attack on the Cuban Interests Section in Washington and the repeated assassination attempts on the then Cuban ambassador. “The so-called Democracy Movement has been a promoter of flotillas that have violated Cuban territorial waters on several occasions,” Rogelio Polanco revealed.

Provocation is doomed to fail

“The provocation of November 15 is doomed to failure, it was never authentic,” emphasized Polanco. “Its attempt to cover itself with some legality is a perverse manipulation. The Constitution of the Republic is a genuine creation of the people, there is no plot that it can hide. The promoters of the alleged march follow the Yankee script, carry out their orders, surround themselves with violent men and terrorists and dream of carrying out their destabilizing actions with impunity.” He continued:

With our first party secretary and president of the Republic of Cuba we proclaim that there are enough revolutionaries here to confront with intelligence, with respect and in defense of our constitution; but also with energy and courage any manifestation that tries to destroy the Revolution.

On November 15, Cuba will open its doors to the world and will also open schools to children, that explosion of joy, happiness and hugs so far contained by the hard months of the pandemic. That is the joy that the promoters of hatred intend to frustrate, “but they will not be able to prevent Cuban mothers from enjoying that sublime moment of accompanying their children to the classrooms, nor the tender smiles of the teachers with the return of their longed-for students. They will not be able to prevent Cuba’s triumph in the face of the pandemic thanks to their own vaccines created with the ingenuity of scientists trained in Revolution. Vaccines made possible by the visionary thought and action of Fidel, founder of a genuinely Cuban biopharmaceutical industry.


“They will not be able to prevent the transition towards a new normality, a responsible normality that will allow us to gradually open up our economic and social life in the coming weeks,” pointed out Polanco Fuentes. “They will not be able to prevent the feat of Cuba, of its health professionals, of its workers, of its youth, of an entire people that in creative resistance advances optimistically over colossal adversities. They will not be able to prevent Cuba’s victory in the face of subversion and the criminal blockade of the United States, intensified in the midst of the pandemic, which magnifies our glorious epic.”

“Like our National Hero José Martí,” concluded Polanco, “whom some seek to outrage with their neo-annexationist pretensions, we proclaim ‘…What should true lovers of the country do…? We are here to prevent the enemy from cornering the standard-bearer, or the flag falling into the wrong hands… Here we are vigilance and love, cordiality and sentinel, passion, reasoned by judgment, of everything that bears the name of decorum: Cuban.'”

These are our reasons, the reasons of Cuba!


Featured image: Rogelio Polanco Fuentes, member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, gave a detailed report on the ongoing US attempts of soft coup in Cuba. Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla / Cubadebate.

Translated from Cubadebate by Walter Lippman.

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Thu Nov 04, 2021 1:41 pm

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July 11 Protests in Cuba: A Personal Narrative of Events
November 3, 2021
By Helen Yaffe – Nov 2, 2021

Download PDF: https://www.american.edu/centers/latin- ... ents-3.pdf

Abstract: On Sunday July 11 anti-government protests took place simultaneously in towns and cities throughout Cuba; the first violent protests there for 27 years. The international media depicted mass opposition to the Cuban government, police repression of peaceful protests and a regime in crisis. Cuban American leaders and US politicians called for US intervention, while President Biden labeled Cuba a “failed state”. The Cuban government and its supporters pointed to media manipulation, called out hypocrisy, emphasized the context of economic hardship caused by increased US sanctions compounded by the global pandemic, and implicated US-funded regime change programs, including a social media war on Cuba. This chapter gives a personal account of what happened on July 11 and the following week, juxtaposing external commentary and internal response. It points out that battle lines are being drawn and more conflict is inevitable.
__________

On Sunday 11 July, anti-government protests, apparently coordinated via social media, took place simultaneously in towns and cities throughout Cuba. In several places, including San Antonio de los Baños on the outskirts of Havana, and in Matanzas, where COVID-19 cases had been surging, protests turned violent, with windows smashed, shops looted, cars overturned, rocks thrown, and people assaulted. These were the first violent protests in Cuba since the maleconazo of 1994, 27 years ago. The international media depicted mass opposition to the Cuban government, police repression of peaceful protests and a regime in crisis. Cuban American leaders and US politicians, called for US intervention, while US President Joseph Biden labelled Cuba as a “failed state”. The Cuban government and its supporters pointed to media manipulation, called out hypocrisy, emphasized the context of economic hardship caused by increased US sanctions compounded by the global pandemic, and implicated US-funded regime change programs, including a social media war on Cuba.

Commentators are unlikely to agree on how to narrate the events of 11 July in Cuba; some will depict the protests as a “cause”, others as an “effect”; some will consider them “surprising”, others “inevitable”; some will describe them as “internal and spontaneous”, others as “externally orchestrated”; some will portray them as peaceful, others as violent. Facts do not speak for themselves; they take place within a context and are filtered and ranked by the analyst. I happened to be in Cuba on that day, and this is an account of events as I understand them.

Sunday 11 July
Between 10-11am on 11 July, in the church park in San Antonio de los Baños, a town on the outskirts of Havana, residents answering a post on Facebook gathered ostensibly to protest recent electricity blackouts and, while they were at it, to demand regime change. The Facebook administrator’s post mentioned the lack of electricity, but his pre-prepared slogans for the protest were overtly political, or anti-communist, rather than expressing practical demands.[iUsing the pseudonym Danilo Roque with the decapitated head of the Cuban President as his profile picture, the Facebook administrator had called for Cubans to take to the streets several times since 2019, to no avail. ‘Then the situation worsened with COVID-19 and the lack of medicines’, he told a journalist for El Estornudo website. ‘And so we were waiting for the opportune occasion for the people to come out to express their feelings’. Occurring during summer and the COVID-19 surge, the electricity blackouts created that ‘opportune occasion’, said Roque. ‘My team and I decided that this was the moment to strike, given that the government was concentrating on COVID-19’.[ii]

They marched through the neighborhood, attempting to enter the local police station, before returning to the park, and soon stones and bottles were thrown. Streamed live on social media, the protest was amplified by members of the external and domestic opposition, including Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara of the San Isidro Movement, who urged the population to take to the streets across the island.[iii] Within the hour thousands of Cubans had heeded that call. In some places, protestors looted shops, walking off with washing machines, mattresses, and bottles of rum. Cars were over-turned, and fights broke out with citizens or police who confronted the protestors. Footage from Havana shows youths striding through the streets clutching rocks or throwing them at police patrol cars. In some places, Cuban ‘black berets’, special forces or plain clothes state security agents poured onto the streets and arrests were made. In others places few police were seen and the protests did not turn violent. In Cárdenas, a town in Matanzas province near the resort city of Varadero, stones were thrown at the Julio Aristegui Villamil children’s hospital, terrifying infant COVID-19 patients, their parents, and medical staff.[iv]

While these mobilizations appeared to be spontaneous, Peruvian media analyst Jota, points to evidence of pre-planning and coordination. Placards displayed the logo of the organization “Cuba Decide”, an exile organization set up in Miami in 2015, and the same political slogans echoed from one place to the next. Claiming to have “scrupulously” analyzed the footage available, Jota states that protests of 100 to 500 people took place in 12 towns and cities. He also claimed that the twitter accounts of Rosa María Payá and the Fundación para la Democracia Panamericana, which are linked to Cuba Decide, had published edited graphic material about the protests “flyers, videographics, denunciations about detentions” since 9am. that same day.[v]

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel responded to events on Sunday 11 July like Fidel Castro during the maleconazo in 1994. He arrived at San Antonio de los Baños shortly after 2pm. Footage shows him speaking to local people and the press, and leading a march through the streets, accompanied by members of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party (CCP) and local CCP leaders and residents. He acknowledged their frustrations, with the electricity blackouts, medicine shortages and surging COVID-19 cases. The temporary electricity blackout was due to repairs being carried out on generators, he explained, adding that the issues were linked as the need to prioritize the electrical and medical supply to the new centers, which had been opened due to the increase in COVID-19 patients, had exacerbated the scarcity experienced by the general population.

In the midst of this situation, he stated, the “Cuban Mafia” had paid YouTubers and social media influencers to create a campaign, using as a pretext the situation in Cuba, particularly in Matanzas, to call for demonstrations throughout the country. He talked about people being confused and manipulated by social media, “you know that social media works with emotions and people have limits, we understand, and they are living with scarcity.” There are even confused revolutionaries, he said, who went out to express their dissatisfaction. “But there is also a group of people, counterrevolutionaries, mercenaries, paid by the US government, or indirectly paid through US government agencies to set up this type of demonstration.” The streets belong to the revolutionaries, he asserted to applause, warning “gusanos” and mercenaries that if they broke the law they would be dealt with. “I put myself first among the many here willing to give our lives for the revolution.” We can improve things in Cuba, he said, but we need the US blockade to be lifted.[vi]

At 4pm. Díaz-Canel appeared on state television to inform the public about the protests, echoing the points made in San Antonio earlier, concluding with the similar declaration: “We are calling on all the revolutionaries in the country, all the communists, to take to the streets in any of the places where these provocations are going to take place. Today, from now, and in all these days, to confront it decisively, firmly, with courage… the order to combat is given, revolutionaries to the streets.”[vii] Some Cubans had already gathered outside places of work and education after seeing reports of the protests on social media. Following Díaz-Canel’s televised speech, thousands of Cubans took to the streets in towns and cities around the country in support of the government and Cuban socialism. According to Cuban reports, prior to Díaz-Canel’s live broadcast, 19 state-owned shops and establishments had been attacked; during the half hour of his televised speech another 10 were ransacked and after 4.30pm., 15 more shops were vandalized.[viii] Most of those shops were in Matanzas.

The anti-government protests had ended within hours and the streets were back under control of the authorities and government supporters. Internet access via mobile phone data was suspended, presumably to prevent social media being used to coordinate more protests.

Monday 12 July
On Monday 12 July, there was a tense calm, with life continuing as normal. Cubans gathered outside some workplaces, like the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television on La Rampa (Calle 23) in Havana, ready to defend them in case of attack. Travelling across Havana on public transport and in taxis, I heard car radios and saw workplace televisions tuned into a live four-hour broadcast by the President, government Ministers and CCP leaders who discussed the events of the previous day, the shortages and the obstacles each ministry faced in the context of the pandemic and suffocating sanctions, and denounced US intervention.

The Cuban Minister of Energy and Mines explained the causes of the electricity blackouts suffered in San Antonio over the previous days. Díaz-Canel, an electrical engineering graduate, added context explaining how US sanctions, particularly the imposition of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act, had generated economic difficulties and fuel shortages.[ix] Cuba’s national electrical system operates with different technologies, or generators, which require different types of fuel, he said, but delays in obtaining specific fuels led to overloading other generators. There were also problems with getting spare parts for repairs, and with the finances to purchase them, both a result of the intensification of financial persecution through sanctions introduced under the Trump administration. Again, he explained how the need to prioritize the electrical supply to hospitals under strain from the COVID-19 pandemic and patient isolation centers put additional stress of Cuba’s generation capacity.

Another violent protest took place in Arroyo Naranjo, another town on the outskirts of Havana, in which one person died, and others sustained injuries, including police. It was reported on state news.[x] Small skirmishes took place over the following days. Police began arresting people at their homes who had been identified as participating. Given the abundance of film footage posted on social media by participants, it cannot have been difficult to identify them.

Many Cubans began to download and connect to the internet using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) called Psiphon, described by Bloomberg as an “anti-censorship tool supported by the US government to evade blackouts of social media such as Facebook”.[xi] Psiphon is funded by the US Agency for Global Media’s Open Technology Fund and in 2010 began providing services to the US Department of State, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and the US Broadcasting Board of Governors, a US government agency which manages Radio Martí and Television Martí, which were set up to broadcast propaganda to Cuba in violation of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) regulations.

Tuesday 13 July
At an international press conference on Tuesday 13 July, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez presented evidence of a new media campaign financed from the United States to foster internal opposition. His accusations included the following: On 15 June, the hashtag #SOSCuba was launched by a US company the same day it was authorized to receive Florida state funding. On 5 July, hashtags appeared calling for a ‘humanitarian corridor’ or ‘humanitarian intervention’ in Cuba. Bots and troll farms were used to disseminate messages on Twitter through false accounts, including one doing five retweets per second on 10 and 11 July. Twitter users had changed their geolocation to appear to be in Cuba.[xii] Similar evidence had been highlighted the previous day by Spanish analyst Julián Macías Tovar who, as Ed Agustin reported for The Guardian, “found that the #SOSCuba campaign had been driven by accounts linked to Atlas Network, a free-market consortium of more than 500 organizations that have received funding from ExxonMobil and the Koch brothers. Twitter accounts of Atlas Network members have been involved in bot or troll center campaigns in recent elections in Peru and Ecuador, as well as the 2019 civic-military coup in Bolivia.”[xiii] Macías Tovar also revealed that the first twitter account to use the hashtag #SOSCuba in relation to the COVID-19 surge in Matanzas had a Spanish flag in its biography. The number of tweets using that hashtag peaked for two days before the 11 July protest and “one of the main accounts was that of Antonneti from the Fundación Libertad de Argentina.”[xiv]

Wednesday 14 July
Internet access improved beginning on Wednesday 14 July. The worried messages I received from people outside Cuba and the foreign media reports that I could now read indicated the extraordinary misreporting underway about the extent and significance of the protests. This was so blatant that even Reuters published a “fact check” article to correct reports circulating the image of the 2018 May Day parade, with hundreds of thousands pouring into Revolution Square in Havana, mislabeled as the anti-government protests from 3 days earlier.[xv] Numerous mainstream outlets, including the New York Times and El País published photos of government supporters in the streets, describing them as opposition activists.[xvi] Photos of protests in Egypt, sports celebrations in Argentina, looting in South Africa, and police repression of Catalan activists were all presented as showing the Cuban protests of 11 July.

In an interview with Fox News, the Mayor of Miami, Francis Suárez, called for the option of airstrikes against Cuba to be “explored”, citing US military intervention in Panama and Kosovo, and the assassination of Osama Bin Laden in sovereign Pakistan as relevant precedents. Footage played during the interview, showed Cubans marching in support of the revolution in the background, with the July 26th Movement flags of supporters of the Revolution and the messages on their placards blurred out, suggesting intent.[xvii] US Senator Ted Cruz was interviewed with the same footage behind.[xviii]

On social media there were accusations of mass disappearances, systemic torture and even missing children. Photos of unnamed victims were presented, which were then identified by social media analysts as originating in other countries. The hundreds arrested and detained were reported as “disappeared”. The Cuban news did not cover up these accusations but aired them and sought to expose them as lies during dedicated television programs.

Friday 16 July
US Senator Marsha Blackburn (Republican-Tennessee), tweeted: “Over 1.3 million Cubans have been able to access the internet today thanks to @PsiphonInc, an open-source tool supported by the bipartisan Open Technology Fund my colleagues and I championed. We must stand with those opposing authoritarian regimes.”[xix] According to Psiphon, the number of daily unique users in Cuba was negligible on 10 July, rising exponentially to 1.3 million by 15 July.[xx]

That same day, a tweet by UN Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, called on the Cuban government to release detainees, used the image of a black woman holding a Cuban flag and shouting in the street. The woman featured, Betty Pairol Quesada, responded angrily on Twitter: “I strongly denounce the use and manipulation of my image as a symbol of the protests by delinquents and vandals in Cuba. We are continuity, long live the Revolution. #NoMoreBlockadeofCuba.”[xxi] Twitter swiftly blocked her account.[xxii]

That evening, Cuban TV presented a video widely circulated on social media apparently showing a Cuban police officer shooting a man at his home, with the camera pausing on a pool of blood on the floor. The presenter showed alternative footage of the man walking calmly to the police car in handcuffs following his arrest and of him being interviewed at his home, in good health, three days later.[xxiii] Every day there were also special news programs about the protests and the arrests and detentions, including the legal process which police must follow.

At the end of the evening news, it was announced that there would be rally on the Malecón in the morning, in support of the government and the socialist Revolution. This was the first mass rally called amidst the strict epidemiological restrictions imposed 16 months earlier.[xxiv] The rally would be restricted to under 200,000, the news announcer said.

Saturday 17 July
Before dawn thousands of Cubans were already gathering at La Piragua on the Malecón. We joined the rally, interviewing diverse participants on camera and asking why they were there. The resounding response was to demand an end to the US blockade and US interference. It was a short event, addressed by Díaz-Canel, who denounced a false narrative, which blamed the violence of the previous Sunday on his call for revolutionaries to take to the streets. Cuban internet news outlets had been subject to “denial of service” attacks aimed to silence Cuba’s ability to counter the opposition narrative, he said.[xxv] Gerardo Hernández of the Cuban Five, now President of the Committees in Defense of the Cuban Revolution also spoke. Former President Raúl Castro was present, along with other ministers. Spirits were high and while the event was serious, it also ended jubilantly with music and Cubans dancing in the road.[xxvi]

The following week/s…
The Cuban government and state media continued to address the accusations of disappearances and other issues related to the protests. For example, a television discussion on 21 July, explained the legal framework under which detentions took place, including the obligation to inform detainees´ families within 24-hours. An Interior Ministry official, Victor Álvarez, said “These lists [of disappeared] are a fallacy of the Revolution’s enemies… we have proved that many of these people are not currently detained”. The Head of the Department of Penal Processes, José Luis Reyes, claimed that since 12 July, 63 people had requested information about a detained person or had made a complaint about a detention. Among this list of “supposedly disappeared people”, he added, “there is a group that has been released, some of them received fines and others have received a caution.”[xxvii]

On 22 July, President Biden reneged on his electoral campaign promises to unwind Trump policy on Cuba, announcing that his administration would use the Magnitsky Act to impose new sanctions on Cuban individuals, starting with Álvaro López Miera, the head of Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces and the Cuban Ministry of the Interior’s Special National Brigade. He also announced a plan to roll out US-controlled internet access to Cubans, which would be outside of Cuban government control.[xxviii]

The Cuban government and the CCP have categorized the protestors into four groups: “counter-revolutionaries” paid and operating under US regime change programs; criminals who took advantage of the situation to loot; people genuinely frustrated by daily hardships; and young people who feel disenfranchised.[xxix] It is the latter two groups that state institutions are now focusing their political work on. Díaz-Canel and Gerardo Hernández, with others, have visited poorer communities, including those where violent protests took place, dialoguing with residents. They aim to reinvigorate the social and political organizations at the neighborhood level.

Resurrecting a program of the Battle of Ideas of the early 2000s, on 26 July 2021, the Union of Young Communists launched new Youth Brigades of Social Work, “groups of prevention and social attention at the Popular Council level”. On 5 August they began to visit homes in the 302 poorer neighborhoods identified to find out about the problems those communities face.[xxx] Within five weeks of the protests, 3,400 university students, young teachers and other professionals had joined these brigades.[xxxi] The CCP was also working to strengthen its institutional presence and influence at the level of the Popular Councils.

Meanwhile, the Facebook page for residents of San Antonio joined calls for a national mobilization to take place on November 20. The Cuban government announced its annual national defense military exercises for three days (November 18-20). In response the opposition brought forward their day of action to November 15. On October 12 Cuban authorities denied permission for the proposed marches, stating that some of the organizers who “have ties to subversive organizations or agencies financed by the United States government, have manifest intentions of promoting a change in the political system of Cuba”.[xxxii] The battle lines are being drawn and more conflict is inevitable.

Notes
[i Instructions were: ‘El clamor va a ser lo siguiente: -Váyanse del gobierno, -Libertad para el pueblo, -Díaz-Canel sing…, -Somos más y no tenemos miedo, -Queremos ayuda.’ Carla Gloria Colomé, ‘11 de julio en San Antonio de los Baños: Lo que se ve/lo que no se ve’, 22 July 2021. https://revistaelestornudo.com/san-anto ... ulio-cuba/

[ii] Colomé, 11 de julio en San Antonio.

[iii] ‘El artista y ex preso político Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara llamó a manifestarse contra la dictadura castrista: “Me voy al Malecón cueste lo que me cueste”’, Infobae, 11 July 2021. https://www.infobae.com/america/america ... me-cueste/

[iv] CubaSi, ‘En Video: Detalles sobre el ataque al hospital territorial Julio Aristegui Villamil el 11 de julio’, 16 Julio 2021. https://cubasi.cu/es/noticia/en-video-d ... l-el-11-de.

[v] Prensa Alternativa – El Jota, ‘¡Poderosa ONG está implicada en las movilizaciones en Cuba!’ YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiiuzF6MazM

[vi] Canal Caribe, ‘Presidente de Cuba recorrió San Antonio de los Baños’ 12 July 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-qd6XkgIKg

[vii] Radio Cubana, ‘Intervención íntegra del Presidente de #Cuba Miguel Díaz-Canel este 11 de Julio’, 12 July 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnGMSGSVnOk

[viii] Canal Caribe, ‘¿Qué hay detrás de los actos violentos en Cuba el 11 de julio?’, 17 July 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdWWDbxwbj8

[ix] CiberCuba, ‘EN DIRECTO: Miguel Díaz-Canel habla al pueblo de Cuba tras una jornada de protestas’, 12 July 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcge7dVTlDo

[x] Nota Informativa del Ministerio del Interior de Cuba, 14 Julio. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6LLivUYHB0

[xi] Brody Fort, ‘Over 1 Million Cubans Evade Internet Curbs With U.S.-Backed Tech’, Bloomberg, 16 July 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... acked-tech

[xii] ‘En vivo: Canciller cubano, Bruno Rodríguez, ofrece Conferencia de Prensa (+Video)’, Granma, 13 July 2021. www.granma.cu/mundo/2021-07-13/en-vivo- ... 1-15-07-58

[xiii] Ed Agustin, ‘Why the internet in Cuba has become a US political hot potato’, 3 August 2021, The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... hot-potato

[xiv] Julián Macías Tovar, Twitter. https://twitter.com/JulianMaciasT/statu ... 0434412548 and https://twitter.com/JulianMaciasT/statu ... 5207440388

[xv] Reuters Fact Check, ‘Fact Check-Photo shows 2018 Cuba May Day march, not 2021 protests’, 14 July 2021,

https://www.reuters.com/article/factche ... SL1N2OQ2DI. The article itself exposed misreporting in a Reuters tweet which labelled photos of Cubans holding a portrait of Fidel Castro as ‘anti-government demonstrations’.

[xvi] Pascual Serrano provides many examples of false reporting and manipulative use of photos, ‘La democracia es desinformar sobre Cuba’, El Diario, 19 July 2021. https://www.eldiario.es/opinion/zona-cr ... 49927.html

[xvii] Gustaf Kilander, ‘Miami mayor calls on Biden to consider airstrikes against Cuba’, Independent, 14 July 2021. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... 84238.html

[xviii]Alan MacLeod, Twitter. https://twitter.com/AlanRMacLeod/status ... 7378629636

[xix] Marsha Blackburn, Twitter. https://twitter.com/MarshaBlackburn/sta ... 0748237824

[xx] Psiphon Inc., Twitter. https://twitter.com/psiphoninc/status/1 ... 7301185537

[xxi] Betty Pairol, Twitter. https://twitter.com/BettyPairol/status/ ... 3184340992

[xxii] Pairol’s twitter account remained ‘temporarily restricted’ on 4 October 2021 when last checked. She recorded a similar message via Facebook, denouncing the media manipulation of her photo and demanding the US government end the US blockade. Betty Pairol, Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/betty.pairolqu ... 7167155070

[xxiii] Cubadebate, ‘Desmintiendo fake news y campaña mediática en redes sociales contra Cuba’, 17 July. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zz3ItstwX_o. Cuban news had already discussed this video on Wednesday 15 July.

[xxiv] From April to June 2021, mobilizations took place on the last Sunday of the month as part of the international ‘caravanas’ against the US blockade of Cuba, with people in cars, on motorbikes, bicycles, on foot or sitting outdoors with social distancing.

[xxv] Oscar Figueredo Reinaldo and Abel Padrón Padilla, ‘Pueblo habanero toma La Piragua en defensa de la Revolución y el socialismo’, 17 July 2021. www.cubadebate.cu/noticias/2021/07/17/p ... evolucion/

[xxvi] Helen Yaffe, Twitter. https://twitter.com/HelenYaffe/status/1 ... 0465427458 and https://twitter.com/HelenYaffe/status/1 ... 8011821060

[xxvii] CubaSi, ‘EN VIDEO: ¿Desaparecidos en Cuba o fantasmas de las fake news?’, 21 July 2021. https://cubasi.cu/es/noticia/en-video-d ... -fake-news. On 4 August, 62 people had been tried in municipal courts following arrests related to 11 July; 53 of them for public disorder and the rest for resistance, contempt, and instigation to commit a crime and cause harm, which carry sentences from a 300 peso fine and one year in prison. One was acquitted and 45 were appealing. The cases of those accused of more violent or serious crimes were still under investigation. Oscar Figueredo Reinaldo, ‘Así marchan las investigaciones penales tras los sucesos del 11 de julio en Cuba’, 4 August 2021, CubaDebate. http://www.cubadebate.cu/noticias/2021/ ... o-en-cuba/.

[xxviii] Marc Caputo and Sabrina Rodríguez, ‘Biden sanctions Cuban regime after crackdown on protesters’, Politico, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/2 ... uba-500534

[xxix] Andrea Rodríguez, ‘Cuban government rallies backers following big protests’, AP News, 17 July 2021. https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-bu ... 9e44cdc25c

[xxx] ‘Constituyen Brigadas Juveniles de Trabajo Social para laborar en 302 comunidades vulnerables’, CubaDebate, 1 August 2021. http://www.cubadebate.cu/noticias/2021/ ... lnerables/

[xxxi] For a full account of the Battle of Ideas see chapter 3, Helen Yaffe, We Are Cuba! How a Revolutionary People Have Survived in a Post-Soviet World, Yale University Press, 2020.

[xxxii] See the reply by Alexis Acosta Silva, Intendente of the Administrative Council of la Habana Vieja on October 12, 2021, “Respuesta al documento presentado sobre la decisión de realizar una marcha con fines desestabilizadores”


Featured image: File Photo

https://orinocotribune.com/11-july-prot ... of-events/

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Cuba Faces CIA’s Most Complex Cultural Warfare Operation

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The Cuban government has made public evidence that the leader of the so-called Archipelago platform, Yunior Garcia Aguilera, is seeking a confrontation with the island's security forces to generate insecurity and destabilization. | Photo: Twitter @rcmenglish

Published 3 November 2021

On Twitter, Cuba's Deputy Foreign Minister Anayansi Rodríguez described a U.S. plan to bring Cuba's political system down, combining social media, digital communication media, and influence over the cultural sector.


A Cuban government representative said that Cuba has probably been facing up the largest and most complex cultural warfare operation orchestrated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), promoting a new type of counterrevolution.

On Twitter, Cuba's Deputy Foreign Minister Anayansi Rodríguez posted a U.S. plan to bring Cuba's political system down, which combines social media, digital communication media, and influence over the cultural sector.

As Ms. Rodríguez explained, the U.S. operation appeals to well-trained young people to be "leaders for change" in foreign universities or the U.S. embassies themselves.

However, these leaders "are exposed and end up being unmasked. Truth and virtue prevail," Ms. Rodríguez tweeted, referring to recent statements by Cuban Dr. Carlos Leonardo Vázquez, who have served as agent "Fernando" for the Cuban Intelligence Services for 25 years.


A new type of counterrevolution to bring down the Cuban Revolution through social networks, digital media, and a strategy of influence on the academic sector. Probably the most extensive and most complex cultural war operation designed by the CIA.
On Monday, Dr. Leonardo Vázquez, an undercover Cuban intelligence officer, revealed some links of well-known terrorist organizations and their representatives with forthcoming Nov. 15 demonstration promoters, an initiative led by Yunior García, head of the Archipelago platform.

On National TV news, he revealed the relations of this young playwright with people who have a history of attacks on Cuba and thinking tanks promoting political subversion from the United States.

Vázquez participated with Yunior García in training courses for political leaders at the service of foreign interests. In 2019, they both participated in a workshop sponsored by the U.S. University of Saint Louis, where "the role of armed forces in a transition process" was one of the main issues.

One of the speakers attending the meeting was Richard Young, an expert in public protests as a political and social change method. During the workshop, Young referred to the new forms of civic activism as a way to establish a fundamentalist and privatizing capitalism.


The TV program also aired a conversation between Yunior García and Ramón Saúl Sánchez Rizo, a well-known terrorist linked to organizations such as Alpha 66, Omega 7, the National Liberation Front of Cuba and the Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations (CORU).

Other disclosures came from Saily González, spokeswoman for the Archipelago platform in the central province of Villa Clara. She acknowledged support and advice from Omar López, director for Human Rights at the Cuban American National Foundation.

Dr. Vázquez specified that the intention of the Nov. 15 demonstration, which municipal governments across the island denied as being unconstitutional, was "to set off chaos and social disobedience."

"Yunior is seeking confrontation with the armed forces, with the Interior Ministry (MININT). He is calling for a march he says is peaceful, but he knows it is not," Dr. Vázquez stated.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Cub ... -0018.html

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Cuba as an Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

November 1, 2021
By Rosa Miriam Elizalde – Oct 28, 2021

The piggy bank rang again. Less than a month ago, in September 2021, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) awarded 6 million 669 thousand dollars in grants for projects aimed at “regime change” in Cuba, a euphemism to avoid saying “direct intervention by a foreign power”.

The current Democratic administration has especially favored the International Republican Institute (IRI) with a bipartisan generosity that Donald Trump never had. Other groups in Florida, Washington and Madrid that have called for an invasion of the island and painted an apocalyptic picture of Havana have also received lavish allocations, thus assuring more money next year.

The USpublic coffers seem inexhaustible for the anti-Castro industry. In the last year, at least 54 organizations have benefited from the Cuba programs of the State Department, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). In the last 20 years, this agency has granted Creative Associates International, a CIA front, more than 1.8 billion dollars for espionage, propaganda and the recruitment of agents of “change” on the island. One of its best known projects, the so-called “Cuban Twitter” or ZunZuneo, turned out to be a superb failure that uncovered a web of corruption and flagrant violations of U.S. law. ZunZuneo cost the USAID director his job, but Creative Associates International’s operations are still going strong, now undercover.

US researcher Tracey Eaton, who for years has followed the path of these funds, commented in a recent interview that many of the financing programs for “regime change” in Cuba are so furtive that we will probably never know who all the recipients are or the total amount, and judging by the millions known, the subsidy must have reached a pharaoh like figure. Democracy-building strategies are considered “trade secrets” and are exempt from disclosure under the US Freedom of Information Act, according to letters Eaton has received from the State Department and USAID.

The US freaks out at the supposed hint of Russian, Chinese or Islamic intrusion into local politics and online platforms. Yet it does not hesitate for a minute to rudely intervene in Cuba, as exposed by the digital newspaper MintPress News, which documented how private Facebook groups instigated the July 11 riots in several Cuban cities. “The involvement of foreign citizens in Cuba’s internal affairs is at a level that is hardly conceivable in the United States,” the publication says, adding, “The people who provoked the July 11 protests in Cuba are still planning similar actions for October and November.”

The military superpower’s plans for political subversion are an embarrassment and a scandal, but nothing indicates that Washington will now achieve what it could not in 60 years. In fact, this obsession of the US government is two centuries old, as Louis A. Perez, a researcher at the University of North Carolina, has shown in a brilliant essay entitled Cuba as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

“The Cuba issue has rarely been a subject of reasoned disquisition. It defies easy explanation, and it certainly cannot be understood solely – or even primarily – within the logic of the policy calculus that fleshes out US foreign relations, mainly because there is no logic,” the historian writes.

What is logical is the permanence of Cuban “intransigence” over time. Ernesto Che Guevara used to repeat in his speeches in the early years of the 1959 revolution that “Cuba will not be another Guatemala”. That is to say, its independence from the US empire would not be boycotted with media bombings first, induced mobilizations and military attacks later.

The habit of overthrowing pro-independence alternatives is so long and the arrogance of overwhelming military and media force so blind, that the US government has not been able to foresee its continuous defeats nor has it overcome the trauma of having a Levantine island “almost within sight of our shores”, as John Quincy Adams said, and to top it all, without the slightest interest in being “the missing state between the entrance to the Gulf and the exit of the vast Mississippi Valley”.

The great truth of all this, comments Louis A. Perez wisely, is that Cubans have learned from history, but Washington has not.

Featured image: File photo

(Resumen Latinoamericano – English)

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Sun Nov 07, 2021 3:10 pm

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How US Interference in Cuba Creates a False Picture of its Society
November 5, 2021
By Manolo de Los Santos and Vijay Prashad – Oct 29, 2021

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) appears to be obsessed with Cuba. Every few days he takes to social media or makes remarks to the press about his desire to overthrow the Cuban Revolution. In recent months, Rubio has played a key role in drumming up support for anti-government protests in Cuba. On September 23, 2021, for instance, Rubio tweeted, “The brave people of Cuba lost their fear of protesting against the dictatorship that represses them. Holguín raises its voice against tyranny.” Rubio included an article about the Cuban town of Holguín in his tweet, where “a group of Cuban citizens” are planning to hold a “march against violence” on November 20. This article appeared in Diario de Cuba, a news site based in Miami, Florida, which received substantial funding from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) from 2016 to 2019, an independent nonprofit that is largely funded by “the U.S. Congress.”

A quick study of the Diario de Cuba website reveals that it regularly publishes news relating to Marco Rubio’s views against the Cuban government. According to the Diario de Cuba article shared by Rubio on the November 20 march, the initiative has been promoted by a group called Archipiélago that proposes to carry out such peaceful demonstrations throughout Cuba. Rubio has extended his support for the march and on September 29 tweeted about a request by the citizens of Guantánamo seeking similar permission to hold a march on November 20. In his tweet, he shared an article from the news site CiberCuba, which is operated from Florida and Spain. There are several other news sites reporting on Cuba that are funded by the United States government and by foundations like the Open Society and NED, including ADN Cuba, Cubanos por el Mundo, Cubita NOW, CubaNet, El Estornudo, Periodismo de Barrio, Tremenda Nota, El Toque, and YucaByte.

A wide range of these U.S. government-funded websites and politicians such as Rubio have been leading the propaganda to support more protests in Cuba. On October 5, the U.S. administration of President Joe Biden also provided support to this agenda. The U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Brian Nichols tweeted, “The fight for a free press and free expression continues in Cuba.” Meanwhile, during an event hosted by Georgetown Americas Institute, Juan Gonzalez, the senior director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council, criticized the Cuban government for arresting artists and protesters. “[W]hen you put artists in jail for singing and for demanding freedom, there’s something wrong with you,” he said.

November 15

On October 9, the U.S. Embassy in Havana issued a statement that criticized the Cuban government’s decision “to hold military exercises throughout the country on November 18 and 19, ending on November 20 with National Defense Day,” calling it “a blatant attempt to intimidate Cubans.” The Cuban government holds this regular exercise to prepare its 11 million citizens for multiple scenarios that range from a possible U.S. invasion to natural disasters. Normally military personnel, the civil defense forces, and members of the general population participate.

To counter this announcement, Archipiélago announced on its Facebook page that the march would now be moved to November 15 (from November 20), the day Cuban authorities are expected to open its border to tourism. Meanwhile, several U.S. government officials and U.S. elected officials gave their support to what is now being called the 15N March.

The first wave of support came from the U.S. elected officials—most of them children of Cuban exiles—who have publicly committed themselves to overthrowing the Cuban Revolution. On October 10, Florida Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar gave her support for the 15N March. The Biden administration, she told the host of a news program on a Miami television channel, must provide Cuban protesters with clandestine internet access. Two days later, on October 12, Senator Rubio criticized the Cuban government for censoring news about the march, while on October 15 Florida Congressman Carlos Giménez, the child of Cuban parents who were landowners before 1959, also tweeted in support of the march. Giménez included an article from the Hill in his tweet that referred to 15N as a “civil liberties protest.” Florida’s other senator, Rick Scott, joined Rubio in tweeting that the U.S. government “can’t sit on the sidelines during this fight for freedom in Cuba.” Scott has introduced a bill in the Senate to increase economic sanctions on Cuba. Meanwhile, the Cuban government denied permission to Archipiélago to hold the march on November 15.

Soon after, on October 16, the U.S. State Department published a statement that condemned the Cuban government’s decision to “deny permission for peaceful protests.” U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price tweeted on October 16 about the U.S. support for “peaceful assembly” by the Cuban people, which was retweeted by the U.S. Embassy in Havana on the same day. On October 17, Nichols also tweetedabout the Cuban denial for the 15N protest. This was retweeted by the U.S. Embassy in Havana and by Bradley Freden, interim U.S. permanent representative to the Organization of American States.

On October 20, Nichols shared a Human Rights Watch report on the July protests in Cuba to once more criticize the government for preventing peaceful marches. Two days later, on October 22, Gonzalez warned that the U.S. would have to take action if Cuba does not allow the 15N protest to take place.

The atmosphere is charged. The U.S. government and right-wing Cubans who are in the U.S. Congress have tried to define the terrain for events in mid-November in Cuba. They will ramp up pressure to overthrow the government.

Arrange an Accident

In April 2021, the National Security Archive declassified the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency top-secret documents about Cuba. These documents showed that in July 1960, the U.S. government planned to assassinate Raúl Castro by paying a Cubana Airlines pilot to crash his plane. High-level CIA officials who were part of the agency at the time (former CIA Deputy Director of Plans Tracy Barnes, former CIA head of the Western Hemisphere Division J.C. King and a former CIA officer in Cuba William J. Murray) worked with the Cuban pilot (José Raul Martínez) to ensure a “fatal accident” that would lead to the death of Raúl Castro. The pilot, however, never found the “opportunity” to carry out such an accident.

The attempt on Raúl Castro’s life is one of many projects by the U.S. government to overthrow the Cuban Revolution, including 638 attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro and the invasion at the Bay of Pigs in 1961.

Reading the CIA documents from 1960 onward, most of which are available in the CIA reading room, shows how cliched—and yet dangerous—the attempts to overthrow the Cuban Revolution by the U.S. government have been. The buildup to 15N bears all the marks of this history, one ghoulish plot both cooked up in and executed by Washington and Miami.



Featured image: Photograph Source: Edgardo W. Olivera – CC BY 2.0

(Counter Punch)

https://orinocotribune.com/how-us-inter ... society-2/

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US Congress Passes Resolution Promoting Destabilization in Cuba

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The U.S. Congress has approved a new resolution to support numerous destabilization actions in Cuba, sponsored by Florida lawmakers opposing the Cuban government. | Photo: Twitter/@NewsLatinPress
Published 5 November 2021

40 Democrats, on the other hand, opposed this resolution including Mass. Representative Jim McGovern, for whom such a provision does not recognize the U.S. contribution to the “suffering” of Cubans with the economic blockade imposed over 60 years ago.

The U.S. Congress has approved a new resolution to support numerous destabilization actions in Cuba, sponsored by Florida lawmakers opposed to the Cuban government.

As many as 382 lawmakers backed up the July riots, as protesters egged on from abroad through a media hype campaign and social networks to take to the streets in Cuba and commit violent acts.

Among U.S. lawmakers are Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart and Dem. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, who, without mentioning the U.S. blockade, asked the Cuban government to respect the rights of its people.

40 Democrats, on the other hand, opposed this resolution, including Mass. Representative Jim McGovern, for whom such a provision does not recognize the U.S. contribution to the “suffering” of Cubans with the economic blockade imposed over 60 years ago.

On Twitter, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez called the U.S. policy towards Cuba as hypocritical and accused the U.S. government of financing subversive actions on Cuba.


In recent days, the Cuban government has presented a great number of evidence of links between promoters of an unlawful march to be conducted in Cuba and representatives of differente U.S. organizations, including the Cuban-American National Foundation and the Florida-based Democracy Movement.

The Cuban-American extreme right, based in the United States, along with government representatives, made explicit their support for these actions and reiterated their burning desire that the destabilization actions spark regime change in Cuba.

In this regard, specialists have warned about the unconventional warfare or the script of a soft coup d’état that is being applied in Cuba following the parameters of an alleged "non-violent struggle."

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US- ... -0019.html

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Cuba Sends New Shipment of Soberana 02 Vaccines to Nicaragua

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Cuba sends to Nicaragua another load of vaccines vs COVID19, Soberana 02, to complete in that country the necessary doses for pediatric immunization. | Photo: Twitter/@EmbacubaChina
Published 5 November 2021

Cuba sent this Friday to Nicaragua another load of the COVID-19 vaccine, Soberana 02, to complete in that country the necessary doses for its pediatric immunization campaign, informed the Finlay Institute, in charge of its production.


In a message on its Twitter account, the Cuban entity detailed that Cuba has already shown a significant reduction in the incidence of COVID-19 in the two to 18 age group, thanks to the vaccination campaign developed in Cuba with its own products Soberana 02 and Soberana Plus.

In this Central American nation, the national vaccination campaign against the disease in pediatric ages began last October 25 and has been extended to the population segment between two and 17 years of age.

For this purpose, Cuba had already sent a first shipment of 1,200,000 doses of the vaccines developed in the country against COVID-19, Soberana 02 and Abdala, the latter produced by the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology.

Both immunizers were approved for emergency use by the Health Regulation Authority of the Nicaraguan Ministry of Health.

This country thus joined other nations such as Iran, Venezuela and Vietnam where vaccines created by Cuban scientific institutions are already being administered to their populations to combat the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.


"Cuba sent this Friday to Nicaragua another load of anti-covid-19 vaccine, Soberana 02, to complete the necessary doses for child immunization in that country."

Deliveries by the pharmaceutical industry of the largest Caribbean island will conclude in December with 1.1 million doses of Soberana Plus and 1.3 million of Abdala.

The agreement with Cuba foresees the delivery to this country, during the last quarter of the year, of a total of seven million doses of the injectables produced by the Antillean nation.

Cuba's ambassador in Nicaragua, Juan Carlos Hernández, recently described the supply of the drugs to this Central American country as an example of solidarity.

The bilateral agreement for the acquisition of seven million vaccines is one more example of the brotherhood between both nations, a work for decades that has been complemented through exchange, said Hernandez.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Cub ... -0014.html
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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Thu Nov 11, 2021 2:55 pm

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Inside Cuban Dissidents’ November 15 Plot: Unpacking the Archipiélago Facebook Group
November 10, 2021
By Arnold August – Nov 9, 2021

Editor’s Introduction: The Canada Files is fortunate to have Arnold August as a columnist, acclaimed since 1997 as one of the most important non-Cuban English-speaking experts on Cuba’s political system and cultural debates. He obtained access to the Cuban dissident run Facebook Group Archipiélago. With his fluency in Spanish, he took a deep dive into it, divulging astonishing posts with original analysis never before published in English.

This article contains the following sections:

• Peaceful?

• “Peaceful” Miami-Based Exiles?

• Cuban Version of the Violent Barricades in Venezuela?

• Amplifying November 15 Internationally

• A “Leftist” Feature of Archipiélago and Annexationism: Is This Possible?

• The Left in North America: Where Does It Stand?

• 15N: What Are Cubans at the Grass-Roots Level Presently Saying?

On July 10–11, 2021, regime-change demonstrations of the “colour revolution” type broke out in several cities across Cuba, turning violent in some instances. They were driven mainly by pro-US social media prompts, with some Cuban citizens joining in for legitimate reasons in the context of the current system and not against it. Since then, the same forces, operating under a new banner and a private, two-month-old Facebook group named Archipiélago, are gathering for a second round of demonstrations to take place on November 15. To delve into it, I applied to become a member and was eventually (and surprisingly) accepted.

Peaceful?
Several points stand out. Despite what they profess, Archipiélago is far from being a peaceful organization. This Facebook group of supposed “pacifists” features a riot in which a vehicle was overturned.

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Even more explicitly, they ask below, “If violence is not the way to demand justice… why is it the way to establish ‘order’?” Reading between the lines, is this a barely veiled justification for the use of violence?

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Furthermore, the following post calls for “a peaceful monthly march, if the people have no breathing space, the dictatorship will have none either.”

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The incitement to chaos is evident as they stir up hatred, with a group member pleading in a comment: “Monthly is too long to wait, weekly is better as they will die more quickly.”

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However, the incitement to simple individual violence also gives way to a collective genocidal policy. In response to the US threat to sanction Cuba if the Cuban government interferes in the planned November 15 march, Archipiélago ups the ante by demanding that “the sanctions not be limited to insignificant individuals” – that is, by calling for more sanctions “against the regime.” This in effect would further punish the Cuban people as part of the drastic tightening of the blockade from Trump to Biden.

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We must recall here the genocidal basis of the US blockade against Cuba as expressed in the 1960 Memorandum from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Mallory) to the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Rubottom): “denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”

“Peaceful” Miami-Based Exiles?

During the course of a special edition of the popular Cuban TV program Mesa Redonda, Rogelio Polanco Fuentes, the head of the Ideological Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, released a recording of a telephone conversation between Ramón Saúl Sánchez and Archipiélago coordinator Yunior García Aguilera.

Who is Ramón Saúl Sánchez? This is a very abbreviated list of his terrorist activities:

“[He was] born in 1954 in Cuba, at the age of 13 he went to live in the US.

Several declassified FBI reports outline the dangerousness of this terrorist. One of them, reports that in December 1980, hours after the explosion of a bomb at the Cuban consulate in Montreal, the alleged perpetrators were arrested on the Canada-United States among them Ramón Saúl Sánchez Rizo.

Another 1982 FBI report deals with an attempted attack against the Cuban ambassador to the UN, detonating a bomb in his car, states: ‘Ramón Saúl Sánchez built the remote-controlled bomb with the help of others members of Omega 7.

Omega-7 came to be considered by the FBI as ‘the most dangerous terrorist organization in the United States.’

In 1984, Ramón Saúl was sentenced to a four-year prison sentence for refusing to appear before a North American grand jury in New York that tried to clarify the activities of Omega-7.

He was a protagonist in the sinking of the fishing boats near the Bahamas, injuring two fishermen, as well as promoting the kidnapping of people in Venezuela, México and the US.

He is the leader of the terrorist organization Jóvenes de la Estrella, a group with which he carried out a dynamite attack at the Miami airport on October 17, 1975.

Second in command of CORU, which carried out more than 90 terrorist attacks against Cuban facilities in various countries, including within the United States itself, the most notable being the blowing up of the Cubana de Aviación plane over Barbados, where 73 people died.

He was a very active element among those who promoted fundraising to help Luis Posada Carriles and the rest of the terrorists arrested in Panama for planning an attack against the Cuban president (Fidel Castro) during the X Ibero-American Summit.”


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Here is the full transcript translated from Spanish between Ramón Sánchez (RS) and Yunior García (YG).

“RS: Yunior?

YG: Yes?

RS: This is Ramón Saúl, how are you?

YG: Hi, how are you, Ramón? So, I don’t know if you saw the announcement we made to move it up to the 15th.

RS: We, the Movimiento Democracia and the Movimiento de Opositores por una Nueva República, are a hundred percent in agreement with what Archipiélago is saying, with what you are saying. So we are with you. One question: Do you think it would be fruitful, or would it be counterproductive, if we managed to shine the freedom lights from offshore of Cuba on that day?

YG: It’s complicated, I think that has to be thought through. I do agree that we need the support of the whole exile community, wherever they are.

RS: We are with you one hundred percent. We have great admiration for you and Otero Alcántara [another star dissident.] We have very good access to the media. So, anything you want to publicize, send it over here and we’ll take care of getting the word out. Or anything else where you think we could be useful. I feel proud to be able to support what you guys are doing.” (Emphasis added)

Yunior had to respond to the leaked telephone conversation. In an interview with a dissident media outlet in Spanish, 14yMedio, he complained that there were “missing parts of the conversation,” but does not (English version) say what was missing. However, he did not deny the most important part of the recorded conversation, namely when he said they “need the support of the whole exile community.” Furthermore, Archipiélago actually takes a stand in favour of working unconditionally with the exile community by saying in the post below, “When exiles contribute to the cause it is not mercenaryism, we are all Cubans, they are part of the same nation and have the right to contribute to the cause.”


Cuban Version of the Violent Barricades in Venezuela?


In Polanco’s Mesa Redonda presentation, he referred to “his personal experience in Venezuela, a country where he served as a diplomatic official. In this sense, he recalled that in 2013, 2014 and 2017 the so-called guarimbas [barricades] were developed. These were violent actions by representatives of opposition sectors in Venezuela to overthrow the Bolivarian government that caused innumerable economic and human damage to society.” (Below is a scene from the guarimbas in Venezuela posted as a “model” by the Cuban Archipiélago.)

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Polanco continues:

“There is a report from the Venezuelan state, ‘The truth of Venezuela against infamy: data and testimonies of a country under siege,’ published in September 2020 that has elements that are related to the actions that are intended to be carried out in our country. This report states that the total number of deaths during the violent protests in February 2014 was 43 people, while in the protests from April to July 2017 the Public Ministry registered 121 deaths and 1958 injured, however, in relation to the protests of 2014 the then Secretary of State of the United States John Kerry issued a statement in which he affirmed that ‘the demonstrations were peaceful and accused the Venezuelan government of confronting peaceful protesters by force,’ he said.”

“A detailed examination, says the report, of the events that occurred reveals that most of the demonstrations provoked and promoted by opposition leaders between April and July 2017 were carried out in violation of current national and international legislation. These demonstrations led to actions of extreme violence characterized by the use of firearms, Molotov cocktails, mortars and homemade weapons, the placement of barricades, death traps on public roads, damage to institutions, schools, health centres, and siege against military and police facilities. There were three unprecedented practices in the recent history of the country: setting fire to people designated as supporters of the government, using children and adolescents to prepare firebombs, guarding barricades and attacking the security forces, as well as the combination of high levels of violence with religious and patriotic symbols.”


Regarding the well-known NED and USAID funding of state subversion, Polanco explained that among those organizations born in Latin America is CADAL (Center for the Opening and Development of Latin America), which is part of a wide network of non-governmental organizations that the United States uses to channel financing for its political operators through NED and USAID. The links between the United States and its political operators in Cuba are obvious.

He revealed that two Cuban citizens are part of the generous beneficiaries of the funds of these US organizations: Manuel Cuesta Morúa and Yunior García Aguilera, signatories of the documents delivered to the Cuban authorities regarding the intention to carry out marches in various cities of the country. Both, he explained, travelled to Argentina in 2018 to participate in a CADAL promoted event pushing for subversion in Cuba by the Armed Forces (a pipe dream if ever there was one).

Polanco denounced the fact that both CADAL and its director, Gabriel Salvia, have been very active in supporting the provocations leading up to 15N in Cuba.

“In 2019, Cuesta Morúa and García Aguilera continued their preparations in a workshop sponsored by the Universidad San Luis Campus Madrid. There they received lessons from Richard Youngs, an expert on public protests as a method of political change.”

As Youngs points out, riots are increasingly a major route through which ordinary people seek to achieve social, political and economic transformation. “Protesters must make tough decisions, do they just disengage from politics or build new kinds of civic campaigns? Do they join existing political parties or do they move away from mainstream politics altogether?”

The official [Rogelio Polanco] also highlighted how the report itself acknowledged with concern the fact that the media intended to present these events as peaceful demonstrations. ‘Some here are beginning to look for so-called non-violent methods of struggle to obtain advice and carry out some of these actions in Cuba.’”

In fact, during the July 11 protests, we actually witnessed the inception of what the US and its allies would like to happen all over Cuba and on a sustained basis. A riot occurred in Cárdenas with the use of projectiles, rocks, the overturning of a car, looting, yet the media persisted in portraying this as “peaceful protests” while highlighting the Cuban government “crackdown.

“Peaceful” was the keyword used in July as part of the narrative to blame Cuba for the arrest of those violent elements. Yet, as we head toward November 15, it is no accident that the Miami press has been all over the fact that a car was overturned in Cárdenas on July 11. The mainstream media knows full well that erecting barricades and weaponizing objects such as cars constitutes a key ingredient in destabilizing the state and creating chaos, injuries and even deaths, as occurred in Venezuela. Thus, it delights in reporting that a “large crowd of people overturn a car in a protest.”

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Yunior García Aguilera is clearly an agent of the US playing out the role he was trained for by the US. Here is further information released on November 1.

On that day, Dr. Vázquez González, a Cuban who for more than 25 years has been the agent Fernando of the Cuban State Security Organs, came out in public after having infiltrated the counterrevolutionary groups.


Dr. Vázquez González confirmed what Polanco asserted regarding the meetings abroad in which “agent Fernando” participated along with Yunior García, his collaborator Manuel Cuesta Morúa and others, including two non-Cuban army generals. “Agent Fernando” revealed photos and videos as the iron-clad proof of Yunior directly working with the US over a period of several years. “Agent Fernando” indicates that the playwright Yunior perfectly fits the role of promoter for the provocative march on November 15. In a new video, “agent Fernando” explained that the:

“strategy is not new, since Yunior García Aguilera tries to reissue an event from three decades ago, when on a similar date playwright Václav Havel, defender of the hegemonic purposes of the US administration, addressed the public in Prague, the capital of then Czechoslovakia. On the night of November 26 of last year [2020], prior to his presence in front of the Ministry of Culture, Yunior published on his Facebook wall the question ‘Cuba, and what should we do now?’ [Similar to] Havel’s statement: ‘Something must be done,’ during the Prague protests. It was that November 27, 2020, when Yunior appeared as an agent of change, a role rehearsed by the United States in the color revolutions. Dr. Vázquez González added that what is sought is to cause chaos, disobedience in society, so that international organizations apply sanctions and that this then leads to military intervention and the imposition of an alternative government in our country.”

The Archipiélago post below: “Communism fell in Prague. So must it be in Cuba!”

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Vaclav Havel saluting a huge crowd in Wenceslao Square in Prague on December 10, 1989.

The overall narrative on the “peaceful” Cuban protests is presented courtesy of The Washington Post in its Editorial Board publication on October 15, “Opinion: Cuba’s peaceful opposition mounts a comeback.” Irrespective of what happens on November 15, the script has already been worked out. The “protesters” are the victims while the government is at fault. Thus, buzzwords such as “peaceful protests” or “pro-democracy protests” are completely arbitrary, based on the objectives of the US and its allies.

If a movement anywhere in the world is against a government not to the liking to the US, it is dubbed a “pro-democracy movement,” thus justifying any means used by its perpetrators. On the other hand, any movement that is in defense of an “anti-US government” is dubbed “terrorist” or “extremist.” The most glaring example of this false dichotomy is in the US itself. No matter how many millions of people demonstrate in the US against the antidemocratic and racist nature of the US state, they are never called “pro-democracy movements.”

Thus, people should be aware, and not be fooled by the cacophony of the “peaceful protests” mantra that is bound, in one way or another, to accompany the events of November 15 and their aftermath.

Amplifying November 15 Internationally

A key ingredient of the Archipiélago destabilization effort is to internationalize it. Members maintain a regularly updated chart which indicates where pro-November 15 marches are to take place outside Cuba. Almost all of them are located in North America and Europe where the Cuban exiles are located.


The goal is now to build on July 11, thus making for a caustic mix of local incidents within Cuba to be amplified outside the country using the hashtags #15NovCuba or #15Nov (which, by the way, can be used by supporters of the Cuban government to attract attention while nevertheless opposing the counterrevolutionary forces).

The counterrevolution has experience going back many years with links in Cuba, the US and elsewhere. For example, one of the key players, Manuel Cuesta Morúa, is a close collaborator of Yunior. He was one of a select group of dissidents who met with then President Obama during his trip to Cuba in March 2016. In the picture, Cuesta Morúa is seated on Obama’s left.


One of the specialities of Cuesta Morúa in the current situation is to amplify 15N to the Miami counterrevolutionary press, which supports any type of terrorist activity. For example, here he retweets a post that thanks ADN Cuba, one of the main US-based and funded counterrevolutionary outlets, for giving visibility to the work of Archipiélago and the upcoming 15N.


Here is Cuesta Morúa’s retweeted thank-you note to USAID-funded CubaNet, another US-based outlet amplifying the 15N march:

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US-based and funded Diario de Cuba (DDC) also gets the nod from Cuesta Morúa when it declares, following July 11, that the “Cuban government can no longer speak in the name of the Cuban people.” While it may seem to be an innocuous comment, this is how the US and its allies act: based on this false narrative, they float an “alternative” government as the real representative of the people, as they do in Venezuela, and justify interference, including military intervention, to back up their choice.


A “Leftist” Feature of Archipiélago and Annexationism: Is This Possible?

This is not the only feature that Cuesta Morúa and his collaborators learned from their training in Argentina and Spain with CADAL. He possibly learned from CADAL the need to portray their movement as not openly right-wing but rather as pseudo left. Believe it or not, he has picked up the popular #DefundThePolice slogan in some Western capitalist countries and applied it to the so-called violence of the Cuban police.


If readers believe that the attempt by the counterrevolution to provide a “left” image to the movement is an exaggeration, below is an Archipiélago post that quotes Fidel Castro’s famous statement that “Revolution is to change everything that needs to be changed.”

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The quote is almost verbatim from Fidel, minus the words “Revolution is…” Nonetheless, one should not take this lightly. After all, Cuesta Morúa and Yunior were probably trained to use “left”-sounding phrases to recruit sections of Cuban society, especially intellectuals.

Sadly, the fact is that some “pro-Cuba” intellectuals and artists in Cuba also use this Fidel phrase to push for their interpretation of change such as capitalist reforms, a multi-party system and a more “open” Cuba policy toward the US, as if the decades-long Cuba-US standoff is the fault of both the US and Cuba. Every indication is that these elements are already indirectly on board with the colour revolution by “both siding” the events: they are opposed to the violence of the colour revolution and that of the Cuban government.

These Cuban intellectuals living in Cuba are not ashamed to complain that the current post-July 11 period is plagued by “two extremes” – the Cuban government (which they now casually describe as a “regime”) and the agitators, with no room for a “reasonable perception.” They also promote the November 2020 San Isidro Movement that arose out of a wide-open debate and polemic in Cuba regarding Decree 349 on the Cuban government’s policy on culture and involved in November 15.

Junior was featured in this San Isidro Movement along with other US-supported individuals. It was the forerunner of July 11 as, and according to some intellectuals, a “made in Cuba opposition.” Of course, in order to remain in the good books with the elites in the West, the intellectuals abundantly use the buzzwords “cracking down hard” and “repressive violence” in reference to the Cuban government.

For a very precise analysis of how these intellectuals operate in Cuba and abroad, see the video presentation in a recent Geopolitical Economy Research Group webinar on Cuba by Cuban revolutionary blogger Iroel Sánchez, with English subtitles. This 15-minute YouTube is worth viewing in its entirety, as Iroel is not one of the “go to” Cubans sought after by the mainstream media and academia. The exact portion where he deals with these intellectuals is from 5:03 to 5:15.

Furthermore, in carefully diving into the pages of the Archipiélago Facebook group, one notices, for example, that it features some out-of-context left quotes from Martin Luther King. Furthermore, its main spokesperson Yunior said in an interview with the Miami Herald, “I am calling on the left worldwide, which is usually complicit and unfortunately usually behaves in a hypocritical way, to tell them that there are no left or right dictatorships, good or bad, there are dictatorships, and we must oppose them all.”

Why does Yunior feel confident in appealing to the left? Does the adage “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire” apply? Are some on the left – and not only abroad but also in Cuba –sympathizing with the Archipiélago movement? Yes, indeed, we have seen above how some Cuban intellectuals on the island have quite an affinity with colour revolution. However, how does anyone reconcile being “progressive” and “left” while hobnobbing with those whose policies favour Cuban annexation to the US?

Every country must be analyzed on its own merits. For Cuba, being left or, more precisely, being communist, or pro-communist or respecting Fidel Castro and his legacy is based solidly among not all but the majority of the population since the early 1960s. Thus, it does not matter how much the Archipiélago folks scream anti-communist slogans, flash “down with the dictatorship” placards or grossly insult their leaders past and present. Not only does this go over like water off a duck’s back for the majority of Cubans, but it actually consolidates and deepens their appreciation of their ideological/political outlook, which they see as the safeguard to maintaining Cuba’s precious sovereignty, patriotism and dignity.

Hard facts and figures speak volumes. For example, in the 2019 constitutional referendum vote, which included a clause to safeguard the ultimate goal of communism (on the insistence of the grassroots), here are the results:

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Thus, of those voting, over 86% voted in favour or their economic/political “communist” system. This ratio coincides with my own experience living in Cuba for extensive periods of time on and off since 1997: not all, but the vast majority of the population supports and works for their system. Even though the Archipiélago will not admit it, they must deal with this situation. Thus, at times, they must attack the system from the “left,” as Yunior does above and Cuesta Morúa also with his #DefundThePolice.

Is it an exaggeration to extrapolate from the Archipiélago pages and Yunior’s interview with the Miami Herald to claim that they use left rhetoric to cover up their goals of pro-US regime change? It does not seem to be a fabrication. However, readers can come to their own conclusions. On October 30 (appropriately the day before Halloween), in another attempt to explain his telephone conversation with the terrorist Ramón Saúl, Yunior dressed up as a virtual “firebrand leftist.”


In chameleon-like fashion, he said in the above recording that he was against “savage capitalism” as an option for Cuba. At the same time, he asserted that there is “no socialism” in Cuba but rather a “primitive, ferocious state capitalism.” To make himself even more palatable to some of the left in Cuba and abroad, he stated that he had signed a petition to President Biden demanding the lifting of the blockade. (Notes taken by the author from the El Toque recording and translated into English.)

This latter revelation is not very impressive. First, in the interview with the Miami Herald cited above, he said that “they always complain about the ‘blockade, he said, referring to the U.S. embargo. ‘There is no worse blockade than the internal blockade on every Cuban citizen in this country.’” Second, as we have seen above, an Archipiélago post called on Biden to increase the blockade sanctions.

To add to his “left credentials,” Yunior said in the same recording that he is “against apartheid.” Okay, but where? In the US racist state, or in Israel, perhaps? No, in Cuba as he refers to its “ideological apartheid” that prohibits thinking outside the official ideology. (Notes taken by the author from the same audio interview with El Toque, one of the main subversive outlets and, of course, fully involved in 15N, as can be seen below, where it is promoting Archipiélago and its coordinators such as Yunior.)

El Toque is based in the Netherlands and its stated goal is to target countries where “freedom of expression is limited.”

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El Toque proudly provides the faces of Archipiélago on the right of the post.

However, while it is increasingly difficult to get people inside and outside of Cuba to swallow the “left” narrative, who comes to the rescue to provide Yunior with “left” credentials? The CNN Havana correspondent on November 4 provided him with the ultimate certification as a “left-leaning playwright.” This is not all. We see in the report based on an interview with Yunior in his home with his bookcase in the background, the two volumes by Fidel Castro, The Strategic Counter Offensive, detailing the epic struggle in the Sierra Maestra leading to the January 1 victory.


We do not know if the playwright, with a natural flare for drama, placed the Fidel volumes there to impress CNN in order to buttress the usual narrative of turn coats being former “supporters” of the Revolution but later “disaffected by the outcome.” One such example of betrayal is Samuel Farber, born in Cuba and having participated in the anti-Batista movement, emigrated to the US in 1958. For quite some time, from the “left,” he is supporting the US narrative against the Cuban leadership by writing among others for a “left alternative” pro colour revolution outlet in Cuba, La Joven Cuba.”

In any case, in the course of scouring Yunior’s Facebook group Archipiélago, one of the most important recurring features of the “left-leaning” Yunior is the utter disdain and hatred for Fidel accompanied with the most insulting cartoons and photos, surpassing anything that can be seen ­– even in the extremist hard-core anti-Castro Miami press.

The Yunior posture of being “neither left or right,” also known as the “end of ideology,” is a particular minority feature in Cuban political culture. It rears its head at every important turning point in Cuban history in recent decades. My 2017 article titled “The End of Ideology in Cuba?” on this controversy is more relevant than ever. I wrote, “Objectively, this so-called neutrality against extremes consists in throwing a life jacket in support of capitalism. The real defiance is against socialism.”

We have touched on the role of the “left face” of Cuban subversion. What about annexation to the US? Likewise, each country must be analyzed on its own, as we have briefly done above with regards to socialism and communism. Now, with regards to US projects to dominate countries in Latin America, for example, the US is threatening the sovereignty of Venezuela and Nicaragua, Bolivia and Peru.

However, for obvious geopolitical reasons, outright annexation is not part of their plans in these countries. The situation that Cuba faces is very different. Think of Puerto Rico. Given Cuban historical ties to the US since the 19th century, even when it was fighting Spanish colonialism, annexation to the US was a secondary part of the political culture on the island and it still exists today. Thus, while Archipiélago does not openly advocate annexation, the movement it is fostering does indeed lead to some kind of 21st-century Cuban “annexation” to the US.

In fact, among the Miami terrorist groups it solicits help from, annexation is still a goal, as they dream of another Playa Girón-like invasion, but one that succeeds in order to convert Cuba into another Puerto Rico. Furthermore, the Archipiélago trove contains innumerable photos comparing in a favourable light the situation that existed before the Revolution compared with today. What was the US–Cuba relationship before 1959, especially in the 1950s under Batista? Cuba’s neocolonialist status was as close as possible to actually being “annexed” to the US. In fact, while painfully navigating through Archipiélago, one cannot help but notice how it is so impregnated with sycophantic pro-US prejudices, that it reminded me of what José Martí said regarding his long exile in the US just before being killed in action in Cuba in 1895: “I have lived in the monster and I know its entrails.”

Controversy arose from my article cited above (“The End of Ideology in Cuba?”) around this statement:

“I have always maintained that the most dangerous opposition to the Cuban Revolution comes from the so-called left, and not from the openly right-wing annexationists.”

Most readers praised the article, while many others participated in the serious debate. Only a few strongly objected to it, mainly singling out that sentence about the “most dangerous opposition.” In responding to detractors, my second piece was penned in Spanish as a columnist for Cuba’s Prensa Latina (and published in English, titled Cuban “Left” Opposition and Annexationists: Two Wings of the Same Eagle).

This piece created more controversy, as well as complaints, and thus in the third installment of this trilogy, I wrote:

“Their common main complaint has been that my articles do not name individuals. Some of their social media accounts even try to dictate to me in referring to the dissidents’ posts. They ‘are asking for names’; ‘Name names!’ they demand. They are oblivious to the fact that by so doing they name themselves and that they do not, and cannot, in any way shame me into citing names. Perhaps the most remarkable proof that there is no need to name names, since worms will surface after rain, comes from Miami. On Feb. 2, 2017, the US-financed CUBA NET published a front-page article on the controversy provoked by my two columns.”

See the screenshot below, for my original Spanish version of the piece published in La Pupila Insomne, edited by Cuban blogger Iroel Sánchez. Perhaps the best example of the boomerang effect is the attack by the CIA-financed and extreme right-wing Miami-based CubaNet against my person and articles, while defending the Cuban “left,” titling their piece: “The Annexationist Left: Arnold August Is the New Agent of Castroism,”.

Thus they inadvertently prove my point that Cuba’s “Leftists” and Annexationists are two wings of the same eagle, and why, as can be read here: I do not name them.https://www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/ ... -0019.html

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The concern about the ideological/political annexationist war being waged against Cuba in the current period goes back to at least 2016, as my piece in Black Agenda Report points out:

“What does it mean when American flags appear on the streets of Havana? Is President Obama winning his war against Cuban socialism by non-military means? Obama confirmed once again that the US is dispensing with openly antagonistic tactics, in favor of diplomatic tactics that he hopes will attain the goal of snuffing out the Cuban Revolution. The Cuban people, themselves, are engaged in a great debate about their future – and ours.”

The Left in North America: Where Does It Stand?

Given the fully documented proof that, despite all the rhetoric, the 15N is not peaceful but is in fact US-driven – even to the point of threatening a military intervention – what can we do to defend Cuba?

The left in the US must be applauded. Virtually all the left alternative independent web-based media in the US has unconditionally opposed the US narrative on Cuba, including Black Alliance for Peace, Black Agenda Report, MintPress News, People’s Dispatch, The People’s Forum, Code Pink, Lee Camp – Redacted Tonight, The Socialist Program, BreakThrough News, The Grayzone, Popular Resistance, CounterPunch and others.

The only major holdout is the North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA), which serves as the virtual official organ of regime change in Cuba. A guide to the alternative left can be found here. NACLA is not listed, yet it is not clear if it is because of its right-wing swing toward Latin America. In any case, it is good thing it is not included.

Here in Canada, we are not blessed with this situation. In fact, the contrast with the US is startling. Only a very small number of outlets stand unconditionally against the US “colour revolution” narrative, while the vast majority either buy into the US agenda or are ominously silent on one of the most important issues for the left today: the Cuban Revolution. Is there a reason for this? Is it perhaps due to Liberal poster boy Justin Trudeau’s barely concealed support for colour revolution in Cuba, which was so appreciated by Archipiélago. Trudeau: “Cuba deserves democracy and freedom?”

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It proudly displays the latest feather in its cap, listing Canada among its supporters along with other countries such as Colombia, US, Sweden, Germany, Uruguay and Spain. The article was taken from “Radio and Television Martí,” the US-funded subversive media based in the US. This position by Justin Trudeau, given the current US-led subversive context, is perhaps one of the most right-wing reactionary statement taken by any Canadian government on Cuba since 1959.

It is far from being “ambiguous,” as some Trudeau apologists would have it. The US-trained Yunior and company have possibly been trained in capturing dog-whistle diplomacy, that is, hearing what music to their ears is, amplifying it while discarding the rest. Not one member of the Canadian Parliament – all the parties, including the social democratic New Democratic Party (NDP) – has yet to take a public stand against Trudeau encouraging colour revolution for Cuba.

After the July 11 event, the first out of the gates against the Cuban government was Canadian Dimension. The Canada Files produced an extended YouTube video based on my presentation at the August 29 panel on Cuba, organized by the Geopolitical Research Economy Group. We completely deconstructed the two Canadian Dimension articles written by Cuban dissidents and its related Trudeau position. Since then, Canadian Dimension has largely stayed clear of Cuba after publishing these two hit pieces. This is hardly a positive step in light of those dangerous precedents. A “left” publication that is neutral at a time that the Cuban Revolution is under attack, more than ever since 1959, is not encouraging. More on that below, as this Canadian disease of “neutrality” is rampant.

In any case, two other “Canadian left” media outlets picked up the baton from Canadian Dimension to try outracing each other, as to which one could cross the anti-Cuban Revolution finish line first.

First, there is Rabble. In a July 19, 2021 article, readers were confronted with several key pro-US regime change stereotypes:

“As a result of horrific conditions there and very likely [emphasis added] American provocation (the U.S. spends tens of millions annually on anti-government media and on-the-ground and social media campaigning), Cubans are demonstrating en masse against the government… They are blaming the Cuban government for the country’s state of affairs, claiming it is caused by Cuban leaders who are enriching themselves at the expense of the public… There are many things not to like about Cuba’s government. It isn’t democratic and there is widespread corruption, but other countries with un-democratic or corrupt governments are not bullied and starved by the U.S … I personally know people who can’t feed their families regularly, who stand in lines in the hot sun for hours every day to meet basic needs, who can’t rely on their excellent health care system anymore and who now fear absolute chaos. An orderly transition to some form of democratic government is impossible to imagine. Chaos is more likely, with widespread poverty, inequality and insecurity.”

Rabble may not realize it, but this “chaos and failed state” mantra was applied to Cuba by Biden, but ripped to shreds in The Canada Files YouTube mentioned above.

In another Rabble article, dated July 23, 2021, the litany of nonsense goes shamelessly beyond the pale by comparing Haiti to Cuba.

“Cuba, you might say, has in recent days had the same problem [as Haiti] – dissent – but in a very different setting [mild concession to Cuba]… Like its sheer longevity: despite a crippling US economic blockade, it has lasted as a one-party communist state, for only about a decade less than the Soviet Union did. Health care and education have been impressive, including a COVID-19 vaccine, though production is hampered by the blockade. Its flaws are many, among them repression of dissent – including the unprecedented current rallies and marches. The government says all economic trouble is due to the blockade, and protests are down to U.S. plots.

Now, one may be tempted to excuse Rabble for this, as this second one was reprinted from one of Canada’s flagship corporate media outlets, the Toronto Star. On the other hand, if Rabble can reprint from the Toronto Star, why did it not attend the two Geopolitical Economy Research Group (GERG) webinars on Cuba, on July 26 and August 29, to report on them and/or republish reports on them? The Rabble accusation above of Cuba as being guilty of “repression of dissent” rings somewhat hollow as our “dissenting voices” against the mainstream narrative on Cuba right here in Canada is repressed. Unless, of course, Rabble knuckles down in the future and reprints articles from The Canada Files on Cuba. Nothing yet.

Moreover, on November 1 it carried an article encouraging Canadian tourism to the island to be inaugurated on November 15. It did this without mentioning the US-led November 15th attempt to disrupt just that. Nor did it take a stand against the Canadian government’s treacherous stand lending credibility to the US-backed colour revolution narrative.

In addition to Rabble, The Breach outdid them all in an October 22 article:

“Well, I don’t think people like Blair and Clinton deserve any kind of left label. The people who understand themselves as being on the left, who are actively part of left campaigns, and who’ve really accepted an End of History narrative, are I think those people who don’t believe we can do any better than the defense of states like China, Syria, Cuba, and sometimes even North Korea, as building blocks in a feeble global antagonism against the overwhelming dominance of American power… When workers in Cuba are concerned about a year of economic brutality caused by both the imperialist American blockade and the collapse of tourism revenues – because of COVID and by mismanagement by a bureaucratic elite that lives a more luxurious life than ordinary Cubans – they can only be imperialist agents… So we oppose, for example, the American blockade on Cuba, but we don’t oppose it in the name of defending the state that these imperialists oppose. Instead, we oppose it in the name of supporting a politics of human freedom against imperialist power, above all, but also against those perverted and deflected forms of supposedly socialist politics that are bureaucratic states.”

However, the supposed rebuttal to this from what amounts to the “left” of Canadian Dimension, Rabble and The Breach is that it is wrong to lionize a leader simply because they are being attacked by the U.S. These words, paternalistically warning people in the North against glorifying Third World leaders, may fly under some of the left radar. It is very convenient for the middle-of-the-roaders.

Thus far, they refuse to purge themselves of the White Man’s Burden complex or US-centric notions that stop them from taking an unconditional stand in favour of leaders who are actually leading their peoples in fighting US imperialism, such as Miguel Díaz-Canel in Cuba.

Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro left me with this impression: “Ready to sacrifice his life.”

This “left” seems to be incapable of bringing itself to overcome the ingrained superiority of the “left” in the comfortable North, which cannot refrain from being “father knows best” for the leaders in the South. Thus, their difference with The Breach’s stark anti-communist, or anti-revolution stance, is just a matter of degree: how far can each of them go to avoid differentiating themselves from the leaders in the South who are vilified by the mainstream media, while maintaining the veneer of being “leftists”?

Is this exaggerated? Not so. How else can one explain that the current three most important Canadian left media – Canadian Dimension, Rabble and The Breach – have all taken stands in favour of a colour revolution in Cuba, while The Tyee and Ricochet have not yet carried any post-July 11 articles on Cuba at all.

On the other hand, The Georgia Straight, L’aut’journal in Quebec and The Canada Files (leading the way by a long shot) have carried favourable articles on Cuba. Aside from The Canada Files, not one of the independent “left” media outlets has taken a stand against Trudeau’s pro-colour revolution statement. Let that sink in: Cuba is being bled by the US now more than ever, and some “leftists” cannot take a stand? However, it is not too late. Now is the time, as the US and its allies are preparing a major offensive for November 15 against Cuba, as my recent article in The Canada Files points out. It is not too late. As Howard Zinn indicated, “You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train.”

15N: What Are Cubans at the Grass-roots Level Presently Saying?

Even if we show without a shadow of doubt that 15N is being US-driven and supported, in recent telephone conversations with some of my Cuban colleagues, they all say that the situation is complicated. Let these Cubans speak for themselves on 15N:

Havana:

1) “Some think it is not US manipulation but rather coming from the base. Others are of the opinion that it is planning destabilization and change in government. I do not think that it will succeed. Last July was a surprise, not now, the government is prepared.”

2) “Many people ask questions, and they are not those who take to the streets to protest or shout offenses against revolutionaries but rather working men and women who see no future anywhere, and brother, they feel they are being let down.”

3) “All those who reside here (a two-generation household) say that regarding all those involved (in 15N), we have already accumulated enough ‘merits’ for them to be detained and accused of collaborating with a foreign power, punishable by our laws. I think we all agree on that here in the house. I really do not know ‘what card’ we will have up our sleeve to face these provocations if in the end they decide to take to the streets. And in these things, as Fidel always did, you have to be one step ahead, not act or riposte blindly. And I do not think that everything that we disseminate here on TV and others, the acts of reaffirmation, etc., have the repercussion that we need them to have outside of Cuba, because I think the propaganda outside is very strong, and people believe everything that the media says.”

4) “There must be a different preparation by the leadership of the country (for 15N) and I think that people were also a bit surprised about 11J. What worries me are the actions to face 15N.”

5) “One member of the family says that they should not be imprisoned now, because they would start a campaign against us, but I think that the campaign to bring them to court will take place at any time convenient for us; the measures should be taken that politically WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE THEM.”

6) “We were not prepared for 11J. However, for 15N we are. Let us see how it unfolds.”

7) “Hi Arnold, I haven’t heard anyone talk about 15N in my neighbourhood. It is not a matter of concern. Today I was in a queue to buy oil, and the neighbours commented on the length of the queue…Chicken is available, and that there is mincemeat for the month’s quota at the butcher shop. However, I saw everyone in their daily routine, as if there is an event to celebrate and that it’s the day (15N) that the students will resume face-to-face classes in the schools [in-person school attendance was suspended as a result of COVID-19]. And that is happiness for everyone.

8) Since the latest revelations on November 1 by agent Fernando proving without a shadow of doubt that Yunior and Archipiélago are a of creation of the U.S. to foment violent regime change, some Cubans are asking: “if it may be true that some people were confused and joined in the July 11 anti-government protests, will they be confused on 15N?

Just in from Santa Clara and elsewhere on the island:

9) “Taking into account the complaints that have been made public, including the uncovering of a Cuban security agent Fernando who was infiltrated in that group, I believe that if there was someone confused with the true objectives of the supposed ‘march’, it has already been clarified and I do not believe that they can manage to deceive many people to continue with their plans. If they continue, they will be accumulating crimes for which they can be prosecuted and convicted in Cuba according to the law.”

10) “Characters like these have no opportunity to carry out their subversion plans in Cuba, even if their trolls, influencers and bots on social networks want us to believe otherwise. The reality is that it is our revolutionary organizations can mobilize thousands of people in a short period to come out in defense of the Revolution.”

11) “These people are either paid, or they are fascists, or they are not really Cubans. I will never understand the hatred they have for us when we only want the best for all humanity.”

12) (It is no secret, in general terms, how the supporters of the Revolution act in a situation such as November 15.) Several sources across the island, especially in Havana, indicate for example that “the Cuban government is well informed about the activities of the counterrevolutionary media activists, the most known of whom is Yunior in Havana. The CDRs (Comités de Defensa de la Revolución- neighborhood committees) are organized with the intention of following them if they leave their houses, so that any action would immediately have revolutionaries on the streets to outnumber the counterrevolutionaries.” It confirms what other sources have stated as quoted above: “our revolutionary organizations can mobilize thousands of people in a short period to come out in defense of the Revolution.”



Featured image: Screenshot of Archipiélago Facebook Group.

(The Canada Files)

https://orinocotribune.com/inside-cuban ... ook-group/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Sun Nov 14, 2021 7:12 pm

No one is going to rain on our party!

On November 15, Cuba will reopen its borders, students will return to school; Havana, the capital of dignity, will await its 502nd anniversary, to celebrate as it has not been able to do in the last two years. National life will resume its course, with the greatest joy, but alert


Author: Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez | internet@granma.cu

november 12, 2021 09:11:09

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In direct contradiction with President Biden's recent declarations before the United Nations General Assembly, supporting multilateralism and cooperation in the struggle against the pandemic at a global level, the blockade of Cuba has been tightened, new sanctions were imposed and a new destabilization plan was set in motion, following their "soft coup" manual to the letter…
-Against a socialist project like ours, violent or military actions, invasion, occupation are never ruled out; but the first bet is on demoralization, on surrender, this is why the message of hatred of communism, the anti-socialist emphasis, the persecution of every possible economic solution, in short, the blockade…
-This is why Washington is so annoyed by Cuba's success in confronting the pandemic, in particular the outstanding results of our vaccination program, developed with ingenuity, effort and our own resources. This explains the determination to disparage our public health system and deny this extraordinary achievement of Cuba…
-Every vaccine created and administered, every immunized compatriot, every infection avoided and every life saved are victories for the national cause and defeats of the imperialist aggression against our country. It may seem incredible to describe it that way, but there is no other way to describe the shameless use of a pandemic, with cold political calculation, against an entire people… In response to the imperialist plans, we are defeating the pandemic, as we have defeated and will defeat their aggressive plans, no matter how vicious the campaigns or slanders…
-Thanks to Fidel's visionary policy of promoting science, and the continuity Raúl provided to that work; thanks to the talent, dedication and commitment with which several generations of Cuban researchers have been trained; our government has been able to face, like no other in Latin America or the Third World, the terrible threat of a pandemic… Today we are the first country in Latin America with three vaccines and two vaccine candidates under development, and the first in the world to begin vaccinating its pediatric population between two and 18 years of age…
-On November 15, Cuba will reopen its borders, students will return to school; Havana, the capital of dignity, will await its 502nd anniversary, to celebrate as it has not been able to do in the last two years. National life will resume its course, with the greatest joy, but alert
-The peace and harmony that distinguish life in our streets will continue to reign.

*Excerpts from remarks by the Party First Secretary and President of the Republic, during the closing of the National Assembly of People's Power most recent Ordinary Period of Sessions

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-11-12/no ... -our-party
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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Mon Nov 15, 2021 3:19 pm

Pdte. Cuba participates in concert with young people from Red Scarves

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"Cuba is going to live in peace, and by living in peace we are going to improve ourselves," said the president. | Photo: @PresidenciaCuba

Published 14 November 2021

"We are seeking the improvement of our society, defending emancipation, defending socialism," said the president.

The president of Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, participated this Sunday in the concert offered by the artist Tony Ávila along with young people from the Red Scarves, where the illegal blockade suffered by the island by Washington was rejected and the defense was highlighted for national peace.

"Cuba is going to live in peace, and by living in peace we are going to improve ourselves (...) We are seeking the improvement of our society, defending emancipation, defending socialism," said the head of state.

The president and also first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party praised the convening power of young people, as well as their spirit of defending the flags in favor of the sovereignty and independence of Cuba.


In addition to the Tony Ávila concert, the day featured a dissenting expression such as the anti-imperialist sit-in, which was held in the Central Park of Havana (capital), where President Díaz-Canel also participated.

The group of young people called Red Scarves issued a statement expressing their rejection of media manipulations (unconventional warfare), which are orchestrated by transnational companies and whose purpose is to destabilize the island.


Likewise, they join the national demand to lift all the illegal coercive and unilateral measures by the United States against the country, as these prevent Cuba from promoting the general welfare with greater determination.

https://www.telesurtv.net/news/cuba-pre ... -0018.html

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World Leaders Sign up to End Subversion and Blockade on Cuba

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The US government has been investing millions of dollars in the creation of "dissidents," irrelevant inside Cuba but extolled by the international press with the purpose of damaging the image of the Revolution and justifying the application of the criminal blockade. | Photo: Twitter/@CubaIreSol

Published 10 November 2021

teleSUR English reproduces in full a letter signed by hundreds of world leaders and personalities in solidarity with the Cuban people and government up against the full-fledged destabilization attempts planned for November 15.


"TO THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY

The United States has maintained a blockade against Cuba for more than sixty years. Since the nineties of the last century, Washington issued a series of laws that tightened it even more, trying to close off possibilities for the purchase of food, seeking to crush its people by hunger.

Donald Trump's government alone issued 243 measures that affect Cuba's economy much more, many of them during the Covid-19 pandemic. They are still in effect under the Joe Biden administration.

The objective has not changed: to suffocate the Cuban economy and cause suffering to its population so that it revolts against the revolutionary government.

Washington has arrogantly disregarded the annual condemnation of the United Nations General Assembly, which demands an end to this inhumane procedure.

At the same time, for decades the US government has been investing millions of dollars in the creation of "dissidents", of "opponents", of all kinds, irrelevant inside Cuba but extolled by the international press with the purpose of damaging the image of the revolution and thus justifying the application of the criminal blockade.

With this, it also seeks the isolation of Cuba, one of the main objectives being that the European Union should break off relations with Cuba.

Without hiding it, it allocates millions of dollars to promote internal subversion, calling for civil disobedience, anarchy and chaos, with the sole purpose of putting an end to the current political system and installing one that only responds to its interests.

Washington cares nothing for the immense scientific achievements of the revolution which, among other things, will make Cuba the first country in the world to have its entire population vaccinated against Covid-19 in a few weeks, and with its own vaccines. Although Washington went to great lengths to prevent Cuba from acquiring even syringes with which to administer the vaccines.


Washington, in addition to counting on the complicity of the great corporate press, also relies on individuals who, mainly from Florida, set up campaigns calling for violent protests in the streets in order to overthrow the government.

Inside the country, individuals who feel supported and protected by Washington, using as a banner the difficult economic situation due to the blockade (a situation that is exacerbated by Covid, as in all other nations), call for subversive demonstrations. They do so regardless of the laws in force which prohibit any attack on the political system in force, as is logical political system in force, as is logical in all the states of the world. And even more so when it is incited by a foreign power.

We, the undersigned, once again call upon the government of the United States to cease the inhumane blockade against Cuba, and to stop its attempts to destabilize a nation that at no time has carried out actions against its security; much less has it interfered in its internal affairs, nor has it called upon the U.S. citizenry to subvert the Cuban government.
U.S. citizens to subvert the established order, in spite of the multiple and serious internal social problems of this world power.

November 10, 2021.

On the initiative of Ignacio Ramonet, journalist, Spain; Hernando Calvo Ospina, writer, France; Atilio Borón, sociologist, Argentina and Fernando Buen Abad, philosopher, Mexico,

we signed :

Dilma Roussef, former president of Brazil.
Rafael Correa, former president of Ecuador.
José Manuel Zelaya, former president of Honduras.
Ernesto Samper Pizano, former president of Colombia.

Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Nobel Peace Prize, Argentina.
Martín Almada, Alternative Nobel Prize, Paraguay.
Pablo González Casanova, UNESCO Prize, Mexico.
Alfred de Zayas, UN independent expert, USA.
Jean Ziegler, former Special Rapporteur, UN, Switzerland.
César Luis Menotti, former coach of Argentina's national soccer team.
Monsignor Jacques Gaillot, France.
Leonardo Boff, liberation theologian, Brazil.
Marcelo Barros, Benedictine monk, Brazil.

Heinz Bierbaum, member of the European Parliament, president of the Party of the European Left,
Germany.
Maite Mola, MEP, vice-president of the Party of the European Left, Spain.
European Left Party, Spain.
Manu Pineda, MEP, Spain.
Yeidckol Polevnsky, Chamber of Deputies, Mexico.
Héctor Díaz-Polanco, Deputy, Mexico City, Mexico.
Bert Anciaux, Senator, Belgium.
Carlo Sommaruga, Senator, Switzerland.
María de Lourdes Santiago, senator, Puerto Rico.
François-Michel Lambert, deputy, France.
André Chassaigne, deputy, France.
Miguel Mejía, minister, Dominican Republic.
Juan E. Romero, deputy, National Assembly, Venezuela.
Michele de Col, Councilman of Venice, Italy.
Dmitrij Palagi, Councilman of Florence, Italy.
Thanasis Petrakos, Regional Councilor, Greece.
José Agualsaca, Legislator, Ecuador.

Costas Isychos, former Alternate Minister of Defense, former MP, Greece.
Dimitris Stratoulis, former MP, former minister, Greece.
Nandia Valavani, former Deputy Minister of Finance and former MP, Greece.
Olivio Dutra, former minister, Brazil.
Paulo Vanucchi, former minister, Brazil.
Juan Ramón Quintana, former minister, Bolivia.
Paolo Ferrero, former minister, Italy.
Ricardo Patiño, former minister, Ecuador.

Galo Chiriboga, former prosecutor, Ecuador.
Gabriela Rivadeneira, former president of the National Assembly, Ecuador.
Piedad Córdoba, former senator, Colombia.
Giovanni Russo Spena, former senator, Italy.
Leonardo Caponi, former senator, Italy.
Eleonora Forenza, former Member of the European Parliament, Italy.
Juliana Isabel Marino, former ambassador, Argentina.
Rosa Rinaldi, former vice-president, Province of Rome, Italy.
Blanca Flor Bonilla, former congresswoman, El Salvador.
Kenarik Boujikian, former TJ-SP judge, Brazil.
Carlos Viteri, former congressman, Ecuador.
Fidel Narváez, diplomat, Ecuador.

Juan Carlos Monedero, Podemos Party, Spain.
Joao Pedro Stedile, Landless Movement, Brazil.
Tania Díaz González, Deputy and Vice-President of Communication of the PSUV, Venezuela.
Mauricio Acerbo, National Secretary of the Communist Refoundation, Italy.
Marco Consolo, International Relations, Communist Refoundation, Italy,
Italy.
Andrea Ferroni, national coordinator Communist Youth, Italy.
Izquierda Unida, Spain.
Communist Party of Spain.
Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain.
Communist Party of Spain (m-l).
Ruben Suarez Ciria, Frente Amplio, Uruguay.
Lois López Leoira, Anti-imperialist International of the Peoples,
Argentina.
Ana Valentino, Movimiento Octubres, Argentina.
Manuel Bertoldi, Frente Patria Grande, Argentina.
Franco Zunino, President ARCI, Savona, Italy.
José Escoda, Frente Socialista, Puerto Rico.
Oscar Bonilla, Acción Política, Ecuador.
Cristian Armando, Fundación Sueños Colectivos, Argentina.
Ricardo Ulcuango, Indigenous leader, Ecuador.
Kanelis Giorgos, Deputy Secretary, Kalamata Labor Center, Greece.
Pratis Dimitris, DOY Mesinias Union, Greece.
Fernando Cardozo, CTA Autónoma, Argentina.
Mariano Ciafardini, Solidarity Party, Argentina.

Chico Buarque, musician, Brazil.
Willie Toledo, actor, Spain.
Norman Briski, actor, Argentina.
Chabela Rodríguez, singer, Puerto Rico.
Daniel Devita, musician, Argentina.
Chico Diaz, actor, Brazil.
Takis Vamvakidis, actor, Greece.
Pierre Carles, filmmaker, France.
Adorno Martín, film director, Argentina.
Tania Hermida, filmmaker, Ecuador.
Ricardo Kiko Cerone, theater director, Argentina.
Enrique Dacal, theater director, Argentina.
Jorge Falcone, documentary filmmaker, Argentina.
Paula Ferré, troubadour. Argentina.
Fabián Bertero, musician, Argentina.
Facundo Jofre, troubadour, Argentina.
Solimar Ortíz Jusino, poet, Puerto Rico.
William Pérez Vega, Poetas en Marcha, Puerto Rico.
Juan Camacho, poet, Puerto Rico.
Francis Combes, poet, France.
Raúl Zurita, poet, Chile.
Jaime Svart, poet, Chile/Greece.
Mauricio Vidales, poet, Colombia.
Manuel Santos Iñurrieta, playwright, Argentina.
Cachito Vera, cultural manager, Ecuador.
Pablo Guayasamin, cultural manager, Ecuador.

Techi Cusmanich, cultural manager, Paraguay.
Javier Etayo, humorist, Basque Country.
Pilar Bustos, artist, Ecuador.
María Centeno, artist, Venezuela.
Martha Moreleon, artist, Mexico/Greece.
Pavel Eguez, painter, Ecuador.
Ilonka Vargas, artist, Ecuador.
Loukia Konstantinou, Cultural Center "Our America," Greece.

Fernando Morais, writer, Brazil.
Frei Betto, writer, Brazil.
Luis Britto García, writer, Venezuela.
Michel Collon, writer, Belgium.
Panagiotis Maniatis, writer, Greece.
Argentina Chiriboga, writer, Ecuador.
Vicente Battista, writer, Argentina.
Τasos Kantaras, writer, Greece.
Galo Mora, writer, Ecuador.
José Regato, writer, Ecuador.
Jenny Londoño, writer, Ecuador.

Patricia Villegas, President Telesur, Venezuela.
Wafi Ibrahim, journalist, Lebanon.
Manuel Cabieses, journalist, Chile.
Stella Calloni, journalist, Argentina.
Mario Silva, journalist, Venezuela.
Gustavo Veiga, journalist, Argentina.
Maxime Vivas, journalist, France.
Cathy Dos Santos, journalist, France.
Pascual Serrano, journalist. Spain.
Geraldina Colotti, journalist, Italy.
Orlando Pérez, journalist, Ecuador.
Carlos Aznárez, journalist, Argentina.
Ivano Iogna Prat, journalist, Luxembourg.
Mery Kampouraki, journalist, Greece.
Maria Kaliva, journalist, Greece.
Daniele Biacchessi, journalist, Italy.
Juan Carlos Espinal, journalist, Dominican Republic.
Ascanio Bernardeschi, journalist, Italy.
Kintto Lucas, journalist, Ecuador.
Telma Luzzani, journalist, Argentina.
José Manzaneda, Cuba Información, Spain.
Jorge Elbaum, journalist, Argentina.
Fabrizio Casari, journalist, Italy.
Sandra Russo, journalist, Argentina.
Omar Ospina, journalist, Ecuador.
Sally Burch, journalist, Ecuador.
Xavier Lasso, journalist, Ecuador.
Elaine Tavares, journalist, Brazil.
Mabel Elina Cury, journalist, Argentina.
Horacio Finoli, journalist, Argentina.
Patricia Latour, journalist, France.
Fernando Arellano Ortiz, journalist, Colombia.
Vaquelis Gonatas, Red Solid@ria, Greece.

Beinusz Smukler, American Association of Jurists, USA.
Carol Proner, jurist, Brazil.
Eduardo "Tuto" Villanueva, lawyer, Puerto Rico.
Wilma Reverón Collazo, lawyer, Puerto Rico.
Paul-Emile Dupret, lawyer, Belgium.
Carmen Diniz, lawyer, Brazil.
Yiannis Rachiotis, lawyer, Greece.
Geovy Jaramillo, lawyer, Ecuador.
Gianluca Schiavon, lawyer, Italy.
Héctor Ortega, lawyer, Spain.
Karla Díaz Martínez, lawyer, Chile.

Glenna Cabello, political scientist, Venezuela.
Gianni Vattimo, philosopher, Italy.
Graciela Ramirez, activist, Argentina.
Milagros Rivera, social leader, Puerto Rico.
Irene León, sociologist, Ecuador.
Paul Estrade, professor, France.
Paula Klachko, sociologist, Argentina.
Arantxa Tirado, political scientist, Spain.
Pasquale Voza, professor, Italy.
Angelo Baracca, professor, Italy.
Francisco Sierra Caballero, professor, Spain.
Ana Esther Ceceña, professor, Mexico.
Waldir Rampinelli, Professor, Brazil.
Nildo Domingos, professor, Brazil.
Emilio H. Taddei, Professor, Argentina.
Ioannis Kouzis, Professor, Greece.
Juan Torres López, professor, Spain.
Andrea Vento, Professor, Italy.
Themis Tzimas , professor, Greece.
Dimitris Katsonis, professor, Greece.
Gonzalo Perera, mathematician, Uruguay.
Rosella Franconi, biotechnologist, Italy.
Fabrizio Chiodo, scientist, Italy.
Clóvis Cavalcanti, ecological economist, Brazil.
Rosella Franconi, researcher, Italy.
Gilberto López y Rivas, anthropologist, Mexico.
Alicia Castellanos, anthropologist, Mexico.
Tiziano Tussi, CESPI Scientific Committee, Italy.
Giovanna Di Matteo, geographer, Italy.
Luis E. Wainer, sociologist, Argentina.
David Chávez, sociologist, Ecuador.
Juan Paz y Miño, historian, Ecuador.
Eirini Nedelkou, architect, Greece.
Mario Della Rocca, researcher, Argentina.
Erika Silva, sociologist, Ecuador.
Julio Peña y Lillo, sociologist, Ecuador.
María Fernanda Barreto, researcher, Venezuela.
Nelson Rolim de Moura, editor, Brazil.
Pedro Páez, economist, Ecuador.
Miguel Ruiz, economist, Ecuador.
Ricardo Sánchez, economist, Ecuador.
Melania Mora, economist, Ecuador.
Cristian Orosco, economist, Ecuador.
Mario Ramos, sociologist, Ecuador.
Alessandro Fanetti, researcher, Italy.
Rafael Quintero, sociologist, Ecuador.

Movimiento Estatal de Solidaridad con Cuba, Spain.
MediCuba, Spain.
Sodepaz, Spain.
Samuel Wanitsch, coordination Switzerland-Cuba Association.
Marco Papacci, president Italy-Cuba Association.
Didier Philippe, President of the France-Cuba Association.
Victor Fernández, President Cuba Cooperación, France.
Didier Lalande, president Cuba Linda Association, France.
Charly Bouhana, president Asociación Cuba Sí Francia.
Roberto Casella, Circulo Granma Italy-Cuba.
Anna Serena Bartolucci, president AsiCuba, Italy.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Wor ... -0014.html

Google Translator

Here is an interactive map showing the world wide demonstrations supporting the Cuban government orchestrated by the US, it's minions and Spanish neo-fascists:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mi ... 299152&z=1

(Edit: Corrected reference to map from 'against' to supporting'. Sorry)

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Attorney General’s Office warns citizens promoting illegal marches

Havana deputy chief prosecutor Yahimara Angulo noted that the warning was based on Article 156 of the Constitution, which charges the Attorney General with the mission of ensuring strict compliance with the law by all citizens

Author: National news staff | informacion@granma.cu

november 8, 2021 09:11:33

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Photo: Juvenal Balán

The Attorney General's Office of the Republic reports that warnings have been issued to a small number of Cuban citizens in the provinces of Havana, Villa Clara, Cienfuegos and Holguin, who publicly persist in promoting and holding a march, for which authorization was denied by government officials in eight provinces, last October 12, after determining that the intended demonstrations were illegal.

The Attorney General's actions, warning these citizens of the legal consequences of holding the marches, make clear that anyone failing to comply with the decision made by local government authorities would be committing the crimes of contempt, unlawful demonstration, instigating delinquency or others established and sanctioned in current criminal legislation.

Yahimara Angulo González, deputy chief prosecutor in Havana, stated that the action taken was based on Article 156 of the Constitution, which assigns the Attorney General's Office the mission of ensuring strict compliance with the Magna Carta, the law and other legal provisions, by all citizens.

Furthermore, she added, Law 83 authorizes state prosecutors to interview, warn, take statements and conduct any other type of procedure that may be necessary to fulfill this responsibility. Also established are stipulations to protect the rights and interests of state bodies, institutions and agencies; promote and contribute to enforcement of the law, prevention of crimes and antisocial behavior, and the strengthening of citizens’ conscious observance of legal norms.

Sufficient reason has been publicly presented to make clear the annexationist nature of the purported marches, promoted by persons financed from abroad, who, falsely presenting their intentions as pacific, seek to generate chaos and destabilization of the country, as part of a regime change strategy based on well-known soft coup formulas, tried and tested in other nations.

The enthusiastic support march promoters have received in the United States is led by the counterrevolutionary leaders of the so-called Council for the Democratic Transition of Cuba, a subversive platform, whose members have openly acknowledged receiving financing from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), which has a long history of subversion in Cuba.

The mercenary provocation has been publicly and notoriously backed by U.S. legislators, political operators of the anti-Cuban mafia, and communications media that encourage all manner of attacks on the Revolution.

Among the most rabid supporters of the provocation are Congress members Marco Rubio, Mario Diaz-Balart and Maria Elvira Salazar; the terrorist Gutierrez Boronat; the infamous Cuban American National Foundation; and frustrated invaders from Brigade 2506, defeated at Playa Giron.

The Constitution of the Republic contains very clear precepts regarding malicious intentions like those of the provocateurs. No one has the right to take action in the interests of a foreign power or jeopardize the stability of the public order. Joining an annexationist project is unconstitutional, illegitimate and immoral.

https://en.granma.cu/cuba/2021-11-08/at ... al-marches

A tad dated but nonetheless...No doubt the infantile left will jump on this but the main question, the class question is "whose authority?"
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Cuba

Post by blindpig » Tue Nov 16, 2021 2:38 pm

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Why is the US fueling the November 15 Cuba protests?
November 15, 2021
By Rosa Miriam Elizalde – Nov 13, 2021

Cuban journalist Rosa Miriam Elizalde discusses the US-backed counter-revolutionary protests planned for November 15

On September 20, letters began to arrive at eight Cuban municipal or provincial government headquarters announcing the holding of “peaceful” marches on November 15 by a group called Archipiélago. The motivation for these marches was a call for change. The letter was not a formal request to occupy the busiest streets of some cities in Cuba, but rather a notification by the group that they would do so and they also demanded that the authorities provide them with security for these marches. By virtue of Cuban laws and obsessive American support for the marches, the Cuban government denied permission for holding the protests.

Almost two months have passed since these letters were sent, but there are few indications that the march will take place in Cuba. Florida’s propaganda machine assures the opposite and adds that similar marches will take place across more than a hundred cities in the world, a third of them in the United States.

On November 10, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez warned the diplomatic corps accredited in Havana that the Cuban government “will not tolerate an opposition march” and further said that “Cuba will never allow actions of a foreign government in our territory, trying to destabilize the country,” while referring to the US’s support of these marches. The provocation follows the plot seen many times before. Meanwhile, this march, which has been scheduled for November 15, is not what many hope it will be: a movement for change in Cuba.

The march is not autonomous

Two days after the delivery of the first letter to the authorities, a string of statements by the US officials and members of Congress began pouring in on September 22. Until November 10, there had been several public interventions from Washington or Florida with all kinds of demands and threats to the island’s authorities. No other issue in the US domestic politics, in recent weeks, has received so much attention or been the case of such obsession before these marches.

The spokesman for the US State Department Ned Price issued a statement on October 16 condemning the denial of permission by the Cuban government to hold the march. Meanwhile, US Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) extended his support for these anti-government protests soon after the news about these marches began circulating, while a couple of top advisers from the Biden administration have threatened more sanctions on the Cuban government for denying permission to hold the march on November 15.

As if that were not enough, more money has been raining in for such efforts against the Cuban government. In September 2021, the Biden administration gave almost 7 million dollars to 12 organizations that almost daily publicize the “civic march for change” in Cuba. Many analysts see the hidden hand of the “color revolutions” in this, which were exported by the West to the Russian periphery.

In addition to “moral,” political and financial support, the US diplomats offer support in many ways to the anti-government movement in Cuba and occasionally serve as chauffeurs to the opposition. The only thing missing in terms of interference is a show like that of the US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who distributed food to anti-government protesters in Independence Square, in the capital of Ukraine, Kiev, in 2013.

The march is not disconnected from other processes
The march is just another episode in a more comprehensive strategy. The Biden administration has interpreted the combined effect of the pandemic, the global crisis and the economic blockade—plus the 243 additional measures imposed by the former US President Donald Trump—as exceptional conditions that have hit Cuba even harder. No spies are required to realize that there are more queues, inflation and shortages in a country that has been managing shortages for 60 years, but it is also important to understand that the march does not have popular support within the country. Cuba is returning to normalcy with the opening of flights, families reuniting after being separated for two years, the return of students to schools and the revival of the national economy.

The group organizing the march is not peaceful

The private Facebook group listed as the march organizer, Archipiélago, is anything but moderate. A large number of publications by the group support symbolic violence and political disqualification of those who defend the socialist project or celebrate some social achievements in Cuba. The debate in these spaces is not to modify opinions, but to stir up prejudices, instill hatred among Cubans as an exclusive source of legitimacy for a government that has led the country under very difficult conditions.

The repertoire is an unbridled McCarthyism and an inordinate impulse to indulge in stigmatization that are very common communicative practices in the current political climate of the United States, but alien to the political, cultural and idiosyncratic character of Cubans. Cuba’s Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, on November 10,assured that Facebook could be sued for supporting the “dissident movement “ in Cuba, according to Reuters.

The marches are not synchronous

There is talk of the synchronization of the marches inside and outside of Cuba to promote change. But there is no such thing. In Cuba, there is definitely no atmosphere to support these marches, while the organizers of Florida speak of the participation of people from a hundred cities in the world on November 15, they have not specified the number of people who will do so.

In reality, those willing to participate in this type of anti-Castro chaos are usually few, but that does not matter. On April 30, 2020, an individual opened fire at the Cuban Embassy in Washington with an assault weapon, which led to the recalling of the foreign minister. On the night of July 27, two individuals threw a Molotov cocktail at the Cuban Embassy in Paris.

It’s not what they say

The conservative ghost of the far-right that travels the world and arrives in Cuba is not what it seems or what is visible to the naked eye. Behind the “non-violent march” mantra is the long shadow of the life-long reactionaries who now combine economic ultra-liberalism, conservative morality, empty concepts, and creative use of social media. They dream of ending the Cuban Revolution no later than November 15, while leaving a moral question unanswered: How is it possible to talk of a civil, peaceful and independent protest, if Washington is lubricating the route plan of the protest with threats and dollars?



Rosa Miriam Elizalde is a Cuban journalist and founder of the site Cubadebate. She is vice president of both the Union of Cuban Journalists (UPEC) and the Latin American Federation of Journalists (FELAP). She has written and co-written several books including Jineteros en la Habana and Our Chavez. She has received the Juan Gualberto Gómez National Prize for Journalism on multiple occasions for her outstanding work. She is currently a weekly columnist for La Jornada of Mexico City.

Featured image: Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez gave a press conference on November 10 to foreign diplomatic corps about the US-led destabilization plan. Photo: Foreign Ministry of Cuba

(Peoples Dispatch)

https://orinocotribune.com/why-is-the-u ... -protests/

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Militant Solidarity With Cuba on Display in 80+ Cities Worldwide

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The images that mass media are not going to show today or tomorrow because they tell a different story. | Photo: Twitter/@CUBAONU

Published 15 November 2021 (15 hours 9 minutes ago)

Demonstrators support Cuba's productive revival and reject U.S. interference against peoples and revolutions that act with sovereignty.

Solidarity movements with Cuba, political parties, social groups, and Cuban emigrants in other countries celebrated on Monday the restart of the school year on the island, its economic-productive revival, and the Cuban people's determination to defend their Revolution against destabilizing attempts plotted from the United States.

Cuban President, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, said through Twitter that "solidarity actions in more than 80 cities support the will of the Cuban people to build their own future."

RELATED:

'Cuba Is Not Alone,' International Solidarity Movements Stress

In an act in front of the headquarters of the Cuban diplomatic representation in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, political parties and social movements supported the reopening of activities and rejected the recent acts of interference by the White House.

The member of the Network of Intellectuals in Defense of Humanity, María Fernanda Barreto, stressed that Cuba is not alone and counts on the militant solidarity of people all over the world.

She explained that the U.S. government is attacking numerous sovereign countries for several reasons, among which she mentioned the loss of its hegemony and the emergence of new powers.

He added that to this is added the determination of its circles of power to impose on Latin America a relationship of subordination through the Monroe Doctrine, aimed against the resistance of several peoples and sovereign revolutions, such as the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua, the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela and the Cuban Revolution.

He stressed that it is now more important than ever to unite against imperialism, which attacks Cuba to prevent the revival of the economy and tourism, a sector he valued as essential to overcome the obstacles of an economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed on Cuba by the U.S. government for more than six decades.


"We appreciate the international solidarity with #Cuba, already in more than 80 countries on all continents multiple activities are taking place against the #Blockade and denouncing the ongoing campaign of the # U.S. government and its lackeys."

Among those who demanded the cessation of the attacks against Cuba was Camila Fabri Saab, wife of Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab, kidnapped by the U.S. Government.

Since last November 11, several acts of solidarity with Cuba have been taking place in Syria, in which Palestinians residing in that nation have also participated.

In addition to demonstrating the failure of the U.S. blockade against Cuba, the participants denounce that Washington wants to set Cubans against each other in order to generate social chaos in Cuba.

This Monday, Cuba solidarity organizations in Greece gathered in front of the U.S. embassy in Athens to denounce the destabilization campaigns and the criminal policy of economic war against Havana.

Similar acts took place over the weekend and this Monday in Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, Ecuador, East Timor, China, Peru, Dominican Republic and other nations.

A few hours before the 31st edition of the solidarity caravan that has been organized since 1992 arrives in Havana, the organization Pastors for Peace similarly emphasized that "once again, Cuba leads as an example in health, science and humanism."

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Mil ... -0015.html

So far I have not seen any current or eye-witness reports on how things went other than hearing overwrought pissing and moaning on npr. They were aghast that youth groups and neighborhood groups blockaded the homes of some of the mercenary counter revolutionaries, preventing them from obeying orders from Miami. Oh, the horror! They were not arrested, shot or beaten, they were blocked from leaving their homes. These people are traitors or fools and I expect that will be sorted out soon. In any case the people taking a hint from the government, it is true, took maintenance of the peace into their own hands successfully and without violence. Whose authority? The people's authority!
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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