diff --git "a/Cuba/2019/news_2019_02.json" "b/Cuba/2019/news_2019_02.json" new file mode 100644--- /dev/null +++ "b/Cuba/2019/news_2019_02.json" @@ -0,0 +1,4608 @@ +{ + "title": "News for Cuba from 2019-02-01 to 2019-02-28", + "totalResults": 100, + "headlines": [ + "New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting - Wilson Center", + "Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution - NPR", + "Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba - Truthout", + "The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis - CNN", + "Cuba To Welcome 5 Million Visitors In 2019 - Forbes", + "Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct - BBC", + "Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism - The Guardian", + "Guest post: \u2018Bicitaxis\u2019 and the streets of Cuba - BikePortland", + "Opinion | Maduro and Cuba Lose - WSJ", + "A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers - The Colorado Sun", + "2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report \u2013 Part One - Society of Architectural Historians", + "Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle - Nature", + "A New Era for Cuba? What the New Constitution Means for the Island. - Americas Quarterly", + "Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism - Al Jazeera", + "Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote - Committee to Protect Journalists", + "10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba - The Borgen Project", + "Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years - Rolling Stone", + "Opinion | Is This the End of Cuba\u2019s Astonishing Artistic Freedom? (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Havana Is Not Your Hipster Playground - Havana Times", + "Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery - HOT ROD Network", + "Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas - Emory University", + "Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution - Civil Rights Defenders", + "Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution - CNN", + "Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents - NBC News", + "Nehanda Abiodun, 68, Black Revolutionary Who Fled to Cuba, Dies (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection - University of Miami News", + "Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know - Al Jazeera", + "Trump Nears Key Cuba Sanctions Decision Over Support for Maduro - Bloomberg.com", + "How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba - Northeastern Global News", + "\u2018A Tuba to Cuba\u2019 Review: A New Orleans Jazz Band Makes a Caribbean Connection (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Exploring The World of Cuban Rum - Forbes", + "Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean - LSE Blogs", + "How Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World - Foundation for Economic Education", + "Urban Agriculture: What U.S. Cities Can Learn From Cuba - U.S. News & World Report", + "Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property - VOA - Voice of America English News", + "Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention - VOA - Voice of America English News", + "I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined - Hyperallergic", + "Travel to Cuba in 2019: What\u2019s Changed and What\u2019s Coming - Travel Agent Central", + "Cuba and Algerian revolutions: an intertwined history - The Militant", + "Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba - The Conversation", + "Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba - BBC", + "IMPRESSIONS: Cuba Festival at the Joyce Theater with Malpaso Dance Company, LOS HIJOS DEL DIRECTOR, and Compa\u00f1\u00eda Irene Rodr\u00edguez - dance-enthusiast.com", + "U.S. bookings to Cuba expected to rise, but Americans still confused about travel rules - Miami Herald", + "Cuba's churches reject gay marriage before vote on new constitution - The Guardian", + "'A Tuba to Cuba' - The Movie Cricket", + "In Fight for Venezuela, Who Supports Maduro and Who Backs Guaid\u00f3? (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Cubans Approve a Constitution, but Opponents Speak Out (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Guitar Virtuoso Manuel Barrueco Has Come a Long Way Since Leaving Cuba - Voice of OC", + "A Forgotten Botanist\u2019s Stunning 19th-Century Manuscript Is Now Online - Atlas Obscura", + "Cuba Unveils 2019 Edici\u00f3n Limitadas - Cigar Aficionado", + "Cuba's new constitution is the same as the old one \u2014 undemocratic - USA Today", + "9 Things You Need To Know About Montecristo - Cigar Aficionado", + "Venezuela & Cuba: an exhausted revolutionary? - openDemocracy", + "Minnesota Native Brett Pfarr Takes Bronze in Cuba - University of Minnesota Athletics", + "D. Rodriguez Cuba - Miami Herald", + "Cubans approve new constitution - DW.com", + "What We\u2019re Reading: Cuba and Mars - Geopolitical Futures", + "Russia Grants New Credit to Cuba to Buy Weapons - Havana Times", + "'They have no idea what democracy is': Tania Bruguera on Cuba's artist crackdown - The Guardian", + "La Ruta Mala (Video) - BIKEPACKING.com", + "The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System - Havana Times", + "Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach - Archdiocese of Miami", + "What Cuban Rums To Bring Home: A Short Guide - Forbes", + "Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba - phelpscountyfocus.com", + "Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution - The Conversation", + "\u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review - Santa Fe Reporter", + "Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank - imemc.org", + "Students study bees, culture in Cuba - Drexel Triangle", + "Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua | English.news.cn - \u65b0\u534e\u7f51", + "In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing - MPR News", + "Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba - FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s", + "Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad - CNN", + "The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck - La Vida Baseball", + "Success in Keeping Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rate Low - BORGEN Magazine", + "Cuba denies Trump claim of troops in Venezuela - Arab News", + "Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen - New Orleans Tourism", + "Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything - Havana Times", + "73 UNGA: Statement by Cuba at the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. New York, February 28, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "Cuban Food Stories Documentary Serves Up A Slice Of Life Through Food - Forbes", + "Texas WWII veteran asked for 100 cards for his 100th birthday. He now has more than 10,000. - Chron", + "Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index - Nearshore Americas", + "Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof on Racial Migrations - Princeton University Press", + "Canadian Diplomats Sue Their Government Over Mysterious Cuban Disease (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean? - Al Jazeera", + "Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami - Matador Network", + "The Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN welcomes Manhattan College students who will represent Cuba in the National Model United Nations. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba - Havana Times", + "Putin to U.S.: I'm ready for another Cuban Missile-style crisis if you want one - Reuters", + "Colombian human smugglers who raped and murdered Cubans sentenced to federal prison - Miami Herald", + "Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet - Aviation International News", + "Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States - U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc.", + "Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 ) - Open Culture", + "Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow - Havana Times", + "Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum - Havana Times", + "Serie del Caribe Championship Game Preview - Baseball Prospectus", + "Medical students warm to studies in Cuba - China's State Council Information Office", + "73 UNGA: Cuba's Intervention at NAM Extraordinary Meeting on Venezuela. New York, February, 12, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday - Los Angeles Review of Books", + "Cuba meteor seen from the air - EarthSky", + "Joe Cuba 100 yr old Veteran - Times Record News" + ], + "articles": [ + { + "title": "New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting - Wilson Center", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting - Wilson Center" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMixgFBVV95cUxObFRjdnBoeFlGcGxJTEE3c0g2NlhVb2VOS2RpQnFST2x2ajdGa2FSYjlpWnNVcDZicEN1TDFqUkpCaWkyam16QUFMQVROSDA5OHJmaDFiS0ZwVE9aQ0I1RllmekpXZHpWRFRaQTZZY2NKV2ZhSHBCeWkzZjJ2S1ZFY0l5YjY3ZDV4RnBONUI5eHYxY3llM0V6YjYxMTJla2NuZ1gxZTlKZUsyQnYxdzJSQXBZTDRUX2ZBdEhVTTUzaXRyLS16M0E?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/new-russian-evidence-soviet-cuban-relations-1960-61-when-nikita-met-fidel-the-bay-pigs", + "id": "CBMixgFBVV95cUxObFRjdnBoeFlGcGxJTEE3c0g2NlhVb2VOS2RpQnFST2x2ajdGa2FSYjlpWnNVcDZicEN1TDFqUkpCaWkyam16QUFMQVROSDA5OHJmaDFiS0ZwVE9aQ0I1RllmekpXZHpWRFRaQTZZY2NKV2ZhSHBCeWkzZjJ2S1ZFY0l5YjY3ZDV4RnBONUI5eHYxY3llM0V6YjYxMTJla2NuZ1gxZTlKZUsyQnYxdzJSQXBZTDRUX2ZBdEhVTTUzaXRyLS16M0E", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 06 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 6, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 37, + 0 + ], + "summary": "New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting  Wilson Center", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting  Wilson Center" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.wilsoncenter.org", + "title": "Wilson Center" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting\nauthor: James G Hershberg\nurl: https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/new-russian-evidence-soviet-cuban-relations-1960-61-when-nikita-met-fidel-the-bay-pigs\nhostname: wilsoncenter.org\ndescription: The forging of the Soviet-Cuban alliance in the years after Fidel Castro\u2019s revolution took power in January 1959, in sync with a deepening split between Washington and Havana, was one of the tectonic developments of the Cold War. Much evidence has emerged, especially on the Soviet side, on relations between the two communist countries and their charismatic leaders, Castro and Nikita Khrushchev, climaxing with the October 1962 missile crisis.\nsitename: Wilson Center\ndate: 2019-02-06\n---\n# New Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61: When Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting\n\n**To download this Working Paper, please click here.**\n\n### James G. Hershberg\n\n## CWIHP Working Paper #90\n\nNew Russian Evidence on Soviet-Cuban Relations, 1960-61:\n\nWhen Nikita Met Fidel, the Bay of Pigs, and Assassination Plotting\n\n\n### James G. Hershberg\n\nFebruary 2019\n\nThe forging of the Soviet-Cuban alliance in the years after Fidel Castro\u2019s revolution took power in January 1959, in sync with a deepening split between Washington and Havana, was one of the tectonic developments of the Cold War. Much evidence has emerged, especially on the Soviet side, on relations between the two communist countries and their charismatic leaders, Castro and Nikita Khrushchev, climaxing with the October 1962 missile crisis (and mostly secret Soviet-Cuban crisis which ensued in November).[1] Yet, much remains closed on the formative period of their alliance.\n\nAlthough Cuban archives remain mostly inaccessible, despite some recent partial openings and considerable oral history testimony[2], far more has become available from the Soviet perspective. During a May 2015 trip to Moscow, with the help of friendly colleagues and staff, I was able to gain access to some pertinent materials in the archives of both the former Communist Party of the Soviet Union Central Committee (CPSU CC) and the Russian foreign ministry.[3]\n\nReproduced below are translated documents, or excerpts, regarding three aspects of Soviet-Cuban relations in 1960-61, after diplomatic ties between Moscow and Havana were formally restored and a Soviet ambassador, Sergey M. Kudryavtsev, arrived in the Cuban capital in the summer of 1960. The first selection concerns the first meeting between Castro and Khrushchev, which took place in New York City on 20 September, 1960, during the annual session of the United Nations General Assembly. The second selection contains conversations between Kudryavtsev and Cuban leaders, especially Fidel Castro, during the run-up to, and aftermath of, the April 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion. And the third presents a glimpse into the Soviet-Cuban dialogue on the explosive topic of US assassination plotting against Castro.\n\nWhen Nikita Met Fidel, and Fidel Met Nikita\u2014New York City, September 1960\n\nOne of the most iconic moments in Fidel Castro\u2019s long career came in September 1960, less than two years after the revolution he led seized power in Havana. In New York City to attend the annual session of the United Nations General Assembly, the Cuban prime minister left his mid-town Manhattan hotel in a huff after a dispute with its management. After threatening to pitch a tent, in a Sierra Maestra-style guerrilla encampment, outside the UN headquarters, or perhaps in Central Park\u2014he relocated, in a gesture of solidarity with African-Americans he declared were oppressed by capitalism, colonialism, and racism, to the Hotel Theresa in Harlem. There, on 20 September, he welcomed Soviet leader Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, who embraced him, figuratively and literally, in what was universally described as a \u201cbear hug\u201d\u2014symbolizing the creation of a sturdy Soviet-Cuban political, economic, and military alliance, and the island\u2019s incorporation into the communist world (what was still then known as the \u201cSino-Soviet bloc,\u201d despite increasing evidence of friction between Khrushchev\u2019s Moscow and Mao Zedong\u2019s Beijing).\n\nAs Castro biographer Tad Szulc observed, the \u201cNew York act\u201d performed by the cigar-chomping *barbudo* and the grizzled Ukrainian peasant was \u201cmagnificent political theatre, leaving no doubt that Cuba had exchanged the American influence sphere for that of the Soviets, with all its attendant political implications in the Western Hemisphere and in East-West relations.\u201d[4] By ditching the Shelbourne Hotel on Lexington Avenue and trooping up to a comparatively dilapidated residential hotel in northern Manhattan\u2019s predominantly \u201cNegro\u201d district, where anti-authority, militant civil rights sentiment was rising, to the evident discomfort of their US-supplied security details, Castro and then Khrushchev dramatized their new revolutionary alignment, proclaimed solidarity with non-white, colonized and/or de-colonizing, anti-imperialist peoples, and jubilantly and defiantly thumbed their noses at their (North) American hosts. Their raucous rendezvous in Harlem, which foreshadowed the partnership that would bring the world to the brink of thermonuclear war two years later, instantly entered the lore of the Cold War, the two leaders\u2019 already larger-than-life biographies, and the neighborhood itself, where it is still remembered as an electric moment.[5]\n\nBesides a milestone in international relations, the highly publicized Castro-Khrushchev encounter also intersected with US domestic politics, coinciding with the presidential election campaign between Republican Richard M. Nixon and Democrat John F. Kennedy, in which disputes over who would be a more effective contender against Soviet (and Cuban) communism played a major role. For many years, historians have been able to rely only on the retrospective accounts of both Castro and Khrushchev, as reproduced in their memoirs (and included below). The new record, while presenting no great revelations, adds to our understanding of the first encounter between these titans of 20th-century cold war and communist history.\n\nKhrushchev\u2019s Recollections of Meeting Fidel Castro\n\nKhrushchev recalled his encounter with Fidel Castro in his tape-recorded recollections, which he dictated at his dacha after he was ousted from the Kremlin in October 1964, and that were then smuggled out to the West. Presented first is the edited version, which appeared in the first volume of memoirs published in 1970; and second is the rawer, slightly longer version, translated slightly differently, which appeared in the 2007 publication of the verbatim tape-recorded memoirs:\n\n**From Khrushchev Remembers: The Last Testament (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1974), pp. 477-479.**\n\nOurs was not the only delegation that received unfriendly treatment at the hands of the Americans. There were also the Cubans. The Americans committed a hostile act against the delegation headed by Fidel Castro. The Cubans had rented rooms in some hotel, but they were thrown out. Of course, the US government pretended it was a private affair between the Cubans and the hotel proprietor and refused to interfere. I was told that Castro was furious and that, as a former guerrilla, he was threatening to pitch a tent in a square near the UN building. Then, out of the blue, he received an invitation from the proprietor of a hotel in Harlem, so Castro decided to establish himself there.\n\nWhen we learned about this outrage which had been committed against the Cuban delegation, we were indignant. We decided that I should go to the hotel in Harlem and shake Castro\u2019s hand as a gesture of sympathy and respect. Not that Castro needed anyone to feel sorry for him. He is a man of strong will. He understood perfectly that he was being harassed as part of the reaction of American monopolies to the policies which his government had been conducting in Cuba since he seized power. I asked one of our people to telephone Castro right away and, if he wasn\u2019t at the hotel, to leave word that Khrushchev would like to visit him as soon as possible. The word came back that Castro thanked me for calling and offered to come to us instead. I took this to mean that he thought because the Soviet Union is a great country and his was a young revolutionary government representing a small country, it would be proper for him to pay a visit to me first, then later I could make a return call on him.\n\nI felt it would be better for me to make the first visit, thereby emphasizing our solidarity with Cuba, especially in light of the indignation and discrimination they were being subjected to. There was another reason for my going to see him at his headquarters. The Cuban delegation was in Harlem and the owner of the hotel was a Negro. By going to a Negro hotel in a Negro district, we would be making a double demonstration: against the discriminatory policies of the United States of America toward Negroes as well as toward Cuba.\n\n\u201cCall Castro and tell him I\u2019m on my way,\u201d I ordered. I told my bodyguard that we were going to drive to Harlem. My security people immediately called up the American head of my police escort. (I knew him already from my previous trip to the US.) He said that I might encounter some unpleasantness in Harlem and tried to persuade me not to go there. This made me all the more determined. I didn\u2019t want the newspapers writing that Khrushchev was afraid of Negroes, afraid of being physically abused in Harlem. So I got into a car and went straight to Castro\u2019s hotel.\n\nNaturally, the journalists got there first. They know everything. I don\u2019t know where they found out. Maybe from the police, maybe from our own people. I couldn\u2019t get away from them. In addition to the newsmen and photographers and movie cameramen, an enormous number of Negroes had gathered around.\n\nCastro was waiting for us at the entrance. This was my first meeting with him. He made a deep impression on me. He was a very tall man with a beard, and his face was both pleasant and tough at the same time. His eyes sparkled with kindness toward his friends. We greeted each other by embracing. When I say \u201cembrace,\u201d I\u2019m using the word in a rather specialized way. You have to take into consideration my height as opposed to Castro\u2019s. He bent down and enveloped me with his whole body. While I\u2019m fairly broad abeam, he wasn\u2019t so thin either, especially for his age.\n\nWe went to his suite. As we made our way through the hotel, I could see right away that, except for Negroes, no one would live in a place like this. It was old and poor, and the air was thick and heavy. The rooms hadn\u2019t been cleaned. The linen on the beds obviously wasn\u2019t fresh, and there was a certain odor you find in overcrowded places with bad ventilation.\n\nCastro expressed his pleasure at my visit, and I repeated my sentiments of solidarity and approval of his policy. The meeting was very brief; we exchanged only a few sentences. We said good-bye, and I went back to my residence.\n\nYou can imagine the uproar this episode caused in the American press and elsewhere as well.\n\nThe next day we arrived at the General Assembly building before the session began. A few minutes later Castro\u2019s delegation appeared. I suggested that we go greet the Cubans, and my comrades agreed. We made our way from one end of the hall to the other, and Castro and I embraced demonstrably. We wanted everyone to know that fraternal relations were forming between our country and Cuba. The democratic press welcomed this development, while the bourgeois press reflected the interests of aggressive circles in capitalist countries by picking Fidel and me to pieces. But this was as it should be. I always say, if our friends praise us and our enemies heap abuse on us, it means we are conducting policy along correct class lines.\n\n\n*******\n\n\n**From Sergei Khrushchev, ed ., Memoirs of Nikita Khrushchev, vol. 3: Statesman [1953-1964] (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007), pp. 270-272:**\n\nI don\u2019t remember what day it was during our visit to the United Nations, but we learned that the delegation from Cuba had arrived, headed by Fidel Castro. The Americans took an insulting attitude toward this delegation, and they did this the way they really know how to in America. The Cuban delegation was expelled from its hotel. Of course, it was supposedly the hotel owner who made this decision, as though it were simply a private matter, so that the government did not have to bear any responsibility, as though it had not interfered. I was told that Castro was raging and thundering, threatening that if shelter was not found for his delegation, that as a former guerrilla fighter he would put up a tent out on the open square near the UN building and live there. Then the owner of a hotel in Harlem offered accommodations for the Cuban delegation. We were furious when we heard about this swinish behavior toward the Cuban delegation. After consulting with the members of our delegation, I proposed that we make a trip to the new hotel and shake Fidel\u2019s hand and express our respect and sympathy. No, not sympathy but indignation. He was a man of strong will and hardly needed sympathy, but he understood that this was a response by the American reactionaries to the policy being pursued by the revolutionary Cuban government. He responded proudly because for him it was not a humiliation but a result of the fight he was putting up to oppose discrimination against his country. I asked our representatives to get in touch with Castro by phone and let him know that Khrushchev wanted to make a visit to him immediately. That was a common practice. Many delegations were visiting one another. I was told that Fidel was grateful for our concern, but he himself wanted to come visit us. He evidently thought that since the Soviet Union was a great country and Cuba a small revolutionary island, he should come visit us first and only after that should the representative of the USSR make a return visit to him. Then I asked that he be informed that Khrushchev had already left, because we thought we should be the first to make a visit. This was to emphasize our solidarity with Cuba and our indignation at the discrimination with which Cuba was being treated. There was a second consideration. The Cuban delegation was now being housed in Harlem, a Black district, and the owner of the hotel was African American. The fact that the Cubans were living in Harlem was impressive to Black people, and a visit by Khrushchev to that predominantly Black part of the city for a visit to the Cuban delegation would in general be a demonstrative display of our position.\n\nI informed our bodyguards that we were going. Our guards immediately got in touch with the head of the police detachment assigned to us. Police on motorcycles accompanied us with an extraordinary amount of noise. There were quite a few of them. Our comrades told me that the head of the American police guarding us, a man I knew personally (because he had also been a guard when I was a guest of President Eisenhower [in September 1959]), was asking that I not go there, because unpleasant incidents could happen in that neighborhood, and he was talking against this visit in every possible way. That convinced me more than ever of the necessity to make this visit; otherwise the journalists would be calling in their reports all over America that Khrushchev was afraid of Blacks or that supposedly there was going to be a demonstration there and perhaps he would suffer some physical injury. Officially I had the right to make the trip, since Harlem was within the limits in which we were allowed free movement, and I asked that the head of the group of police be informed that I was exercising my rights and was going to make this trip, and if he did not want to go there, he did not have to. Of course, he did go. I was given a car and we set off for the hotel where Castro was staying. A huge crowd of people had gathered there, primarily journalists. I don\u2019t know what methods they used to find out about everything, but it was impossible to hide from them anywhere. They were present outside our residence, on constant duty, and they followed the police. When I arrived in Harlem the whole area was jammed full of cars. And since so many photographers, movie cameramen, and journalists had arrived, other people also were drawn there. A huge number of the local Black population also gathered. I will not talk here about the external appearance of that part of New York. It has been described perfectly well by others, and people who are interested in America have a clear picture of it.\n\nWhen we arrived at the hotel, Castro and his comrades were waiting for us by the entrance. This was the first time I had ever seen him in person, and he made a powerful impression on me: a man of great height with a black beard and a pleasant, stern face, which was lit up by a kind of goodness. His face simply glowed with it and it sparkled in his eyes. We enclosed each other in an embrace. (I use the term \u201cenclose\u201d provisionally, keeping in mind my height in contrast to Castro\u2019s.) He bent over me as though covering my body with his. Although my dimensions were somewhat wider, his height overpowered everything. Besides, he was a solidly built man for his height. Then we immediately went up to his hotel rooms.\n\nWhen I entered the hotel I became aware immediately that no one lived there but Blacks. It was an old, rundown building. The air was heavy and stale. Apparently the furniture and the bedclothes had not been aired out sufficiently, and perhaps they were not, as we say, of the first degree of freshness--or even the second. We went into his rooms and exchanged a few remarks. He expressed his pleasure at my visit, and I spoke words of solidarity and approval of his policies. Our meeting was brief; actually, that was all there was to it. I immediately returned to my residence. You can imagine what an uproar was raised in the American press! Not only the American press. The incident echoed widely throughout the world. The rudeness and discrimination toward the Cuban delegation was noted, as well as the demonstrative visit to Castro by the Soviet delegation. And of course our fraternal embrace.\n\nOn the next day we arrived at the United Nations before the opening of the session. Then the Cuban delegation arrived. It was seated a fairly good distance away from us. I suggested that we go over and say hello. We demonstratively walked across the entire meeting hall and greeted each other. Castro and I embraced again, showing that fraternal relations were being established between us and that we were treating Cuba as a friend. We emphasized our unity on questions of struggle against imperialism and colonialism and against aggression by the imperialist powers. This demonstrative action came off well. It too was echoed in the press in an appropriate way. The press reactions varied. The democratic press welcomed this and the capitalist press picked us apart. But that too was an expression of the capitalists\u2019 attitude toward us and also worked in our favor.\n\n\n**Fidel Castro\u2019s Recollections of Meeting Khrushchev**\n\nI was not able to find any detailed account by Fidel Castro of his first encounter of Khrushchev\u2014for example, he does not mention it in a massive \u201cspoken autobiography\u201d published in 2006\u2014although he has undoubtedly discussed it in his countless public statements and interviews.[6] The most substantive description located was during an oral history conference on the Cuban Missile Crisis in Havana in January 1992, a week after the Soviet Union disappeared:\n\n**Fidel Castro comments, Cuban Missile Crisis conference, Havana, January 1992, in James G. Blight, Bruce J. Allyn, and David A. Welch, Cuba on the Brink (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, Inc., 1993, 2002), pp. 192-93:**\n\nLet me start by saying that in analyzing a period such as this one, we must also analyze or review the participation of several personalities in it. Two of them are two very important personalities of our time: Khrushchev and Kennedy. They were two people for whom I feel great respect. In the case of Khrushchev, for the gestures of friendship he had for our country in very difficult times, I\u2019ve always regarded him with affection. I met him personally. I remember when, immediately after a meeting of heads of state in the United Nations, he went to visit me at the Theresa Hotel, where I had virtually been confined at the time due to the enormous hostility directed at me there. I was practically ejected from my original hotel. I had two options: either to get and set up a tent on the United Nations patio, or to go to the Theresa Hotel. There I was welcomed, and I received the visits of many heads of state. Khrushchev among them. That was a great honor; he behaved toward us extremely well. Anytime or every time that we requested anything from him, he did everything possible to try to meet our requests. I had the feeling that I was rather dealing with a peasant\u2014a very wise peasant\u2014but, more than that, an intelligent man\u2014a very intelligent man\u2014an audacious man, and a courageous man. Those were my personal impressions of Khrushchev.\n\n**Soviet-Cuban Consultations in the Run-Up to the Khrushchev-Castro Meeting**\n\nTo lay the groundwork for the Castro-Khrushchev encounter, the Soviet ambassador in Havana, Sergey Kudryavtsev, spoke with Cuban leaders in the days before the Cuban leader left for New York. From the Russian foreign ministry archives in Moscow, records of conversation were located with, first, Foreign Minister Ra\u00fal Roa Garc\u00eda, and the next day, with Fidel Castro, at which Soviet-Cuban coordination in New York was discussed. Notably, Roa described Fidel Castro as \u201cvery hot-tempered and mercurial, like all Cubans,\u201d in explaining that it was frequently necessary to advise him so he acted \u201cmore discreetly and cautiously.\u201d Both Roa and Castro looked forward to meeting their Soviet counterparts (foreign minister Andrei Gromyko and Khrushchev) and promised full cooperation in New York. The Cuban leader promised, in particular, to endorse Soviet positions on international affairs, especially disarmament and Berlin, in his own speech. (Note: The documents were not fully transcribed, so only extensive excerpts are presented below. Also, all records of conversation between Kudryavtsev and Cuban leaders were from the \u201cambassador\u2019s journal,\u201d not the ciphered telegrams reporting such talks which the Soviet Embassy in Havana sent to the foreign ministry in Moscow; those, unfortunately, apparently remain classified.)\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, f. 0104, op. 16, p. 116, d. 4, ll. 157-160. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/176347.]*\n\n\nSecret Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n7 November 1960\n\nOutgoing N\u00ba 97\n\n\nThe Soviet Embassy\n\nin the Republic of Cuba\n\nHavana\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Raul Roa, Minister of Foreign Affairs\n\n__14 September 1960__\n\n\nIn accordance with instructions [I] had I visited Raul Roa and informed him that N. S. Khrushchev had departed for New York on the steamship Baltika on 9 September and would arrive in the USA on 19 September.\n\nI told R. Roa that Cde. N. S. Khrushchev will of course be glad to meet with him in New York and to discuss any questions which are of interest to R. Roa.\n\nThen I said that the Soviet delegation will be in constant contact with the Cuban delegation on all the questions of the General Assembly agenda and [will] inform it of our position.\n\nThanking me, Roa said that he would immediately inform Fidel Castro, who is outside Havana right now, of what [I] had said. R. Roa continued, F. Castro and the entire Cuban delegation intend to arrive in New York on 18 September. F. Castro will not delay in meeting N. S. Khrushchev as soon as this is possible for the head of the Soviet government. The Cuban delegation will maintain the closest contact with the Soviet delegation on all the questions and he, Raul Roa, would like to meet A. A. Gromyko as soon as he arrives in New York.\n\nIn reply to this I said that, of course, this could be done both through our UN Mission as well as through the Soviet delegation at the General Assembly.\n\nI further told Raul Roa that our position on the question of disarmament is based on the same positions which were presented by N. S. Khrushchev in speeches at the UN General Assembly in 1959, and those proposals which were submitted by the Soviet government at the Committee of 10 Countries in Geneva.\n\nR. Roa said in reply that the information I had reported to him about the position of the Soviet delegation on disarmament would help the Cuban government develop its own position on this question. Right now, continued R. Roa, we are preparing a draft of a speech for F. Castro and therefore your information will give us substantial assistance.\n\nR. Roa continued, F. Castro intends to limit his stay in New York as much as possible. He prefers to leave New York immediately after he makes his speech there. It seems to me, R. Roa stressed, that the speech is not the main thing, although an important place. In my view, it would be important if F. Castro did not limit himself to just making the speech and used his stay in New York to establish contacts with the heads of government of other countries, and to inform them in more detail about the development of the Cuban revolution and the problems which Cuba encounters today. We have tried to convince F. Castro of this, but it seems to me that this was not exactly successful. R. Roa stressed, I personally think that F. Castro\u2019s stay and his establishment of contacts with the heads of government of other countries would help us obtain the support of a number of countries in your [sic--trans.] struggle against the US. In any event, F. Castro\u2019s trip to the General Assembly will be important in all respects, not only for him personally, but also for Cuba as a whole. For F. Castro this trip will be a unique experience [*shkola*] for the formation of an important state figure. __R. Roa noted, F. Castro is very hot-tempered and mercurial, like all Cubans, and it is often necessary to give him advice so that he acts more discreetly and cautiously. __\n\n<\u2026>\n\n[the rest of the conversations concerned other topics, such as the Dominican question; the restoration of relations with Venezuela; and Tito\u2019s trip to the UN General Assembly and the cooling of Yugoslav-Cuban relations--trans.]\n\nSOVIET AMBASSADOR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\nS. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\n*******\n\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104, Op. 16, P. 116, D. 4, ll. 161-165. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/177858.]*\n\nSecret. Copy N\u00ba 2\n\n7 November 1960\n\nOutgoing N\u00ba 96\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister of Cuba Fidel Castro\n\n\n__15 September 1960__\n\n\nIn accordance with instructions I had I visited F. Castro and informed him that N. S. Khrushchev had left for New York on 9 September on the steamship Baltika and would arrive in the US on 19 September.\n\nI told Fidel Castro that Cde. N. S. Khrushchev would of course be glad to meet with him in New York and discuss any questions of interest to F. Castro.\n\nThen I said that the Soviet delegation would be in constant contact with the Cuban delegation about all questions of the General Assembly agenda and would inform it of our position.\n\nF. Castro said in reply that he would be very glad to meet with N. S. Khrushchev and was quite thankful for our readiness to help him during the UN General Assembly session. F. Castro continued, it is the first time I have had to go to such an Assembly, and I still do not know how to act. Therefore N. S. Khrushchev\u2019s advice will be very useful. I would like to know how [I] can meet N. S. Khrushchev in such a situation where there might be the opportunity to talk about all questions of interest to Cuba. Personally, F. Castro continued, I don\u2019t know at all where and how such contacts between heads of delegations and the delegations themselves are accomplished.\n\nI said in reply that he ought not worry about this. A more convenient place for a meeting with N. S. Khrushchev can be arranged between the delegations as soon as he, F. Castro, arrives in New York. Considering the questions of F. Castro about the work of the General Assembly, I told him in detail about the procedure and means of establishing the necessary working contacts on questions being discussed between the delegations.\n\nF. Castro stressed that he attaches very great importance to the current session of the General Assembly. N. S. Khrushchev gave this session a completely unusual nature. F. Castro continued, I am personally very grateful to him that, as a result of the initiative he has exhibited to me, a representative of a small country fighting to preserve its independence, an opportunity has been presented to this high forum to expose to the entire world the aggressive designs of the American imperialists. You know that I am not able to speak from a written text. Therefore I am thinking out the plan of a speech, and I am selecting individual facts and arguments. [Antonio] Nunez Jimenez is giving me much help in this. F. Castro noted further, I want to devote the main attention in my speech to exposing the aggressive nature of American imperialism and address an appeal to the peoples of the world to protect Cuba from the threat of aggression from the USA.\n\nHaving said that he would like to support the proposals of the Soviet Union on the main international problems in his speech, F. Castro asked me in what terms the Soviet delegation would raise the question of disarmament.\n\nI said in reply to this that our position on the question of disarmament is based on the same positions which were described by N. S. Khrushchev\u2019s speech at the UN General Assembly in 1959, and those proposals which were introduced by the Soviet government at the Committee of 10 Countries in Geneva.\n\nSo that our position on the question is clearer for you, I continued, I would like to pass [you] necessary materials about the position of the Soviet Union on this question in Spanish.\n\nF. Castro expressed gratitude for the information and the materials, stressing that he would support the proposal of the Soviet Union about disarmament without fail and devote a proper place to this question in his speech. Undoubtedly, I will stress the reluctance of the USA to disarm with sharp criticism, and I will explain the reasons why the American government takes such a position.\n\nF. Castro said further that tonight he would read N. S. Khrushchev\u2019s speech about general and complete disarmament at the last General Assembly session, and also our statement in the Committee of 10 Countries in Geneva.\n\nThen F. Castro said that along with criticism of the USA government for its complicity in the revival of German militarism he would stress the just nature of the Soviet proposals on the German question and the question of Berlin, and also favor the elimination of all foreign bases on foreign territory. F. Castro continued, in my speech I intend to also declare that military bases on foreign territory not only present a threat to peace, but are also impermissible interference in the internal affairs of these countries, inasmuch as the presence of such bases in itself limits their sovereignty.\n\nIn the course of further conversation F. Castro expressed a desire to speak at the General Assembly after N. S. Khrushchev in order to support the main proposals of the speech of the head of the Soviet government with greater effectiveness.\n\nThen F. Castro said that during his stay in New York he intended to establish contact with the heads of the governments of other countries, and especially with the representatives of the countries of Africa.\n\n<\u2026>\n\n[not copied: passages concerning the restrictions on the movements of Castro in New York; future anti-American activities of the Cuban government; Dominican-Cuban relations and the unsuccessful policy of Trujillo]\n\nIn conclusion F. Castro asked me again to pass his gratitude to N. S. Khrushchev for the aid. F. Castro said further, I will be accompanied in the trip to the UN General Assembly by Nunez Jimenez. He personally intends to spend 10-12 days in New York, regardless of when he will be given an opportunity to speak. After his departure the Cuban delegation will be headed by Minister of Foreign Affairs Raul Roa.\n\nCounsellor Cde. A. I. Alekseyev was present at the conversation.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n*******\n\n\n**Record of Conversation between N.S. Khrushchev and Prime Minister of Cuba Fidel Castro**\n\n*[Source* *RGANI, F. 52, Op. 1, D. 512, ll. 2-5. Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya. Accessible at **https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/208455**.]*\n\nSeptember 20, 1960\n\nNew York\n\n__Fidel Castro__ said he was very happy to hear that N.S. Khrushchev would come for a visit, despite all obstacles. Such an important person as the head of the Soviet government would be the first to visit the Prime Minister of such a small country as Cuba. This is very important for the Cubans and for public opinion as a whole.\n\n__N.S. Khrushchev__ replied that he has been waiting for this opportunity for a long time, and it is a great pleasure to meet with Fidel Castro. \u201cThe powers do not treat us very well,\u201d N.S. Khrushchev continued, \u201cbut this should not trouble us. We are cheerful and inspired when our enemies are raging in anger. The American government\u2019s attitude is a manifestation of their powerlessness. They do stupid things and all sensible people condemn their behavior.\u201d\n\nNext, N.S. Khrushchev said that he would like to use this opportunity to express his deep respect for Fidel Castro personally and through him for the heroic Cuban people as a whole.\n\n__F. Castro__ noted that the poorest people in New York are the Hispanics and Blacks. Despite the anti-Cuban, anti-revolutionary propaganda in TV, film, and print media in the United States, they understand the truth and are sympathetic to the revolution in Cuba. The Hispanics enthusiastically greeted the Cuban delegation at the airport. The US authorities tried to deceive them, claiming that the plane with the delegation would land at another airport.\n\n__N.S. Khrushchev__ said all Latin Americans understand that Cuba\u2019s new government is doing everything for the people. He noted further that [Adlai E.] Stevenson said in a recent article that the State Department should protect America from Communism, but the communists are already in New York, so [the State Department] has to put up defenses in Manhattan.\n\n\u201cYou,\u201d N.S. Khrushchev continued, \u201cmade a very good move by transferring to a hotel in Harlem \u2013 a neighborhood where ordinary people live. It was very well received here.\u201d\n\n__F. Castro__ noted that they relocated to the hotel at night, and still at that late hour a big crowd gathered and shouted welcoming slogans. Enemies of the revolution will not come to this neighborhood. The Blacks said they will protect the delegation from ill-wishers and they will do it without the help of police. They also favorably received N.S. Khrushchev\u2019s visit to the area and will remember it for their entire lives.\n\n\u201cIt is common knowledge that your first visit to the United States,\u201d Fidel Castro said, \u201cmade a huge impression and is well understood by the people. I read the statement you made upon arriving to the US and I must say you are very aware of the needs of ordinary people. You speak their language. I am sure that after a second visit to the US, they will have an even better opinion of you.\u201d\n\nFurther, Fidel Castro said he decided to lead the Cuban delegation only because it was announced that N.S. Khrushchev would lead the Soviet delegation to the XV session of the General Assembly. This is a very important session and it is very good that N.S. Khrushchev will take part in its work.\n\nIf imperialist countries do not change their position, they have no future. People all over the world will regard us more and more favorably. The imperialists are trying to create a coalition against us in the UN, but they will not be able to. They have nothing to counter the compelling and persuasive arguments of Chairman Khrushchev. People do not want war; consequently the peaceful aspirations and efforts of the Soviet government are recognized worldwide. The struggle for peace is a very strong argument.\n\n__N.S. Khrushchev__ replied that imperialist powers think they still have control over us, that they can do whatever they want. However, the imperialists can no longer dictate their terms to us, either militarily or economically. We are not dependent on them for anything. We are developing our economy and technology completely independently, and this is the most important thing. Our ideas have always been stronger, and now they are backed by material and technical factors. One must always have the means to support one\u2019s ideas, and we have these means.\n\nOur politics, our slogans are clear and relevant to all people \u2013 peace, friendship, and non-interference in the internal affairs of other states.\n\n__F. Castro__ said that this is the most persuasive argument. People understand this very well and that is why they have a high regard for us, despite the position of the US State Department.\n\n__N.S. Khrushchev__ said that after the conversation with Fidel Castro he would like to tell the reporters that he visited Castro to express the deep respect of the Soviet people and government for the Cuban people, who under Fidel Castro\u2019s leadership defeated the forces of tyranny and were victorious.\n\nFurther, N.S. Khrushchev said he hopes this is not the last meeting, and when Fidel Castro comes to visit the Soviet government at any time that is convenient for him, they will be able to have a more detailed discussion with no outsiders listening in.\n\n__F. Castro__ said that N.S. Khrushchev is highly respected by the Cuban people, who are very grateful to the Soviet government for its assistance. When N.S. Khrushchev comes to Cuba, Fidel Castro will personally make sure that the Cuban people give him a heartfelt reception.\n\n__N.S. Khrushchev__ thanked Fidel Castro for the warm words and a friendly conversation.\n\nThe conversation lasted 40 minutes. Present at the conversation were: F. Castro\u2019s adviser [Antonio] N\u00fa\u00f1ez Jimenez, V.S. Lebedev, A.I. Adzhubei, P.A. Satyukov.\n\nRecorded by: [Signature] (V. Vinogradov)\n\nThe Bay of Pigs, April 1961: The Run-Up, the Invasion, and the Aftermath\n\nThe failed April 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion is of course a landmark in the development of the US-Cuban confrontation, the Cuban revolution, and the wider Cold War. In a series of conversations with Soviet ambassador to Cuba Sergey M. Kudryavtsev, Fidel Castro and his top aides, from January to April 1961, considered the prospects for an assault on Cuba by anti-Castro exiles, supported by the US government and organized by the Central Intelligence Agency. Since the ostensibly clandestine preparations (including training camps in Guatemala and Florida), were widely reported on by the media, ranging from *The Nation* magazine to *The New York Times* and *Miami Herald*, and the subject of loud gossip among emigres in Florida and elsewhere, the topic frequently came up\u2014as did the question of whether the new US President, John F. Kennedy, would follow through on an operation evidently begun under Eisenhower.\n\nIn the first document, Kudryavtsev describes a talk with Fidel Castro from 21 January, 1961, the evening after John F. Kennedy took office and gave his inaugural address.[7] As the conversation shows, JFK\u2019s speech, expressing his willingness to negotiate with communist adversaries, encouraged Castro, who believed the danger of a US intervention had diminished. Fondly recalling his meetings with Khrushchev in New York four months earlier, Castro also raised his ideas for a visit to the Soviet Union, possibly later that year (it would not happen until the spring of 1963). Castro also speaks optimistically about military operations to suppress \u201ccounterrevolutionaries\u201d in the Escambray mountains, and about economic challenges.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 48-52. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/177859.]*\n\nSecret. Copy N\u00ba 2\n\n15 February 1961\n\nOutgoing N\u00ba 44\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba\n\nFidel CASTRO RUZ\n\n__21 January 1961__\n\n\nFidel Castro came to my apartment this evening.\n\nIn the conversation which passed in a warm and friendly atmosphere, I touched on several questions of the domestic political situation and the foreign policy situation of Cuba.\n\nFidel Castro talked much about how he was quite satisfied with the results of the mobilization of the Cuban people held on days when the threat of possible direct intervention from the US hung over Cuba. This mobilization, stressed Fidel Castro, again showed the readiness of the Cubans to defend their homeland, and helped the revolutionary government rally all the people together to repel possible American aggression. This mobilization helped the military formations of the people\u2019s militia better prepare from the military point of view, and at the same time reveal and correct some shortcomings in the organization of the country\u2019s defense as a whole.\n\nThe people\u2019s militia, continued Fidel Castro, has passed through a good combat school, moved considerably forward in mastering modern weaponry, and have now essentially been turned into a serious military force capable of resisting any aggressor.\n\nIn the course of further conversation the discussion turned on the operations conducted by the people\u2019s militia to put down counterrevolutionary breeding grounds in Escambray. Saying that every cloud has a silver lining Fidel Castro noted that the participation of the people\u2019s militia in operations to clean out the mountain forests in Escambray strengthens their combat readiness still further. In his words, at the present time there are groups of counterrevolutionaries in the mountains of Escambray surrounded by individual armed detachments of the people\u2019s militia. Right now it has been decided to send additional detachments of the people\u2019s militia to this region directly from the capital so that they get a baptism of fire, liquidating the counterrevolutionary clusters in this region.\n\nFidel Castro said, the counterrevolutionary breeding grounds in Escambray do not present any serious danger either to the revolutionary government or the domestic situation of the country as a whole. A decision was made just now to conclude agrarian reform in this region more quickly and to first of all undermine the economic base of the rich peasants, who are as a matter of fact supporting these counterrevolutionary groups, supplying them with food. The most dangerous elements of the rich peasants will be exiled from this region and hauled into court in the event that their ties with the counterrevolutionaries are detected.\n\nFidel Castro continued, on the whole the activity of the internal counterrevolutionaries fell somewhat after the adoption of a stricter law by the government. However, this does not mean that internal counterrevolutionaries have been done away with. On the contrary, a long and difficult struggle lies ahead, but we are all confident that the internal counterrevolution will be brought to an end in 1961.\n\nThen the conversation turned on the economic situation of the country. Fidel Castro noted in this connection that, in his opinion, the state of the economy does not arouse any serious worries, although of course there will be some difficulties in 1961 in supplying the population with individual goods.\n\nAt the same time unemployment in agriculture will probably be ended, and this fact will strengthen the revolution even more. In order to continually supply the population of the country with food the government intends to somewhat reduce the amount of land occupied by sugar cane. The stalks of the sugar cane will be used to feed cattle, and the land under the sugar cane released from the sugar cane plants will be sown with grain crops.\n\nThe mood of the peasant population is very good. At the present time all cooperatives and public estates [*narodnye imeniya*] are on the whole operating successfully. A growth of sugar production is taking place. As regards the situation in nationalized industry, of course the mobilization performed in January created certain difficulties in this sphere. However, this mainly affects the quality rather than the quantity of output produced.\n\nIn our view the external danger, Fidel Castro continued, has somewhat declined with the coming to power of Kennedy. However we, of course, realize that it would be na\u00efve to think that the US will suddenly abandon its aggressive designs with respect to Cuba. In our view, the preamble [sic: *vstupitel\u2019naya chast\u2019*; trans.: presumably referring to Kennedy\u2019s Inaugural Address, given the date of the conversation] of Kennedy represents a certain concession to the forces of peace and progress, that is, to the socialist camp. Fidel Castro stressed, I am confident that the consistent struggle of N. S. Khrushchev for peace, disarmament, and the elimination of the vestiges of colonialism forced Kennedy to make some concessions. This is what forced him to say that the US is supposedly ready to hold talks and they are also in favor of peace. Of course, Kennedy continued in the previous positions on the questions of Latin America, and he still could not say anything new in this area. But this worries us least of all. Fidel Castro said further, a national liberation movement is developing in Latin America and whatever Kennedy says he will not be able to stop it.\n\nIn my view, continued Fidel Castro, the second part of the speech of the American President is more important. It is this part of the speech which can be defined as positive. Of course, everything depends on whether these words of Kennedy\u2019s remain on paper, or he will actually pursue a policy of lessening tensions.\n\nIn any event, said Fidel Castro, the Cuban government thinks that the most dangerous period for Cuba has passed, and now our main task will be to throw all [our] efforts into ensuring the best organization of Cuban industry, agriculture, and the state apparatus. The main task will be to increase the production of industrial goods, and also food for the Cuban people.\n\nIn the course of further conversation at his own initiative Fidel Castro touched on the question of his plans for a trip to the Soviet Union. He talked much on this subject, stressing that he anticipates to accomplish this desire of his in the spring or summer of this year. Fidel Castro continued, I would like the majority of my stay in the Soviet Union to be devoted to the study of the experience of managing agriculture. Fidel Castro said, I am especially interested in your achievements in the virgin lands, the organization of state farms there, and all the problems associated with opening up these lands. In this connection he again began to develop the idea regarding sending approximately 1000 young Cubans to our state farms in order for them to adopt the work experience there, study the language, and then become active leaders of the Soviet experiment in Cuba.\n\nReturning again to the plans for his trip to the Soviet Union, Fidel Castro said that he would like to give Cde. N. S. Khrushchev a wigwam in advance which could be built in Cuba beforehand, and then erected near Moscow by two Cuban craftsmen. Fidel Castro noted, I would like for Cde. N. S. Khrushchev to have good memories of Cuba and the hard work of its people.\n\nHe began to speak in this connection about the successful experiment of building wigwams in the area of Treasure Lake [trans. note: on the Isla de Tesoros (Treasure Island), now called the Isla de la Juventud (Island of Youth)] for tourism purposes, which a delegation of Soviet journalists viewed.\n\nIn the course of further conversation Fidel Castro warmly spoke of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev and the aid of the Soviet Union. Fidel Castro stressed, I will never forget my meetings with Cde. N. S. Khrushchev at the UN General Assembly in New York. The struggle of Cde. Khrushchev for peace has won him personally, the Soviet Union, and its foreign policy universal respect in the entire world. The authority of the Soviet Union, Fidel Castro continued, as far as he can judge from the reports of his ambassadors, has grown immeasurably recently especially in the countries fighting for their independence. The growth of the authority of the Soviet Union, the growth of the popularity of its foreign policy, Fidel Castro said in conclusion, is what is forcing Kennedy to search right now for ways to develop more flexible methods in US foreign policy.\n\nAt the end of the conversation I passed Fidel Castro lectures on military questions in English which were sent at his request.\n\nThanking me for the materials, Fidel Castro said that he needs them very much. He would not only study them closely himself, but would also give instructions about the study of the materials contained in these lectures by all senior Cuban military leaders.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\nIn the second conversation, on 24 February, Cuban Foreign Minister Roa, after a lengthy consideration of the Congo crisis in the wake of Patrice Lumumba\u2019s assassination, notes that the anti-Castro exiles in Guatemala had stepped up their military preparations. Expecting an impending invasion with US support, Roa speculates that Washington, which had accelerated its efforts to gain Latin American support for the anti-Castro action, hoped to create a \u201csmall bridgehead\u201d on Cuban soil where a \u201cpuppet\u201d government could be established. In this conspiracy, the United States could then openly aid a \u201cgovernment\u201d that would be headed by former prime minister (under Castro, in 1959) Jos\u00e9 Mir\u00f3 Cardona, who had gone into exile to oppose Castro, and who in fact headed the CIA-organized Cuban Revolutionary Council that was supposed to organize a post-Castro government in Havana. To counter US diplomacy, Roa noted that Cuba was appealing to Latin American governments to resist efforts to draw them into the anti-Castro operation.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 94-97. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188122. ]*\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n22 March 1961\n\nN\u00ba 110\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Minister of Foreign Affairs Raul ROA\n\n\n24 February 1961\n\n\nToday I visited Raul Roa and held a conversation with him about the 14 February statement of the Soviet government in connection with the murder of Patrice Lumumba. I presented the content of our statement in detail and expressed the hope that the Cuban government would support the proposal of the Soviet government presented in this document.\n\nRaul Roa said in reply that the Cuban government, just like the Soviet government, was deeply offended by this crime and thinks that it cannot remain unpunished. During discussion of the question about the situation in the Congo in the second part of the 15th UN General Assembly session, Raul Roa stressed that the Cuban government will speak in favor of handing Mobutu and Tshombe over to a court and halting the so-called UN operation in the Congo. We will act together with the Soviet delegation and also demand the removal of [Dag] Hammarskjold from the post of UN Secretary-General, and vigorously condemn Belgium, which bears direct responsibility for the murder of Lumumba. Raul Roa continued, the Cuban government intends to henceforth give comprehensive support to the legal government of the Congo. Cuba has already recognized the government of Gizenga and will support it in the UN.\n\nRaul Roa said, the question of the policy of the Cuban government at the upcoming UN General Assembly session which opens in March was considered at yesterday\u2019s meeting of the Council of Ministers. The Council of Ministers has charged me, as leader of the Cuban delegation, with maintaining the closest contact with the delegation of the Soviet Union, and also with the delegations of the Afro-Asian countries on the question of the Congo.\n\nRaul Roa continued, at the Council of Ministers meeting a general political guideline was adopted that in its future activity the Cuban government should step up its relations with the Afro-Asian countries, and also with the neutral countries. Then Raul Roa noted that the Council of Ministers had charged him with holding a discussion of the question of the aggressive actions of the USA against Cuba. It is obvious that the Cuban representative to the UN will take part in the discussion of the question of the Congo. However, considering the importance of the question of the Congo, said Raul Roa, I myself would prefer to hold its discussion in the [General] Assembly. I will try to talk with Fidel Castro about this question. Raul Roa let it be understood unambiguously in this connection that it would not be a bad thing if this thought were hinted to Fidel Castro or [Cuban President Osvaldo] Dorticos from our side if the occasion arose. Raul Roa stressed that personally he gives the question of the Congo no less importance than the Cuban question, and prefers to consider them in close relationship. Raul Roa asked who will head the Soviet delegation and whether Cde. A. A. Gromyko would take part in the second part of the Assembly session.\n\nThen Raul Roa informed me about the upcoming foreign policy steps of the Cuban government in connection with the impending threat of the intervention of the forces of external counterrevolution. Raul Roa said that according to information at the disposal of the Cuban government the military preparations of the counterrevolutionary bands in Guatemala have been notably stepped up recently. These bands allegedly intend to act against Cuba at the end of February or the beginning of March. Raul Roa said further, it is clear to everyone that the landing of assault groups of the external counterrevolution in Cuba can only be accomplished with the direct support of the USA.\n\nThe Cuban government knows that the Kennedy Administration has organized a rapid stepping-up [of diplomatic activity] among the governments of the Latin American countries, trying to get agreement from them to support the actions of the counterrevolutionaries against the legal government of Cuba. Our ambassador to the OAS [Organization of American States], [Carlos] Lechuga, Raul Roa continued, reported that, by organizing an invasion of Cuba by forces of the external counterrevolution, Kennedy intends to create a small bridgehead on Cuban territory in which the formation of a puppet government can then be proclaimed. Kennedy wants to present the matter to world public opinion such that there would purportedly be two governments in Cuba and that the counterrevolutionaries already have territory in their hands which they control. In reality, after the invasion by forces of the external counterrevolution Kennedy intends to create a puppet government in exile which will be in Florida or Guatemala. [Former Cuban Prime Minister Jos\u00e9] Mir\u00f3 Cardona is believed to be appointed the head of this government.\n\nRaul Roa noted that the US government recently organized so-called pro-Castro acts [*vystupleniya*] in a number of Latin American countries with the aid of its agent network. Then the fault for these acts was shifted to Fidel Castro\u2019s \u201cagents,\u201d who allegedly were striving \u201cto overthrow\u201d the legal governments of the Latin American countries.\n\nWith the aid of these provocative methods Kennedy is striving to stir up the governments of a number of Latin American countries against revolutionary Cuba in order to incline them to take part in joint actions against the government of Fidel Castro.\n\nTaking this into consideration, in its meeting yesterday the Council of Ministers of Cuba decided to send the governments of all the Latin American countries a note which presented the basic principles of the independent foreign policy of the Cuban government to assure them that revolutionary Cuba desires to live with everyone in peace, does not threaten their independence, and does not intend to [serve as] a base for an attack or aggression against other countries. Raul Roa stressed, we think the Americans\u2019 preparations of provocations against Cuba will at least be made difficult with the aid of the note, if not paralyzed beforehand.\n\nIn the aforementioned note of the Cuban government, Raul Roa continued, it will also stress that Cuba will vigorously repel any aggression by itself and will make use of the aid of those countries which are ready to unselfishly support it so that it can defend Cuban independence and territorial integrity.\n\nRaul Roa stressed, the Council of Ministers also charged [him with] pointing out in the note that the revolutionary government of Cuba respects the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, and does not intend to export revolution, but at the same time will fight against the export of counterrevolution with all its resources. It should also be declared in the note that, as before, Cuba will remain within the OAS in spite of all the bad experience of this organization, and that Cuba is ready to cooperate with all other Latin American countries. At the same time, continued Raul Roa, the note expresses the gratitude of the Cuban government to all those governments and peoples of Latin American countries who state their solidarity with Cuba, refuse to take part in the economic blockade being conducted by the USA right now, and condemn the American policy of force they are conducting with respect to Cuba. The note will also denounce the recent hostile maneuvers of the USA with respect to Cuba.\n\nIn accordance with these instructions of the Council of Ministers, Raul Roa said further, the Cuban MFA prepared such a note to the governments of the countries of Latin America. This note was delivered to the ambassadors of these countries today, 24 February. A copy of this note will be sent to the Chairman of the UN General Assembly and the General Secretariat in the next two days for distribution among all UN members as an official document. At the same time a copy of the note will be distributed to all representatives of the OAS.\n\nThus, Raul Roa said in conclusion, we think that this note will serve as a unique basis for the development of a discussion about the Cuban question in the Political Committee and the UN General Assembly. It is possible that in the event an urgent need arises the Cuban question will also be raised in the Security Council. The note of the Cuban government to the countries of Latin America will be published in the press on 28 February. At the end of the conversation Raul Roa gave me for information a copy of the aforementioned note to the governments of the countries of Latin America (attached).\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\nThe next day, 25 February, Kudryavtsev met with Fidel Castro, who, in the midst of a conversation on various topics, assessed the likelihood of a US-backed intervention, and expressed strong confidence in Cuba\u2019s ability to rebuff any such invasion--especially as it had already succeeded in crushing the resistance in the Escambray mountains and also intercepted airdrops of arms and supplies intended for them. Castro also alluded to alleged Vatican support for such an invasion, foreshadowing the crackdown on the Catholic Church he would enforce after the Bay of Pigs landing had been crushed.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 98-108. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188123.]*\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nSecret. Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n22 February 1961\n\nN\u00ba 111\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith the Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba\n\nFidel CASTRO\n\n\n25 February 1961\n\n\nFidel Castro came to my apartment on the evening of 25 February with [Antonio] Nunez Jimenez.\n\n1. [discussion of situation in the Congo]\n\n2. In the course of further conversation several questions were touched upon connected with the situation of recent days.\n\nFidel Castro declared that, in his opinion, it was probable that in these days an attack will be made by the forces of external counterrevolution at Kennedy\u2019s order. On the one hand, the recently increased dropping of American weapons from aircraft and their supply on small ships to the shores of Cuba tells of this. For example, on 24 February in the area of the province of Pinar del Rio representatives of Cuban counterintelligence received a large batch of weapons from a counterrevolutionary group from the US in the open sea, including small field guns [*pushki*]. This counterrevolutionary group took the representatives of Cuban counterintelligence for agents of the internal counterrevolution. In approximately the same period weapons were dropped by parachute in a number of provinces, in particular in Oriente, Las Villas, and Pinar del Rio \u2013 in places where counterrevolutionary groups are evidently located, according to information of the external counterrevolution.\n\nFidel Castro continued, information comes to us that the Vatican is pushing Kennedy to act against Cuba more quickly. It is known that the Vatican is pursuing large and active preparations in the countries of Latin America, seeking the agreement of the governments of these countries for a condemnation of the Cuban government and a breaking of diplomatic relations with it. In recent days the leadership of the NSP [ed. note: probably PSP, for \u201cPopular Socialist Party,\u201d the pro-Moscow Cuban communist party] has received some information demonstrating the preparations of counterrevolutionary assault groups to sail from Guatemala, Florida, and Costa Rica. Finally, Cuban counterintelligence recently discovered a number of quite large counterrevolutionary groups which were seized, in particular in the provinces of Oriente, Matanzas, and Pinar del Rio. From the statements of those arrested it follows that the counterrevolutionary groups were preparing to act against the revolutionary government in the period from 28 February through 8 March. They received the order about such actions from the USA.\n\nFidel Castro said, Kennedy and the external counterrevolution are placing unjustified hopes on the counterrevolutionary movement in the mountains of Escambray. However, the Americans do not yet know that the resistance of the counterrevolutionaries in Escambray has been broken and clearing operations are going on to liquidate the individual small groups having no military importance. More than 30 counterrevolutionaries have been killed in clashes and more than 300 counterrevolutionaries have been taken prisoner. There remained only a small group in the eastern part of Escambray which will be liquidated in the near future.\n\nFidel Castro continued, it seems to me that Kennedy thinks this is the most suitable moment for landing counterrevolutionaries, believing that the forces of the Cuban army and the people\u2019s militia are occupied in Escambray at this time and that accordingly we cannot cope with the landing parties if they are landed at a number of points of the country. However, Kennedy is deeply mistaken. His plan to seize part of Cuban territory and create a puppet government is doomed to fail. The Cuban government has carefully prepared to repel aggression, and Escambray cannot now prevent the Cuban armed forces from acting swiftly and proficiently. The protection and defense of the east coast of Cuba have been reinforced and the garrisons on the Isle of Pines have been considerably reinforced. Fidel Castro stressed, I am more than convinced that now the counterrevolutionaries will not be able secure a foothold even on the Isle of Pines, not to mention Cuba itself.\n\nThe revolutionary army and the people\u2019s militia are properly prepared for defense and are at combat positions right now. The results of the conclusion of military operations in Escambray will be published in the near future and an exhibit of the American weapons dropped into Cuba and seized by units of the revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia has been organized. Fidel Castro stressed, this will inflict a serious blow to the morale of both the external as well as the internal counterrevolution and put the USA in a difficult position on the eve of the discussion of the Cuban question at the UN.\n\nThe Cuban government does not exclude that at the last moment Kennedy might have second thoughts and put off the realization of his aggressive plans, especially as in connection with the events in the Congo the international political situation as a whole does not favor American imperialism unleashing a new conflict. However, Kennedy does not want to come to the conference in Quito with empty hands, and therefore will take steps to foment a civil war in Cuba and try to undermine the Cuban revolution from within.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, the Cuban government is completely confident that it is able to handle any situation. At the present moment the government is deliberately not raising a fuss about the aggressive intentions of Kennedy in order to take the counterrevolutionaries unawares if they nevertheless try to land assault groups. The defeat of the counterrevolutionary assault groups will allow Cuba to be made safe for a long time, since it will be very hard to collect new contingents of capable soldiers of the counterrevolution after this.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n\n\nA week later, at a lunch for Cuban leaders on 3 March, Fidel Castro discussed the \u201cnew threat\u201d of a counter-revolutionary invasion and predicted the Kennedy Administration, which he now viewed as \u201ceven harsher and more hostile\u201d than Eisenhower\u2019s, was preparing \u201csome big provocation\u201d against Cuba.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 110-113. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188124.]*\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n22 March 1961\n\nN\u00ba 87\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith the Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba\n\nFidel CASTRO\n\n\n3 March 1961\n\n\nThe conversation was held over a lunch which I held in honor of Fidel Castro. Besides Fidel Castro, Ernesto Guevara, Raul Castro, Martinez Sanchez, Armando Hart, Haydee Santamaria, and Celia Sanchez were at the lunch.\n\nThe conversation chiefly concerned the political situation developing in Cuba in recent days in connection with the new threat of an invasion of the forces of the external counterrevolution.\n\nFidel Castro said, we are absolutely convinced that Kennedy is preparing some big provocation against Cuba. From the first days the new American government has taken an even harsher and more hostile line with respect to the Cuban revolution than the Eisenhower Administration. The main efforts of the Kennedy government are being directed along two lines at the present time: first, through an all-round stepping up of the internal Cuban counterrevolution and second, through isolating Cuba from the countries of Latin America. Under the influence of the active assistance coming from the USA the internal counterrevolution has been unusually lively in recent days. Almost every day large batches of American weapons are dropped from American planes in various points of the country. Aircraft belonging to the counterrevolutionaries often violate Cuban airspace and drop counterrevolutionary leaflets with calls to overthrow the revolutionary government. In particular, just yesterday, for example, three aircraft flew over Cuba which threw out leaflets with calls to overthrow the revolutionary government. Unfortunately, noted Fidel Castro, we cannot yet take effective measures against the flights of these aircraft inasmuch as Cuban air defense does not have sufficient means for this. Orders are given in documents sent from the USA to local counterrevolutionary organizations to start insurrections throughout the entire country. In addition, propaganda through all American radio stations directed at Cuba has recently increased significantly; plus, once again the main thrust is being made on a call to rise up against the revolutionary government.\n\nFidel Castro said further, we have information that increased preparations are going on in Florida, Guatemala, and Costa Rica for an action of the external counterrevolution against Cuba. Information about the sailing of assault groups in the direction of Cuba which has been received from Guatemala has not yet been confirmed. However, for its part the Cuban government has taken all the necessary steps to increase the defense of the Cuban coast. Cuban patrols have not yet detected the movement of assault groups anywhere.\n\nFidel Castro noted, it is not excluded that the forces of the external counterrevolution concentrated in Guatemala, Costa Rica, and Florida are waiting until a more or less large uprising has been raised in Cuba which would serve as a specific signal for a general action.\n\n\nThese hopes of the external Cuban counterrevolution, Fidel Castro noted ironically, will remain pipe dreams. Our situation is strong right now, and there can be no talk of some broad, large uprising in the country. In recent days a number of quite large conspiratorial centers, which set as their goal the organization of uprisings in various parts of the country, have actually been discovered and rendered harmless. Therefore now attempts of the counterrevolution to begin an uprising have become even more unrealistic than before. Individual acts of terrorism are rather gestures of desperation and powerlessness than a sign of strength.\n\nFidel Castro said further, recently the Catholic Church, the center of all counterrevolutionary activity, has discredited itself even more in the eyes of the broad strata of the population with its statements hostile to the revolution. Therefore right now it is not in a position to lead the masses of believers. On the contrary, right now the government has to restrain the actions of the people against the Church for foreign policy considerations, for the hatred for the Franc\u043eist priests is extraordinarily high. The liquidation of the counterrevolutionary hotbeds in the mountains of Escambray, continued Fidel Castro, is being protracted to a certain degree by virtue of the fact that the counterrevolutionaries are hiding in caves and do not engage in clashes with either units of the people\u2019s militia or units of the revolutionary army. Therefore it is obvious that another two or three weeks will be needed for a final elimination of these hotbeds until Escambray is cleared of counterrevolutionaries. However, in a military sense Escambray does not present a problem for the Cuban government any more.\n\nFidel Castro noted, the USA will try to keep us in constant tension and direct its main efforts at undermining the Cuban revolution from within. Only after this will they probably move the forces of the external counterrevolution, who get direct American support, against Cuba. The actions of the forces of the external counterrevolution are also made difficult by virtue of the fact that Cuba is an island and does not have common borders with other countries. It\u2019s not a simple matter to move large assault groups by sea and evidently the relatively calm existence of the Cuban revolution is to a certain degree due to the geographical position of Cuba.\n\nFidel Castro said, in external terms, the situation is on the whole even better than the Cuban government expected. The 23 [sic; 24] February note of the Cuban government to the government of the countries of Latin America has received a positive reaction in a number of countries of Latin America, not only from the public but from the governments themselves. The Cuban government has received a number of reports from its embassies in Mexico, Ecuador, and Brazil that the governments of these countries regarded the arguments cited in this note with understanding and in all probability will not give in to the pressure of the US government, which is seeking the agreement of the countries of Latin America to a collective severance of relations with Cuba.\n\nIn the course of further conversation I asked Fidel Castro\u2019s opinion about the advisability of inviting some state and public figures, in particular Raul Roa and [his] son, [Labor Minister Augusto] Martinez Sanchez, [Rolando D\u00edaz] Astarain, [Cuban National Bank President Ra\u00fal] Cepero Bonilla, and two or three other people to visit the USSR in 1961 for familiarization with the life of the Soviet people. Fidel Castro said in reply that he would be very grateful if these people were invited to the Soviet Union. These ministers ought to become acquainted not only with the life of the Soviet people, but also with the work of Soviet ministers so that they could adopt the best Soviet practices, which Cuba needs very much. Fidel Castro stressed further that, in his opinion, a trip by Cuban ministers to the Soviet Union will also be useful in political terms. This would help Cuba to implement even closer political cooperation with the USSR, and also help the ministers look at individual international problems more broadly. Concerning the question of the timeframes of the trips of individual Cuban ministers to the USSR, Fidel Castro expressed the wish that the Cuban government could decide itself when it would be more advisable for a particular minister to go to the USSR after receiving the invitations. This is caused by the fact that the situation in Cuba is constantly tense and therefore the presence of a number of ministers in place is often required.\n\nThe rest of the conversation with Fidel Castro turned on ordinary subjects. Guevara and Raul Castro, who expressed approximately the same views, also took part in the discussion.\n\nEmbassy Counsellor Cde. B. A. Kazantsev was present at the conversation.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n\nBy 12 March, in a conversation at the Soviet ambassador\u2019s apartment, Fidel Castro believed the danger of an intervention had receded, and that the \u00e9migr\u00e9 forces might instead form a government-in-exile. He remained confident that if an attack nevertheless took place, the Cuban forces could overwhelm the invaders. Still, he felt so concerned about the danger of a US \u201cprovocation\u201d that he indicated he did not feel comfortable leaving the country, even to make a much-desired visit to the Soviet Union, until the state political and military apparatus was better prepared. He acknowledged some stepping up of the efforts of the \u201cexternal counterrevolution,\u201d but attributed this to \u201cblind desperation\u201d rather than any strengthening of their forces. Castro insisted domestic opponents were in a \u201cstate of disarray,\u201d in particular citing the work of fake \u201ccounterrevolutionary groups\u201d that had countered the real ones.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 130-135, AVP RF. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188125.]*\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n22 March 1961\n\nN\u00ba 87\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba\n\nFidel CASTRO\n\n\n12 March 1961\n\n\nI met with Fidel Castro on Sunday evening at [my] apartment.\n\n1. At the start of the conversation the discussion was about the foreign policy situation of Cuba which has developed in recent days and the domestic situation in the country.\n\nFidel Castro spoke about these questions in quite optimistic tones, stressed that, in his opinion, the threat of an invasion of the forces of external counterrevolution is receding into the background, but the hostile policy of Kennedy with respect to the Cuban revolution is encountering ever-growing resistance from both the broad public as well as a number of governments of the countries of Latin America.\n\nMeasures recently carried out by the revolutionary government to strengthen the defense of Cuban territory, nip a number of counterrevolutionary plots in the bud, and the approaching conclusion of the clearing operations to liquidate counterrevolutionary forces in the mountains of Escambray \u2013 all this, stressed Fidel Castro, has strongly demoralized both the internal as well as the external counterrevolution. This is demonstrated by a number of the following facts. In recent days the external counterrevolution has begun to make efforts to form an exile government. As is well-known, the external counterrevolution clamored much in October of last year and also at the end of [January or February?-ed.] of this year about their plans to create a Cuban \u201cgovernment\u201d on Cuban territory or, at least, on the Isle of Pines. Now, stressed Fidel Castro, the counterrevolution is not talking any more about this and prefers to form an exile government either in the USA or in Guatemala. A conclusion can be drawn from this one fact alone that the external counterrevolution does not hope any more for an opportunity to reinforce its assault parties on Cuban territory and does not count on the ability to create a puppet government inside Cuba itself.\n\nFidel Castro continued, we have no doubt that in the event the external counterrevolution under American pressure nevertheless tries to land assault groups on Cuban territory they will be immediately defeated. The defensive measures carried out by the revolutionary government in recent months, the general growth of the combat effectiveness and the organizational level of the people\u2019s militia and the revolutionary army, and their combat spirit and readiness for self-sacrifice are a guarantee of this. Finally, the revolutionary enthusiasm of the Cuban people as a whole, who are ready to sustain any casualties in the name of saving the revolution, is a guarantee of this.\n\nFidel Castro continued, the revolutionary consciousness of the masses has risen considerably in recent months, and the constant threat from American imperialism and the forces of external counterrevolution help the revolutionary government rally the people to the defense of Cuba.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, the consolidation of the position of the revolutionary government inside the country as a whole and the further deepening of the revolution, moreover, cannot fail to aggravate the class struggle inside the country. That is why right now we are witnesses to a certain stepping up of the struggle of the external counterrevolution against us. This new outburst is rather a gesture of a blind desperation, rather than a sign of strength, and is occurring as a result of the constant pushing from without and the empty promises given by both counterrevolutionary organizations located outside Cuba as well as by the Americans themselves that the USA will supposedly support the actions of the internal counterrevolution. Faith in these promises of support from the US has recently begun to weaken, and the internal counterrevolution increasingly reacts to such persuasions increasingly coldly.\n\nFidel Castro noted, the following in particular tells of this. At our instruction, small \u201ccounterrevolutionary groups\u201d have been created in a number of points of the country, part of which take refuge in the mountains under the \u201cguise\u201d of rebels and maintain communications with the external counterrevolution. The task of these groups is to identify counterrevolutionary elements inside the country and then liquidate them. It is characteristic that recently it has become much more difficult for these groups to recruit counterrevolutionaries. Many of those recruited declare that the revolutionary regime is stronger and that right now it is senseless to risk their necks, especially as the USA is only speaking of support.\n\nOn the whole, Fidel Castro said further, the internal counterrevolution is in a state of disarray, and its chiefs are trying to encourage them with desperate acts, but the main thing is to show the USA that the counterrevolution is still alive and [they] ought not to forget about it. Some days ago, Fidel Castro noted further, with the aid of one of our \u201ccounterrevolutionary groups\u201d we managed to lure two aircraft of the counterrevolutionaries to Cuba, one of which was shot down into the sea and the other, after it threw out American weapons in the region of the Organos Mountains, was hit and forced to land in Jamaica.\n\nAt the present time, continued Fidel Castro, a large quantity of modern American weapons has fallen into our hands which were dropped and are being dropped right now on the territory of Cuba from American aircraft, and also from aircraft belonging to the Cuban counterrevolution. These weapons are enough to arm an entire regiment. It is probable that on 14 or 15 March the Cuban government will organize an exhibit of the captured American weapons. This exhibit will exert a demoralizing influence on the internal counterrevolution. Moreover, it will corroborate Raul Roa\u2019s speech in the General Assembly about the new aggressive actions of the USA against Cuba.\n\nIn Fidel Castro\u2019s words, one of these days the government intends to send a new note to the governments of the countries of Latin America to which will be attached photographs of the captured American weapons and new facts of the aggressive actions of the US against Cuba will be cited. This note will again declare Cuba\u2019s solidarity with the countries of Latin America and stress [its] readiness to develop and strengthen Latin American cooperation.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, with respect to the countries of Latin America we intend to pursue a more flexible policy in the future, skillfully using their differences with the US, and striving to draw those countries to our side who are ready to cooperate with Cuba. The Cuban government is quite satisfied with the firm favorable position of [Brazilian President] Janio Quadros with regard to Cuba; everything will be done from the Cuban side to strengthen and develop our relations with Brazil. The President of Ecuador, Velasco Ibarra, who bravely denounces the insidious intrigues against Latin America, takes a good position with respect to Cuba. Mexico and Uruguay are taking a good position. Even Argentina is now beginning to search for a way for a new approach to Cuba, fearing being remaining alone. On the whole a new tendency in support of Cuba is taking shape right now in Latin America, and we are confident, stressed Fidel Castro, that Kennedy will now hardly be able to force the governments of all the Latin American countries to unconditionally support his hostile line toward Cuba.\n\nIf Kennedy agrees to the creation of a Cuban government in exile, which is obviously part of his plans, noted Fidel Castro, then for our part we will declare our right to form revolutionary governments in exile in Cuba of such countries as, for example, Puerto Rico, Guatemala, etc. The activity of the governments we have created, stressed Fidel Castro, which will be genuinely revolutionary governments, will be much more dangerous for the USA than the activity of the Cuban counterrevolutionary government is for Cuba.\n\nIn my 13 March speech, noted Fidel Castro, I will obviously make a statement about the conclusion of the operations in the mountains of Escambray, where we have taken about 400 people prisoner and killed about 40. There remain practically no more than 40-60 counterrevolutionaries in Escambray right now, who in time will be hunted down and handed over to court. The leaders of the insurrection in Escambray will be shot, but the people who joined them out of fear and opportunism will be sent to camps for re-education. Fidel Castro declared, our statement about the elimination of the counterrevolutionary breeding grounds in Escambray will inflict a new blow to the internal and external counterrevolution. It will demoralize the counterrevolutionaries even more and, at the same time, strengthen the morale of the people and thus the domestic political situation in the country as a whole.\n\n2. [not copied]\n\n3. In the course of further conversation at his own initiative Fidel Castro touched on the question of his plans to visit the Soviet Union and other socialist countries. Fidel Castro said that he very much wants to visit the Soviet Union, of which he had read much and heard much good and interesting from his colleagues in the government who have already been there. Fidel Castro noted, I even somewhat envy my ministers who have already been in the Soviet Union or will make such trips in the near future. Moreover, I feel somewhat uncomfortable in connection with the fact that I speak much about my plans to visit the USSR and again and again I put off a final decision on this question. I would like to openly admit, stressed Fidel Castro, that I am somewhat afraid of leaving Cuba for a long time. I do not exclude that my absence might be used by the Americans to organize some provocation against Cuba. Fidel Castro noted, the constant tense situation created around Cuba by Kennedy forces all of us, and especially me, to be on our guard all the time. We still have not yet created such a state apparatus which could act without trouble in the event of the absence of the prime minister if, for example, an extraordinary situation arose at this moment. Therefore, before I can leave Cuba for some time to pay state visits I have to finish a reorganization of the state apparatus, strengthen the armed forces of the country and the people\u2019s militia, train them militarily and politically, and more or less put an end to the counterrevolution. All this requires a certain [amount of] time, and therefore evidently it will be difficult for me to be absent from Cuba this year. Fidel Castro stressed, I would like for you to understand this correctly. Things are going not badly on the whole, but much more still needs to be done. Before making a final decision on the trip, Fidel Castro said in conclusion, I have to have full confidence in the fate of the country.\n\nFrom this part of the conversation with Fidel Castro it was felt that he was speaking frankly and sincerely and that he first and foremost is seriously worried about possible provocative actions of the Americans at the time of his absence from Cuba.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n\nOn the evening of 13 April, only a few days before the Bay of Pigs operation began, despite considerable Cuban intelligence on the \u00e9migr\u00e9 forces, Fidel Castro seemed confident that the danger of a counter-revolutionary invasion had receded. This misjudgment corroborates Cuban evidence revealed at a March 2001 conference in Havana on the Bay of Pigs suggesting that Cuban intelligence (G-2) had considerable information on the invasion preparations, but lacked precise tactical information on the date or landing site of the projected operation.[8] Castro also expressed pleasure that some Latin American countries, such as Brazil and Ecuador, were resisting US pressure to endorse strong anti-Cuban measures, and sent congratulations to Khrushchev on a major Soviet achievement: the day before, 12 April, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin had orbited the earth, becoming the first human in space.\n\n**From the Journal of S.M. Kudryavtsev, \u2018Record of a Conversation with Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba Fidel Castro Ruz, 13 April 1961\u2019***[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 170-176. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188140.] *\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 1\n\n28 April 1961\n\nN\u00ba 149\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba\n\nFidel CASTRO RUZ\n\n\n13 April 1961\n\n1. I met with Fidel Castro this evening and in accordance with instructions [I] had I informed him of the content of a conversation Cde. N. S. Khrushchev had with US Ambassador [to the Soviet Union Llewellyn E.] Thompson in which he touched upon the aggressive actions of the US against Cuba.[9]\n\nHaving listened closely, Fidel Castro said that first of all he would like to ask me to pass his sincere gratitude to Cde. N. S. Khrushchev for the brilliant and firm defense of Cuba from the aggressive pretensions [and] efforts of American imperialism. We never doubted, stressed Fidel Castro, that the Soviet Union would always be on the side of Cuba and support it at a difficult moment. We are confident that this statement of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev\u2019s will undoubtedly exert a sobering effect on the US government, and we do not exclude that Kennedy\u2019s statement that the USA does not intend to carry out a military intervention against Cuba was a consequence of this firm warning from Cde. N. S. Khrushchev.\n\nWe believe in the Soviet Union, we believe Cde. N. S. Khrushchev, stressed Fidel Castro, and no American propaganda will deceive us which tries to instill in us an uncertainty about the possible position of the Soviet Union in the conflict between Cuba and the USA.\n\nThen Fidel Castro said that he especially liked the place in the conversation where Cde. N. S. Khrushchev drew a parallel with Iran and in that example convincingly showed all the absurdity and impermissibility of the aggressive actions of the USA against Cuba. Fidel Castro stressed, in the person of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev Cuba and the revolutionary government have a loyal friend, and we are very appreciative of this aid and support.\n\nFidel Castro noted, information about such questions in a confidential manner touches us a great deal and is of great importance to us. These statements of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev will serve for us, the leaders of the Cuban government, as a good orientation and they will instill in us still greater confidence in the final victory of our just cause.\n\nTaking advantage of this opportunity, Fidel Castro said that I would like to assure Cde. N. S. Khrushchev through you that our revolution is enduring. This revolution is strengthening and deepening with each day, and on the whole our matters are going well. Right now we have become considerably more organized, better prepared militarily, and more prepared in a political sense. Now neither external nor domestic enemies are frightening [*strany*] to us, although they are many. We are confident that these enemies will be crushed in the event of aggression or some other acts inside the country. The revolution firmly relies on the broad support of the popular masses, who will selflessly defend their achievements, just as the Soviet people did at one time.\n\nFidel Castro then asked [me] to pass Cde. N. S. Khrushchev, besides the open telegram he sent, his personal cordial congratulations on the occasion of the brilliant victory of Soviet science. The flight of a Soviet man in space made a strong impression on the Cuban people. Cubans rejoice at this success and speak of him as if they were part of this great achievement of the Soviet people. This achievement will undoubtedly have great significance for the cause of peace, and Fidel Castro said I would like to name Major Gagarin the cosmonaut of peace.\n\nIn the course of further conversation Fidel Castro stressed that, in his opinion, the Soviet government has acted very wisely making a new call for disarmament and peace on the day of such a brilliant victory of Soviet science.\n\n[Points 2-4 not copied]\n\n5. In the course of further conversation some questions of the domestic and foreign policy situation developing around Cuba were examined.\n\nFidel Castro evaluated the situation in quite optimistic tones, stressing that circumstances right now are developing in favor of revolutionary Cuba. Fidel Castro noted, the threat of an invasion of Cuba by the forces of the external counterrevolution, which hung over the country in the first days of April, has considerably lessened and is gradually receding into the background. According to information available to the Cuban government and also various symptoms in current conditions the forces of the external counterrevolution will hardly decide to organize a massive invasion when the revolutionary government has a well-trained army and people\u2019s militia. Fidel Castro said, there will obviously not be an invasion such as was contemplated in October of last year, in January, and finally in March of this year. Kennedy understands that the defeat of the counterrevolutionary detachments by the forces of the people\u2019s militia might have irreparable consequences both for the counterrevolution itself as well as for the prestige of the USA in Latin America. Fidel Castro continued, based on this, we think that the domestic situation in Cuba is strong and stable and is strengthening with each day. Kennedy cannot fail to know that right now the revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia represent a serious combat force which is capable to destroying any assault parties of the forces of the external counterrevolution, however large they are. Fidel Castro continued, the revolutionary government is forming the conviction that the US State Department and external counterrevolution are beginning to change the tactics of the struggle against Cuba. At the present time the main reliance is being made not on an invasion of large landing parties, but on infiltrating small groups of 15-20 men each in various points of the country, mainly in mountainous regions. Fidel Castro said, the main task of these groups, as is now becoming clear, includes a gradual accumulation of strength, and primarily the accomplishment of acts of terrorism, various [acts] of subversion, acts of sabotage, etc. We have already detected the appearance of such groups on Cuban territory who have arrived from the USA. A number of saboteurs and terrorists have been arrested.\n\nWe are absolutely convinced, stressed Fidel Castro, that the Americans and the forces of the internal and external counterrevolution will act in the near future in just this very respect. The internal counterrevolution has become more organized right now, is more skillfully directed from the outside, and is striving to inflict blows on us primarily in the economic sphere. Recently the internal counterrevolution has managed to set fire to several large stores and warehouses with goods and food. Today, 13 April, the counterrevolutionaries set fire to El Encanto, the largest store in Havana. The total losses from subversion and sabotage in the past several days Is already reckoned in tens of millions of pesos. The Cuban revolutionary government fully realizes that all the actions of Kennedy and the internal and external counterrevolution controlled by the US government are directed at causing a breakdown of the economy of the country and to thus cause a growth of dissatisfaction of the broad masses with the policy of the revolutionary government.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, the revolutionary government, of course, is taking steps to combat the internal counterrevolution. However for now the possibility of subversion and acts of sabotage cannot be completely excluded. Fidel Castro stressed, we have decided to act against the internal counterrevolution decisively. Subversives, terrorists, and saboteurs will be mercilessly eliminated. The people understand such a need right now and even think that in a number of cases our government is acting too leniently with regard to the counterrevolutionaries.\n\nThen the discussion turned on Kennedy\u2019s statement that the USA supposedly does not intend to make a direct military intervention against Cuba. Fidel Castro said in this connection that this statement has positive importance only in the respect that to some degree it demoralizes the internal counterrevolution which, as is well-known, pins all its hopes on the arrival of American soldiers in Cuba. In reality, Fidel Castro continued, Kennedy will take the previous hostile line with respect to Cuba. Yes, this is what properly follows from his statement. Fidel Castro noted, it seems to me that this statement is a peculiar smokescreen to outwardly not compromise the USA before the world and the peoples of Latin America, and in case of necessity to depict the whole matter as if the fight is not between the USA and Cuba, but between Cubans of different political tendencies. In reality Kennedy, Fidel Castro continued, will continue the previous hostile line with respect to Cuba. Obviously, they will take steps to further intensify the economic blockade and give even broader aid to the external and internal counterrevolution. We are confident that the subversive activity against our government will be carried out as before. Kennedy hopes that he will be able to smother the Cuban revolution with the aid of this tactic. However, Kennedy is deeply mistaken.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, the Cuban revolution is developing successfully, and the political consciousness of the masses and their enthusiasm are growing, in spite of all the difficulties. Fidel Castro noted, I am especially happy that right now a consolidation of all the leftist forces in the country is occurring. A process of the merging of these forces is actually going on. At the same a peculiar polarization of forces is occurring -- an alignment and some retreat from the revolution by the bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie elements. This is a natural process, of course, and it does not frighten us. Fidel Castro noted, the bourgeoisie cannot be made revolutionaries.\n\nThe main thing, Fidel Castro stressed in conclusion, is that we have firm support in the people. The peasantry and working class support the revolution right now, and every day the union of the working class and the peasantry becomes stronger, and this is the guarantee of our victory. Domestic political difficulties do not worry us right now as much as the economic difficulties created by the American blockade. Fidel Castro said, on the whole agriculture and industry are operating successfully, and the country will be supplied with all the necessary kinds of food and manufactured goods with the exception of fats and soap. Rationing will unavoidably have to be temporarily introduced. Fidel Castro stressed, in our opinion it will only further harden the people and teach them to deal with the difficulties with which they will have to cope more than once in the difficult and stubborn battle with the forces of American imperialism.\n\nThe rest of the conversation with Fidel Castro touched on several general questions.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\nOn 22 April, after the Cuban government had crushed the Bay of Pigs invasion and launched a massive crackdown against real or perceived anti-regime forces, the Soviet ambassador met with Fidel Castro and President Osvaldo Dortic\u00f3s, inviting them to breakfast. It is not clear whether they met once or twice, but Kudryavtsev recorded two separate memoranda of conversation.\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 216-218. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188141.] *\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 2\n\n26 April 1961\n\nN\u00ba 149 [SIC]\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister Fidel CASTRO RUZ and President Osvaldo DORTICOS TORRADO\n\n22 April 1961\n\n\nI met today with Fidel Castro and Dorticos. In accordance with instructions [I] had I passed them the text of a message of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev in reply to Kennedy\u2019s message of 18 April.[10]\n\nPresident Dorticos read the text of this message aloud, and Fidel Castro repeatedly interrupted him with individual approving remarks.\n\nAfter reading the text of the message of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev Fidel Castro said that this is a remarkable document which will have enormous significance for the cause of peace. The argumentation contained in this document, continued Fidel Castro, is unusually strong and convincing. The tone of the message is first and in addition calm and confident, which advantageously distinguishes it from the hysteria of Kennedy. Fidel Castro stressed, I am confident that this new message, just like the first message of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev, will raise the prestige of the Soviet Union by an enormous degree and will be evaluated by all peoples as a document of peace.\n\nWe are extremely grateful to Cde. N. S. Khrushchev for this new support to Cuba, stressed Fidel Castro. It will undoubtedly force Kennedy to think seriously before deciding on any new adventure against Cuba. This message will undoubtedly exert its own influence and strengthen those circles in the USA which support a more reasonable policy. It will also find a very positive response in a more reasonable policy.\n\nPresident Dorticos also spoke highly in approximately the same words about the message of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev, stressing the deep and dialectic character of the analysis of the situation which Cde. N. S. Khrushchev gave in this document.\n\nFidel Castro and Dorticos especially liked the place in the message where it said that if Kennedy considers himself justified to take such steps against Cuba, as the US government did recently, then it ought to admit that other countries have no less grounds to act in the same fashion with respect to countries on whose territory military preparations are actually being made which represent a threat to the security of the Soviet Union. Fidel Castro and Dorticos stressed in this connection that such a response hit the nail on the head.\n\nIn the course of further conversation it was arranged that the message of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev will be immediately published in the Cuban press as soon as it was placed in our press and broadcast over Soviet radio.\n\nThen, in accordance with instructions [I] had I passed Fidel Castro cordial congratulations of Cde. N. S. Khrushchev on the occasion of the victory won by the Cuban people over the interventionists.\n\nFidel Castro was very moved by these congratulations and asked that Cde. N. S. Khrushchev be passed his cordial and sincere gratitude.\n\nFidel Castro stressed that the firm support given Cuba by Cde. N. S. Khrushchev at the moment of the attack on it by counterrevolutionary bands exerted a decisive influence on the Americans, and after this warning they decided not to expand aid to the interventionists or use their aircraft and other resources more broadly.\n\nIt was felt from this part of the conversation with Fidel Castro and Dorticos that they were genuinely quite satisfied with Cde. N. S. Khrushchev\u2019s message in reply to Kennedy and see it as strong and effective support to Cuba.\n\nThen, in accordance with instructions [I] had I informed Fidel Castro about the granting of the Cuban government\u2019s request regarding sending weapons and combat equipment, and specialists, and the proposed delivery of aircraft and also air defense equipment. Fidel Castro asked in this connection that Cde. N. S. Khrushchev be passed his sincere gratitude for the aid to Cuba and the rapid granting of the requests concerning these questions which the revolutionary government had appealed for at one time.\n\nIn the course of further conversation Fidel Castro said that, in his opinion, the danger for Cuba had still not passed, and therefore he would request all possible steps be undertaken so that the weapons, combat equipment, and aircraft be sent in the shortest possible time. It would also be advisable, if possible, to more rapidly send the specialists to Cuba, who would immediately be able to start work on arrival. It would not be at all bad, noted Fidel Castro, if specialists in questions of combined-arms tactics were also included in the aforementioned category of specialists. He continued, combat operations to eliminate the interventionists have shown the weakness of the revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia, primarily in questions of tactics and troop command.\n\nThen Fidel Castro stressed that he would like to ask the Soviet government to send aircraft and air defense equipment to Cuba in as short a time as possible. The Cuban air forces have no more than 15 pilots in all. However, the Soviet flight instructors who should arrive in Cuba among the other specialists might quickly instruct the available Cuban pilots and thus they could quickly fly on Soviet aircraft. In addition, if possible it is desirable to accelerate the training of 25 Cuban pilots who are now studying in the Soviet Union.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, for our part we will take every step to carefully conceal the aircraft from the enemy, and I would like to assure the Soviet government that these aircraft will not be harmed. It is also extremely important to strengthen the country\u2019s air defenses, to begin with, even at the expense of anti-aircraft artillery.\n\nFidel Castro further noted that Czechoslovakia also intended to help Cuba with weapons and combat equipment, and the Cuban government had decided to accept this aid.\n\nIn conclusion Fidel Castro again asked me to pass his sincere gratitude to Cde. N. S. Khrushchev for the aid and support to Cuba in the difficult days for it.\n\nThe rest of the conversation with Fidel Castro and Dorticos touched on several general questions. Fidel Castro told in detail about the combat operations to eliminate the amphibious forces of the external counterrevolution which had invaded, and the revolutionary army and the people\u2019s militia displayed great heroism and selflessness in these battles.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n\n*******\n\n**From the Journal of S.M. Kudryavtsev, \u2018Record of a Conversation with Prime Minister Fidel Castro Ruz and President Osvaldo Dorticos Torrado, 22 April 1961\u2019***[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 3. ll. 219-222. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188142.] *\n\nfrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nTop Secret. Copy N\u00ba 2\n\n9 June 1961\n\nN\u00ba 186\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister Fidel CASTRO RUZ and President Osvaldo DORTICOS TORRADO\n\n22 April 1961\n\n\nI invited Fidel Castro and President Dorticos to breakfast.\n\n1. Referring to instructions of the Soviet government I informed them about the granting of the request of the Cuban government concerning the question of the special deliveries on the basis of the agreement reached in Moscow in the course of the talks with the mission of Flavio Bravo.\n\nFidel Castro and President Dorticos asked that their sincere gratitude be passed to the Soviet government for the rapid and effective solutions of these so important questions for the strengthening of the defense of Cuba. When doing this Fidel Castro assured the Soviet government that the Cuban government would take all necessary steps to keep the special equipment from possible bombing by the enemy. Fidel Castro further provided assurance that he would give the necessary orders to the General Staff and other Cuban military authorities to ensure the proper acceptance and storage of the special deliveries.\n\n2. Several questions associated with the development of the foreign policy and domestic situation in Cuba were touched upon in the course of further conversation with Fidel Castro and Dorticos.\n\nFidel Castro said, the attack of the counterrevolutionary bands on Cuba, as can now be established on the basis of the operations which have taken place, was well and carefully planned in the military sense. The Pentagon\u2019s military plan to carry out this operation was also well thought-out and drafted from the purely military point of view. The Pentagon\u2019s plan provided for launching a lightning strike, and in the event of its failure consolidation in this inaccessible sector of territory and the waging of a lengthy war of attrition against Cuba, mainly with the aid of aircraft. In developing the plan of intervention against Cuba the USA proceeded from the position that at the first clash the revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia would scatter and a mass revolt against the revolutionary government would arise throughout the entire country. This, however, __was the Pentagon\u2019s main miscalculation.__\n\nThe interventionists were supplied with a large quantity of modern weapons, enough weapons for up to 10,000 men. The USA counted on people from the internal counterrevolution to come running toward the counterrevolutionaries. Six battalions in all, one of them a parachute battalion, were landed under air cover. The total strength of the assault group was about 1500 men. From the statements of the prisoners it follows that these were the main forces which the external counterrevolution had at this time. Right now, in all probability, small detachments of counterrevolutionaries were left in the US and other Central American countries which are no great danger to Cuba from the military point of view.\n\nFidel Castro continued, the General Staff of the army and the people\u2019s militia developed a plan to surround the amphibious force which had landed. When this was done the main task was not to allow the interventionists to penetrate into the interior of the country, to the north, and also to the east, to the region of Escambray. A mission was assigned at the same time to cut off this enemy grouping from the sea, not allow it to be evacuated. Fidel Castro continued, a large role in the destruction of the enemy assault force was played by the revolutionary air force which, although it numbered only 10 aircraft in all, nevertheless sank four ships of the interventionists and several barges with weapons and ammunition. In addition, the path for their retreat was actually thus cut off. Ten enemy aircraft were shot down in battles.\n\nThe enemy group was quickly suppressed and demoralized as a result of the air strikes, mortar, and artillery fire. Thanks to the successful encirclement operations none of the interventionists managed to break through to Escambray nor to be evacuated by sea. Right now the interventionists are surrendering en masse and the number of prisoners already exceeds 400. The revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia have lost in battle over 100 men killed and about 200 wounded.\n\nThen Fidel Castro said that right now the question is being raised in the UN of showing mercy to the interventionists. He said, we can show such mercy only on one condition: the UN gives guarantees that counterrevolutionary bands will not be sent to Cuba any more, that the US will stop arming, training, and supporting them, and also that Cuban counterrevolutionary organizations who have found shelter on their territory will disband. Corresponding instructions in this direction have been given to Raul Roa.\n\nThe defeat of the interventionists, stressed Fidel Castro, has inflicted an irreparable blow to US prestige, and in Latin America most of all. The annoying speeches of Kennedy demonstrate that he wants to intimidate or, rather, maintain the fear of the USA by Latin American peoples. However, now the situation has radically changed. We think that if Kennedy tries to raise the Cuban question in the Organization of American States right now and demand agreement to perform a collective intervention against Cuba, this would lead to the collapse of the OAS. Brazil, Mexico, and Ecuador will now even more surely support Cuba.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, now it can be established that the foreign policy positions of Cuba have considerably strengthened as a result of the victory. The domestic situation of the country will now be even stronger. The victory of the revolutionary forces has resulted in an extraordinary consolidation of the entire Cuban revolution. The internal counterrevolution was dealt a number of blows in these days from which it will be difficult for it to recover. On the whole we can now look at the future more confidently and calmly. Of course, there remains the danger of direct intervention from US forces. The aircraft of the US Air Force fly over all Cuban military bases, evidently for purposes of intelligence [collection], and American destroyers continue to cruise along [our] coasts.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, we well understand our responsibility to the world. Therefore the revolutionary army and people\u2019s militia have been given all the necessary orders not to give the Americans any pretext for provocations. We have decided not to demobilize, and the country will be in a state of combat alert until the situation is finally clear.\n\nFidel Castro stressed, we hope that the firm warning given by Cde. N. S. Khrushchev in his messages to Kennedy will exert a sobering influence on the US government.\n\nPresident Dorticos, who took part in the conversation, also expressed himself in the same terms.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\nAssassination Plotting, June 1961: A Soviet Warning\n\nOne of the most controversial, and perennially intriguing, aspects of the US-Cuban confrontation in the early 1960s is the topic of assassination plotting against Fidel Castro by the Central Intelligence Agency during the Kennedy Administration. The subject recently received a renewed surge of attention with the staged release in late 2017 and early 2018 of thousands of formerly classified (in part or in full) documents opened as a result of the 1992 John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act. That legislation was inspired by the controversial Oliver Stone movie \u201cJFK\u201d (1991), which posited the idea of a conspiracy to murder the president involving the CIA, Lyndon B. Johnson, and assorted shadowy characters.\n\nLong missing from the story, however, has been much sense of how the topic entered Soviet-Cuban exchanges at the time, and the level of knowledge of the assassination plots in Moscow (many Cuban figures, from Fidel Castro on down, have commented regarding their own knowledge of various plots).\n\nOn 24 June, 1961, the document reproduced below indicates, Moscow\u2019s ambassador in Havana informed Fidel Castro about \u201cthe plans of the external counterrevolution and American intelligence\u201d regarding assassination plots against Cuban leaders. After thanking Kudryavtsev for the information, Castro, in turn, promised to commission Minister of the Interior Ramiro Vald\u00e9s Men\u00e9ndez, a top intelligence aide in the Cuban government, to urgently investigate the \u201cnames\u201d provided and \u201cpossibly arrest\u201d the organizers of the assassination attempt being prepared. Alas, the document provides no details on precisely which assassination plotting the Soviets had uncovered\u2014and US sources do not clarify which of the many anti-Castro schemes was foremost at that moment. The CIA\u2019s internal 1967 report on assassination plotting against Castro referenced the \u201cGambling Syndicate Operation\u201d as the main effort from \u201cAugust 1960-May 1961,\u201d including in the months surrounding the Bay of Pigs operation, but it is not clear whether the Soviet report involved these particular plots or others involving the intelligence agency and anti-Castro Cuban activists.[11]\n\n*[Source: AVP RF, F. 0104. Op. 17, P. 118, D. 4, ll. 105-106. Obtained by James G. Hershberg and translated by Gary Goldberg. Accessible at https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/188148.] *\n\nFrom the journal of\n\nS. M. KUDRYAVTSEV\n\nSecret. Copy N\u00ba 2\n\n12 July 1961\n\nN\u00ba 224\n\nRECORD OF A CONVERSATION\n\nwith Prime Minister of the Republic of Cuba Fidel Castro Ruz\n\n\n__24 June 1961__\n\nI met with Fidel Castro at my apartment and in accordance with instructions [I] had I informed him of the plans of the external counterrevolution and American intelligence being drafted regarding the organization of attempts on the lives of the most prominent state figures of Cuba.\n\nListening to me closely, Fidel Castro said that he would like to ask me to pass on his gratitude to the Soviet government for this confidential information and the concern about him. Fidel Castro continued, this report deserves attention especially as it contains a number of names and details. He will immediately charge Minister of Internal Affairs Ramiro Valdes with personally dealing with the investigation of this matter.\n\nThe plan of attempts on the lives of the leaders of the Cuban government hatched by American intelligence and the Cuban counterrevolution have long been known in general outline. The internal and external counterrevolution essentially have no other way out left, and they are hanging on to the idea of assassination as the only and last means to smother the Cuban revolution. They actually hope that the murder of the main leaders of Cuba will cause chaos in the country and make it easier for them to carry out a plan of intervention. But, Fidel Castro stressed, American intelligence and the external counterrevolution are mistaken, mainly in that the Cuban revolution will not perish as a result of the removal of a particular political leader. Our revolution, continued Fidel Castro, has put down deep roots, and such acts of terrorism might first of all be turned against their organizers.\n\nIn the course of further conversation Fidel Castro stressed that these words of his do not at all mean that he personally and the other leaders do not attach importance to their security protection. Concerning the question of revealing some information I had reported to him in accordance with the aforementioned instructions, Fidel Castro said that he thinks that no publication ought to be made for the time being. He thinks that this can only make a mess of the matter. Of course, he and Ramiro Valdes will take every step for the names reported to him not to be known to anyone. He and Ramiro Valdes will keep all this a proper secret. The Cuban MVD [Ministry of Internal Affairs] will conduct a careful investigation and possibly manage to arrest the organizers of the assassination attempts being prepared. The protection of Cuban leaders will be increased and every step will be taken to ensure their safety.\n\nSpeaking further about Kennedy\u2019s policy with respect to Cuba Fidel Castro stressed that at the present time the US and the Cuban counterrevolution are relying on the development of terrorism in the country, acts of sabotage and subversion, in order to make it easier for the new intervention against Cuba that they are preparing. However, he, Fidel Castro, thinks that after the failure of the [US Ambassador to the United Nations Adlai E.] Stevenson mission with which he travelled throughout the countries of Latin America to organize an intervention against Cuba with the forces of the countries of Central America and Cuban counterrevolutionaries, it will be very hard for the United States, even in the event that they decide to support such an intervention with their air force and navy. An assassination attempt on the leaders of the Cuban state and a subsequent intervention against Cuba, Fidel Castro said in conclusion, can cause a revolutionary explosion in Latin America and immense consequences for the US itself.\n\nThe rest of the conversation touched on some general questions.\n\nAMBASSADOR OF THE USSR IN THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA\n\n(S. KUDRYAVTSEV)\n\n\n**James G. Hershberg **is Professor of History and International Affairs at George Washington University; former Director of the Wilson Center\u2019s Cold War International History Project; and author of *James B. Conant: Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the Nuclear Age* (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993) and *Marigold: The Lost Chance for Peace in Vietnam* (Washington/Stanford: Wilson Center Press/Stanford University Press, 2012). He is currently working on a study of Cuba, Brazil, and the Cold War.\n\n\n\n[1] Svetlana Savranskaya, ed., Sergo Mikoyan, *The Soviet Cuban Missile Crisis* (Washington, DC: Stanford University Press/Wilson Center Press, 2012). The *Cold War International History Project Bulletin* (*CWIHPB*) has published many translated Soviet documents from late 1962, around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. See esp. issues no. 5 (Spring 1995), pp. 58-115, 159; no. 8/9 (Winter 1996/1997), pp. 270-354; no. 10 (March 1998), pp. 223-6; no. 11 Winter 1998), pp. 251-62; no. 14/15 (Winter 2003-Spring 2004), pp. 385-98; no. 17/18 (Fall 2012), pp. 299-348.\n\n[2] See, e.g., James G. Blight, Bruce J. Allyn, and David A. Welch, *Cuba on the Brink: Castro, the Missile Crisis, and the Soviet Collapse* (New York: Pantheon, 1993), and for translations of Cuban documents released at a 2002 conference in Havana, see *CWIHPB* no. 17/18 (Fall 2012), pp. 135-56.\n\n[3] For assistance related to this Moscow trip the author thanks, in particular, the staffs at the Archive of Foreign Policy, Russian Federation (*Arkhiv Vneshnei Politiki Rossiiskoi Federatsii*; AVP RF) and Russian State Archive of Contemporary History (*Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv noveishei istorii*; RGANI), especially RGANI deputy director Mikhail Prozumenschikov; at the Institute of World History, Mikhail Lipkin (director) and Stepan Eliseev; Prof. Robert Edelman (Univ. of California San Diego) and Prof. C.J. Young (Cambridge Univ.) for inviting me to the \u201cSports and the Cold War\u201d conference in Moscow that enabled the research; Christian F. Ostermann, Gary Goldberg, and Laura Deal of the Wilson Center for facilitating the translation of the AVP RF documents; and Svetlana Savranskaya (National Security Archive) for translating the Khrushchev-Castro memcon.\n\n[4] Tad Szulc, *Fidel: A Critical Portrait* (New York: Morrow, 1986), p. 562.\n\n[5] For accounts of Castro\u2019s move to the Hotel Theresa and meeting with Khrushchev, see, e.g., Szulc, *Fidel*, 580-83, and Robert E. Quirk, *Fidel Castro* (New York: Norton & Co., 1993), pp. 335 ff.\n\n[6] Fidel Castro and Ignacio Ramonet, My Life: A Spoken Autobiography (New York: Scribner, 2006, 2007).\n\n[7] Kudryavtsev also discussed the new American president and prospects for a US-supported intervention in Cuba with Ernesto \u201cChe\u201d Guevara in January 1961. See records of Kudryavtsev-Guevara conversations on 11, 17, and 30 January 1961 in \u201cChatting with Che,\u201d *CWIHPB* 17/18 (Fall 2012), pp. 157-67, esp. 159-62.\n\n[8] See James G. Hershberg, intro., \u201cBefore the Bay of Pigs--What Did the Cubans Know? Cuban Intelligence Reports, January-May 1961,\u201d *CWIHP Bulletin* 17/18 (fall 2012), pp. 167-70.\n\n[9] The date of the Khrushchev-Thompson conversation is not specified, but it was apparently a 1 April 1961 conversation that the US ambassador described in a telegram to Washington reproduced in US Department of State, *Foreign Relations of the United States* (*FRUS*), vol. V: *Soviet Union* (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1998), doc. 51.\n\n[10] For Khrushchev\u2019s 22 April 1961 letter to Kennedy see US Department of State, *FRUS, 1961-1963, Vol. VI: Kennedy-Khrushchev Exchanges* (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1996), doc. 11; for Khrushchev\u2019s prior message to JFK and JFK\u2019s reply, both 18 April 1961, see ibid., docs. 9 and 10.\n\n[11] CIA Inspector General, Memorandum for the Record, Subject: Report on Plots to Assassinate Fidel Castro, 23 May 1967, at https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0005/7324009.pdf or https://www.archives.gov/files/research/jfk/releases/104-10213-10101.pdf\n\n### Author\n\nProfessor of History and International Affairs at George Washington University\n\n## Cold War International History Project\n\nThe Cold War International History Project supports the full and prompt release of historical materials by governments on all sides of the Cold War. Read more\n\n## History and Public Policy Program\n\nA leader in making key foreign policy records accessible and fostering informed scholarship, analysis, and discussion on international affairs, past and present. Read more" + }, + { + "title": "Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution - NPR", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution - NPR" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMitAFBVV95cUxPcnZoQktYY0VJRmtfdnR2NTJWQ183M19PeDlRY21jbWt1eVNGQVRPaWNYQm51Z3RGbWxZbUo1UUxsaUVPNGxqT2YyVnVmQUlhWlVPeVY1enE0dFY4Wm05RXo3S21QR1dLeUN4QVFVQzF4NFVfWkpvX0tRRlByRFc5UHZOMlJ6TVY2V1Fiam42dV9lS0lkNGE2OEx3NWI1YkhpSlZuN0FITXVoQk1sTG93QldVeU0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.npr.org/2019/02/23/697256711/religious-leaders-in-cuba-outspoken-and-critical-of-proposed-constitution", + "id": "CBMitAFBVV95cUxPcnZoQktYY0VJRmtfdnR2NTJWQ183M19PeDlRY21jbWt1eVNGQVRPaWNYQm51Z3RGbWxZbUo1UUxsaUVPNGxqT2YyVnVmQUlhWlVPeVY1enE0dFY4Wm05RXo3S21QR1dLeUN4QVFVQzF4NFVfWkpvX0tRRlByRFc5UHZOMlJ6TVY2V1Fiam42dV9lS0lkNGE2OEx3NWI1YkhpSlZuN0FITXVoQk1sTG93QldVeU0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 23 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 23, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 54, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution  NPR", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution  NPR" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.npr.org", + "title": "NPR" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution\nauthor: Tom Gjelten\nurl: https://www.npr.org/2019/02/23/697256711/religious-leaders-in-cuba-outspoken-and-critical-of-proposed-constitution\nhostname: npr.org\ndescription: Cubans vote this weekend on a new constitution that enshrines the Communist party as the \"supreme guiding political force.\" Religious leaders are critical of new limits on pluralistic thought.\nsitename: NPR\ndate: 2019-02-23\ntags: ['Cuba', 'constitution', 'Communist Party', 'religious freedom']\n---\n# Religious Leaders In Cuba Outspoken And Critical Of Proposed Constitution\n\nPeople in Cuba vote Sunday on whether to make socialism \"irrevocable\" on the island and establish the Cuban Communist Party officially as the \"supreme guiding political force\" in the state and society.\n\nIn recent weeks, debate around those propositions has been unusually intense for an island not known for democratic processes, and it has featured the growing strength of religious leaders.\n\nThe political and ideological monopoly would come via a new constitution that Cubans can either endorse or reject in a popular referendum. The draft document, prepared under the guidance of the Communist Party, would replace the current Soviet-era constitution, adopted in 1976 and amended numerous times in subsequent years.\n\nNo opposition parties are allowed in Cuba, but in the deliberation over the proposed constitution, religious groups on the island have taken a lead in criticizing the government plan, revealing a level of influence they have not previously demonstrated.\n\nCatholic bishops in Cuba have been particularly outspoken, issuing a joint statement earlier this month that noted how the document \"effectively excludes the exercise of pluralist thought regarding man and the social order.\"\n\nIn an objection reminiscent of religious freedom debates in the United States and other countries, the Catholic bishops argue that \"the free practice of religion is not merely the freedom to have religious beliefs but the freedom to live in conformity with one's faith and to express it publicly.\"\n\nThe government reaction to the church criticism came swiftly. Mariela Castro, the daughter of party leader Ra\u00fal Castro and a leading member of the National Assembly in Cuba, shared a post on her Facebook page calling the church \"the serpent of history.\"\n\nThe government's campaign to promote a \"yes\" vote in the constitutional referendum has also encountered fierce opposition in the growing evangelical community. An early version of the constitution defined marriage simply as \"the union of two persons,\" which conservative Christian leaders saw as an implicit endorsement of gay marriage.\n\n\"We love the sinner, but there are some practices that are not in accord with our biblical principles,\" says the Rev. Moises de Prada, president of the Assembly of God denomination in Cuba.\n\nIn their joint statement, the Catholic bishops made the same objection to the marriage article. \"Given its importance for the future of the family, the society, and the education of new generations,\" the bishops said, \"it's natural that this article was the one that most alarmed our population.\" The bishops said opposition to the marriage article was widely evident among Cubans as a whole.\n\nIn what appeared to a recognition of the opposition to the marriage article, the committee drafting the new constitution removed the reference in the final draft. Communist party leaders, however, denied the move came in response to the criticism, and they promised to revive it as part of a new family law.\n\nThis uproar over the proposed constitution marks another turning point in the Cuban government's ever-shifting attitude toward religion. In the early years of the revolution, the Catholic church in particular was subject to severe repression. Relations with the church improved in the period after the collapse of the Soviet bloc, when Cuban leaders were seeking alliances** **with western countries to make up for the loss of subsidies from former Communist allies. The Catholic church was revived, and evangelical Protestantism gained new ground.\n\nThe new churches enjoyed relatively good relations with the government for a while, but in recent years tensions have been rising.\n\n\"Evangelism for me doesn't live just within the four walls of the church,\" says Pastor Mario Felix Lleonart, who founded a Baptist church in the town of Taguayab\u00f3n, in the province of Villa Clara. \"Our faith doesn't just free us from the eternal consequences of sin. It also makes us free here on earth, and that brings us into conflict with a totalitarian regime that restricts our freedoms.\"\n\nAfter starting a Christian blog in his community, Lleonart faced harassment from local Communist party leaders.\n\n\"They would tell me, 'Pastor, you could be better in your pastoral work if you stuck to teaching songs to your congregation and talking about the Bible and staying inside the church,'\" Lleonart said. \"They told me I was mixing with too many delinquents.\" After his children began suffering the consequences of his activism, Lleonart and his family sought political asylum in the United States.\n\nSome articles in the new Cuban constitution suggest a further hardening of government attitudes toward religion, according to an analysis by Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), a religious freedom advocacy group based in the United Kingdom.The new constitution does guarantee religious freedom and freedom of conscience. Under the previous constitution, however, those provisions were tied together. In the new version, they are separated, and the freedoms are not defined as clearly as they were before.\n\n\"At least the language was there [previously],\" says Anna-Lee Stangel, CSW advocacy director for the Americas. \"Now that seems to be taken away. I don't think it's necessarily going to change things hugely but I do think it's symbolic. And if the language is going backwards, even symbolically, that's significant.\"\n\nAn especially big problem for religious and other opposition groups is that the guaranteed right to freedom of conscience is not actually guaranteed; it cannot be invoked to get around other constitutional provisions, like the ones officially establishing the Communist Party as the \"supreme guiding power\" and declaring the socialist system \"irrevocable.\"\n\nThus, there may be freedom in Cuba, but not if it is used to oppose Communist rule.\n\nIn the weeks leading up to the constitutional referendum, Cuban religious leaders say they have come under intense pressure to urge their congregants to vote Yes.\n\n\"If a pastor dares in church to raise some criticism of the constitution, he's branded a counter-revolutionary,\" says Rev. de Prada.\n\nGiven the government's tight control in Cuba, the new constitution is virtually certain to be approved in this weekend's referendum, but the deliberation over its provisions appears to have given energy to a new church-based opposition movement on the island." + }, + { + "title": "Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba - Truthout", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba - Truthout" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMie0FVX3lxTE1QWWFVRUQ1bFVtVXdETVpBTGEtbjJiM18xN29rMHhGbVZRWTZXZk5MalhGX1djdTdscUpic0JKT1lrTjh4RDFUdjAyVmtQNVhSaUdGXy1DbkV2RHFVWHN2ME5YX0NXSzJMZWpoSVVNS0FpUk02VHlwS0lFTQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20190205-cubas-tano-people-a-flourishing-culture-believed-extinct", + "id": "CBMie0FVX3lxTE1QWWFVRUQ1bFVtVXdETVpBTGEtbjJiM18xN29rMHhGbVZRWTZXZk5MalhGX1djdTdscUpic0JKT1lrTjh4RDFUdjAyVmtQNVhSaUdGXy1DbkV2RHFVWHN2ME5YX0NXSzJMZWpoSVVNS0FpUk02VHlwS0lFTQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 24 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 24, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 55, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba  Truthout", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba  Truthout" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://truthout.org", + "title": "Truthout" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct\nauthor: Christopher P Baker\nurl: https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20190205-cubas-tano-people-a-flourishing-culture-believed-extinct\nhostname: bbc.com\ndescription: Although it\u2019s commonly believed that the indigenous Ta\u00edno were extirpated after Spanish conquest in 1511, their bloodlines, identity and customs were never completely extinguished.\nsitename: BBC\ndate: 2019-02-06\n---\n# Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct\n\n**Although it\u2019s commonly believed that the indigenous Ta\u00edno were extirpated after Spanish conquest in 1511, their bloodlines, identity and customs were never completely extinguished.**\n\nA commonly repeated belief says that Cuba\u2019s indigenous Ta\u00edno people were extirpated shortly after the Spanish conquest in 1511. Yet signs of living Ta\u00edno culture appear as my car bounces down the track to El G\u00fcirito, a remote hamlet at Cuba\u2019s easternmost extreme that\u2019s sandwiched between the azure Atlantic Ocean and surging mountain ranges smothered in throttling green.\n\nIt\u2019s easy to see how pockets of indigenous people could survive in this wild, rugged place, passing down their genes through the centuries.\n\nArriving at El G\u00fcirito, I\u2019m greeted by *indios campesinos*, humble farmers proud of their Indian heritage. Their coppery complexions, square jaws and prominent cheekbones \u2013 so distinct from elsewhere in Cuba \u2013 remind me of Amerindian faces I\u2019ve seen in the Amazon.\n\nMany rural Cuban families live in simple *boh\u00edos* (thatched huts) with palm-plank walls. Yet nowhere else in Cuba have I seen graves topped by thatch and surrounded by *guamo* (conch) shells, preserving a Ta\u00edno superstition meant to thwart evil spirits. Nor still-smouldering plots of *boniato* (sweet potato), yucca and maize, newly cleared by slash-and-burn and heaped in earthen mounds, Ta\u00edno-style. Nor weathered campesinos prodding at the soil with *coas*, long, sharpened hoes that pre-date Columbus\u2019 arrival in Cuba on 27 October 1492.\n\nI\u2019m as close as I\u2019ll ever come to seeing the idyll Columbus saw on his first voyage to the New World.\n\n\u201c[The indigenous people] show the most singular loving behaviour\u2026 and are gentle and always laughing,\u201d Columbus recorded. Conquistador Diego Vel\u00e1zquez\u2019s arrival in 1511 would change that forever. Those Ta\u00edno not put to the sword or worked to death fell victim to smallpox, influenza and measles, against which they had no defence. Within 100 years of Columbus\u2019 landfall, virtually the entire indigenous population \u2013 heavily concentrated in the fertile lowlands of eastern Cuba \u2013 had perished.\n\nYet contrary to popular claims, Ta\u00edno bloodlines, identity and customs were never completely extinguished.\n\n**You may also be interested in:**\n\n\u2022 The shipwreck that created a culture\n\n\u2022 The US islands of slave descendants\n\n\u2022 The islands with a \u2018third gender\u2019\n\nMany survivors mixed with Spanish colonists or fled the flatlands to endure in *palenques* (hidden redoubts) in the rugged, densely forested mountains inland of Baracoa \u2013 an ancient Ta\u00edno village that, in 1511, became Cuba\u2019s first Spanish colony. Encircled by a mountain meniscus unfurling like an *abanico* fan around the Bah\u00eda de Miel (Bay of Honey), this insular enclave wasn\u2019t connected by road to the rest of Cuba until 1964.\n\nThroughout the colonial period, Spanish authorities refused to acknowledge the existence of Ta\u00edno people. Yet 19th-Century records are full of references to *caser\u00edos* (Indian kinship communities) in the mountains of eastern Oriente province. Even Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed, revolutionary apostle of Cuban independence, recorded (in the days preceding his death in a Spanish ambush in May 1895) how he was tracked by the *\u2018indios de Garrido\u2019* \u2013 Indian scouts from Yateras under the command of Spanish Lieutenant Pedro Garrido Romero.\n\nAs recently as the 1940s, Cuba\u2019s preeminent geographer and anthropologist Antonio Nu\u00f1ez Jim\u00e9nez \u2013 who would later hold top positions in the Castro government \u2013 had documented dozens of caser\u00edos scattered throughout the Sierra del Cristal and Macizo Nipe-Sagua-Baracoa mountains. Following the 1959 Cuban Revolution, however, the communist government vehemently promoted the notion of the Ta\u00edno\u2019s extinction. It dissuaded distinct racial identification and instilled a singular mind set of \u2018Cubanness\u2019, intended to equalise everyone. \u201cThe government was drastic about it for years and didn\u2019t want it to come up,\u201d says Jos\u00e9 Barreiro, Cuban-American former director of the Office for Latin America at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, in a 2016 article for Smithsonian Magazine.\n\nNot even Baracoa and its remote, rugged hinterland was spared the government\u2019s gauche promotion of a singular \u2018New Man\u2019 mindset. \u201cWe families knew we were Indian, but as children we were told not to discuss it with other people,\u201d said Rafael Cobas Romero, a member of El G\u016birito\u2019s Grupo Kirib\u00e1-Neng\u00f3n, a cultural ensemble that keeps alive 19th-Century *kirib\u00e1* and *neng\u00f3n* country music and dance forms that are rustic precursors to *son*, Cuba\u2019s iconic traditional music (of Buena Vista Social Club fame).\n\nToday the living Ta\u00edno identity is acknowledged, and no longer viewed as a challenge to *cubanidad* (Cuban identity). Instead, it\u2019s promoted (albeit somewhat begrudgingly) as a touristic asset. Appropriately, I\u2019ve brought my US motorcycle group to El G\u016birito for a cultural \u2018people-to-people\u2019 encounter during our ride across Cuba (US embargo law states that US citizens traveling to Cuba for group travel may legally do so only for \u2018people-to-people educational exchange\u2019).\n\nThe ensemble strikes up, interpreting their traditional sounds with age-old Cuban instruments \u2013 the *tambor *(African drum), *tres *(Cuban guitar), *claves *(hardwood percussion sticks), *g\u00fciro *(gourd scraper), maracas, *marimbula *(plucked box), and a *g\u00fcayo* scraper inherited from the Ta\u00edno serrated stone grating board used to shred yucca. Indios campesinos take our hands, kiss our cheeks and invite us to dance, showing us how to glide our feet across the floor like fish moving through water.\n\n\u201cKirib\u00e1 and neng\u00f3n are rooted in our traditional *guajiro* (peasant) lifestyle. But our culinary traditions date back to the pre-Columbian era,\u201d Teresa Roch\u00e9 Lore, the group\u2019s director, explained.\n\nSpread out before us is a buffet of uniquely *baracoense* dishes \u2013 distinctive from Cuba\u2019s predictable pork, rice and beans \u2013 served Ta\u00edno-style in coconut shells and *j\u00edcaras *(hollowed gourds) or laid out on *bateas* (wooden trays). I savour spinach-like* calal\u00fa* simmered in *leche de coco* (coconut milk), and *bac\u00e1n*, a steamed corn dough stuffed with plantain and pork, wrapped in blanched banana leaves. There\u2019s *lechita*, shrimp in a well-seasoned coconut sauce, and a tiny opaque fish called *tet\u00ed*, fried then simmered in coconut milk with slivers of sweet peppers and onions. We end with delicious desserts, including *yemitas*, sweet balls of grated coconut and chocolate, and a chocolate drink called *chorote* made from coconut milk and cacao thickened with corn starch.\n\nWhile many residents of El G\u016birito display Amerindian features, Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno descendants can\u2019t always be identified by physical traits.\n\n\u201cYou can be looking at a very Afro-Cuban or Iberian-looking person, but the DNA tells a different story,\u201d Barreiro says in the article.\n\nThe government\u2019s volte face echoes studies carried out in 2013 showing that Cuban blood is spiced with Ta\u00edno DNA, like *ajiaco* (a hearty Cuban stew of various meats, vegetables and tubers). The average proportion of Native American ancestry in the veins \u2013 8% nationwide \u2013 climbs to 15% in eastern provinces (and far more in some individuals). It\u2019s almost exclusively derived from maternal lineage, likely from the conquistadors brutal rape of Ta\u00edno women.\n\n\u201cThere are no more pure-bloods, but I know many extended families of Indian heritage that still live in their aboriginal areas,\" said Baracoa\u2019s historian, Alejandro Hartmann Matos, who has spent the past decade dedicated to rewriting the tale of the Ta\u00edno's demise. He estimates there are at least 4,000 Indo-Cubans who are biologically more Ta\u00edno than not.\n\n\u201cMany people in other communities have Ta\u00edno blood but won\u2019t admit it. We don\u2019t live exactly like our ancestors, but we\u2019re proud of our heritage,\u201d said Isolino Cobas Romero, a sun-beaten guajiro who leads the El G\u016birito dance troupe.\n\nTa\u00edno culture is most fully preserved in La Caridad de los Indios, a constellation of small caser\u00edos of some 1,600 kin, nestled high in the lush Sierra del Cristal mountains overlooking Guant\u00e1namo. La Caridad de los Indios was the most remote palenque where Indian families settled after being ousted from their last lowland territory in 1850.\n\n\u201cThere are Indians all over these mountains,\u201d says 82-year-old Francisco \u2018Panchito\u2019 Ram\u00edrez Rojas, *cacique* (chief) of the Rojas-Ram\u00edrez clan, Cuba\u2019s main Ta\u00edno extended family. Even Granma*,* Cuba\u2019s official Communist Party newspaper, recently acknowledged the extended clan as living proof that the dictum of Ta\u00edno extinction is myth in an article titled *Panchito, el \u00faltimo cacique* (Panchito, the last chief).\n\nThe government\u2019s acknowledgement of living Ta\u00edno culture owes much to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Cuba was suddenly critically short on food and medicine. In desperation, it turned to indigenous knowledge of traditional farming and natural medicines, shining a spotlight on a culture it had long denied.\n\n\u201cThere are medicines all around us,\u201d Panchito said, sweeping his arm in an arc. \u201cThe forest, this yard. They\u2019re an entire pharmacy.\u201d\n\nThe discovery that Cuba\u2019s indigenous healers use scorpion stings to treat arthritis led Cuban scientists to ground-breaking cancer treatments. \u201cWe found that scorpion venom acts as an anti-inflammatory agent. It also stimulates the immune system and shrinks tumours,\u201d explained Dr Jos\u00e9 Rodr\u00edguez Alonso, an Oxford-trained Cuban physician at Guant\u00e1namo\u2019s Universidad de Ciencias M\u00e9dicas.\n\nSince the Cuban Revolution, most caser\u00edos now have a clinic and school, and residential bungalows (many with solar panels) built by the State. But the community\u2019s ways of life are infused with Ta\u00edno ceremonies, traditions and spiritual values common to many Native American cultures.\n\nThey fish tet\u00ed by the *luna menquante* (waning moon), and plant and harvest by the four lunar phases. They still pray to the sun, moon and Mother Earth. And they ask permission or forgiveness before harvesting or taking bark and leaves for *cocimientos* (healing remedies).\n\n\"The Spaniards killed most of us, but they left our roots,\u201d Panchito said. \u201cWe mustn\u2019t let this beautiful way that we have die.\u201d He\u2019s been passing on his knowledge to his children and grandchildren. But younger indios are leaving the mountains for a modern life in the cities. \"Our race is disintegrating,\" he lamented wistfully.\n\nBut experiencing the ancestral rhythms and indigenous cuisine at El G\u016birito \u2013 just 17km east of Baracoa \u2013 gives me hope. Watching Roch\u00e9 Lore and her kin guiding my group on the dance floor, I grasp how respectful visitation can be a viable way of helping keep alive traditional lifestyles by providing an income. Of investing indios campesinos in a future by giving touristic value to their past.\n\nBurdened with the myth of extinction, most communities of Ta\u00edno descendants are still far off travellers\u2019 radar. I\u2019m inspired to take my next group into the mountains.\n\nOur Unique World *is a BBC Travel series that celebrates what makes us different and distinctive by exploring offbeat subcultures and obscure communities around the globe.*\n\n*Join more than three million BBC Travel fans by liking us on *Facebook*, or follow us on *Twitter* and *Instagram*.*\n\n*If you liked this story, *sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter* called \"If You Only Read 6 Things This Week\". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Capital and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.*\n\n*{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"\"}}*" + }, + { + "title": "The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis - CNN", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis - CNN" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMidEFVX3lxTFBQaXh2ODBjRGwzNnpMYnV0RTduNDQ3Z1lMbVh0UHVjRzFpZXp5SGhqRlYyam95RHFxUkxOMUk4ejhPcGItOGNkbjJzWDh1bzBiSk05clJia2JWMWJvTHRzNjFwSFRuTFk1YjZEd1FGMnBkdEk1?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.americasquarterly.org/article/a-new-era-for-cuba-what-the-new-constitution-means-for-the-island/", + "id": "CBMidEFVX3lxTFBQaXh2ODBjRGwzNnpMYnV0RTduNDQ3Z1lMbVh0UHVjRzFpZXp5SGhqRlYyam95RHFxUkxOMUk4ejhPcGItOGNkbjJzWDh1bzBiSk05clJia2JWMWJvTHRzNjFwSFRuTFk1YjZEd1FGMnBkdEk1", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 02 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 2, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 33, + 0 + ], + "summary": "The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis  CNN", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis  CNN" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.cnn.com", + "title": "CNN" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba To Welcome 5 Million Visitors In 2019 - Forbes", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba To Welcome 5 Million Visitors In 2019 - Forbes" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMinwFBVV95cUxNLWJMX0NYUC1BZ1JvWmgyZjZxOWVESXM4M25mOFdTQ0EzeUFsMkNfT3Ftb0VPRmdOZzgzUEhfYzBEWHZRMkFFMklySzlvWXhjam9kWE9jX29RQmJJdmJsV1dYV2taZ0VZZHdBWkVrSGVMUHozclg3eGdFZ2JEOXhDOVlsOEp0cGFZSjUwOEhMc2dMQjRJVWR2TFdfQVlDVzA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://truthout.org/articles/trump-threatens-a-second-embargo-of-cuba/", + "id": "CBMinwFBVV95cUxNLWJMX0NYUC1BZ1JvWmgyZjZxOWVESXM4M25mOFdTQ0EzeUFsMkNfT3Ftb0VPRmdOZzgzUEhfYzBEWHZRMkFFMklySzlvWXhjam9kWE9jX29RQmJJdmJsV1dYV2taZ0VZZHdBWkVrSGVMUHozclg3eGdFZ2JEOXhDOVlsOEp0cGFZSjUwOEhMc2dMQjRJVWR2TFdfQVlDVzA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba To Welcome 5 Million Visitors In 2019  Forbes", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba To Welcome 5 Million Visitors In 2019  Forbes" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.forbes.com", + "title": "Forbes" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Trump Threatens a Second Embargo of Cuba\nauthor: Marjorie Cohn\nurl: https://truthout.org/articles/trump-threatens-a-second-embargo-of-cuba/\nhostname: truthout.org\ndescription: With a second embargo, Trump would be effectively punishing the Cuban people to satisfy his base in Florida.\nsitename: Truthout\ndate: 2019-02-24\n---\n#### Part of the Series\n\n##### Human Rights and Global Wrongs\n\n*Truthout is an indispensable resource for activists, movement leaders and workers everywhere. Please make this work possible with a **quick donation**.*\n\nThe Trump administration is threatening to unleash a flood of lawsuits involving Cuba, which no U.S. president has ever done. It has set a deadline of March 2 to announce whether it will create, in the words of the National Lawyers Guild, \u201ca second embargo\u201d of Cuba \u2014 \u201cone that would be very difficult to dismantle in the future.\u201d\n\nTrump may give current U.S. citizens standing to sue in U.S. courts even if they were Cuban citizens when the Cuban government nationalized their property after the 1959 Revolution. They would be able to bring lawsuits against U.S. and foreign companies that allegedly profit from the nationalized properties.\n\nIn accordance with international law, the Cuban government had offered compensation to U.S. nationals for the taking of their property, as I explain below. If Trump permits myriad new lawsuits to proceed, it would unleash a tsunami of litigation that would harm U.S. companies and punish the Cuban people even more.\n\nFor 59 years, the United States has maintained a cruel embargo against Cuba. \u201cThe embargo on Cuba is the most comprehensive set of U.S. sanctions on any country, including the other countries designated by the U.S. government to be state sponsors of terrorism \u2014 Iran, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria,\u201d according to the U.S. government.\n\nIn 1960, the Eisenhower administration declared a partial embargo on trade with Cuba in an attempt to pressure Cuba to change its form of government. The embargo was prompted by a secret State Department memorandum that proposed \u201ca line of action which, while as adroit and inconspicuous as possible, makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.\u201d\n\nThis type of action is illegal under international law, according to Idriss Jazairy, the U.N. special rapporteur concerned with the negative impact of sanctions.\n\n\u201cCoercion, whether military or economic, must never be used to seek a change in government in a sovereign state,\u201d said Jazairy. \u201cThe use of sanctions by outside powers to overthrow an elected government is in violation of all norms of international law.\u201d That includes the Charter of the Organization of American States and the Charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States.\n\nNonetheless, John F. Kennedy expanded the embargo in 1962 and every U.S. president since has continued it, hurting the Cuban people, but not succeeding in overthrowing Cuba\u2019s government.\n\nIn 1996, Bill Clinton signed the Helms-Burton Act, which codified the embargo into law so that no president could unilaterally lift the sanctions against Cuba. Although Barack Obama took some limited steps toward normalization of relations between the United States and Cuba, Helms-Burton would have prevented him from lifting the embargo.\n\n**Will Trump Open the Floodgates of Litigation?**\n\nAfter the Cuban Revolution, the new government led by Fidel Castro nationalized the property of Cuban nationals, many of whom then fled Cuba and emigrated to the United States. Helms-Burton contains a notorious provision in Title III that allows private lawsuits against U.S. and foreign entities for allegedly \u201ctrafficking\u201d in property confiscated in Cuba since 1959. \u201cTrafficking\u201d as defined includes knowingly engaging in a commercial activity or otherwise \u201cbenefitting from confiscated property.\u201d\n\nEvery U.S. president beginning with Clinton has delayed the implementation of Title III by waiving its provisions in six-month increments. Clinton put Title III \u201con hold because it triggered immense opposition from U.S. allies, whose companies operating in Cuba would become targets of litigation in U.S. courts,\u201d American University professor and Cuba scholar William M. LeoGrande wrote in *The Conversation*.\n\nClinton\u2019s waiver was also motivated by the European Union\u2019s filing of a complaint against the United States in the World Trade Organization and adoption of a statute that forbids EU members and their firms from complying with Title III.\n\nThus far, the Trump administration has followed suit with three six-month waivers. But on January 16, the president waived Title III for only 45 days, from February 1 to March 17, while his administration conducts \u201ca careful review\u201d of whether to allow the provision to go into effect. He will announce his decision by March 2.\n\nIf Trump does activate Title III, it would be the first time since Helms-Burton was enacted. It would tie up U.S. and foreign firms in a tidal wave of litigation if they do business with Cuba \u2014 including in medicine and agriculture \u2014 and have allegedly benefited from confiscated properties.\n\nUp to 200,000 people who were not U.S. citizens at the time of their property\u2019s confiscation would be able to file claims for property they held in Cuba when they were Cuban citizens. This is considerably more than the nearly 6,000 claims already filed by U.S. parties at the time their property was nationalized.\n\n**Cuba\u2019s Nationalization Did Not Violate Either U.S. or International Law**\n\nThe U.S. State Department takes the well-established position that a sovereign\u2019s nationalization of the property of its own nationals does not violate international law. In 1962, U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk told the National Business Advisory Council:\n\nAny sovereign national has the right to expropriate property, whether owned by foreigners or nationals. In the United States we refer to this as the power of eminent domain. However, the owner should receive adequate and prompt compensation for his property.\n\n\nOn several occasions, Cuba has offered to negotiate compensation of the nearly 6,000 claims of U.S. parties, as it has successfully done with claims from other countries. \u201cIt is well-known that all nationalizations of foreign property, including that of the U.S., were provided by law with a commitment to compensation, which the U.S. government refused even to discuss, while it was adopted by the governments of claimants of other countries, all of which enjoyed due compensation,\u201d the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Cuba said in a statement.\n\nPermitting lawsuits to proceed under Title III would overturn long-standing law. In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court held in *Banco Nacional de Cuba v. Sabbatino* that U.S. courts should not decide the legality of taking property in Cuba\u2019s jurisdiction and that state-to-state negotiations provide the best way to resolve these issues.\n\n\u201cTitle III attempts to reverse that precedent, placing the long-term future of U.S.-Cuban relations into innumerable private hands and holding hostage the ability to normalize relations for decades,\u201d according to the National Lawyers Guild\u2019s International Committee.\n\n**Trump Says \u201cMake Rubio Happy\u201d**\n\nOn January 16, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida) ominously tweeted, \u201cTodays waiver of Title III of Helms-Burton for only 45 days instead of the customary 180 days & the accompanying warning, is a strong indication of what comes next.\u201d\n\nDoes Rubio have inside information? Very likely. *The New York Times *recently called Rubio \u201ca virtual secretary of state for Latin America.\u201d Indeed, Trump described his Cuba policy to White House staff early in his term: \u201cMake Rubio happy.\u201d\n\nRubio and Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Florida), whose brother pressured Clinton into signing Helms-Burton, are the leading advocates for Title III. They represent the richest and most conservative people in Miami\u2019s Cuban-American community, once known as Cuba\u2019s \u201cOne Percent,\u201d LeoGrande writes. Since Title III exempts private residences and small businesses from potential compensation, it is the one-percenters \u2014 people who owned businesses worth more than $433,000 at today\u2019s prices \u2014 who have the most to gain if Trump unblocks Title III and allows litigation to proceed.\n\nTrump is also apparently making Rubio happy by recognizing Juan Guaid\u00f3 as Venezuela\u2019s legitimate president, albeit in violation of international law. Rubio is part of Trump\u2019s inner circle working with the opposition in Venezuela to carry out an illegal coup.\n\n\u201cVenezuela is really an extension of the position on Cuba,\u201d Ricardo Herrera, director of the Cuba Study Group, told *The New Republic*. Both nations are targets in a plan to reassert U.S. control over Latin America, and finally overthrow the Cuban Revolution, according to *The Wall Street Journal*.\n\nAt a February 18 rally in Miami, Trump played to a large voting bloc by criticizing Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro. South Florida has the largest population of Venezuelans in the United States, many of whom are opposed to Maduro\u2019s government. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (D-Florida) accused the Trump administration of \u201cusing Venezuelans\u2019 suffering to score political points here in Florida,\u201d adding, \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be using this as a political weapon.\u201d\n\nBut, \u201cTrump doesn\u2019t care about Latin America. It\u2019s still about domestic politics,\u201d LeoGrande told *The New Republic*. \u201cTrump thinks he won Florida because of the Cuban American vote. Rubio convinced him that that\u2019s what made the big difference in Florida.\u201d Many older Cuban Americans oppose the Cuban government and have been pivotal votes for Republican presidential candidates in the swing state of Florida.\n\n**Who Stands to Lose If Title III Is Activated?**\n\nIt is the Cuban people who would suffer most from the activation of Title III. A torrent of lawsuits would not only discourage foreign firms from trading with, investing in, or operating in Cuba; they would also endanger the food supply and other essentials for life in Cuba for years to come. They would weaken Cuba\u2019s fragile economy.\n\nTitle III could affect firms that currently operate in Cuba on confiscated property and companies that profit from such \u201ctrafficking.\u201d Because of jurisdictional issues, U.S.-based companies would be the most vulnerable to these lawsuits, which would disadvantage them internationally. They would be unlikely to expand their operations in Cuba.\n\nEnding the suspension of Title III would have a chilling effect on future efforts to normalize relations with Cuba because it was written to prevent future U.S. administrations from interfering with this private litigation. Sanctioning lawsuits under Title III could also negatively impact areas such as travel, academic exchanges and research collaboration.\n\nMeanwhile, Cuba has asserted its own claims against the U.S. for billions of dollars of injury due to the impact of the illegal and expanded multinational economic embargo against Cuba, which had been intentionally enacted to deny money and supplies to Cuba, to impose hunger and hardship and seek to overthrow its government, as quoted above. One such case filed in Cuban civil courts in 2000 sought over $120 billion in damages. A prior case sought more than $180 billion in damages based on illegal acts of violence and sabotage, including CIA sponsorship of the Bay of Pigs invasion; this resulted in a judgment in 1999. Cuba seeks resolution of its claims as part of its attempt to mutually resolve issues between Cuba and the United States.\n\n\u201cActivating Title III would represent a quantum leap in hostility [against Cuba],\u201d LeoGrande maintains. By refusing to further suspend Title III, Trump would effectively be punishing the Cuban people with a second embargo.\n\nCuba represents no threat to the United States. It is time to end the illegal 59-year-old embargo against Cuba once and for all.\n\n##### An urgent appeal for your support: We Have Until Midnight to raise $13,000\n\nTruthout relies on individual donations to publish independent journalism, free from political and corporate influence. In fact, we\u2019re almost entirely funded by readers like you.\n\n**Unfortunately, donations are down. **At a moment when independent journalism is urgently needed, we are struggling to meet our operational costs due to increasing political censorship.\n\nTruthout may end this month in the red without additional help, so we launched a fundraiser. **We have until midnight tonight to hit our $13,000 goal.** Please make a tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation if you can." + }, + { + "title": "Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct - BBC", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct - BBC" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiogFBVV95cUxPTEJ1Tnp5TzA5Q3l0LWtHejNYQ3JKdDV2M0g0RkR2bHFxdUdGbDRaVUpXcWZVdnhmZWpZQmVXbWhIcjN1WDVreV8xVGRmWXBRZHVPbHRZN0xWOEVFU1NUNkcycTdNSnBtZUZrYm5oY1VMdkFhMldrQXBScWxfZV8yU0c5YTk5a1dvVkRBRGZFOThwMS1NSWNtNjdpYmFOTE40Ymc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexandratalty/2019/02/07/cuba-to-welcome-5-million-visitors-in-2019/", + "id": "CBMiogFBVV95cUxPTEJ1Tnp5TzA5Q3l0LWtHejNYQ3JKdDV2M0g0RkR2bHFxdUdGbDRaVUpXcWZVdnhmZWpZQmVXbWhIcjN1WDVreV8xVGRmWXBRZHVPbHRZN0xWOEVFU1NUNkcycTdNSnBtZUZrYm5oY1VMdkFhMldrQXBScWxfZV8yU0c5YTk5a1dvVkRBRGZFOThwMS1NSWNtNjdpYmFOTE40Ymc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 06 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 6, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 37, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct  BBC", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Ta\u00edno people: A flourishing culture, believed extinct  BBC" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.bbc.com", + "title": "BBC" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism - The Guardian", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism - The Guardian" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMijwFBVV95cUxQUld6SUoxS0QyODBGNmlXaXRja240MXlFV3VoVFBVZHZZT2x4UkxFemJ5ZjVvN05NWHJ3bmdiWFZSR1U5dFg4cGtvckpEeVRYSzN0dFhCYmNJc0JVZGM2VlQ0VmVtcS1FTWlDdjVBRmYwOGNnWG5kTkNOaFdoS1NHMjY4MkE3b1BJWlVsNGNVMA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/02/americas/venezuela-cuba-history-oil", + "id": "CBMijwFBVV95cUxQUld6SUoxS0QyODBGNmlXaXRja240MXlFV3VoVFBVZHZZT2x4UkxFemJ5ZjVvN05NWHJ3bmdiWFZSR1U5dFg4cGtvckpEeVRYSzN0dFhCYmNJc0JVZGM2VlQ0VmVtcS1FTWlDdjVBRmYwOGNnWG5kTkNOaFdoS1NHMjY4MkE3b1BJWlVsNGNVMA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism  The Guardian", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism  The Guardian" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.theguardian.com", + "title": "The Guardian" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: The history that chains Cuba to Venezuela\u2019s crisis | CNN\nauthor: Patrick Oppmann\nurl: https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/02/americas/venezuela-cuba-history-oil\nhostname: cnn.com\ndescription: Venezuelan oil is the lifeblood of Cuban economy. But Nicolas Maduro\u2019s rival, Juan Guaid\u00f3, has already vowed to end Cuban influence in Venezuela, and any governmental change could upset the special relationship between the two countries.\nsitename: CNN\ndate: 2019-02-02\ncategories: ['world', 'americas']\ntags: ['banking, finance and investments, business and industry sectors, business, economy and trade, caribbean, commodity markets, continents and regions, cuba, eastern europe, energy and utilities, energy commodities, europe, fidel castro, financial markets and investing, government and public administration, government bodies and offices, government departments and authorities, havana, hugo chavez, intelligence services, international relations and national security, latin america, military, national security, nicolas maduro, north america, oil and gas industry, oil prices, political figures - intl, russia, south america, the americas, united states, venezuela', 'banking, finance and investments, business and industry sectors, business, economy and trade, caribbean, commodity markets, continents and regions, cuba, eastern europe, energy and utilities, energy commodities, europe, fidel castro, financial markets and investing, government and public administration, government bodies and offices, government departments and authorities, havana, hugo chavez, intelligence services, international relations and national security, latin america, military, national security, nicolas maduro, north america, oil and gas industry, oil prices, political figures - intl, russia, south america, the americas, united states, venezuela']\n---\nLess than a month after seizing power in 1959, Fidel Castro embarked on his first trip as leader to seek support for his revolution. The young rebel leader\u2019s destination wasn\u2019t Moscow or Washington, it was Caracas.\n\nVenezuela\u2019s government had secretly supported Castro and his rebels with funds and weapons during their fight to oust US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. Now a victorious Castro had a new request: Loan Cuba $300 million dollars worth of oil.\n\nThe oil shipments would be \u201ca master trick on the gringos,\u201d Castro told then-Venezuelan president R\u00f3mulo Betancourt, breaking Cuba\u2019s economic dependence on the US. Not wanting to upset Washington, Betancourt frostily replied that if Castro wanted Venezuelan oil, he should buy it on the open market.\n\nBut Castro got what he wanted, in the end. Today, Venezuelan oil is the lifeblood of Cuban economy, under a barter system where Cuba receives billions of dollars of crude in exchange for Cuban doctors, teachers, sports trainers, and military and intelligence advisers. And now, as political unrest threatens the Maduro r\u00e9gime in Caracas, it also threatens to put the lights out in Havana.\n\nMaduro\u2019s rival, Juan Guaid\u00f3, has vowed to end Cuban influence in Venezuela, and any change in government could upset the special relationship between the two countries. Shipments from Venezuela have become less frequent, and Cuba is hurrying to expand how much oil it can store. \u201cOur calculation is Cuba has 5 million barrels of total primary storage,\u201d says Jorge Pi\u00f1\u00f3n, a Cuba energy expert at the University of Texas in Austin. \u201cI am saying if Cuba has a crisis, Cuba has enough oil to last them 35 to 45 days.\u201d\n\nSo far Cubans have not experienced a shortage. But many still remember the painful end of another special relationship, which led to widespread blackouts and drove Cuban refugees toward the United States: the so-called \u201cSpecial Period\u201d in the 1990s, when the USSR collapsed.\n\n## Cuba, the Soviet Union, and a painful \u201cSpecial Period\u201d\n\nWhen Castro first approached Venezuela in 1959, he envisioned a leftist government in control of its massive oil riches, which could support like minded regimes across the region and finally challenge Washington\u2019s control of the hemisphere.\n\nInstead of Venezuela, it was the Soviet Union that ultimately provided crucial support to the Cuban revolution, becoming the island\u2019s main trading partner and sending thousands of military and intelligence advisers to island. But Castro never forgot Venezuela\u2019s potential, and backed several failed attempts at revolution beginning in the 1960s.\n\nAfter the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, Cuba found itself in dire need of new friends. The economy on the communist-run island had all but collapsed without Soviet support. Called \u201cthe Special Period\u201d in Cuba, Cubans endured wartime food rations, daily blackouts of electricity while thousands of citizens fled the island on rafts.\n\nIn 1998, the stars seemed to align for the Cuba-Venezuela alliance that Castro had dreamed of: Hugo Chavez, a charismatic former Army paratrooper, was elected to the Venezuela\u2019s presidency. Like Castro, Chavez had led a thwarted uprising but used that failure to raise his profile.\n\nAfter time in jail, Chavez came back to win an upset victory. Both men could speak for hours, casting a spell over their supporters, and both swore to erase the gap between rich and poor in their countries.\n\nCastro would eventually take the role of the elder statesmen, and Chavez his heir to the mantle of the leader of the Latin American left.\n\n## Access to \u201cthe largest oil reserves on the planet\u201d\n\nIn the early 2000s, Castro and Chavez struck a barter deal that pulled Cuba from the depths of its economic crisis with generous dose of petroleum. \u201cCuba got access to the largest oil reserves on the planet, in exchange for sending doctors and coaches and intelligence advisers and military advisers,\u201d Geoff Ramsey of the Washington Office on Latin America tells CNN.\n\nSoon Venezuela was sending the island roughly 100,000 barrels of oil a day to the island. In exchange, Cuban doctors set up clinics for the poor \u2014 Chavez\u2019s political base \u2014 in Venezuela\u2019s most downtrodden neighborhoods, and thousands of Venezuelans traveled free of charge to Havana for medical treatment of everything from cataracts to gunshot wounds.\n\nWith oil flowing in from Venezuela, Cuba was able to pay off longstanding debts and revamp the island\u2019s faded tourism industry. The workers-for-oil deal generated more income than rum, cigars or anything else Cuba produced. The island\u2019s citizens became its main export. Cuban workers returned from postings in oil-rich Venezuela carting flat-screen TVs, bottles of whiskey and other hard-to-find items back home.\n\nChavez took to proclaiming that Cuba and Venezuela were not two countries, but a single one: *La Gran Patria*, or \u201cthe Big Homeland.\u201d He frequently popped over to Havana for strategy sessions and to play late night baseball games with Castro.\n\nCastro gave Chavez a sprawling mansion next to the North Korean ambassador\u2019s residence. The Cuban government had originally spent a small fortune restoring the house\u2019s frescoed ceilings and yards of marble from every region in Italy for Pope John Paul II\u2019s 1998 visit. But the pontiff preferred simpler lodging, and the house became Chavez\u2019s.\n\n## \u201cDesench\u00fafalos!\u201d: Calls to disconnect \u201cCuba-zuela\u201d\n\nVenezuela\u2019s political opposition criticized the two leaders\u2019 tight friendship, saying Castro had all but taken over their country and accusing Cuba\u2019s intelligence services of monitoring Chavez\u2019s own military for loyalty. *Desench\u00fafalos* or \u201cdisconnect them\u201d became a rallying cry of the Venezuelan opposition, referring to the Cubans.\n\nWhen Chavez was briefly ousted by the Venezuelan military, Fidel Castro called him by phone and urged him to take power back. \u201cAre you president still or not?\u201d Castro told him, according to Cuba\u2019s state-run press. Chavez regained control of the country.\n\nWhen Chavez announced he had pelvic cancer in 2011, he flew to Havana for treatment. Venezuelan officials in the city attended a public ceremony of the Afro-Caribbean Santer\u00eda religion meant to safeguard Chavez. When his death was announced in March 2013, Havana officials announced three days of official mourning and banned live music from being played in public.\n\nThe alliance continued with Chavez\u2019s handpicked successor Nicolas Maduro, a former bus driver who had studied in Cuba in his youth. But Venezuela\u2019s oil production plummeted, as Chavez stacked the country\u2019s oil industry with loyalists who mismanaged the country\u2019s principal export.\n\n## A downturn for Venezuela\n\nAs Venezuela\u2019s economy tanked, soon it was the Venezuelans working in Cuba who returned home with bags packed with toilet paper, toothpaste, soap and other items that had disappeared from store shelves back home.\n\nCuba now receives about 50,000 barrels of oil a day from Venezuela, about half of what it did during its neighbor\u2019s boom years, estimates Pi\u00f1\u00f3n, the energy expert. Although analysts believe that Cuba has also recently imported oil from Russia and Algeria, it is unlikely that the island enjoys the same favorable terms that it receives from its socialist ally and neighbor.\n\nAs Guaid\u00f3 demands new elections in Venezuela and heads of state around the world weigh in on the country\u2019s future, it\u2019s not just the local opposition calling to disconnect the bond between Caracas and Havana.\n\nOn Monday, US National Security Adviser John Bolton blamed Chavez and Maduro for allowing Venezuela\u2019s \u201cpenetration by adversaries of the United States, not least of which is Cuba. \u201cSome call the country \u2018Cuba-zuela\u2019, reflecting the grip that Cuba\u2019s military and security forces have on the Maduro regime,\u201d he said. \u201cWe think that is a strategic significant threat to the United States.\u201d\n\nBolton also announced new sanctions on Venezuelan oil, which could cripple the tottering Venezuelan oil industry, and further shrink its supply to Havana.\n\nCuban officials have said they will not abandon their Venezuelan comrades. But US officials are eyeing Cuba as the key to forcing embattled president Nicolas Maduro\u2019s resignation.\n\nPressure Cuba, their reasoning goes, and Cuba will pressure Venezuela." + }, + { + "title": "Guest post: \u2018Bicitaxis\u2019 and the streets of Cuba - BikePortland", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Guest post: \u2018Bicitaxis\u2019 and the streets of Cuba - BikePortland" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMikAFBVV95cUxQYjczRmhtVHBhSUo4bER2d0tRbFZnWW1FaXRCNFl4Zy11ZFRsTDd0UHk0RF9penhFWm0ta3AxVkN0X2I2Q3JGOWhOOXFFYzdQUkdOT2NfSENNUFNlQmRpcU9IVXpSZS10XzRvM181SDhiS25YTU5lOWRWQndrdXNtWUhlVEsyWnJhSm04RU5faDHSAZYBQVVfeXFMTVdiMENJSzEtbnZYLWhaOHd3S0FQc0xlQlZrR2JZVHJQWDVydlM1NHpscllIMVUtcHFKS1A0anZqMHNybkI2RjZJUGM4Q3p3VEtNS2lxcFlLdDlLTW9faXg4M0VpVWxqckpNQjBLSnB0YjZXMkJEY3BPSU1CSHpkNGo4RVlVdUFaY0x1bXJ5QVcwYXcxUEN3?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/25/cuba-approves-new-socialist-constitution", + "id": "CBMikAFBVV95cUxQYjczRmhtVHBhSUo4bER2d0tRbFZnWW1FaXRCNFl4Zy11ZFRsTDd0UHk0RF9penhFWm0ta3AxVkN0X2I2Q3JGOWhOOXFFYzdQUkdOT2NfSENNUFNlQmRpcU9IVXpSZS10XzRvM181SDhiS25YTU5lOWRWQndrdXNtWUhlVEsyWnJhSm04RU5faDHSAZYBQVVfeXFMTVdiMENJSzEtbnZYLWhaOHd3S0FQc0xlQlZrR2JZVHJQWDVydlM1NHpscllIMVUtcHFKS1A0anZqMHNybkI2RjZJUGM4Q3p3VEtNS2lxcFlLdDlLTW9faXg4M0VpVWxqckpNQjBLSnB0YjZXMkJEY3BPSU1CSHpkNGo4RVlVdUFaY0x1bXJ5QVcwYXcxUEN3", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 05 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 5, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 36, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Guest post: \u2018Bicitaxis\u2019 and the streets of Cuba  BikePortland", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Guest post: \u2018Bicitaxis\u2019 and the streets of Cuba  BikePortland" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://bikeportland.org", + "title": "BikePortland" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba overwhelmingly approves new constitution affirming \u2018irrevocable\u2019 socialism\nauthor: Ed Augustin\nurl: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/25/cuba-approves-new-socialist-constitution\nhostname: theguardian.com\ndescription: 86.85% of voters ratified the document, but in an unprecedented display of ballot-box dissent, more than 700,000 people voted against it\nsitename: The Guardian\ndate: 2019-02-25\ncategories: ['World news']\ntags: ['Cuba,Americas,World news']\n---\nCubans have overwhelmingly ratified a new constitution that reaffirms that socialism on the island is \u201cirrevocable\u201d while also legalising modest economic reforms instituted over the last decade.\n\nBut in an unprecedented display of ballot-box dissent on the Communist-ruled island, more than 700,000 people voted \u201cno\u201d to the new founding document.\n\n86.85% of those who voted answered \u201cyes\u201d to the question, \u201cDo you ratify the new constitution of the Republic\u201d. 9% of voters opposed ratification and 4.15% spoiled or left ballots blank. Turnout was 84.4%\n\nThe state had campaigned hard prior to the vote, casting a \u201cyes\u201d vote as an act of patriotism and a vote for the Revolution. TV, radio, posters, billboards and huge banners unfurled over public buildings urged the population to get out and vote. Even the electric ticker boards on buses chugging along Havana\u2019s main thoroughfares read \u201cI Vote Yes\u201d (\u201cYo Voto S\u00ed\u201d).\n\nBut the state was met with a surprisingly forceful challenge from an unofficial campaign against the new constitution.\n\nEvangelical churches concerned that the new constitution would create a pathway towards gay marriage hung banners reading \u201cmarriage: man + woman\u201d from church walls, while religious activists daubed posters on lamp posts \u2013 a direct challenge to the state\u2019s monopoly on public space.\n\nAlthough pastors did not explicitly call for a \u201cno\u201d vote, analysts say the church campaign mobilised non-religious, socially conservative sectors of the population to vote against the new constitution.\n\nAnd while state media gave no airtime or column inches to critical voices, #I\u2019mVotingNo (#YoVotoNo) hashtags were trending on Facebook.\n\nWhile older citizens said they voted to support the government, a younger generation of Cubans, particularly those living in the cities, are more daring.\n\nCuban journalist M\u00f3nica Rivero, 29, said: \u201cI think the new constitution is too conservative. It crystallises the status quo rather than making changes.\u201d\n\nIn Cuba\u2019s last referendum on a constitution in 1976, during the Cold War, 98% of ballots voted \u201cyes\u201d.\n\nVoting on the island is optional though strongly encouraged by the state and nosy neighbours. Cuba does not allow international observers to monitor its elections but citizens are allowed to watch the vote count at local polling stations.\n\nThe new constitution reaffirms the Communist Party as the only legitimate political party on the island, defines access to health and education as fundamental rights, and claims that humans can only \u201creach full dignity\u201d through \u201csocialism and communism\u201d.\n\nBut there are also big changes. The new constitution introduces presidential term limits and enshrines the right to legal representation upon arrest.\n\nThe document also gives constitutional backing to cautious pro-market reforms carried out since 2011. Private property is recognised, the rights of multinationals investing with the state are strengthened, and the market is recognised as a fact of life.\n\nAnalysts estimate that one million Cubans now work in the private sector.\n\nEmily Morris, an economist from University College London, said the new constitution might open the path to stronger labour rights for those working in the island\u2019s non-state sector.\n\n\u201cWorker exploitation is already happening in the private sector,\u201d she said. \u201cBut recognising private enterprise could be a step forward by facilitating improved regulation of relationships between employers and employees.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "Opinion | Maduro and Cuba Lose - WSJ", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Opinion | Maduro and Cuba Lose - WSJ" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.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?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://bikeportland.org/2019/02/05/guest-post-bicitaxis-and-the-streets-of-cuba-295054", + "id": "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", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 24 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 24, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 55, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Opinion | Maduro and Cuba Lose  WSJ", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Opinion | Maduro and Cuba Lose  WSJ" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.wsj.com", + "title": "WSJ" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers - The Colorado Sun", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers - The Colorado Sun" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMib0FVX3lxTE42cUg2VXVTQmNscHhYc0pRQTRSR0NZSzF4WFd0STZ5bnFVVXViQUpTUEYxUWF5THVhNFF0SDR4YjhrU2hDZlItYm5fclphZE1IWmpuQ1BoTUlPWTJmTkxjUWgxb0JCSkVHQ05lR1dnaw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.wsj.com/articles/maduro-and-cuba-lose-11551045493?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=AWEtsqcT83QrxSzULTn0I6U9SpIUx_LcoURpN0170atvGjFYuyZKxvp7GvqQ&gaa_ts=69c54e54&gaa_sig=NIkZggguC9IDlESCEWF8O5wE2T-9ZgkeMtjMBk1CMOZGuyhtPfmggDzaGIvOZFHKMg8RQlY0PK_RHtddwTHqQQ%3D%3D", + "id": "CBMib0FVX3lxTE42cUg2VXVTQmNscHhYc0pRQTRSR0NZSzF4WFd0STZ5bnFVVXViQUpTUEYxUWF5THVhNFF0SDR4YjhrU2hDZlItYm5fclphZE1IWmpuQ1BoTUlPWTJmTkxjUWgxb0JCSkVHQ05lR1dnaw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 22 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 22, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 53, + 0 + ], + "summary": "A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers  The Colorado Sun", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers  The Colorado Sun" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://coloradosun.com", + "title": "The Colorado Sun" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report \u2013 Part One - Society of Architectural Historians", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report \u2013 Part One - Society of Architectural Historians" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMic0FVX3lxTE1CMV9qZXFWV0dlOFBaXzVyVkc5ekN1d19TbVRTRUNnMjFKY1E3RXV3UlprR0JsdzFwZ1Y2cXFwRHo4RlJwMFBuZGxwZThtRnhVcWdZd2pIN25zeWZ6TTM2UGhCeTFJYjUwR3ZNVms1U21sd1k?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://coloradosun.com/2019/02/22/cuba-travel-story-colorado/", + "id": "CBMic0FVX3lxTE1CMV9qZXFWV0dlOFBaXzVyVkc5ekN1d19TbVRTRUNnMjFKY1E3RXV3UlprR0JsdzFwZ1Y2cXFwRHo4RlJwMFBuZGxwZThtRnhVcWdZd2pIN25zeWZ6TTM2UGhCeTFJYjUwR3ZNVms1U21sd1k", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 06 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 6, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 37, + 0 + ], + "summary": "2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report \u2013 Part One  Society of Architectural Historians", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report \u2013 Part One  Society of Architectural Historians" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://sah.org", + "title": "Society of Architectural Historians" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: A trip to Cuba is worth it, even if leaves you with more questions than answers\nauthor: Jesse Paul\nurl: https://coloradosun.com/2019/02/22/cuba-travel-story-colorado/\nhostname: coloradosun.com\ndescription: I underestimated the political complexity of Cuba. I didn\u2019t realize the level of poverty in the country. And I definitely had no idea how welcoming and hopeful its citizens would be, despite their very real struggles.\nsitename: The Colorado Sun\ndate: 2019-02-22\ncategories: ['Culture', 'News', 'Opinion']\ntags: ['Cuba', 'Instagram', 'national politics', 'travel']\n---\n**HAVANA, Cuba \u2014** It takes less than an hour to fly from south Florida into Cuba. But descending through the clouds toward the island nation felt like entering another universe.\n\nBefore we even touched down I could feel the threshold I was passing through.\n\nFrom above, I could see old vehicles traversing dusty roads. I could see fields burning. I could see brilliant colors that have come to symbolize Cuba\u2019s vibrant culture.\n\nWhen I told people I would be visiting this island nation with my family at the end of 2018, there were mixed reactions. About half seemed excited. The rest were puzzled. \u201cWhy there?\u201d they wondered.\n\nAnd, to be honest, I really had little idea of what I was getting myself into. I underestimated the political complexity of Cuba. I didn\u2019t realize the level of poverty in the country. And I definitely had no idea how welcoming and hopeful its citizens would be, despite their very real struggles.\n\nAt every turn, I found myself incredibly confused. How does this place work, with its unusual economy sucking energy away from its immense potential? And then there\u2019s the history \u2014 so much of it \u2014 entangled in a head-scratching relationship with the U.S. that I still can\u2019t fully wrap my mind around.\n\nThe country\u2019s economy is obviously struggling, but at the same time Cuba and its people clearly could have a bright future. They have some of the best healthcare outcomes in the world and a landscape with much to offer. Its citizens are hoping to benefit from that, even as they acknowledge their nation is straddling a precarious line between financial chaos and tourist mecca.\n\nHere\u2019s a snapshot of Cuba today: Many people make less than $100 a month if they work a government job, which most do, but often supplement that with side gigs that raise their income to sometimes $200 a month or more. That means there is a lot of incentive to work in the socialist nation\u2019s limited private industry or in tourism, where tips can be generous \u2014 and necessary to make a life.\n\nAt the first bed and breakfast we stayed in, one of the employees was a trained veterinarian. But as a mother of three, she said she could make more money working in hospitality. A cab driver we met was an engineer, but couldn\u2019t make enough in his trade so he ferries tourists around Havana.\n\nParts of Cuba\u2019s capital city look post-apocalyptic. Buildings are decrepit because no one takes care of them. They frequently collapse during the summer rainy season because of disrepair. But for a city that feels like it\u2019s disintegrating, it\u2019s so beautiful at the same time. I kept wanting to wrap myself up in its energy like a blanket.\n\nThe colorful, romantic images of Cuba that include fedoras, great music, old cars, rum and cigars aren\u2019t wrong. They\u2019re just very nuanced. If you don\u2019t take into consideration the extreme poverty alongside those vibrant traditions, you\u2019re missing the picture.\n\nConsider this: a nice Cuban cigar costs only a few dollars. That might not seem like a lot, but considering the low wages in the country, they are often out of reach for Cubans.\n\nYet, Cubans I spoke with were generally happy and hopeful. They spoke of their free and easy access to health care and universal education as positives. The woman we met at the bed and breakfast kept repeating the same phrases when she spoke of Cuba\u2019s future: \u201cvamos a ver\u201d and \u201cpoco a poco.\u201d\n\nTranslated: \u201cWe will see\u201d and \u201clittle by little.\u201d\n\nThat doesn\u2019t mean they are content with their economic reality, but they said they are optimistic. America plays a big role in that outlook.\n\nFormer President Barack Obama\u2019s visit in 2016 was a watershed moment. People in Cuba are still talking about it. Conversely, everyone I spoke with didn\u2019t like the Trump administration or its decision to roll back some of the restrictions loosened by Obama. But they generally like Americans.\n\nTwo men stopped me in the Cuban mountain town of Vi\u00f1ales to find out where I was from. When I told them the United States, they gave me a big, excited hug.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t believe the lies about what Cubans feel about Americans,\u201d one of the men said in Spanish, telling me the U.S. was his favorite nation.\n\nIt was difficult to piece these feelings and realities together. The math, to me, didn\u2019t add up. Cuba is embracing pieces of capitalism to the benefit of many, but most people seemingly are still being left behind unless they can hustle their way upwards. It reminded me of China, where capitalism and communism have a backroom agreement to coexist.\n\nThe creation of those divides would appear to go against everything communism stands for. How could it not spell socio-economic friction in the years to come? And what would happen to Cuba if, say, tourism dried up because of geopolitical realities? What then?\n\n\u201cCuba is not as black and white as it seems,\u201d one person told us.\n\nI\u2019d recommend a trip to Cuba to anyone who is able. There are still travel restrictions that bar visits for tourism. My family, 20 of us \u2014 yes, 20, ranging in age from 15 to 83 \u2014 went for educational purposes. You can also visit for family reasons, official government business, journalism, research, religion, support for Cuban people and humanitarian projects.\n\nCuba has a painful record when it comes to human rights \u2014 and that cannot be ignored. There\u2019s still plenty of communist propaganda \u2014 like signs demanding people adhere to socialism \u2014 and clear repression of private economic growth. I saw plenty of people living in poverty, something that was hard to square while enjoying a mojito in Havana\u2019s restored old city.\n\nA sign of the lack of access to the outside world for Cubans: Internet is something you can really only get in a public park, and it\u2019s fairly expensive.\n\nYou will, however, learn so much. Cubans are welcoming to outsiders. They want to talk about their lives and experiences and interact. The culture is rich with music and art.\n\nIt\u2019s a beautiful place worth attempting to understand." + }, + { + "title": "Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle - Nature", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle - Nature" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiX0FVX3lxTE5ldElnWVVfMkl6cGRvdUF2ejA0Z0JhZE91OXBSbjE3QXE2M2xhRXp3SEU3dnRmLTNPUkcwWlBTeGwwYnhKMURPMGZKNVVaSzZHelZ2M0M5MTVoRW1wV204?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://sah.org/2019/02/06/2018-cuba-field-seminar-report-part-1/", + "id": "CBMiX0FVX3lxTE5ldElnWVVfMkl6cGRvdUF2ejA0Z0JhZE91OXBSbjE3QXE2M2xhRXp3SEU3dnRmLTNPUkcwWlBTeGwwYnhKMURPMGZKNVVaSzZHelZ2M0M5MTVoRW1wV204", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle  Nature", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle  Nature" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.nature.com", + "title": "Nature" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: 2018 Cuba Field Seminar Report - Part One - Society of Architectural Historians\nauthor: SAH News\nurl: https://sah.org/2019/02/06/2018-cuba-field-seminar-report-part-1/\nhostname: sah.org\ndescription: Introduction Cuba is beautiful, interesting, perplexing, but above all, I consider it the most controversial place on earth. Cuba means different things to different people around the world. Its geographic location is unequivocal, but the rest is up for interpretation. I\u2019m Valentina, a Ph.D. candidate at McGill University and a proud Canadian-Venezuelan; I decided to [\u2026]\nsitename: Society of Architectural Historians\ndate: 2019-02-06\ncategories: ['News']\n---\n** Introduction **\n\nCuba is beautiful, interesting, perplexing, but above all, I consider it the most controversial place on earth. Cuba means different things to different people around the world. Its geographic location is unequivocal, but the rest is up for interpretation. I\u2019m Valentina, a Ph.D. candidate at McGill University and a proud Canadian-Venezuelan; I decided to organize my dual nationality alphabetically as today I can\u2019t tell which country I belong the most. The reason why this matters is because I constantly find myself struggling to reconcile the contrasting notions that Canadians and Venezuelans have of Cuba. On the one hand, Canadians jump with joy when they hear I\u2019m taking two weeks off my schedule (and teaching responsibilities\u2014thanks to my professors for their understanding!) to visit Cuba. On the other hand, Venezuelans look at me in disbelief with their eyes full of fear and anger, asking me why am I doing such thing, couldn\u2019t I go somewhere else? Anywhere\u2026? The reasons behind each reaction are clear: for my fellows in the north, Cuba is a sunny paradise, and for my fellows in the south, it represents a notorious political ally of the Chavez-Maduro regime. They are both right. There is no Cuba without the sun and beach, but there is also no Cuba without treacherous political ideology. With this in mind, six months ago I applied to the SAH Study Program Fellowship and disclosed my unapologetic, politically charged research interest. I explained that a tour that closely looks at Cuban architecture throughout history could help us answer in what way political power plays a defining role in domestic architecture (my field of interest). There\u2019s no better place than Cuba to contribute to answering this question. Full of joy and pride for the architectural education system, I get my bags ready to embark on this amazing trip.\n\n**Day 1. Saturday, Dec. 1 st, 2018. Welcome to Miami, Bienvenidos a Miami!**\n\n\nThere\u2019s no better place to start our journey and to prepare us for Cuba like Miami. The \u201cLatino Metropolis\u201d houses around 1.8 million Cuban-Americans, which comprise 54% of its population. Cuban culture\u2014from cafes and restaurants to the Museum of the Cuban Diaspora\u2014has added to Miami\u2019s vibrancy and azucar!\n\n\nAmerican Museum of the Cuban Diaspora\n\n\nIllustration of Celia Cruz in the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora\n\nI arrived at the hotel very excited. After all, this is no ordinary tour\u2014 all the participants share an immense passion for architecture. Gary, our tour operator, is waiting for us in the meeting room asking simply, \u201cArchitecture?\u201d Gary is a tall, smiling fellow who spends half of his time in Cuba and will be our tour guide from beginning to end. The third person to arrive is Victoria Young, SAH\u2019s First Vice President, an outstanding architectural historian, a strict timekeeper, a wonderful coordinator, and a delightful person to be around. Between cheerful greetings and joyful handshakes we distributed nametags and all the important documentation for our trip. Belmont (Monty) Freeman, a New York-based architect, writer, and Professor in Practice at Columbia University, is appointed to lead this tour; I\u2019m sure that without his passion for Cuban architecture and personal and professional connections this trip wouldn\u2019t have been as successful as it was. He brought not only a deep, grounded knowledge of architecture and the country, but most importantly, a sense of pride and belonging, which made us all honored to be seeing Cuba through his eyes. He delivered a very complete and sophisticated introduction to Cuba, which was the perfect appetizer for what was about to come. After we all introduced ourselves, we went to bed to prepare for an early morning flight that would take us to Havana.\n\n\nOur first group gathering in the Miami Crowne Plaza\n\n\n** Day 2. December 2 nd, 2018. Havana\u2026. Here we go! **\n\nThe hotel agreed to open the breakfast bar early that day especially for us. At 5:30 a.m. recognizing the faces from the night before, we started greeting each other and shared the table for a fueling breakfast of fresh fruits, cereals, pastries, and coffee. The buses that would take us to the airport were readily waiting at 6:20 a.m. Things went smoothly in the airport, we presented our documentation, checked in our bags, and patiently waited in long lines to make it through security. We boarded the plane, and 45 minutes later we were landing safely in Havana where our local tour guide, Lazaro, was waiting for us. \u201cWhat\u2019s your name?\u201d we asked. \u201cLazaro,\u201d he responded, followed by a mimic of someone coming back from the dead. We appreciated the biblical humor, which made it virtually impossible to forget his name. Lazaro was instrumental in making our trip safe, well-coordinated, and memorable. Trained at the University of Havana in international relations and close to completing his Ph.D. in Cuban history, he added precious knowledge that would help us understand Cuban history and society from an insider\u2019s perspective. Lazaro\u2019s perfect English and educated ways impressed us to the point that members of the group would line up to talk to him and ask many questions to which he would answer insightfully and honestly.\n\nFreshly off the plane after retrieving our bags without inconveniences, Lazaro directed us to our bus\u2014a big, long, blue and white Transtur *guagua* that we came to recognize as our comfortable second home in Cuba. The best thing about this bus that drove us all around the narrow streets of the cities and towns we visited wasn\u2019t its efficient air-conditioning system or how clean it was, but the person driving it: Juanito. Juanito\u2019s genteel ways, utterly professional driving, helping hand (always waiting for us at the bottom of the bus to avoid accidents), and persistent smile captivated us all and brought an extra good vibe into our trip.\n\n\nOur bus and our reliable driver, Juanito.\n\nReady to begin the adventure, we each chose a seat on the bus, which, like schoolkids, we would always return to and seldom switched. As we drove to the city center for lunch, we made our first stop: Plaza de la Revolucion. This iconic square is a group of buildings and monuments devoted to the Cuban Revolution. Originally named Plaza Civica, the massive complex of monuments, buildings, and public space was planned by Jean Claude Forestier in the 1920s. On the northern part of the plaza, the Ministry of Interior, a 1958 grey concrete building serves as a canvas for the recognizable image of Che Guevara, by now impossible, at least for me, to disassociate from Fidel Castro. Che and Camilo Cienfuegos on its left act as the backdrop of political rallies, communist assemblies, and even a couple of high-profile Catholic masses like faithful servants to *La Revolucion.* On the other side of the street, overlooking the plaza, its events, and the city from an insurmountable height is the country\u2019s national hero Jose Marti, father of the homeland*. *Marti\u2019s monument is the largest built for a writer, it was designed by Raoul Otero de Galarraga and encased in Cuban marble.\n\n\nMonty, Julie and David admire the Jose Marti Memorial.\n\n\nA group of us posing for the picture in front of the iconic Ministry of Interior.\n\nWe continued our trip to Havana\u2019s historic district where we walked around the San Francisco de Assis square and had lunch in the Restaurant Caf\u00e9 Oriente. Our first lunch was a great opportunity to get to know each other while listening to a live piano performance and enjoying a nice meal (and a mojito or two, but who was keeping score?). After lunch, we drove to El Castillo del Morro, a solid Spanish fortress dating back to the 16th century originally built to guard Havana. Today, *el Castillo *has stood the test of time, and although it has been partly damaged and reconstructed in the 18th century, it remains a permanent reminder of the importance of Havana for the Spanish crown. Placed on top of a small hill, this massive stone structure observed from afar becomes an elegant linear composition, almost blending with the horizon line. The vibrant green of the grass and a contrasting blue sky add to the sense of the majesty of the *Castillo *and to our joy of being in Cuban territory.\n\n\nLiliana tries to capture the beauty of the place while Steve and David talk.\n\n\nDavid and Susanne take a selfie.\n\n\nCastillo del Morro\n\nLater, it was time to check in at our Hotel Parque Central, in the heart of the historic district of Havana. With an excessively decorated lobby, our hotel was pleasantly filled with light, vegetation, and with the sweet noises of music and cheerful people. After leaving our bags in the room and resting for a while, we headed out for lunch in a close-by paladar. We walked about two blocks south of our hotel into a well kept 18th-century building with high ceilings, big, massive wooden beams and tall, magnificent windows. Once inside the almost empty lobby of the building, we went up three flights of stairs into a covered rooftop, which overlooked the illuminated plaza. Eating\u2014or, more accurately\u2014offering food to tourists in the highest point of the building seems to be a national obsession. Maybe locals believe that the city is prettier from a safe distance. The menu of the Paladar La Terraza was a choice of grilled seafood or meat platter, which we enjoyed under a perfect starry night while the warm air breeze reminded us that we were in Havana!\n\nOur hotel in Havana had a spacious lobby where we gathered every morning.\n\n\nLobby of the Terraza restaurant\n\nWelcome dinner in Havana\n\nMore of our welcome dinner in La Terraza restaurant\n\n**Day 3.**** Walking through La Habana Vieja. December 3rd, 2018.**\n\nWe met at the hotel lobby to start our walk through Old Havana. Our first stop was the Edificio Bacardi, an outstanding Art Deco building designed by Esteban Rodr\u00edguez-Castells and Rafael Fern\u00e1ndez Ruenes and completed in 1930. Originally built as the headquarters for the Bacardi Rum company, it is arguably the best Art Deco building of Latin America and one of the finest examples in the world. Like the Bacardi Mansion we later visited in Santiago de Cuba, the government confiscated this building after the revolution and today both are used as office buildings. The only part of the building open to the public is the impeccably kept lobby, guarded by a watchman unperturbed by our presence. One thing I started noticing in Cuba\u2019s tourism management is that they are cognizant of their architectural assets and take good care of them to keep the travelers (and their capital) flow to the island. The Bacardi Building entrance was impeccable, and its magnificent spotless golden lamps symbolize the government\u2019s triumph over the unyielding Bacardi rum company. Right in front of this architectural gem is another rather dilapidated building, which evidences a different relationship with time and power. I couldn\u2019t find any information on the name, date, or architect of this commercial hub, but I think it\u2019s called *Actualidades* for the iron letters on its front, although I can\u2019t be certain since five letters are missing. The *Actualidades *building hasn\u2019t received any maintenance in years, but its tall arches, heavy iron lamps, and discreet moldings hint to a dignified past that is now long gone. There\u2019s nothing really special about this building\u2014there are thousands like it around Havana\u2014but the contrast with the Bacardi building right in front of it inspired these lines. Back to the Bacardi building, we went inside the lavishly decorated lobby where every wall was covered with granite or marble, and the floors had intricate patterns of the same materials in exotic colors like red, orange, and yellow. Entering an Art Deco space (especially a lobby) is always a treat to the eyes and a reminder of a wealthier time filled with enthusiasm and jubilance, and this building brings that particular atmosphere to this area of Havana. While taking pictures of the marble, golden lamps, stain glass, and ironwork around the lobby, I developed a private exercise consisting of going inside and outside of the building, in and out, in and out\u2026as a method of physically assimilating Cuba\u2019s perplexing contrasts.\n\nOur group in front of the facade of the Bacardi building\n\nFacade of the Bacardi building\n\nEdificio Actualidades\n\nInterior of the Bacardi Building\n\nThe Bacardi Building inspired us in different ways. Our tour leaders had a hard time getting us out of the lobby.\n\nJuanito and the bus awaited us a block away to see other parts of *La Vieja Habana*.* *We hopped in and spent a physically intense afternoon going around Old Havana, in and out of majestic colonial buildings. Initially, we gathered under the shadow of a leafy tree where we carefully listened to Monty explain the buildings surrounding the square. The Plaza de Armas dates to the 16th century and is the oldest square in Havana. The place we were occupying was considered at the beginning of the Spanish Colony as the administrative heart of this Captaincy General. Around this square proudly stood *El Palacio de Los Capitanes Generales, El Templete, the Royal Post Office and El Castillo de la Real Fuerza. *The group of buildings cohesively represent the power once bestowed on this city. We continued our walk towards the cathedral passing by a great number of beautiful and perfectly kept buildings.\n\nMonty explaining the importance of El Templete while Paul carefully listens.\n\nEl Templete\n\nLeafy trees and gallerias cast generous shadows for passersby.\n\nWe developed the habit of peeping through the heavy wooden doors where we would usually find hidden architectural elements and details like stairways, interior patios, doorways, and ironwork. Old Havana is a UNESCO World Heritage site, which differentiates this section of the city from the rest because every building in this area is fully restored and impeccably kept.\n\nInteresting interiors in Old Havana\n\nWe made it to the cathedral, an exemplary piece of Cuban Baroque architecture. The slightly asymmetric two-tower building was built in 1748\u20131777 out of blocks of coral that gracefully reveal bits and pieces of fossilized sea life. The building underwent major renovations in 1946, which is probably why it\u2019s very cohesive and homogenous in appearance.\n\nHavana\u2019s cathedral\n\nAfter visiting the cathedral, while walking through a narrow street, we encountered a small house close by which seemed to be out of place and out of scale. What interested me about it was a hand-painted sign above the door that read: *Te Estoy Mirando,* I\u2019m looking at you. When I peeped inside its wide-open door, I spotted a *Santero *sitting inside who smiled at me and asked me to come in. I was really tempted but had to reject his offer to keep up with the group. While rushing to catch up with everyone, I thought of the relationship between these two buildings. The cathedral and the small house are not only a representation of the two coexistent local religions\u2014Catholicism and Santeria\u2014but also of the two sides of Cuba\u2014one put in place for tourists and visitors and the other side of the city that one has to look further to appreciate: Cuba for Cubans. I\u2019m by no means an expert on the subject, nor do I intend to sound like one, but from what I could observe, gather, and infer, Santeria is deeply rooted in Cuban society but not represented in the city\u2019s formal infrastructure.\n\nTe Estoy Mirando house\n\nA few blocks later we made it to lunch in a local paladar. For many this was one of the best meals we had, and I agree. The fully renovated 1890s house had a phenomenal atmosphere with amazing works of art and top-of-the-line musicians, great food, and young, energetic waiters representative of a new generation of Cubans. The owner, a young engineer, came to greet us and to tell us about his paladar, a project he initiated with his wife three years ago. Today he supports over 18 local farmers by only buying local produce and hires students and cooks who love to innovate and rediscover Cuban cuisine. After a succulent lunch, we continued our walking trip of Havana. Now it was time for *El Paseo del Prado, *an elegant boulevard designed by Jean Claude Nicolas Forestier in 1772. Originally it was surrounded by theaters, mansions, clubs, cafes, and restaurants, some of which still exist in an excellent state of conservation.\n\nOur lunch in a local paladar\n\nAfter the Prado Boulevard, we visited a working-class neighborhood close to the Capitol and our hotel. Havana is full of contrasting architecture. Blocks of five-star hotels are surrounded by a larger number of dilapidated, impoverished blocks of literally crumbling housing. Interestingly, the two extreme realities cohabitate in peace with extremely low theft rates. The reason we walked into this underprivileged part of town (confusingly close to *our *part of town) was to look at some interesting examples of 20th-century domestic architecture, especially a couple of rare art nouveau houses Monty had spotted before. I must say, Monty knew no limits when it came to finding great architecture; our leader wasn\u2019t restricted by a sense of scale and he was forgiving with the ungracious effects that time had on some buildings. He would share with us and talk with the same passion about the Bacardi headquarters or about a crumbling small Art Deco house in the middle of nowhere. I\u2019m happy to report that this neighborhood and many of its houses were the cherries on the cake, the perfect closure to a day charged with magnificent architecture and history.\n\nSusanne, David, Dan, Pat, Tim, Ryan and Julie listen to Monty explain the buildings surrounding El Paseo del Prado.\n\n\nArt Nouveau houses in a working neighborhood in HavanaRight across the Art Nouveau houses, the group took pictures and took time to absorb the beauty of it without knowing that they made a pretty good picture themselves.\n\n\nDay 4. Tuesday, December 4th, 2018. Spectacular Cuban Modernism Part I.\n\nToday we incorporated a very distinguished guest to our cohort: architect and historian Eduardo Luis Rodriguez. Eduardo Luis is an internationally recognized expert, an outstanding scholar and a charming person whose smile, soft voice, and passion for Cuban architecture captivated us as soon as he started talking. We began our tour with the Solimar building, designed by Manuel Copado and built in 1944. The name of the building means \u201csun-and-sea\u201d and Eduardo said that the sensuous shape of its balconies was a poetic reference to the waves. The seven story-high building is oddly out of scale in the middle-class neighborhood; this fact grants its upper floors an outstanding view of Havana and the sea.\n\nSolimar building\n\nView from the 6th floor of Solimar\n\nMonty caught smiling in one of his favourite buildings in Havana\n\nMoving away from Solimar, we drove to the* Colegio de Arquitectos, *the architect\u2019s association, a 1944 elegant modernist building designed by Fernando de Z\u00e1rraga and Mario Ezquir\u00f3z. I was personally impressed by the elegant tectonics of this building representing our guild.\n\nThe green and grey construction consists of a semi-basement and two floors occupied by offices, a library, a fencing room, an auditorium, study rooms, and a large entrance hall, which was the only space we were allowed access. In the lobby, we photographed the slim and elegant staircases while a nervous secretary appeared to wonder the reason for all this commotion.\n\nColegio de Arquitectos of Havana\n\n\nEduardo Luis explaining the Colegio de Arquitectos\n\nStaircase inside the lobby\n\nAfter hearing Eduardo Luis talk passionately about several buildings on that same block, we took our conversation to the bus while Juanito drove south to La Universidad de La Habana. The massive neoclassical complex built between 1906 and 1940 inspired by the Greek Parthenon and Columbia University is located on the Arostegui hill overlooking the Cuban sea. The complex has seven different entrances; the main one was monumentally conceived with an 88-step staircase topped with a bronze statue of Alma Mater created in 1919 by the Czech-American sculptor Mario Korbel.\n\nOur group standing on the main entrance of Universidad de La Habana\n\n\nResting inside the University\u2019s Aula Magna\n\nAfter visiting the University, we went for lunch in a local paladar called La Moraleja located in the El Vedado neighborhood inside a beautifully renovated eclectic house. What came next was one of the favorite parts of the trip for many of us: modernist Cuban houses. Our first visit was to the house of Guillermina de Soto Bonav\u013aa, built in 1957 by Mario Roma\u00f1ach. The modernist building, impeccably kept by its original owner, adapts Japanese and Corbusian concepts to the elements of the tropics. True to the research interests I walked to the back of the house hoping to find the domestic employee\u2019s bedroom; there it was, transformed (like it usually is) into a storage room. Following conventional architectural patterns, it had been placed behind the kitchen, next to the service area and the posterior patio. What was interesting is that despite characteristic reduced dimensions and marginal location, the interior of the room complied with the rest of the house\u2019s architectural language of wood louvers, brick, and cement. The tiny bedroom had a neat brick wall, wood, and tinted glass windows, indicative of the cohesiveness between the service area and the rest of the house.\n\nOur group arriving at the Soto Bonavia Residence\n\nEduardo Luis with our host, Berta.\n\nOn the left the sliding doors are completely open, on the right they\u2019re open halfway. Jack, Julie and Victoria take pictures of the house and its amazing views.\n\nIt was time to move on to our second house call of the day, also in the El Vedado neighborhood, the Farfante Residence designed by Frank Martinez in 1955. This phenomenal house was conceived for two sisters living in independent units yet sharing some communal areas. Today the house is occupied by two families of the father (on top) and son (on the first floor) relatives of the original owners and proud guardians of this architectonic gem. Knowing the importance of the house, the current residents take exceptional care of the structure and the original furniture. The most impressive feature of these houses is how they adapt modernist concepts to the tropics with their strategic use of crossed ventilation to regulate interior temperatures. Wood and glass louvers, brise-soleil, sliding doors, terraces, and vegetation are critical architectonic elements to adapt to the Cuban weather. This house can be manually open almost entirely to become a galleria where the wind can blow freely, refreshing everyone inside. In this home, I asked about the domestic workers quarters and was told they had been repurposed as a mechanical shop. The owner pointed out an additional set of stairs in the back of the house behind the kitchen that used to go to the servants\u2019 bedrooms. This space was not given the same aesthetic considerations as the rest of the house neither in the original materials nor in the posterior upkeep.\n\nCross ventilation is easy to regulate with these sliding wood doors still intact after more than five decades.\n\n\nService area with stairs leading to the servants\u2019 quarters\n\nTo wrap up a wonderful day we visited a house designed for the Cuban painter Enrique Garcia Cabrera. The Art Deco home by Max Borges features two reliefs in the brilliant fa\u00e7ade, one by Garcia Cabrera himself and another by one of his students, Manuel Rodulfo. The interior of the house has carefully kept all the original materials, furniture, and artwork and the artist\u2019s large studio still displays his last unfinished work on the easel. The current residents of the house, a couple of intellectuals related to Monty, invited us for refreshments and a joyful evening of pleasant conversation.\n\nPart of the group without host in the backyard of the Garcia Cabrera house\n\nGarcia Cabrera\u2019s studio\n\nRelief by Garcia Cabrera\n\nOur group having a wonderful time\n\n\nDay 5. Tuesday, December 5th, 2018. Spectacular Cuban Modernism part II.\n\nExcited to see and hear Eduardo Luis again we arrived at our first visit of the day, the Hebrew Community Center by Aquiles Capablanca, built in 1951. Before the revolution, the Hebrew community in Havana used the main (and largest) part of the building for recreational purposes, social events, and administration. The almost hidden lateral section of the building\u2014smaller, less monumental yet gracious and elegant\u2014was, and continues to be, the synagogue with a large catenary arch that welcomes visitors with wide arms. Today, only this smaller section of the building belongs to the Jewish community as the other larger parallelepiped is the Bertold Brecht Cultural Center.\n\nInterior Views of the Synagogue\n\n\nExterior facade of the Synagogue\n\nOur next two scheduled visits were contrasting examples of architecture and life stories. First, an elegant yet extravagant pink Italian Renaissance palace that the sugar magnate Juan Pedro Bar\u00f3 built for his creole Anna-Karenina-type-of-love named Catalina Lasa, supposedly the most beautiful woman in Havana. Designed by Evelio Govantes and F\u00e9lix Cabarrocas in 1927, the building was the first in Cuba to have interior Art Deco spaces designed by Rene Lalique, also the designer of Catalina Lasa\u2019s mausoleum. Art Deco is only present inside the mansion as the product of deep infatuation with the style that came too late in the construction process.\n\nEclectic exterior of the Baro-Lasa residence\n\nEclectic interior of the Baro-Lasa residence\n\nArt Deco interior of the Baro-Lasa residence\n\nNext, we went to a very different home designed thirty years later for the de Schulthess family by Austrian-American architect Richard Neutra. Originally the house was commissioned by a Swiss banker to house his family of five in the upper-class neighborhood of Country Club, today known as Cuabanacan, in a 9,896-square-meter lot. De Schulthess contacted Neutra through a common friend who immediately accepted to build this house, writing to de Schulthess, \u201cThis project is not the beginning, but it is supposed to be a culminating event in my career at the service of human beings.\u201d1 This house is a fascinating adaptation of Neutra\u2019s iconic architecture to the Caribbean. Unlike most of Neutra\u2019s projects, which have a steel structure, the de Schulthess residence is supported by a reinforced concrete structure following the standard local building techniques. Wood, concrete, and framed glass bring the exterior vegetation in and allow it to become part of the architecture. The extraordinary landscaping, an integral part of the global design, was planned by the world-famous Brazilian landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx. I knocked on the kitchen door and asked to see the kitchen and the back of the house; the answer was the same I receive everywhere, an incredulous \u201csure\u201d followed by a \u201cthere\u2019s not much to see here.\u201d\n\nGiven that this house is the official residence of the Swiss ambassador, the service area is fully functional and occupied by a large staff as originally intended. The spacious kitchen and service area are segregated from the rest of the house by a large white wall and a wood revolving door. Inside this area, there is a servants\u2019 lounge with a tiny table to eat and a garden definitely not designed by Burle Marx. Also, I discovered a long hallway of doors pertaining to the servants\u2019 bedrooms, comparable with the upstairs bedrooms\u2019 hallway. The difference was the size of the hallway and its windows, and the lack of interior vegetation and elegant light fixtures on the bottom floor. After a cocktail courtesy of the Swiss ambassador\u2019s chief of staff, we went for lunch in a restaurant by the sea where we sat on the upper floor terrace of a fully renovated house with an incredible aquatic view.\n\nOur group with Eduardo Luis and staff from the Swiss Embassy\n\nInterior of the de Schulthess home\n\nGardens of the de Schulthess home designed by Burle Marx\n\n\nKitchen door and interior of the large kitchen\n\nDomestic servants eating area\n\nService are view from above\n\nServants bedroom\n\nFamily bedrooms\n\nLunch with a view\n\nIn the afternoon we fast-forwarded to contemporary Cuban architecture as we visited the house/studio of the wonderful female architect Vilma Bartolome. The project started as her home and evolved into an art and architecture gallery. According to Vilma herself, the two story, fully renovated house blends minimalism with elements of Cuban and tropical architecture such as vernacular materials, vegetation, and use of light and ventilation. Vilma is in charge of redesigning the important *Linea Street *in Havana and represents the talent, wisdom, and pride of contemporary Cuban artists. I feel privileged to have met her and her team.\n\nArchitect Vilma Bartolome\n\nVilma Bartolome\u2019s house\n\n\n\n\n\nDay 6. Thursday, December 6\n\nDay 6. Thursday, December 6\n\nth, 2018. Revolutionary ArchitectureOur last day in Havana was devoted to education and revolution. We began by visiting the Centro Universitario Jose Antonio Echeverria (CUJAE). This colossal architectural work is considered the most important built after the revolution. CUJAE is an exemplary project that adapts brutalism to the local weather conditions by including local building and design traditions such as patios, long covered galleries, and shutters to regulate light and air flow. More than forty modernist buildings grouped in a 398,000-square-meter area house CUJAE\u2019s faculties of architecture and eight engineering. The total complex includes classrooms, laboratories, conference rooms, libraries, workshops, warehouses, student housing, cafeterias, administration offices, sports facilities, and printing services. The main drawback of this polytechnic school is its isolated location and difficult, and expensive, access by public transportation. A student told me in the bathroom how one of her classmates couldn\u2019t continue her architectural education because she couldn\u2019t afford the bus fees to CUJAE.\n\nOne of CUJAE\u2019s patios\n\nCUJAE\n\nAfter CUJAE we made a quick stop in Las Ruinas Restaurant, a spectacular structure built around the ruins of an old sugar mill in the Lenin Park. Designed between 1969 and 1972 by Joaquin Galvan, the concrete and glass building gives the impression of a strong, brave guard protecting the delicate traces of a rich architectural past. Unfortunately, the building, which is currently underused as an unremarkable restaurant, suffered under the inexperienced hands of an uninformed interior designer who chose oversized crystal chandeliers and outdated ironwork handrails. Nevertheless, it is easy to distinguish Galvan\u2019s intentions to the later thoughtless add-ons.\n\nLas Ruinas Restaurant\n\n\nWe left Las Ruinas to visit what many (myself included) consider one of the best examples of Latin American architecture: The *Escuela Nacional de Arte *designed by Ricardo Porro, Roberto Gottardi and Vittorio Garratti between 1959 and 1964. Waiting for us at the entrance of the Art School was Universo Garcia Lorenzo, architect, university professor, and professional in charge of coordinating the renovation of the project since 1999. In the complex five schools are spread throughout the former Havana Country club golf course creating an ample campus devoted to arts.\n\nEntrance to the fine arts school\n\nFirst, we visited the fine arts school designed by Porro now fully occupied by exceptionally talented students. To enter, one has to choose between the three magnificent brick vaulted tunnels, walking through them is the perfect preamble to the outstanding interior. The fine art school is a conglomeration of smaller buildings connected by vaulted gallerias playfully unfolding around a large, uncovered courtyard. Inside the classrooms, the skylights in the gigantic domes are designed to shed zenithal light onto the works of art or live models.\n\nSkylight in one of the fine art school\u2019s classrooms\n\nFine Art School\u2019s hallway\n\nFine art school\u2019s patio\n\nWork of the art school\u2019s students\n\nAfter the fine arts school, we walked to the second and last fully functional building: the school of modern dance, also designed by Porro. On our way, we passed by Garatti\u2019s School of Music and Gottardi\u2019s School of Drama, only halfway built and totally abandoned and empty except for a couple of squatter students who, in search for a quiet space to work, decided to reside there. One art student used the welding techniques learned in his sculpture course to build a zinc door for one of the empty classrooms.\n\nA green door fashioned by an art student searching for a private space to work\n\n\nAfter examining the abandoned structures, we walked to the dance school with a different atmosphere. The fully finished building was filled with dynamic young students chatting, stretching, and dancing to music everywhere. This building had a similar distribution to the fine arts school where classrooms are connected by ample vaulted hallways revolving around the main courtyard. Unlike the rest of the schools fully built in brick, here large, imposing, white walls contrast with the tile floor and roof, creating a more traditional effect. Lastly, we walk to the also abandoned school of ballet. For me, this was the best of the five buildings, even if dilapidated and only 80% completed. The game of shadows and lights created by the paper-thin non-continuous vaulted ceilings is moving and inspiring, like magic could be created here and nowhere else. It\u2019s easy to imagine ballerinas pirouetting under this light, music filling the air around, and black and pink leotards adorning the grassy hills. With a perfect sunset, we say goodbye to this architectural tragedy, hoping that Universo finds a way to save it, to guard it against the inclement effects of time and nature. Goodbye Arts School, goodbye Havana!" + }, + { + "title": "A New Era for Cuba? What the New Constitution Means for the Island. - Americas Quarterly", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "A New Era for Cuba? What the New Constitution Means for the Island. - Americas Quarterly" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMirAFBVV95cUxPeFFzTXk1Z08yaTNVWTlJdG1oV2VvRFFWcm5vaGUxeTZlOS1KVDM3VC00QnpCZndJV1ZCTGRIS1poZE9salBkai04WTFteDJhdkYzZjd0MExrNHRiX050b3FqV2NoMEEtM0VsajdSLTJ0TFB4cGQ3NVJyUjBkRTd4bVZoWms5TGNOcURPd2tyNzhIOS1GR01qNkFaY3J1MGoxTGVHOTdxemRHWUJv?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-38144-8", + "id": "CBMirAFBVV95cUxPeFFzTXk1Z08yaTNVWTlJdG1oV2VvRFFWcm5vaGUxeTZlOS1KVDM3VC00QnpCZndJV1ZCTGRIS1poZE9salBkai04WTFteDJhdkYzZjd0MExrNHRiX050b3FqV2NoMEEtM0VsajdSLTJ0TFB4cGQ3NVJyUjBkRTd4bVZoWms5TGNOcURPd2tyNzhIOS1GR01qNkFaY3J1MGoxTGVHOTdxemRHWUJv", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 22 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 22, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 53, + 0 + ], + "summary": "A New Era for Cuba? What the New Constitution Means for the Island.  Americas Quarterly", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "A New Era for Cuba? What the New Constitution Means for the Island.  Americas Quarterly" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.americasquarterly.org", + "title": "Americas Quarterly" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle - Scientific Reports\nauthor: Rooker; Jay R; Dance; Michael A; Wells; R J David; Ajemian; Matthew J; Block; Barbara A; Castleton; Michael R; Drymon; J Marcus; Falterman; Brett J; Franks; James S; Hammerschlag; Neil; Hendon; Jill M; Hoffmayer; Eric R; Kraus; Richard T; McKinney; Jennifer A; Secor; David H; Stunz; Gregory W; Walter; John F\nurl: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-38144-8\nhostname: nature.com\ndescription: The timing and extent of international crossings by billfishes, tunas, and sharks in the Cuba-Mexico-United States (U.S.) triangle was investigated using electronic tagging data from eight species that resulted in >22,000 tracking days. Transnational movements of these highly mobile marine predators were pronounced with varying levels of bi- or tri-national population connectivity displayed by each species. Billfishes and tunas moved throughout the Gulf of Mexico and all species investigated (blue marlin, white marlin, Atlantic bluefin tuna, yellowfin tuna) frequently crossed international boundaries and entered the territorial waters of Cuba and/or Mexico. Certain sharks (tiger shark, scalloped hammerhead) displayed prolonged periods of residency in U.S. waters with more limited displacements, while whale sharks and to a lesser degree shortfin mako moved through multiple jurisdictions. The spatial extent of associated movements was generally associated with their differential use of coastal and open ocean pelagic ecosystems. Species with the majority of daily positions in oceanic waters off the continental shelf showed the greatest tendency for transnational movements and typically traveled farther from initial tagging locations. Several species converged on a common seasonal movement pattern between territorial waters of the U.S. (summer) and Mexico (winter).\nsitename: Nature\ndate: 2019-02-07\ncategories: ['Animal migration', 'Ichthyology']\nlicense: CC BY 4.0\n---\n## Abstract\n\nThe timing and extent of international crossings by billfishes, tunas, and sharks in the Cuba-Mexico-United States (U.S.) triangle was investigated using electronic tagging data from eight species that resulted in >22,000 tracking days. Transnational movements of these highly mobile marine predators were pronounced with varying levels of bi- or tri-national population connectivity displayed by each species. Billfishes and tunas moved throughout the Gulf of Mexico and all species investigated (blue marlin, white marlin, Atlantic bluefin tuna, yellowfin tuna) frequently crossed international boundaries and entered the territorial waters of Cuba and/or Mexico. Certain sharks (tiger shark, scalloped hammerhead) displayed prolonged periods of residency in U.S. waters with more limited displacements, while whale sharks and to a lesser degree shortfin mako moved through multiple jurisdictions. The spatial extent of associated movements was generally associated with their differential use of coastal and open ocean pelagic ecosystems. Species with the majority of daily positions in oceanic waters off the continental shelf showed the greatest tendency for transnational movements and typically traveled farther from initial tagging locations. Several species converged on a common seasonal movement pattern between territorial waters of the U.S. (summer) and Mexico (winter).\n\n### Similar content being viewed by others\n\n## Introduction\n\nLarge pelagic fishes are common apex predators in coastal and open ocean ecosystems1,2 and play important roles in structuring marine communities through top-down control3,4. Conservation and rebuilding efforts for key constituents of the pelagic fish assemblage (e.g., billfishes, tunas, and sharks) requires species-specific information on movements (i.e., spatial displacements) necessary for individuals to complete their life cycles5,6. This is due to the fact that overexploitation and incidental bycatch are arguably the most critical barriers to conserving and rebuilding billfish, tuna, and shark populations7,8, and these threats vary both spatially and temporally9. As a result, an improved understanding of the spatial dynamics and movement pathways/phases of these predators is needed to support both sustainable fisheries and the conservation of pelagic ecosystems10,11. Because billfishes, tunas, and sharks routinely traverse international borders and high sea regions, migrations respective to boundaries are often key in implementing effective management strategies12.\n\nTri-national initiatives among Cuba, Mexico, and the United States (U.S.) are currently being developed to advance the conservation of marine ecosystems and pelagic fisheries in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM)13,14. Billfishes, tunas, and sharks are common components of the pelagic ecosystem in the GoM15,16,17, and the territorial waters of the three countries serve as critical spawning, nursery, and/or foraging habitat for multiple species within each taxonomic group18,19,20. Conservation measures for these pelagic predators vary spatially across the GoM7,10, with each country displaying different levels of cooperation in fishery organizations responsible for their management. As an example, Mexico and the U.S. are contracting parties of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), while Cuba\u2019s participation in the Commission ended in 1991. In response, international crossings both within and outside the GoM will expose individuals to different levels of fishing pressure (e.g. pelagic longline effort), which in turn can have profound impacts on a species\u2019 population dynamics16.\n\nHere, we characterize the spatial and temporal (seasonal) distribution of selected pelagic fishes in the GoM to better understand the significance of population connectivity and use of the territorial waters within the Cuba-Mexico-U.S. triangle. Our investigation is based on electronic tagging research conducted in U.S. waters of the GoM (hereafter U.S. GoM) (Fig. 1), and includes tag deployments on three general categories of pelagic predators: (1) billfishes, (2) tunas, and (3) sharks. The first two taxonomic categories include four marine teleosts (bony fishes) of high commercial and ecological value in pelagic ecosystems: blue marlin (*Makaira nigricans*), white marlin (*Kajikia albida*), Atlantic bluefin tuna (*Thunnus thynnus*), and yellowfin tuna (*T*. *albacares*). Coastal and open ocean migratory sharks investigated here are equally important from an ecological point of view and selected species range from the filter feeding whale shark (*Rhincodon typus*) to upper-level predators: scalloped hammerhead (*Sphyrna lewini*), shortfin mako (*Isurus oxyrinchus*), and tiger shark (*Galeocerdo cuvier*). Several species included in our assessment are currently red listed as \u201cendangered\u201d (Atlantic bluefin tuna, whale shark, scalloped hammerhead) by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), with three other species listed as \u201cvulnerable\u201d (white marlin, blue marlin, shortfin mako21), further emphasizing the significance of this study. The primary goal of this investigation was to quantify the timing and prevalence of international crossings displayed by each species as well as identify areas of high exchange or crossing hotspots.\n\n## Results\n\nPopulation connectivity of billfishes (n = 65), tunas (n = 98), and pelagic sharks (n = 133) was based on electronic tagging data collected from 2003 to 2018 (Table 1). The total number of positional tracking days (daily position estimates) used for all eight species investigated was substantial (22,289 daily positions), and reasonably extensive for each taxonomic group: billfishes (5,332 daily positions), tunas (10,105 daily positions), and sharks (6,852 daily positions) (Table 1). Overall, the spatial distribution of these taxa within the GoM and the incidence of international crossings varied considerably among the eight species investigated but demonstrated that territorial waters of all three countries were visited, often regularly, by most of these pelagic predators.\n\n### Billfishes\n\nTagging data demonstrated strong bi-national connectivity for blue marlin between Mexico and the U.S. with nearly half of the overall daily positions in the territorial waters of Mexico, primarily in the southern GoM (Bay of Campeche) or off the Yucatan Peninsula. Blue marlin also crossed into the territorial waters of Cuba, often passing through the Straits of Florida and moving into areas off eastern Cuba near Haiti (Fig. 2A) or farther north into the Bahamas. Movements of blue marlin were essentially restricted to Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. GoM; however, daily positions were also present farther east into the Caribbean Sea after egress through the Straits of Florida or Yucatan Channel. Although this species is capable of long-distance displacement (>1000 km), movement was largely restricted to the GoM and the passageways connecting this basin to the Atlantic Ocean. In addition, no individuals were detected north of Miami, Florida in U.S. waters or farther east in the Atlantic Ocean. International crossings varied seasonally with the highest occurrence of blue marlin in the U.S. GoM (61.6%) during summer (July-September), followed by individuals moving into the territorial waters of Mexico in fall (October-December) and winter (January-March) (Fig. 3A). In fact, over 70% of the daily positions for blue marlin in fall (70.3%) and winter (72.7%) were from positions in the southern GoM (Mexico). Movement back into the U.S. GoM occurred during spring (April-June) with the majority of daily positions (63.9%) once again in the northern part of the basin.\n\nData for white marlin were more limited due to a smaller sample size, but results further underscore the importance of transnational movements. Daily positions for white marlin were observed in the territorial waters of both Cuba and Mexico, with movements into Mexico being reasonably common (Fig. 2B). Given that nearly all tagging was conducted in the U.S. GoM from May to September, it was not unexpected that daily position estimates were highest in this region during summer (75.5%). Nevertheless, seasonal shifts were clearly evident again, and the largest percentage of daily positions in fall (45.1%) and winter (46.8%) seasons occurred in the territorial waters of Mexico (Fig. 3B), which may signify a movement pattern similar to blue marlin (i.e., overwintering in the southern GoM). Daily positions observed in waters off Cuba also peaked in winter (9.4%) with positions also detected north of Cuba in the Bahamas, indicating that this area may also represent overwintering habitat.\n\n### Tunas\n\nAtlantic bluefin tuna tagged in the U.S. GoM or farther north (Canada) but returning to this region to spawn were common in the territorial waters of both Mexico and the U.S. GoM (Fig. 2C). High occurrence of this species was observed throughout the northwestern GoM, particularly in outer shelf and slope waters both north and south of the Mexico-U.S. territorial boundary at ~26\u00b0N latitude. Daily positions were relatively rare in the territorial waters of Cuba but more common in areas to the north in the Bahamas. Because Atlantic bluefin tuna display directed migrations between spawning areas (GoM) and foraging areas (North Atlantic Ocean), our assessment of temporal variability in daily positions within Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. GoM was primarily limited to periods when they occupy this basin, January to June, which corresponds to winter (January-March) and spring (April-June) seasons in this region. During winter and spring, percentages of daily positions in the territorial waters of Mexico and the U.S. GoM combined were 57.5% and 67.1%, respectively. We observed a higher overall percentage of daily positions in Mexico during winter (35.1%) and this trend was reversed in spring with a higher percentage occurring in the U.S. GoM (48.0%), probably representing a northward shift by Atlantic bluefin tuna as individuals get ready to spawn (Fig. 3C). Spawning adults exit the basin as the water temperature in the GoM begin to increase, and nearly all of the daily positions in summer (July-September) were outside the GoM in the Atlantic Ocean (97.8%) with only 2.2% of the daily positions in the U.S. GoM. This general trend continued into fall with a small percentage of daily positions still present in either Mexico (7.1%) or the U.S. GoM (3.4%), although most of these daily positions were from a single month (December) and represent early entry into the spawning area by a few individuals.\n\nInternational crossings by yellowfin tuna in the GoM were less evident relative to the other teleosts investigated (Fig. 2D). Even though tagging data for yellowfin tuna was based on a fairly large sample size (>50 individuals tracked) and included several fish with relatively long deployment periods (9 tags 6\u201312 + month tracking periods), 89.5% of the daily positions for yellowfin tuna were in the U.S. GoM; all remaining positions were either in Mexico (9.3%) or the two high seas regions in the GoM (1.2%). Thus, transnational movements by yellowfin tuna were limited entirely to Mexico, with no individuals entering the territorial waters of Cuba or areas in the western Atlantic Ocean. The spatial distribution of daily positions intimated the potential for longer distance migration through the Yucatan Channel (i.e., outside GoM), but these positions were based on a single individual. Similar to blue marlin and white marlin, the percentage of daily positions for yellowfin tuna in Mexico increased during fall (14.7%) and winter (12.4%) relative to spring (5.0%) and summer (0.0%) (Fig. 3D), again conveying that a fraction of the GoM population may overwinter in Mexico. Nevertheless, seasonal shifts were less pronounced for yellowfin tuna than blue marlin, white marlin, or Atlantic bluefin tuna, and retention (i.e. lower spatial displacement) within the northern GoM appears to be remarkably high for individuals tagged in this region.\n\n### Sharks\n\nDaily positions for whale sharks were common in the territorial waters of all three countries, and the majority of daily positions were present on the outer continental shelf/slope or in oceanic waters. Transnational movements were primarily between Mexico and the U.S. GoM, with almost 50% of all daily positions occurring in Mexico even though all tagging was conducted to the north in the U.S. GoM. Most of the remaining daily positions (44.3%) for whale sharks were located in the U.S. GoM, which is further evidence of strong bi-national connectivity between the two countries. Daily positions of whale sharks were relatively widespread throughout the entire basin, including areas within or proximal to the Yucatan Channel in the territorial waters of all three countries (Fig. 4A). International crossings into Cuba were evident near the Yucatan Channel, but daily positions in Cuba only accounted for 2.1% of the total percent occurrence (Fig. 5A). Nearly 2% of the daily positions were outside the territorial waters of all three countries and, similar to billfishes and tunas, long distance movements (>1000 km) occurred for this species. The spatial distribution of whale sharks in the Cuba-Mexico-U.S. triangle varied seasonally with daily positions of whale sharks in the U.S. GoM peaking in spring (57.0%) and summer (69.6%) (Fig. 5A). Summer occupancy of the northern GoM by whale sharks was followed by shifts into Mexico during fall (77.3%) and winter (87.8%), which again is suggestive of overwintering in more southerly latitudes. In addition, daily positions were also detected in areas south of the Yucatan Channel outside the territorial waters of all three countries in areas off Belize.\n\nThe degree of exchange among Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. for the three other shark species (scalloped hammerhead, shortfin mako, tiger shark) was negligible to modest, although transnational movements were detected for all three species (Fig. 4B\u2013D). Even though the number of tagged individuals and amount of daily positions (685 days) were limited for the shortfin mako relative to both scalloped hammerheads and tiger sharks, this species showed the greatest capacity for moving into waters outside the U.S. GoM (Fig. 5B\u2013D). In fact, nearly 20% of the overall daily positions were from other regions: Cuba (1.8%), Mexico (8.2%), and Atlantic Ocean outside U.S. waters (10.9%). Seasonal shifts were present for shortfin makos with daily positions in Mexico highest during winter (15.3%), which was followed by a conspicuous shift to areas in the Atlantic Ocean during summer (61.7%). However, a large fraction of the daily positions outside the GoM were from a single individual moving through the Yucatan Channel and into the Caribbean Sea as far east as Jamaica. Movements of scalloped hammerheads and tiger sharks were more limited even though the total number of daily positions and deployment durations for both species were comparable or higher than other species included in the assessment (Table 1). Over 99% of all daily positions for scalloped hammerheads were in the U.S. GoM. No salient seasonal patterns were detected with daily positions occurring in the territorial waters of Mexico being insignificant during all seasons (~1% or less). Although a large percentage of the overall daily positions for tiger sharks also occurred in the U.S. GoM (91.7%), a meaningful percentage of daily positions were present in the territorial waters of Mexico during fall and winter seasons (13.1% and 7.6%, respectively). Both scalloped hammerheads and tiger sharks showed very limited or no movement into waters off Cuba or areas outside the GoM.\n\n### Multispecies border crossing locations\n\nDistinct areas of exchange were identified for our multispecies groups within the Cuba-Mexico-U.S. triangle using movement-based kernel density estimates (MKDE) based on daily position estimates 10 days before and 10 days after each international crossing. Unexpectedly, two relatively large geographic areas of exchange were present for both multispecies groups: (1) western GoM along Mexico-U.S. border and (2) central GoM along 26\u00b0N latitude and between both high seas regions (Fig. 6). The largest crossing hotspot for billfishes and tunas occurred in the western GoM and extended from the outer continental shelf to slope waters well beyond the 200-m isobath from approximately 94\u00b0 to 96\u00b0W longitude. A second crossing location for billfishes and tunas was again present along 26\u00b0N latitude but farther east from 88\u00b0 to 90\u00b0W longitude. Less conspicuous areas of exchange with Cuba were present in the Straits of Florida. Similar to billfishes and tunas, a key crossing location for the shark multispecies group was identified in the western GoM; however, movement-based distributions of sharks for this region occurred primarily on the continental shelf and closer to shore (inside 200-m isobath), and the frequency of open ocean crossings (off the continental shelf, >200 m depth) was significantly lower for the shark group than observed for billfishes and tunas (*X*2 = 27.27, df = 1, p < 0.001) (Fig. 6B). Areas of high exchange along the territorial boundary separating Cuba from both Mexico and the U.S. (~87\u00b0W) were also present for sharks but this was largely a function of whale shark movements, which strongly influenced MKDEs for this multispecies group. In contrast to the billfishes and tunas, crossings in areas east of 85\u00b0W along Cuba-U.S. boundary including the Straits of Florida were limited for the shark multispecies group.\n\n### International crossings as a function of days at liberty\n\nThe influence of tag duration on the probability of moving out of the U.S. GoM and into the territorial waters of either Cuba or Mexico was investigated for a representative teleost (blue marlin) and shark (whale shark). The two species were ideal for examining the relationship between days at liberty and international crossings because neither showed residency to the northern GoM, and daily position data were substantial for both species. The prevalence of international crossings by blue marlin and whale sharks into Cuba or Mexico was strongly affected by days at liberty. The percentage of blue marlin visiting either Cuba or Mexico increased rapidly during the first 100 days, ranging from about 10% at 10 days at liberty to over 90% at 100 days at liberty (Fig. 7A). Similarly, international crossings by whale sharks increased rapidly ranging from <5% at 10 days at liberty to nearly 90% at 100 days at liberty (Fig. 7B). After approximately 120 and 160 days at liberty for whale sharks and blue marlin, respectively, 100% of tagged individuals with deployment durations extending this long had entered the territorial waters of Cuba and/or Mexico, suggesting that tracking periods of approximately 150 days or greater appear suitable for assessing international exchange of these and potentially other pelagic fishes in the GoM.\n\nIn response, we quantified bi- (occurrence in Cuba or Mexico) and tri-national (occurrence in both Cuba and Mexico) population connectivity for all individuals tagged in the U.S. GoM with tag deployments of 150 days or longer (Table 2). For seven of eight species investigated, at least half of the individuals with days at liberty of 150 days or more showed strong bi-national connectivity, with the one exception being scalloped hammerheads. In addition, 50% or more of the long-term tag deployments (>150 days) for white marlin, Atlantic bluefin tuna, and shortfin mako showed tri-national connectivity, with individuals occupying the territorial waters of Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. during the deployment period (Table 2). The mean number of regions visited (Fig. 1) for individuals with tracking duration of 150 days or more was also the highest for Atlantic bluefin tuna (5.4) and white marlin (4.7), which was due to many individuals present in the territorial waters of all three countries within the GoM, the high seas region of the GoM, and both regions outside the GoM in the Atlantic Ocean.\n\n## Discussion\n\nInternational crossings by pelagic predators tagged in the U.S. GoM occurred for nearly all of the species investigated with varying levels of bi- or tri-national population connectivity displayed by billfishes, tunas, and sharks. In general, teleosts included in the assessment (billfishes and tunas) commonly moved throughout the basin, with individuals regularly crossing management boundaries (*sensu* \u2018crossing the line\u201922) and entering the territorial waters of Cuba or Mexico. Although whale sharks commonly used the territorial waters of Cuba, Mexico and the U.S., the other sharks investigated generally displayed more limited movements with two species (scalloped hammerhead and tiger sharks) exhibiting prolonged periods of residency to areas in the northern GoM. Migration patterns and transnational movements of pelagic fishes at the basin scale are commonly linked to both intrinsic and external factors1,5, and observed spatial shifts in distributions for billfishes, tunas, and sharks in the GoM appear to be related to directed movements between foraging and spawning areas as well as exploratory and/or physiologically motivated movements potentially associated with oceanographic conditions23,24. Because spawning or related reproductive activities (e.g., mating, parturition) for the majority of species investigated occurs in the GoM15,25,26, movements out of the U.S. GoM and/or systematic returns to this area after journeys to Cuba, Mexico and areas outside the basin (i.e., natal homing and/or spawning site fidelity16,27) are likely determined by the interplay of intrinsic factors and environmental conditions experienced by individuals.\n\nThe prevalence of international crossings and the spatial extent of associated movements (distance and areal extent) by pelagic fishes may be due in part to their differential use of coastal (on continental shelf, <200 m depth) and open ocean (off continental shelf, >200 m depth) ecosystems. Recent research suggests that displacement lengths (distance) and the type of movement (random versus directed) differs for large marine predators inhabiting coastal shelf versus open ocean ecosystems, with species occurring off the continental shelf showing more directed movements with larger displacement lengths28. Observed movement patterns for the eight species investigated largely support this premise. Species with the majority of daily positions in oceanic waters\u2014which included blue marlin, white marlin, Atlantic bluefin tuna, and whale sharks\u2014showed the greatest tendency to transit international borders with most crossings occurring in open ocean regions. In addition, these species traveled the farthest distances from initial tagging locations. In fact, nearly all of the long-term tag deployments (>150 days) for these four species showed bi-national connectivity, with 93\u2013100% of the individuals crossing into the territorial waters of either Cuba or Mexico during their track. By contrast, the majority of daily positions for scalloped hammerheads and tiger sharks, and to a lesser degree yellowfin tuna, were inside or near the continental shelf break (~200 m isobath), and international crossings by these species were more limited. In fact, nearly all individuals from these three species showed residency to the U.S. GoM, which was not entirely unexpected because more limited displacement distances have been reported previously for each species29,30,31. The diverse range of resources and habitats on the continental shelf presumably promotes more complex, but less directed movements by these species32, often resulting in more restricted displacement from the initial tagging location. The close association of daily positions along the outer continental shelf for scalloped hammerheads and tiger sharks is in accord with the coastal-open ocean movement hypothesis, and both species are commonly grouped into the \u201ccoastal shark management group\u201d by fishery management organizations33.\n\nFor species showing strong bi- or tri-national population connectivity, the timing of international crossings and the periods of occurrence in the territorial waters of Cuba, Mexico, or the Caribbean Sea varied seasonally. Movements out of the U.S. GoM during summer and fall and into Mexico or areas off Cuba in the fall and winter were observed for several of the species investigated. Seasonal movement of pelagic fishes into the southern GoM and Caribbean Sea has been suggested previously for open ocean and coastal migratory species including blue marlin16, whale sharks34,35, king mackerel36 and tarpon37. Here, conspicuous fall/winter movements into the territorial waters of Mexico were observed for over half of the species investigated (blue marlin, white marlin, yellowfin tuna, whale sharks). In addition, a greater percentage of the daily positions for Atlantic bluefin tuna during the winter (i.e., beginning of ingress into the GoM spawning area) were in Mexico. However, by spring the majority of daily positions for Atlantic bluefin tuna were farther north in the U.S. GoM, which suggests that adults may move into the northern part of the basin (north of 26\u00b0N latitude) in the late spring as sea surface temperature (SST) starts to increase and the spawning period begins.\n\nSeasonal changes in the distribution of marine fishes have been linked to external drivers, with individuals often attempting to reduce the amount of environmental variability experienced throughout the year6. Because the physicochemical environment at the same location in the GoM can vary markedly over the year, individuals may move to new locations to compensate or control for seasonal changes in external conditions. For pelagic fishes, shifts in their spatial and temporal distribution have been attributed to a variety of physicochemical factors including SST, salinity, chlorophyll *a*, and dissolved oxygen17,26,38,39, and such factors may be responsible for the convergence of seasonal movement patterns observed for blue marlin, white marlin, yellowfin tuna, and whale sharks. Daily positions of all four species were concentrated in the U.S. GoM during the spring and summer, with positions shifting farther south into the territorial waters of Mexico, Cuba, and the Caribbean Sea in the fall and winter. The following spring, individuals often moved back into the U.S. GoM, possibly indicating the closure of an annual migration loop between the northern and southern regions of this basin. One external factor that shows strong seasonal variability in the U.S. GoM is SST, and changes in this factor are known to influence the movement of pelagic fishes as well as other marine predators1. Given that mean SSTs in outer shelf and slope waters of the U.S. GoM can vary 6\u20138 \u00b0C between summer and winter seasons, it is possible that movement south into the territorial waters of Mexico by these species is an overwintering adaptation. In fact, occupying regions in the southern part of the basin during winter reduces the SST change experienced by up to 3\u20134 \u00b0C (NOAA Physical Oceanography Division, http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/phod/dhos/sst.php), possibly serving to moderate physiological stress for species exhibiting this type of seasonal movement pattern.\n\nConvergence on the seasonal movement pattern described above may also be attributed to intrinsic incentives related to reproduction and/or energetics6. A quintessential example of a species displaying directed, long-distance movements to support reproductive activities is the Atlantic bluefin tuna40,41. This temperate tuna commonly resides in the North Atlantic Ocean but migrates to the tropical waters of the GoM to spawn17,42. Entry into the warmer and highly productive waters of the GoM presumably supports rapid growth of larvae and early juveniles (optimal SST ~24\u201328 \u00b0C)25, which may lead to higher survival and recruitment potential for the early life stages even though the upper range of SSTs encountered in the spring and summer are near the cardiac capacity of spawning adults43. Bottom up processes that enhance the growth and survival of Atlantic bluefin tuna larvae and other pelagic species is also a likely explanation for the presence of higher order consumers such as whale sharks, billfishes, and tunas. These species presumably move into this region to take advantage of abundant prey resources linked to nutrient loading and associated production from the Mississippi River. In fact, the presence of whale sharks in the U.S. GoM during the spring and summer is potentially related to energetics with this species gaining a trophic advantage by feeding on eggs and larvae (top down control by predator) produced by both invertebrates and fishes in these highly productive waters. Interestingly, movements into territorial waters farther south off Cuba, Mexico, and into the Caribbean Sea may also be driven by favorable foraging conditions and associated energetic benefits because whale sharks commonly aggregate and show site fidelity to known mass spawning areas44,45,46. Our findings demonstrate that several species converge on a common seasonal movement pattern between summer (U.S. GoM) and winter (Mexico) locations within the basin, and intrinsic motivations for such movements appear to be associated with both bottom up and top down processes.\n\nWhile the nature and timing of spatial shifts in distribution is essential information for management, areas of international exchange are typically poorly defined, and crossing locations defined here highlight priority areas for billfish, tuna, and shark conservation. Similarities were observed between our two multispecies groups, with important areas of exchange located in the central GoM across large expanses of the open ocean. One area in particular was identified between the two high seas zones in the GoM as an important crossing location for both billfishes/tunas and sharks. Although a variety of extrinsic factors are known to influence ocean navigation and migration pathways of vertebrate fauna (e.g., currents, fronts, magnetic fields47), this multispecies crossing location occurs in oceanic waters that are relatively homogenous and less complex in physicochemical conditions than areas on or near the continental shelf. As a result, less directed or more free-ranging movements by billfishes, tunas, and sharks may be responsible for elevated levels of border crossings observed in this area. Although oceanic waters extend east of this border crossing location, transnational movements between Mexico and the U.S. east of 88\u00b0W longitude were less evident (Fig. 6). The western margin of the northward flowing Loop Current in the GoM often resides near 88\u00b0W longitude or close to the easternmost high seas region of the basin. Because billfishes, tunas, and pelagic sharks often use frontal boundaries or areas near the outer margins of major currents48,49, movement along the edge of this mesoscale feature may explain the high concentration of international crossings observed in this general area. Farther east, individuals would be within this mesoscale feature and traveling against the prevailing current and in less productive waters, which may explain the more limited degree of north to south movement between the U.S. and Mexico at 87\u201385\u00b0W longitude. We also observed a second hotspot of exchange for both taxonomic groups in the western GoM, with the primary crossing area being on the continental shelf for sharks and in deeper waters for the billfish and tuna group. This finding further accentuates the on-shelf affinity by several of the sharks investigated, while blue marlin, white marlin, Atlantic bluefin tuna, and yellowfin tuna were more commonly observed on the outer continental shelf or in oceanic waters off the shelf.\n\nOne caveat to characterizing movements of pelagic fishes using data from multiple tagging efforts and different tagging platforms is that distance traveled and the number of areas/regions visited (i.e., international crossings) is often a function of both the release location and tag configuration (e.g., deployment duration). As expected, shorter tracking periods are often associated with more limited displacement distances16,50. Moreover, daily positions are often concentrated around release locations, particularly for species displaying more limited movements as shown for certain shark species (Fig. 4). It is also important to note that individuals tracked for shorter periods of time may not be representative of an individual\u2019s movement capacity because post-release behavioral modifications related to capture and handling stress may extend up to 60 days51. Recognizing these potential sources of bias is fundamental to developing accurate representations for metadata derived from independent tagging efforts. Fortunately, our findings on population connectivity and international crossings were consistent between pooled metadata for each species and the more limited dataset comprised only of long-term tags (>150 days at liberty) (Table 2), supporting the assertion that our characterization of population connectivity using pooled data from multiple tagging campaigns was appropriate for the pelagic predators assessed. Nevertheless, we acknowledge that different tagging platforms and modeling frameworks used to track these pelagic fishes may have affected the precision, accuracy, and number of daily location estimates52. Moreover, future studies with extended tracking periods and larger samples sizes are critically needed to develop a more holistic understanding of international exchanges, which will guide future management and rebuilding efforts for these ecologically and economically valuable species.\n\nThe scale of management (unit stock) is inherently linked to animal movement, and changes in the spatial structure can alter population and community dynamics53. Even low rates of movement across international boundaries or between management zones can compromise our ability to effectively assess population status and achieve sustainable management54,55. The current study emphasizes the range of possibilities regarding the spatial distribution and movement of large pelagic fishes common to the GoM, and plainly shows a need for cooperative fisheries management among Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. for many of the highly migratory species that inhabit these waters. Research to improve our understanding of the drivers (intrinsic and extrinsic) of both temporary movements and longer-term, directed seasonal migrations across international boundaries will ultimately lead to more informed characterizations of the spatial structure of billfish, tuna, and shark populations within the GoM. Since the majority of the species assessed in this study are IUCN red listed as endangered or vulnerable, failure to adequately define the spatial dynamics of GoM populations and the mechanisms underlying their movement will further compromise the ability of resource managers to quantify the impacts of both anthropogenic and natural disturbances that are common to this region (e.g. oil spills, hurricanes), as well as forecast the impacts of a changing environment (climate change) on these species.\n\n## Methods\n\nSimilar to other multispecies assessments that highlight the movement pathways of apex predators1, this study was based on pooled data from several electronic tagging efforts and platforms (Table 1). Daily position estimates were generated using smart position tags (SPOTs), pop up archival tags (PATs), and archival implants tags (AITs). Details regarding tag programming and attachment varied among species but followed previously described protocols15,16,17,56,57. Because the aim of this study was to characterize spatial and temporal shifts in the distribution of pelagic predators residing in U.S. GoM, we relied exclusively on tagging conducted in this region for seven of eight species investigated. For Atlantic bluefin tuna, a fraction of the daily positions was again derived from tagging performed in the U.S. GoM; however, natal homing is well developed for this species and individuals return to the GoM to spawn42. Their directed movements into this basin also allowed for the incorporation of additional tagging conducted outside the U.S. GoM (Canada) to explore transnational movements and the significance of international crossings by individuals after moving into the basin. All tagging was performed in accordance with relevant guidelines and regulations of institutional animal care and use committees (IACUC) and tagging protocols were approved by Texas A&M University (TAMU) and Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi (TAMUCC). IACUC approved animal use protocols relevant to this study included TAMU 2007-168, TAMU 2013-0221, TAMU 2017-0056, and TAMUCC 08-15.\n\nThe accuracy and precision of daily position estimates (latitude and longitude) from different electronic tagging platforms varies, with only SPOTs transmitting directly to the Argos satellite system during the tracking period for near real-time positions. Both PATs and AITs include light and temperature sensors for deriving light-based geolocation. The accuracy of daily positions based on ARGOS satellite transmissions from SPOTs (or PATs after pop up to the surface) are often highly accurate (<500 m58); however, light-based positions derived from PATs and AITs are known to have markedly larger estimates of uncertainty, especially for estimating latitude around equinox phases59. Daily positions from SPOTs used in this study were filtered to remove poor location class (Z) positions, with highest quality position estimates used each day for all individuals outfitted with these tags. For PATs and AITs, a variety of approaches are commonly used to estimate daily position using light-based models. Wildlife Computers PATs (e.g. MK10, Mini-PAT) fit a subset of light levels at sunrise and sunset to a sun elevation model, while Microwave Telemetry PATs (e.g. X-Tag) rely on a proprietary algorithm to extract the timing of sunrise and sunset60. Light-based location from Lotek AITs (LAT 2000 series) is based on template fitting to irradiance using a geophysical model of twilight61. Also, data included in our assessment utilized state-space models that implement the Kalman filter (KFTRACK and UKFSST packages; http://positioning.github.io) to reduce uncertainty and further refine daily positions62. Although the accuracy and resolution of the initial or post-processed daily positions may differ among the approaches used, all are assumed to yield suitable locations for examining movement at the scale being investigated here.\n\nGiven that our intent was to describe the range of migratory behaviors displayed by billfishes, tunas, and pelagic sharks in the U.S. GoM, data from multiple tagging periods (years) were combined to characterize movements and spatial distributions of each species. Even though migration patterns of these and other highly migratory species are known to vary from year to year26,35,63, interannual variability was not assessed because most tagging efforts in this region did not tag sufficient numbers of individuals across multiple years to allow for such comparisons64,65,66. Moreover, certain intrinsic factors (e.g., sex, age) are known to influence the migration patterns of marine teleosts16,27 and sharks67, but evaluating these factors was beyond the scope of this paper.\n\nMetadata similar to our multispecies dataset are useful for characterizing transnational movements of marine megafauna, often between foraging and spawning areas24,28, and the integration of data derived from different tagging platforms have also proven useful for elucidating seasonal shifts displayed by pelagic predators1. In the current paper, daily positions of each species were partitioned into four quarterly seasonal periods: January\u2013March (winter), April\u2013June (spring), July\u2013September (summer), and October\u2013December (fall) to explore intra-annual patterns of movement for each of the selected species. The seasonal use of territorial waters off Cuba, Mexico, U.S. GoM, and adjacent areas was assessed by calculating the percent occurrence of individuals in 6 designated regions: (1) U.S. GoM (includes Florida Keys), (2) Mexico (all territorial waters in the GoM plus waters from the Yucatan Channel to Xcalak), (3) high seas areas in the GoM, 4) Cuba (all territorial waters), (5) U.S. waters in the Atlantic Ocean outside GoM, and (6) all remaining areas of the Atlantic Ocean (i.e., locations outside regions 1\u20135 including the Caribbean Sea) (Fig. 1).\n\nDaily positions were presented along with information on the primary tagging areas for each species (based on 95% kernel utilization distributions [KUD] from deployment locations) within ArcGIS 10.2.2. The spatial configuration and extent of the 95% KUDs for tagging areas varied among species, and KUDs were included to acknowledge inherent bias in the spatial distribution of daily positions due to the geographic location of tagging activities (Figs 2 and 4). Territorial boundaries (established or virtual) of Cuba, Mexico, and the U.S. were accessed from https://maritimeboundaries.noaa.gov and shape files were imported into ArcGIS for assigning each daily position to a region (1\u20136). Percent occurrence to each region was determined by dividing the number of daily positions in a region to the total number of daily positions for each species. Multispecies crossing areas were also described for two taxonomic groups (billfishes/tunas and sharks) in an effort to describe the geographic location(s) where the majority of transnational movements occurred. These areas of exchange or pathways to other countries were based on daily positions 10 days before and 10 days after each international crossing, and determined using a biased random bridge approach68 to derive movement-based kernel density estimates (MKDE) based on daily position estimates. We then summed MKDEs of individuals to visualize multispecies crossing areas for each group. The frequency of open ocean (>200 m depth) versus coastal (<200 m depth) crossings between the two multispecies groups was examined with a chi-square test.\n\nThe relationship between days at liberty and international crossings was also investigated for one representative teleost (blue marlin) and one shark (whale shark). We selected these two species because both displayed non-resident behavior and regularly moved to areas outside the U.S. GoM. Also, these two species had the greatest number of daily positions for individuals tagged in the U.S. GoM. Days at liberty were binned into 10-d periods for each individual and then the percent of individuals displaying international movement was estimated for each 10-d bin up to 200 days. Once an individual crossed into the territorial waters of either Cuba or Mexico, it retained the international migrant designation for the remainder of the deployment period. Locally weighted scatterplot smoothing (LOWESS) was used as the non-parametric regression method to describe non-linear relationships between days at liberty and the likelihood of an international crossing for both species.\n\n## Data Availability\n\nDaily position estimates for each species are available in Supplementary Data File S1. Additional details regarding dataset used in the current study are available from the corresponding author upon request.\n\n## References\n\nBlock, B. A.\n\n*et al*. Tracking apex marine predator movements in a dynamic ocean.*Nature***475**, 86\u201390 (2011).Worm, B. & Tittensor, D. P. 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Sturdivant, R. Underwood, and J. Whitman. Any use of trade, product, or firm names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the United States Government.\n\n## Author information\n\n### Authors and Affiliations\n\n### Contributions\n\nJ.R.R. wrote the main manuscript text, J.R.R. and M.A.D. conducted formal analyses and prepared figures and tables. J.R.R., M.A.D., R.J.D.W., M.J.A., B.A.B., M.R.C., J.M.D., B.J.F., J.S.F., N.H., J.M.H., E.R.H., R.T.K., J.A.M. and G.W.S. conducted electronic tagging and/or analyzed tagging data. 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To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.\n\n## About this article\n\n### Cite this article\n\nRooker, J.R., Dance, M.A., Wells, R.J.D. *et al.* Population connectivity of pelagic megafauna in the Cuba-Mexico-United States triangle.\n*Sci Rep* **9**, 1663 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-38144-8\n\nReceived:\n\nAccepted:\n\nPublished:\n\nVersion of record:\n\nDOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-38144-8\n\n\n## This article is cited by\n\n-\n### Specific locally, general globally: a synthesis on the isotopic niche in hammerhead sharks (Class Chondrichthyes, Genus Sphyrna)\n\n*Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries*(2025) -\n### Population genetics of the scalloped hammerhead shark (Sphyrna lewini) in the Gulf of Mexico: evaluating fine scale female philopatry and its importance for management and conservation\n\n*Hydrobiologia*(2025) -\n### Mesoscale activity drives the habitat suitability of yellowfin tuna in the Gulf of Mexico\n\n*Scientific Reports*(2024) -\n### Seasonal variability in the feeding ecology of an oceanic predator\n\n*Scientific Reports*(2024) -\n### Risk of capture is modified by hypoxia and interjurisdictional migration of Lake Whitefish (Coregonus clupeaformis)\n\n*Scientific Reports*(2024)" + }, + { + "title": "Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism - Al Jazeera", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism - Al Jazeera" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiogFBVV95cUxNNGs5THZqdXItdm9CUlR1SXNOc3JMaWRqb2ZOaW5oV0dYNV9pWFBiMHNIOThvc2RBV0dNczBnSWFoZUVFaGpCTFNJX0pOYklDcEE1YVBWR1dtWlkzY0Y2ekZFZk1reWZXY0xuUkxzS0gxbVlSdDVEZkF0b0N5bGQwbWI2WDFfRV9QVFdsRG0wVmktQ3BCdjJsTmFMQkM4UWxfV1HSAacBQVVfeXFMTS12a1F0dTJ4djNvVGdnQnAxSm92TUZLNm5tSHNWWS1PWHpVYTFhSlp4M1NndUQyOHNkd3NNbjFLRmUtYldTYlgyNXVuTnhsTjlFeUdoeVNsbEVzXzNBbVM0ZjV1VWpMSG5WQlpCal9YYXo4dHpiVm01NHlTUm1SemxOdkpIWnVPTW5NT3dKbWtROXB4NjVkTGdiZzIwOXdHRm5KclpNXzA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/26/cubans-approve-new-constitution-affirming-role-of-socialism", + "id": "CBMiogFBVV95cUxNNGs5THZqdXItdm9CUlR1SXNOc3JMaWRqb2ZOaW5oV0dYNV9pWFBiMHNIOThvc2RBV0dNczBnSWFoZUVFaGpCTFNJX0pOYklDcEE1YVBWR1dtWlkzY0Y2ekZFZk1reWZXY0xuUkxzS0gxbVlSdDVEZkF0b0N5bGQwbWI2WDFfRV9QVFdsRG0wVmktQ3BCdjJsTmFMQkM4UWxfV1HSAacBQVVfeXFMTS12a1F0dTJ4djNvVGdnQnAxSm92TUZLNm5tSHNWWS1PWHpVYTFhSlp4M1NndUQyOHNkd3NNbjFLRmUtYldTYlgyNXVuTnhsTjlFeUdoeVNsbEVzXzNBbVM0ZjV1VWpMSG5WQlpCal9YYXo4dHpiVm01NHlTUm1SemxOdkpIWnVPTW5NT3dKbWtROXB4NjVkTGdiZzIwOXdHRm5KclpNXzA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 26 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 26, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 57, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism  Al Jazeera", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism  Al Jazeera" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.aljazeera.com", + "title": "Al Jazeera" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism\nauthor: News Agencies\nurl: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/26/cubans-approve-new-constitution-affirming-role-of-socialism\nhostname: aljazeera.com\ndescription: Nearly 87 percent of Cuban voters approved new constitution, which updates some financial, electoral and criminal laws.\nsitename: Al Jazeera\ndate: 2019-02-26\ntags: ['Miguel Diaz-Canel', 'News, Miguel Diaz-Canel, Cuba, Latin America']\n---\n# Cubans approve new constitution affirming role of socialism\n\n*Nearly 87 percent of Cuban voters approved new constitution, which updates some financial, electoral and criminal laws.*\n\nNearly 87 percent of Cuban voters approved a new constitution that preserves the island\u2019s single-party socialist system and centrally planned economy while updating some financial, electoral and criminal laws, authorities said on Monday.\n\nThe margin of victory was relatively low for a country where opposition parties and campaigns are illegal and official proposals routinely receive higher than 90 percent approval.\n\nCuba\u2019s National Electoral Commission said 7,848,343 people voted Sunday on the new charter, which was widely promoted as a vehicle for continuity in one of the world\u2019s last communist nations.\n\nThe commission said 6,816,169 people voted in favour of the new constitution. Some 300,000 votes were counted as invalid because they were blank or defaced, while 706,400 people voted against the new constitution.\n\nThe current constitution was approved by 97.7 percent of voters in a referendum in 1976, the peak of a system dedicated to displays of national unity.\n\nBoth President Miguel Diaz-Canel and his predecessor, Raul Castro, received 94 percent approval in their last elections.\n\nIn recent weeks, Diaz-Canel\u2019s government waged a non-stop campaign promoting a \u201cyes\u201d vote and tarring those voting \u201cno\u201d as counterrevolutionaries and enemies of the state. Aside from a few independent websites, all Cuban media is state-run and the airwaves were filled with messages urging people to vote \u201cyes\u201d for the sake of continuity on the island.\n\n## \u2018Points us towards the future\u2019\n\nThe new constitution recognises private and cooperative businesses alongside state ones, creates the posts of prime minister and provincial governor, and introduces the presumption of innocence and habeas corpus to the justice system. It also sets term limits for the president.\n\n\u201cThis constitution establishes the best for the country, for the future of the Cuban people,\u201d said Miguel Alvarez, a 57-year-old technician for the Havana water utility. \u201cIt eliminates past mistakes and points us towards the future.\u201d\n\nBut Carlos Saladrigas, a Cuban-American businessman and head of the Cuban Study Group, which advocates engagement with Cuba, said the constitution is \u201canother big missed opportunity\u201d.\n\n\u201cThe few important economic changes made are not sufficient to create economic growth and attract foreign investment in the needed quantities,\u201d he told Reuters news agency.\n\nIn recent days, the government\u2019s messages were mixed with words of support for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro as tensions rise between Cuba\u2019s main ally and the Trump administration, along with Latin American allies who support the Venezuelan opposition and its attempt to force aid into the country.\n\nThe \u201cno\u201d campaign was amplified by the rapid spread of mobile internet across Cuba in recent months. Some 2 million Cubans on the island have contracted mobile data service since it was offered for the first time in December.\n\nThe largest block of \u201cno\u201d votes was expected to come from the growing ranks of evangelical Christians in Cuba, who object to language that eliminates a requirement for marriage to be only between a man and woman, paving the way for a future legalisation of gay marriage." + }, + { + "title": "Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote - Committee to Protect Journalists", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote - Committee to Protect Journalists" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiekFVX3lxTE9KYTN6NThYWFlqc0xWdGY3NVM2UlFDbU5qSkpTM3JYN1ZlRWZGbHdTYmM4cU8wdjMyMFI1WXVXWWZ3UWpGYTJGOTNnak9WVWJxRjdvYnk5UE9hQlY1RVFEVC1hTUFIbVVsaGJBSXQtSkN5bkZubEhDVWpR0gF_QVVfeXFMUEM4Ukp0bnpjYXJ2YTAyTnhheWFwRC0zX2ZyVDd5VU1hTnNiSEs3X2EyVXUtOGY0MEMyZGdKWEFSaDQ2MU9fMDhLcGRqeXJMQ1RvMlNvX1lvU3A0MVRxdXdsMkhNelh2UU1XMXNULWtNN1ZXeHJqem9GUVBIZTNwYw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://cpj.org/2019/02/cuba-referendum-news-website-internet-blocked/", + "id": "CBMiekFVX3lxTE9KYTN6NThYWFlqc0xWdGY3NVM2UlFDbU5qSkpTM3JYN1ZlRWZGbHdTYmM4cU8wdjMyMFI1WXVXWWZ3UWpGYTJGOTNnak9WVWJxRjdvYnk5UE9hQlY1RVFEVC1hTUFIbVVsaGJBSXQtSkN5bkZubEhDVWpR0gF_QVVfeXFMUEM4Ukp0bnpjYXJ2YTAyTnhheWFwRC0zX2ZyVDd5VU1hTnNiSEs3X2EyVXUtOGY0MEMyZGdKWEFSaDQ2MU9fMDhLcGRqeXJMQ1RvMlNvX1lvU3A0MVRxdXdsMkhNelh2UU1XMXNULWtNN1ZXeHJqem9GUVBIZTNwYw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote  Committee to Protect Journalists", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote  Committee to Protect Journalists" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://cpj.org", + "title": "Committee to Protect Journalists" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Critical news websites blocked during Cuba referendum vote - Committee to Protect Journalists\nauthor: Jessica Jerreat\nurl: https://cpj.org/2019/02/cuba-referendum-news-website-internet-blocked/\nhostname: cpj.org\ndescription: Miami, February 25, 2019-- Cuban authorities should immediately ensure citizens have access to news websites, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Several critical news sites were blocked in the country yesterday, as Cuba held a national referendum on proposed changes to its constitution, news sites reported.\nsitename: Committee to Protect Journalists\ndate: 2019-02-25\ntags: ['14yMedio', 'Access', 'Blocked', 'Blogger', 'Cibercuba', 'Constitution', 'Cubanet', 'Diario de Cuba', 'Election', 'ETECSA', 'Internet', 'Social Media', 'Tremenda Nota', 'yoan\u00eds\u00e1nchez']\nlicense: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0\n---\nMiami, February 25, 2019\u2013 Cuban authorities should immediately ensure citizens have access to news websites, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Several critical news sites were blocked in the country yesterday, as Cuba held a national referendum on proposed changes to its constitution, news sites reported.\n\nAccess was blocked to several sites that operate from Cuba, including *14ymedio* and *Tremenda Nota*, as well as news sites operating abroad, including *Cibercuba, Diario de Cuba *and* Cubanet*, according to media reports. Several of the sites reported on the blocks via Twitter. Yoani S\u00e1nchez, the director of *14ymedio *and a Cuban blogger, tweeted that her site had been blocked since February 23.\n\nCPJ\u2019s calls to ETECSA, the Cuban telecommunications regulator, at the listed phone number for its Havana headquarters went unanswered.\n\n\u201cIf the Cuban government wants the international community to view the constitutional referendum as legitimate, blocking access to critical news sites on voting day is not the way to go,\u201d said CPJ Central and South America Coordinator Natalie Southwick in New York. \u201cCubans have the right to access information from a broad range of sources.\u201d\n\nETECSA often blocks independent news outlets, according to Freedom House\u2019s latest \u201cFreedom on the Net\u201d report. Yesterday, ETECSA called for a yes vote on the referendum via its official Twitter account.\n\nCuba\u2019s electoral commission announced today that citizens voted in favor of the changed constitution. The proposed changes introduce the notion of \u201cprivate property\u201d and make references to business, foreign investment, and the right to legal representation if detained, Reuters reported. However, the ban on private ownership of news outlets remains, thus maintaining total state control of the media.\n\nCuban leaders had been calling** **for a \u201cyes\u201d vote on the proposed constitution, including via *Granma**,* the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba. Meanwhile, opponents have complained that state-run media did not cover the \u201cno\u201d campaign and that they were** **forced to limit their campaign to social media, according to journalists.\n\nDespite some improvements to internet access in recent years, Cuba remains highly disconnected and is one of the most hostile environments for the press, with the most restrictive laws on free speech and press freedom in the Americas, CPJ found in its 2017 report \u201cConnecting Cuba.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba - The Borgen Project", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba - The Borgen Project" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMic0FVX3lxTFBtUHVVMV9rdExpZHBIZ1AwN2lhdnNBb01iUlBIM0NxdmFaS05iQ0JPQmQzM1h2SHE0VmJuUEowR0ZBeGxUdlpxbkZ0Vk5Va092SzVuaVdiejlTVjFPXzhkRDFUd1d1aDk3NXgtbnBMc2Z1dE0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://borgenproject.org/10-facts-about-life-expectancy-in-cuba/", + "id": "CBMic0FVX3lxTFBtUHVVMV9rdExpZHBIZ1AwN2lhdnNBb01iUlBIM0NxdmFaS05iQ0JPQmQzM1h2SHE0VmJuUEowR0ZBeGxUdlpxbkZ0Vk5Va092SzVuaVdiejlTVjFPXzhkRDFUd1d1aDk3NXgtbnBMc2Z1dE0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 18 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 18, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 49, + 0 + ], + "summary": "10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba  The Borgen Project", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba  The Borgen Project" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://borgenproject.org", + "title": "The Borgen Project" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: 10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba - The Borgen Project\nauthor: Kim Thelwell\nurl: https://borgenproject.org/10-facts-about-life-expectancy-in-cuba/\nhostname: borgenproject.org\ndescription: Cuba is a large island located in the center of the Caribbean Sea. The country has made a tremendous effort in improving healthcare and, therefore, increasing the average life expectancy for its residents. There is still room for improvement though, as the average life expectancy is less than those in first world countries. The following are 10 facts about the average life expectancy in Cuba that sheds light on the issues and improvements Cuba has made to increase the average lifespan.\nsitename: The Borgen Project\ndate: 2019-02-19\ncategories: ['Global Poverty', 'Life Expectancy']\n---\n# 10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba\n\n\nCuba is a large island located in the center of the Caribbean Sea. The country has made a tremendous effort in improving healthcare and, therefore, increasing the average life expectancy for its residents. There is still room for improvement though, as the average life expectancy is less than those in first world countries. The following are 10 facts about the average life expectancy in Cuba that sheds light on the issues and improvements Cuba has made to increase the average lifespan.\n\n#### 10 Facts About Life Expectancy in Cuba\n\n- Cuba\u2019s estimated average life expectancy was 78.9 years in 2018 while the U.S. is just above their rank at 80.1. This puts Cuba at number 56 in the world for life expectancy. The U.S.\u2019s rank is 45 in comparison. Cuba\u2019s average life expectancy is excellent compared to most developing countries and has increased substantially in the last 50 years. The average life expectancy in Cuba was 63.8 in 1960.\n- Smoking is prevalent in Cuba. At least 40 percent of men and 33 percent of women smoke tobacco in Cuba. Reducing this number would increase the average life expectancy as smoking tends to increase respiratory diseases. In one study, 41 percent of all deaths in Cuba in 2002 were from heart disease, stroke and \u201cother unspecified diseases of the heart and veins,\u201d and one such cause is due to frequent cigarette smoking.\n- The prevalence of abnormally high blood pressure, or hypertension, is estimated to be around 25 percent in Cuba. About 70 percent of people who experience a heart attack have high blood pressure as do about 80 percent who suffer a stroke. The good news is that Cuba has been effective in treating patients with high blood pressure. In 2002, about 39 percent of Cubans aged 35 to 60 with high blood pressure were taking medication that successfully lowered their blood pressure to normal levels. These results are the highest in the world. To compare, the U.S. has a 29 percent rate for successfully treating hypertension patients in that age range.\n- Since 2012, Cuba has had only one to two cases of pediatric HIV per year. Pediatric HIV is the spread of HIV from the mother to the baby. The World Health Organization recognized Cuba as the first country to eliminate the mother-to-child transmission of HIV and congenital syphilis.\n- Despite Cuba being a developing country, their health care is exceptional. Cuba has universal healthcare, and infant and maternal mortality rates are less than most developing countries. The infant mortality rate is at four out of 1,000 children and maternal mortality is 39 out of every 100,000 births. There\u2019s still space for improvement, but these numbers often decline as a country develops and improves things such as healthcare technology. This is still an impressive number when considering the infant mortality rate was 32 in 2015.\n- The 1990s, the U.S. embargo against Cuba led to a reduction of medicine being sent to Cuba, which put lives at risk. In 2000, the Trade Sanction Reform and Export Enhancement Act allowed trade to resume, allowing the needed medications to enter the country. Cuba\u2019s major importer for medications is the U.S. With medicine imported from the U.S. and other countries, Cubans have a higher average life expectancy than the rest of Latin America. Medication shortages let to a 48 percent increase in deaths from tuberculosis from 1992 to 1993. After the act was passed, deaths from tuberculosis decreased from .7 in 1997 to .2 in 2007 for every 100,000 Cubans.\n- The United Nations Population Fund began in 1971 and seeks to extend reproductive and healthcare services in Cuba. The UNPF has reached more than 140,000 people. In 2017, the UNPF spent more than $300,000 in integrated sexual and reproductive health services, which included maternal health and HIV.\n- According to the Cienfuegos survey referenced in the National Center for Biotechnology Information, only 30 percent of the people engaged in vigorous activity, but 93 percent engaged in some kind of moderate physical activity at least three days a week. In one study by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, participants who engaged in regular physical activity at least three times a week reduced their risk of mortality by 30 to 35 percent.\n- One nongovernment organization called CARE began operating in 1995 during the Special Period in Cuba, an economic crisis caused by the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Most recently, in 2017, Hurricane Irma ravaged Cuba. Care was on site helping to provide clean water and sanitation as well as assistance with shelter for more than 20,000 people. One issue CARE worked on was disaster risk reduction by improving buildings so as to save lives whenever the next hurricane strikes. As an isolated island, Cubans along the coastline have a high chance of their homes being completely destroyed from deadly hurricanes, such as Hurricane Gustav in 2008.\n- Cuba boasts the highest ratio of doctors-to-patients in the world. In 2006, for every 10,000 people, there were 59 doctors. By 2010, Cuba still held the number one spot, far above the U.S. and Great Britan. Cuba also sends its doctors to more than 40 countries across the world to assist in health care programs.\n\nThese 10 facts about life expectancy in Cuba explain why the average lifespan is currently at 78.9. The average life expectancy, although excellent compared to other developing countries, can still be improved by continuing their focus on high-quality healthcare. Another way to increase the average life span is by reducing the amount of Cubans that smoke tobacco.\n\n*Lucas Schmidt*\n\nPhoto: Flickr" + }, + { + "title": "Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years - Rolling Stone", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years - Rolling Stone" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMihgFBVV95cUxNT0tFT1RXUXhXMEl0dVJ1WEtPSV9PRVVzNUs4S1RWdGVMN1JVUFQ0eXM3SS16VFZ2MDBGN24tRFpDQk9vQkE0VlRlNjdJOU55cldNVU9wNmlabUlHNnNmaDZfbVZYcTRpMFhYdi02TVBmMTJhTGwtdFR2ZHJpRGdrb0JGOS1Zdw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/blondie-cuba-concerts-783886/", + "id": "CBMihgFBVV95cUxNT0tFT1RXUXhXMEl0dVJ1WEtPSV9PRVVzNUs4S1RWdGVMN1JVUFQ0eXM3SS16VFZ2MDBGN24tRFpDQk9vQkE0VlRlNjdJOU55cldNVU9wNmlabUlHNnNmaDZfbVZYcTRpMFhYdi02TVBmMTJhTGwtdFR2ZHJpRGdrb0JGOS1Zdw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 04 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 4, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 35, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years  Rolling Stone", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years  Rolling Stone" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.rollingstone.com", + "title": "Rolling Stone" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Blondie Explain How They're Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years\nauthor: Kory Grow\nurl: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/blondie-cuba-concerts-783886/\nhostname: rollingstone.com\ndescription: Debbie Harry and Blondie discuss the cultural exchange trip they're taking to Cuba next month.\nsitename: Rolling Stone\ndate: 2019-02-04\ncategories: ['Music Features']\ntags: ['Blondie, Debbie Harry']\n---\n# Blondie Explain How They\u2019re Finally Getting to Cuba After 43 Years\n\n\u201cIf you look at the first five years of CBGBs and Cuba, there might be an analogy to be drawn,\u201d Blondie guitarist Chris Stein tells *Rolling Stone*. \u201cBoth were very isolated. One of the strong points of the CBGB scene and the New York rock scene was that it was so isolated.\u201d\n\n\u201cI feel the same way,\u201d says singer Deborah Harry. \u201cI like to draw my own conclusions about things. Chris and I both came up through the hippie era, and Che Guevara and Fidel Castro are fascinating, enigmatic political heroes and antiheroes in the United States for the most part. It was always very attractive to me.\u201d\n\nThe band members will be able to draw their own conclusions about the country next month when they embark on a four-day cultural exchange dubbed \u201cBlondie in Havana.\u201d The excursion is an opportunity for fans of the group to experience the country firsthand with museum tours, sightseeing trips and tickets to two Blondie concerts. For U.S. citizens, it\u2019s one of the few ways to visit the country after President Trump rolled back Obama-era permissions that made it easier to travel to the country.\n\n\n\u201cI really don\u2019t know any sane person who is a Trump supporter,\u201d drummer Clem Burke says. \u201cWhen you travel the world, you get more of a perspective on how people are viewing the U.S. and it\u2019s like everything is turned upside down.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s probably some good to come out of the Trump administration, but it\u2019s very hard for me to see,\u201d Harry offers.\n\n\u201cThe good to come out of the Trump administration is it being over,\u201d Stein rejoins.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re just pulling the United states back to the 1950s,\u201d Harry says. \u201cBut we\u2019re not here to talk about that, and I\u2019m sorry I brought it up.\u201d\n\nStein came up with the idea of performing in Cuba and, for the past year or so, the band members have been trying to navigate the countries\u2019 governments to get there. None of them have been to the country \u2014 they were touring when Obama relaxed the rules \u2014 and they\u2019re eager to see what Cuba offers. The guys in the group say they\u2019re interested in Cuba\u2019s vintage cars and general ingenuity \u2014 \u201cNothing comes in there, so they make power drills into electric fans,\u201d Stein says \u2014 and they\u2019re all excited to meet some Cuban musicians.\n\n\nBlondie have always drawn inspiration from Latin and Caribbean music, and they point to \u201cRapture\u201d and \u201cThe Tide Is High\u201d as examples. \u201cWe did a song called \u2018Wipe Off My Sweat,\u2019 which is kind of a Latin thing,\u201d Burke says, \u201cAnd Chris is into the whole reggaeton thing. On the album *Ghosts of Download*, we did a song called \u2018Sugar on the Side,\u2019 which is very Latin-roots oriented.\u201d They also have a history of working with Latin percussionists, such as Alex Acu\u00f1a, who played on \u201cThe Tide Is High.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s a big influence but maybe not so obvious,\u201d Burke says. \u201cIt\u2019s always in the undercurrent, and the whole Latin community in general, I think, are big supporters of Blondie.\u201d\n\n\u201cBeing from New York City, we were fortunate that it\u2019s a melting pot of musical ideas, nationalities, ethnicities and cultures,\u201d Harry adds. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t seem so far-fetched that we would adopt some of those feelings into what we do.\u201d\n\nIn Havana, three Cuban artists will be opening for the band at their two concerts. The 12-piece group S\u00edntesis blend rock, disco and Latin music into a unique sound. Solo artist David Torrens has a poppier vibe, while Alain Perez performs salsa music with his own 12-piece band. The members of Blondie are eager to see them live and, if it works out, would consider inviting them onstage to play with them during the Blondie concerts. (The band said each show will have a unique set list.)\n\nThey intend on playing their biggest hits, but also want to dig beyond their standard repertoire to create something special. \u201cWe\u2019re talking about bringing back \u2018Attack of the Giant Ants,\u2019 which was one of the very early Blondie versions of a Latin feel,\u201d Harry says, referring to the closing song of the group\u2019s 1976 self-titled debut. \u201cChris wanted to bring back [*Blondie\u2019s*] \u2018Man Overboard\u2019 and I once did a Spanish version of \u2018Call Me\u2019 years ago, \u2018Ll\u00e1mame,\u2019 which was very fun to do and was actually a hit in South America. So I would love to do that. Maybe we\u2019ll do \u2018Sugar on the Side,\u2019 which Chris wrote with some of the guys from Systema Solar from Colombia.\u201d\n\n\u201cI was deep into this modern Latin music, you know, reggaeton and cumbia stuff, eight, nine years ago,\u201d Stein says. \u201cThis was on the last two records, especially for some of the stuff on [2011\u2019s] *Panic of Girls*. I was always kind of waiting for it to cross over. I knew those beats were so great. And now the reggaeton beat fucking everywhere. It\u2019s in everything at this point.\u201d\n\nWhile they\u2019re in Havana, Harry hopes to visit some clubs and see younger artists. \u201cI can\u2019t really predict what the music scene there is like, whether it\u2019s sort of controlled in a certain way,\u201d she says. Stein says he\u2019s interested to see how prevalent rock music and its influences are there, since \u201cthere\u2019s really hardcore rock fans in Mexico and Brazil.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dearest wish is that we can do a free concert at some point in Cuba on this trip,\u201d Harry says. \u201cI want to invite a regular street audience to come in for one of the sound checks. I know that if people have spent money for a ticket, they\u2019re not going to be happy that we\u2019re giving something away for free, but I feel like it would be a good thing to do.\u201d\n\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re hoping to try to sort of semi-integrate ourselves into the community and maybe do some performances and jamming prior to the official concerts for the local community,\u201d Burke concurs. \u201cI really don\u2019t know what to expect other than there\u2019s a common denominator when you\u2019re playing music. If possible, maybe we\u2019ll do a drum circle or some kind of musical communication, which is always a great field leveler.\u201d\n\nThe one thing they\u2019re not ready for yet is just how isolated from the rest of the world they\u2019ll be. Since the Cuban government restricts internet usage, they\u2019re anticipating it will be difficult to get online. \u201cIncommunicado,\u201d Harry says. \u201cBoy, oh, boy, there\u2019s gonna be a lot of withdrawal.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe\u2019ll just have to wait for the Instagram posts until we get out,\u201d Stein says." + }, + { + "title": "Opinion | Is This the End of Cuba\u2019s Astonishing Artistic Freedom? (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Opinion | Is This the End of Cuba\u2019s Astonishing Artistic Freedom? 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It pains us to see the gorgeous architecture now filthy and reduced to rubble. The spirit and \u201ccuban-nes\u201d of the people livens our souls, but it breaks our hearts to see them living the way they have to.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-04\ncategories: ['Opinion']\n---\n# Havana Is Not Your Hipster Playground\n\n**By Chris Vazquez***\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 I\u2019m beginning to understand that there is a fundamental difference in the paradigm by which Cuban Americans & non-Cuban US citizens view Cuba.\n\nI was recently approached by a friend to lead a trip to Cuba for her company. She isn\u2019t Cuban, so the group would consist mainly of non-Cuban US citizens between the ages of 28 and 35. The travelers on her trips tend to be in the midst of life transitions, and they embark on the trips to experience nature & gain new perspectives.\n\nFor some reason, I was not very enthused. I LOVE Cuba. My heritage is my passion, and I practically breathe Cuban culture. As it turns out, this is exactly why I wasn\u2019t very motivated to lead the group. You see, I always thought that if I took people to Cuba it would be primarily Cuban Americans, and the trips would be centered around my favorite buzzword *cubanidad*\u2014the essence of being Cuban. The idea of exploring your roots while discovering and understanding the Cuba of 2019 and all the while connecting with the Cubans of the island would be central to the experience.\n\nIn common with my fellow travelers would be that we all fall somewhere on the timeline of the Cuban diaspora, all members of the exile community by association. We would have all grown up on the stories and on the conflicting notions\u2014that Cuba was the greatest land God ever created, but at the same time it was now the desolate aftermath of a failed Revolution, and if you went there it was only to give money to the regime and dishonor the sacrifices of your family. To a young kid growing up in Hialeah, where everyone in your first-grade class shares a similar origin story, that\u2019s like dangling candy in front of your face and slapping you when you reach for it (or at the very least calling you fat).\n\nMy point is that we all feel that we know Cuba through the *cuentos* (stories) of our loved ones, who proclaim that they lived in paradise before 1959 and had to leave it all behind when they were forced to come to the United States\u2014a move they widely viewed as temporary\u2014because, well, why would you want to be anywhere else?\n\nFor the community of young Cuban Americans of which I am a part, going to Havana and seeing the contradictions for ourselves is shocking. It pains us to see the gorgeous architecture now filthy and reduced to rubble. The spirit & \u201ccuban-nes\u201d of the people livens our souls, but it breaks our hearts to see them living the way they have to.\n\nThe identity crisis is almost indescribable. We did not pretend to know Cuba, though we have identified as Cuban our whole lives. But because of this association, we have always felt Cuban\u2014especially as we moved further and further from our Cuban (or should I say Cuban American) bastion\u2014Miami\u2026 until we arrive in Havana, that is. We see the Cuba of today and its residents, and we feel like outsiders in our own ancestral land. What we implicitly thought we knew because of those damn stories goes right out the window, and it\u2019s nothing like what any of us thought.\n\nBut it\u2019s nothing like what they warned us about either\u2026. Amidst the rubble, the long lines, and the classic *cacharros*, there are people hustling, living, helping one another, creating opportunity for themselves, *luchando*, *resolviendo*, y *sobreviviendo (struggling, hustling, surviving)*.\n\nIt takes getting over the initial shock, but once you do, it\u2019s there\u2014clear as day: **These are our people.** These are the people that fought for independence\u2014independence from the Spanish, independence from the United States, independence from themselves. These are the people that sent their children off alone on planes to give them better lives; these are the people that crossed 90 miles on makeshift rafts; these are the people that BUILT Miami and established a powerful community in the most powerful country in the world.\n\nWe, the young Cuban Americans, because of the *cubandidad* that binds us, understand what they are capable of, understand what Cuba is capable of. We understand their limitless potential because it is our history?\u2014?It is in our blood; it is what we built in Cuba and what we persevered to build abroad. The strength of the 11.2 million Cubans on the island and the 1.5 million abroad is one; it is theirs, it is ours\u2014Cuban & Cuban American.\n\nWe implicitly understand how beautiful Havana once was, how we made it that way, and how we then started over and made Miami that way. We understand the ingenuity, passion, and creativity; the love, spirit, and warm-heartedness; and the work ethic, the commitment to family, and the willingness to sacrifice living within every *cubano*.\n\nThat is why when young Cuban Americans travel to Havana it breaks our hearts. We see through the fa\u00e7ade that traps other US citizens who are not of Cuban descent, and it torments us. You see, I have come to realize by developing relationships with many people of non-Cuban descent who have traveled to the island and are obsessed with Cuba that what they see is largely novelty. To them, it is the equivalent of going to a forbidden island lost to time.\n\nThe reactions are something to the tune of, \u201cOh wow, no internet, it\u2019s so primitive.\u201d \u201cOh my gosh, I want a picture in my flowy sundress outside these ruins (someone\u2019s residence).\u201d \u201cThe people have nothing, but they\u2019re so amazing and welcoming! It\u2019s like a fairytale land; I love being able to come here and just disconnect\u2014I hope it never changes.\u201d\n\n*Basura!* (Garbage) A fairytale is exactly what that narrative is\u2026. To them, Havana is a hipster\u2019s playground?\u2014?a place where Instagram models, travel-diary nomads, and all these other 2019 BS buzzwords can frolic around for a few days or weeks before returning home. Their paradise\u2014my hell. Don\u2019t get it twisted: Cuba is a beautiful place filled with amazingly incredible people, my people. But these people deserve so much more.\n\nCuba was the pearl of the Antilles, the preferred island for the Spanish, and the envy of Latin America. Havana was beautiful the way San Francisco or Barcelona are today, not the way ancient Aztec temples or Egyptian pyramids are. But what was once the vibrant home of my *abuelos* (grandparents) and their contemporaries is now a pretty, boho-chic relic for US visitors.\n\nBecause of my paradigm, though, I could never see that. I could never put into words that I did not comprehend how non-Cuban Americans viewed Cuba and the Cuban people with the same curious fascination I would view an isolated tribe of indigenous people in the middle of the Amazon rainforest.\n\nTo know through the stories and through my upbringing what Cuba was and to know what it is today breaks my heart. Yet, I am filled with so much hope. I now understand what they mean when they say, \u201cI hope it never changes.\u201d They are enamored by the beauty they see in Cuba and its people, and they fear it would be lost through modernization. But still I say, to hell with that. Cuba is no foreigner\u2019s playground. Cuba is the land of the most talented immigrant group to ever grace the shores of the United States. A land of tradition, beauty, history, and life.\n\nNo, Havana should not be the preferred getaway for a week-long technology detox. But I want to set the record straight that regardless of their views, non-Cuban US citizens traveling to the island already do wonders for the Cuban people by contributing to a broader policy of engagement as opposed to the United States\u2019 historical policy of isolation \u2013 But the key to ethical travel to Cuba is being intentional in that engagement.\n\nThe most popular category exemption for US citizens traveling to Cuba is \u201cSupport for the Cuban People,\u201d which requires travelers to patronize the private sector and promote civil society by staying at *casas particulares* (homestays) eating at *paladares (private restaurants)* and supporting *cuentapropistas (the self-employed)*.\n\nThe beauty of this type of travel is that it fosters the people-to-people interactions that create the mutual understanding that ultimately changes perspectives. And the best part is: You don\u2019t have to be Cuban American or of Cuban descent to embrace it. All you have to do is start an honest dialogue and exchange ideas respectfully. These are the seeds that lead to meaningful change, and change is a good thing.\n\nI want Cuba to change. I want it to change in whatever way my people living there today want it to change. I want internet in homes and caf\u00e9s, structurally sound apartments, and this year\u2019s model vehicles on the road. It may ruin your little getaway, but it will dramatically improve their standard of living. And if they want a Starbucks and a McDonalds on every corner then so be it. It sure beats ration cards, long lines, and empty shelves in state stores.\n\nHowever, I personally hope that it won\u2019t be Starbucks & McDonalds. I hope it\u2019ll be \u201cCortaditos\u201d and \u201cFulano\u2019s Fritas,\u201d or something authentically Cuban. I want the Cuba of 2019 and beyond to be a country built by Cubans, for Cubans\u2014not for visitors to sip mojitos & take pictures next to the dilapidated homes of the locals for their latest Facebook post. And trust me, meaningful development will not diminish the beauty of the island, denigrate the culture of the country, and it most certainly will not change the warm-hearted spirit of the Cuban people.\n\nThis is the best I could ever explain the ever-so-subtle feeling I felt in my stomach when I was asked to lead a trip of well-intentioned, adventure-seeking US citizens to Cuba\u2014and why I am just now realizing that I must decline. I want to lead my people, the Cuban American people, to the righteous land of our ancestors.\n\nI want to eat dinners with friends we meet on the island, talk as equals on par with one another, explore development opportunities, discuss politics and philosophy, have coffee with families, and reconcile past & present. My dream is to convert the diaspora into one giant Cuban family.\n\nAnd I want to do it by harnessing the power of *cubanidad *to create an almost instant familiarity & trust among Cubans no matter their age, views, birthplace, or what side of the Florida Straights they live on.\n\nWriting this has been a surreal experience. I\u2019m going to go call my friend!\n\n**A Havana Times guest writer who will be contributing more articles in the future.*\n\nWell, I just got back to Vancouver from Cuba. I was in Havana. And its a SHITHOLE. You have \u201crenovated\u201d building in a city square, so the city looks nice, but behind them \u2013 a dirty, shithole, where nobody gives a shit about anything. They literally live like Eastern European gypsies there.\n\nBeaches \u2013 beautiful \u201cnever ending\u201d beaches with soft sand \u2013 full of PLASTIC GARBAGE! Cubans still haven\u2019t realized, that RUBBISH BINS along the beach, help to keep them CLEAN!\n\nTips \u2013 This was the most pissing me off thing I have experienced in Cuba. Cubans DEMAND tips. They think, that they MUST get them! Its not a \u201cyou have to earn \u2013 deserve that tip\u201d. No. Its a \u201cyou must give me tip\u201d, because you are a walking ATM \u2013 a.k.a a tourist, and you have to take care of me! Tips for any possible thing you can imagine! There are some women in the street in vividly coloured dresses who \u201ckiss\u201d your cheeks, so you feel welcome. Right after you give them 5 pesos for that \u201ckiss\u201d! Screw that! Just unbelievable.\n\nI had a guide in Havana and I asked him, if 1 CUC (currency for tourists. Dont ask me why they have two currencies) tip makes difference for Cubans. He said not really. Now. I pay 1500 CAD dollars rent. I am sure, Cubans don\u2019t. When I buy a lunch for lets say $20 CAD, I give tip 10-15% = $2-3 CAD. That tip MEANS SOMETHING in Vancouver. He said, that reasonable tip would be 5+! CUC!!! That is around $7 CAD! Absolutely unbelievable!\n\nSo, after 10 days I spent in Cuba, I left with these feelings / opinions on Cubans. They live in communism. That means, that the government owns almost everything. This leads to ONE thing. Nobody gives a shit about anything!!! Buildings are falling apart? Not my problem. It belongs to the government. Trash on the beaches? Not my problem. It belongs to the government. Nothing in the stores? Not my problem. It belongs to the government. Completely fucked up public transport \u2013 Not my problem. Government should fix it. They keep bitching about embargo and that the embargo brought Cuba where it is now. Hell no. Its Cuban\u2019s government which brought Cubans where they are now! They just don\u2019t wanna see it. They blame everybody else for their shitty situation, but them self. Cubans know about all the problems. They just don\u2019t care about fixing them. I have heard, that everybody in Cuba, must have an educations. That only the best people study for engineers, doctors etc. So where are they? Where is that educated intelligence? Cubans still make electricity by burning crude oil! I haven\u2019t seen a SINGLE SOLAR PANEL!!!\n\nI think if Cubans dance less and work more, than they would have better lives. But first they have to get rid of communist regime. Not to rely on tourists, because they say tourists must support them and only tourism can save Cuba etc. These are real things I have heard from Cubans! Nothing here was made up. Most of Cubans are like scammers who will try to milk every single CUC out of you. I was born in communist country and lived in communist country. So I knew what I should expect. Yet, I left Cuba with VERY bitter taste in my mouth.\n\nTravel to Cuba from The US by non Cubans , and Cubans travelling to the Island other than to visit relatives is now banned by The Trump Administration. The aim is to cut off hard currency flows to The Cuban Gov\u2019t.\n\nWant to see violence? Start an anti-revolutionary blog in Cuba \u2026 oops sorry can\u2019t, march with the Ladies-In-White to protest violence against dissidents and get beaten up for peacefully marching after they attend Sunday Mass. Easy to start violence in Cuba, just ask for liberties.\n\nI would like my Cuban brethren to have \u2026 I don\u2019t know, maybe freedom of assembly, freedom of press, FULL access of the internet, ability to join political parties that aren\u2019t socialist / communist, self-actualization, choices that are basic in a free market economy and many, many things that don\u2019t exist in a standard totalitarian state in which they have lived for nearly 60 years. That\u2019s a start.\n\nThank you for the meaningful comment\n\nI believe that Cuba is one of the most stirring and authentic places I\u2019ve ever been so far. The impression I have always got from most of the Cubans I have known for over twenty years is that they don\u2019t want what the U.S. has to offer. Most Cubans are quite unimpressed by the American tourists that have visited their country in the past. I think Cuba will be much better off the longer they can keep the greedy US companies from stealing their land and identity.\n\nYour article was so meaningful to me. It actually brought me to tears. It really explained so clearly why, as a Cuban-American who left Cuba at 7 in 1961, I find Americans going to Cuba in such bad taste!\n\nThank you so much for posting this.\n\nI can\u2019t imagine anyone seeing Cuba and not wanting it to change. I for one (an American) am heartsick for my Cuban friends who don\u2019t have enough food, clothes, shelter, money or even a sense of security in their own country. Whispering their opinions to avoid spies and persecution.\n\nI hate watching mothers wrap their babies in rags and an old bag because their are no diapers, an try to keep their little bellies full with watered down powdered milk.\n\nI sat for hours with an old man in Ojo de Agua a few weeks ago when I was there. He was wearing old torn ill fitting clothes and two different sandals (one men\u2019s one women\u2019s) that I\u2019m sure he scavenged out of the beach sand. He was crippled from his years serving in the cuban military and told me about his service with tears in his eyes. He swallowed his pride and tried to sell me an old coconut for one cuc. I told him i would like to buy him lunch instead.\n\nI have a great friend from Santa Clara who was swallowed up by the tourist hustling trade in an attempt to survive. A beautiful person who constantly paints on a smile and compromises his morals to survive and help support his grandmother.\n\nHumans have a desire to travel and experience other cultures, including Cuba. And most Cubans dream of visiting Italy and the United States. Maybe even immigrating to Miami . The stereotypes Cubans have about the United States are equal to the stereotypes Americans have about Cuba. The best way to break down these barriers is to travel, meet and embrace each other. Nobody leaves Cuba without being amazed by it\u2019s beauty and spirit. Nobody leaves Cuba without being broken by the way people live and survive there.\n\nAnd most go back. They educate their friends and family about the reality of life there. They return and bring clothes and shoes and diapers and tampons and some treats and things never available in Cuba. They visit old friends and share in the joy and sadness of life there and hope for a better, freer future for the cuban people.\n\nI get some of the things you state in your article, but it seemed bigoted and shallow. Sometimes anger comes out in weird ways. But an article like this sticks in people\u2019s minds and causes friction and misunderstanding.\n\nI kept wishing the end of the article was\u2026. that you took the blanquitos to Cuba. Introduced them to the people there. Showed them the complexities in the cities, the country, the poorest in the mountains and helped them learn about true Cuban culture. But it was not so\u2026 sadly.\n\nI\u2019m glad most Cubans and Americans have a more rounded and open and loving view of each other.\n\nGracias mi hermano, you hit the nail on the head.\n\nGia, none of what I expressed in the article was political discourse but rather personal feelings surrounding the state of Cuba today and my thoughts on travelers who visit Cuba without context. I have researched Cuba extensively for years and have written about the embargo on several occasions. I didn\u2019t ignore it here, it just simply wasn\u2019t about that. It wasn\u2019t an article on policy or politics, but one man\u2019s feelings about the land of his ancestors. I want to acknowledge that the embargo is a completely failed policy and it, along with the travel ban, should be lifted as soon as possible. I believe myself to be a logical person, and I form my own opinions \u2013 I do not fall blindly into narratives. While I am adamantly against the embargo and sanctions on Cuba, I guarantee you that the embargo is not the reason Cuba\u2019s economy has failed and it certainly has nothing to do with Cuba\u2019s repression of its own people. Cuba was not the best country in the world before 1959 (by a long shot), and I never made that case. My family was middle class in Cuba, schoolteachers and bodega owners. They lived a wonderful life and remember those times with great fondness, as do many other Cubans and Cuban Americans who were forced to flee their country after 1959. My grandmother\u2019s house was confiscated and given to someone who was homeless \u2013 I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s the most pragmatic solution to address poverty.\n\nGustavo thanks very much for your comment and your perspective. I agree wholeheartedly. When you take away human incentive by providing a small safety net (with many, many holes) and impose an insurmountable ceiling, you effectively crush the human spirit. Because of this, many Cubans have fled and I wish nothing more for them than the opportunities for them to achieve their fullest potential in their homeland. Perhaps what\u2019s alluring about Cuba is that the spirit of the people has never broken. It\u2019s captivating and heartbreaking, contributing more so to the narrative of Cuba being one great contradiction. My base case is that advancement will not change what people love about Cuba, which is rooted in the culture not the poverty. I\u2019m not opposed to free healthcare or free education \u2013 but you have to make them work for the people. What\u2019s the point of having the best literacy rates if they don\u2019t translate to living wages and the lowest infant mortality rates if their is no quality of life. I agree that the Revolution bore fruits, but those fruits are now rotten. I have more on this at my Medium & LinkedIn pages.\n\nMayte, I\u2019m not saying the Cuba of the 50\u2019s is the answer at all. Of course it had its issues, just like every place in every point in time. But I can introduce you to a million (yes there\u2019s over a million) Cubans and Cuban Americans in Miami who left because the barbudos broke their promises. The revolution was amazing and much needed, but its promises ended very soon after 1959. More so than anecdotally, though, just look at the immigration data \u2013 numbers never lie. Everyone will tell you que se vivia bien in the Cuba of old, or else history wouldn\u2019t have shaken out the way it has. Inequality was at a high, but is it really better to keep everyone at 0? Of course not.\n\nNot corny at all! I think that hits the nail right on the head. They can surely teach us to take pride in our work and live with gratitude.\n\nChris, first of all, thank you for your words. I fully agree with the majority of what you expressed which, I may add, are not often included in this publication. I was motivated to share my perspective on this most personal part of our lives, our identity. At age 8 I left Cuba to live in NYC. 56 years later I returned as a VIP having dinners with government ministers, researching the possibility of foreign investments. Nearly a year later I found myself having dinner at one of the most famous paladares in Cuba with 6 Hispanic leaders, i.e., presidents, general managers, directors, all of a very well known global company, along with one US born college professor who studies Cuba. All of the business men were stationed through out Latin America. One of the directors said that when he heard that they were coming to Havana for the meeting, he was sure that he would find Havana to be a dump\u2026. but that he found Havana to be on the contrary, most beautiful and cosmopolitan! Much more so than any of the other Latin American capitals! I visibly reacted to his statement and he asked me for an explanation. I told those at the table that at age 8 before leaving Cuba, my family enjoyed a home, a car, I watched Mickey Mouse, Perry Mason, and the Gillette Friday Night Fights on TV. I lived the quality of life of let\u2019s say of any kid in Chicago. Never mind Miami, which was basically a swamp at the time. \u201cAnd after 57 years, when I look outside this beautiful paladar, all I see is a tragedy!\u201d\n\nAs a counterpoint , the professor reminded them of the free education and medicine. I told them about the other side of the equation, of the lost opportunities for a people to fulfill their potentials in this life, which is all that we are truly given. That is the tragedy, the loss of potential for three generations of our fellow Cubans. The broken down facades, the lines for food, the lack of services, these are definitely heartbreaking, and frustrating, but these can be remedied in time, the lost potential is forever.\n\nI have since traveled 4 times, bringing my friends and family. They have experienced the decaying beauty, the simplicity of life, the struggle to survive of the everyday people with whom we interact. Without exception, everyone I have taken has said that the thing that always stays with them after every visit, is the heart of the Cuban people, the \u201ccubanidad\u201d. Let us hope that this generation\u2019s potential is not squandered also.\n\n\u201cCuba was the best country in the world before 1959\u201d is a common trope of US citizens with Cuban ancestry which is unfortunately reproduced here despite its lack of empirical validity. Despite the visble wealth accumulated in Havana before 1959, millions of Cubans were in dire poverty. Not poverty like you see in Cuba today, where people at the very least have rice and beans to eat and an old house to take shelter, but real poverty where they died of starvation or police abuse.\n\nThis article also follows Miami discourse in that it fails to mention the massive impact of the US imposed trade embargo against Cuba in maintaining the island\u2019s economy and exterior trade in a very disadvantageous position.\n\nPerhaps the author of this article would be better served (and would help his country more effectively) if he did some research and stopped reproducing really damaging political discourses created by the Cuban diaspora in Miami, which were incidently part of the elite which kept most Cubans in rags before the revolution.\n\nIt\u2019s refreshing to see that U S Regimes have eased the restrictions on the freedom of movement of it\u2019s citizens.\n\nThe US restrictions have now been loosened to the extent that US citizens can manage to get to Cuba and formulate their own opinions rather than having their opinions dictated to them in the old Cold War propaganda tradition.\n\nHere in Europe we never had this problem or those ideology-based restrictions.\n\nI was therefore able to spend a good length of time living in Cuba and know the place very well.\n\nIt\u2019s great to see that the folks of the USA are gaining the same freedoms that we have always taken for granted. Bravo.\n\nI remember going to the refugee camp in Pennsylvania as a little girl in the late 70s to pick up my aunties uncles and cousins and looking back. Amazed on how we all lived together in a 4 bedroom house with only 2 bathrooms. But we did. Two years ago my children we to Cuba for the first time and were able to see the Cuba many tourists don\u2019t see. The one thing that struck me was my daughter stayed she finally understood a lot about me and my aunts and that it was cool to be in a country with people that looked like her. My children enjoyed the opportunity of seeing their ancestral home. Cubans are strong intelligent creative and resilient. It\u2019s sad to see the it become more of a desolate country . It\u2019s heart breaking.\n\nHi Chris,\n\nRight, I was thinking more about your article today (that is the power of good writing!) and I know there are so many fundamental differences btwn Cuba and the US\u2013so comparing tourism\u2019s effect in the two places is tricky. Of course we New Yorkers find the Naked cowboy ridiculous, and a false and empty image of nothing, but yes, the backdrop is not as terrifying as some of the circumstances and conditions in Havana. I think the compounding effect of the poverty and the lack of freedom is the key. Here, we have poverty, and many social classes would say they don\u2019t really have the freedom or representation they should\u2013which is true\u2013but that part is at least a little different. Nevertheless, I still love visiting Cuba and try to make myself a lone ambassador of sharing ideas, warmth, empathy and love from the US as best I can being one person. I think it\u2019s important for Cuban people there to know that US citizens love something about them and their place that may not be clear to anyone yet. It is what makes travel a source of peace. The hipster playground angle is pretty foreign to me. What I see more of, that turns my stomach, is the caricature angle. Tourists who want to see what they are \u2018supposed to\u2019 see,, and don\u2019t consider that there is life outside of that. This usually seems to come from either that language barrier, which makes them uneasy about leaving the dead center of the tourism zones, or it comes from a generalized travel style where they visit other countries, hit the top 5 spots in the travel guide, complain about the food being slow or not perfect, gossip about who tried to rip them off for $5 in a taxi ride, etc. Socially conscious travel is a good term for the opposite of this! Quick story to share with you: last time I went to Cuba, a month ago, I brought 10 or 15 seed packets from an organic seed company here in the US. I own a nursery and landscape company in upstate NY. Wandering in Havana I found a small corner startup nursery that the \u2018owner\u2019 explained began as his vision to clean up a corner dump site (Luz and Compostela), and give the lot and the neighborhood, and some of the cast-off furniture a second chance. It was done as a community effort. Now 6 months in, he grows herbs and medicinal plants from cuttings and root divisions, mostly in recycled water bottles and Bucanero cans. All the fixtures and benches and the few seats he has there are built from re-purposed everything. Of course, as you can imagine. He sells coconuts to eat and drink and he sells plants. The beautiful thing was that when I offered him the seeds I had brought, he almost came to tears and said it was a treasure, pretty much impossible to find. I\u2019ll bring some more seed for him next time, but the key thing was how two people who do the same work in life\u2013albeit under pretty different circumstances\u2013can find something to share and appreciate together. And those are the true people to people moments that make me keep going, and that override all the other stuff. I hope that doesn\u2019t sound too corny\u2026\n\nI loved this thoughtful and heartfelt essay. Thank you, Chris. I take small groups of non-Cuban Americans to Havana and Vi\u00f1ales de vez en cuando, and the one thing that practically (not all, but) all of them wanted was to \u201csee Cuba before it changes!\u201d They\u2019d say this like they wanted to be the lucky ones to make it into the human zoo, a jurassic park for humans, before it was inevitably overrun by . . . Starbucks. For some reason, that was always the benchmark. \u2018I want to get here before there\u2019s a Starbucks on every corner.\u2019 And they just have no clue that what they\u2019re also saying is, \u2018you people are SO photogenic in your abject poverty!\u2019 They don\u2019t know what a shortage of bread or eggs or milk or cooking oil or ibuprofen or whathefuckever feels like. They don\u2019t know that getting piped water in the capital happens only every other day and a million Habaneros are bathing with water they\u2019ve stored in tanks, with buckets of water that they heat on the stove. They don\u2019t know la libreta and they certainly haven\u2019t a clue about CDR or tramites or multas or or or or. Esa es la pincha mia, la del guia. Chris, te apoyo en la misi\u00f3n tuya de unir la comunidad cubana, dentro y fuera de la isla. Sigo yo en el aprendizaje de los yumas. Suerte.\n\nIt always amazes me when people talk about the Cuba of the 50s like some kind of paradise. Why do you think the revolution happened and so many people supported the barbudos? Cuba was the playground of the US mafia. The ruthless dictator Batista was torturing people right and left with no end in sight. He came to power in a coup d\u2019etat in 1952 and wasn\u2019t planning any elections. Racism was rampant along with poverty and prostitution. Not to mention that no decision in the country was made without the approval of the US ambassador and the US loved our dictator. I\u2019m not saying things are fine now. I\u2019m saying the Cuba of the 50s isn\u2019t the answer.\n\nYas! Thanks Rachel (:\n\nThanks for the comment, I love your perspective. I just don\u2019t think it\u2019s mine or anyone else\u2019s right to forbid McDonald\u2019s or anything else from Cuba. If they want it, they should be able to have access to it \u2013 just as they shouldn\u2019t be forced to eat it if they don\u2019t want it. They should be given as much choice as we have here in the states, and for me to say anything else would be selfish. I personally haven\u2019t had McDonald\u2019s in maybe 7 years, but I like knowing I can visit the golden arches and grab a milkshake if I wanted to. I love the aspect of family you describe and can definitely attest to it, everyone seems to \u201cbe\u201d for his fellow man\n\nI know many Cubans that love their country and never wish to leave \u2013 I am elated by this fact. I want Cubans to want to stay in their country, but it\u2019s a travesty that they cannot prosper and achieve their dreams in their homeland. Cubans (including Cuban Americans) are some of the proudest people on the planet and I love that about my culture. The idea of affordable healthcare is wonderful, but please don\u2019t deny that Cuba exports their doctors (keeping 70% of their wages), doctors in Cuba steal from their practices, hospitals lack beds and modern-day technology. When doctors drive cabs, something is broken.\n\nIt\u2019s not about materialism or ideology. It\u2019s about food on the table and the ability to earn a living in your own country. I don\u2019t \u201cwant Cuba to be\u201d anything except what the people want it to be, which is not the dump it is currently. We have to open our eyes to these realities. There\u2019s no milk, no eggs. You should not be impressed by Cuba finally allowing internet in 2019, which by the way is not cheap for the average Cuban.\n\nHey Dan I really appreciate the comment and actually don\u2019t think we disagree very much. I write in the article that I am hopeful and glad because I understand that visitors of non-Cuban descent want Cuba to remain unchanged because they want to preserve the beauty they experience there, and that is wonderful. I am writing from a very personal place and describing my own feelings when I say that it is wrong to impose any philosophy on Cuba: forced change or forced continuity. But an understanding of the needs and wants of the people makes it very obvious they desire so much change. And so that\u2019s what it\u2019s about for me, I want them to have all the access and all the opportunities in the world, just as we enjoy anywhere else. To your point, tourists will be tourists wherever they go, but the United States has the largest economy in the world and is more than fine. If you want to take a picture with the naked cowboy in Times Square then power to you! but it\u2019s impossible to act the same way in Cuba without being entirely negligent to the harsh realities. That\u2019s why I advocate socially conscious travel. And again, my opinions are all very personal and influenced by my upbringing. I\u2019m happy you enjoyed the article and I appreciate your comment \u2013 language is definitely a huge barrier in Cuba as well.\n\nThanks so much!! You can follow along on Instagram @cubanochris_\n\nI\u2019m not sure it\u2019s entirely fair to criticize American, or non-Cuban, visitors to Cuba for being fascinated by the place. There is no getting around the fact that it has been stopped in time, to some degree. There is such a wide range of reactions to this\u2013sometimes people gawk, sometimes people fetishize the time-capsule nature of Cuba, sometimes people are just enamored with the beauty of the place, and yes, with the amazing warmth of people who endure such poverty. Yes, today\u2019s Cuba has a very sad side, of course\u2013with institutional poverty and the ongoing, long-term, deranged defense of a failed system. But Cuba still has one thing that few countries have\u2013a chance to decide how it will eventually develop. I agree that McD\u2019s and Starbucks would be disappointing\u2013I hope Cuba will be able to develop its own brands of creature comforts rather than to import, or be forced to import, our brands of comfort\u2026I think a big part of the experience depends on one\u2019s depth of engagement\u2013same as with any travel experience. Would we want to criticize all non-Americans for coming to the US and wanting to take a selfie with some kind of tourist-centered backdrop? Or for wanting to eat or drink at famous NYC or LA bars and restaurants? Yes it seems a little silly if you know the US and if you realize that the guy dressed up as Elmo in Times Square does not really represent the US\u2026but that is tourism in a nut shell. To me, the key is why you go and what your goal is from a visit to Cuba\u2013what lies beyond the initial moment of astonishment. And a lot of that depends on whether you speak some Spanish and can actually try to have conversations, discuss things, ask questions, understand answers, offer answers to questions that Cuban people ask of US travelers, etc. There are lots of chances to have really interesting conversations as a US traveler in Cuba\u2013it is the ultimate people to people, and it is real. I feel bad for US and other travelers whose visits to Cuba are limited by language, so their conversations remain extremely superficial. But anyway, your article was very moving and I agree with all the other sentiments.\n\nFor the longest time I couldn\u2019t understand why I felt some sort of way whenever I see non-Cubans going to Cuba. This hits the nail right on the head. Awesome article! Thank you!\n\nI\u2019m Cuban who live in NYC and never would live in Cuba again.\n\nI was ten years old when Castro took the power promising everything especially free elections and going back to the 1940 constitution, when Havana looks like Paris when it was stores for the whealties and poorest, a Havana of Luxury and poverty.. with a the biggest middle class in L A and bigger standard of living that Brussels in 1958. (UNdata) when you compare with the Havana of Today. This Havana of today is Vulgar, dirty, poorest, less European in its way of life, less mysterious and more \u201cfriendly\u201d (only for tourists) this Havana is misery for those who live in it and exotic for tourists looking for mojitos, stereotype of Cubans, images, cheap sex with Mulatos, and a general aspect of poverty. YIKES!\n\nInteresting article, I am not Cuban, but I feel a much deeper connection to my own roots there than I do in the U.S. due to the African diaspora- the Motherland is permeable in the air as soon as you land on Cuban soil. I\u2019ve traveled to Cuba a few times now, but I have friends that have been traveling there for over forty years. I have never participated in a Cuban-American tour group so I cannot comment whether pro or con. I have encouraged by Cuban friends to go back and make that connection and not to believe the negativity spewed towards Cuba by the U.S. Cubans seem to welcome their family from the U.S. with open arms and speak of lost relatives with love, pride and yes sadness as Cubans value family more than anything.\n\nMy friends who have made the journey say that the trip home was the best experience of their lives and will continue to maintain the connection and encourage their parents to return to Cuba. One friend that recently returned stated that her family in Cuba told the entire town of her anticipated visit. They cleared a bedroom for her; one neighbor made new curtains for the bedroom windows; another neighbor provided bed linen; everyone pitched in and made repairs and spruced up the home all in anticipation of her visit. Everyone should travel to Cuba and take your children too. I could go on and on because I love the Cuban people and I was so thankful that it has not become Miami or NYC or \u2026 Who needs Starbucks when the best coffee is Cuban brewed. McDonald\u2019s kills people with its fast fried foods causing obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, inflammation so why introduce that garbage to Cubans or any other group of people?\n\nI met Cubans in Santiago who lived im Germany, but moved back to Cuba. I asked her why she did not stay in Germany. She said, with fire in her eyes \u201cI am Cuban\u201d. I met Cubans in Havana who lived in Italy, but who moved back to Cuba. I met Cubans in Havana who lived in Miami but who moved back to Havana \u201cto be with family and get away from the violence\u201d. I met Miami Cubans lined up at immigration to get their Cuban citizenship back \u201cbecause I need the medical care and I can\u2019t afford it in Miami.\u201d\n\nI like the first answer best. Why don\u2019t you live in Germany ? \u201cBecause I am Cuban.\u201d\n\nJust like West Germany saved East Germany. I have met former East German professors who moved to Cuba because it reminded them of their childhood \u2013 a happy time. One of them teaches a course in startup entrepreneurship at the University of Havana. Perhaps your glasses are no less rose colored than those you decry \u2013 you see Cuba through the rose glasses of an American materialist. A generation is 30 years, and two have passed by since 1959. I\u2019d be interested to hear just what you want Cuba to be. As of this month Cubans have cellular internet wherever they like, and it\u2019s really cheap if you don\u2019t watch video, as it\u2019s charged only by data usage. What else do you want for Cuba ?" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery - HOT ROD Network", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery - HOT ROD Network" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMif0FVX3lxTE0zQ25kdTFHQzIxWDBrNWlCOXNCQ3FpSkRwblpReDhkclpHX3VYSUlGRkNhVmFUbkxIaUdRUWV0VXA0SVRZXzI2M1JMVGgtSlBlVXprMGdNMWFkN2pXbHJENUZhQWZjM3ozWVBySG5yeVpmbjlYcHZQbXE1WWxTZlk?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.hotrod.com/features/cubas-vintage-american-taxis-photo-gallery", + "id": "CBMif0FVX3lxTE0zQ25kdTFHQzIxWDBrNWlCOXNCQ3FpSkRwblpReDhkclpHX3VYSUlGRkNhVmFUbkxIaUdRUWV0VXA0SVRZXzI2M1JMVGgtSlBlVXprMGdNMWFkN2pXbHJENUZhQWZjM3ozWVBySG5yeVpmbjlYcHZQbXE1WWxTZlk", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 11 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 11, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 42, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery  HOT ROD Network", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery  HOT ROD Network" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.hotrod.com", + "title": "HOT ROD Network" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery\nauthor: Eric Geisert\nurl: https://www.hotrod.com/features/cubas-vintage-american-taxis-photo-gallery\nhostname: hotrod.com\ndescription: A land that time forgot. We tour the streets of Old Habana, Cuba and share a photo gallery of Cuba's vintage american taxis.\nsitename: MotorTrend\ndate: 2019-02-11\ncategories: ['features']\n---\n# Cuba\u2019s Vintage American Taxis\u2026Photo Gallery\n\nIt seems Cuba is something everyone knows both everything and nothing about. If someone were to say \"Cuba\" to a group of hot rodders, they'd probably conjure up images of old '50s-era cars driving down city streets; a place where time had stopped back when cars still had large amounts of steel and chrome on them.\n\nAnd though the lure of seeing all these old cars being used as daily drivers or taxis would be strong with these rodders, very few have ever seen it for themselves due to the travel restrictions put in place by the U.S. government preventing any kind of tourism with the island nation.\n\nLike these rodders I, too, have wanted to see Cuba for years, but only recently was able to put together a trip together to fly from Miami to Havana to see for myself what it's like, and I was blown away when I got there; American cars from the '50s were everywhere. From the moment I left the airport and down the highway, to every single street I traveled on, at any hour and every day\u2014there were so may you couldn't figure out which way to look.\n\nOld Habana (the Cuban spelling of Havana) has been around since the early 16th century, and much of the Spanish-influenced architecture is still in place, but much of it is in a serious state of disrepair. There are specific areas (where the tourists go) that is in decent shape, and a brand new Chinese hotel is being built in the midst of downtown, but most of the buildings in the immediate outskirts are crumbling and severely damaged by time. You can't tell by looking at the buildings if the damage is from a recent hurricane or tornado or just not maintained for the past 80 or 100 years.\n\nBut the rest of the world has been visiting Cuba for decades, and a flood of enterprising taxi drivers tote euro tourists around the city while pointing out interesting spots in Cuban history. Most of these cars are late '50s Chevrolets, but maybe 90 percent of the old cars I saw have had their drivetrains replaced by the more available Audi, Peugeot, or even Lada powerplants. (The Soviet-made Lada, the third-most produced vehicle in the world behind the VW Bug and the Model T, was popular in eastern-bloc countries in the '70s). We ran across 1955 Chevys with 1.8-liter Korean diesel engines as well as Mercedes-powered Bel Airs. Still, it seems there are more Chevys driving around Cuba's capitol than you might find at the Street Rod Nationals, and they use them every single day in every which way they can; usually as taxis but also for those employed in a construction or fabrication trade to haul goods in makeshift trailers.\n\nThe most popular body style is, of course, the convertible and, if a Cuban happened to own a sedan, it wouldn't be uncommon to see he's chopped the roof off and converted his ride into an open-air vehicle to attract more tourists.\n\nA one-hour guided tour of Havana in a nice Tri-Five Chevy convertible runs about $25, but in a 1930 Ford Phaeton it ran about $15 US. In contrast, the three-wheeled bicycle pedal pusher was asking $10 for a 1-hour trike ride around downtown. Many of the taxi drivers are employees to a car owner who might be operating with several old cars in their fleet.\n\nBut where Tri-Five Chevys are easily the most common found driving around, Chryslers, Pontiacs, Dodges, Buicks, Oldsmobiles, Studebakers, Fords, Ramblers, Plymouths, and Mercurys are also easily found, with nearly every one having been manufactured in the 1948-1960 year range. Vauxhall, Anglia 100E, GAZ, and other various European nameplates make up the balance.\n\nBut just because you're looking at a mid-1950s Chevrolet parked on the curb doesn't mean it couldn't also have an Audi dash and steering, a Mercedes diesel engine under the hood, a Toyota five-speed gearbox, and sitting on a HiLux frame. This is a country where sandpaper is not readily available, let alone automotive paint or any type of welding (though I did see some acetylene brazing being done), so it shows how creative and determined Cubans are in keeping these cars up and running." + }, + { + "title": "Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas - Emory University", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas - Emory University" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMif0FVX3lxTE5xTUNRN1ZUWDVRemRyTjV6aHR2MXlRQVRfdWZLa1pRZ0hhUzFlZVg4aGNLaFV6RTZucGp0WmFVUmpvcVNxQnRRY1B4bFVmV0NpeUMxaUc4LVE3Umk4aGtBTW9vT2FOZG8zVlhSdE93OWE1TnVHLVUtV2tmS3lJWlk?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/cuba-votes-new-constitution-intl", + "id": "CBMif0FVX3lxTE5xTUNRN1ZUWDVRemRyTjV6aHR2MXlRQVRfdWZLa1pRZ0hhUzFlZVg4aGNLaFV6RTZucGp0WmFVUmpvcVNxQnRRY1B4bFVmV0NpeUMxaUc4LVE3Umk4aGtBTW9vT2FOZG8zVlhSdE93OWE1TnVHLVUtV2tmS3lJWlk", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas  Emory University", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas  Emory University" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://news.emory.edu", + "title": "Emory University" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution | CNN\nauthor: Euan McKirdy\nurl: https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/cuba-votes-new-constitution-intl\nhostname: cnn.com\ndescription: Cubans have voted to approve a new constitution, according to government officials, after going to the polls in a historic vote on Sunday.\nsitename: CNN\ndate: 2019-02-25\ncategories: ['world', 'americas']\ntags: ['caribbean, continents and regions, cuba, latin america, the americas, elections and campaigns, government and public administration, politics, referendums', 'caribbean, continents and regions, cuba, latin america, the americas, elections and campaigns, government and public administration, politics, referendums']\n---\nCubans have overwhelmingly voted to approve a new constitution that enshrines the one-party system and ushers in a series of economic and social changes, according to government officials.\n\nAlmost 87% of the 7.8 million people who participated in the historic referendum on Sunday voted to ratify the new constitution, according to preliminary results.\n\nMore than 700,000 Cubans \u2013 or 9% of those who voted \u2013 marked their ballot against the constitution, a rare sign of widespread dissent on the communist-run island. Cuban officials heavily pushed voters to approve the constitution and censured or stifled public campaigning against the referendum. Just over 4% of the ballots were left blank or were invalid, officials said at a news conference in Havana on Monday.\n\nAuthorities said the results would be official once the final count is done.\n\nThe updated constitution was crafted with the input of ordinary Cubans, through thousands of meetings between government officials and citizens to suggest modifications to the constitution.\n\nThe new document replaces the 1976 Soviet-era charter enacted under Fidel Castro. It protects private property and foreign investment, and for the first time places two five-year terms on the office of the presidency.\n\nHowever, following a backlash by conservative religious groups, the government backed off from language that would have legalized same-sex marriage in the constitution.\n\n## A matter of patriotism\n\nThe referendum was widely seen as a vote on whether or not socialism had a future in Cuba.\n\nEarlier this week, US President Donald Trump claimed that \u201csocialism is dying\u201d and described Cuba as a \u201ccaptive nation.\u201d But Cuban officials framed voting yes to the constitution as a matter of patriotism.\n\nAcross the island, government supporters placed signs on buildings, doorways and school buses urging people to vote for the constitution. There were few \u2013 if any \u2013 public displays supporting a \u201cno\u201d vote. Dissident complained they had been blocked from campaigning against the constitution.\n\nIn one government-produced video released on social media ahead of the vote, former Cuban spy and onetime US prisoner Gerardo Hernandez raises the stakes.\n\n\u201cI will vote \u2018yes\u2019 because there are two groups, the \u2018yes\u2019 and the \u2018no\u2019,\u201d he said. \u201cThe ones calling us to vote \u2018no\u2019 are the traitorous enemies of Cuba.\u201d\n\nOn his official Twitter account, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said a \u201cyes\u201d vote was \u201ca mobilization for peace and against imperial intervention in Latin America.\u201d\n\nUnder the new constitution, the Communist party is still the only political party allowed in Cuba, and it remains the guiding force for all government policy.\n\nCNN\u2019s Patrick Oppmann in Havana and Jaide Garcia in Atlanta contributed reporting." + }, + { + "title": "Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution - Civil Rights Defenders", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution - Civil Rights Defenders" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiogFBVV95cUxNY1ZEZEJjVTBpem1kRTRFLTR3ckFPaENwc25URUtLZU12Zmw0bUNHX1dLSDhOeldyTFBjV1BZY25idFM0amlCSWVfV1NJNzlZbTZUb0tPQ0JWQkF5YXhrM3RRMGxsbGlLc05xWjExcGppZEhsVEFoNWFFRmZub1ZrczB3RzFaUEp5aDlPMHB5aHk1SGdjYWQ5b0ttbWtEemNfanc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://news.emory.edu/stories/2019/02/upress_tenenbaum_lecture/index.html", + "id": "CBMiogFBVV95cUxNY1ZEZEJjVTBpem1kRTRFLTR3ckFPaENwc25URUtLZU12Zmw0bUNHX1dLSDhOeldyTFBjV1BZY25idFM0amlCSWVfV1NJNzlZbTZUb0tPQ0JWQkF5YXhrM3RRMGxsbGlLc05xWjExcGppZEhsVEFoNWFFRmZub1ZrczB3RzFaUEp5aDlPMHB5aHk1SGdjYWQ5b0ttbWtEemNfanc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 23 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 23, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 54, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution  Civil Rights Defenders", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution  Civil Rights Defenders" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://crd.org", + "title": "Civil Rights Defenders" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Tenenbaum Lecture explores the Jews of Cuba and their diasporas | Emory University | Atlanta GA\nurl: https://news.emory.edu/stories/2019/02/upress_tenenbaum_lecture/index.html\nhostname: emory.edu\ndescription: Emory's annual Tenenbaum Lecture will explore \"The Jews of Cuba and their Diasporas: Memories, Stories, Dilemmas,\" with guest scholar Ruth Behar of the University of Michigan, at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb.13.\nsitename: Emory University\ndate: 2019-02-07\n---\nEmory\u2019s annual Tenenbaum Lecture will explore \u201cThe Jews of Cuba and their Diasporas: Memories, Stories, Dilemmas,\u201d with guest scholar Ruth Behar of the University of Michigan, at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb.13.\n\nThe lecture, sponsored by Emory\u2019s Tam Institute for Jewish Studies, will take place in the Ackerman Hall of the Michael C. Carlos Museum on campus (571 South Kilgo Circle), and will be followed by a reception.\n\nAlthough a small community of scarcely 1,000 people, the Jews of Cuba have attracted wide attention for choosing to shoulder the responsibility of safeguarding the Jewish legacy. Many American Jews have traveled to Cuba on \"missions\" to aid in this Jewish \"rebirth\" and have marveled at the vibrancy of the island's Jewish community.\n\nAt the same time, the Jewish community has been affected by the continual loss of its members through the many migrations that have occurred since the early years of the Cuban revolution. Behar\u2019s lecture will address the contradictions surrounding Cuba's Jews on the island as they forge a path between the scroll and the revolution, between Jewishness and Cuban citizenship, while also exploring the connection to and separation from Cuban Jews in the diaspora.\n\nBehar was born in Havana, Cuba, and grew up in New York City. She is the Victor Haim Perera Collegiate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Michigan and the recipient of numerous prestigious awards, including the MacArthur \u201cGenius Grant\u201d and the Guggenheim Fellowship.\n\nA prolific author, her books include \u201cAn Island Called Home: Returning to Jewish Cuba,\u201d and \u201cTraveling Heavy: A Memoir in between Journeys,\u201d among many others.\n\nThis year marks the 23rd anniversary of the Tenenbaum Family Lectureship in Judaic Studies, which salutes the family of the late Meyer W. Tenenbaum \u201931C-\u201932L of Savannah, Georgia. Tenenbaum, a native of Poland, arrived in the United States at age 13 knowing no English, and graduated from the Emory University School of Law 11 years later. He went on to head Chatham Steel Corporation, now a major steel service center with headquarters in Savannah.\n\nThe lectureship was established in 1997 by Meyer\u2019s son, Samuel Tenenbaum \u201865C, and honors the entire Tenenbaum family and its ethos of citizenship and public service, which is expressed through its support of religious, educational, social service and arts institutions across the United States.\n\nThe Tam Institute for Jewish Studies at Emory is one of the leading institutions teaching Jewish Studies in the Southeast. Bringing together scholars and students from a number of different departments and programs, the Institute awards an undergraduate major and minor and provides support for doctoral-level work.\n\nEach year, the Institute sponsors public events including the Tenenbaum Family Lecture in Judaic Studies and the Rabbi Jacob M. Rothschild Memorial Lecture, bringing distinguished visiting scholars to campus to share knowledge with faculty, students, and the Atlanta community.\n\nFor more information, visit js.emory.edu" + }, + { + "title": "Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution - CNN", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution - CNN" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMifEFVX3lxTE10ZlJlZUg0dndrX1habkVlWktYSEVjdFhDSlVHdlc0WkRGamxOUjdXTUduMmRWNVhkMnNCOGhkSXpwY2RiaExZVzhWTW9NZzdycUo4UjFvMHVUVjZXbUtxV0NpeU1jLS1MS28xVWM4YVUxQ2RGbUZfcUdyYWY?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://crd.org/2019/02/23/referendum-in-cuba-human-rights-defenders-unite-against-new-constitution/", + "id": "CBMifEFVX3lxTE10ZlJlZUg0dndrX1habkVlWktYSEVjdFhDSlVHdlc0WkRGamxOUjdXTUduMmRWNVhkMnNCOGhkSXpwY2RiaExZVzhWTW9NZzdycUo4UjFvMHVUVjZXbUtxV0NpeU1jLS1MS28xVWM4YVUxQ2RGbUZfcUdyYWY", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution  CNN", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans overwhelmingly vote in favor of new constitution  CNN" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.cnn.com", + "title": "CNN" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution\nauthor: Admin crd org\nurl: https://crd.org/2019/02/23/referendum-in-cuba-human-rights-defenders-unite-against-new-constitution/\nhostname: crd.org\ndescription: On February 24, the Cuban government will call on its citizens to vote in a referendum on a new constitution that will replace the current one from 1976. When it comes to democracy and respect for human rights there is however nothing new in the text. It consolidates a political system that has excluded its citizens from [\u2026]\nsitename: Civil Rights Defenders\ndate: 2019-02-23\ncategories: ['Cuba', 'News']\ntags: ['Latest', 'Latin America']\n---\n# Referendum In Cuba \u2013 Human Rights Defenders Unite Against New Constitution\n\n**On**** ****February 24,**** ****the Cuban government will call on its citizens to vote in a referendum on a new constitution that will replace the current one from 1976. When it comes to democracy and respect for human rights there is however nothing new in the text. It consolidates a political system that has excluded its citizens from political power**** ****for**** ****decades****.**\n\nWithin the Cuban democracy movement there are several different strategies on how to use the referendum to drive demands for political change. Civil Rights Defenders cooperates with a number of organisations on the island, some promote a general boycott of the referendum and some an active \u2018No\u2019-vote.\n\n\n\u201cFirst of all, it is not a referendum as we live under a dictatorship. It is just a new maneuver of the Castro regime trying to sell reformist makeup to the world,\u201d says Ailer Gonzalez from Estado de Sats.\n\n\nAiler Gonzalez will boycott the referendum that she describes as \u201ca farce\u201d.\n\n\n\u201cWe ask people to disobey, to boycott, as what the regime needs the most is high levels of assistance and participation. And as there is no possibility to scrutiny the results, no transparency or electoral guarantees, and everything is absolutely controlled and supervised by the regime, there is no point in participating.\u201d\n\nTo Ailer Gonzalez the result of the referendum is already given.\n\n\n\u201cThe regime will announce that this false constitution was approved with the percentage it believes is most credible to the world. They will even present a percentage of people who voted \u2018No\u2019, and thus promote the idea of a \u201cdemocratic exercise\u201d. The \u2018Yes\u2019 has already won, the rest is pantomime.\u201d\n\n\nAriadna Mena from Cuba Decide believes the referendum is just another course of action for the government to strengthen its grip on power.\n\n\u201cThe new constitution doesn\u2019t represent the Cuban citizens, as it\u2019s an imposed constitution that only caters to the regime\u2019s own interests.\u201d\n\nAriadna Mena will vote no, but believes Cuba needs a new system.\n\n\u201cWe must create public conscience and not play by the rules established by the regime.\u201d\n\nManuel Cuesta Mor\u00faa, from the Democratic Action Roundtable (MUAD), believes the government has three objectives with the referendum on the constitution.\n\n\n\u201cTo appear more modern, to provide new legitimacy to the government and to institutionalize the country as it is facing new challenges. For society however, it is an opportunity to express its dissatisfaction with the government.\u201d\n\n\nHe says that depending on the results it will show a new balance of power between the social forces within the country.\n\n\n\u201cThat is why I take the opportunity to vote \u2018No\u2019, especially to the articles making the Communist party the owner\n\nof the country.\u201d\n\nManuel Cuesta Mor\u00faa is however convinced that the \u2018Yes\u2019 will win, even though the feeling in society indicates that the \u2018No\u2019 has significant support.\n\n\u201cThe government\u2019s temptation to manipulate the result is in direct proportion to the actual behavior of the voters. For that reason, I would say that the \u2018No\u2019 wins even if the government only recognizes it has won 20 percent. That means that the constitution is born lame, with weak legitimacy.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents - NBC News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents - NBC News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMirwFBVV95cUxOVVg0cFBxcXpCYW5HVVFpQmJwVjZFWmZ0LWxPalZrVFZZbmo1X3hNZEMyWFNzOFNkMHN0bVU4cXRCdmpCX3dsaHVzcGRQaHRkWDQ0Q3R3bmNVcHg2M01GRkhQUl9PUEJhQXFJQy1rVi1laGU2enFfUFlIQ18zUzhzcTA3MHQ3cFpRcmpzVXI0UzlRNkpRSE9wNGFqcXVrS2ZZcEhrUTY5OEpfRGR5Ry00?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.voanews.com/a/cuba-denies-military-in-venezuela-charges-us-readies-intervention/4795545.html", + "id": "CBMirwFBVV95cUxOVVg0cFBxcXpCYW5HVVFpQmJwVjZFWmZ0LWxPalZrVFZZbmo1X3hNZEMyWFNzOFNkMHN0bVU4cXRCdmpCX3dsaHVzcGRQaHRkWDQ0Q3R3bmNVcHg2M01GRkhQUl9PUEJhQXFJQy1rVi1laGU2enFfUFlIQ18zUzhzcTA3MHQ3cFpRcmpzVXI0UzlRNkpRSE9wNGFqcXVrS2ZZcEhrUTY5OEpfRGR5Ry00", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 08 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 8, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 39, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents  NBC News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents  NBC News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.nbcnews.com", + "title": "NBC News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention\nauthor: Reuters\nurl: https://www.voanews.com/a/cuba-denies-military-in-venezuela-charges-us-readies-intervention/4795545.html\nhostname: voanews.com\ndescription: President Trump and members of administration charge Cuba's security forces and military control Venezuela's and that troops are also on ground there\nsitename: Voice of America (VOA News)\ndate: 2019-02-20\ncategories: ['Americas']\ntags: ['Americas, Cuba, military, Venezuela, U.S.']\n---\nCuba denied on Tuesday it has security forces in Venezuela and charged the statements were part of an orchestrated campaign of lies paving the way for military intervention in the South American country.\n\nU.S. President Donald Trump and members of the administration have charged that Cuba's security forces and military control Venezuela's and that troops are also on the ground there.\n\n\"Our government categorically and energetically rejects this slander,\" Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said at a Havana press conference, adding all of the some 20,000 Cubans in Venezuela were civilians, most health professionals. Rodriguez called on the U.S. administration to produce proof.\n\n\"There is a big political and communications campaign underway which are usually the prelude to larger actions by this government,\" Rodriguez said.\n\nCommunist-run Cuba has been a key backer of the Venezuelan government since the Bolivarian Revolution that began under former leader Hugo Chavez in 1998.\n\nThe Trump administration has been trying to pressure Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to step down and hand over power to Juan Guaido, the head of Venezuela's National Assembly. Guaido invoked a constitutional provision to assume the presidency a month ago, arguing that Maduro's re-election last year was a sham.\n\nThe United States immediately recognized Guaido as interim president. Since then many of Venezuela's neighbors and most Western countries have followed suit.\n\nMaduro retains the backing of Russia and China and control of Venezuelan state institutions, including the security services.\n\nRodriguez termed the political crisis in Venezuela \"a failed imperialist coup ... fabricated in Washington,\" and warned plans to deliver humanitarian aid were a recipe for violence and intervention.\n\nThe United States has sent tons of aid that is being stockpiled on Colombia's border with Venezuela, but Maduro has refused to let it in.\n\nGuaido has announced he will move the aid into the country by air, land and sea on Feb. 23 and called on Venezuelans to help bring it through.\n\nPresident Trump, speaking in Miami on Monday, warned the Venezuelan military to let the aid in or face dire consequences. \"We are all witnesses in the making of humanitarian pretexts. A deadline has been set for forcing the entry of humanitarian aid,\" Rodriguez said.\n\nRodriguez reiterated Cuba's claim last week that the United States was moving special forces to the Caribbean, a charge the State Department's special envoy for Venezuela, Elliott Abrams, termed a \"lie.\"" + }, + { + "title": "Nehanda Abiodun, 68, Black Revolutionary Who Fled to Cuba, Dies (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Nehanda Abiodun, 68, Black Revolutionary Who Fled to Cuba, Dies (Published 2019) - The New York Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMie0FVX3lxTFB6cjNLWEFMQ01aeUQ4dXpnS1psUlEtelVMaHViS2RLaFRnSVY0c1FyVnVqRkFzaW5icHd0WXVfZW9wQndiQTFIalZxbjZEOVBBV2R6N3lKUC1hS1FYNWVqajF3SjNheVhWcjVfS1ZkLVI3NC1iOE8yNHR0WQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://theconversation.com/trump-may-seek-more-punishment-of-cuba-111947", + "id": "CBMie0FVX3lxTFB6cjNLWEFMQ01aeUQ4dXpnS1psUlEtelVMaHViS2RLaFRnSVY0c1FyVnVqRkFzaW5icHd0WXVfZW9wQndiQTFIalZxbjZEOVBBV2R6N3lKUC1hS1FYNWVqajF3SjNheVhWcjVfS1ZkLVI3NC1iOE8yNHR0WQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 08 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 8, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 39, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Nehanda Abiodun, 68, Black Revolutionary Who Fled to Cuba, Dies (Published 2019)  The New York Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Nehanda Abiodun, 68, Black Revolutionary Who Fled to Cuba, Dies (Published 2019)  The New York Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.nytimes.com", + "title": "The New York Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba\nauthor: William M LeoGrande\nurl: https://theconversation.com/trump-may-seek-more-punishment-of-cuba-111947\nhostname: theconversation.com\ndescription: Cuban exiles in the US may soon be able to sue companies that use property seized from them in the Cuban revolution. If Trump moves to allow that, it could slow economic development in Cuba.\nsitename: The Conversation\ndate: 2019-02-18\n---\nPresident Donald Trump may soon do a huge favor for Cuba\u2019s wealthy, upper-class exiles, many of whom are now U.S. citizens living in Miami.\n\nSome of them still dream of recouping their lost fortunes in Cuba, and Trump may try to make that possible.\n\nMuch of that wealthy upper class went into exile in Miami in the 1960s, when the Cuban revolution turned to socialism and Fidel Castro\u2019s government nationalized their businesses and confiscated their property.\n\nMore than 20 years ago, Congress passed a sanctions law that included a provision to help these Cuban exiles who are now U.S. citizens. The provision would allow them to sue in U.S. courts companies that operate using property that the exiles lost in the 1959 revolution.\n\nThe lawsuit provision, known as Title III, was put on hold because it triggered immense opposition from U.S. allies, whose companies operating in Cuba would become targets of litigation in U.S. courts.\n\nIf Trump activates the provision, it could reignite that opposition, complicating already rocky relations with Mexico, Canada, the European Union \u2013 and obviously Cuba \u2013 at a time when the U.S. needs their help to deal with the crisis in Venezuela.\n\nAs a scholar of U.S. relations with Latin America, especially Cuba, I\u2019ve closely followed the Trump administration\u2019s growing antagonism toward Havana. But activating Title III would represent a quantum leap in hostility.\n\n## Triggering new sanctions\n\nThe people who stand to benefit from activating this law are Cuba\u2019s pre-revolutionary rich \u2013 what was once Cuba\u2019s \u201cOne Percent.\u201d\n\nThey arrived in the U.S. expecting Washington to quickly overthrow Fidel Castro and restore their power, property and privilege. Instead, the revolutionary government survived and by the 1990s was attracting foreign direct investment from Canada, Europe and Latin America.\n\nIn 1996, Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., and Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., sponsored the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act. It passed after anti-Cuba sentiment in the U.S. was galvanized when the Cuban Air Force shot down two civilian planes piloted by Cuban-Americans.\n\nTitle III of the law specifically targeted foreign investors in Cuba.\n\nIt gave naturalized Cuban Americans permission to sue in U.S. federal court anyone \u201ctrafficking\u201d in (that is, using or profiting from) property the exiles lost in the 1959 revolution, when they were Cuban citizens.\n\nNormally, U.S. courts have no jurisdiction over property owned by non-citizens that is nationalized by a foreign government. For U.S. courts to sit in judgment of another government\u2019s actions towards its own citizens would be a challenge to that government\u2019s sovereignty.\n\nSince virtually all property in pre-revolutionary Cuba was privately held, the foreign companies operating there, including many that also do business in the U.S., fear being accused of profiting from confiscated property and getting caught up in Title III lawsuits.\n\nConsequently, U.S. allies bitterly opposed the law as illegal U.S. interference in their commerce with Cuba.\n\nThe European Union filed a complaint against the U.S. with the World Trade Organization in 1996 and adopted a statute prohibiting EU members and their companies from complying with Title III. Mexico, Canada and the United Kingdom passed similar legislation.\n\nIn response, President Bill Clinton suspended Title III of the act for six months, which the law allowed. The suspension has to be renewed every six months. Since then, every president, Democrat and Republican, has renewed the suspension. Donald Trump has already renewed it three times.\n\nBut recently, there have been indications that the longtime practice of suspending Title III\u2019s provisions may end soon.\n\nIn November 2018, National Security Adviser John Bolton threatened to activate Title III, saying, \u201cThis time, we\u2019ll give it a very serious review.\u201d In January, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced a short 45-day suspension while the administration studied the issue.\n\nThe president has until the end of February to notify Congress if he decides to extend the suspension. Otherwise, Title III takes effect automatically.\n\n## Politics in command\n\nAccording to The New Yorker magazine, Trump gave White House staff paltry guidance on Cuba policy at the beginning of his administration.\n\n\u201cMake Rubio happy,\u201d he told them.\n\nSen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Rep. Mario D\u00edaz-Balart, R-Fla, are the principal advocates for Title III. They are Cuban-Americans who represent the oldest, most conservative and wealthiest segment of the Miami Cuban community. From their mansions in Miami, that elite still wields disproportionate influence over U.S. policy through these legislators.\n\nMost Cuban-Americans will gain nothing from Title III. It exempts private residences from compensation. So, if an exile\u2019s main asset was their home, they are out of luck.\n\nThe provision also exempts businesses worth less than US$50,000 in 1959 \u2013 $433,000 today, adjusted for inflation. The exiled owners of thousands of small mom-and-pop shops nationalized in 1968 are out of luck, too.\n\nStill, a 1996 State Department analysis estimated that Title III could flood U.S. federal courts with as many as 200,000 lawsuits, creating a legal morass that would take years to sort out.\n\nIn the meantime, most U.S. firms and some foreign ones would likely hesitate to enter into commercial relations with Cuba for fear of becoming litigation targets in the United States. That\u2019s a major purpose of Title III \u2013 to stymie Cuba\u2019s economic development.\n\nCuban American families have already voiced claims for the port of Havana and Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed International Airport, putting cruise ship companies and airlines on notice that they could face potential legal jeopardy over their use of these properties.\n\nIf these companies pull out of the Cuban market, Americans would still have a right to travel to Cuba, but no way to get there.\n\nIf Title III reduces foreign investment in Cuba, it will damage Cuba\u2019s already fragile economy, which in turn would hurt the standard of living of ordinary Cubans.\n\nIn retaliation, Havana might well stop buying agricultural goods from U.S. farmers. That\u2019s a market of over $250 million annually that American farmers can ill afford to lose when exports are down due to Trump\u2019s trade wars.\n\nTrump believes he won Florida in 2016 because of the Cuban-American vote, and he thinks Rubio can deliver it again in 2020.\n\nI think Trump is miscalculating.\n\nThe remnants of Cuba\u2019s pre-revolutionary \u201cOne Percent\u201d no longer represent the Cuban-American community as a whole. By decisive majorities, Cuban-Americans support free travel between the U.S. and Cuba, broader commercial ties and President Obama\u2019s decision to normalize relations. Every year, they send $3 billion to family on the island, and hundreds of thousands of them travel there to visit.\n\nThose Cuban-American voters may not want to inflict more economic pain on ordinary Cubans, including their friends and family. Come 2020, they may punish a president who does." + }, + { + "title": "Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection - University of Miami News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection - University of Miami News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMipwFBVV95cUxPcTNCdGJRVWJrcDJnajRZZFlPSF9XY3dsS2plS1dvSzN5Z2xYNy1lMm5qNVJ1QnIzUDFoRngzem5tZjlWQzR3bVZQX1pWYjJXaVRNeDlJWlZxV2k1c0toSkZQNTY2c1FIa3UyN1RXMk41dHBKbVVlekplLTdrc0kwYl9Qb1d5UE0yQWRtWTNDZFZIMF94MlNNMGFuRUF4MHUxM3lDNThFcw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/canada-insists-it-takes-health-diplomats-very-seriously-amid-suit-n969616", + "id": "CBMipwFBVV95cUxPcTNCdGJRVWJrcDJnajRZZFlPSF9XY3dsS2plS1dvSzN5Z2xYNy1lMm5qNVJ1QnIzUDFoRngzem5tZjlWQzR3bVZQX1pWYjJXaVRNeDlJWlZxV2k1c0toSkZQNTY2c1FIa3UyN1RXMk41dHBKbVVlekplLTdrc0kwYl9Qb1d5UE0yQWRtWTNDZFZIMF94MlNNMGFuRUF4MHUxM3lDNThFcw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection  University of Miami News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection  University of Miami News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://news.miami.edu", + "title": "University of Miami News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Canada insists it takes health of diplomats 'very seriously' amid suit over Cuba incidents\nauthor: Josh Lederman\nurl: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/canada-insists-it-takes-health-diplomats-very-seriously-amid-suit-n969616\nhostname: nbcnews.com\ndescription: \u201cDespite knowing of the risks of Havana Syndrome early on, Canada continued to put its diplomats and their families in harms\u2019 way,\" says the suit filed by a group of diplomats.\nsitename: NBC News\ndate: 2019-02-09\n---\nCanada\u2019s leader is defending his country\u2019s handling of mysterious incidents that have damaged the health of both American and Canadian diplomats in Cuba, as a group of the affected Canadians sue their government.\n\nPrime Minister Justin Trudeau said there was \u201cno question that the health impacts on diplomats in Cuba have been visible and real,\u201d pushing back on suggestions that the diplomats merely suffered from mass hysteria or psychosomatic symptoms.\n\nMedical testing on diplomats evacuated from both Canada and Cuba have led doctors to conclude that the diplomats developed symptoms and medical issues that can\u2019t be faked, NBC News has reported.\n\n\u201cWe\u2019ve been taking it very, very seriously from the beginning, and we will continue to take very seriously the health and safety of all Canadians who serve anywhere overseas,\u201d Trudeau said in Ontario. He said Canada has continued to work with local authorities in Cuba to investigate.\n\nTrudeau\u2019s defense came as a group of 14 Canadian diplomats, including some children of diplomats represented by their parents, are suing Ottawa for $28 million in Canadian dollars (about $21 million U.S. dollars).\n\nThey accuse the Canadian government of withholding information and interfering in their ability to seek appropriate medical care.\n\nLast month, Canada\u2019s government confirmed a 14th case of a diplomat working in Cuba falling ill and announced it would pull up to half of its diplomats off the island.\n\n\u201cCanada badly mishandled the growing crisis,\u201d says the lawsuit filed in Canadian court and obtained by NBC News.\n\n\u201cDespite knowing of the risks of Havana Syndrome early on, Canada continued to put its diplomats and their families in harms\u2019 way by sending them to Havana and requiring them to stay there despite becoming aware of the high and growing risk that they would sustain the brain injuries associated with Havana Syndrome,\u201d the suit alleges.\n\nThe Canadians join 26 American diplomats who the U.S. State Department says are \u201cmedically confirmed\u201d to have been affected by what the U.S. government calls \u201chealth attacks.\u201d The Trump administration says it does not know who or what is behind the incidents, which in some cases were accompanied by unexplained sounds and symptoms.\n\nCuba has adamantly denied any knowledge of or involvement in attacks in diplomats. The diplomats developed an array of symptoms including traumatic brain injury, hearing loss and problems with memory and balance.\n\nCanada\u2019s government, until now, has been reluctant to discuss the issue publicly, despite sending the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to Havana to investigate. Unlike the United States, which has been at odds with the Communist-run island for half a century, Canada has long enjoyed a close relationship with Cuba\u2019s government.\n\nNBC News has interviewed three of the Canadian diplomats who say they were affected while serving in Cuba and maintain that its government's response was marked by \u201cincompetence\u201d and \u201creluctance to address the concern\u201d about the situation.\n\nThey said that unlike the American diplomats, the Canadians had to seek out their own medical providers, who told some of them they had medical conditions similar to concussions, also known as mild traumatic brain injury.\n\n\u201cIt took a very long time before we got recognition,\u201d from the Canadian government, one of the diplomats said.\n\nThe Canadians interviewed by NBC News said they were suffering from headaches, dizziness, visual issues, problems concentrating, and extreme fatigue, among other symptoms.\n\n\u201cFor us to be discredited or for us to have to fight for credibility has had a huge impact on us as people and professionals,\u201d said another diplomat, referring to public suggestions that the diplomats weren\u2019t really injured or that the sound heard in Havana was merely crickets.\n\nThe U.S. diplomats have been sent to the University of Pennsylvania\u2019s Center for Brain Injury and Repair for advanced testing, treatment and rehabilitation.\n\nNBC News has learned that the Canadian government in late 2018 selected Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to screen potentially affected diplomats, treat their symptoms and study the medical conditions they have developed.\n\nThe Canadians, in their lawsuit, are seeking $14 million in \u201cgeneral and aggravated damages\u201d from Canada\u2019s government for allegedly failing to adhere to its own laws, and another $7 million for allegedly breaching the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The plaintiffs also want punitive damages of another $7 million.\n\nMany of the U.S. diplomats affected have also hired lawyers as they contemplate legal action and work to navigate the complex U.S. government\u2019s medical bureaucracy in seeking medical care and lost wages.\n\nMeanwhile, an American government-accountability group this week sued the U.S. to try to force the public release of a report, known as an Accountability Review Board, that the State Department conducted to evaluate its response to the initial incidents. Only a brief summary of the results of that report, which found no wrongdoing but several shortcomings in the U.S. response, has been released publicly.\n\nA lawsuit from The James Madison Project and New Yorker journalist Adam Entous seeks to force the State Department to comply with a Freedom of Information Act request by Entous for a copy of the report. The lawsuit alleges the State Department hasn\u2019t handed over the report and has missed the statutory deadline for responding to the request." + }, + { + "title": "Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know - Al Jazeera", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know - Al Jazeera" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMimAFBVV95cUxQUFlvZjk0V29VT2ZCaHdHVUk2UHNIbW9Pa2hhTC16NWJnUmhwMlR1dlE1RUNMSUpxcmU1ZXFhXzJjdDRGMThsVWZja1dYTnc0b3hqczdnVnN3LU15Z3hXOGlYY3hvOEtvRUFUNk5rcUtmVFVjTVM3SDBfbVlSbVY1ejVFeU4wdzlLZXE0UmlYTGVLbjk1OWlTWNIBngFBVV95cUxQUmVZdTFCdnZlVmdmOHNEM3d5eHRWcWFmSWpNek5OSDBGdzhaMzg2c1haOEhtV1hNWGo2b1U3YkxWRnpLZFZXTTA1ZXA4MzdNSTZpZ2d3dmN0RThSa0oxS1ZlWm1xZFJwaExwYUdsczhlNGEtTGdHeTdkU0t2cUVveS1VOV9HZ0JaN25tck1DZmszRGN3aXJHTld1VWZLdw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/08/obituaries/nehanda-abiodun-dead.html", + "id": "CBMimAFBVV95cUxQUFlvZjk0V29VT2ZCaHdHVUk2UHNIbW9Pa2hhTC16NWJnUmhwMlR1dlE1RUNMSUpxcmU1ZXFhXzJjdDRGMThsVWZja1dYTnc0b3hqczdnVnN3LU15Z3hXOGlYY3hvOEtvRUFUNk5rcUtmVFVjTVM3SDBfbVlSbVY1ejVFeU4wdzlLZXE0UmlYTGVLbjk1OWlTWNIBngFBVV95cUxQUmVZdTFCdnZlVmdmOHNEM3d5eHRWcWFmSWpNek5OSDBGdzhaMzg2c1haOEhtV1hNWGo2b1U3YkxWRnpLZFZXTTA1ZXA4MzdNSTZpZ2d3dmN0RThSa0oxS1ZlWm1xZFJwaExwYUdsczhlNGEtTGdHeTdkU0t2cUVveS1VOV9HZ0JaN25tck1DZmszRGN3aXJHTld1VWZLdw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 23 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 23, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 54, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know  Al Jazeera", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know  Al Jazeera" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.aljazeera.com", + "title": "Al Jazeera" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Trump Nears Key Cuba Sanctions Decision Over Support for Maduro - Bloomberg.com", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump Nears Key Cuba Sanctions Decision Over Support for Maduro - Bloomberg.com" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMitAFBVV95cUxPMlp0OTR2bGlzaHpnUmR5NXh2ZWFxMUYxM0VadnU1SGttMGdpRWg0Zi1oUHRiY09fbHhmdHhmRnlXVXVJQlc2WklDSzRTdXdDNTZ0ZThheUFFcmNwa3g3M2x1SUpiT2RVSTNrMUhISEloeXhtMkE1cmpTZlpNTk1hSGZEdzhVOXVsTXh4VFBhMEpReDRqWmtNQ3E3QVBRVzV2SzVJZGZkTFdCQWZaNW9qZGhKTlQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://news.miami.edu/stories/2019/02/honoring-the-founding-women-of-the-cuban-heritage-collection.html", + "id": "CBMitAFBVV95cUxPMlp0OTR2bGlzaHpnUmR5NXh2ZWFxMUYxM0VadnU1SGttMGdpRWg0Zi1oUHRiY09fbHhmdHhmRnlXVXVJQlc2WklDSzRTdXdDNTZ0ZThheUFFcmNwa3g3M2x1SUpiT2RVSTNrMUhISEloeXhtMkE1cmpTZlpNTk1hSGZEdzhVOXVsTXh4VFBhMEpReDRqWmtNQ3E3QVBRVzV2SzVJZGZkTFdCQWZaNW9qZGhKTlQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Trump Nears Key Cuba Sanctions Decision Over Support for Maduro  Bloomberg.com", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump Nears Key Cuba Sanctions Decision Over Support for Maduro  Bloomberg.com" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.bloomberg.com", + "title": "Bloomberg.com" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Honoring the founding women of the Cuban Heritage Collection\nauthor: Barbara Gutierrez\nurl: https://news.miami.edu/stories/2019/02/honoring-the-founding-women-of-the-cuban-heritage-collection.html\nhostname: miami.edu\ndescription: Without their foresight and love of homeland, the collection\u2014the largest repository of Cuban documents outside of the island\u2014might not exist.\nsitename: news.miami.edu\ndate: 2026-01-03\ntags: ['University of Miami, Cuban Heritage Collection, Cuba, Cuban diaspora']\n---\nGladys G\u00f3mez-Rossi\u00e9 remembers sitting after lunch in the break room of the University of Miami Libraries in the late 1960s listening to a transistor radio as the Spanish-language station read the names of the Cubans who had arrived on the Freedom Flights that day.\n\nG\u00f3mez-Rossi\u00e9, community relations coordinator for the Cuban Heritage Collection, who left the island alone at age 14 in the Pedro Pan exodus, was hoping to hear her parents\u2019 names mentioned, but her colleagues also wanted an update on how many of their compatriots had made it to Miami. Anything Cuban was of utmost importance to these Cuban-American library workers.\n\n\u201cWe really thought that our exile would be short lived, but we knew that whatever was happening in exile we needed to document so we could take back to Cuba,\u201d said G\u00f3mez-Rossi\u00e9, who did not see her parents for 17 years.\n\nKeeping track of everything Cuban was the mission established by UM Cuban-American librarian Rosa M. Abella, who together with fellow librarians Ana Rosa N\u00fa\u00f1ez, Esperanza Bravo de Varona, Lesbia Orta Varona and G\u00f3mez-Rossie, were the visionaries who created what is now the Cuban Heritage Collection, which was formally established in 1998. Abella and N\u00fa\u00f1ez are both deceased.\n\nThe five founding women will be honored on Feb. 25 at a special event at the Roberto C. Goizueta Pavilion at the Otto G. Richter Library.\n\n\u201cThe sixteen years that have passed since the opening of the Pavilion have been marked by remarkable growth and impact,\u201d said Charles Eckman, dean of UM Libraries. \u201cThis collection \u2013 a crown jewel of the University of Miami and its Libraries \u2013 has had quite a historical trajectory. It is an amazing story, rooted in the extraordinary efforts of five Cuban-American librarians, all women.\u201d\n\nElizabeth Cerejido, newly appointed CHC director and Esperanza Bravo de Varona chair, considers the CHC \u201cthe most remarkable accomplishment achieved by the Cuban exile community.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot only is the scope and breadth of its collection unrivaled, but also the way this collective vision reflects how the founding women of the CHC understood the arc of Cuban history and its diaspora; that is, as all-encompassing, broad, interdisciplinary and inclusive.\u201d\n\nAll five women worked in different sections of the library\u2014acquisitions and special collections\u2014but they had lunch together every day and treated each other like family, said G\u00f3mez-Rossi\u00e9, who has worked at the Richter Library for 54 years.\n\nOn their own initiative and later aided by the administration, they collected documents, posters, newspapers, maps, books, and anything that had to do with the Cuban and Cuban exile experience.\n\nAmong those documents was *La Gaceta Oficial de Cuba*, a newspaper published on the island that printed the names of all the lawyers who were registered with degrees. This became a huge draw to recently arrived Cuban lawyers who, with the help of the UM librarians, would copy these pages to verify their degrees\u2019 authenticity to U.S. schools as they were recertified in exile. * *\n\nFor years, most of the collection of Cuban documents and periodicals were stored in \u201c*la jaula*\u201d (the cage), a steel contraption that sat in the third floor of the library. But other documents were spread throughout the different departments. The documents included post-revolutionary periodicals such as *Granma, El Caim\u00e1n Barbudo* and *Revoluci\u00f3n y Cultura.*\n\nde Varona always had the vision that all Cuban documents, books, and maps should be housed together and that there should be a designated staff to help researchers explore the archives. She also knew the value of each piece they collected.\n\n\u201cWhat I wanted was to make sure that the truth about the history of Cuba was told,\u201d said de Varona. \u201cSince that government distorts everything about the island\u2019s history, I wanted this collection to reflect the truth.\u201d\n\nde Varona\u2019s leadership during more than 40 years brought many noted collections and donations to the CHC. UM Libraries later established the Esperanza Bravo de Varona chair in her name.\n\nAs the collection grew, the group and the library administration realized that they needed a fundraising arm and the *Amigos *of the Cuban Heritage Collection was founded. The inaugural co-chairs were former UM President Henry King Stanford and Elena D\u00edaz\u2013Vers\u00f3n Amos, a Cuban-American philanthropist. In 1994, a significant monetary donation on her behalf contributed to the establishment of the Collection in the Richter Library, said Orta Varona.\n\nToday, the *Amigos* board of directors, chaired by Aida Levitan, are the best ambassadors for the CHC. One of their main goals is to raise funds so they can continue to \u201cdocument the exceptional contributions of Cuban Americans\u201d in the Luis J. Botifoll Oral History Project, which already has more than 100 interviews with Cuban-American leaders, said Levitan.\n\n\u201cCHC, through its fabulous collection, tells the story of Cubans and Cuban-Americans for the benefit of all Americans and others interested in Cuban history and culture,\u201d said Levitan. \u201cEsperanza de Varona and other Cuban-American women who founded CHC are to be commended for ensuring that the Cuban-American legacy will be preserved for posterity.\u201d\n\nThe CHC now houses more than 200,000 precious documents, most of which are in the Goizueta Pavilion. The Goizueta Foundation also funded the Goizueta Foundation Graduate Fellowship Program to provide assistance for doctoral research at the CHC. More than 80 fellows have gone through the program.\n\nLesbia Orta Varona, who worked at UM Libraries for 46 years and was the CHC reference librarian and bibliographer, said the collection attracts hundreds of researchers because of its uniqueness.\n\n\u201cThe CHC is the most comprehensive collection on Cuba that exists anywhere,\u201d said Orta Varona. \u201cThere is nothing like it anywhere else.\u201d\n\nAmong the rich artifacts it holds are:\n\n- A first edition book of\n*\u201cIsmaelillo*\u201d written and signed by Cuban patriot Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed, who had dedicated the book to his son. - Original letters by several Cuban patriots, including a rare one by Antonio Maceo, a general in the Cuban War of Independence.\n- The Cuban flag that draped the coffin of salsa queen Celia Cruz, and a pair of her shoes.\n- An extraordinary black and white photo of the\n*Mambises*on horseback, the Cuban rebels who fought in the war against Spain. It is dated from the late 1800s. - The Lydia Cabrera Collection: papers, documents and other objects of Cuba\u2019s most celebrated ethnologist, who devoted her life to research the culture and religion of Afro-Cubans.\n- The first recipe for the Bacardi daiquiri.\n\nOne researcher who found CHC invaluable is Martin Tsang, now CHC librarian and curator of Latin American collections. Back in the early 2000s, he wanted to find information about the influence of the Chinese culture on the Afro-Cuban religion (Santeria). He knew that what he was looking for was rare and perhaps non-existent. He took \u201ca leap of faith\u201d and called the CHC.\n\nG\u00f3mez-Rossi\u00e9 helped him. \u201cI found everything I needed of the Chinese influence in Lydia Cabrera\u2019s papers,\u201d Tsang said. He later became one of the first Goizueta Fellows at the library and was able to complete his thesis for his Ph.D. on that topic.\n\n\u201cThe CHC changed my life,\u201d he said." + }, + { + "title": "How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba - Northeastern Global News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba - Northeastern Global News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiwAFBVV95cUxNS21ReUUyZGlMV3BlQlBfZDFPaTFuOEdmR0Y1b0ZFVWk3YUVtbU1nb3NkN21MVUo0UWcwVF9oaTNZMFZxRk1DcHZqeUk2azI3OExOX21HaDloZ2hEeUV2b2g0V1Z5SXd3cmJzMkxsOU1NZkdMdWlKZDRqQnFEUzU5VnZrSnVMQUZEaE1fMFdzXzRDaDd1VWpYSmI3R0JEUHh3YUJSc3ROMnpReVEzQ2F6Sm1kNWllaDgzbXZRRnNydUo?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/23/cubas-constitutional-referendum-what-you-should-know", + "id": "CBMiwAFBVV95cUxNS21ReUUyZGlMV3BlQlBfZDFPaTFuOEdmR0Y1b0ZFVWk3YUVtbU1nb3NkN21MVUo0UWcwVF9oaTNZMFZxRk1DcHZqeUk2azI3OExOX21HaDloZ2hEeUV2b2g0V1Z5SXd3cmJzMkxsOU1NZkdMdWlKZDRqQnFEUzU5VnZrSnVMQUZEaE1fMFdzXzRDaDd1VWpYSmI3R0JEUHh3YUJSc3ROMnpReVEzQ2F6Sm1kNWllaDgzbXZRRnNydUo", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba  Northeastern Global News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba  Northeastern Global News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://news.northeastern.edu", + "title": "Northeastern Global News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know\nauthor: Heather Gies\nurl: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/23/cubas-constitutional-referendum-what-you-should-know\nhostname: aljazeera.com\ndescription: Cubans are set to vote on Sunday on a new constitution that limits president's term, broadens discrimination ban.\nsitename: Al Jazeera\ndate: 2019-02-23\ntags: ['Donald Trump', 'News, Donald Trump, Cuba, Latin America, United States, US & Canada, Venezuela']\n---\n# Cuba\u2019s constitutional referendum: What you should know\n\n*Cubans are set to vote on Sunday on a new constitution that limits president\u2019s term, broadens discrimination ban.*\n\nCubans will decide on Sunday whether to accept or reject a draft new constitution that recognises the free market while still enshrining communism as the island\u2019s official political ideology.\n\nThe National Assembly approved the updated version of the Cold War-era 1976 constitution in December after a popular consultation process.\n\nIn addition to recognising private property, the new charter also limits the president to serving two consecutive five-year terms, creates the position of prime minister to oversee day-to-day state affairs, introduces a presumption of innocence in the judicial system, and extends a ban on discrimination to include on the basis of sexuality and gender identity.\n\nAn earlier draft enshrined marriage equality, but the version to be put to a vote removed the clause and delayed defining marriage in response to church pushback.\n\n\u201cThe Cuban reality has been changing in the last decades and especially in recent years,\u201d said Luis Carlos Battista, a Stephen M Rivers Memorial Fellow at the Center for Democracy in the Americas.\n\nThe private sector, for example, already has been expanding on the island for years. \u201cThe constitution needed to be updated,\u201d he told Al Jazeera.\n\n## A modern Cuba\n\nSupporters say it\u2019s a constitution for modern-day Cuba, reflecting developments on the island since the end of the Cold War and, more recently, the thawing of more than half a century of frozen relations with the United States.\n\nCritics say the changes fail to restructure political power by keeping intact the one-party system and not introducing a direct vote to elect the president.\n\nState media has widely promoted a \u201cyes\u201d vote, while the opposition has pushed for a \u201cno\u201d.\n\nAndres Pertierra, a Cuban-American historian based in Washington, DC, told Al Jazeera the vote serves as a referendum not just on the new constitution, but also on the government of President Miguel Diaz-Canel, who took office last year, succeeding Raul Castro.\n\nPertierra said that a sizeable \u201cno\u201d vote could be a \u201chuge symbolic win\u201d for Cuba\u2019s opposition. The 1976 constitution was adopted with the approval of 97.7 percent of voters.\n\n\u201cThere are different visions even among government supporters of where the government should go,\u201d Pertierra added. \u201cBut as long as US foreign policy is aggressive as it is, those things will be subsumed behind the need for unity.\u201d\n\n## Opening the economy\n\nLong hamstrung by the 60-year-old US embargo and impacted in recent years by a strain on its oil access amid economic crisis in Venezuela, Cuba has recently sought to make its economy more sustainable in the long-term.\n\nIn 2010, former President Raul Castro began lifting market restrictions to stoke the economy by encouraging private business development and foreign investment.\n\nMore than 580,000 Cubans are now independently employed, according to government statistics.\n\nThis week, the government announced reforms to clear additional activities for entrepreneurial ventures, including artistic production.\n\nThe new constitution formalises these recent changes by recognising private property. Previously, possible forms of property were state, cooperative, personal or joint ventures.\n\nDespite opening up the economy, President Donald Trump has called into question the historic normalisation of US-Cuba relations achieved between former Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro, casting doubt on the potential deepening of economic ties between the two nations.\n\nObama called the embargo \u201coutdated\u201d, while the Trump administration has floated tightening economic barriers.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t think the fact that we\u2019re having a referendum with likely high approval is going to change the US policy of hostility whatsoever,\u201d Francisca Lopez Civeira, history professor at the University of Havana, told Al Jazeera.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s a very aggressive policy in relation to Latin America as a whole and Cuba continues to be a target of regime change,\u201d she continued. \u201cAll governments have had this objective from Eisenhower to Trump.\u201d\n\n## US-Cuba relations\n\nLast month, the Trump administration hinted it could be considering activating a US law, dormant since it was created in 1996, that would allow lawsuits against companies profiting from property seized by the Cuban government in the wake of the 1959 revolution.\n\nPotential litigation through the measure, known as Title III of the Helms-Burton Act, could make companies and investors from other countries increasingly wary of sinking cash into Cuba.\n\n\u201cEnacting Title III is a mistake for US national interests,\u201d argued Battista. The move would likely alienate US allies including Canada, Mexico, and the European Union, spur a flood of lawsuits in US courts, negatively affect US business efforts in Cuba, and sour the potential for future normalization of bilateral ties with Cuba, he said.\n\nIt\u2019s unlikely the new constitution will change Trump\u2019s mind on Cuba. The US president railed against Cuba this week in a speech in Miami in which he called the Venezuelan military to break ranks with President Nicolas Maduro.\n\n\u201cThe days of socialism and communism are numbered not only in Venezuela, but in Nicaragua and Cuba, as well,\u201d Trump said, also declaring \u201csocialism is dying\u201d.\n\nCuba\u2019s Diaz-Canel responded on Twitter, calling Trump\u2019s speech \u201carrogant, cynical, immoral, threatening, offensive, interventionist, hypocritical, warmongering, and dirty\u201d.\n\n\u201cOur response: mobilisation for peace and against imperial intervention in Latin America and a successful triumph when we vote yes,\u201d Diaz-Canel continued, using the hashtags for the referendum \u201cYes\u201d campaign.\n\nAn earlier draft of the Constitution omitted communism, instead describing Cuba\u2019s aspirations as socialist. But after the popular consultation, the phrase stating Cuba\u2019s objective of \u201cadvancing toward a communist society\u201d was added to the version to be put to a vote.\n\nLopez Civeira noted this was a result of popular demand to maintain the \u201caspiration\u201d of building a \u201cmore just, more inclusive society\u201d through communism.\n\nThe referendum is scheduled on the anniversary of the 1895 launch of Cuba\u2019s independence war against Spain. Eight million Cubans are eligible to vote." + }, + { + "title": "\u2018A Tuba to Cuba\u2019 Review: A New Orleans Jazz Band Makes a Caribbean Connection (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "\u2018A Tuba to Cuba\u2019 Review: A New Orleans Jazz Band Makes a Caribbean Connection (Published 2019) - The New York Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMid0FVX3lxTE04elpqRUt2bi0tdHd0enJaWU5kb056eWpFYXRSSkF5YnJDcUIzOWIyaU5oSXFaZ19xZFdCUDZ3RXZSLV9GaEtadGp1amhhbjlJb096YTRfRDZLT243Q2RJc1dnWlFxeTFhWDBCazY0MmwtbEc1ak1V?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/14/movies/a-tuba-to-cuba-review.html", + "id": "CBMid0FVX3lxTE04elpqRUt2bi0tdHd0enJaWU5kb056eWpFYXRSSkF5YnJDcUIzOWIyaU5oSXFaZ19xZFdCUDZ3RXZSLV9GaEtadGp1amhhbjlJb096YTRfRDZLT243Q2RJc1dnWlFxeTFhWDBCazY0MmwtbEc1ak1V", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 14 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 14, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 45, + 0 + ], + "summary": "\u2018A Tuba to Cuba\u2019 Review: A New Orleans Jazz Band Makes a Caribbean Connection (Published 2019)  The New York Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "\u2018A Tuba to Cuba\u2019 Review: A New Orleans Jazz Band Makes a Caribbean Connection (Published 2019)  The New York Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.nytimes.com", + "title": "The New York Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Exploring The World of Cuban Rum - Forbes", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Exploring The World of Cuban Rum - Forbes" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMijgFBVV95cUxQb2dJZFBQZU5tQWQ4RHpFQll5VlFXV0VBZ05lWXM3Nm9ZN05TLXJsVDRrcFNXZXRwU09Fa3JxYVlCZVZYUlpuYlBpbW5wWEgzb3FXWWREeG9WcG5PeFJ3d2hzVEtYUWltYW9CTG1ZTmdxcHUyZWlEaFRxZDF5aEo4SUNVeUpXaFltbWZBb0Jn?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-27/trump-nears-key-cuba-sanctions-decision-over-support-for-maduro", + "id": "CBMijgFBVV95cUxQb2dJZFBQZU5tQWQ4RHpFQll5VlFXV0VBZ05lWXM3Nm9ZN05TLXJsVDRrcFNXZXRwU09Fa3JxYVlCZVZYUlpuYlBpbW5wWEgzb3FXWWREeG9WcG5PeFJ3d2hzVEtYUWltYW9CTG1ZTmdxcHUyZWlEaFRxZDF5aEo4SUNVeUpXaFltbWZBb0Jn", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 14 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 14, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 45, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Exploring The World of Cuban Rum  Forbes", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Exploring The World of Cuban Rum  Forbes" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.forbes.com", + "title": "Forbes" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean - LSE Blogs", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean - LSE Blogs" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMitAFBVV95cUxOTnJfaG5Qd1FKMXE0WjV4TVN5WmtpQy03Y3hyR29IREpjZDQyTzFjMGhNMEJZLXF2V0hJaERHRFZjQjVGc0lUc3d0MHdnX0x1cldfUkZtM29SVU1FTnktY0hhZzVEaDNqcGxXQmVsbG0yZGdXSGdYQm9XQlE3UXB1YjA0cklHYzNZWUd2bGJmZ2FrYnhxZ0FvQzY1ZEtzNk5zR1g2VEpHcXhXRW1pdTBWejhVTzE?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://news.northeastern.edu/2019/02/25/how-pancakes-helped-this-student-understand-the-effects-of-the-us-embargo-on-cuba/", + "id": "CBMitAFBVV95cUxOTnJfaG5Qd1FKMXE0WjV4TVN5WmtpQy03Y3hyR29IREpjZDQyTzFjMGhNMEJZLXF2V0hJaERHRFZjQjVGc0lUc3d0MHdnX0x1cldfUkZtM29SVU1FTnktY0hhZzVEaDNqcGxXQmVsbG0yZGdXSGdYQm9XQlE3UXB1YjA0cklHYzNZWUd2bGJmZ2FrYnhxZ0FvQzY1ZEtzNk5zR1g2VEpHcXhXRW1pdTBWejhVTzE", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean  LSE Blogs", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean  LSE Blogs" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://blogs.lse.ac.uk", + "title": "LSE Blogs" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba\nauthor: Molly Callahan\nurl: https://news.northeastern.edu/2019/02/25/how-pancakes-helped-this-student-understand-the-effects-of-the-us-embargo-on-cuba/\nhostname: northeastern.edu\ndescription: When this student, working on co-op in Cuba, finally found eggs after months of scouring the stores, the effects of the US embargo hit home.\nsitename: Northeastern Global News\ndate: 2019-02-25\ncategories: ['University News']\n---\n# How pancakes helped one student understand the effects of the US embargo on Cuba\n\nKatrina Haase never expected she\u2019d be so excited to see a carton of eggs.\n\nBut when the Northeastern student, a month into her co-op in Cuba, saw someone walking down her street with a dozen and a half eggs, she ran outside to ask where he\u2019d gotten them. She dashed off to the grocery store the man described, and came home with dozens of eggs. After a month without them, it was like striking culinary gold.\n\n\u201cMy roommate was so excited when she saw them, and we were dancing and hugging and jumping around because we finally had eggs,\u201d Haase said. A month into their trip and \u201cthat was our first real bonding moment,\u201d she said.\n\nIn Cuba, I felt a lot of responsibility as someone from America. I felt like a citizen diplomat. That experience was really important for me, because I may want to go into the foreign service in the future.\n\nKatrina Haase, Northeastern student\n\nIt was Haase\u2019s first personal experience with the chilling effects of the United States\u2019 economic embargo on Cuba.\n\nPresident Dwight D. Eisenhower first proclaimed an **embargo on trade with Cuba** in 1960 in response to Fidel Castro\u2019s Communist revolution of the island. Soon after he came to power in 1959, Castro established ties with the Soviet Union. In 1962, in what became known as the Cuban Missile Crisis, Cuba became the site of a tense military standoff between the U.S. and the Soviets over nuclear missiles the Soviet Union was building on the island. It was then that President John F. Kennedy **expanded** the reach of the trade restrictions.\n\nIn 2014, it seemed tensions between the two countries were easing, and President Barack Obama **signed a measure** that would relax the embargo. But in 2017, President Donald Trump **issued a memorandum** that strengthened the economic sanctions on the country.\n\nThough Haase had learned about the embargo, living it was something else entirely, she said.\n\n\u201cLet\u2019s say I wanted to make pancakes,\u201d she said. \u201cOne grocery store would have flour, another would have eggs, and another would have baking soda\u2014you couldn\u2019t get all the ingredients in one place because they were so hard to come by. That\u2019s something we take for granted in the United States.\u201d\n\nHaase is studying international affairs, specifically related to Latin America, she said. During the spring semester of 2018, she worked at the **Antonio N\u00fa\u00f1ez Jim\u00e9nez Foundation****, **a non-governmental organization dedicated to studying the effect of climate change on Cuba. Haase helped the foundation assess whether tourism would be a sustainable financial avenue for certain rural communities on the island, she said.\n\nFor her work, Haase was recently selected out of hundreds of students to receive the International Work Experience Award from the **Cooperative Education and Internship Association**, an organization that serves as a resource for schools and employers that participate in experiential learning.\n\nHer co-op at the foundation was made possible by academic partnerships among Northeastern, the University of Havana, and the Antonio N\u00fa\u00f1ez Jim\u00e9nez Foundation.\n\n\u201cIn Cuba, I felt a lot of responsibility as someone from the United States,\u201d Haase said. \u201cI\u2019ve always considered myself to be a citizen diplomat. That experience was really important for me, because I may want to go into the foreign service in the future.\u201d\n\n*For media inquiries**, please contact media@northeastern.edu.*" + }, + { + "title": "How Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World - Foundation for Economic Education", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "How Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World - Foundation for Economic Education" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMimAFBVV95cUxPak5UZ0xkYXNJMFRlT3lvSHNsclphWHNFZVNjR2t0N0o2YnZIVF9vREQ4a0Q3RGJyMXFJelZNRXAxY2Q0ZU05QVRVSnlLaTdLako3QTdtNnRjQTFLZm1hQTRXaUYtR0NXWWVJR19WamRfNi1BQjNMYl9GLWZORk5DMzBOOUIzNFhqdTlrRW5yUEJ3cTdwaGhYTA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.forbes.com/sites/joemicallef/2019/02/14/exploring-the-world-of-cuban-rum/", + "id": "CBMimAFBVV95cUxPak5UZ0xkYXNJMFRlT3lvSHNsclphWHNFZVNjR2t0N0o2YnZIVF9vREQ4a0Q3RGJyMXFJelZNRXAxY2Q0ZU05QVRVSnlLaTdLako3QTdtNnRjQTFLZm1hQTRXaUYtR0NXWWVJR19WamRfNi1BQjNMYl9GLWZORk5DMzBOOUIzNFhqdTlrRW5yUEJ3cTdwaGhYTA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 21 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 21, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 52, + 0 + ], + "summary": "How Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World  Foundation for Economic Education", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "How Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World  Foundation for Economic Education" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://fee.org", + "title": "Foundation for Economic Education" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Urban Agriculture: What U.S. Cities Can Learn From Cuba - U.S. News & World Report", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Urban Agriculture: What U.S. Cities Can Learn From Cuba - U.S. News & World Report" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiqwFBVV95cUxNRV83YUVtRy01VE1obUpqejZYRkdYUm9MSDY0bmtUVHJlQ19pNWtjWWtVNXFqclB3bUZLQXNrOG0yWDdhQ1J2bWRPcHZya2o4LWlkeWJwNVh6MGN1cXZBS1JrVWVsRXkwQlpSOUdIUjVQNkFvZU5ZTzJWZkl2bUZ5RFI4dUxKUGJ5TVd2U3pOSjQteG9NdU53dC03Q013bDVTeXIyOXdkQXY4Uk0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/latamcaribbean/2019/02/27/cuban-healthcare-offers-many-lessons-for-global-health-security/", + "id": "CBMiqwFBVV95cUxNRV83YUVtRy01VE1obUpqejZYRkdYUm9MSDY0bmtUVHJlQ19pNWtjWWtVNXFqclB3bUZLQXNrOG0yWDdhQ1J2bWRPcHZya2o4LWlkeWJwNVh6MGN1cXZBS1JrVWVsRXkwQlpSOUdIUjVQNkFvZU5ZTzJWZkl2bUZ5RFI4dUxKUGJ5TVd2U3pOSjQteG9NdU53dC03Q013bDVTeXIyOXdkQXY4Uk0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 13 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 13, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 44, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Urban Agriculture: What U.S. Cities Can Learn From Cuba  U.S. News & World Report", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Urban Agriculture: What U.S. Cities Can Learn From Cuba  U.S. News & World Report" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.usnews.com", + "title": "U.S. News & World Report" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuban healthcare offers many lessons for global health security - LSE Latin America and Caribbean\nauthor: Editor\nurl: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/latamcaribbean/2019/02/27/cuban-healthcare-offers-many-lessons-for-global-health-security/\nhostname: blogs.lse.ac.uk\ndescription: Despite its impressive achievements in a resource-poor setting, Cuba has never been seen as a poster child for health security. Yet the country's medical internationalism and integrated healthcare system have proved remarkably successful in preventing and controlling infectious-disease threats, write Clare Wenham (LSE Department of Health Policy) and Sonja Kittlesen (University of Oslo).\nsitename: LSE Latin America and Caribbean - Expert analysis of Latin American and Caribbean affairs from LSE and beyond\ndate: 2019-02-27\ncategories: ['Society, Caribbean, Cuba, Cuba-US relations, Ebola, embargo, epidemics, global health, health, health policy, healthcare, infectious diseases, Latin America, Mais M\u00e9dicos, medical internationalism, socialism, universal health coverage, clare-wenham, sonja-kittlesen']\n---\n*Despite its impressive achievements in a resource-poor setting, Cuba has never been seen as a poster child for health security. Yet the country\u2019s medical internationalism and integrated healthcare system have proved remarkably successful in preventing and controlling infectious-disease threats, write** ***Clare Wenham** (LSE Health Policy) *and *** Sonja Kittlesen **(University of Oslo)\n\n*.*\n\n**\u2022 Disponible tambi\u00e9n ****en espa\u00f1ol**\n\nWhen we think of epidemics, we tend not to think of Cuba. Yet, Cuba has an exemplary track record when it comes to health security \u2013 that is, the prevention and control of infectious-disease threats. It eradicated polio, malaria, tetanus, and measles, as well as bring the first country in the world to eliminate mother-to-child transmission of HIV.\n\nHowever, discussions on Cuban healthcare tend to focus less on health security and more on its strong state-run, integrated health system, which is rooted in a vision of health as a fundamental right and part of the socialist project. The free preventative and curative services provided by this system have been shown to produce world-leading health outcomes across a variety of indicators, even if the veracity of certain claims is sometimes disputed.\n\nDespite its impressive achievements in a resource-poor setting, Cuba has never been seen as a poster child for health security, yet the Cuban experience does offer important lessons for improving health security globally.\n\n**Cuba\u2019s medical internationalism**\n\nFrom an international perspective, a key trait of Cuba\u2019s health-security activities is medical internationalism, which involves both sending medical teams abroad and bringing medical students and patients back to Cuba. Recent media coverage of the closure of the Mais M\u00e9dicos programme in Brazil has focused on the political determinants of these overseas medical missions, where Cuban doctors are sent to provide healthcare in the name of international solidarity or in exchange for oil or hard currency.\n\nParticularly significant from the standpoint of global health security, however, is the role that Cuban doctors have played in supporting responses to a number of epidemic outbreaks. The Cuban government was one of the first to respond to the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, and its medical teams constituted the largest international bilateral support to reach the region. This contrasts sharply with the criticism faced by the wider global community for its inadequate and delayed response to the crisis.\n\nYet, Cuba does not approach its medical internationalism as a matter of health security. Rather, Cuba\u2019s medical missions are rooted in the principle of solidarity with the global population and considered an extension of Cuba\u2019s national health policy. From the government\u2019s perspective, medical internationalism is also a means of promoting the socialist project. This differs markedly from other international approaches to epidemic response, many of which are anchored in military and defence programmes and motivated by a desire to protect domestic populations from external threats of disease.\n\n**Cuba\u2019s integrated health system**\n\nAlongside its international efforts, Cuba also has a remarkably strong health-security position domestically.\n\nAs already mentioned, Cuba has eradicated a number of infectious disease threats from its territory. Moreover, in an effort to ensure that these and other non-native infectious diseases are not re-introduced, Cuba maintains fierce point-of-entry controls: mandatory prophylaxis if returning from a malaria-endemic region and quarantine if returning from Ebola-infected locations.\n\nThough it raises some questions around civil liberties, routine follow-up actually occurs for travellers returning from any potential disease \u201chot spot\u201d. First, the neighbourhood doctor is notified of a recently returned passenger. The doctor is then obligated to follow up directly with that person both to allow for detection of any unusual symptoms and to ensure quick treatment where necessary as a means of avoiding onward transmission. In this way, the Cuban health system far outperforms any health system in the Global North.\n\nAnother key trait of Cuba\u2019s domestic health-security efforts is their embedding within the universal healthcare system. Cuba\u2019s example here shows that health security can be achieved in low-income settings through strengthened health systems and promotion of universal health coverage (UHC), which ensures that all individuals can access quality health services without having to endure financial hardship as a result.\n\nNot only that, mechanisms and processes for providing UHC also provide the foundation for effective infectious disease control. The Cuban health system prioritises preventative care through vaccinations and health-education programmes, which in turn reduce the chances of an outbreak taking hold in the country. This is then reinforced by the facilitation of easy and free access to health professionals through neighbourhood health clinics: when infections do occur, they are detected and responded to sooner rather than later. Despite a lack of automated infrastructure and a paper-based surveillance system, this kind of early detection through UHC has enabled Cuba to respond to outbreaks of dengue and cholera with impressive speed and efficacy.\n\n**Learning from the Cuban experience**\n\nWhilst it is impossible to imagine a replication of the Cuban health system in other resource-poor settings owing to the uniqueness of the country\u2019s political situation, a number of meaningful lessons can be ported nonetheless.\n\nAs is well-known, a focus on preventing infectious diseases should be paramount in any health-security efforts, and Cuba demonstrates how a strong, prevention-oriented, and community-based health system can contribute to reducing such threats. It also demonstrates the effectiveness of providing national doctors for international service in disease-control efforts; that is, allowing a well-trained medical corps to respond to outbreaks both at home and abroad.\n\nDespite the successes of Cuba\u2019s international and domestic health-security efforts to date, one glaring threat persists: the US embargo. The embargo has wide-ranging effects, which notably extend to the health sector. The lack of access to the latest medicines can have a severe impact on responses to novel outbreaks or diseases for which Cuban\u2019s emerging biotechnology industry has yet to develop indigenous alternatives. Thus, Donald Trump\u2019s reversal of the Obama administration\u2019s attempts to normalise US-Cuban relations represents just one more detail of the Cuban experience that has far-reaching implications for health security.\n\n\nNotes:\n\n\u2022 The views expressed here are of the authors rather than the Centre or the LSE\n\n\u2022 Please read our Comments Policy before commenting\n\nThank you very much.. Indeed, with the increasing cost of health care, most of the countries are in need to learn from such experience especially from a country with limited resources in addition to the imposed sanctions. Hope for more in-depth similar articles. Hope as well for more research on the health system in North Korea (I have worked there for almost 8 years. Best wishes." + }, + { + "title": "Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property - VOA - Voice of America English News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property - VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMinwFBVV95cUxOWVplal9yX19kemFfdmxHLTQyWjEzbEI0TVJZNDZWUUZyTm1iUmhVNERkbnYzZ1E4M3ROVzN0MmFIMldJTkhYQU45dEoyOE5yOUswcmxWX1hpV0xSNUZlektPZTJiZ0pKQUNIVzBoU3FET29pTXdGT1kwWmZtZldJeFQ5andKdzdtMFEwelN3Z1d6RlhtVE51RFZPcTZua1nSAaIBQVVfeXFMUGFsU0dEV2E1WnE5bUFRWXJ6SWJiX25iSlg2UjVPVDlZREpZYmVDQmoxS0FrY3YybW5JN3NCbnZENnUyaWxoV0Jmal9ydUt2VmZQdWtQWUpNLV82RXpEdy0tQkJOYmtKRkxYMjhNWFZxRXhiLXhONkZydDNxRGR3QldPM2ZoZ2k1aVJ0cGM5dVZNakc0NEl5NWh1dl9lemlFQmdn?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.voanews.com/a/cuba-votes-on-updated-constitution-accepts-private-property/4802115.html", + "id": "CBMinwFBVV95cUxOWVplal9yX19kemFfdmxHLTQyWjEzbEI0TVJZNDZWUUZyTm1iUmhVNERkbnYzZ1E4M3ROVzN0MmFIMldJTkhYQU45dEoyOE5yOUswcmxWX1hpV0xSNUZlektPZTJiZ0pKQUNIVzBoU3FET29pTXdGT1kwWmZtZldJeFQ5andKdzdtMFEwelN3Z1d6RlhtVE51RFZPcTZua1nSAaIBQVVfeXFMUGFsU0dEV2E1WnE5bUFRWXJ6SWJiX25iSlg2UjVPVDlZREpZYmVDQmoxS0FrY3YybW5JN3NCbnZENnUyaWxoV0Jmal9ydUt2VmZQdWtQWUpNLV82RXpEdy0tQkJOYmtKRkxYMjhNWFZxRXhiLXhONkZydDNxRGR3QldPM2ZoZ2k1aVJ0cGM5dVZNakc0NEl5NWh1dl9lemlFQmdn", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 24 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 24, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 55, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property  VOA - Voice of America English News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property  VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.voanews.com", + "title": "VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba Votes on Updated Constitution, Accepts Private Property\nauthor: Associated Press\nurl: https://www.voanews.com/a/cuba-votes-on-updated-constitution-accepts-private-property/4802115.html\nhostname: voanews.com\ndescription: The new document, which had been tweaked after a series of public consultations, maintains control by the Communist Party, but adjusts the nation\u2019s legal system to account for years of greater opening to small-scale private enterprise and closer ties to Cuban emigrants abroad\nsitename: Voice of America (VOA News)\ndate: 2019-02-24\ncategories: ['Americas']\ntags: ['Americas']\n---\nCubans voted Sunday on a new constitution that expands recognition of private property and updates a Soviet bloc-era charter for the socialist nation.\n\nThe new document, which had been tweaked after a series of public consultations, maintains control by the Communist Party, but adjusts the nation\u2019s legal system to account for years of greater opening to small-scale private enterprise and closer ties to Cuban emigrants abroad.\n\nPassage of the measure was assured, despite opposition by some evangelical Christian leaders upset that the document opens the possibility for eventual legalization of gay marriage.\n\nLines stretched from schools used as polling places on Sunday following days of heavy official promotion for a \u201cYes\u201d vote and less prominent opposition sentiment expressed on social media sites recently opened to a broader range of Cubans.\n\nPresident Miguel Diaz-Canel took to Twitter to encourage support, writing \u201cCubaVotesYes\u201d and saying the document \u201cguatantees the rights of each and every citizen of the nation.\u201d\n\nThe previous constitution was adopted in 1976 at a time when Cuba depended heavily on Soviet aid and trade and tightly restricted private enterprise. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union slammed Cuba\u2019s economy in the early 1990s, the island has allowed hundreds of thousands of people to launch small private businesses, though their scale has been tightly restricted. The new constitution would allow some such businesses to legally hire a few workers.\n\nIslandwide consultations led to numerous changes in the document, notably omitting an article that would have legalized gay marriage. But evangelicals were alarmed that it seems to open the way for eventual legalization by omitting the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman.\n\nThe document also would create the post of prime minister, promote cooperatives and recognize dual citizenship." + }, + { + "title": "Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention - VOA - Voice of America English News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention - VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMipwFBVV95cUxOWGVadXF5TjV0Y1ZsYUdiQk9KT2VURGNTdUtHN0xLTEc4ZE1RUTJTV3BFUHBDOGtNQXdaeEJ0Njc1Znl0Y2xtaThWdy1XSkFqVGN4NmVqWlcyZGw5eVg4akFTdUM4ckVGY3pNVDg4dTY4bmRxSW1iRERhMnU4dG9VZkpiTmpya21kTkpmT1p4Y2VqNzJvUzM5RVdpSnhYdlMxNGYzeDJESdIBqgFBVV95cUxOMThTSjFMQWh4RVJSbXZwcEY5clpoa0hIMVJYMVUwakNRdVZDQzZKX25scTRfNi1oclQ1ZlgxUXFXTXJvbzNGcTFhOUpKSUlPV21GbmY4OGRTWktOMEQ2SDYwclE5Q3I5LVpQMTlIYUlCRWQ3eXhTdkU4RndBRmlfSHNNV2ZpRmpPX0tJTld2Nk1qWmxUbHhlTjhkVmpQcmx3ZUxncHNMT2I4Zw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.usnews.com/news/cities/articles/2019-02-13/urban-agriculture-what-us-cities-can-learn-from-cuba", + "id": "CBMipwFBVV95cUxOWGVadXF5TjV0Y1ZsYUdiQk9KT2VURGNTdUtHN0xLTEc4ZE1RUTJTV3BFUHBDOGtNQXdaeEJ0Njc1Znl0Y2xtaThWdy1XSkFqVGN4NmVqWlcyZGw5eVg4akFTdUM4ckVGY3pNVDg4dTY4bmRxSW1iRERhMnU4dG9VZkpiTmpya21kTkpmT1p4Y2VqNzJvUzM5RVdpSnhYdlMxNGYzeDJESdIBqgFBVV95cUxOMThTSjFMQWh4RVJSbXZwcEY5clpoa0hIMVJYMVUwakNRdVZDQzZKX25scTRfNi1oclQ1ZlgxUXFXTXJvbzNGcTFhOUpKSUlPV21GbmY4OGRTWktOMEQ2SDYwclE5Q3I5LVpQMTlIYUlCRWQ3eXhTdkU4RndBRmlfSHNNV2ZpRmpPX0tJTld2Nk1qWmxUbHhlTjhkVmpQcmx3ZUxncHNMT2I4Zw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 19 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 19, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 50, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention  VOA - Voice of America English News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba Denies Military in Venezuela, Charges US Readies Intervention  VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.voanews.com", + "title": "VOA - Voice of America English News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: " + }, + { + "title": "I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined - Hyperallergic", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined - Hyperallergic" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMibEFVX3lxTE5ialJZWnUwQm1DNVNmNVI2M01IcFdxRmNOZzFDbmZCemU4LXBYNmZhb3VuNXl4bGZqcHRIS0ZxLWNJRnFIQ053TTNZU1FSTk1keHU1VFNOWk9BYVNEX1ZyUkE0UmRFd3lGdk1nVA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://fee.org/articles/how-cubas-infant-mortality-rank-fell-from-13th-to-49th-in-the-world/", + "id": "CBMibEFVX3lxTE5ialJZWnUwQm1DNVNmNVI2M01IcFdxRmNOZzFDbmZCemU4LXBYNmZhb3VuNXl4bGZqcHRIS0ZxLWNJRnFIQ053TTNZU1FSTk1keHU1VFNOWk9BYVNEX1ZyUkE0UmRFd3lGdk1nVA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 21 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 21, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 52, + 0 + ], + "summary": "I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined  Hyperallergic", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined  Hyperallergic" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://hyperallergic.com", + "title": "Hyperallergic" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: How Cuba's Infant Mortality Rank Fell from 13th to 49th in the World\nauthor: Hans Bader\nurl: https://fee.org/articles/how-cubas-infant-mortality-rank-fell-from-13th-to-49th-in-the-world/\nhostname: fee.org\ndescription: Cuba in 1950 had a lower child mortality rate than all but a handful of the world\u2019s countries\u2014lower than Canada and on par with the United States. What happened?\nsitename: Foundation for Economic Education\ndate: 2024-02-06\ncategories: ['Economics']\ntags: ['Capitalism', 'Communism', 'Cuba', 'Fidel Castro', 'Health Care']\n---\n## Cuba has made less progress in health care and life expectancy than most of Latin America in recent years due to its decrepit health care system.\n\nIt has never been a safer world in which to be a child. According to the UN, in 1950, most of the world had a child death rate (by age five) of over 20 percent, while only a few countries, such as the United States, Cuba, Canada, England, Australia, and New Zealand had child death rates of below 5 percent. By 2015, most of the world had a child death rate of below 5 percent, and every country on Earth had a child death rate below 20 percent (even war-torn Yemen, whose child death rate fell from 50 percent in 1950 to 4.8 percent in 2015, the first year of its current civil war).\n\nFor many developed countries, the child mortality rate is now below 1 percent. It\u2019s less than 1 percent in the United States; all but two countries in the European Union; Japan, Korea, and Malaysia; Canada, Australia, and New Zealand; and parts of Arabia. (See \u201cChild Mortality in 1800, 1950 and 2015,\u201d three maps from Our World in Data).\n\nAnd world hunger and poverty have diminished enormously. As the Cato Institute\u2019s Marian Tupy pointed out, in 1981, \u201c44.3 percent of the world lived in extreme poverty.\u201d But in 2015, only \u201c9.6 percent\u201d did. The last 40 years have seen a \u201cmassive and historically unprecedented decline in global poverty.\u201d\n\n## Castro Took Credit for Capitalism\u2019s Successes\n\nCuba in 1950 had a lower child mortality rate than all but a handful of the world\u2019s countries\u2014lower than Canada and on par with the United States. That was long before the Communists took over in Cuba in 1959. The Communists did not give Cuba its unusually good world health ranking. Cuba had already achieved it long before the Marxist dictator Fidel Castro seized power.\n\nCuba has made less progress in health care and life expectancy than most of Latin America in recent years.\n\nYet Castro\u2019s regime took credit for the prior achievement of his non-communist predecessors, and many progressives have gullibly swallowed that propaganda. In 2016, *The Washington Post*\u2019s fact-checker, Glenn Kessler, debunked such claims. He gave \u201cthree Pinocchios\u201d to Canadian Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for claiming that Castro made \u201csignificant improvements to the education and healthcare of his island nation.\u201d He pointed to data about how Cuba already had well-developed health and education systems by world standards.\n\nBut similar claims have been made by many other gullible progressive politicians. They depict the dictator Castro as the savior of Cuba. Bernie Sanders claimed it was Castro who \u201ceducated their kids, gave their kids healthcare.\u201d Jimmy Carter claimed that Castro gave Cuba \u201csuperb systems of health care and universal education.\u201d Obama also promoted the myth of excellent Cuban health care, saying, \u201cThe United States recognizes progress that Cuba has made as a nation, its enormous achievements in education and in health care.\u201d\n\nIn reality, Cuba has made less progress in health care and life expectancy than most of Latin America in recent years due to its decrepit health care system. \u201cHospitals in the island\u2019s capital are literally falling apart.\u201d Sometimes, patients \u201chave to bring everything with them, because the hospital provides nothing. Pillows, sheets, medicine: everything.\u201d\n\nAs *Townhall* notes, in 1958, the year *before* the Communists took over Cuba:\n\nCuba ranked 13th from the top, worldwide with\n\nthe lowest infant-mortality rate.This meant that robustly capitalist and immigrant-swamped pre-Castro Cuba hadthe 13th lowest infant-mortality rate in the world.This put her not only at the top in Latin America but atop most of Western Europe, ahead of France, Belgium, West Germany, Israel, Japan, Austria, Italy, Spain, and Portugal. Today all of these countries leave Communist Cuba in the dust, with much lower infant mortality rates.Today Cuba is ravaged by diseases that had been long-eradicated in pre-Castro Cuba (dengue, cholera, for a few examples.) And of Cuba\u2019s \u201cdoctors\u201d fortunate enough to escape their indentured servitude to the Castro-Family-Plantation, the overwhelmingly majority flunk the exam given in the U.S. for licensing as doctor\u2019s assistants.\n\nAnd even plummeting from 13th (Capitalist) to 49th (Communist), Cuba\u2019s \u201cimpressive\u201d infant mortality rate is kept artificially low by Communist chicanery with statistics and by an appalling abortion rate of 0.71 abortions per live birth. This is the hemisphere\u2019s highest, by far. Any Cuban pregnancy that even hints at trouble gets \u201cterminated.\u201d\n\nA few years ago Dr. Juan Felipe Garc\u00eda, MD, of Jacksonville, Fla., interviewed several recent doctor defectors from Cuba. Based on what he heard, he reported the following:\n\n\u201cThe official Cuban infant-mortality figure\n\nis a farce.Cuban pediatricians constantly falsify figures for the regime. If an infant dies during its first year, the doctors often report he was older. Otherwise, such lapses could cost him severe penalties and his job.\u201d\n\nIt should be noted that the official Cuban infant mortality rate is still quite low compared to most of the world. But relatively speaking, it has lost ground, especially compared to capitalist countries in Asia like South Korea.\n\nCuba also lost the big edge in life expectancy it once enjoyed. Prior to communism, it led virtually all countries in Latin America in life expectancy. But by 2012, Chileans and Costa Ricans lived slightly longer than Cubans. Back in 1960, Chileans had a life span seven years shorter than Cubans, and Costa Ricans lived more than two years less than Cubans on average. In 1960, Mexicans lived seven years shorter than Cubans; by 2012, the gap had shrunk to just two years.\n\nIn celebrating Communist Cuba\u2019s non-existent achievements, progressive politicians don\u2019t even listen to fellow progressives who have actually studied Cuba\u2019s record under communism, to their chagrin. As the progressive economist Brad DeLong points out (he calls it \u201chideously depressing\u201d):\n\nCuba in 1957\u2014was a developed country. Cuba in 1957 had lower infant mortality than France, Belgium, West Germany, Israel, Japan, Austria, Italy, Spain, and Portugal. Cuba in 1957 had doctors and nurses: as many doctors and nurses per capita as the Netherlands, and more than Britain or Finland. Cuba in 1957 had as many vehicles per capita as Uruguay, Italy, or Portugal. Cuba in 1957 had 45 TVs per 1000 people\u2014fifth highest in the world \u2026Today? Today the UN puts Cuba\u2019s HDI [Human Development indicators] in the range of \u2026 Mexico. (And Carmelo Mesa-Lago thinks the UN\u2019s calculations are seriously flawed: that Cuba\u2019s right HDI peers today are places like China, Tunisia, Iran, and South Africa.) Thus I don\u2019t understand lefties who talk about the achievements of the Cuban Revolution: \u201c\u2026to have better health care, housing, education.\u201d\n\n\n## Communism Destroyed Education\n\nCuba\u2019s outmoded Marxist education system also does not deserve praise. Obama mistakenly called Cuba\u2019s \u201csystem of education\u201d an \u201cextraordinary resource\u201d that \u201cvalues every boy and every girl.\u201d\n\nBut there\u2019s nothing \u201cextraordinary\u201d about Cuba\u2019s educational system. Children are taught by poorly paid teachers in dilapidated schools. Cuba has made less educational progress than most Latin American countries over the last 60 years. According to UNESCO, Cuba had about the same literacy rate as Costa Rica and Chile in 1950 (close to 80 percent) before Cuba was taken over by the communists. And it has almost the same literacy rate as they do today (close to 100 percent).\n\nWhile Cuba made substantial progress in Castro\u2019s first years in power, its educational system has stagnated since.\n\nMeanwhile, Latin American countries that were largely illiterate in 1950\u2014such as Peru, Brazil, El Salvador, and the Dominican Republic\u2014are largely literate today, closing much of the gap with Cuba. El Salvador had a less than 40 percent literacy rate in 1950 but has an 88 percent literacy rate today. Brazil and Peru had a less than 50 percent literacy rate in 1950, but today, Peru has a 94.5 percent literacy rate, and Brazil a 92.6 percent literacy rate. The Dominican Republic\u2019s rate rose from a little over 40 percent to 91.8 percent. While Cuba made substantial progress in reducing illiteracy in Castro\u2019s first years in power, its educational system has stagnated since, even as much of Latin America improved.\n\nThe child mortality statistics above are from the United States Population Division (2017) for 1950 and 2015 and Gapminder for 1800. The maps depicting that data are by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser. The child death rate discussed above refers to the percentage of kids dying by age 5, not just in the first year of their life." + }, + { + "title": "Travel to Cuba in 2019: What\u2019s Changed and What\u2019s Coming - Travel Agent Central", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Travel to Cuba in 2019: What\u2019s Changed and What\u2019s Coming - Travel Agent Central" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiogFBVV95cUxObFRnZjVmNWpvTGJHRFlWWUFKZTV3aEpIN1lTeWlhM2lpWS1YSTh0S05QS3k1NEhjdE50YUh3ZnNhQnY1d3c2UnFHbTBiZU9rMnl5QVNvcVZBdkdJeEY2YnB2aVJVTTlOX2VaSDNYWlA1aHgtUEUzb1VwaFlRbTBDTUlLR0lMaEhqM1Vwc096LUxaUnczUExWMi01MHJFZk02VFE?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://hyperallergic.com/i-am-cuba-restored-and-reimagined/", + "id": "CBMiogFBVV95cUxObFRnZjVmNWpvTGJHRFlWWUFKZTV3aEpIN1lTeWlhM2lpWS1YSTh0S05QS3k1NEhjdE50YUh3ZnNhQnY1d3c2UnFHbTBiZU9rMnl5QVNvcVZBdkdJeEY2YnB2aVJVTTlOX2VaSDNYWlA1aHgtUEUzb1VwaFlRbTBDTUlLR0lMaEhqM1Vwc096LUxaUnczUExWMi01MHJFZk02VFE", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 14 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 14, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 45, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Travel to Cuba in 2019: What\u2019s Changed and What\u2019s Coming  Travel Agent Central", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Travel to Cuba in 2019: What\u2019s Changed and What\u2019s Coming  Travel Agent Central" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.travelagentcentral.com", + "title": "Travel Agent Central" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined\nauthor: Maggie Sivit\nurl: https://hyperallergic.com/i-am-cuba-restored-and-reimagined/\nhostname: hyperallergic.com\ndescription: Newly restored and screening tonight, I Am Cuba raises questions about the ways film negotiates authenticity.\nsitename: Hyperallergic\ndate: 2019-02-21\ntags: ['Film', 'Film Forum', 'Review']\n---\n# I Am Cuba, Restored and Reimagined\n\nNewly restored and screening tonight, I Am Cuba raises questions about the ways film negotiates authenticity.\n\nWhen Soviet director Mikhail Kalatozov was commissioned to make a film about the Cuban Revolution, he set out to make a *Battleship Potemkin* for the Cuban people. The film he made instead, *I Am Cuba* (1964), was a hallucinatory, freewheeling work of communist kitsch, a pastiche of Soviet and Cuban symbolism that tried to combine camp and revolution; a sprawling story whose narratives never quite run together, all shot with a gravity-defying, always-on-the-move, \u201cemotional\u201d camera; a cinephile\u2019s wet dream, the film about which Werner Herzog once said anyone who hadn\u2019t seen it didn\u2019t deserve to be a cinematographer. Or, that\u2019s part of the myth surrounding the film, anyway, which also says that *I Am Cuba*, the first Soviet-Cuban coproduction, was hated by both countries upon its release (by the Soviets for being too artsy, and by the Cubans for being inauthentic). It remained in obscurity for nearly 30 years until it was rediscovered by the Americans, the kings of kitsch. Most recently, the new restoration by Milestone Films of this movie that is at least nominally about Cuba, brings up questions of authenticity once again.\n\n*I Am Cuba* tells the story of the Cuban Revolution through the lives of several Cuban people: Maria, a young woman who works at a Havana nightclub that caters to rich Americans, who is forced to entertain and sleep with tourists for money; Pedro, a tenant farmer whose sugarcane fields are taken from him after the landowner decides to sell the plot to a U.S. company; Enrique, a young revolutionary and university student who\u2019s part of the intellectual resistance; and Mariano, a peasant who\u2019s moved to take up arms and join the rebel army after a government bomb kills his son. Over all of this, the voice of Cuba \u2014 narrated by Raquel Revuelta \u2014 carries the story to its conclusion: the triumph of the revolution, which is where the film ends.\n\nIt\u2019s worth watching *I Am Cuba* for the cinematography alone. In one sequence, the camera follows Enrique\u2019s funeral procession through the streets of Havana when, suddenly, the camera lifts off the ground, travels up the side of a building, through a window, across a room full of men rolling cigars, out another window, and returns once again to the funeral procession below as it sails over the street \u2014 all in a single shot. Even in the age of drone photography, it\u2019s hard to imagine how this was pulled off. (According to the press kit, the filmmakers used a makeshift elevator and planks, passing the handheld camera between two cameramen in a carefully choreographed sequence, ultimately attaching it to two cables to guide it over the street for the final part of the shot.)\n\nThe soundtrack is as impressive. Music, especially early on in the film, carries the viewer through its different spaces: the nightclub singer\u2019s ecstatic performance of \u201cLoco Amor\u201d being one memorable example, and the fruit vendor\u2019s melodic call of oranges and California plums being another. Plus, there\u2019s the velvety voice of the narrator reading impressionistic lines (the script was written by two poets, one Russian and one Cuban), that knits these spaces together.\n\nIn these respects, the new restoration really is a revelation. The close-ups feel almost invasively close in 4K. The music and limited dialogue are goosebump-inducingly intimate. For those of us who\u2019ve watched previous versions of* I Am Cuba* \u2014 which, for me, have included a version with the somewhat bizarre Spanish-Russian soundtrack (the voiceover repeated in both languages, one after the other, which was part of the original Milestone release), as well as pixelated versions on laptop screens \u2014 it\u2019s tempting to say this version combines the best of image and sound.\n\nRestoration is always bound up with ideas about authenticity. Milestone Films gained distribution rights to *I Am Cuba* back in the mid-1990s, before which the film was virtually unseen outside of Cuba and the USSR. Since then, Milestone has re-released the film one other time, in 2005. The 2005 version had the Spanish-only soundtrack, but the image still showed splotches, bad splices, and, most noticeably, a flicker throughout the film due to lab work. These were the issues they sought to correct with the new restoration, releasing what will now be considered the authoritative version of the film.\n\nCuba itself is a place that attracts projections of authenticity, frequently imagined as a land \u201clocked in time,\u201d with its mid-century automobiles, pastel-colored peeling buildings, and other symbols that serve as shorthands for fetishized pastness. When Milestone released *I Am Cuba* in 2005, they overtly employed these symbols, packaging the DVD in a container designed to look like a decorative Cuban cigar box, making kitschiness part of the marketing and enjoyment of the film in yet another way. On the other hand, *I Am Cuba* has real documentary value, and its connections to Cuba go beyond mere symbolism; the latest restoration was, after all, undertaken because a documentary filmmaker wanted to use footage from it in a documentary about Havana. Just as with any film, it\u2019s uncanny to see familiar locations displaced through time and space into the remote fictional world of *I Am Cuba*; when Enrique races to the roof of the building with the intent of shooting the police officer, for instance, I\u2019m always struck by the fact that I\u2019ve looked onto that staircase many times before, standing across the street at a window of an apartment near the Malec\u00f3n. *I Am Cuba* is an ode to a place that never existed and yet one that continues to exist. The Cuba it depicts may be an imagined one, but it\u2019s one we\u2019re continuing to imagine today.\n\nI Am Cuba* plays **at Film Forum* *(209 W Houston St, Manhattan, New York, 10014) through February 21st.*" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba and Algerian revolutions: an intertwined history - The Militant", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and Algerian revolutions: an intertwined history - The Militant" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMikgFBVV95cUxQV0FsZnE1dy1hdy1pMnFLZm1YTXJ3OWdETFN4Q1dPUHJoM3pvZFphTDZlRHhKSEpCMmhFVVVCM1FidlQ4dVlkTWppQkJGZW9KR3pjbmZvOFdmVzRlY0t5LUpVU3c3dG45SzZpekRDbWVsUi1jTUFlRHB6VHY5RU5oSTROcGJEbHduVEdmTTI2Ql94UQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.travelagentcentral.com/destinations/travel-to-cuba-2019-what-s-changed-and-what-s-coming", + "id": "CBMikgFBVV95cUxQV0FsZnE1dy1hdy1pMnFLZm1YTXJ3OWdETFN4Q1dPUHJoM3pvZFphTDZlRHhKSEpCMmhFVVVCM1FidlQ4dVlkTWppQkJGZW9KR3pjbmZvOFdmVzRlY0t5LUpVU3c3dG45SzZpekRDbWVsUi1jTUFlRHB6VHY5RU5oSTROcGJEbHduVEdmTTI2Ql94UQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 16 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 16, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 47, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba and Algerian revolutions: an intertwined history  The Militant", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and Algerian revolutions: an intertwined history  The Militant" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://themilitant.com", + "title": "The Militant" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba - The Conversation", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba - The Conversation" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMifkFVX3lxTFAxNTlXMUVMb3Z1RW1FOERBVVpic2dTUWx4LXhSa0dERUYzTS1TS3BJRmNOeTNOU0MtQk4ySjF2OEQtSFQ1RjB2MG1lZkd4RHIxTW1kQUpWUVVCOGE3VFVTbl8yYmZiZkZJNmhUYjhEUTdFcHdlOGRqVEN6MGJFdw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://themilitant.com/2019/02/16/cuba-and-algerian-revolutions-an-intertwined-history/", + "id": "CBMifkFVX3lxTFAxNTlXMUVMb3Z1RW1FOERBVVpic2dTUWx4LXhSa0dERUYzTS1TS3BJRmNOeTNOU0MtQk4ySjF2OEQtSFQ1RjB2MG1lZkd4RHIxTW1kQUpWUVVCOGE3VFVTbl8yYmZiZkZJNmhUYjhEUTdFcHdlOGRqVEN6MGJFdw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 18 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 18, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 49, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba  The Conversation", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Trump may seek more punishment of Cuba  The Conversation" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://theconversation.com", + "title": "The Conversation" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 307, + "response": "Error: HTTP 307" + }, + { + "title": "Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba - BBC", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba - BBC" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiXkFVX3lxTFBGOFpxMk1vWG5NYXJYN2Z5MzJNc2JjcnkyeVl3OHRDOXFLZHBVRFlRQ1NaYWhyQVlRU204U21NMTFYZ3RMTWZ4MHo3Ui1CRjhPREd4QnFobndSTlMtWXc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47154987", + "id": "CBMiXkFVX3lxTFBGOFpxMk1vWG5NYXJYN2Z5MzJNc2JjcnkyeVl3OHRDOXFLZHBVRFlRQ1NaYWhyQVlRU204U21NMTFYZ3RMTWZ4MHo3Ui1CRjhPREd4QnFobndSTlMtWXc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba  BBC", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba  BBC" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.bbc.com", + "title": "BBC" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba\nurl: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47154987\nhostname: bbc.com\ndescription: The government took too long to evacuate and treat them when they were posted in Cuba, they say.\nsitename: BBC News\ndate: 2019-02-07\n---\n# Diplomats sue Canada government over mystery illness in Cuba\n\n**A group of Canadian diplomats is suing the country's government for C$28m ($21.1m; \u00a316.4m) after they succumbed to a mysterious illness in Cuba.**\n\nThe group of 14, including diplomats' family members, says Ottawa took too long to warn, evacuate and treat them.\n\nLast year, Canadian and US officials were recalled from Havana after complaining of dizziness and migraines.\n\nThe cause of the illness is unknown, but Canada has discounted the idea of a \"sonic attack\" on its embassy.\n\nIn a statement, the diplomats said: \"Throughout the crisis, Canada downplayed the seriousness of the situation, hoarded and concealed critical health and safety information, and gave false, misleading and incomplete information to diplomatic staff.\"\n\n\"My wife, she isn't the same anymore,\" one unnamed diplomat told Canadian broadcaster CBC.\n\n\"She has gaps in her memory, headaches, problems hearing. She picks up the telephone to make a call but forgets why, enters rooms without reason.\"\n\nAccording to CBC, staff at the Canadian embassy began experiencing symptoms of the so-called \"Havana syndrome\" in spring 2017.\n\nSeveral families were subsequently moved from Havana, but until April 2018 Canada continued to post new staff to Cuba despite warnings from US counterparts who had received similar complaints.\n\nThe US withdrew most of its non-essential personnel from the country in September 2017 and said 21 embassy employees had been affected.\n\nLast month, Canada said it would be cutting its embassy staff by up to half.\n\nAt a news conference in Washington, Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said she was aware of the lawsuit.\n\n\"I am not going to comment on the specifics, but I do want to reiterate that I have met with some of these diplomats and, as I said to them, their health and safety needs to be our priority.\"\n\nCuba has repeatedly denied any involvement in the incident.\n\nThe country's Foreign Minister, Bruno Rodriguez, said US claims were a \"political manipulation\" aimed at damaging bilateral relations." + }, + { + "title": "IMPRESSIONS: Cuba Festival at the Joyce Theater with Malpaso Dance Company, LOS HIJOS DEL DIRECTOR, and Compa\u00f1\u00eda Irene Rodr\u00edguez - dance-enthusiast.com", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "IMPRESSIONS: Cuba Festival at the Joyce Theater with Malpaso Dance Company, LOS HIJOS DEL DIRECTOR, and Compa\u00f1\u00eda Irene Rodr\u00edguez - dance-enthusiast.com" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMi3AFBVV95cUxQOExpMmw2b1F6M18xUzNaRi1ZcmtRQnlnajlIY2s4ZW1uSno2el91YUg1NllrU2NoZV8xbVpWTnQyN3hoRXV3RWl3b2Fad25wVkFzTGtPQ25QQTVRRUtiSDlhZFpnZVZqWGtwMEFZdVNSank2RVFTQWxuUEYycVlucGdKM29tM3BOSmJVdTl3RG4tTlZnVVhGaTN5dmJxN20tYlRYUDRic1o0bEV0TEg5dVg0NzdiSEdEaTllLTFyOUFiVWp0QWFkQ21KRXhVa1ZBZGhBTktjSGpmdjE0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "http://voiceofoc.org/2019/02/guitar-virtuoso-manuel-barrueco-has-come-a-long-way-since-leaving-cuba/", + "id": "CBMi3AFBVV95cUxQOExpMmw2b1F6M18xUzNaRi1ZcmtRQnlnajlIY2s4ZW1uSno2el91YUg1NllrU2NoZV8xbVpWTnQyN3hoRXV3RWl3b2Fad25wVkFzTGtPQ25QQTVRRUtiSDlhZFpnZVZqWGtwMEFZdVNSank2RVFTQWxuUEYycVlucGdKM29tM3BOSmJVdTl3RG4tTlZnVVhGaTN5dmJxN20tYlRYUDRic1o0bEV0TEg5dVg0NzdiSEdEaTllLTFyOUFiVWp0QWFkQ21KRXhVa1ZBZGhBTktjSGpmdjE0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 05 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 5, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 36, + 0 + ], + "summary": "IMPRESSIONS: Cuba Festival at the Joyce Theater with Malpaso Dance Company, LOS HIJOS DEL DIRECTOR, and Compa\u00f1\u00eda Irene Rodr\u00edguez  dance-enthusiast.com", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "IMPRESSIONS: Cuba Festival at the Joyce Theater with Malpaso Dance Company, LOS HIJOS DEL DIRECTOR, and Compa\u00f1\u00eda Irene Rodr\u00edguez  dance-enthusiast.com" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.dance-enthusiast.com", + "title": "dance-enthusiast.com" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: HTTP 0" + }, + { + "title": "U.S. bookings to Cuba expected to rise, but Americans still confused about travel rules - Miami Herald", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "U.S. bookings to Cuba expected to rise, but Americans still confused about travel rules - Miami Herald" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMikAFBVV95cUxPT1cxMDlTYkVPYlhFR2E0OHladW9NenVSSXJFc0hDdnJKbEFLdVBFNHRXSzZXZnNXWDRXTTU5eFNhZnY0Z3hpZGFtX0VFZ2dzaHhOT2hZWGdReWZsbU5oRThpYmNQSTNQbExIT0JCSlhwcVhnRWRRVi1haWZIVXZILXhRSmpfSWxtNWl2OHJ5LU3SAZABQVVfeXFMTzRRem1saDVUQklpdGQxOVZvNnJDZVRkVGZkREFjQUxEWDg1anFQNVlxNGZaZjBpYXJsZ2VnRF9RXzVoV1ZQb0o3UFI0YkVPWldFR2xKaWx5OHRCSUhBWFZqNlRjVFM3UkM2Zmt6a1VEVTBZejNzaXJaTFBpOHJ4Sl9lUW1nMHR6QVp4Rk01SThO?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/democraciaabierta/venezuela-cuba-revolutionary-burnout/", + "id": "CBMikAFBVV95cUxPT1cxMDlTYkVPYlhFR2E0OHladW9NenVSSXJFc0hDdnJKbEFLdVBFNHRXSzZXZnNXWDRXTTU5eFNhZnY0Z3hpZGFtX0VFZ2dzaHhOT2hZWGdReWZsbU5oRThpYmNQSTNQbExIT0JCSlhwcVhnRWRRVi1haWZIVXZILXhRSmpfSWxtNWl2OHJ5LU3SAZABQVVfeXFMTzRRem1saDVUQklpdGQxOVZvNnJDZVRkVGZkREFjQUxEWDg1anFQNVlxNGZaZjBpYXJsZ2VnRF9RXzVoV1ZQb0o3UFI0YkVPWldFR2xKaWx5OHRCSUhBWFZqNlRjVFM3UkM2Zmt6a1VEVTBZejNzaXJaTFBpOHJ4Sl9lUW1nMHR6QVp4Rk01SThO", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 13 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 13, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 44, + 0 + ], + "summary": "U.S. bookings to Cuba expected to rise, but Americans still confused about travel rules  Miami Herald", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "U.S. bookings to Cuba expected to rise, but Americans still confused about travel rules  Miami Herald" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.miamiherald.com", + "title": "Miami Herald" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba's churches reject gay marriage before vote on new constitution - The Guardian", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba's churches reject gay marriage before vote on new constitution - The Guardian" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMisgFBVV95cUxQWHRXdmpPcFQ1dnpLZVY3WjZFMEdwV0tnd1hoWnZLVDJRVjhaQVVFcGpCMmVXM1FTT2lOY040UFJMT1lHZkZ3ZG9aaW96aG9kcTZCNG9ZV2tZN3F5UlQ0SlVPalBfYkktT00wdE9HLXRZRnhTbjBXN3hDcUNVV19kQjB4VFY4Y3BoQlAzWWdhMEluLUxjQVZJcGJLNHI2ZHE5NE5QNWhwSmZ4Z3Ixc20xYlZR?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/news/russia-grants-new-credit-to-cuba-to-buy-weapons/", + "id": "CBMisgFBVV95cUxQWHRXdmpPcFQ1dnpLZVY3WjZFMEdwV0tnd1hoWnZLVDJRVjhaQVVFcGpCMmVXM1FTT2lOY040UFJMT1lHZkZ3ZG9aaW96aG9kcTZCNG9ZV2tZN3F5UlQ0SlVPalBfYkktT00wdE9HLXRZRnhTbjBXN3hDcUNVV19kQjB4VFY4Y3BoQlAzWWdhMEluLUxjQVZJcGJLNHI2ZHE5NE5QNWhwSmZ4Z3Ixc20xYlZR", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 17 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 17, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 48, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba's churches reject gay marriage before vote on new constitution  The Guardian", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba's churches reject gay marriage before vote on new constitution  The Guardian" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.theguardian.com", + "title": "The Guardian" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Russia Grants New Credit to Cuba to Buy Weapons - Havana Times\nauthor: Circles Robinson\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/news/russia-grants-new-credit-to-cuba-to-buy-weapons/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: Russia announced to day that it will grant Cuba a state loan of 38 million euros for the purchase of Russian military equipment. The new credit for military equipment comes at a time when the Cuban population is suffering shortages of many basic consumer products including medicines.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-06\ncategories: ['News']\n---\n# Russia Grants New Credit to Cuba to Buy Weapons\n\n**HAVANA TIMES** \u2013 Russia will grant Cuba a state loan of 38 million euros (43 million USD) for the purchase of Russian military equipment, announced today the director of the Federal Service of Military Technical Cooperation, Dimitri Shugaev, reported Europa Press .\n\nThe new credit for military equipment comes at a time when the Cuban population is suffering shortages of many basic consumer products including medicines, and also strives to recover from a devastating tornado in the capital.\n\n\u201cThe credit agreement was signed and already exceeded all internal procedures of the Russian side,\u201d said Shugaev in an interview to the Russian newspaper \u2018Kommersant\u2019 when asked about the status of the agreement on the delivery of the said credit \u201cwhich must be used to acquire Russian military equipment. \u201d\n\nAccording to Shugaev, the military technical cooperation agreement with Cuba came into force in 2006. \u201cNow cooperation is carried out within the framework of the technological cooperation program, which mainly presupposes projects to develop Cuba\u2019s defense sector,\u201d he added, as the Sputnik agency collects.\n\nShugaev stressed that this cooperation offers Cuba the possibility of developing its long-term military-industrial complex. As he has specified, the funds of this loan will be channeled to the development of technological cooperation and technical assistance to the island.\n\nWhether Cuba should further indebt itself for military equipment, when it is already having problems paying creditors, and is having to cut back on the import of basic consumer products, is a forbidden topic of discussion in the government media.\n\nThe U.S. is trying to take over the Carribean and South America!! I would be buying alot of guns; ect. if i was them!! Just saying!! BE PREPARED!!!??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????\n\nWTF!!! Weapons???? Buy grain!!! It used to be the very poor that had to survive on bread and sugarwater (visit the rural countryside and see how \u201cequal\u201d communism is in Cuba). But lately even the people that have a job can hardly buy bread (nor meat, olive oil and a lot of other products) because there\u2019s hardly any import and everything is becoming scarce or completely non-available.\n\n(I only hope these recent import problems will give the Cubans the power to vote NO to the new constitution and send the government a clear signal that Cuba needs an economic reform based more on giving the people what they need and less on controlling every aspect in the Cuban economy in the current governmental way \u2013 stifling al progress, spilling perfectly good food, etc.)\n\nBy today\u2019s military standards, $43 million doesn\u2019t buy much. I am assuming that Cuba is interested in small arms and vehicles. Even at this level, not a lot of stuff if you consider this as a multi-year purchase as opposed to a one-time shipment. On the other hand, how many homes could be repaired for that amount of money? How many streets resurfaced? This sounds like a Cuban purchasing manager and a Russian arms dealer figured out a way to make some money on the side.\n\nWTF\u2026..cuba is not needing weapons\u2026my God\u2026.stupid people we need something huger than weapons for God sake\u2026..to shoot whom???\u2026..still fucking around\u2026..\n\nWeapons for what use? Against the people when one day says enough? When people ask them for freedom of speech, assembly, basic humans rights? Or for the over fortold imperialist invasions that no one believes any more?" + }, + { + "title": "'A Tuba to Cuba' - The Movie Cricket", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "'A Tuba to Cuba' - The Movie Cricket" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiZEFVX3lxTE5QeE5pVW9Jd3hLMWlWXzZpSjlMc0FORzl6OVpiNnNEZlVPZnAteXhFdEVfRUwzcGlFM1VxS05XVEpZanpZMzF4RmdEbnpfYWJsdjk0Q3hER08tTGxUdk4zUmw1eXo?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.dance-enthusiast.com/features/view/Cuba-Festival-Joyce-Theater-Malpaso-Dance-Company-LOS-HIJOS-DEL-DIRECTOR-Compania-Irene-Rodrguez-", + "id": "CBMiZEFVX3lxTE5QeE5pVW9Jd3hLMWlWXzZpSjlMc0FORzl6OVpiNnNEZlVPZnAteXhFdEVfRUwzcGlFM1VxS05XVEpZanpZMzF4RmdEbnpfYWJsdjk0Q3hER08tTGxUdk4zUmw1eXo", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 28 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 28, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 59, + 0 + ], + "summary": "'A Tuba to Cuba'  The Movie Cricket", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "'A Tuba to Cuba'  The Movie Cricket" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://moviecricket.net", + "title": "The Movie Cricket" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: " + }, + { + "title": "In Fight for Venezuela, Who Supports Maduro and Who Backs Guaid\u00f3? 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It\u2019s historic,\u201d he added, as drivers honked at women in wedding dresses and unwitting tourists in pink Cadillacs waved.\n\nClutching a bunch of flowers next to her husband, Debora Lisset Covas, 32, insisted the demonstration was not homophobic.\n\n\u201cMy auntie is a lesbian and I have homosexual friends and colleagues. They are all creations of God and I love them,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I don\u2019t want gender ideology to be taught in schools. That\u2019s what happens in other countries once gay marriage is legalised.\u201d\n\nWhile the state is using television, newspapers and public billboards to urge the population to vote yes to the new constitution, evangelical denominations have run a bullish and unprecedented counter-campaign.\n\nMethodist, Pentecostal, Baptist and Assembly of God denominations have hung three-metre banners on their churches reading: \u201cI\u2019m in favour of the original design. Marriage: man + woman.\u201d\n\nChurches have printed hundreds of thousands of posters and flyers which the faithful have stuck on doors, lamp posts and inside buses.\n\nThe church delivered a petition with 178,000 signatures against the legal recognition of gay marriage to Cuba\u2019s National Assembly in October last year \u2013 an event without historical parallel on the island.\n\nThe church\u2019s highly organised operation has overwhelmed the campaign in support of gay marriage run by the state-linked National Centre for Sex Education (Cenesex) and the island\u2019s LGBT community. Most independent LGBT activists on the island have relied mainly on social media posts.\n\nThe Cuban government backed away from enshrining gay marriage in the new constitution after widespread popular rejection. In the public consultations about the new constitution organised in neighbourhoods, workplaces, and universities last year, Cubans made 192,408 comments on Article 68 \u2013 which defined marriage as \u201cthe voluntary union between two people\u201d rather than a union \u201cbetween man and woman\u201d as in the current constitution. A strong majority requested that Article 68 be eliminated.\n\nCuba\u2019s National Assembly announced on Twitter in December that it had eliminated the language \u201cas a way of respecting all opinions\u201d. The final constitution to be voted on by the population waters down the initial wording while leaving the door open to the legalisation of gay marriage in the future.\n\nAnalysts expect the yes vote to win comfortably and turnout to be high. But a significant no vote would reflect a political opening on the island coupled with a new generation of leadership that has not yet cemented its authority.\n\nIt would also underline how, as elsewhere in Latin America, evangelical Christians have become a political force. Pastors claim that 10% of Cuba\u2019s population of 11 million are now evangelical. The vast majority of them the Guardian has spoken to in recent weeks have said they will vote no on Sunday.\n\nAccording to electoral authorities, 98% of the Cuban electorate turned out to vote on Cuba\u2019s current constitution in 1976. But in recent years turnout has fallen. While strongly encouraged, voting in Cuba is optional and ballots are secret. 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Guardian staff reporter\nurl: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/feb/22/tania-bruguera-cuba-artist-crackdown-decree-349\nhostname: theguardian.com\ndescription: Imprisoned and harassed for her radical projects, the Turbine Hall artist is now uniting the Havana Biennial\u2019s artists against Decree 349, the government plan to criminalise independent art\nsitename: The Guardian\ndate: 2019-02-22\ncategories: ['Art and design']\ntags: ['Tania Bruguera,Art and design,Culture,Cuba,Censorship,Art,Festivals']\n---\nIf Tania Bruguera has her way then this year\u2019s Havana Biennial, which runs from 12 April to 19 May, will be an uncomfortable one for the Cuban government.\n\nBruguera, one of Cuba\u2019s most prominent artists, is coordinating a protest against Decree 349, which was brought in by the country\u2019s communist regime to clamp down on artistic expression. Foreign artists at the biennial, a showcase for Cuban and Latin American art, will be asked to wear T-shirts showing their opposition to the measure and will be asked to mention it during their public appearances.\n\nBruguera understands that the Cuban government is sensitive to bad press, especially at what should be its most important cultural event, which is why she hopes to subvert what she expects to be a \u201cwhitewashing\u201d of Decree 349.\n\nThe protests are part of a campaign by a group of artists and Bruguera, whose work occupies the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern in London until Sunday, against the decree, which was condemned by Amnesty International as \u201cdystopian\u201d. The proposed Decree 349 required artists to get a permit from the Cuban ministry of culture if they wanted to perform or operate in public or private spaces. It also allowed the government to shut down anything that it decided contained \u201csexist, vulgar or obscene language\u201d.\n\nBruguera says that since December when Decree 349 was due to be brought in \u2013 the government delayed it due to an international outcry \u2013 two Cuban rappers have since been detained along with a Cuban artist, Michael Osorno. She describes how Rafael Almanza, a writer who organises salon-style arts events in Camaguey, tried to hold a talk about Decree 349 but he was called at 4am by government agents and told he would be killed if he did so. Almanza confirmed to the Guardian that he has received more than a dozen such calls since then, but no longer answers his phone.\n\nSuch harassment is nothing new for dissidents, but what is happening for the first time in Bruguera\u2019s lifetime is that the Cuban government is doing the same towards artists, she told the Guardian on the phone from New York.\n\n\u201cNow there is no way Cuba has independent art.\u201d She says. \u201cIf you cannot do anything unless the ministry of culture gives you a permit, where is the independent art? It\u2019s non-existent.\u201d\n\nAn unintended effect of the law is that for the first time in 60 years artists from all different disciplines are united in one thing \u2013 their opposition to Decree 349. Bruguera says: \u201cPeople in Cuba are very savvy, they know the fact this new law is saying the government can enter into your house, there are no more private spaces at all in Cuba now.\n\n\u201cThe fact they can take your instrument, your goods, they know that all of these decision are not artistic, all of these decisions are completely political. What more do they want from us, how much more submissive do they want us to be? Before there was censorship, you could play around. Now you go to jail, now they take your house. It\u2019s not a joke. There are no more games to play.\u201d\n\nIn the face of intense opposition, Cuba\u2019s vice minister of culture Fernando Rojas backed down and said that art would only be banned in extreme cases, such as obscenity or racist content. He also began a nationwide consultation, but Bruguera says it was a sham and Rojas was only speaking to state-licensed artists, not independent artists like her.\n\nBruguera says: \u201cWhat we want is to eliminate the decree and work together to find regulations that are based on the needs of the artists and what will protect them, not only the government.\u201d\n\nBruguera last visited Cuba in late November and had planned to stay for a week. She ended up staying for two months to help with the fight against Decree 349 and passed up the chance to attend the Kochi Biennial in India. During her visit she was detained five times, each time for about 24 hours. One incarceration ended shortly after Tate director Maria Balshaw mentioned Bruguera was behind bars during a speech at the Turner Prize award ceremony in London.\n\nBruguera was constantly followed and harassed on the phone, including one call she recorded. She gave a copy of the recording to the Guardian and in it the interrogator tells her menacingly that she \u201cwould not want anything to happen to you\u201d.\n\nThe artist has a gallows humour about it and says that woman who spoke with her was \u201cnicer than usual\u201d. She added that the Cuban government \u201creally want to look democratic and sound democratic but they have no idea what democracy is.\u201d\n\nAs Bruguera sees it, Decree 349 is a desperate attempt by the Cuban government to wrest back control it has lost since the spread of internet access. Cuba finally got 3G access through mobile phones in December, though it is too costly for most, but there are dozens of public wifi hotspots in parks.\n\nThe internet has enabled film-makers to get movies out of the country without the permission of the ministry of culture and musicians have set up their own recording studios. Journalists and authors are sending their writings out of Cuba on their own and Decree 349 will not change that, Bruguera says. What will change is that artists will start to be \u201cblackmailed\u201d by the government.\n\n\u201cPeople are going to continue doing things but they know it\u2019s illegal.\u201d She says. \u201cNow the government has more control of the artists. Their tactics since the beginning of the revolution say: \u2018I let you do that as long as you don\u2019t go against me.\u2019 It\u2019s kind of a blackmail situation and it\u2019s going to be used to separate artists, \u2018you are the good artists and you are the bad artists\u2019.\u201d\n\nThe Trump administration is unlikely to help matters as its threats to tighten the US embargo allow the Cuban government to paint America as the enemy. Bruguera says the U-turn from Barack Obama\u2019s approach, which culminated in his visit to Havana in 2015 and led to former Cuban President Ra\u00fal Castro passing a number of reforms, would lead to stagnation.\n\nHaving an aggressive America was \u201cterrain the Cuban government knows\u201d, she says, and that they \u201cknow how to cultivate the victim role\u201d. Despite this she was careful about guessing what will happen in the coming months.\n\n\u201cThe one thing you learn about Cuba is to never predict anything because it never goes the way you predicted.\u201d\n\n## Comments (\u2026)\n\nSign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion" + }, + { + "title": "'They have no idea what democracy is': Tania Bruguera on Cuba's artist crackdown - The Guardian", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "'They have no idea what democracy is': Tania Bruguera on Cuba's artist crackdown - The Guardian" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiogFBVV95cUxPUGVGQ1lWUXFjNEhNWGF6ZTBXWk9GV2RMZ01xTjBNc0ZSeHhkczdlMnFqYVFieVdLd1NjeDRYTHRvOEJyOTJINjRDaHMwdXJKb2RPaEhQc1U5OFhHMG1FTXhEQ01mZ08zZ052RE9RR3BTTFljODZDX2NpbXVIcVRGd2FPd19GVlRtR2RTVXBtVWdyQ3JiM3Z0MGIxcDVWbkNkSHc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.dw.com/en/cubans-approve-new-constitution-confirming-communist-party-power/a-47688612", + "id": "CBMiogFBVV95cUxPUGVGQ1lWUXFjNEhNWGF6ZTBXWk9GV2RMZ01xTjBNc0ZSeHhkczdlMnFqYVFieVdLd1NjeDRYTHRvOEJyOTJINjRDaHMwdXJKb2RPaEhQc1U5OFhHMG1FTXhEQ01mZ08zZ052RE9RR3BTTFljODZDX2NpbXVIcVRGd2FPd19GVlRtR2RTVXBtVWdyQ3JiM3Z0MGIxcDVWbkNkSHc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 22 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 22, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 53, + 0 + ], + "summary": "'They have no idea what democracy is': Tania Bruguera on Cuba's artist crackdown  The Guardian", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "'They have no idea what democracy is': Tania Bruguera on Cuba's artist crackdown  The Guardian" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.theguardian.com", + "title": "The Guardian" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cubans approve new constitution\nurl: https://www.dw.com/en/cubans-approve-new-constitution-confirming-communist-party-power/a-47688612\nhostname: dw.com\ndescription: Cuban voters have approved a new constitution cementing Communist Party power. The constitution also implements minor social and economic changes.\nsitename: Deutsche Welle\ndate: 2019-02-26\n---\n# Cubans approve new constitution\n\nFebruary 26, 2019Cubans overwhelmingly approved a new constitution that preserves a one-party socialist state while implementing modest economic and social reforms, the electoral commission announced Monday.\n\nMore than 86 percent of voters backed the changes in Sunday\u2019s referendum, while nine percent opposed. Around four percent of ballots were declared invalid. Electoral authorities said 84 percent of 8.7 million eligible voters cast ballots.\n\n*Read more: *Fidel Castro - Cuba's hero and dictator\n\n\"The constitution has been ratified by the majority of citizens,\" electoral commission president Alina Balseiro told a news conference.\n\nThe constitution entrenches socialism's \"irrevocable\" role and replaces the 1976 constitution, which had passed with 97.7 percent support.\n\nThe new constitution:\n\n- Enshrines the Communist Party as the \"superior ruling political force in society and the State\"\n- Allows for a limited role for free markets and private investment under the guidance of the state\n- Creates a new post of prime minister alongside provincial governorships\n- Imposes term limits on the president\n- Fully recognizes a right to own private property for the first time since the 1959 revolution.\n\nThere are also references to gender identity that could pave the way for gay marriage, and the right to legal representation upon arrest and habeas corpus.\n\n\nSince 1959, Cuba has been run first under revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, then by his brother Raul and, since last year, by Miguel Diaz-Canel, the first leader to be born after the revolution.\n\nThe government had lobbied heavily for a \u201cyes\u201d vote, labelling opponents as counterrevolutionaries and enemies of the state\n\nIt was helped by the near monopoly over the media and information. A simple majority was needed for the changes to pass.\n\nOpponents argued the constitution perpetuates an oppressive regime and some religious groups criticized it due to provisions that eliminate a requirement for marriage to be only between a man and woman.\n\ncw/jm (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)" + }, + { + "title": "La Ruta Mala (Video) - BIKEPACKING.com", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "La Ruta Mala (Video) - BIKEPACKING.com" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiYkFVX3lxTFBwN3FkbTV2cWp6dTJYNkNxNXhqRm5yb2NaUW1WMzBLQ0xfMjRWWEVtcUNfQ0FWRHhwSWpBMGNPdXdWRGxLNFJudGptekkyZDlpTHJWV0NpaG0zVzM2bkt1aXRn?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://bikepacking.com/plog/bikepacking-cuba-video/", + "id": "CBMiYkFVX3lxTFBwN3FkbTV2cWp6dTJYNkNxNXhqRm5yb2NaUW1WMzBLQ0xfMjRWWEVtcUNfQ0FWRHhwSWpBMGNPdXdWRGxLNFJudGptekkyZDlpTHJWV0NpaG0zVzM2bkt1aXRn", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "La Ruta Mala (Video)  BIKEPACKING.com", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "La Ruta Mala (Video)  BIKEPACKING.com" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://bikepacking.com", + "title": "BIKEPACKING.com" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System - Havana Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System - Havana Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiqAFBVV95cUxPS0NzWnBuc3B6WkZaMm5nd3F4Q1NxYXVQUnRPS0RGSFNRa1FDMnlqT005RUxrbFNrZ2g1SW8yV3NVblJhdU5KbmFIalpBRGZYekVCLVNiZmZBcW1GQWl6RWlCT2tpaVhCT2pXYm5aRER5eVM1bDlxWGlWWGdKdGZ4YmZkWGdWYXgwWGpIZnowTnlDX0hFQlVmekpWampadF9TY3VHMnQzaUU?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.miamiarch.org/CatholicDiocese.php?op=Article_155068371817184", + "id": "CBMiqAFBVV95cUxPS0NzWnBuc3B6WkZaMm5nd3F4Q1NxYXVQUnRPS0RGSFNRa1FDMnlqT005RUxrbFNrZ2g1SW8yV3NVblJhdU5KbmFIalpBRGZYekVCLVNiZmZBcW1GQWl6RWlCT2tpaVhCT2pXYm5aRER5eVM1bDlxWGlWWGdKdGZ4YmZkWGdWYXgwWGpIZnowTnlDX0hFQlVmekpWampadF9TY3VHMnQzaUU", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 28 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 28, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 59, + 0 + ], + "summary": "The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System  Havana Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System  Havana Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://havanatimes.org", + "title": "Havana Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: ADOM :: Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach\nauthor: La Voz Catolica staff\nurl: https://www.miamiarch.org/CatholicDiocese.php?op=Article_155068371817184\nhostname: miamiarch.org\ndescription: The Archdiocese of Miami :: 9401 Biscayne Blvd - Miami Shores, FL 33138\nsitename: miamiarch.org\ndate: 2018-04-24\n---\n## By La Voz Catolica staff - La Voz Catolica\n\n\nBy Soli Salgado and Gail DeGeorge\n\n*Global Sisters Report*\n\nCUBA | Forbidden by the communist government to run official Catholic schools, a congregation in Havana quietly offers alternative after-school courses focusing on the arts. Parents, who learn about the program by word of mouth or church bulletins, tell the sisters they\u2019d prefer the classes focus on math and science rather than guitar lessons, theater and painting.\n\nBut one project in particular highlighted the merits of the artistic assignments.\n\n\u201cWe asked the kids to draw someone who loves them very much, thinking they\u2019d draw their mothers, their grandparents, someone from their home,\u201d one sister said. \u201cInstead, they drew Fidel.\u201d\n\nFidel Castro led the Cuban Revolution and took power in 1959, implementing a communist agenda and depending on the Soviet Union for financial support until its fall in 1991. He was a dictator until 2006, when his health deteriorated and he ceded power to his brother Raul, who stepped down April 19. Fidel Castro died in 2016.\n\nAt school it was \u201cdrilled into them that Fidel loves them very much,\u201d the sister said. \u201cThat\u2019s the benefit of teaching the arts: You\u2019re teaching them to think for themselves, to develop independently.\u201d\n\nThe sister\u2019s after-school program \ufffd not illegal, but managed quietly and with careful language \ufffd is one of many programs throughout the island where Catholic sisters and organizations shore up social services otherwise lacking because of the struggle Cuba\u2019s economy faces from the chill in relations with the United States. More than 75 percent of Cuban households earn less than $1,000 per year, according to the Boston Consulting Group, and 90 percent of Cubans use food rations, which cover basics such as flour and vegetable oil. Shortages occur often.\n\nThrough work by the sisters and other programs, the Catholic Church in Cuba extends its reach beyond parishes and strengthens ties with donors, often Cuban exiles in the United States and elsewhere.\n\nAs the Soviet Union broke up and support to Cuba stopped in the 1990s, the country entered an economic crisis, and the government realized it needed help, said Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski of Miami. More than a third of Miami\u2019s population is from Cuba.\n\n\u201cCommunism is the ultimate \u2018big daddy\u2019 state: They take care of everybody\u2019s needs,\u201d he said. \u201cTo recognize that a church or somebody else can provide social assistance was a bitter pill for the communists to swallow.\u201d\n\nFollowing decades of repression, the Catholic Church in Cuba has been rebuilding in the last 20 years. Visits from the last three popes have helped the Church\u2019s standing with the government and the Cuban people, maintaining the Vatican\u2019s stance against the 1962 U.S. embargo of Cuba, which covered all economic, commercial and financial exports except for medicine and some foods. While U.S.-Cuba relations briefly warmed in 2015 under President Barack Obama, the Trump administration once again tightened sanctions.\n\nCare is taken to not draw attention from government officials lest there be repercussions. Fear of the government, which discourages publicity on how the Church or organizations step in where the state falls short, manifested itself throughout conversations Global Sisters Report had in various parts of Cuba, with subjects requesting anonymity for both themselves and the centers where they work.\n\n\n'PUBLICITY IS BAD'\n\n\u201cPublicity is bad because we\u2019re not the ones who are at risk,\u201d said one sister who works at a government-run home for people who are disabled that depends on the presence of her congregation. \u201cThe patients are the ones who suffer the consequences.\u201d\n\nRepercussions for drawing too much attention to social services that the Church provides may range in severity \ufffd a program can be closed, supplies not delivered or managers questioned and intimidated by government officials \ufffd so all are artful in the language they use to describe their programs. Still, some Church-sponsored programs are well-known and successful in the cities, without interference from the government.\n\nAs one Cuban American academic said, \u201cThe Church in Cuba is mostly there with and for the people, to lift them up, because a lot of people who are suffering do not have family in the outside\u201d who can help them.\n\nElderly people who do not have family and can only rely on their meager government-provided retirement, he continued, might depend on Church-sponsored dining halls, where they can eat breakfast and another hot meal a day. People who need affordable medicine also often turn to the Church, which collects donations from parishioners and Cubans who have left the country.\n\nIn Santa Clara, about 175 miles east of Havana, the Franciscan Capuchin sisters run a day-care center for about 60 children between the ages of 2 and 5.\n\nWhile the sisters are not allowed to teach the children, their presence is a form of educating, one sister said.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s no possibility for the Church to do any kind of formal education,\u201d said Father Alberto Garcia, a Cuban American spiritual counselor at Belen Jesuit Preparatory School in Miami. \u201cBut the Church has been able to offer a number of educational programs in different centers,\u201d such as parish programs \u201chelping kids with their homework, support to parents, programs of human values formation, language courses, computer stuff \ufffd.\u201d\n\nIn the government-run home for people who are disabled, sisters serve as the eyes and hands of the operation, a visible example of how the state depends on religious services. Most of the 180 adults who live in this home are unable to communicate verbally or eat independently. Some use wheelchairs. Their parents either couldn\u2019t afford to take care of them when they were children or were unable to.\n\nBefore the 1959 revolution, the sisters ran a school in that building. Once Catholic-run institutions were forced to shut down and the state took over the building, the government started bringing in people who were handicapped for the sisters to look after. But managing the place without officially running it, one sister said, is difficult.\n\nAll 27 staff members are employees of the state, with five sisters and three postulants in the home.\n\n\u201cThe question is not to impose, but to teach, to try to value the human in the patient,\u201d said one of the sisters.\n\n\nWORK OF CARITAS\n\nCaritas, the Church\u2019s network of charitable agencies, extends the Church\u2019s reach to the larger community by filling gaps in social services throughout the island. Financial support is provided through Boston-based Friends of Caritas Cubana.\n\nIn Cuba, support from Caritas also trickles to individual volunteers.\n\nLidia Rivera, a laywoman from Santa Clara, set her attention in 1998 on Jorobada, a farm town less than 20 miles south of her home. With help from Caritas, Rivera\u2019s work became a source of survival for this community of bean- and plantain-planters, especially after Hurricane Irma last September.\n\nAfter almost 50 days of no electricity or running water in Jorobada, Rivera dug a well with the help of the local church and Caritas. As a retired doctor, she also helps provide basic health care, such as treating parasitic infections.\n\n\u201cWe have no words for how Lidia has helped us,\u201d one resident said. \u201cShe\u2019s given her life, love and soul to this community.\u201d\n\nRivera said the purpose of her work in Jorobada \u201cis only religious, and charity is a dimension of the evangelizing process.\u201d\n\nA big improvement for that community was the community center, once a hut that has been renovated into a chapel, sacristy, kitchen and dining hall for the elderly, laundry facility, and a spare bedroom for when the priest sleeps over. Pens for rabbits, goats and pigs are interspersed around the center.\n\nThe Marists used to have Catholic schools in the area, and their graduates regularly volunteer as tutors.\n\n\n\nIN TRINIDAD: A HOME FOR GIRLS\n\nIn the vibrant colonial town of Trinidad, two sisters live in a spacious home that\u2019s been transformed to accommodate up to 20 girls from nearby rural communities. They come to the city for education, staying with the sisters on weekdays at practically no charge and returning to their families on the weekends.\n\n\u201cThe idea is that we give them an integral Christian formation,\u201d said one of the sisters, who\u2019s been running the home for five years.\n\n\u201cWe try for them to live well and know God, that God loves them, so that, in the future, they can be the protagonists in their lives and defend themselves head-on,\u201d she said.\n\nThe sisters are familiar faces in the rural areas, visiting often to celebrate sacraments \ufffd baptisms, first Communions, confirmations \ufffd and they take these opportunities to observe how families are doing and which girls are in the most precarious situations. Far from the city mentality, one sister said, rural life can encourage early pregnancies, and some girls have three or four children while they are teenagers.\n\nBefore, the sisters took in girls between the ages of 18 and 21; now, the girls are 12 to 15 years old so the sisters can introduce positive influences in their lives sooner. \u201cWhen they\u2019re older, they can defend themselves better,\u201d one sister said.\n\nThe diocese and the sisters\u2019 congregation help finance boarding for the girls. Some have gone on to graduate from professional schools.\n\nOne girl arrived when she was still in elementary school, the younger end of the norm. She eventually joined their congregation \ufffd a favorite story of one of the sisters.\n\n\u201cWe see the fruits of our work,\u201d she said. \u201cThey see the work of sisters who touched their lives; it\u2019s like a tiny hook. Of course, it isn\u2019t for all the girls. But them seeing our work and our influence and becoming curious and interested for themselves \ufffd it\u2019s a testimony to our presence here.\u201d\n\n*Posted April 24, 2018.\nDeGeorge is editor of Global Sisters Report. Salgado is a staff writer for Global Sisters Report.\n*" + }, + { + "title": "Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach - Archdiocese of Miami", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach - Archdiocese of Miami" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMifEFVX3lxTE1mdmdQMXhPMGhIZnRETDlvc1Y1RF9ua3E4RG9NYmM3NjU0OHdsZWpHSWxKZUp2SElscjJ4bjhicEZKMTlhTXlmQnpIRGpIYUV5a0RtRHNfRUNOVUVHOEh3LVo0d0ZZNW9Fa3VpVF9JSGJIWlIzVEtqV3M3cC0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.forbes.com/sites/joemicallef/2019/02/16/what-cuban-rums-to-bring-home-a-short-guide/", + "id": "CBMifEFVX3lxTE1mdmdQMXhPMGhIZnRETDlvc1Y1RF9ua3E4RG9NYmM3NjU0OHdsZWpHSWxKZUp2SElscjJ4bjhicEZKMTlhTXlmQnpIRGpIYUV5a0RtRHNfRUNOVUVHOEh3LVo0d0ZZNW9Fa3VpVF9JSGJIWlIzVEtqV3M3cC0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 25 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 25, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 56, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach  Archdiocese of Miami", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Women religious help Cuba's Church extend its reach  Archdiocese of Miami" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.miamiarch.org", + "title": "Archdiocese of Miami" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "What Cuban Rums To Bring Home: A Short Guide - Forbes", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "What Cuban Rums To Bring Home: A Short Guide - Forbes" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMinAFBVV95cUxOYnUwemVkQ3RfR19yOG5TUWNQSU1vUnlEYWNzYnU1ZG9rWURjUUkyUVRuaFlZYmVBTnlVb1ZPRTZkVFM3YTJHdXVqWUVqakt3bW1udmF3RFl0R25VR05kOEV4TkVqa1ZyTWI4Rm1KcURyRTVXeGR3TlF6MF83Qnl4NjZucmRRZkdOY3B4eDJ1UV94STRGZVNqZzUwbWs?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.phelpscountyfocus.com/article_49e07c5a-2bb1-11e9-a4a1-f36d5945af80.html", + "id": "CBMinAFBVV95cUxOYnUwemVkQ3RfR19yOG5TUWNQSU1vUnlEYWNzYnU1ZG9rWURjUUkyUVRuaFlZYmVBTnlVb1ZPRTZkVFM3YTJHdXVqWUVqakt3bW1udmF3RFl0R25VR05kOEV4TkVqa1ZyTWI4Rm1KcURyRTVXeGR3TlF6MF83Qnl4NjZucmRRZkdOY3B4eDJ1UV94STRGZVNqZzUwbWs", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 16 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 16, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 47, + 0 + ], + "summary": "What Cuban Rums To Bring Home: A Short Guide  Forbes", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "What Cuban Rums To Bring Home: A Short Guide  Forbes" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.forbes.com", + "title": "Forbes" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba\nauthor: Phelps County Focus\nurl: https://www.phelpscountyfocus.com/article_49e07c5a-2bb1-11e9-a4a1-f36d5945af80.html\nhostname: phelpscountyfocus.com\ndescription: A woman leapt to her death Wednesday by jumping off the Interstate 44 overpass in Cuba.\nsitename: phelpscountyfocus.com\ndate: 2019-02-08\n---\nA woman leapt to her death Wednesday by jumping off the Interstate 44 overpass in Cuba.\n\nA press released from the Cuba Police Department reports its officers were alerted at 8:20 a.m. Wednesday that a woman was witnessed jumping off the overpass and hitting the roadway below. Upon arrival, officers provided life saving measures until ambulance crews arrived on scene, however, the woman was later declared dead after being taken to a hospital.\n\nThe release states no other people were in or near the vehicle she abandoned prior to jumping. Her name was not released pending next of kin notification.\n\n## Commented\n\nSorry, there are no recent results for popular commented articles." + }, + { + "title": "Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba - phelpscountyfocus.com", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba - phelpscountyfocus.com" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiiwFBVV95cUxQV3NhZENfRm44SzBLbEM5dVVNMnVadEp4V0phcEJUOEF0Nm1uckh5UXFtcWxQNGRRZXFwWk03anQ5aktNMTB2TVA5enY4UmdpRTBMSkhHZEZwcmFPSkx0aXVzWVJpenJka2RzTlJfOGVMYTlvRy1JY2VkVHo3clFneF95QWk5THY2bVVJ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/diaries/lynn-cruzs-diary/the-hershey-train-and-the-collapse-of-cubas-rail-system/", + "id": "CBMiiwFBVV95cUxQV3NhZENfRm44SzBLbEM5dVVNMnVadEp4V0phcEJUOEF0Nm1uckh5UXFtcWxQNGRRZXFwWk03anQ5aktNMTB2TVA5enY4UmdpRTBMSkhHZEZwcmFPSkx0aXVzWVJpenJka2RzTlJfOGVMYTlvRy1JY2VkVHo3clFneF95QWk5THY2bVVJ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 08 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 8, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 39, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba  phelpscountyfocus.com", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Woman jumps to death from I-44 overpass in Cuba  phelpscountyfocus.com" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.phelpscountyfocus.com", + "title": "phelpscountyfocus.com" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System - Havana Times\nauthor: Lynn Cruz\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/diaries/lynn-cruzs-diary/the-hershey-train-and-the-collapse-of-cubas-rail-system/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: Producing the independent film Corazon Azul (Blue Heart) by Miguel Coyula, we needed to film a train trip. The first thing that came to my mind was the time I spent over the years on the Hershey train coming from Matanzas to visit my maternal family, especially my grandparents.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-28\ncategories: ['Lynn Cruz\u2019s Diary']\n---\n# The Hershey Train and the Collapse of Cuba\u2019s Rail System\n\n**Lynn Cruz**\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 Producing the independent film Corazon Azul (Blue Heart) by Miguel Coyula, we needed to film a train trip. The first thing that came to my mind was the time I spent over the years on the Hershey train coming from Matanzas to visit my maternal family, especially my grandparents.\n\nStarted in 1920, it was famous for being the only electric train that rolled in Cuba. With time it became a vintage object, also exploited for tourist purposes.\n\nIt owes its name to the famous American chocolatier who ordered it to be built, with the purpose of transporting passengers, but also to his employees. It passed through the small town of Hershey, where the businessman built, in 1916, a sugar mill, now in disuse and traveled the 98 km that separate Havana from the province of Matanzas.\n\nOf the 17 cars that the train had in the early 1920s, there are three authentic cars built in 1917 in Pennsylvania, headquarters of the Hershey group.\n\nOrganizing the filming plan, I called the Casa Blanca station, from where the train departs in Havana, and to my surprise the train no longer exists. The custodian who attended me, with indignation, told me that four days before Hurricane Irma in 2017, it left for the last time.\n\nHe also told me that this information has only been given in the province of Mayabeque, since the train went through many of its towns and municipalities, being the most affected. He complained that they have not even taken the trouble to update the news on the Internet, which is why many tourists are still coming in search of the promised trip.\n\nThis man, who undoubtedly has a sense of belonging to the place, also said that the employees of that station lost their jobs, leaving only the watchmen.\n\nI asked if they have given reasons, and he replied that there is a rumor about the breakage of the trains, apparently stationed at the Hershey station. He also said that the administration was more delinquent than common criminals and that they cared little about the workers\u2019 fate.\n\nRegretting the news, I said goodbye to the custodian, because this train, besides carrying the passengers for a very cheap price, carried with it the weight of History.\n\nAs my goal was to film a train trip, I thought then of the one that goes from San Antonio de los Ba\u00f1os to Havana, where another part of my family lives. I called the station located on Tulipan Street in the capital city of Nuevo Vedado and it turned out that it is also canceled since September, they have not given any reasons, they only say there are \u201cbreakages\u201d and it is not known how long it will take to repair.\n\nI then tried through the Central Station in Old Havana, which included transfers to almost all the provinces, and the only accessible train was to Sancti Sp\u00edritus, it goes out at night, and the scene I needed to film happens during the day.\n\nIn any case, we could even do without filming it, only that the geographic conditions of Cuba, with a mostly flat terrain, made the railway one of the main means of transportation. It is regrettable to note another of the great losses during the so-called Cuban revolutionary period.\n\nDan Segal is correct. Cuba can trade with many other countries and still does. The problem is systematic of socialism. The corruption and repression from the leaders are the biggest issues. Trust me I live there off and on for years now.\n\nMr. Hershey built the RR from his sugar cane factory to the sea port to ship his sugar cane to his plant in Hershey Pa. There was a horrific train accident that killed many male workers so Mr. Hershey set up an orphanage school, similar to Milton Hershey school to train the children who lost a parent in the accident. Mr. Hershey loved Cuba.\n\nIt is a Blockade!!! End the Blockade\n\nThe US has a hand in Cuba\u2019s problems, but Cuba\u2019s problems are mainly systemic and internal. For example, not letting its own people work freely and contribute to their own economy by making money the old-fashioned way (finding something that people want and providing it to them)\u2026I don\u2019t like how the US views and treats Cuba at all, and as a US citizen, in our free society, I can\u2019t believe that our government can try to limit where we go and what we do. But if Cuba wanted to, it could easily make some drastic improvements for its own people, regardless of what the US says or does. However, it the Cuban government chooses not to help its own people.\n\nUsed to go to Hershey sugar mill on school field trips and with family. As I recall there was a narrow gauge train that ran from the cane fields to the mill. Don\u2019t know if it still exists. Many fond memories of the place. The railroad system in Cuba is older than that of Spain, the colonial master. Cuba is poor and a dictatorship. I hope the us does not make it worse by enforcing title 3 of helms-burton act.\n\nIt\u2019s complicated, embargo, as USA government call\u2019s the economic blockade they have against Cuba, has the purpose of economically suffocating the Cuban people. The economic deficiencies bring misery, loss of values, and above all, corruption! The USA have caused all this, and in public opinion they only point out the consequences but not the causes or the responsible parties (USA, if is not clear). The Cuban people looked for ways to survive without kneeling in front of the United States, and those ways of surviving, unfortunately, are linked to theft and corruption.\n\nThat strategy of suffocating the people until putting them against their government, is being applied against Venezuela too.\n\nThe Hershey Train is a sweet memory of my childhood too. It reminded me the days when we were on our way to the beach( Jibacoa ), my cousins and I were looking out of the car window in search for the electric train. Thank you for bringing those memories back! Sad very sad.\n\nSoooo sad how everything in that place falls apart. Nothing function. Well yes one thing functions very well on that island. REPRESSION" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution - The Conversation", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution - The Conversation" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiqAFBVV95cUxNeWdNWG4xd3E5OURDbHJjd0lYTFJjbVdXY1B5MnBlR1JrZmhVcUNRWnVUdkNDSVR1T0JydUdqal8xZjRCS1R2cjFrUHY0Rk5ZdEQwQzBjdXJwdnpBRV9KQk5jN2JvbUE3b25rcUhUS25RVDl0OEs5bkw3b3d2RllYZGFOZUR3Vjcwb19iZmpxeEUtY0dVME41ZHNVVldxUjFUbm9JaFFPU2U?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/02/07/climate-cast-cuba", + "id": "CBMiqAFBVV95cUxNeWdNWG4xd3E5OURDbHJjd0lYTFJjbVdXY1B5MnBlR1JrZmhVcUNRWnVUdkNDSVR1T0JydUdqal8xZjRCS1R2cjFrUHY0Rk5ZdEQwQzBjdXJwdnpBRV9KQk5jN2JvbUE3b25rcUhUS25RVDl0OEs5bkw3b3d2RllYZGFOZUR3Vjcwb19iZmpxeEUtY0dVME41ZHNVVldxUjFUbm9JaFFPU2U", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution  The Conversation", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution  The Conversation" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://theconversation.com", + "title": "The Conversation" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing\nauthor: Paul Huttner\nurl: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/02/07/climate-cast-cuba\nhostname: mprnews.org\ndescription: MPR News chief meteorologist Paul Huttner visited Cuba last week and got a lesson on how climate change is affecting the country.\nsitename: MPR News\ndate: 2019-02-07\n---\n# In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing\n\n### Go Deeper.\n\nCreate an account or log in to save stories.\n\n### Like this?\n\nThanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.\n\nA verification code has been emailed to\n\nCreate an account or log in to save stories.\n\nThanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories." + }, + { + "title": "\u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review - Santa Fe Reporter", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "\u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review - Santa Fe Reporter" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiXEFVX3lxTE9QdVJ6MTRxVFVzOTdjUWRvTm5odDVlUWZ1bnJBWG1ZNWZPZElxdTdTbkxNSmxIOU5yNWRKblNZRTM2a2xodndyc2RPZm1NZEV4VVdzMGxwXzZUVE9r?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://theconversation.com/cuba-expands-rights-but-rejects-radical-change-in-updated-constitution-112578", + "id": "CBMiXEFVX3lxTE9QdVJ6MTRxVFVzOTdjUWRvTm5odDVlUWZ1bnJBWG1ZNWZPZElxdTdTbkxNSmxIOU5yNWRKblNZRTM2a2xodndyc2RPZm1NZEV4VVdzMGxwXzZUVE9r", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "\u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review  Santa Fe Reporter", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "\u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review  Santa Fe Reporter" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://sfreporter.com", + "title": "Santa Fe Reporter" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution\nauthor: Mar\u00eda Isabel Alfonso\nurl: https://theconversation.com/cuba-expands-rights-but-rejects-radical-change-in-updated-constitution-112578\nhostname: theconversation.com\ndescription: Cuba will not legalize same-sex marriage, as gay activists hoped. But its new constitution adds greater protections for LGBTQ people and for women, and gives Cubans the right to own private property.\nsitename: The Conversation\ndate: 2019-02-27\n---\nCuba has rejected a proposal to legalize same-sex marriage in its new and revised constitution, a move that disappointed some gay rights activists.\n\nAn article that would have redefined marriage as a \u201cunion between two people\u201d \u2013 rather than a \u201cunion between a man and a woman\u201d \u2013 was eliminated from a proposed new constitution, which was written last year by the National Assembly, analyzed and debated in thousands of public meetings across the island and, on Feb. 24, approved by the Cuban people at referendum.\n\nBut marriage equality is not totally off the table in Cuba.\n\n*\nRead more:\nCuba actualiza su Constituci\u00f3n, expandiendo derechos pero posponiendo cambios radicales\n*\n\nMarriage is now defined in the constitution as \u201ca social and legal institution\u201d and \u201cone form of family organization.\u201d In other words, same-sex marriage is not explicitly permitted \u2013 but it\u2019s no longer strictly prohibited, either.\n\nThis is how social change works these days in Cuba, my home country and the subject of my academic research. Progress is no longer revolutionary. It comes slowly, and cloaked in moderation.\n\n## Slow change\n\nIn this way, Cuba has undergone a gradual and dramatic metamorphosis under the governments of Ra\u00fal Castro and his successor, President Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel.\n\nThanks to a thaw in U.S.-Cuba relations under President Barack Obama, American tourists began visiting the communist country for the first time since the Kennedy administration placed a trade embargo on Cuba after Fidel Castro\u2019s 1959 communist revolution.\n\nStarting in 2008, Castro opened the economy to some foreign investment and allowed Cuban workers \u2013 once confined to government jobs \u2013 to start small businesses.\n\nThe new constitution \u2013 the fourth such update to Cuba\u2019s founding document \u2013 creates official legal standing for Castro\u2019s economic reforms, which had remained in legal limbo under a Cold War-era constitution that did not recognize private property or the business sector.\n\nMany Cubans hoped the reform process would also expand civil liberties, bringing Cuban law more into line with its changing society.\n\nLGBTQ rights groups, in particular, launched public awareness campaigns about sexual diversity. By late 2018, the path seemed to have been paved for gay marriage.\n\nBut religious groups fiercely opposed the move, and ultimately the government removed new language defining marriage as a \u201cunion between two people.\u201d\n\n## Some hits, some misses\n\nStill, the newly approved constitution does substantially expand social, political and economic rights in Cuba.\n\nIt limits Cuban presidents to two five-year terms. Previously, Cuba had no term limits. It also creates a prime minister position and strengthens local government, shifting power out of the executive. The criminal justice system in Cuba now operates on the presumption of innocence, not guilt.\n\nFreedom of assembly, long restricted on the island, has also been expanded.\n\nPreviously, Cubans had the \u201cright to meet, demonstrate and associate, for licit and peaceful purposes,\u201d but only as part of a so-called \u201corganizaci\u00f3n de masa\u201d \u2013 the Cuban term for state-run groups. The new constitution removes the words \u201corganizaciones de masa,\u201d depoliticizing the freedom of assembly.\n\nIt remains to be seen whether the government will actually respect Cubans\u2019 new right to form independent organizations \u2013 especially if those groups are political in nature.\n\n\u201cSpontaneous gatherings [in Cuba] are not seen positively and are always perceived to be the product of a foreign power,\u201d wrote Jos\u00e9 Gabriel Barrenechea of La Trinchera, a blog for and by \u201cyoung Marxists,\u201d in a recent post.\n\n## Greater equality\n\nCuba\u2019s prior constitution prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, skin color, sex, national origin and religious belief. Now gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, ethnic origin, disability and territorial origin have been added to the list.\n\nThe National Assembly stopped short of proposing any affirmative action policies, however, which would have been a more radical step toward equality.\n\nThe 1959 Cuban Revolution aimed to abolish all economic and racial differences among the Cubans, at least 36 percent of whom are Afro-Cuban. And Cuba\u2019s inequality levels still remain well below other countries in the region.\n\nBut the recent economic reforms that increased prosperity for some have left certain minority groups \u2013 namely Afro-Cubans and the elderly \u2013 behind. Anti-discrimination statutes do nothing to close the widening wage gap.\n\nThe verdict is also mixed on how women fare under new laws.\n\nAbortion, which unlike in the majority of Latin America and Caribbean has long been easily accessible in Cuba, is now officially protected in a provision guaranteeing women\u2019s access to reproductive health services. And all forms of gender-based violence, not just domestic abuse and sexual assault, but also street harassment and workplace intimidation, are criminalized.\n\nHowever, a popular constitutional guarantee that the government will provide free, universal child care and elder care to all working families women was eliminated.\n\nThis shifts the burden of care away from the government and onto the family. In a patriarchal society like Cuba\u2019s, I believe women will inevitably assume these domestic duties.\n\nCubans evidently feared that other heralded rights would be lost, too.\n\nIn last year\u2019s island-wide public meetings, people frequently requested assurances that universal health care and free public education through the post-graduate level would be maintained.\n\nThey were.\n\n## Rights deferred\n\nBut some long-hoped-for rights remain elusive.\n\nIndependent media is still prohibited, a blow to the blogs and alternative news sites that have cropped up to fill the information vacuum of a country where all news sources are government-owned.\n\nSome analysts have observed that, as in the case of gay marriage, language defining the role of the media in Cuba was loosened somewhat. And in December the government announced it would allow Cubans to access the internet on their smartphones.\n\nThis may leave the door open for greater press freedom in the future.\n\nHowever, in my analysis, regional politics make that unlikely to occur any time soon.\n\nFor six decades, the U.S. government has tried to destabilize Cuban society by broadcasting anti-Communist messages on radio and TV broadcasts.\n\nNow, the U.S. Office of Cuba Broadcasting has turned its attention to social media. The Trump administration in 2018 admitted that it tried to create fake Facebook accounts to foment dissent on the island, though it says the project \u201cnever got off the ground.\u201d\n\nThis revelation will likely only strengthen the Cuban government\u2019s resolve to limit Cubans\u2019 access to information.\n\nThe constitutional reform process has confirmed that radical progress in Cuba will have to wait. But Cuba is changing, in zigs and in zags \u2013 just perhaps not as fast as some might hope." + }, + { + "title": "Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank - imemc.org", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank - imemc.org" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiR0FVX3lxTE9NSFM0dkNqamlFcERRdE84cnNlSlk4QTRMUXNxb3hsS2Q0aGVTQVpoS1JuTTNGamFXSmdiYzVzZ04yWW03QVRz?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://sfreporter.com/archives/soy-cuba-review/", + "id": "CBMiR0FVX3lxTE9NSFM0dkNqamlFcERRdE84cnNlSlk4QTRMUXNxb3hsS2Q0aGVTQVpoS1JuTTNGamFXSmdiYzVzZ04yWW03QVRz", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 21 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 21, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 52, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank  imemc.org", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank  imemc.org" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://imemc.org", + "title": "imemc.org" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: \u2018Soy Cuba\u2019 Review\nauthor: Alex De Vore\nurl: https://sfreporter.com/movies/2019/02/27/soy-cuba-review/\nhostname: sfreporter.com\ndescription: Scary-pretty in glorious black and white\nsitename: Santa Fe Reporter\ndate: 2019-02-27\ncategories: ['Legacy Content']\ntags: ['Reviews,Arts,Alex De Vore', 'Reviews', 'Arts']\n---\nMake no mistake\u20141964's *Soy Cuba *is about as anti-America a propaganda film as there has ever been, but Russian director and cinematographer Mikhail Kalatozov's vision of a post-Missile Crisis Cuba is shot so beautifully, it's sometimes hard to absorb the actual contents of the four disparate vignettes set on the island nation. Now, completely remastered in 4K resolution with the assist from America's own cinematic legends Scorsese and Coppola, audiences have the first chance to see the film since its last wide-ish cinematic foray in 1995.\n\nKalatozov takes us from the dizzying highs of a Havana rooftop bikini-off to the lowest, darkest corners of the filthiest slums; the disgusting Americans who loudly take what they want; the poverty-stricken farmer whose land is sold out from under him. Revolutionary students take to the streets to vie for Castro, women forced into prostitution sell their faith, and the shadow of the US-backed Batista looms over everything like some omnipresent boogeyman we're meant to hate.\n\nAnd so we do. Oddly, or perhaps just as it was intended, *Soy Cuba *begins to sway us\u2014or at least make us understand. Besides, Americans are loud and boorish and easy to hate. Why did we hate Cuba for so long anyway?\n\nBesides, Kalatozov's technical prowess is undeniable, particularly in shots that descend sheer towers or pan through windows then soar over citizen-packed city streets without even the hint of a cut. How such shots were possible so cleanly in 1964 is anyone's guess, but *Soy Cuba *is rumored to have had an astronomical budget from its joint government backers in Cuba and Russia. The film was near-universally reviled at the time of its release and has largely remained unseen, save now and again when it's pulled out and pointed to as a historically relevant time capsule. Which it is, of course, and evocatively so, even if it lags toward the middle.\n\nAs a cinematic accomplishment, *Soy Cuba *is astonishing and utterly gorgeous. As a propaganda flick, it's chilling to think of the particulars of the era. Still, it's a cinephile's dream laid out in impossibly crisp black and white and a significant must for any film or history buffs.\n\n**8**\n\n+A cinematographic powerhouse; weirdly hard to look away\n\n-So needlessly long; subtext pretty much becomes text\n\n**Soy Cuba**\n\n**\nDirected by Kalatozov**\n\n**\nThe Screen, NR, 108 min.**" + }, + { + "title": "Students study bees, culture in Cuba - Drexel Triangle", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Students study bees, culture in Cuba - Drexel Triangle" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMidkFVX3lxTE1rLXJULTJmUF9qSWVnRUpSLUpSUjM3bkJxc3hJMjVzRGNsckVFb191NUc2MjVpXzJzWExRVFV6WmN1UUE5d1pYMktaQWJ0QWFXYm9vTWtkN2RKS0VJSFJpS1gxaV9DZ1VZSkZsY05kWGtDalllUHc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://imemc.org/article/98269/", + "id": "CBMidkFVX3lxTE1rLXJULTJmUF9qSWVnRUpSLUpSUjM3bkJxc3hJMjVzRGNsckVFb191NUc2MjVpXzJzWExRVFV6WmN1UUE5d1pYMktaQWJ0QWFXYm9vTWtkN2RKS0VJSFJpS1gxaV9DZ1VZSkZsY05kWGtDalllUHc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 22 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 22, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 53, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Students study bees, culture in Cuba  Drexel Triangle", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Students study bees, culture in Cuba  Drexel Triangle" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://thetriangle.org", + "title": "Drexel Triangle" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Project Cuba: Palestinian Doctor Helps Refugees in the West Bank\nauthor: IMEMC; Agencies\nurl: https://imemc.org/article/98269/\nhostname: imemc.org\ndescription: Muhammad\u2019s project represents what he dreams for the Palestinian health system in the future. \u201cI went through many difficulties, but today I have the best r ...\nsitename: - Imemc News\ndate: 2019-02-21\ncategories: ['Human Interest', 'Human rights', 'News Report', 'Refugees/Immigration', 'West Bank', 'Bethlehem', 'Israeli attacks', 'Israeli Settlement', 'Nablus', 'Tubas', 'Hebron', 'Jericho', 'Tulkarem']\nlicense: CC BY-NC 4.0\n---\n*Muhammad\u2019s project represents what he dreams for the Palestinian health system in the future. \u201cI went through many difficulties, but today I have the best reward of seeing my project come true,\u201d he says. Credit: personal archive*\n\n*by Alethea Kanas- PNN/ Bethlehem/*\n\nEven though \u201cProject Cuba\u201d is only four month old, it was still enough to offer 300 free medical visits for Palestinian refugees living in Aida camp in Bethlehem, home to 5,000 Palestinians who were expelled from their homes after the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, and the place where Dr. Muhammad Abu Srour was born and raised.\n\nDespite all the difficulties, he got a scholarship, traveled to Cuba and made the dream of studying medicine at the University of Medical Sciences of La Habana, one of the most prestigious in the area. For eight years he lived far from the family, faced barriers such as the language and the sacrifice of his parents, who with great sweat managed to cover his son\u2019s health and food expenses during this time.\n\nAfter finishing his specialization and residency in Pediatrics, Muhammad returned to live in Palestine and today works at the Baby Caritas hospital, which is in the same city where he was born. About 330,000 people under the age of 14 live in the southern West Bank. And it is the only hospital in the region that cares exclusively for children. But the pediatrician felt that he needed to do a little more for where he was born and suffered during childhood and adolescence with a rather precarious health system. That is why in October 2018 Muhammad materialized the idea of the project, which alone would provide medical care to those who need it. \u201cThe idea came especially from my love for Cuba\u2019s health system, which is based on family medicine. I learned this during my studies and wanted to put into practice attending the Palestinians who really need it, \u201che said. Between shifts at the hospital where he works professionally and a few sleepless nights, Muhammad manages to reconcile the agenda and visit the families served by the project. The pediatrician has a list of the contacts of all the families who live in Aida and the residents contact him by telephone when necessary.\n\n\u201cMy care is not just about visiting families. I make analyzes of the entire health situation of the camp for future projects, health campaigns and the environment, and at the moment I have 10 patients in chronic situation who need special care, \u201cconcluded the pediatrician. According to Muhammad, the complicated childhood living in the midst of the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict only gave him the strength to strive even harder to achieve his goals. \u201cWe need to make negative experiences positive for our own personal growth. I went through many difficulties, but today I have the best reward of seeing my project come true. There is nothing to pay to see the positive result in the treatment of my patients, it is a unique feeling and a duty of mine as a doctor. \u201d With no financial backing from the government, the young 27-year-old doctor is considering leaving Palestine only to improve his academic knowledge. And assured that he will continue working voluntarily to contribute to the development of his homeland. \u201cIn the future I want to see the Palestinian population enjoying a free and inclusive community health system.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua | English.news.cn - \u65b0\u534e\u7f51", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua | English.news.cn - \u65b0\u534e\u7f51" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMia0FVX3lxTE1aWkNJQ0dVdnZ3VFhndTdtbEV2Y3VKS1piNGQyZHU4ZllfbWpzbTJkcGozdm5OWWdVNHhOQlBBeHpYcnM5OU9qNTlQVlRkVjE3U3BfaWFsNURfU193eFlvanI2RFNVNUI0NHJB?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://fsspx.news/en/news/inauguration-catholic-church-historically-communist-cuba-21028", + "id": "CBMia0FVX3lxTE1aWkNJQ0dVdnZ3VFhndTdtbEV2Y3VKS1piNGQyZHU4ZllfbWpzbTJkcGozdm5OWWdVNHhOQlBBeHpYcnM5OU9qNTlQVlRkVjE3U3BfaWFsNURfU193eFlvanI2RFNVNUI0NHJB", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 20 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 20, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 51, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua | English.news.cn  \u65b0\u534e\u7f51", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua | English.news.cn  \u65b0\u534e\u7f51" + }, + "source": { + "href": "http://www.xinhuanet.com", + "title": "\u65b0\u534e\u7f51" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba\nurl: https://fsspx.news/en/news/inauguration-catholic-church-historically-communist-cuba-21028\nhostname: fsspx.news\ndescription: 60 years after the Marxist Revolution, the Cuban Catholic Church was able to open a new place of worship on January 26, 2019, in Sandino, a small city in the western province of Pinar del Rio.\nsitename: FSSPX News\ndate: 2019-02-14\n---\n# Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba\n\n60 years after the Marxist Revolution, the Cuban Catholic Church was able to open a new place of worship on January 26, 2019, in Sandino, a small city in the western province of Pinar del Rio.\n\nUntil the fall of Communism in the Soviet Union, Cuban Catholics had to practice their religion underground.\n\nWishing to break from his political isolation and still fascinated by the Catholic Church, Fidel Castro invited Pope John Paul II to Cuba for the first time in 1998. That same year, Christmas was allowed to be celebrated on the island.\n\nThe dictator\u2019s brother, Ra\u00f9l Castro, who has been in power since 2008, has pursued a policy of peace between Church and State, seeing her as a factor of stability compared to the Evangelical sects that are proliferating anarchically.\n\nRa\u00f9l Castro even thanked Pope Francis in 2014 for helping Cuba to strengthen its diplomatic relations with the United States. The following year, construction began on the Sacred Heart Church of Sandino, funded by $100,000 from faithful in Florida.\n\n60% of the island\u2019s 11.1 million Cubans are Catholic, but only a minority of them practice. Cuba has 650 churches serviced by 340 priests and 600 religious.\n\nSources: Huffington Post / La Croix / cath.ch / FSSPX.News \u2013 2/13/2019" + }, + { + "title": "In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing - MPR News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing - MPR News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiakFVX3lxTE5ENk5FaWFCeDF5a2pmSy1Qc3JqLXlCVHBNVW1XQkRxR0JCWVhqalBpdWtJa0kwX2lzSGYtWFQyN2RfcXlNY3B0UkxxcEM1bzZ3VDk2aHZlVGFJcHBaRWFQNVJjd2NseFZhMnc?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/09/americas/trump-venezuela-socialism-oppman-intl", + "id": "CBMiakFVX3lxTE5ENk5FaWFCeDF5a2pmSy1Qc3JqLXlCVHBNVW1XQkRxR0JCWVhqalBpdWtJa0kwX2lzSGYtWFQyN2RfcXlNY3B0UkxxcEM1bzZ3VDk2aHZlVGFJcHBaRWFQNVJjd2NseFZhMnc", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing  MPR News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "In Cuba, climate change means harsher hurricanes and tough coffee growing  MPR News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.mprnews.org", + "title": "MPR News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad | CNN\nauthor: Patrick Oppmann\nurl: https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/09/americas/trump-venezuela-socialism-oppman-intl\nhostname: cnn.com\ndescription: When Barack Obama traveled to Cuba in 2016, he vowed to reshape relations not just with the Communist-run island but with all of Latin America. The last US President to visit Cuba had been Calvin Coolidge. That was 80 years ago \u2013 and he had arrived accompanied by gunboats.\nsitename: CNN\ndate: 2019-02-09\ncategories: ['world', 'americas']\ntags: ['caribbean, cold war, conflicts and wars, continents and regions, cuba, donald trump, government and public administration, government bodies and offices, latin america, military, nicolas maduro, north america, political figures - intl, political figures - us, politics, south america, the americas, united states, unrest, conflicts and war, us federal government, venezuela, white house, forms of government, socialism', 'caribbean, cold war, conflicts and wars, continents and regions, cuba, donald trump, government and public administration, government bodies and offices, latin america, military, nicolas maduro, north america, political figures - intl, political figures - us, politics, south america, the americas, united states, unrest, conflicts and war, us federal government, venezuela, white house, forms of government, socialism']\n---\nWhen Barack Obama traveled to Cuba in 2016, he vowed to reshape relations not just with the Communist-run island but with all of Latin America. The last US President to visit Cuba had been Calvin Coolidge. That was 80 years ago \u2013 and he had arrived accompanied by gunboats.\n\nObama promised that the future would be different, no matter what political differences remained between the US and Latin America. \u201cI have come here to bury the last remnant of the Cold War in the Americas,\u201d he said in a speech in Havana.\n\nBut it seems there was too much history to fit into just one grave. Once again, the US is squaring off against Cold War-era adversaries in Latin America, this time over Venezuela and its embattled socialist President, Nicolas Maduro.\n\n## Pushing for a regime change in Venezuela\n\nThe downward spiral of the oil-rich South American nation has caused a coalition of Latin American and European nations to demand the socialist government of Venezuela change course. Many, with the US leading the way, have recognized self-declared president Juan Guaid\u00f3 as its interim head of state.\n\n\u201cIt is a remarkable coalition. Getting that many Latin American countries to recognize essentially an insurgent government is, I think, unprecedented,\u201d said William LeoGrande, a Latin America expert at American University in Washington. \u201cLatin Americans have always had this strong anti-intervention principle, partly because of the history of US interventions in Latin America.\u201d\n\nBut the Trump administration has refused to rule out a US invasion, a move that could fracture the coalition\u2019s consensus. In a throwback to the Cold War era, as the administration drums up fear of \u201csocialism\u201d at home, it seems to be edging closer to advocating for the violent overthrow of Maduro.\n\n## The Monroe Doctrine and \u2018America\u2019s backyard\u2019\n\nHistorically, Washington has tried to exercise the final say over what happened in the hemisphere, a policy famously articulated in the 1823 Monroe Doctrine. For decades after that, Latin America would be infamously considered \u201cAmerica\u2019s backyard,\u201d and any government deemed insufficiently friendly to US interests quickly toppled by the sight of US gunboats off their shores or a CIA-backed coup.\n\nThe Cold War raised the stakes in Latin America, as the US feared communism would spread to America\u2019s borders. Many Americans feared that the Soviets wanted to destroy the US, either by infiltrating high levels of government or by placing nuclear missiles 90 miles off the coast of the US in Cuba. \u201cBetter dead than red,\u201d went the anti-communist slogan of those times.\n\nUnder the guise that their \u201cstrong hand\u201d was the only way to prevent radical leftist governments from taking root in Latin America, the US supported military dictatorships that tortured and disappeared thousands of their own citizens.\n\nBy the time the Berlin Wall collapsed, many in Washington had grown tired of the human rights violations in the region and pushed for democratic reforms. The days of coups and military juntas seemed to be over. If the US again gets into the regime-change business in Latin America and pushes Maduro out, it could galvanize the region and lead to cries once more of, \u201cYankee go home.\u201d\n\n## \u2018America will never be a socialist country\u2019\n\n\u201cWe stand with the Venezuelan people in their noble quest for freedom,\u201d US President Donald Trump said in his State of the Union speech on Tuesday, \u201cand we condemn the brutality of the Maduro regime, whose socialist policies have turned that nation from being the wealthiest in South America into a state of abject poverty and despair.\u201d\n\nTrump, is his speech, even seemed to stoke Cold War-era fears declaring, \u201cHere, in the United States, we are alarmed by new calls to adopt socialism in our country.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe are born free, and we will stay free. Tonight, we renew our resolve that America will never be a socialist country,\u201d Trump continued, even though it was unlikely anyone in the room actually supported following Venezuela\u2019s failed policies.\n\nAlthough the administration has yet to show how Venezuela\u2019s collapse poses a direct threat to the US, the White House has enlisted veteran Cold Warriors to show Maduro the door.\n\nThe administration named Elliott Abrams to be the special envoy for Venezuela. That\u2019s despite the fact that In the 1980s, Abrams incorrectly claimed that the US-backed government in El Salvador had not carried massacres; in 1991, he pleaded guilty to two counts of withholding information from Congress during the Iran-Contra affair; and during the 2018 US presidential campaign, he wrote a sharp-tonged essay about why Trump was not qualified to be president.\n\nHimself a fierce critic of leftist regimes, Trump\u2019s national security adviser, John Bolton, has called Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua \u201ca troika of tyranny\u201d and promised to place harsh sanctions on the three countries. Meanwhile, US Sen. Marco Rubio, who has the Trump administrations ear on Latin America, has called on Venezuela\u2019s military to force Maduro to step down.\n\n\u201cTo the other military officials we have been in contact with over the last few days,\u201d Rubio wrote February 2 on Twitter, \u201cthe time has come for you to write your names in the pages of the history of #Venezuela. History will remember as heroes those who step forward at this moment.\u201d\n\n## Gunboat diplomacy all over again?\n\nIn a standoff that further recalls Cold War-era divisions, Maduro is backed by Russia, China and Cuba, which don\u2019t want to lose an ally in the region. Both China and Russia have loaned Maduro billions as his country\u2019s economy crashed and burned, and the Russian government has said it is considering installing an air base in Venezuela.\n\nCuba has received billions of dollars in Venezuelan oil and has sent tens of thousands of military and intelligence advisers to prop up its allies in Caracas.\n\nBut they are confronting a US administration that has vowed to take the gloves off \u2013 and has plenty of historical precedent to do so.\n\n\u201cIf this succeeds and Maduro is overthrown, it won\u2019t be the last time, and (the US has) already as much as said that Cuba and Nicaragua are on the agenda,\u201d the Latin America expert, LeoGrande, said.\n\nTrump administration officials have said they will hold Nicaragua accountable for violent crackdowns on student protesters and are exploring further sanctions on Cuba, including possibly overruling Obama\u2019s decision to remove the island from the list of countries that support terrorism. More intervention could be in the works.\n\n\u201cThis is a return to the 20th-century policy of the United States,\u201d LeoGrande said, \u201cthat if \u2018we don\u2019t like a government in Latin America, we overthrow it.\u2019\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba - FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba - FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMikwFBVV95cUxOSWVxdjBsSjFlXzBrV0w1QmVudnVtcWJfRm9mOHEzcWpOSFZ0WnNqT1h0WS1fNnVwdUdxVTk1MTAzbFpYOXdESS1TWTlVcmlfVi12U01haTBIRlNra3BuWWtRTTZwNUZoN1BMS2xUX2pUZzE1VGktNUlhVDhjNmhCLWJkVlY5V2VNU2htMU1QS3FrM00?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://thetriangle.org/article/students-study-bees-culture-in-cuba", + "id": "CBMikwFBVV95cUxOSWVxdjBsSjFlXzBrV0w1QmVudnVtcWJfRm9mOHEzcWpOSFZ0WnNqT1h0WS1fNnVwdUdxVTk1MTAzbFpYOXdESS1TWTlVcmlfVi12U01haTBIRlNra3BuWWtRTTZwNUZoN1BMS2xUX2pUZzE1VGktNUlhVDhjNmhCLWJkVlY5V2VNU2htMU1QS3FrM00", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 14 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 14, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 45, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba  FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Inauguration of a Catholic Church in Historically Communist Cuba  FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://fsspx.news", + "title": "FSSPX Actualit\u00e9s" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Students study bees, culture in Cuba\nurl: https://thetriangle.org/article/students-study-bees-culture-in-cuba\nhostname: thetriangle.org\nsitename: The Triangle\ndate: 2019-02-22\n---\n# Students study bees, culture in Cuba\n\nFeb. 22, 2019This past summer, a group of Drexel University faculty and students traveled to Cuba to study a particular type of honeybee, but also learned about themselves along the way as they immersed themselves in the local culture and community.\n\nThe group, led by Dr. Dane Ward, are all part of the Department of Biodiversity, Earth & Environmental Science at Drexel. Their research goal was to investigate a type of stingless honeybee, Melipona beecheii, and its ecology. Student projects ranged from surveying the best location for a new colony of bees to exploring how the bees regulate their body temperature. Perhaps the most significant result of the experience, however, was the group\u2019s unique opportunity to engage with the local Cuban community.\n\nDespite the long history of tense American-Cuban relations, the group found the people they encountered were more than welcoming.\n\n\u201cThe generosity and the warmth we experienced while we were there is something that I had never felt in an academic setting,\u201d environmental engineering student Margaret McCurdy said. \u201cWe only lived with our first casa mom for two weeks, but she cried when we left because we were so bonded with her. Every person we met wasn\u2019t just a colleague, they were also our friends.\u201d\n\nThe group\u2019s research heavily relied on field work, which meant that they often needed to enter people\u2019s property to access the bees they were studying. However, they found that the community happily accepted them into their homes to allow them to conduct their studies.\n\n\u201cWhile most people would be protective of their things, we had folks who were making us coffee or home remedies for our colds. We were just doing research and they just wanted to make sure we were still going,\u201d Ward said.\n\nOne of the primary initiatives of the program was to develop the students as global citizen scientists. These are researchers who don\u2019t just look for data and results in the field, but who also take the time to engage with the community where they work.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s the 9 to 5 time \u2014 that\u2019s the science time \u2014 when you\u2019re in classes or meetings, and then there\u2019s the 5 to 9 and then some. The second leg of the day is just as significant as the first part. In fact, I think it\u2019s the only part of significance. If you stopped at 5 p.m. and removed yourself from the culture and the people, you didn\u2019t embrace someone else\u2019s culture,\u201d Ward said.\n\nAlthough it may seem like working eight hours a day and then investing another significant portion of the day to cultural immersion would be exhausting, the students had nothing but positive things to say about their time there.\n\nThough Serena Joury, majoring in environmental science and product design, had little to no experience speaking Spanish, the official language of Cuba, she had no problem communicating.\n\n\u201cThe language barrier, although you would assume it would be a big issue, it really wasn\u2019t in retrospect,\u201d she said.\n\nAlthough there are no plans for this summer to send another research group due to funding limitations, Ward still plans to maintain the partnership between Drexel and the Universidad de Cienfuegos, the host institution in Cuba. One of the lead professors on the research project at Cienfuegos is planning on visiting Drexel to learn about how to perform a high-powered genetic study using lab techniques.\n\nHowever, Ward hopes that in the future, he can bring a diverse group of students back to Cuba to continue both the research project and to teach students how to be global citizen scientists.\n\nWard\u2019s research team would not have been able to have this experience without the support of the Office of Undergraduate Research, the Office of Global Engagement, and the Department of Biodiversity, Earth & Environmental Science at Drexel University.\n\nFor 100 years, The Triangle has operated as a financially and editorially independent student newspaper. In order to continue this legacy, The Triangle relies on the generosity of our alumni, family, and friends. Please consider donating to The Triangle in order to secure the future of student-journalism at Drexel.\n\nDonate" + }, + { + "title": "Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad - CNN", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad - CNN" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiiAFBVV95cUxNNHdVY2g3N1prLVhsUzFYckFPeGpFdDlUV0VidFBWLVNXeVVsTVZGaFQwU3VQd24xOFcyRTlZVVpFTEtKbDh1Y1pDYTBBN0E0YXVMSUV2Zkg2ZXlhVENGWWRCeVVYeE0wTTF1aVFEUUdTOUFrdHVSa0Fod25vREIwME42amUxZXdx?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-02/20/c_137837057.htm", + "id": "CBMiiAFBVV95cUxNNHdVY2g3N1prLVhsUzFYckFPeGpFdDlUV0VidFBWLVNXeVVsTVZGaFQwU3VQd24xOFcyRTlZVVpFTEtKbDh1Y1pDYTBBN0E0YXVMSUV2Zkg2ZXlhVENGWWRCeVVYeE0wTTF1aVFEUUdTOUFrdHVSa0Fod25vREIwME42amUxZXdx", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sat, 09 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 9, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 5, + 40, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad  CNN", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Fearing socialism at home, Trump takes a Cold War stance abroad  CNN" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://edition.cnn.com", + "title": "CNN" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext\nsitename: Cuba warns of U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on humanitarian pretext - Xinhua\ndate: 2019-02-20\n---\nCuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez speaks during a press conference in Havana, Cuba, Feb. 19, 2019. Bruno Rodriguez has warned that Washington is planning a military intervention in Venezuela on the pretext of delivering humanitarian aid. Rodriguez said that Washington is following a \"script\" that \"has been previously used in other parts of the world, with severe consequences,\" repeating recent warnings by Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel of the \"economic, military, social and humanitarian consequences of a U.S. military venture\" and its destabilizing effect on all of Latin America. (Xinhua/Joaquin Hernandez)\n\nHAVANA, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez has warned that Washington is planning a military intervention in Venezuela on the pretext of delivering humanitarian aid.\n\nRodriguez said that Washington is following a \"script\" that \"has been previously used in other parts of the world, with severe consequences,\" repeating recent warnings by Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel of the \"economic, military, social and humanitarian consequences of a U.S. military venture\" and its destabilizing effect on all of Latin America.\n\n\"Cuba calls on the international community to overcome political differences to act in defense of peace and prevent a military intervention in Venezuela,\" he added.\n\nOn Friday, billionaire Richard Branson announced an aid concert in Colombia to benefit Venezuelans in Cucuta, a Colombian border city with Venezuela. It is scheduled for Feb. 23 in the context of other demonstrations organized by the Venezuelan opposition in the country.\n\nThe power struggle between Venezuela's ruling socialist party and opposition groups deepened last month after Juan Guaido, who is also the head of the National Assembly, proclaimed himself \"interim president.\"\n\nImmediately recognized by the White House and its allies, Guaido announced that the opposition will bring the U.S. aid into Venezuela via Cucuta by land on Feb. 23, despite the government's blockade.\n\nThe border crossing has turned into a potential flashpoint as the Venezuelan opposition, with the support of Washington, steps up pressure on President Nicolas Maduro's government to renounce power.\n\nVenezuela's Minister of Culture Ernesto Villegas referred to the concert as an attempt to \"varnish with culture the shameful act of war,\" saying it is intended to put pressure on the Venezuelan government so that so-called \"humanitarian aid\" sent by the United States can enter Venezuela.\n\nDenying the existence of a humanitarian crisis, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro called the aid operation a U.S.-orchestrated show leading to an eventual invasion into the oil-rich country, and promoted a rival concert on its side of the border for Feb. 22-23.\n\nOn Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump gave a speech to the Venezuelan American community in Miami, Florida, in which he lambasted Venezuela's socialist government and said the days of leftist governments in the Western Hemisphere, including Nicaragua and Cuba, are coming to an end.\n\nCuba rejected those statements earlier on Tuesday. Trump was \"ill-advised\" on Cuba, Venezuela and Latin America, said Johana Tablada, deputy director of the Cuban Foreign Ministry's department for U.S. affairs.\n\nVenezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez also dismissed U.S. President Donald Trump's speech on the South American country as \"arrogant and rude.\"\n\nTrump \"completely disregards the eminently Bolivarian (revolutionary), anti-imperialist and professional character of our institution,\" Padrino said in a statement issued on behalf of the superior chief of staff of the National Bolivarian Armed Forces (FANB).\n\nTrump is using \"hybrid warfare\" against Venezuela, \"strangling the economy by imposing an economic and financial blockade, with which he plans to generate ungovernability, chaos and anarchy,\" Padrino said.\n\n\"Coercion, blackmail, manipulation, sanctions and amnesty,\" however, will not lead the military to violate the Constitution by abandoning Maduro's democratically elected government, he added.\n\nVenezuela's military is aware that the true goal of the United States is to gain control over the South American country's vast oil reserves and gold deposits, Padrino said, adding that \"The country is calm, institutions are functioning, people are working, and the government is leading.\"" + }, + { + "title": "The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck - La Vida Baseball", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck - La Vida Baseball" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMidEFVX3lxTE9xdkg1YlA3dmVtSGhPX0NCcnk1V1BkYlQ5eDZNNkQ1MEo5ZEpWTGlLaWF3TENFMzYxY3JjcjZFb0ZHUWo5dFBVaHlqX191V0hyX09YU1BOTHU0dHlfMVFmTENsUm1GTk1BbV9jak4xUkRPZFd2?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.borgenmagazine.com/success-in-keeping-cubas-infant-mortality-rate-low/", + "id": "CBMidEFVX3lxTE9xdkg1YlA3dmVtSGhPX0NCcnk1V1BkYlQ5eDZNNkQ1MEo5ZEpWTGlLaWF3TENFMzYxY3JjcjZFb0ZHUWo5dFBVaHlqX191V0hyX09YU1BOTHU0dHlfMVFmTENsUm1GTk1BbV9jak4xUkRPZFd2", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 05 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 5, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 36, + 0 + ], + "summary": "The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck  La Vida Baseball", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck  La Vida Baseball" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.lavidabaseball.com", + "title": "La Vida Baseball" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Success in Keeping Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rate Low - BORGEN Magazine", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Success in Keeping Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rate Low - BORGEN Magazine" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiigFBVV95cUxNY3I0ano1UnI5MEpNcldiSDhQUUhZUWNlbzZhTTktSlJfdFNxYlROZ204UFQ3OGpVUEI0akRjUWE1RW5qUjd1cGVtYUg4Q05lLUlXUTlha1hoVUpWN3Nka05zenpzeVVONWZyNEg2VW1GVkpVLWctc2ZzQW8tRnZrU1FmOHU2M0Z3WUE?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.neworleans.com/blog/post/preservation-hall-jazz-bands-a-tuba-to-cuba-comes-to-the-silver-screen/", + "id": "CBMiigFBVV95cUxNY3I0ano1UnI5MEpNcldiSDhQUUhZUWNlbzZhTTktSlJfdFNxYlROZ204UFQ3OGpVUEI0akRjUWE1RW5qUjd1cGVtYUg4Q05lLUlXUTlha1hoVUpWN3Nka05zenpzeVVONWZyNEg2VW1GVkpVLWctc2ZzQW8tRnZrU1FmOHU2M0Z3WUE", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 13 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 13, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 44, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Success in Keeping Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rate Low  BORGEN Magazine", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Success in Keeping Cuba\u2019s Infant Mortality Rate Low  BORGEN Magazine" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.borgenmagazine.com", + "title": "BORGEN Magazine" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen | New Orleans\nurl: https://www.neworleans.com/blog/post/preservation-hall-jazz-bands-a-tuba-to-cuba-comes-to-the-silver-screen/\nhostname: neworleans.com\ndescription: New Orleans and Cuba - linked by the Gulf of Mexico - were once located on the same trade routes. Scholars have since been able to trace cultural exchanges and common musical influences dating back to the 1800s. In \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Ben Jaffe, son of Preservation Hall founders and current tuba player for the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, embarks on a journey accompanied by his band members to fulfill his late father\u2019s wish of discovering the musical roots of jazz on the shores of Cuba.\nsitename: New Orleans & Company\ndate: 2019-02-04\ncategories: ['Music, Cultural Arts']\n---\nFrom food to architecture, New Orleans is one of the most unique cities in the world due to a remarkable blend of cultures that has shaped the city. Attributable to the Spanish presence in 18th century New Orleans, the city still embraces many Hispanic influences.\n\nNew Orleans and Cuba - linked by the Gulf of Mexico - were once located on the same trade routes. Scholars have since been able to trace cultural exchanges and common musical influences dating back to the 1800's.\n\nIn \u201c**A Tuba to Cuba**\u201d Ben Jaffe, son of Preservation Hall founders and current tuba player for the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, embarks on a journey accompanied by his band members to fulfill his late father\u2019s wish of discovering the musical roots of jazz on the shores of Cuba.\n\nDirected by T.G. Herrington and Danny Clinch, \u201c**A Tuba to Cuba**\u201d chronicles this epic journey of discovery while also shedding light on the history of both New Orleans and Cuban music and those who created it. This riveting odyssey offers a firsthand account of how music is the true universal language.\n\n\n**\u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d comes to the silver screen on Feb. 15 at select theaters in New Orleans, New York and Glendale, California.**\n\nFor general information on the film, visit: https://www.atubatocuba.com/. For information on showtimes in your city, see the following:\n\n*Loved the film and want to take your experience a step further? Preservation Hall Jazz Band still performs nightly in the heart of the French Quarter where it has served both locals and visitors intimate jazz concerts since 1961.*" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba denies Trump claim of troops in Venezuela - Arab News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba denies Trump claim of troops in Venezuela - Arab News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiVkFVX3lxTFBGeVUtOW1NUVRMdEpTZTVjNHMwT0hsdDlBaTFwWFRqOHd6WFVqTU1GTC0wVlZfVEowRzNOb1I0SkRwYXRCMnd6WVRzRUFoWVlGcDVlaU1B?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.arabnews.com/node/1455111/world", + "id": "CBMiVkFVX3lxTFBGeVUtOW1NUVRMdEpTZTVjNHMwT0hsdDlBaTFwWFRqOHd6WFVqTU1GTC0wVlZfVEowRzNOb1I0SkRwYXRCMnd6WVRzRUFoWVlGcDVlaU1B", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 19 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 19, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 50, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba denies Trump claim of troops in Venezuela  Arab News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba denies Trump claim of troops in Venezuela  Arab News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.arabnews.com", + "title": "Arab News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen - New Orleans Tourism", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen - New Orleans Tourism" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMirAFBVV95cUxQVkJ3dnpyaXhkbFlIUWprM3RPQUQxRGdXSkx2VDlPRE9PLXRVcDFvX1JrTG9mVlA0V2RnMkdwMkZ4SU9JVXFKVGR3RWxZMXpQYzBPLVJjY1pfVlBLek1lM29Da2hvR0F1b2lqVHY3cHpTWkpmNUdUeVlPSGJyYjUzdmtrbmY0dVk2S25iSkpnNnVNWTh5YjJGV3RNNm45bEw2aFFiV0hvd1VrQmN6?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.lavidabaseball.com/bill-veeck-minnie-minoso-white-sox/", + "id": "CBMirAFBVV95cUxQVkJ3dnpyaXhkbFlIUWprM3RPQUQxRGdXSkx2VDlPRE9PLXRVcDFvX1JrTG9mVlA0V2RnMkdwMkZ4SU9JVXFKVGR3RWxZMXpQYzBPLVJjY1pfVlBLek1lM29Da2hvR0F1b2lqVHY3cHpTWkpmNUdUeVlPSGJyYjUzdmtrbmY0dVk2S25iSkpnNnVNWTh5YjJGV3RNNm45bEw2aFFiV0hvd1VrQmN6", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 06 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 6, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 37, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen  New Orleans Tourism", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Preservation Hall Jazz Band\u2019s \u201cA Tuba to Cuba\u201d Comes to the Silver Screen  New Orleans Tourism" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.neworleans.com", + "title": "New Orleans Tourism" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck\nauthor: Luis Rodr\u00edguez Mayoral\nurl: https://www.lavidabaseball.com/bill-veeck-minnie-minoso-white-sox/\nhostname: lavidabaseball.com\ndescription: The relationship between Bill Veeck and Minnie Mi\u00f1oso will never leave my mind. I remember Veeck as a flamboyant and formidable baseball man who treasured the friendship of his friend from Cuba for some 40 years. He was a man who likely never encountered\nsitename: La Vida Baseball\ndate: 2019-02-05\ncategories: ['']\ntags: ['Bill Veeck', 'Chicago White Sox', 'Minnie Minoso']\n---\n# The odd couple: Minnie Mi\u00f1oso and Bill Veeck\n\nThe relationship between Bill Veeck and Minnie Mi\u00f1oso will never leave my mind.\n\nI remember Veeck as a flamboyant and formidable baseball man who treasured the friendship of his friend from Cuba for some 40 years. He was a man who likely never encountered barriers to making friends, but was not above making waves. Many may not remember, but Veeck, who had a wooden leg, marched in Martin Luther King Jr.\u2019s funeral procession in Atlanta on April 9, 1968.\n\nTo me, Orestes \u201cMinnie\u201d Mi\u00f1oso, the first black Latino star in MLB history, was a person and ballplayer with great passion who contributed immensely in uniting countries and fans at an international level. He was a very gracious person. His impact is still felt in baseball.\n\nThe two were titans of baseball and I feel blessed to have gotten to know them while they lived. It was a joy to spend time with them and a pleasure to share my memories and their stories.\n\n**United through Baseball**\n\nTheir backgrounds could not have been more different, one from an American baseball family and the other a poor Cuban. Worlds apart at birth, Veeck and Mi\u00f1oso are intertwined in baseball history, a pioneering duo, whose impact on the game still brings joy to fans.\n\nVeeck\u2019s dad, William, was a sportswriter who covered the Chicago Cubs from 1916-1933. This paved the way for his son Bill to be a popcorn vendor in Wrigley Field, and, after attending Kenyon College in Ohio, eventually become the Cubs treasurer.\n\nMinnie\u2019s parents, on the other hand, worked in sugar cane plantations on the outskirts of El Perico, a small town in the Province of Matanzas, close to Havana. A young Orestes, with a machete in hand, worked the cane fields to help his parents make ends meet.\n\nHe had very little formal education, but Mi\u00f1oso was gifted with superb abilities when it came to baseball. As with most kids, he played unorganized juvenile baseball. From there, he stepped up to the amateur level then, in 1945, became a professional with the Marianao team in Cuba\u2019s winter league.\n\nThe following year, legendary baseball man Alejandro Pompez, born in Key West, Florida (to Cuban parents) signed Mi\u00f1oso to the New York Cubans in the National Negro League. There the Cuban native began to make his name in U.S. professional baseball.\n\nWhile scouting the Negro Leagues for Veeck\u2019s Cleveland Indians in 1948, Abe Saperstein, owner of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team, paved the way for Minnie to play in \u201corganized baseball\u201d by acquiring Mi\u00f1oso from Pompez\u2019s Cubans team. The then third baseman was assigned to Cleveland\u2019s Class A affiliate, Dayton, in the Central League. A year later, the Cuban would make his major league debut on April 19, 1949.\n\n**Bill Veeck: MLB Innovator**\n\nAt different times, Veeck owned three MLB teams: Cleveland Indians (1946-49), St. Louis Browns (1951-53), and the Chicago White Sox (1959-61 and 1975-81). He was a natural showman, believed the fans were of utmost importance to an organization, had the touch of a genius when it came to promotions and never feared speaking his mind.\n\nThe Brooklyn Dodgers broke MLB\u2019s color barrier in the National League with Jackie Robinson on April 15, 1947. Exactly 82 days later, Veeck tore down the American League barricade with Larry Doby making his debut with Cleveland on July 5\u2014in Chicago of all places.\n\nOn July 9, 1948, Veeck made it possible for African-American pitcher, Satchel Paige, himself a great showman, to become the oldest player ever to make his MLB debut at age 42 years and two days. That pair were able to reach MLB\u2019s pinnacle, winning the 1948 World Series against the Boston Braves.\n\nIn 1959, Veeck became owner of the White Sox. The team enjoyed immediate success, winning the American League pennant before losing the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers.\n\nBelieving he had lung cancer, Veeck sold the White Sox to John and Arthur Allyn in 1961.\n\n\u201cIf I ever return to baseball, I want you at my side.\u201d \u2013 Veeck to Mi\u00f1oso in 1961.\n\n\n**The \u201cCuban Comet\u201d**\n\nWhen Mi\u00f1oso made his MLB debut with Cleveland on April 19, 1949, Veeck was the team owner, but that wasn\u2019t the case when the outfielder played his first game with the White Sox on May 1, 1951. On that occasion, Mi\u00f1oso became the first black player in White Sox history. During his first at-bat, on the first pitch at Comiskey Park in the bottom of the first inning, he hit a 415-foot homer against Yankees righty Vic Rasche.\n\nThat marked the beginning of an everlasting love affair between the \u201cCuban Comet\u201d and the great city of Chicago.\n\nDuring his MLB career with Cleveland, the White Sox, the St. Louis Cardinals and the Washington Senators, Mi\u00f1oso was an All-Star three times, recipient of three Gold Gloves and led his league in stolen bases on three occasions.\n\nReleased by Washington on July 17, 1964, Mi\u00f1oso headed for Mexico where he would live 12 years. He continued playing and managing while becoming a legend among Mexican fans who lovingly nicknamed him \u201cEl Charro Negro.\u201d\n\nBut Minnie, surprisingly, was not done performing in the Majors.\n\nOne day during January 1976, Mi\u00f1oso got a call from Roland Hemond, new White Sox general manager, telling him Veeck had once again bought the team. And true to his words in 1961, Veeck wanted Minoso on his coaching staff.\n\n**Retiring Comebacks**\n\nContinuing in his long string of promotional maneuvers, Veeck reactivated Minoso for a few at-bats in 1976 to give him a claim of playing in four decades. He did it again in 1980 to give Minnie a claim of playing in five.\n\nWhy did Veeck keep bringing Minnie back? Veeck\u2019s response to my question during a 1976 interview about what he thinks when he hears the name Mi\u00f1oso gives us an indication:\n\n\u201cGreat player he was! Great person he is! Very dedicated and focused player. Besides, he possesses a great personality in or out of uniform. He had the ability to put aside the hardships in his personal life and play the game with passion. And he has always been great when it comes to his obligations with the fans. Minnie also proves that average sized players can be a great stars in baseball and that any player\u2026white or black, no matter where he was born, even while not speaking English well, can be loved and adored by fans.\u201d\n\nThe White Sox invited me to be present for the retirement of Minoso\u2019s #9 on May 8, 1983. The ceremony took place on Mother\u2019s Day and I got the chance to talk with Minnie about his baseball life. To who did he attribute his success in baseball?\n\n\u201cFirst, I give thanks to God. Today I honor my mother, Cecilia, my idol, Dihigo, Alejandro Pompez, who signed me for the New York Cubans and Silvio Garcia (Cuban infielder) who taught me how to live, how things are in the United States and to those who helped me with my English. I am also humbled by representing Latin America in baseball.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can never forget, Bill Veeck. He is like a big brother to me. He believed in me! He always has stood by me!\u201d\n\n\n**An Unforgettable Pair**\n\nAbout three years after Minnie\u2019s number retirement, just after New Year in 1986, Bill Veeck died from a heart attack in his beloved Chicago. Mi\u00f1oso attended the funeral services wearing a White Sox game jersey and cap in honor of his dear friend. Veeck was enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991 for his career as an outstanding executive.\n\nWe lost Minnie on March 1, 2015, he died from a pulmonary disease in Chicago. Mi\u00f1oso had been enshrined in four halls of fame: Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame (1994), Hispanic Heritage Baseball Hall of Fame (2002), the Latin American Baseball Hall of Fame in the Dominican Republic (2010), and in the Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame (2014).\n\nThe two were titans of baseball, who always shared with fans what they wanted: the joy of baseball.\n\n*Featured Image: Transcendental Graphics / Getty Images Sport*\n\n*Inset Images: Luis Rodriguez Mayoral*" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything - Havana Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything - Havana Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMipAFBVV95cUxOM1R1ZkVvMnlKeVBiclJTQXFBdXRCSHhuVW1LbTZsM3pYX1BVY2RxWjlmVXdQYVlyQVpSQmdCNEFEOVExTElidGJ3ekdPOVZRQ0pXV3Zkd3V1QThfLTE5V2haNTRqNXNReFpsMUN1bmUzdzFqZ2M4T0JxVXFCZ0hvNlZnN00wcnh6b0F6b0NMeWN0eHU0T0p2aXJKb3NiT245d1NyWA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.forbes.com/sites/megykarydes/2019/02/20/cuban-food-stories-documentary-serves-up-a-slice-of-life-through-food/", + "id": "CBMipAFBVV95cUxOM1R1ZkVvMnlKeVBiclJTQXFBdXRCSHhuVW1LbTZsM3pYX1BVY2RxWjlmVXdQYVlyQVpSQmdCNEFEOVExTElidGJ3ekdPOVZRQ0pXV3Zkd3V1QThfLTE5V2haNTRqNXNReFpsMUN1bmUzdzFqZ2M4T0JxVXFCZ0hvNlZnN00wcnh6b0F6b0NMeWN0eHU0T0p2aXJKb3NiT245d1NyWA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 08 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 8, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 39, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything  Havana Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything  Havana Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://havanatimes.org", + "title": "Havana Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "73 UNGA: Statement by Cuba at the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. New York, February 28, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "73 UNGA: Statement by Cuba at the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. New York, February 28, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMizAFBVV95cUxOU0h6ZTJRY0xPU0xkX0VENkZEaW4teHVIbTFzc2dHWFh6cm9pRzQ2WjZOckN6Ui1RdUtlVVJWVmRadnNlR3dDLWxJUUpMXzlqcWVIUXRMVkxCRjRHMnk5SXpmejdkVS1QV3k2U2pLdkE3U0lySlBCdGpYRDFUdl9hb1lIWnl5bUlOc2xHNVdYQUFNVGsyRGFfbzdnRmdhOTMyZ2RTN1E1VEk2NU9jaEZYTU1RV1oweS1xYkdyblFjdEVLQlk4V0t5a0VIekM?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/diaries/osmelramirez/cubas-revolutionary-parades-and-people-losing-everything/", + "id": "CBMizAFBVV95cUxOU0h6ZTJRY0xPU0xkX0VENkZEaW4teHVIbTFzc2dHWFh6cm9pRzQ2WjZOckN6Ui1RdUtlVVJWVmRadnNlR3dDLWxJUUpMXzlqcWVIUXRMVkxCRjRHMnk5SXpmejdkVS1QV3k2U2pLdkE3U0lySlBCdGpYRDFUdl9hb1lIWnl5bUlOc2xHNVdYQUFNVGsyRGFfbzdnRmdhOTMyZ2RTN1E1VEk2NU9jaEZYTU1RV1oweS1xYkdyblFjdEVLQlk4V0t5a0VIekM", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 28 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 28, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 59, + 0 + ], + "summary": "73 UNGA: Statement by Cuba at the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. New York, February 28, 2019.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "73 UNGA: Statement by Cuba at the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Revitalization of the Work of the General Assembly. New York, February 28, 2019.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu", + "title": "Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba's Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything - Havana Times\nauthor: Osmel Ramirez\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/diaries/osmelramirez/cubas-revolutionary-parades-and-people-losing-everything/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: As is tradition already, Cuban Communists held an event on January 28th, which involves marching with torches to see in Marti\u2019s birthday. It\u2019s a post-revolutionary simulation of the parade that Fidel Castro and young people (known as the Centennial Generation) took part in in 1953, when it was the 100th anniversary of our Apostle, Jose Marti\u2019s birth.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-08\ncategories: ['Osmel Ramirez']\n---\n# Cuba\u2019s Revolutionary Parades and People Losing Everything\n\n**Osmel Ramirez Alvarez**\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 As is tradition already, Cuban Communists held an event on January 28th, which involves marching with torches to see in Marti\u2019s birthday. It\u2019s a post-revolutionary simulation of the parade that Fidel Castro and young people (known as the Centennial Generation) took part in in 1953, when it was the 100th anniversary of our Apostle, Jose Marti\u2019s birth.\n\nHowever, this year, the celebration coincided with a catastrophic event, separated by just a few hours difference, which caused a great deal of material and human damage in the capital. Not cancelling the parade was at the very least in bad taste and resulted somewhat ironic and out of place.\n\nIn that situation, while hundreds or thousands of people were crying because they had just lost everything and saw how their homes and neighborhood were converted into rubble in just a few minutes, thousands of young people, headed by the Government and Communist Party, marched just a few blocks away and shouted out cheers for the Revolution and Marti.\n\nThese images traveled the world over and every sane person criticized them. You couldn\u2019t really expect any different. I personally believe that it wasn\u2019t their intention to offend or mock those affected, it was a just a matter of politics being above everything else in Cuba (even the economy or human values), and there is no room for improvising. It had been planned and, if it didn\u2019t occur to the two or three leaders at the very top to call it off, the rest just do as they are told like robots.\n\nThis is the worst thing about an authoritarian system of government, everything depends on those at the top. I imagine that Raul didn\u2019t realize there was a fiasco on the streets and Canel didn\u2019t dare to ask him what to do.\n\nThe Cuban Revolution (which is still the name used for the extreme socialist system that came from a process of reforms) is full of symbolism. And this was one attempt, trying to tie Marti to a social model that he criticized some of the \u201cdangers\u201d of, especially the ones that have ended up corrupting our 1959 Revolution, which was needed to reinstate democracy in Cuba, not to change the dictatorship\u2019s political stripes.\n\nMarti was an illustrious, upstanding, patriotic and universal man. Very honest. The letter he wrote to Maximo Gomez on October 20, 1884, breaking away from the Gomez/Maceo Plan because of irreconciliable differences at that time, give you a clear idea about his integrity and democratic values.\n\nIn my opinion, and many other Cubans\u2019, this is his real political testament and I recommend that everyone gives it a read and takes a close look. It\u2019s tempting to send it to every revolutionary who is faced with the dilemma of using their achievements to respect their people\u2019s rights or take possession of them.\n\nCuban Communists aren\u2019t really true followers of Marti, THEY CAN\u2019T BE, they are just on the tips of their tongues. Anyone who doesn\u2019t respect freedom of speech and every human right can\u2019t be called a follower of Marti. Marti said, \u201ca man who hides what he thinks, is not an honorable man.\u201d And, oh how many of us suffer here in Cuba for being honorable! You don\u2019t need to march with a torch in your hand to be a Marti follower, wearing a sweater with his face on it, shouting empty phrases, without honoring him in your heart and actions. And, this is what we really need.\n\nA good tribute to Marti would have been to change the parade of torches this year for a marathon on the 28th to collect rubble and help those affected by the tornado. Not a revolutionary reaffirmation event that has nothing to do with what Cuba\u2019s Maestro wanted, while other Cubans have just lost everything. Marti once said that the Republic should be \u201cwith everyone and for everyone\u2019s wellbeing\u201d, not for a single party or social class.\n\nThe best tribute to Marti would have been to \u201cchange everything that needs changing\u201d to achieve a better Cuba, like he and other heroes wanted and fought for. Which has nothing to do with the \u201ccontinuity\u201d of something that hasn\u2019t worked for 60 years.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s no resting while the project is incomplete,\u201d is Marti\u2019s phrase that should be our guide. And there\u2019s no doubt that his work is still incomplete. We urgently need a new Constitution that fixes our problems and paves the road to democracy, national reconciliation and prosperity. This is what Cuba needs and what the Apostle of our Independence fought and died for.\n\nA very appropriate analysis of that day. Very courageous of Osmel to write this commentary." + }, + { + "title": "Cuban Food Stories Documentary Serves Up A Slice Of Life Through Food - Forbes", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuban Food Stories Documentary Serves Up A Slice Of Life Through Food - Forbes" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMivwFBVV95cUxNSDB5UC14ZlhhOTA2ZjdlSm5YeVZzNGgzNHJJQjlJNGtWaHkxVDRveFJnaDlOSjRsTi10WVN3OEdud2lqZ2cyYm9Cc0xmYWlFVE9NQXR1NXlHakNuQk9GWDVfUG5fbW9ESExtU2Y1c2pscjNIRGNPU0EwbmRwSUozNU9yQXpENzUxckR2a0djZXc5U2lVN0J1SDROak5OWHV0Wk1RSFMzcmhuWVdGYmtWcmtMcHZaT2JCdEhrOTk5dw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu/en/un/statements/73-unga-statement-cuba-ad-hoc-working-group-revitalization-work-general-assembly-new", + "id": "CBMivwFBVV95cUxNSDB5UC14ZlhhOTA2ZjdlSm5YeVZzNGgzNHJJQjlJNGtWaHkxVDRveFJnaDlOSjRsTi10WVN3OEdud2lqZ2cyYm9Cc0xmYWlFVE9NQXR1NXlHakNuQk9GWDVfUG5fbW9ESExtU2Y1c2pscjNIRGNPU0EwbmRwSUozNU9yQXpENzUxckR2a0djZXc5U2lVN0J1SDROak5OWHV0Wk1RSFMzcmhuWVdGYmtWcmtMcHZaT2JCdEhrOTk5dw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 20 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 20, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 51, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuban Food Stories Documentary Serves Up A Slice Of Life Through Food  Forbes", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuban Food Stories Documentary Serves Up A Slice Of Life Through Food  Forbes" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.forbes.com", + "title": "Forbes" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: HTTP 0" + }, + { + "title": "Texas WWII veteran asked for 100 cards for his 100th birthday. He now has more than 10,000. - Chron", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Texas WWII veteran asked for 100 cards for his 100th birthday. He now has more than 10,000. - Chron" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiqwFBVV95cUxOMnh1TGxOU2dsekZEWUhEOU5nV0pWdjBuMUF6SWJsQWNGNUtSYXNSeDlSbTFuUUFpVk1odTdCaGt3V1A2MjVQc0sxTERjM1ZZQ0pxNVV6b0F4YmxyR1JvUzdZQnQ0R1ExVV8xcFVFdFlDWGFCR0FFUkZOMWo5SXM1NnhlMDMtR1BaaTNFdkpzMklsZnZRYkdUWG5JZzBkbkxVQW1rdlFPTi02cEk?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Texas-WWII-veteran-100-birthday-cards-13645654.php", + "id": "CBMiqwFBVV95cUxOMnh1TGxOU2dsekZEWUhEOU5nV0pWdjBuMUF6SWJsQWNGNUtSYXNSeDlSbTFuUUFpVk1odTdCaGt3V1A2MjVQc0sxTERjM1ZZQ0pxNVV6b0F4YmxyR1JvUzdZQnQ0R1ExVV8xcFVFdFlDWGFCR0FFUkZOMWo5SXM1NnhlMDMtR1BaaTNFdkpzMklsZnZRYkdUWG5JZzBkbkxVQW1rdlFPTi02cEk", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 26 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 26, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 57, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Texas WWII veteran asked for 100 cards for his 100th birthday. He now has more than 10,000.  Chron", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Texas WWII veteran asked for 100 cards for his 100th birthday. He now has more than 10,000.  Chron" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.chron.com", + "title": "Chron" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Client Challenge\n---\nJavaScript is disabled in your browser.\nPlease enable JavaScript to proceed.\nA required part of this site couldn\u2019t load. This may be due to a browser extension, network issues, or browser settings. Please check your connection, disable any ad blockers, or try using a different browser." + }, + { + "title": "Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index - Nearshore Americas", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index - Nearshore Americas" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiggFBVV95cUxQNFpZY1B1TGk0aS1kZzZPOENvQWFzNGFhOGQwTEpyUkFZVmExcmRvY1ZSTmxiaTRkYnRuU1BFaFVGN0pHNEtUODNQeWQtRjJVQ3RmZWhEc3VUTkFsT3hsYXBETXlXcW9IdzBMaGgxSVhqNU9qRHQ3QmxrVkg4ZDJfNlRB?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://nearshoreamericas.com/cuba-chile-perform-better-global-health-index/", + "id": "CBMiggFBVV95cUxQNFpZY1B1TGk0aS1kZzZPOENvQWFzNGFhOGQwTEpyUkFZVmExcmRvY1ZSTmxiaTRkYnRuU1BFaFVGN0pHNEtUODNQeWQtRjJVQ3RmZWhEc3VUTkFsT3hsYXBETXlXcW9IdzBMaGgxSVhqNU9qRHQ3QmxrVkg4ZDJfNlRB", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index  Nearshore Americas", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index  Nearshore Americas" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://nearshoreamericas.com", + "title": "Nearshore Americas" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba and Chile Perform Better on Global Health Index - Nearshore Americas\nauthor: Narayan Ammachchi\nurl: https://nearshoreamericas.com/cuba-chile-perform-better-global-health-index/\nhostname: nearshoreamericas.com\ndescription: Cuba and Chile are the most healthiest countries in Latin America, according to the 2019 edition of the Bloomberg Healthiest Country Index.\nsitename: Nearshore Americas\ndate: 2019-02-27\ncategories: ['News Briefs']\ntags: ['bloomberg health index', 'chile', 'costa rica', 'cuba', 'panama', 'uruguay']\n---\nCuba and Chile are the healthiest countries in Latin America, according to the 2019 edition of the Bloomberg Healthiest Country Index.\n\nChile plunged four places from the last year\u2019s survey to be ranked 29 on the index, which gauged 169 economies according to factors that contribute to overall health.\n\nRanked 30, Costa Rica is another Latin American country enjoying good health.\n\nAll three countries have ranked above the United States, whose ranking was decreased slightly due to deaths from drug overdose and suicides, Bloomberg noted.\n\nOther regional countries that found a place in the top 50 healthiest countries include Uruguay and Panama. Cuba is not really known for healthy foods, but people in the communist country have a better lifestyle. They focus more on preventative care rather than medicines that cure diseases.\n\nThe index, according to Bloomberg, grades countries on the basis of factors such as life expectancy while imposing penalties on risks such as tobacco use and obesity.\n\nMediterranean countries, including Spain and Italy, topped the list because of their eating habits. Mediterranean meals are flush with healthy contents such as vegetables, olive oil, fish, vegetables, and nuts.\n\nBloomberg said it also took into account environmental factors including access to clean water and sanitation.\n\nConsidering the report, countries can perform better on the index if they provide basic infrastructure to their people. African countries fared poorly on the index because of lack of basic civic amenities.\n\n## Add comment" + }, + { + "title": "Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof on Racial Migrations - Princeton University Press", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof on Racial Migrations - Princeton University Press" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMif0FVX3lxTE9IYkFSWnhlT2RBQndCaGJmZ3lGZGhtWDItbkNSNG44UTgwQk04MURpU3BDcWk3aEdfNm16OUtvTWcxRWZyZXg4M1VMbUU1WUdfMGZkeWhEQXJITF81elA5WnZsSW55bks0emM2Z1cxSklTdXRmX0gtUmk5bk9QUjA?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.openculture.com/2019/02/historic-manuscript-filled-with-beautiful-illustrations-of-cuban-flowers-plants-is-now-online-1826.html", + "id": "CBMif0FVX3lxTE9IYkFSWnhlT2RBQndCaGJmZ3lGZGhtWDItbkNSNG44UTgwQk04MURpU3BDcWk3aEdfNm16OUtvTWcxRWZyZXg4M1VMbUU1WUdfMGZkeWhEQXJITF81elA5WnZsSW55bks0emM2Z1cxSklTdXRmX0gtUmk5bk9QUjA", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 28 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 28, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 59, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof on Racial Migrations  Princeton University Press", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Jesse Hoffnung-Garskof on Racial Migrations  Princeton University Press" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://press.princeton.edu", + "title": "Princeton University Press" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 )\nauthor: Josh Jones\nurl: https://www.openculture.com/2019/02/historic-manuscript-filled-with-beautiful-illustrations-of-cuban-flowers-plants-is-now-online-1826.html\nhostname: openculture.com\ndescription: The internet has become an essential back up system for thousands of pieces of historical art, science, and literature, and also for a specialized kind of text incorporating them all in degrees: the illustrated natural science book, from the golden ages of book illustration and philosophical naturalism in Europe and the Americas.\nsitename: Openculture.com\ndate: 2019-02-11\ncategories: ['Art', 'Books', 'Science']\n---\nThe internet has become an essential back up system for thousands of pieces of historical art, science, and literature, and also for a specialized kind of text incorporating them all in degrees: the illustrated natural science book, from the golden ages of book illustration and philosophical naturalism in Europe and the Americas. We\u2019ve seen some fine digital reproductions of the illustrated *Nomenclature of Colors *by Abraham Gottlob Werner, for example\u2014a book that accompanied Darwin on his *Beagle *voyage.\n\nThe same source has also brought us a wonderfully illustrated, influential 1847 edition of Euclid\u2019s *Elements*, with a semaphore-like design that color-codes and delineates each axiom. And we\u2019ve seen Emily Noyes Vanderpoel\u2019s 1903 *Color Problems: a Practical Manual for the Lay Student of Color *come online (and back in print), a study whose ideas would later show up in the work of modern minimalists like Josef Albers.\n\nAbove and below, you can see just a fraction of the illustrations from another example of a remarkable illustrated scientific book, also by a woman on the edge of being forgotten: Nancy Anne Kingsbury Wollstonecraft\u2019s 1826 *Specimens of the Plants and Fruits of the Island of Cuba*.\n\nThis study of Cuban plant life might never have seen the light of day were it not for the new online edition from the HathiTrust digital library, \u201cby way of Cornell University\u2019s Library Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections,\u201d notes Atlas Obscura. The book is notable for more than its obscurity, however. It is, says scholar of Cuban history and culture Emilio Cueto, \u201cthe most important corpus of plant illustrations in Cuba\u2019s colonial history.\u201d Its author first began work when she moved to the island after her husband, Charles Wollstonecraft (brother of Mary and uncle of Mary Shelley) died in 1817.\n\nShe began documenting the plant life in the region of Matanzas through the 1820s. That research became *Specimens of the Plants and Fruits of the Island of Cuba*, a meticulous study, full of Wollstonecraft\u2019s vibrant, striking watercolors. After making several attempts at publication, she died in 1828, and the manuscript never appeared in public. Now, almost two centuries later, all three volumes are available to read online and download in PDF. They had been dormant at the Cornell University Library, and few people knew very much about them. Cueto, the scholar most familiar with the manuscript\u2019s place in history, had himself searched for it for 20 years before finding it hidden away at Cornell in 2018.\n\nNow it is freely available to anyone and everyone online, part of an expanding, shared online archive of fascinating works by non-professional scientists and mathematicians whose work was painstakingly interpreted by artists for the benefit of a lay readership. In the case of Wollstonecraft, as with Goethe and many other contemporary scholar-artists, we have the two in one. View and download her 220-page work, with its 121 illustrated plates at the HathiTrust Digital Library.\n\n**Related Content:**\n\nTwo Million Wondrous Nature Illustrations Put Online by The Biodiversity Heritage Library\n\nWagashi: Peruse a Digitized, Centuries-Old Catalogue of Traditional Japanese Candies\n\n*Josh Jones is a writer and musician based in Durham, NC. Follow him at @jdmagness*\n\n## Leave a Reply" + }, + { + "title": "Canadian Diplomats Sue Their Government Over Mysterious Cuban Disease (Published 2019) - The New York Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Canadian Diplomats Sue Their Government Over Mysterious Cuban Disease (Published 2019) - The New York Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMigAFBVV95cUxQTmk2TUc3MlZJSEJhcHQtVGxlWDUyLTgya3ZRZldPajRURlVxUGt6Y2JockZscV9CQ20xN3VaZkYwTm96U3JueUNnZE4yd0tNZXdJVWFOa3NtY00ySWFYdWJaOXpPVExYQXdwbjB1VDFnakRmbC1kYXJ5MGkta3dEdQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://press.princeton.edu/ideas/jesse-hoffnung-garskof-racial-migrations", + "id": "CBMigAFBVV95cUxQTmk2TUc3MlZJSEJhcHQtVGxlWDUyLTgya3ZRZldPajRURlVxUGt6Y2JockZscV9CQ20xN3VaZkYwTm96U3JueUNnZE4yd0tNZXdJVWFOa3NtY00ySWFYdWJaOXpPVExYQXdwbjB1VDFnakRmbC1kYXJ5MGkta3dEdQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Canadian Diplomats Sue Their Government Over Mysterious Cuban Disease (Published 2019)  The New York Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Canadian Diplomats Sue Their Government Over Mysterious Cuban Disease (Published 2019)  The New York Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.nytimes.com", + "title": "The New York Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean? - Al Jazeera", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean? - Al Jazeera" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMinwFBVV95cUxNeUg0V3VKcEdYYWN6a2ZKeVVhQ3BaUloxcl9NUGVScU9BM2RZSkd3RG9CSGRnek5tUlRkZ0VQdmc5ZS1iUUtnUGxhbGkzemVEZmhPVWNidXpsT25kQi1tdWtqYzAxRkRqQkJfTlBUQWI2NC11NnYxUG96X1BnY19XSFJGajZQQnhhTGNjYkp1SVZfVU85VmdGNFp6YUQ5bTjSAaQBQVVfeXFMTzVEaVBhZVdYakN0MDdlbmhJQUxDNFZiUlEyV096N0NEbzlQbmJFYmpha19QbkVmOFprWmtnMlNBYjN0SGRJUHNSMWhCV1NyYkh4NkJyQzg5QUwzQkl0UkpxdWs3MGpVQ2pTX29IY0YySzNiSlA4STNuS0N1dlM2UEFhR1pkQ3NCbmtZbzhZVGttcXBiSV96SVgwWjFfZk1pYnBqVVY?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/features/cuba-and-the-secrets-behind-good-rum/", + "id": "CBMinwFBVV95cUxNeUg0V3VKcEdYYWN6a2ZKeVVhQ3BaUloxcl9NUGVScU9BM2RZSkd3RG9CSGRnek5tUlRkZ0VQdmc5ZS1iUUtnUGxhbGkzemVEZmhPVWNidXpsT25kQi1tdWtqYzAxRkRqQkJfTlBUQWI2NC11NnYxUG96X1BnY19XSFJGajZQQnhhTGNjYkp1SVZfVU85VmdGNFp6YUQ5bTjSAaQBQVVfeXFMTzVEaVBhZVdYakN0MDdlbmhJQUxDNFZiUlEyV096N0NEbzlQbmJFYmpha19QbkVmOFprWmtnMlNBYjN0SGRJUHNSMWhCV1NyYkh4NkJyQzg5QUwzQkl0UkpxdWs3MGpVQ2pTX29IY0YySzNiSlA4STNuS0N1dlM2UEFhR1pkQ3NCbmtZbzhZVGttcXBiSV96SVgwWjFfZk1pYnBqVVY", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 27, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 58, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean?  Al Jazeera", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean?  Al Jazeera" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.aljazeera.com", + "title": "Al Jazeera" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum - Havana Times\nauthor: Circles Robinson\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/features/cuba-and-the-secrets-behind-good-rum/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: \u201cKnocking back a long swig, swimming in a sea of brandy,\u201d a poem by Nicolas Guillen reads which describes hardcore drinkers. However, many fans of the bottle, who boast about their \u201calcoholic culture\u201d, have no idea about the scientific expertise behind each of their favorite drinks.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-07\ncategories: ['Culture', 'Features']\n---\n# Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum\n\n\n*Rum has its secrets, not only among fans of a good swig, but also for scientists who examine its age-old mysteries in search of a more productive and better-quality industry.*\n\n\n**By Richard Potts**\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 \u201cKnocking back a long swig, swimming in a sea of brandy,\u201d a poem by Nicolas Guillen reads which describes hardcore drinkers. However, many fans of the bottle, who boast about their \u201calcoholic culture\u201d, have no idea about the scientific expertise behind each of their favorite drinks.\n\nThe main component has many different names, however the most well-known (alcohol) comes from the Arabic word \u2018kohol\u2019 (\u2018fine dust\u2019 or \u2018subtle thing\u2019), which modern chemistry defines today as a compound of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen.\n\nOrganic alcohols are divided into two large groups: the fatty or aliphatic alcohols and the aromatic and heterocyclic alcohols. In the former, those with a single carbon atom are \u201cwood alcohols\u201d or methanol and it is very toxic; but the one with two carbon atoms is the base of alcoholic drinks, also known as ethanol; thus, a single carbon atom is the only difference between death and having a good time. Ethanol molecules have two carbon atoms, six hydrogen atoms and only one oxygen molecule, and it is extracted from the starch and sugar in fruit and plant juices.\n\n**The history of buccaneers and pirates**\n\nSon of the tropics and the sun, born from sugar cane in Caribbean mills, rum was originally a rough drink for buccaneers and pirates, rough people who had a stomach for drinking, and has evolved today, thanks to science, conquering global markets. According to experts like Emilio Echevarria, from the science and technology unit at Cuba Ron, there are still secrets being discovered by scientific methods.\n\nHe says that the history of rum is as eccentric as the tropics where it was founded. From colonial times, raw brandy was drunk in the mills, freshly distilled from sugarcane honey, and then rum production began.\n\nBack then, when the Enlightenment period had just begun to cast its light on the Old World, \u201ccivilized\u201d drinks were wine and cognac. The best of these were consumed in aristocratic circles, and not every child of your neighbor could taste a well-matured Burgundy or a glass of champagne.\n\nIn Europe\u2019s colonies, transport at the time hiked up prices and when the working class discovered that sugarcane honey could produce a cheap alcoholic drink, they incorporated it into their drinking habits.\n\nBuccaneers and pirates were among the first to adopt it quickly, and as they were people used to strong emotions and adventure, it soon became their favorite. Smuggling played an important role, especially in Cuba, as it was the last Spanish colony in the Americas and was, as a result, subjected to the metropoli\u2019s monopoly laws for longer.\n\nThose rums of yesteryear were thick and very strong liquids, as simply mixing water and distilled ethanol didn\u2019t produce a pleasant tasting drink, so empirical techniques were invented to improve it.\n\nFrom pirate ships to city bars, rum is a lot more refined today; it is a lot less rough, is pleasant to the palate, and the experience of centuries is distilled with scientific techniques that technologists cook up in their flasks, sorcerer\u2019s apprentices who try to get a new flavor out of this golden liquid.\n\nThere are certain aspects that are constantly being perfected, Echevarria explains, such as the Habana Club sensorial evaluation system, of both the finished product as well as the different stages of the process to achieve the best quality in the end. This brand is possibly one of the ones that has made the most progress in recent years, especially with its collaboration with Pernod Ricard, setting up a mixed company with Cuba Ron corporation.\n\nA good sensorial evaluation system needs judges, with a rigorous selection process, training and verifying the quality of their work. \u201cThe designated \u201csensorial judge\u201d, he says, \u201cis like a machine that needs to be tuned up on a regular basis and, therefore, it\u2019s important to check whether their skills are still within the established criteria.\u201d\n\n**Scientific criteria of rum**\n\nAn expert\u2019s opinion doesn\u2019t bear a direct relationship with that of a consumer, the expert explains, as the latter will appreciate some things from a subjective point of view, while the judge needs to relate these subjective impressions with objective situations he is aware of, such as phases of the process and the shortcomings that can occur, so they can be eliminated, and not affect the typicality of the product so it holds onto its \u201cpremium\u201d label among distilled alcoholic drinks.\n\n\u201cSo, we measure appearance, smell, taste and feeling in the mouth, but careful,\u201d he warns, \u201cas they each have a variety of characteristics. With regard to appearance, glossiness, color and transparency are all assessed, which are criteria linked to the filtration system. Typicality, maturity, sweet-bitter relationship and the harmony between different characteristics are all assessed when evaluating smell and taste.\n\nWhile sensations in the mouth include the more difficult \u201caftertaste\u201d, or remaining taste that reminds the palate, after having swallowed. Another important thing to assess is how it hits the tongue and how hard it is to swallow; for example, experts say that Habana Club \u201cgoes down quite easily\u201d.\n\nEchevarria stresses that the mature touch is also very important, as you need to be able to pick up on the traditional maturing process in oak barrels, which implies painstaking production controls, because in the final stage different rums which have been matured for a similar amount of time are mixed together and this mixture needs to create a product that has the brand\u2019s typical flavor.\n\n**The enigma of oak wood**\n\nOther researchers, like Juan Carlos Gonzalez, are studying oak wood and its effects on maturing the drink. \u201cWe have always heard that oak is ideal for maturing,\u201d he explains, \u201cbut, why? In order to find out, we have designed a research strategy so we can better understand the process and have elements to improve production technology.\n\nIt\u2019s a matter that is as old as wine production itself,\u201d the expert clarifies, \u201cas we have known for centuries (via the process of natural selection) that oak was the best wood for barrels and it has the best sensorial properties, but this knowledge is empirical and the world of science has only been studying it for a few decades. Our results are still in the early phases,\u201d he concludes, \u201cbut, we are already seeing the first responses, and we are in a better position to manage the technical side of production.\u201d\n\nAccording to Mercedes Garcia Muniz, an expert at Cuba Ron, quality is also undergoing a study on strains of yeast in the production of alcohol and brandy, as they are the basic elements of the fermentation process and contribute to aromatic characteristics. \u201cOur work involves identifying the strains by aroma and then taking these results from lab tests to an industrial level, thereby improving the quality of the final product,\u201d she explains.\n\n\u201cIn Cuba, good rum has always been made empirically,\u201d says Echevarria, \u201cbut today, science has contributed more precise factors, as rum production carries a lot of weight in the national economy and so industry needs to be more efficient and profitable, and this calls for science today, as research is a valuable contribution not only for the quality of production, but also for technological know-how to satisfy greater demand.\n\n**Cocktails for a winning smile**\n\nRather than drowning your sorrows, rum makes you want to party and be happy. It frees tongues so they sing and makes dancers\u2019 feet more agile because Cubans hold onto their natural good mood at parties. This is how the young barman also smiles, who like a dignified end to this interview, has prepared a luxury cocktail which only he knows the recipe for as if it were a family secret; an orgy of fruits with touches of mint and, of course, rum.\n\nThe sorcerer\u2019s apprentice pushes the glasses nearer with a complicit smile of nighttime revelry, jolly like Habana Club spilling generously over a cocktail. \u201cHere you are,\u201d he proudly announces, \u201ctropical sky, sea and sun.\u201d\n\nNot even Jacques de Sores\u2019 pirates could have defined it any better.\n\nThank you very informative article and education on the science of rum" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami - Matador Network", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami - Matador Network" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiZkFVX3lxTE9LU1lybzREejB6UWQzZThLNm5IcUdGTTRrWnB5T09yVi0yY3U5aHJOdGxBcUdFSGJTNFJObEM4WWg5M3FDYlVRWlBtTkQ1WVEyaUcxb2Q1R2ZkMWh5aG9zVTQwMmUxQQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/27/cubans-approve-a-new-constitution-what-does-the-vote-mean", + "id": "CBMiZkFVX3lxTE9LU1lybzREejB6UWQzZThLNm5IcUdGTTRrWnB5T09yVi0yY3U5aHJOdGxBcUdFSGJTNFJObEM4WWg5M3FDYlVRWlBtTkQ1WVEyaUcxb2Q1R2ZkMWh5aG9zVTQwMmUxQQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 13 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 13, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 44, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami  Matador Network", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami  Matador Network" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://matadornetwork.com", + "title": "Matador Network" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean?\nauthor: Heather Gies\nurl: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/2/27/cubans-approve-a-new-constitution-what-does-the-vote-mean\nhostname: aljazeera.com\ndescription: Although Cubans voted overwhelmingly to approve the Constitution, Sunday's vote saw a growing portion express dissent.\nsitename: Al Jazeera\ndate: 2019-02-27\ntags: ['Miguel Diaz-Canel', 'News, Miguel Diaz-Canel, Cuba, Latin America']\n---\n# Cubans approve a new Constitution: What does the vote mean?\n\n*Although Cubans voted overwhelmingly to approve the Constitution, Sunday\u2019s vote saw a growing portion express dissent.*\n\nCuban voters ratified a new Constitution on Sunday that legalises the free market in a vote that saw a growing portion of the population express dissent compared with the island\u2019s last constitutional referendum in 1976.\n\nIn Sunday\u2019s ballot, 86.85 percent voted in favour of the new Constitution while nine percent voted against it. Spoiled or blank ballots made up 4.15 percent of ballots cast.\n\nVoter turnout was recorded at 84.4 percent, down from 98 percent who turned out in 1976 when 97.7 percent of voters ratified the Constitution.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s no longer political unanimity around government proposals,\u201d Raudiel Pena Barrios, adjunct professor of law at the University of Havana, told Al Jazeera. \u201cWe should see this as an important minority of Cubans who hope for something more in the management of the state.\u201d\n\nThe new Constitution legalises private property and promotes foreign investment, bringing it in line with economic reforms the Cuban government has implemented to encourage entrepreneurship and investment over the past several years.\n\nArturo Lopez-Levy, visiting professor at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota who served as a political analyst for the Cuban government from 1992 to 1994, said such changes resolve a \u201clegal limbo\u201d around moves to liberalise the economy. This opens the door for further reform aimed at building a \u201ccomprehensive mixed economy\u201d, he said.\n\nThe updated charter also creates the position of prime minister to administer day-to-day state affairs and imposes age and term limits for the president.\n\nLopez-Levy calls these \u201cimportant instrumental changes within the one-party system\u201d. For Pena Barrios, the new Constitution signals \u201cpolitical continuity marked by novel aspects such as notable economic pragmatism\u201d.\n\nAfter casting his referendum ballot, President Miguel Diaz-Canel described the new Constitution as a bearer of \u201ccontinuity and unity\u201d in Cuba.\n\n## What does the vote mean for the opposition?\n\nCritics argue the reforms are cosmetic. The power of the Communist Party within a one-party system remains untouched and citizens still do not have the ability to directly vote for a president, an issue thousands of voters raised in a three-month public consultation process.\n\nBut Lopez-Levy argued that any demands for deep political restructuring were pipe dreams from the outset.\n\n\u201cThe process never had the intention of a transition to a liberal democracy,\u201d he said. \u201cThe opposition and the groups that are pushing for this type of agenda have proven to be very isolated and with very limited political mobilisation capability.\u201d\n\nHe cautioned that \u201cNo\u201d votes, abstentions, or null ballots should not be equated with support for the Cuban opposition.\n\nPena Barrios doubts the dissident vote will work in the opposition\u2019s favour.\n\n\u201cThe opposition in Cuba doesn\u2019t have sufficient political capital to identify with those who didn\u2019t support the text,\u201d he said.\n\n## \u2018New political dialogue\u2019\n\nBut many are optimistic the reforms and the process of drafting the new charter will help make room for continued debate among other sectors.\n\n\u201cThe result points the way towards new political dialogue, or at least the need for it,\u201d Miguel Alejandro Hayes, editor of the blog La Trinchera and a contributor to other Cuban alternative media outlets, told Al Jazeera.\n\nHe believes it is unlikely such dialogue would include the traditional opposition. Instead, the government could engage with more moderate critics, though political will could still be lacking.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s an opposition that doesn\u2019t want dialogue, that approves of the blockade on Cuba, and that doesn\u2019t care about the cost of toppling the government,\u201d he said. \u201cThese actors \u2013 the majority live outside of Cuba \u2013 don\u2019t have any credibility, and they are out of the scene,\u201d he added.\n\nPena Barrios argued that the official response to polarisation over marriage equality in the run-up to the referendum has demonstrated the government\u2019s openness to dialogue.\n\nWhile an earlier draft of the Constitution legalised marriage equality, the final version left marriage to be defined in a separate referendum.\n\n\u201cNow comes the big challenge,\u201d Pena Barrios added, \u201cwhich is to fulfil the Constitution\u201d.\n\nThe Cuban government is expected to implement various measures to complement the charter.\n\nHayes stressed the need for these new laws to \u201cbe inclusive\u201d and ensure that \u201cpolitical ideology is not cause for discrimination.\u201d\n\n\u201cEverything proposed in the Constitution that is not explicit, everything that goes against the orthodox mentality, deserves attention because it is what runs the most risk of being forgotten or excluded,\u201d he said.\n\n## US-Cuba ties\n\nBeyond the island, the Constitution is unlikely to smooth over relations with the United States.\n\nBilateral ties have deteriorated under President Donald Trump after the historic normalisation of frozen US-Cuba ties under Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro with the opening of embassies in Washington, DC, and Havana in 2015.\n\nTrump has suggested deepening the more than half-a-century-old trade embargo on Cuba.\n\nLopez-Levy argued the time for fruitful debate on Cuba was before the referendum, and the US missed the opportunity. \u201cTrump doesn\u2019t have a policy towards Cuba, he has a policy towards the next election in Florida,\u201d he said.\n\nFlorida is home to two-thirds of the 1.2 million Cuban-American voters in the US. Although Cuban-Americans have increasingly turned towards the Democratic Party for more than a decade, according to the Pew Research Center, Cubans in Florida were twice as likely to vote for Trump compared with other Latinos.\n\nIn a statement on Tuesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo dismissed the vote as a \u201cso-called referendum\u201d and claimed the charter blocked potential for economic reform by enshrining socialism.\n\n\u201cNo one should be fooled by this exercise, which achieves little beyond perpetuating the pretext for the regime\u2019s one-party dictatorship,\u201d Pompeo said. \u201cThe entire process has been marked by carefully managed political theater and repression of public debate.\u201d\n\nThe new Constitution declares the socialist system \u201cirrevocable\u201d and states the state\u2019s central goal as \u201cthe construction of socialism and advance towards a communist society.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "The Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN welcomes Manhattan College students who will represent Cuba in the National Model United Nations. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN welcomes Manhattan College students who will represent Cuba in the National Model United Nations. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMixwFBVV95cUxPbEVoalZ6YVNuYlpta29zTmprRmdQSW9CaUdLYXhTREc4NnF6dWtFNFViZUtXdXpfam8wVXp4aGs2TmFSVGdyUGpPUE42cTBSZ1JjdkNvQXE4UURGU1RLbE14TDB6eHZFdldzOGo0UzlfVjRNUFVpREp4Uno5TkNDU1hkZjNTNWdwc1gwV2dpT0JlZEd1dGZBaWlUSDRtZm9QQTJJeG5tVXdWekNNUHVQR1UzWGs0YkpBUTdabGNKYm1KcmprSnRV?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://lareviewofbooks.org/blog/reviews/everything-nothing-wendy-guerras-revolution-sunday/", + "id": "CBMixwFBVV95cUxPbEVoalZ6YVNuYlpta29zTmprRmdQSW9CaUdLYXhTREc4NnF6dWtFNFViZUtXdXpfam8wVXp4aGs2TmFSVGdyUGpPUE42cTBSZ1JjdkNvQXE4UURGU1RLbE14TDB6eHZFdldzOGo0UzlfVjRNUFVpREp4Uno5TkNDU1hkZjNTNWdwc1gwV2dpT0JlZEd1dGZBaWlUSDRtZm9QQTJJeG5tVXdWekNNUHVQR1UzWGs0YkpBUTdabGNKYm1KcmprSnRV", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 18 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 18, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 49, + 0 + ], + "summary": "The Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN welcomes Manhattan College students who will represent Cuba in the National Model United Nations.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "The Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN welcomes Manhattan College students who will represent Cuba in the National Model United Nations.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu", + "title": "Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday | Los Angeles Review of Books\nurl: https://lareviewofbooks.org/short-takes/reviews/everything-nothing-wendy-guerras-revolution-sunday\nhostname: lareviewofbooks.org\ndescription: Elena Sheppard reviews Wendy Guerra's new novel, \"Revolution Sunday.\"\nsitename: Los Angeles Review of Books\ndate: 2019-02-11\ncategories: ['short-takes']\n---\n# Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday\n\n## Elena Sheppard reviews Wendy Guerra's new novel, \"Revolution Sunday.\"\n\n### By Elena SheppardFebruary 11, 2019\n\nA fact about the state of literature in Cuba today: The literacy rate on the island is 99%, but censorship means that the pickings for those readers is slim \u2014 histories of the island, the poetry of Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed, Fidel Castro\u2019s philosophies, among other approved selections. Another fact: Castro, the revolutionary leader of the island who ruled for nearly 60 years, was friends with many of Latin America\u2019s literary giants (Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez would send him his manuscripts before publication). One more fact: Literature scared him. In 1961, just a few years after the Revolution began, Castro famously gave the island\u2019s intellectuals and artists a mandate on what type of art and writing was permissible in the new Cuba: *\u201cDentro de la Revoluci\u00f3n, todo; contra la Revoluci\u00f3n, ning\u00fan derecho.\u201d Within the Revolution, everything; against the Revolution, nothing.*\n\nLike many Cuban writers working today, Wendy Guerra, the Cuban poet and novelist, has learned to craft her works both around and within that Castro mandate. She writes about the difficulties of Cuba, without ever outright criticizing the government. \u201cFrom the time we\u2019re kids, we Cubans are taught how to sharpen our double-speak to survive,\u201d Guerra writes in her new novel, *Revolution Sunday.* Her work is a relentless example of that. Guerra\u2019s first novel, *Todos Se Van (Everybody Leaves), *won Cuba\u2019s Bruguera Novel Prize in 2006. Her success caught the attention of the global literary community, but also of Castro\u2019s secret police. In *Revolution Sunday, *translated by Achy Obejas, Guerra crafts a highly-meta character; a poet named Cleo, lonely and alone, who also deals with this struggle of making art under surveillance. Cleo becomes lonelier and more alone after her parents die in what she believes to be a suspicious car accident: \u201cI was convinced someone had tampered with the brakes on my parents\u2019 car, making them disappear into the air.\u201d In her grief Cleo submits her new manuscript to a Spanish competition. She wins, and her success makes her a celebrity off island and a pariah on. Indeed, the only people who occupy her space are her trusted housekeeper, M\u00e1rgara, and the Cuban state police who knock daily on her door to enquire about her activities, while simultaneously keeping a watchful eye on her via cameras and microphones planted in her house. \u201cMy personal space became public,\u201d Cleo narrates.\n\nEnter Ger\u00f3nimo, an Oscar-winning actor who arrives at Cleo\u2019s doorstep one night with the intent to make a film about her father\u2019s life. But the father to whom he is referring is not the one Cleo saw die in the car, but rather a \u201cCuban Rambo\u201d whom Ger\u00f3nimo claims is her real father. Ger\u00f3nimo has the paperwork to prove it, and as Cleo listens, his information begins to make sense. While trying to unravel this mystery and make his film, Cleo and Ger\u00f3nimo begin a love affair, consumed by their project and by each other.\n\nCleo, as a narrator, is not defined by this relationship or even her work, but rather the tension between her isolation and her lack of privacy; her success and her solitude \u2014 a paranoiac tightrope of constantly being watched but never being listened to. Guerra imbues life on the island with a feeling of constantly checking over one\u2019s shoulder, looking in the shadows, even if the dangers are not in dark corners but in the blazing Caribbean sun. Cleo is also consciously, like Guerra, an artist who chooses to stay in Cuba rather than expatriate. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you leave?\u201d she is regularly asked, \u201cWithout Cuba, I don\u2019t exist,\u201d Cleo says. \u201cI am my island.\u201d But the government is working hard to undo that certainty.\n\nGuerra\u2019s work is banned in Cuba, but is flourishing abroad. Like Cleo, Guerra operates in a strange space; her international success affords her opportunities unavailable to most Cubans \u2014 travel abroad, for one \u2014 but it also isolates her domestically. \u201cSome of my friends in exile think I am the spy of Cuban art who returns to Cuba with their secrets, which I pass on as reports or accusations,\u201d Guerra said in an interview with Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez. \u201cIn Cuba, on the other hand, they think I\u2019m hiding something, that I have some plan; they are suspicious of these long visits among the exile and think I\u2019m the head of something, the spearhead of something.\u201d In another stroke of autofiction, that situation is paralleled in the character of Cleo; she is accused of being someone she\u2019s not no matter where she is.\n\nGuerra\u2019s writing in *Revolution Sunday *is frenetic, poetic, almost hallucinatory. The translation is faithful and vibrant, keeping the gorgeous disjointedness of Guerra\u2019s original words, even if the Spanish reads more dreamily. Much of that is a product of what Spanish words feel and sound like. The vowel-ending vocabulary which defines romance languages gives Guerra\u2019s original words a hypnotic effect; the Germanic roots of English keep the meaning, but the ethereal quality of the sounds isn\u2019t as heightened, the words feel more clipped. Still Achy Obejas\u2019s translation is fearless, reckless, manic in the same way as Guerra\u2019s Spanish.\n\nIn both languages, Guerra\u2019s narrator exists in a surreal state, whether drunk on Cuban rum, wandering through the house she grew up in like a ghost in the night, or just lost in thought and worry and writing \u2014 needing to be pulled back to reality by another person, any person.\n\nNo one should stay for very long where they\u2019re rejected, but I go in circles, aimless in the pool of my own social defeat. I feel like I\u2019m about to drown in my own tears, my own verses, dizzy with my own blah blah blah writings, choking on the suffocating and ever guarded summer haze. Then a hand appears in the dark. I take it without asking questions and rise out of the water.\n\nThe novel is complex; it mixes prose and poetry, hyperrealism and surrealism. The plot is vague and meandering and the point of it feels not to be the action forward but the movement within Cleo herself \u2014 her feelings and struggle and plight. The novel interior because Cleo herself must be interior \u2014 her mind is the only thing the government can\u2019t monitor. Even during external moments as intimate as sex, she knows others are watching, \u201cThe walls of my room are viewed from who knows where in this city, a place where other men and women share the crumbs of our intimacy.\u201d The only private space is inside her head.\n\nWhat is the state of Cuban literature now? That is a question the book asks literally, but is also a question it forces its readers to consider. The literary scene is disjointed. There is the official literary culture, sanctioned by authorities, tightly controlled and monitored. There is the reality of censorship and the fact that Cuba stopped importing Western books in the 1960s which means that many authors and readers exist in a vacuum, unaware of what\u2019s happening *afuera*. There are the Cuban authors celebrated internationally \u2014 like Guerra herself \u2014whose best-selling work isn\u2019t easily available on the island. The history that brought us to this literary moment is traceable. Forty years ago poet Herberto Padilla was jailed by the government, and the world\u2019s writers \u2014 including Simone de Beauvoir, Susan Sontag, and Jean-Paul Sartre \u2014 wrote a letter to Castro in his defense. Thirty-eight years ago Reinaldo Arenas left the island via the Mariel boatlift, and 26 years ago he wrote *Before Night Falls, *his autobiographical account of his life in Cuba and then in exile*. *It has been roughly three decades since the \u201cSpecial Period\u201d when lack of resources shut the majority of the island\u2019s publishers down and sent writers searching for publishers *afuera*. It has been 13 years since one of Cuba\u2019s best-known contemporary writers, Leonardo Padura, published his first book, and six years since he won the country\u2019s highest literary honor, the National Literature Prize. It has been three years since Cuban-American poet Richard Blanco (who read a poem at President Obama\u2019s second inauguration two years before that) helped celebrate the opening of the American Embassy in Havana. And it has been 14 years since Guerra published her first book.\n\nThe question of how much Guerra is responding to this history, and how much of Cleo is Guerra, is hard to avoid. Both are poets, both Havana diehards, both working to share stories but having those stories siloed, both isolated from the island by the government controlling it. Cleo states:\n\nThe plainclothes officers didn\u2019t even look at me; they were obsessed with the idea that I shouldn\u2019t speak to anyone, express opinions, or give interviews. Interviews? With whom? For what? No one had contacted me, yet they insisted, demanded silence, asked me to trust them. More silence? Is there anything more silent than this profound mutism? What is left after your voice is nullified by the death of everything you ever had\u2026I\u2019m out of the game. I don\u2019t exist.\n\nIt should be noted that in the Spanish version \u201cout of the game\u201d reads as \u201c*fuera de juego*,\u201d a nod to Padilla and his poetry collection, *Fuera de Juego, *which landed him in Cuba\u2019s jails. Cleo\u2019s imposed silence is the 21st-century version of Padilla\u2019s incarceration.\n\nAfter Ger\u00f3nimo leaves Cuba, Cleo is able to go visit him in New York. Off island, Cleo is instantly unmoored. \u201cI arrive in New York to discover this is an abstract place where no one is really waiting for me, where I\u2019m not important, where I don\u2019t exist.\u201d Cuba is filled with complications, but they are complications Cleo understands. Ger\u00f3nimo makes clear that off island, Cleo means something different to him as well; and as they travel to Cannes to premiere the film he made about her family, Cleo increasingly sees that without her island she is incomplete. \u201cMy spirit is still held captive in Havana,\u201d Cleo declares after arrival in New York. \u201cI hadn\u2019t yet arrived with my entire being.\u201d Cleo also understands that outside of Cuba she is more artifact than real human; she is a character in a film, Ger\u00f3nimo\u2019s \u201ccartoon girlfriend.\u201d She is, as she says, \u201cunreal.\u201d Havana makes Cleo feel alive, even as it confines her. Guerra\u2019s Twitter bio echoes that feeling: \u201cWriter. I am alive and in Havana.\u201d\n\nIn recent years Cuba has published roughly 25 million books a year, two thirds of which are textbooks. The books sold on the island are nearly entirely state controlled \u2014 *\u201cDentro de la Revoluci\u00f3n, todo; contra la Revoluci\u00f3n, ning\u00fan derecho.\u201d *But there are workarounds. There is an underground literary community, in which books are shared on flash drives and via photocopies, or people get new books from visitors to the island. There is publication abroad which can provide protection for writers at home. There are the code words, and smokescreens, via which Cubans have learned to write and speak. There is the prevalence and preference for fiction, which is brought just to the brink of non-fiction; just false enough to be safe.\n\nOnly two to three percent of English publishers output is translation, and while that number is depressingly low, it is both exciting and critical that one of this year\u2019s translations comes from Cuba. As Cleo says, \u201cA novel isn\u2019t meant to be kept hidden in a drawer until someone finds it. A novel needs air, ink, light. It needs to be seen by editors, to go out into the world, to fly.\u201d Cuba is filled with stories in drawers, and while it may be easy to glance at the island \u2014 with its 1950s cars and limited infrastructure \u2014 and say that it is frozen in the past, there are voices pushing the island\u2019s narrative forward. *Within the Revolution, everything; against the Revolution, nothing \u2014* but cracks are forming, opinions showing through, novels, like Guerra\u2019s, that desperately deserve air are finding it. Without translation, English readers would never be able to experience this novel\u2019s complexity of being an artist and being surveilled, as well as the confusing pull of a homeland that is both silencer and muse. And while the Cuban government still tries to quiet those voices it is vital for us to translate, to read, to listen.\n\n*Image: title page of \"revolution approved\" edition of *Don Quixote*, published in 1960. Via Shelly Smartt.*\n\nLARB Contributor\n\n**Elena Sheppard is an MFA candidate in non-fiction writing at Columbia University. Her essays, reviews, and other writings have been featured in the ****New York Times****, ****Vogue, ****and ****Elle ****among others. She is Cuban-American. You can follow her on Instagram ****@eleshepp****.**" + }, + { + "title": "Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba - Havana Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba - Havana Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMid0FVX3lxTE5tRVo2NGNvaWlCaGZneFplbkRFbjJVbTlNTFV2cVZ4cXpFLVpxTllJeFNobU5uV2ZSX0pVYm1pMmwyM25RbllwajhzTW95NkFXdklpWmducFRodk9xY25nRTlUQnVubDBvYl94Z3RLMlk4dGNvNk5r?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu/en/un/statements/73-unga-cubas-intervention-nam-extraordinary-meeting-venezuela-new-york-february-12", + "id": "CBMid0FVX3lxTE5tRVo2NGNvaWlCaGZneFplbkRFbjJVbTlNTFV2cVZ4cXpFLVpxTllJeFNobU5uV2ZSX0pVYm1pMmwyM25RbllwajhzTW95NkFXdklpWmducFRodk9xY25nRTlUQnVubDBvYl94Z3RLMlk4dGNvNk5r", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 14 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 14, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 45, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba  Havana Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba  Havana Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://havanatimes.org", + "title": "Havana Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: HTTP 0" + }, + { + "title": "Putin to U.S.: I'm ready for another Cuban Missile-style crisis if you want one - Reuters", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Putin to U.S.: I'm ready for another Cuban Missile-style crisis if you want one - Reuters" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMixwFBVV95cUxNeHR1SjBGUXJXVDh5QjJvQzNLRU1pdUwteXptWExuQWUxS3FCRXlKalJKSENseElZS3BOdFJVT1FkbUh0Nk9HTm5tYkhSMkExNGFEdVprZnJRUE9MdHF3bzc5MTJBLWJ4c0MwcHRPdE1mV3l2eU1wX1dyMGRZTER6dTJ6TG8yTGVnMTdvQlcxbjZPeDJXaC11UWwxcHNZOERxR3ZFNzM4NUtsVGJabnhDVHZ1eW9WZFZfd2c2ZHNaV1QwZGVxN280?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://matadornetwork.com/read/cuban-sandwich-history/", + "id": "CBMixwFBVV95cUxNeHR1SjBGUXJXVDh5QjJvQzNLRU1pdUwteXptWExuQWUxS3FCRXlKalJKSENseElZS3BOdFJVT1FkbUh0Nk9HTm5tYkhSMkExNGFEdVprZnJRUE9MdHF3bzc5MTJBLWJ4c0MwcHRPdE1mV3l2eU1wX1dyMGRZTER6dTJ6TG8yTGVnMTdvQlcxbjZPeDJXaC11UWwxcHNZOERxR3ZFNzM4NUtsVGJabnhDVHZ1eW9WZFZfd2c2ZHNaV1QwZGVxN280", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 21 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 21, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 52, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Putin to U.S.: I'm ready for another Cuban Missile-style crisis if you want one  Reuters", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Putin to U.S.: I'm ready for another Cuban Missile-style crisis if you want one  Reuters" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.reuters.com", + "title": "Reuters" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba\u2019s Most Famous Food Isn\u2019t Even From Cuba \u2014 or Miami\nauthor: Matthew Meltzer\nurl: https://matadornetwork.com/read/cuban-sandwich-history/\nhostname: matadornetwork.com\ndescription: The Cuban sandwich isn\u2019t from Cuba or Miami, Florida. Here is the history of the Cuban sandwich in Tampa, Florida, and best Cuban sandwiches in Miami and Tampa.\nsitename: Matador Network\ndate: 2019-02-13\ncategories: ['Food + Drink']\n---\nIt\u2019s an immigration story as old as America itself.\n\nSomeone is born in the United States to immigrant parents, and they assimilate, but their life is filled with little slices of where their family is from. Then they move to a city and create their own identity forged with other immigrants around them. As they grow, they move to the biggest city they can find, leaving a little of themselves behind but finding the world discovers their greatness.\n\nIn this case, the immigrant is a sandwich.\n\nThe Cuban sandwich is on menus around the world. Though you might find small variations, the most ubiquitous style includes ham, mojo-roasted pork, swiss cheese, and mustard on bread. It carries the name Cuban, but aside from the pork on the inside, the sandwich has about as much to do with Cuba as snowmobiling. But somehow, it\u2019s become the island\u2019s most famous export this side of Gloria Estefan." + }, + { + "title": "Colombian human smugglers who raped and murdered Cubans sentenced to federal prison - Miami Herald", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Colombian human smugglers who raped and murdered Cubans sentenced to federal prison - Miami Herald" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMikAFBVV95cUxQV2MxWC1rc1VKaDA3cm82Uk95STd4RmxwczROaHZpdEl6OU9YUDV1Z2N1a1ZCTHB3QkVEVUhpUnNUNGYwWXFJeXltMGVXcHQ4WXM0VmpZSmtZTWprb05iQTVqSnlJV1RqZDRTV0NBNTZSNDQ4eFI2QjZPeFNEcjkxRVJEa2RCalljM1ltdWJ4MnTSAZABQVVfeXFMTlY0eXgxWXFvN1BjZXQwTDFhYXJLY1pQNGFkam5kck9ld1U4SHlHbkdVOXpvVGhSQVhpU2c0X0c2eVBHbXpxVHlVWXVJR3JQeGliNy12YVlzMnBCUG1SOTJGWTlsRHU4NVd5cm1mdDIzMWtNMnk1M043cmJuaFQ5OWFoZjgxUzhOZFBJbnU1aEZ0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/07/world/canada/havana-syndrome-canada.html", + "id": "CBMikAFBVV95cUxQV2MxWC1rc1VKaDA3cm82Uk95STd4RmxwczROaHZpdEl6OU9YUDV1Z2N1a1ZCTHB3QkVEVUhpUnNUNGYwWXFJeXltMGVXcHQ4WXM0VmpZSmtZTWprb05iQTVqSnlJV1RqZDRTV0NBNTZSNDQ4eFI2QjZPeFNEcjkxRVJEa2RCalljM1ltdWJ4MnTSAZABQVVfeXFMTlY0eXgxWXFvN1BjZXQwTDFhYXJLY1pQNGFkam5kck9ld1U4SHlHbkdVOXpvVGhSQVhpU2c0X0c2eVBHbXpxVHlVWXVJR3JQeGliNy12YVlzMnBCUG1SOTJGWTlsRHU4NVd5cm1mdDIzMWtNMnk1M043cmJuaFQ5OWFoZjgxUzhOZFBJbnU1aEZ0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 13 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 13, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 44, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Colombian human smugglers who raped and murdered Cubans sentenced to federal prison  Miami Herald", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Colombian human smugglers who raped and murdered Cubans sentenced to federal prison  Miami Herald" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.miamiherald.com", + "title": "Miami Herald" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet - Aviation International News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet - Aviation International News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiowFBVV95cUxQb05LZXFXSEdyaUtoWmZQZXpLanMzcnVnRlNVWFNTMzJlQS1vUXVJUndWUWZkZEZJUG1DLUJyWFBhOGlqZy1Uejhadm96c0swNkVUUFRydG0wcWVPWTQyMXdsM1FmNWNHbTN5aW5Fc0tZRkQ4VUJhaXd0MnFld1BoZTc2Um16akk0UmxaZTN5RWtMd1hrVnIxSDhNckJWa3B4NkM0?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu/en/articulo/permanent-mission-cuba-un-welcomes-manhattan-college-students-who-will-represent-cuba", + "id": "CBMiowFBVV95cUxQb05LZXFXSEdyaUtoWmZQZXpLanMzcnVnRlNVWFNTMzJlQS1vUXVJUndWUWZkZEZJUG1DLUJyWFBhOGlqZy1Uejhadm96c0swNkVUUFRydG0wcWVPWTQyMXdsM1FmNWNHbTN5aW5Fc0tZRkQ4VUJhaXd0MnFld1BoZTc2Um16akk0UmxaZTN5RWtMd1hrVnIxSDhNckJWa3B4NkM0", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 04 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 4, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 35, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet  Aviation International News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet  Aviation International News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.ainonline.com", + "title": "Aviation International News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 0, + "response": "Error: HTTP 0" + }, + { + "title": "Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States - U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc.", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States - U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc." + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiwgFBVV95cUxNTmQ4aGR2bnBaNEhrR0dNc1ZjaVZFRGhfWnZzbExxa3g3TGRRWV82SFlJV08yMGhWTnNULWtSSkN2SndqRTFwQ1Y1RFlVdjQ0MG8yZExOeVhkamRONVZBcXdOY0lCM1lpbmxVQzdwbFo1aTBrNVVKdkdHX0hiMVZMTUtrNTB4azRLMktfTVJkNmEwbF9YUE9IWV93Y1c4ZkNqeDVCX2JZT2RBZ3dhczlqQUJsdjVfZnZuNmdFUXRlRlZpUQ?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/features/twenty-first-century-loves-in-cuba/", + "id": "CBMiwgFBVV95cUxNTmQ4aGR2bnBaNEhrR0dNc1ZjaVZFRGhfWnZzbExxa3g3TGRRWV82SFlJV08yMGhWTnNULWtSSkN2SndqRTFwQ1Y1RFlVdjQ0MG8yZExOeVhkamRONVZBcXdOY0lCM1lpbmxVQzdwbFo1aTBrNVVKdkdHX0hiMVZMTUtrNTB4azRLMktfTVJkNmEwbF9YUE9IWV93Y1c4ZkNqeDVCX2JZT2RBZ3dhczlqQUJsdjVfZnZuNmdFUXRlRlZpUQ", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 18 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 18, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 49, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States  U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc.", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States  U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc." + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.cubatrade.org", + "title": "U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc." + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba - Havana Times\nauthor: Circles Robinson\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/features/twenty-first-century-loves-in-cuba/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: February is suitable for declarations of love and reconciliation, on Valentine's Day, with exchange of kisses, poems and flowers. For Cubans, it is still the \"Day of Lovers\", with new meanings in this new millennium. Happy Valentine's Day to all our readers.\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-14\ncategories: ['Features']\n---\n# Twenty-First Century Loves in Cuba\n\n*Being \u201csweathearts\u201d in Cuba, becomes a mixture of tradition and postmodernism, where the trends of old customs are still preserved in the contemporary social framework, also influenced by the dilemmas of our time.*\n\n**By Richard Potts**\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 February is suitable for declarations of love and reconciliation, on Valentine\u2019s Day, with exchange of kisses, poems and flowers. For Cubans, it is still the \u201cDay of Lovers\u201d, with new meanings in this new millennium.\n\n\u201cWe are sweethearts, we keep a clean and pure affection\u201d \u2013 says the song of the Mexican author Armando Manzanero. \u2013 \u201cNonsense,\u201d says my neighbor, Eddy, 23 years old. Today, nobody is content only with kisses and caresses, and the girls know that without direct contact, the matter does not last long.\u201d\n\n\u201cToday we still have some romantics that fell in love in the old ways \u2013 says my friend Pepe, 35 years old \u2013 but most of the young people go directly to the material\u201d.\n\nThese phenomena among the youngest Cuban population occur in a country where the tradition of *\u201cpater familias\u201d* had deep roots, but many young women no longer wait for parental approval to begin in the mysteries of love with relationships at an early age. So what are the main characteristics of courtship among Cubans today?\n\nAccording to specialist Elsida Alvarez, of the Adolescent Clinic in Havana, being sweethearts is a loving relationship defined by a level of commitment and intimacy between the couple, as well as desire and physical attraction. \u201cOne of the components of courtship is sexual attraction and falling in love begins in adolescence with the arousing of sexual desire. However, there can be faster and more casual relationships, even if they do not reach such a degree of intimacy and commitment.\u201d\n\nPerhaps that is why many adult Cubans believe that current generations tend to confuse terms such as courtship, casual relationships, love relationships, desire and sympathy, and begin to have sexual contacts early on. Only a couple of decades ago, most people did not admit sexual intercourse prior to marriage, but today it is a common practice for couples of all ages.\n\n**Dating or relationship?**\n\n\u201cThe courtship has changed,\u201d says Elsida Alvarez, \u201cbut it is still important before marriage, as a relationship of intimacy and commitment with a strong spiritual charge. Of course, contradictions often arise, males often consider sex and other material aspects important, while girls demand more of the spiritual; however, many girls follow the current mainstream and begin sexual relations before being well prepared.\u201d\n\nAccording to Carolina D\u00edaz Bravo, psychologist at the National Center for Sexual Education, there are three levels: sexual desire, whose orientation is consolidated in adolescence. Attraction -which also involves desire- is influenced by the cultural environment. The third level is falling in love, in which desire, attraction and fascination are mixed, turning the beloved into an engine that moves the emotional, cognitive and behavioral life.\n\nAbout the confusion between formal and fortuitous relationships, Carolina clarifies that relationships can arise based only on desire, but ideally they should be supported by love and admiration, so that both people are truly enriched by the encounter.\n\nFor Dr. Patricia Ares, psychologist and professor at the University of Havana, the theme of romantic love sometimes becomes \u201ca relationship model that tries to turn two into one, with expectations of fusion, community of ideas and total commitment of the relationship. While this model is important as an ideal, it is not real in practice, placing the happiness of the subject in the hands of another, and loss is perceived as something disintegrating and means losing half of one.\u201d\n\n\u201cFusing is a false conception that hinders authentic love\u201d \u2013 s??he concludes and agrees with other experts that \u201ctwo people love each other when they are able to live without each other but decide to live together.\u201d\n\n**From physical attractiveness and age to economics**\n\nBeauty parameters have also become more complex. The fashionable physical attractiveness is a slender woman, that does not correspond with the dietary patterns and real figure of the Latin culture. Cuban males used to prefer the \u201c*criollita de Wilson*\u201d type, the Cuban caricaturist who painted his female characters with generous curves.\n\nOf course, in terms of beauty patterns these criteria have been changing, the preferences point to women neither too bulky nor too fat, so that the latter can sometimes be somewhat excluded from the usual parameters for choice of partner.\n\nOn the other hand, girls often admire the young athletic physique, and more or less good-looking popularized by film, television and fashion. In a general sense, Cuban girls are trending to reject the kind of \u201cbeer belly\u201d that many Cubans used to acquire.\n\nThese definitions, along with the promotion of a healthier and less sedentary life, have produced in recent years the emergence of private gyms, some surprisingly well equipped, with rates that the average Cuban can\u2019t pay \u2026 and yet, the gyms are successful.\n\nAge and their differences are another matter. According to experts, the man usually seeks a younger woman and the woman a man somewhat older than her. Reflection and exaggeration of these trends in popular imagery was a fashionable song in the 80s, which satirized the so-called **\u201ctitiman\u00eda\u201d,** (from \u201cTiti\u201d, very young girl) as the desire of men of 40 to 50 years to engage with girls in her twenties.\n\nThe trend affects to a certain extent an age group of the adult female population, women over 40 years whose chances of choosing a partner decreased because while she is looking for a man a little older than her, that man could be in search of a younger girl.\n\nFurthermore, there is a large group of young women weary of some negative experience with immature boys of their age, who choose to search for a couple several years older, also reflected in a current fashion song: \u201cI like older men, those who open you the door and send flowers \u2026\u201d\n\nOn the other hand, with the economic difficulties that the Cuban population is going through today (low salaries, rising cost of living, scarcity of food and clothing, lack of transportation) criteria from traditional patriarchal culture reappear, when many women aspired to a man affectionate, tender and dedicated, but also with economic ease. Today the average Cuban doesn\u2019t have that position, and this leads us to consider a usual pattern of the adulterous couple: the economically successful Cuban who supports two houses: his home with wife and kids, and the house of a younger lover. This situation in today\u00b4s Cuba, reminds that of 60 years ago, when the trend used to be frequent.\n\nThere are even tragicomic situations, such as the butcher of my neighborhood, a prosperous man thanks to the smuggling of meat, who died of a heart attack and whose wake came to mourn four more women, apart from the wife. I commented the incident with Pedrito the singer of the Van Van orchestra, and shortly after their director Juan Formell released a song that also became popular \u201cThe Butcher\u201d.\n\nIn short, the island is experiencing problems similar to those of the rest of the world: breaking of the patriarchal family, increasing divorce, increasing consensual unions, weakening the value of \u201cmarriage\u201d as an institution, and the search for continuity of the couple as a life option, which leads to \u201creconstructed\u201d \u2013 or \u201cmultinuclear\u201d families, as expressed by Havana psychologist professor Calvi\u00f1o, in his Cuban TV program.\n\nIn Cuba there are other problems like housing, which causes the coexistence of several generations in the same home and the clash of criteria. The dilemmas of the Cuban young couple largely come on account of economic conditions and solutions do not depend on psychologists or sociologists, but on the economic situation of the country and its society. To analyze them, a much more extensive article would be required, but as regards the topic that concerns us, simply Love, as singer Silvio Rodr\u00edguez would say in a popular song\u2026..\n\n**What can be done with love?**\n\nWhat can be done then? According to experts, the important thing for young generations to enter the universe of love with open eyes is to offer them social and sexual orientation so that they better understand what can expect from their experiences. \u201cThis enriches them -says Carolina D\u00edaz- with more pleasant relationships that generate security and stability, in a kind of \u201cscale of tenderness\u201d that must be explored before reaching a more intimate relationship with other levels of commitment and implications.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe can\u2019t define exactly the age at which a young person should initiate courtships and sexual relations, it is a personal decision conditioned by individual development and values ??and social norms, which the family has been instilling on the adolescent.\u201d Research shows similar data to those of other countries on the beginning of relationships at an early age, since Cuban adolescents are not in this respect very different from the rest of the world.\n\n**And what does the average Cuban think?**\n\nAccording to some criteria collected by a Cuban TV program on the street: \u201cCourtship is important, something very serious by mutual agreement as a couple and the rest comes with time (Gerardo, 28 years old). \u201cTo be real boyfriends you have to be deep in love (Mar\u00eda, 18). \u201cWhile I interacted with my girlfriend, it helped me to know her better, that was what the courtship was for. Today life has changed, boys become boyfriends earlier. (Elderly).\n\n\u201cToday young people are free to do almost everything they want\u201d (middle-aged woman). \u201cIn my house, I would not allow my grandchild or my granddaughter to sleep with their partners in their room.\u201d (Older adult). \u201cIf he is going to be with her on the street, I prefer he talks to me first and see how we fix the issue\u201d (middle-aged woman). \u201cParents worry when a young woman spends a lot of time alone in her room with her boyfriend, and they are actually studying or in another activity that is not necessarily sexual.\u201d (young mother)\n\nSo, in this third millennium of our era, Cubans also fight their own internal battle between the dynamics, the demands and the problems of modern life and the attempt of not to lose \u201cthe fright of love\u201d, as said writer Gabriel Garc\u00eda said M\u00e1rquez. Cuban writer and patriot, Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed, who also marked modernism in the romantic literature of Latin America, said referring to love: \u201cPerpetual work of every moment is tenderness. If not, thinking not satisfied looks for another job. There is a word that gives the idea of ??all tactics of love: Dew, drip. \u201d\n\nOr in short, we will have to repeat with Manzanero, \u201cwithout any more comments, we are sweethearts.\u201d" + }, + { + "title": "Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 ) - Open Culture", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 ) - Open Culture" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMi1gFBVV95cUxOaWdQdGlqcUJCbjNkNVJGeWlOVTU2b21VbEgtanY5NjhGQXlVQjlzRGRvMDB3b3FOd0J0RGVESmpiclhsZldscnFUdmkxUU9XUFR0a1VaUG01QTB5Rkg1LW9qRkNEem9JcjZHRy1peFlGUGNKTGxxWUhNUkhoX1FvaFNHdFdWVEtrMlJELThrZkRvZHVON2lnUzgyYkRYYjNtdHNHZXhoN1FQdFM5WlZXWjVLZHZKa3U3M2pxRVFEWGlaTXdjTE5NNEtiUXgwdE9zVGpkaXh3?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.reuters.com/article/world/putin-to-us-im-ready-for-another-cuban-missile-style-crisis-if-you-want-one-idUSKCN1QA1A3/", + "id": "CBMi1gFBVV95cUxOaWdQdGlqcUJCbjNkNVJGeWlOVTU2b21VbEgtanY5NjhGQXlVQjlzRGRvMDB3b3FOd0J0RGVESmpiclhsZldscnFUdmkxUU9XUFR0a1VaUG01QTB5Rkg1LW9qRkNEem9JcjZHRy1peFlGUGNKTGxxWUhNUkhoX1FvaFNHdFdWVEtrMlJELThrZkRvZHVON2lnUzgyYkRYYjNtdHNHZXhoN1FQdFM5WlZXWjVLZHZKa3U3M2pxRVFEWGlaTXdjTE5NNEtiUXgwdE9zVGpkaXh3", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 11 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 11, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 42, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 )  Open Culture", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Historic Manuscript Filled with Beautiful Illustrations of Cuban Flowers & Plants Is Now Online (1826 )  Open Culture" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.openculture.com", + "title": "Open Culture" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 401, + "response": "Error: HTTP 401" + }, + { + "title": "Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow - Havana Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow - Havana Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiiwFBVV95cUxNRlRJNDJBVHBKOTVQZWhqOE84QU1fcFNSZW5UODNJWmU5a1gtUjlnM2RxU1dPTXdjUURDVXRGYTVTSC05YnVwS00zOThTRWp0NHk3dWlYZ0JhNU5UZy15M3VONEliYk5rTEZtaEo4eWdsTXBfTzZNVmxFSjdFZERraFFYeWx1dEd3MFZz?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.cubatrade.org/blog/2019/2/18/title-iii-lawuits-for-cuba-expropriations-could-impact-20-countries-and-6-us-states", + "id": "CBMiiwFBVV95cUxNRlRJNDJBVHBKOTVQZWhqOE84QU1fcFNSZW5UODNJWmU5a1gtUjlnM2RxU1dPTXdjUURDVXRGYTVTSC05YnVwS00zOThTRWp0NHk3dWlYZ0JhNU5UZy15M3VONEliYk5rTEZtaEo4eWdsTXBfTzZNVmxFSjdFZERraFFYeWx1dEd3MFZz", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Wed, 20 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 20, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 2, + 51, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow  Havana Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow  Havana Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://havanatimes.org", + "title": "Havana Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States \u2014 U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc.\nauthor: U S -Cuba Trade; Economic Council; Inc\nurl: https://www.cubatrade.org/blog/2019/2/18/title-iii-lawuits-for-cuba-expropriations-could-impact-20-countries-and-6-us-states\nhostname: cubatrade.org\ndescription: Title III- Lawsuits May Be Filed 31 Potential Targets 21 Countries 6 U.S. States 913 Plaintiffs? 2018 revenues approximately US$700 billion 2018 market capitalization approximately US$1 trillion Defendants Will Have Resources For Global Legal Defense Settlement May Be The Mos\nsitename: U.S. - Cuba Trade and Economic Council, Inc.\ndate: 2019-02-18\n---\n# Title III Lawsuits For Cuba Expropriations Could Impact 21 Countries And 6 U.S. States\n\n/**Title III- Lawsuits May Be Filed**\n\n**31 Potential Targets**\n\n**21 Countries**\n\n**6 U.S. States**\n\n**913 Plaintiffs?**\n\n**2018 revenues approximately US$700 billion**\n\n**2018 market capitalization approximately US$1 trillion**\n\n**Defendants Will Have Resources For Global Legal Defense**\n\n**Settlement May Be The Most Profitable**\n\n**Will They Settle?**\n\n**What Will EU Do? What Can EU Do? Does US Care?**\n\nOn 17/18 March 2019, the Trump Administration is planning to permit Title III and further implement Title IV of the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996 (known as \u201c*Libertad Act*\u201d).\n\nTitle III authorizes lawsuits in United States District Courts against companies and individuals who are using a certified claim where the owner of the certified claim has not received compensation from the Republic of Cuba or from a third-party who is using the asset.\n\nTitle IV restricts entry into the United States by individuals who have connectivity to unresolved certified claims. One company is currently subject to this provision.\n\nThere is a rationale for companies and individuals who are targets of **Title III** lawsuits to find commercial, economic and political value from negotiating a settlement(s) with a plaintiff(s).\n\nUpon settlement, the companies and individuals may no longer be subject to impediments to their operations relating to the Republic of Cuba and other countries which are a focus of the Office of Foreign Assets Control (**OFAC**) of the United States Department of the Treasury and of the Office of Legal Adviser (**OLA**) of the United States Department of State.\n\nSettlements would reasonably result in an increase to the operational value of an asset located in the Republic of Cuba- the value of the asset increases as governments, financial institutions, investors, partners, and suppliers have increased confidence in long-term market-based viability.\n\nWith settlement, there could be commercial, economic and political value to those who were subject to certified claims from having an ongoing presence of companies and individuals subject to United States jurisdiction as a shareholder, partner or leaseholder- meaning that if a company settles with the owner of an asset, and the owner is of Cuban descent residing in the United States or an individual not of Cuban descent, or company located in the United States, there may be an optical and practical benefit- lessening stigma, lessening risk, increasing opportunity and increasing value of the asset.\n\n**Potential Lawsuit Targets**\n\nThe following companies have been mentioned by claimants (certified and non-certified) as potential targets of lawsuits using provisions of Title III. A company could be subject to multiple lawsuits.\n\n*If the Trump Administration authorizes the use of Title III by some certified claimants and some non-certified claimants while not authorizing the use of Title III by other certified claimants and other non-certified claimants, there may be legal challenges by those excluded from access to Title III. *\n\nThe targeted companies will expectedly be those who have meaningful financial exposure within the Republic of Cuba and have meaningful financial exposure within the United States. In some instances, the reputational impact upon a company may, rather than the financial exposure, be a catalyst for agreeing to a settlement.\n\nThe combined revenues of the companies in 2018 were approximately **US$678 billion** and the combined market capitalization of the companies in 2018 was approximately **US$860 billion**:\n\nAmstelveen, Netherlands-based **KLM**\n\nAtlanta, Georgia-based **Delta Air Lines**\n\nBeijing, China-based **Air China**\n\nBethesda, Maryland-based **Marriott International**\n\nChicago, Illinois-based **United Airlines**\n\nDallas, Fort Worth, Texas-based **American Airlines**\n\nDallas, Texas-based **Southwest Airlines**\n\nFrankfurt, Germany-based **Lufthansa**\n\nGeneva, Switzerland-based **MSC Cruises**\n\nIstanbul, Turkey-based **Turkish Airlines**\n\nLeuven, Belgium-based **Anheuser-Busch InBev**\n\nLondon, United Kingdom-based (controlled by Turkey-based interests) **Global Ports Holding**\n\nLondon, United Kingdom/Rotterdam, Netherlands-based **Unilever**\n\nLong Island City, New York-based **Jet Blue Airways**\n\nMadrid, Spain-based **Iberia Airlines**\n\nMadrid, Spain-based **NH Hotel Group**\n\nMiami, Florida-based **Carnival Corporation & plc**\n\nMiami, Florida-based** Norwegian Cruise Line**\n\nMiami, Florida-based **Royal Caribbean International**\n\nMoscow, Russia-based** Gazprom**\n\nPalma de Mallorca, Spain-based **Iberostar Hotels & Resorts**\n\nPalma de Mallorca, Spain-based **Melia Hotels International**\n\nParis, France-based **Accor SA**\n\nParis, France-based **Air France**\n\nParis, France-based **Pernod Ricard**\n\nShenzhen, China-based** Huawei Technologies **\n\nTokyo, Japan-based **Mitsubishi (an entity)**\n\nToulouse, France-based **Newrest Group Holding**\n\nToronto, Canada-based **Air Canada**\n\nToronto, Canada-based **Sherritt International**\n\nVevey, Switzerland-based **Nestle** **SA **\n\n**Certified Claims Background**\n\nThere are 8,821 claims of which **5,913** awards valued at **US$1,902,202,284.95** were certified by the USFCSC and have not been resolved for nearing sixty years. The USFCSC permitted interest to be accrued in the amount of 6% per annum; with the current value of the 5,913 certified claims approximately **US$8,521,866,156.95**.\n\nThe first asset to be expropriated by the Republic of Cuba was an oil refinery in 1960 owned by White Plains, New York-based **Texaco, Inc.**, now a subsidiary of San Ramon, California-based Chevron Corporation (USFCSC: CU-1331/CU-1332/CU-1333 valued at **US$56,196,422.73**).\n\nThe largest certified claim (*Cuban Electric Company*) valued at US$267,568,413.62 is controlled by Boca Raton, Florida-based **Office Depot, Inc.** The second-largest certified claim (*International Telephone and Telegraph Co, ITT as Trustee, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc.*) valued at US$181,808,794.14 is controlled by Bethesda, Maryland-based **Marriott International**. The smallest certified claim is by *Sara W. Fishman* in the amount of US$1.00 with reference to the Cuban-Venezuelan Oil Voting Trust.\n\nThe two (**2**) largest certified claims total US$449,377,207.76, representing **24% **of the total value of the certified claims. Thirty (**30**) certified claimants hold **56%** of the total value of the certified claims. This concentration of value creates an efficient pathway towards a settlement.\n\nTitle III of the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity (**Libertad**) Act of 1996 requires that an asset had a value of US$50,000.00 when expropriated by the Republic of Cuba without compensation to the original owner. Of the 5,913 certified claims, 913, or **15%**, are valued at US$50,000.00 or more. Adjusted for inflation, US$50,000.00 (3.70% per annum) in 1960 has a 2019 value of approximately US$427,267.01. The USFCSC authorized 6% per annum, meaning the 2019 value of US$50,000.00 is approximately US$1,649,384.54. ** **\n\n**The ITT Corporation Agreement **\n\nIn July 1997, then-New York City, New York-based **ITT Corporation** and then-Amsterdam, the Netherlands-based STET International Netherlands N.V. signed an agreement whereby STET International Netherlands N.V. would pay approximately US$25 million to ITT Corporation for a ten-year right (after which the agreement could be renewed and was renewed) to use assets (telephone facilities and telephone equipment) within the Republic of Cuba upon which ITT Corporation has a certified claim valued at approximately US$130.8 million. *ETECSA*, which is now wholly-owned by the government of the Republic of Cuba, was a joint venture controlled by the Ministry of Information and Communications of the Republic of Cuba within which Amsterdam, the Netherlands-based Telecom Italia International N.V. (formerly Stet International Netherlands N.V.), a subsidiary of Rome, Italy-based Telecom Italia S.p.A. was a shareholder. Telecom Italia S.p.A., was at one time a subsidiary of Ivrea, Italy-based Olivetti S.p.A. The second-largest certified claim (*International Telephone and Telegraph Co, ITT as Trustee, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc.*) valued at US$181,808,794.14 is controlled by Bethesda, Maryland-based **Marriott International. **\n\n**TITLE III--SEC. 302. LIABILITY FOR TRAFFICKING IN CONFISCATED PROPERTY CLAIMED BY UNITED STATES NATIONALS.**\n\n(a) Civil Remedy.-- (1) Liability for trafficking.--(A) Except as otherwise provided in this section, any person that, after the end of the 3-month period beginning on the effective date of this title, traffics in property which was confiscated by the Cuban Government on or after January 1, 1959, shall be liable to any United States national who owns the claim to such property for money damages in an amount equal to the sum of-- (i) the amount which is the greater of-- (I) the amount, if any, certified to the claimant by the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission under the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949, plus interest; (II) the amount determined under section 303(a)(2), plus interest; or (III) the fair market value of that property, calculated as being either the current value of the property, or the value of the property when confiscated plus interest, whichever is greater; and (ii) court costs and reasonable attorneys' fees. (B) Interest under subparagraph (A)(i) shall be at the rate set forth in section 1961 of title 28, United States Code, computed by the court from the date of confiscation of the property involved to the date on which the action is brought under this subsection.\n\n(2) Presumption in favor of the certified claims.--There shall be a presumption that the amount for which a person is liable under clause (i) of paragraph (1)(A) is the amount that is certified as described in subclause (I) of that clause. The presumption shall be rebuttable by clear and convincing evidence that the amount described in subclause (II) or (III) of that clause is the appropriate amount of liability under that clause.\n\n(3) Increased liability.--(A) Any person that traffics in confiscated property for which liability is incurred under paragraph (1) shall, if a United States national owns a claim with respect to that property which was certified by the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission under title V of the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949, be liable for damages computed in accordance with subparagraph (C).\n\n(B) If the claimant in an action under this subsection (other than a United States national to whom subparagraph (A) applies) provides, after the end of the 3-month period described in paragraph (1) notice to-- (i) a person against whom the action is to be initiated, or (ii) a person who is to be joined as a defendant in the action, at least 30 days before initiating the action or joining such person as a defendant, as the case may be, and that person, after the end of the 30- day period beginning on the date the notice is provided, traffics in the confiscated property that is the subject of the action, then that person shall be liable to that claimant for damages computed in accordance with subparagraph (C).\n\n(C) Damages for which a person is liable under subparagraph (A) or subparagraph (B) are money damages in an amount equal to the sum of-- (i) the amount determined under paragraph (1)(A)(ii), and (ii) 3 times the amount determined applicable under paragraph (1)(A)(i). (D) Notice to a person under subparagraph (B)-- (i) shall be in writing; (ii) shall be posted by certified mail or personally delivered to the person; and (iii) shall contain-- (I) a statement of intention to commence the action under this section or to join the person as a defendant (as the case may be), together with the reasons therefor; (II) a demand that the unlawful trafficking in the claimant's property cease immediately; and (III) a copy of the summary statement published under paragraph (8). (4) Applicability.--(A) Except as otherwise provided in this paragraph, actions may be brought under paragraph (1) with respect to property confiscated before, on, or after the date of the enactment of this Act.\n\n(B) In the case of property confiscated before the date of the enactment of this Act, a United States national may not bring an action under this section on a claim to the confiscated property unless such national acquires ownership of the claim before such date of enactment. (C) In the case of property confiscated on or after the date of the enactment of this Act, a United States national who, after the property is confiscated, acquires ownership of a claim to the property by assignment for value, may not bring an action on the claim under this section.\n\n(5) Treatment of certain actions.--(A) In the case of a United States national who was eligible to file a claim with the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission under title V of the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949 but did not so file the claim, that United States national may not bring an action on that claim under this section. (B) In the case of any action brought under this section by a United States national whose underlying claim in the action was timely filed with the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission under title V of the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949 but was denied by the Commission, the court shall accept the findings of the Commission on the claim as conclusive in the action under this section.\n\n(C) A United States national, other than a United States national bringing an action under this section on a claim certified under title V of the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949, may not bring an action on a claim under this section before the end of the 2-year period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act.\n\n(D) An interest in property for which a United States national has a claim certified under title V of the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949 may not be the subject of a claim in an action under this section by any other person. Any person bringing an action under this section whose claim has not been so certified shall have the burden of establishing for the court that the interest in property that is the subject of the claim is not the subject of a claim so certified. (6) Inapplicability of act of state doctrine.--No court of the United States shall decline, based upon the act of state doctrine, to make a determination on the merits in an action brought under paragraph (1) .\n\n(7) Licenses not required.--(A) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, an action under this section may be brought and may be settled, and a judgment rendered in such action may be enforced, without obtaining any license or other permission from any agency of the United States, except that this paragraph shall not apply to the execution of a judgment against, or the settlement of actions involving, property blocked under the authorities of section 5(b) of the Trading with the Enemy Act that were being exercised on July 1, 1977, as a result of a national emergency declared by the President before such date, and are being exercised on the date of the enactment of this Act.\n\n**LINK**** To Complete Text Of Libertad Act Of 1996**\n\n**LINK** **To Complete Analysis In PDF Format**" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum - Havana Times", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum - Havana Times" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiekFVX3lxTE1vaUZwWlZQTlhkUVhGNGZfM2dvWmhzWDlwQXg3WU9vWWVBenZLbHJSdk0xSElXUUlJV0pOS1BzVWFId2Y3dzlER04tRG43cEVsbl9QWmt5VVE3M1p0Nnh2aFJRcHlMOE00TlZNZEJta0FJQUFFWVYwaVdn?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2019-02-04/moscow-commits-reviving-cubana-fleet", + "id": "CBMiekFVX3lxTE1vaUZwWlZQTlhkUVhGNGZfM2dvWmhzWDlwQXg3WU9vWWVBenZLbHJSdk0xSElXUUlJV0pOS1BzVWFId2Y3dzlER04tRG43cEVsbl9QWmt5VVE3M1p0Nnh2aFJRcHlMOE00TlZNZEJta0FJQUFFWVYwaVdn", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 07 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 7, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 38, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum  Havana Times", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba and the Secrets Behind Good Rum  Havana Times" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://havanatimes.org", + "title": "Havana Times" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Moscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet | AIN\nauthor: Vladimir Karnozov\nurl: https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2019-02-04/moscow-commits-reviving-cubana-fleet\nhostname: ainonline.com\ndescription: The Kremlin agrees to provide most of the funding to resuscitate Cuba\u2019s airliners.\nsitename: Aviation International News\ndate: 2019-02-04\n---\nClosing in\n0\n...\nMenu\nSearch\nLATEST\nPOPULAR\nAIRCRAFT FOR SALE\nSECTIONS\nBusiness Aviation\nAerospace & Defense\nRotorcraft\nGeneral Aviation\nFutureFlight\nSUSTAINABILITY & ENVIRONMENT\nCHANNELS\nAircraft\nMaintenance\nAvionics\nCharter & Fractional\nSafety\nAll Categories\nNews Archive\nNewsletter Archive\nMORE\nAirshows & Conventions\nAviation Events\nCompliance Countdown\nExpert Opinion\nIn-Depth Reports\nLeeham News & Analysis\nPrint Archives\nVideos\nWebinars\nWhitepapers\nABOUT\nAbout AIN\nOur Writers\nHistory\nAdvertise\nContact Us\nSubscribe\nLATEST\nPOPULAR\nAIRCRAFT FOR SALE\nSECTIONS\nABOUT\nSearch\nSubscribe\nSearch\nAircraft\nMoscow Commits To Reviving Cubana Fleet\nThe Kremlin agrees to provide most of the funding to resuscitate Cuba\u2019s airliners.\nThe first Cubana Ilyushin Il-96-300 rolls out of VASO's assembly hall in Voronezh, Russia, in 2005. (Photo: Vladimir Karnozov)\nShare\nPost\nShare\nPrint\nCopy\nEmail\nBy\nVladimir Karnozov\nFebruary 4, 2019\nMore In Aircraft\nAura Aero Targets Defense Sector As Civil Aircraft Progress\n\u2018New Aura M\u2019 business unit supports dual-role development of regional aircraft\nAircraft\nGulfstream G600 Sets Milestone with 200th Delivery\n200th went to customer in North America\nAircraft\nNASA Second X-59 Flight Cut Short from Warning Light\nOn its second flight, supersonic demonstrator flew for 9 minutes\nAircraft\nDiamond Unveils DA62 Special Missions Upgrade Plans\nPlans included improved aerodynamics and more sensors\nAircraft\nValo eVTOL Moves Closer to Service as Vertical and Bristow Collaborate\nUpdated Valo model features design changes from the VX4 prototype.\nAircraft\nFAA Launches Annual General Aviation Activity Survey\nIndustry appeals for participation\nAircraft\nJetNet To Evolve iQ into Multi-format Analysis\nRather than quarterly reports, iQ will be offered through a variety of means\nAircraft\nEngines Change, Weight Increases for Hydrogen Business Airplane\nPusher propfans have replaced ducted fans in BYA-1\u2019s preliminary design review\nAircraft" + }, + { + "title": "Serie del Caribe Championship Game Preview - Baseball Prospectus", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Serie del Caribe Championship Game Preview - Baseball Prospectus" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMingFBVV95cUxNRXQ4dWNfeVRWWlNjdXF5eXU2cEg4SmdaY0M5VGJ4MndIUG1HUUdKQndPTkV0V2JZQy1YSHBIc1B6MHlUYmpHMTBoWWk2RDFhYUZia2tQZmtHLXg3VXNYRE52cDBPdmh5bVZRTE45eVk1a3F1MVZBRzh1Q1FoQVRxb1A3TjhOZTdzNnNjZU1menZPU3djekNLQTRZdlo4Zw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article226186305.html", + "id": "CBMingFBVV95cUxNRXQ4dWNfeVRWWlNjdXF5eXU2cEg4SmdaY0M5VGJ4MndIUG1HUUdKQndPTkV0V2JZQy1YSHBIc1B6MHlUYmpHMTBoWWk2RDFhYUZia2tQZmtHLXg3VXNYRE52cDBPdmh5bVZRTE45eVk1a3F1MVZBRzh1Q1FoQVRxb1A3TjhOZTdzNnNjZU1menZPU3djekNLQTRZdlo4Zw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 10 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 10, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 41, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Serie del Caribe Championship Game Preview  Baseball Prospectus", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Serie del Caribe Championship Game Preview  Baseball Prospectus" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.baseballprospectus.com", + "title": "Baseball Prospectus" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Medical students warm to studies in Cuba - China's State Council Information Office", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Medical students warm to studies in Cuba - China's State Council Information Office" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiiwFBVV95cUxPX243RmFDQmVGUElndkQ2ZEh4cXB0SlNqOFJCQWU4eTVTVXpwMHhqdmhELURybi13QkxnTHJENFhPWFc2U0Y4OWRxeU4tUjJpX0NUWGY3ZE04cTM2Y2ZNWDk0TEZDX2huUjAzS2lPWHh4QXk3Rk9SeDQtWkItX01seG1UOFJpWlh6OFZn?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://earthsky.org/todays-image/photo-cuba-meteor-feb-1-2019-from-air/", + "id": "CBMiiwFBVV95cUxPX243RmFDQmVGUElndkQ2ZEh4cXB0SlNqOFJCQWU4eTVTVXpwMHhqdmhELURybi13QkxnTHJENFhPWFc2U0Y4OWRxeU4tUjJpX0NUWGY3ZE04cTM2Y2ZNWDk0TEZDX2huUjAzS2lPWHh4QXk3Rk9SeDQtWkItX01seG1UOFJpWlh6OFZn", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Fri, 22 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 22, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 4, + 53, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Medical students warm to studies in Cuba  China's State Council Information Office", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Medical students warm to studies in Cuba  China's State Council Information Office" + }, + "source": { + "href": "http://english.scio.gov.cn", + "title": "China's State Council Information Office" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Cuba meteor seen from the air | Today's Image | EarthSky\nauthor: Eddie Irizarry\nurl: https://earthsky.org/todays-image/photo-cuba-meteor-feb-1-2019-from-air/\nhostname: earthsky.org\ndescription: On February 1, 2019, a small asteroid - thought to be the size of a van - disintegrated over Vi\u00f1ales, Cuba. Many caught the meteor and its smoke trail from the ground. Cruz Mar\u00eda Ruiz caught them from an airplane.\nsitename: EarthSky | Updates on your cosmos and world\ndate: 2019-02-18\ncategories: [\"Today's Image, EddieIrizarry\"]\ntags: ['photo cuba meteor february 1 2019 from air,today\\\\s image']\n---\nHelp EarthSky keep going! Please donate what you can to our annual crowd-funding campaign.\n\nThe huge fireball that dropped meteorite fragments over Cuba on February 1, 2019, was captured in images from a commercial aircraft. Cruz Mar\u00eda Ruiz was aboard Spirit flight 923 travelling from Orlando, Florida, to San Jose, Costa Rica, and was taking pictures of the beautiful views through her window when she unknowingly (until later) photographed the meteor. Cruz Mar\u00eda Ruiz told EarthSky:\n\nI took the images with my cellphone, but I didn\u2019t see the meteor at that moment. Then I was reviewing my pictures and saw the fireball and its trail, and after hearing the news about the event, I realized I got the same meteor with my cell\u2019s camera.\n\n\nThe time at which the images were taken match perfectly, she added. The flight\u2019s path shows it flew very close to the meteor\u2019s trajectory, and the photographed trail shows some characteristics that confirm it is the same smoke trail seen from Cuba.\n\nCruz Mar\u00eda Ruiz, who is from Arecibo, Puerto Rico, said that after seeing the pictures she had taken, she was a little worried about the possibility of a meteor striking an aircraft. And indeed \u2013 although there are no documented incidents of a space rock hitting an aircraft, and although the probabilities are very low \u2013 it\u2019s not impossible.\n\nIn fact, a few cars have been impacted by meteorites, and the roofs of some houses have been hit by small space rocks.\n\nBottom line: At around 1:16 \u2013 1:17 p.m. EST on February 1, 2019, a small asteroid, thought to be about the size of a van, disintegrated over Vi\u00f1ales, a town in Pinar del R\u00edo, Cuba. Several meteorites were found after the huge meteor was seen in broad daylight. Many photographed the meteor and resulting smoke trail from the ground. Cruz Mar\u00eda Ruiz of Arecibo, Puerto Rico caught them from an airplane." + }, + { + "title": "73 UNGA: Cuba's Intervention at NAM Extraordinary Meeting on Venezuela. New York, February, 12, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "73 UNGA: Cuba's Intervention at NAM Extraordinary Meeting on Venezuela. New York, February, 12, 2019. - Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiywFBVV95cUxNZ1BsRmRSeU8xUXgwM052MzFrb0ZoblpTV2pnVnVROHNDQl9fa2t2SVRFYWtoTHpzcTZUTFNGZGVYX3E3Z2RTVHpmR2E0bXdBRnh4NmRrNDJhLVY3bG5vSGMwbGR2ZFR3ZVRzdVhrMUxBYU5ScUNYZmlHZnNiZk5NNmM0alpZdFplYUhtT3A2d285OUFpaldBTUt1UzR5TFFKSHoxaGFtVlkyWVVUQUhkZGkxbGY3UU1DclFRdEpaSFhwcC1kV0xYdDJNdw?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.timesrecordnews.com/picture-gallery/news/local/2019/02/21/joe-cuba-100-yr-old-veteran/2943191002/", + "id": "CBMiywFBVV95cUxNZ1BsRmRSeU8xUXgwM052MzFrb0ZoblpTV2pnVnVROHNDQl9fa2t2SVRFYWtoTHpzcTZUTFNGZGVYX3E3Z2RTVHpmR2E0bXdBRnh4NmRrNDJhLVY3bG5vSGMwbGR2ZFR3ZVRzdVhrMUxBYU5ScUNYZmlHZnNiZk5NNmM0alpZdFplYUhtT3A2d285OUFpaldBTUt1UzR5TFFKSHoxaGFtVlkyWVVUQUhkZGkxbGY3UU1DclFRdEpaSFhwcC1kV0xYdDJNdw", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Tue, 12 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 12, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 1, + 43, + 0 + ], + "summary": "73 UNGA: Cuba's Intervention at NAM Extraordinary Meeting on Venezuela. New York, February, 12, 2019.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "73 UNGA: Cuba's Intervention at NAM Extraordinary Meeting on Venezuela. New York, February, 12, 2019.  Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://misiones.cubaminrex.cu", + "title": "Cubadiplom\u00e1tica" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 403, + "response": "Error: HTTP 403" + }, + { + "title": "Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday - Los Angeles Review of Books", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday - Los Angeles Review of Books" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMilwFBVV95cUxQOHRqVUd2X0xBY2lsc09lZWJXallRaGtjZWhPTEtHemxSMVRRd3NLTVVvWk9Tbzl6MUVJV2dEVk00STFQcno1UlM2RXZPSmdTRWdSNmRBS0hqYkVzX09waUtoaEhKOGZuTWpsRUZxTG1Kbi02bzFzazgyNVlIS0xZR2lVamJpekVHRTNUaUNzd19QRWdDTm1n?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/47064/serie-del-caribe-championship-game-preview/", + "id": "CBMilwFBVV95cUxQOHRqVUd2X0xBY2lsc09lZWJXallRaGtjZWhPTEtHemxSMVRRd3NLTVVvWk9Tbzl6MUVJV2dEVk00STFQcno1UlM2RXZPSmdTRWdSNmRBS0hqYkVzX09waUtoaEhKOGZuTWpsRUZxTG1Kbi02bzFzazgyNVlIS0xZR2lVamJpekVHRTNUaUNzd19QRWdDTm1n", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Sun, 10 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 10, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 6, + 41, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday  Los Angeles Review of Books", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Everything or Nothing: Wendy Guerra's Revolution Sunday  Los Angeles Review of Books" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://lareviewofbooks.org", + "title": "Los Angeles Review of Books" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 307, + "response": "Error: HTTP 307" + }, + { + "title": "Cuba meteor seen from the air - EarthSky", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba meteor seen from the air - EarthSky" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMifEFVX3lxTE80azVPOHRPeTl5Yk1mLWlUT0QtUGFxcUE0el9DNjcxVDdtT0JCN0lJbklINDlPUThmbFRWNTFpVXFPZGtJRENOQm9uT0w4a0VpLW53WjFua2hCSE5NNFZKX0J2NUprcVlmUnlXX1hod1hteUxsQWFMMUx5Z2M?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "https://havanatimes.org/other-galleries/havana-street-art-here-today-gone-tomorrow/", + "id": "CBMifEFVX3lxTE80azVPOHRPeTl5Yk1mLWlUT0QtUGFxcUE0el9DNjcxVDdtT0JCN0lJbklINDlPUThmbFRWNTFpVXFPZGtJRENOQm9uT0w4a0VpLW53WjFua2hCSE5NNFZKX0J2NUprcVlmUnlXX1hod1hteUxsQWFMMUx5Z2M", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Mon, 18 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 18, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 0, + 49, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Cuba meteor seen from the air  EarthSky", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Cuba meteor seen from the air  EarthSky" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://earthsky.org", + "title": "EarthSky" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow - Havana Times\nauthor: Circles Robinson\nurl: https://havanatimes.org/other-galleries/havana-street-art-here-today-gone-tomorrow/\nhostname: havanatimes.org\ndescription: I once showed a woman in Centro Havana a photo of a wall painting in Callejon de Hamel. She said, \u201cOh that\u2019s not there anymore.\u201d. She called to her friend and showed him the photo. They both remembered it and agreed it was gone. Painted over with something new. (19 photos)\nsitename: Havana Times\ndate: 2019-02-20\ncategories: ['Other Galleries', 'Photo Feature']\n---\n# Havana Street Art: Here Today Gone Tomorrow\n\n*Speak softly, but carry a big can of paint. *\n\n**Photo Feature by Ken Alexander***\n\nHAVANA TIMES \u2013 In Old Havana, in a little alcove, there is a small painting on a dirty, cracked cement wall that has captured my heart. It is small but it speaks loudly. It was years ago when, by chance, I encountered it. It is called \u2018Mi Mundo\u2019. Each year I go back and the paint is more worn and the colors are less vivid. One day it will succumb to the elements.\n\nI once showed a woman in Centro Havana a photo of a wall painting in Callejon de Hamel. She said, \u201cOh that\u2019s not there anymore.\u201d. She called to her friend and showed him the photo. They both remembered it and agreed it was gone. Painted over with something new.\n\nAt that moment I realized just how much this colorful street art, expressed perfectly against the texture of Havana\u2019s pitted and decaying exterior, is but a transient expression of life in Havana.\n\nIt has been said that street art is nothing else but Urban Poetry that catches someone\u2019s eye. Art as an evolutionary act. At no point static and with no rules.\n\nThis month I will visit Mi Mundo again, and this time I am determined to find the artist as well. (If you know the artist, please contact me.)\n\nFor 19 years I have been trying to understand Cuba through the eye of my camera lens. But like the changing art on Havana\u2019s walls, Cuba is an elusive, moving target.\n\nThe more I think I understand Cuba\n\nthe more it changes,\n\nbecause the more she changes me\n\nthe more I realize how little\n\nI understand.\n\nThe most transient aspect of the experience is watching people as they walk in front of a work. For a brief moment they are unknowingly part of the art. The mother and child, the old woman, the street vendor. Each person interacts with the masterpiece creating something new and different that appears and then dissolves as they pass.\n\nBanksy, the renowned street artist famous for his self-shredding \u2018Girl with Balloon\u2019, says \u201cGraffiti is one of the few tools you have if you have almost nothing. And even if you don\u2019t come up with a picture to cure world poverty you can make at least someone smile while they are having a piss.\u201d\n\n**Ken Alexander is a photojournalist in Woods Hole, MA USA. He can be reached at [email protected].\u201d*\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n*Click on the thumbnails below to view all the photos in this gallery. On your PC or laptop, you can use the directional arrows on the keyboard to move within the gallery. On cell phones use the keys on the screen.*\n\n\u2018Mi Mundo\u2019 is by artist Yankel Olea Delgado. I am very fortunate to own one of his (extremely rare) oil-on-canvas paintings\n\nI really hope you find that artist Ken, it\u2019s a pitty how time slowly destroys all these works of arts. In a country where freedom is an irony, street art is a precious gift.\n\nHello, just bump into this article, my name is Liber, I\u2019m a Cuban urban photographer, no longer in Cuba now, but Cuba will forever be in me, check out different cities where street art is as prolific ( if not more) than in Havana, recomend Santa Clara, for decades know amongst Cuban underground artist as the meca of urban art. Thanks for your admiration of Cuban arts.\n\n\u2018The more I think I understand Cuba the more it changes..\u2019\n\nKen you are missing the point. Cuba, like any country, is the sum of its changes. That makes up its history, culture, society etc etc. Focus on the changes if you want to \u2018understand\u2019\u2026.\n\nWow, what a great article, just made me want to reach out. As a lot of great art does. Do you think Mi Mondo is really gone?\n\nI love the poem about understanding Cuba \u2013 did you write it? It\u2019s fascinating. Where are you from? I went to Cuba in January and cant stop thinking about it. Hoping to go back in a few months.\n\nEnjoy your next trip to Cuba, I\u2019ll be jealous! I wonder if you might personally email me so I could ask you a few art related things for my next trip?\n\nThanks, Lucy" + }, + { + "title": "Joe Cuba 100 yr old Veteran - Times Record News", + "title_detail": { + "type": "text/plain", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Joe Cuba 100 yr old Veteran - Times Record News" + }, + "links": [ + { + "rel": "alternate", + "type": "text/html", + "href": "https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMirgFBVV95cUxNc2x2d1FON1R4SXJmTm5ROFlFMGpkaXFMSnVEOFRvSUhRTHhVRWZMd0NfNnJhOURxdjJfczV0RmFVQWJDLUpVVEI3Wm1kLWp4d2lzX0dkaUx5UGMxdXRMMzFpY3JJSEc4cmFTMU9YQzI5dlhieURnZDc2S1pZYzhOUksyYXJSTE52ZC04SnhHQlpBM2lfaWlHbzAyZ2pmRVk0cW54ODJXeWpmSUNMREE?oc=5" + } + ], + "link": "http://english.scio.gov.cn/internationalexchanges/2019-02/22/content_74492677_0.htm", + "id": "CBMirgFBVV95cUxNc2x2d1FON1R4SXJmTm5ROFlFMGpkaXFMSnVEOFRvSUhRTHhVRWZMd0NfNnJhOURxdjJfczV0RmFVQWJDLUpVVEI3Wm1kLWp4d2lzX0dkaUx5UGMxdXRMMzFpY3JJSEc4cmFTMU9YQzI5dlhieURnZDc2S1pZYzhOUksyYXJSTE52ZC04SnhHQlpBM2lfaWlHbzAyZ2pmRVk0cW54ODJXeWpmSUNMREE", + "guidislink": false, + "published": "Thu, 21 Feb 2019 08:00:00 GMT", + "published_parsed": [ + 2019, + 2, + 21, + 8, + 0, + 0, + 3, + 52, + 0 + ], + "summary": "Joe Cuba 100 yr old Veteran  Times Record News", + "summary_detail": { + "type": "text/html", + "language": null, + "base": "", + "value": "Joe Cuba 100 yr old Veteran  Times Record News" + }, + "source": { + "href": "https://www.timesrecordnews.com", + "title": "Times Record News" + }, + "sub_articles": [], + "status_code": 200, + "response": "---\ntitle: Medical students warm to studies in Cuba\ndescription: Medical students warm to studies in Cuba\nsitename: english.scio.gov.cn\ndate: 2019-02-22\ntags: ['Cuba,medical']\n---\nAfter Kou Shunchao arrived in 2006 in Havana, Cuba's capital, at age 19, he became one of the first Chinese to pursue medical studies in Cuba.\n\nKou Shunchao (2nd R) and his classmates from Cuba and other Latin American countries pose for a photo with the physician in charge of a ward at Calixito Garica Hospital in Havana last month. [Photo provided to China Daily]\n\nKou, from Qinghai province, would spend the next 13 years \u2013 almost half his life \u2013 in the Caribbean island nation.\n\nMore than 3,000 Chinese students from 12 central and western provinces have studied in the country with a Cuban government scholarship. They have since gone on to become doctors and nurses back home.\n\n\"I chose the project because of the financial aid given by the government. I could also learn Spanish as well as medicine, my major,\" the 32-year-old said of his decision to study in Cuba. Financial concerns were also a key motivation for most of the Chinese students taking part in the program.\n\nLi Siya from Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi province, did some research and found that Cuba is strong in the fields of biopharmaceutical technology, ophthalmic clinical practice and clinical medicine.\n\nLi Siya (R) assists her teacher to examine a glaucoma patient at the Cuban Institution of Ophthalmology. [Photo provided to China Daily]\n\nShe planned to apply to Northwest University of Political Science and Law in her home city after taking the national college entrance examination in 2009, but changed her mind when she saw information about the Cuban program in a local newspaper.\n\n\"My mother is a doctor. She believes it is an honor to be a doctor or a nurse ... Moreover, we don't need to pay tuition, so I finally decided to join the program,\" Li said.\n\nThe Chinese all grew up after the launch of the reform and opening-up policy in 1978. They were shocked when they witnessed the embargoes placed on Cuba by the United States, but all have had heart-warming experiences while studying on the island.\n\n\"Although Cubans suffer from a critical shortage of supplies, I am deeply touched by their simple and sincere interpersonal relationships,\" said Kou, who expects to earn his PhD this year.\n\n\"Teachers and local doctors have low salaries, but most of them are devoted to their jobs.\"\n\nDuring one day of Kou's six-year internship, he was responsible for health checks and setting up medical records for a new patient.\n\n\"The process required lots of time and there was a shortage of disposable sterilized gloves at the time. I asked the director if I could do the work after lunch, since the college canteen was going to stop serving in half an hour,\" Kou said.\n\n\"The director agreed, but when I came back from the canteen, he had already done the job for me, and explained the whole process in detail. Later, I found he had eaten his lunch of rice and soup in the rest room.\"\n\nWhen Li arrived in Havana 10 years ago, most daily products, such as eggs, meat and potatoes, could not be traded freely.\n\n\"At the very beginning, we used to complain about the food in the canteen. But when we did health screening in local people's homes, we suddenly recognized that the Cuban government had tried its best to provide a quality life for us,\" Li said. \"And most Cubans I have met are very friendly and helpful.\"\n\nKou Shunchao (sitting R) watches a checkup at Calixito Garcia Hospital. [Photo provided to China Daily]\n\nLi has spent her time studying healthcare in Havana. In January last year, the 28-year-old began her postgraduate studies at the Central Institute of Ophthalmology Ramon Pando Ferrer in the city as a medical resident. After graduation, she will specialize in general ophthalmology.\n\nLi remembers clearly her teacher's opening remark in her first class at the School of Santiago Figueroa, where students spend the first year learning Spanish. The teacher said, \"I am 26 years old this year, and I am excited to have so many children (referring to the students) all of a sudden.\" Li said all the students burst into laughter on hearing this.\n\nLi was among the last group of students to enroll in the program. The scholarship, which started in 2006, was suspended after 2009 due to the Cuban government's financial difficulties, but many students stayed in the country to further their studies.\n\nZhou Can, from Guiyang, capital of Guizhou province, began her studies in Cuba in 2008. She returned to China after seven years and became a doctor at a hospital in her home city.\n\n\"I often miss my time in Cuba, even though the living conditions there are not so good,\" she said.\n\n\"I was deeply impressed by Cuban people's gratitude for life and their outlook. They long to see the rest of the world, and they cherish each day, whether they are rich or poor.\"\n\nAfter working for three years as a doctor in Guiyang, Zhou said her most direct impression is that China, with its large population, cannot emulate Cuba's free healthcare system. Chinese doctors face a great deal of pressure due to the large number of patients, she said.\n\n\"Sometimes we even have to run to the restroom. And in China, the relationship between doctors and patients is not so harmonious as it is in Cuba. A lack of preliminary medical knowledge usually makes communication between doctors and patients more difficult in China.\"\n\nZhou left the Guiyang hospital last year to pursue further studies in Spain, while Kou, who is president of the Chinese student union in Cuba, is applying for an internship at the World Health Organization.\n\nKou's research for his doctorate is on atherosclerosis, a condition in which the inside of an artery narrows dues to a buildup of plaque, a topic highly relevant in both Cuba and China, due to their fast-growing aging populations.\n\n\"I am thinking about finding a job in Beijing later, hoping my strengths in both medicine and Spanish can give me a competitive edge,\" Kou said. \"But maybe I need more time to familiarize myself with the medical system and process at home.\"\n\nLi (L) examines a patient at the ophthalmology institution. [Photo provided to China Daily]\n\nLi is also thinking about becoming a doctor at home after finishing postgraduate studies in Cuba. \"But if my country needs me to work in Cuba, I will never refuse,\" she added. \"There are many practices we can learn from Cuba.\"\n\nThe State-run healthcare system has earned Cuba praise over the years. Despite scarce resources and a less-developed economy, the country has one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates \u2013 just slightly below that of the United States. Industry statistics show that its life expectancy is 77.5 years, one of the world's highest. The nation has 30,000 family doctors and 500 local clinics, and every Cuban sees a doctor at least once a year.\n\nCuba is one of the few countries to offer its citizens free healthcare treatment and services. Although not wealthy or economically developed, the country spends half of the national budget on healthcare and education.\n\nChinese students enrolled in the program have also benefited from Cuba's free medical system.\n\nKou said a Chinese student, Zhou Kai, had a heart attack during his studies in Cuba. After Zhou's parents gave their approval, he underwent surgery at a local hospital. All the medical treatment, including rehabilitation, was free.\n\n\"All of us enjoy the same treatment as Cuban citizens, and our institution does its best to look after us,\" Kou added.\n\nHe believes that early emphasis on community-based primary care and prevention is the key to success.\n\n\"China should really learn from that,\" Kou said. \"Promoting health knowledge and treating common illnesses in communities is an efficient method, with minimum cost.\"\n\nThe Cuban healthcare system starts at community level, where each neighborhood has a clinic with a doctor and a nurse. These doctor-nurse teams spend each morning in their neighborhood office seeing patients, and every afternoon they visit people based on need.\n\nKou (R) chats with a physician. [Photo provided to China Daily]\n\n\"That's why Cubans love to have some small talk with doctors, as they take them as their friends. There are not that many patients in hospitals as quite a number of them have received timely treatment in the community where they live,\" Kou said.\n\nEvery Cuban is assigned a health number and has an annual care plan developed for them based on their level of risk. As a result, most illnesses can be detected or prevented at an early stage.\n\nLi said: \"For instance, a number of patients come to the ophthalmology department for regular half-year examinations by appointment for dilated pupils. Although China has a very high instance of myopia, only a few people recognize the necessity for such periodic checks.\n\n\"Although the medical equipment and treatment in China is much better than what we have in Cuba, medical students have fewer chances to practice,\" Li said. \"And this is one of the major strengths of studying medicine in Cuba.\"\n\nWhat impressed Li the most was her experience in helping to deliver a baby when she served as an intern at a local hospital during her fourth year of learning gynecology and obstetrics.\n\n\"My teacher was beside me to tell me what to do next, but I was so nervous and was sweating,\" she said. \"I even found my legs shaking and I burst into tears when I finally held the baby. This was the first time I felt the great joy brought by studying healthcare. I am now more determined to further pursue my studies and am glad I decided to learn medicine in Cuba.\"\n\nWhen Li began her studies at the Central Institute of Ophthalmology Ramon Pando Ferrer, the lecturer taught students how to use delicate devices.\n\n\"The lecturer even loaned me her research materials, written notes and e-books, which makes me feel we are in a big family,\" Li said.\n\nFor Xu Shicheng, a researcher with the Latin America Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, there are many \"successful experiences\" that China can learn from the Cuban healthcare system.\n\nBut the Caribbean country also faces challenges. The US embargo resulted in a lack of essential drugs, and no new medical facilities. The government faced a huge financial burden in providing a free healthcare system, and as private hospitals are not allowed, a reduced level of competition has led to low efficiency in public ones.\n\nGail Reed, founder of Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba, a nonprofit organization, was quoted by Tampa Bay Times, a Florida newspaper, as saying, \"You can get a heart transplant (in Cuba) but might have to bring your own sheets to the hospital.\"" + } + ] +} \ No newline at end of file