Cuba fires minister in charge of oil and nickel

Is this the first layoff of the 500.000?

Now ex-minister Yadira Garcia with ex-president Castro

Cuba fired Basic Industry Minister Yadira Garcia, in charge of the oil and nickel industries, on Sunday and said the first vice minister would stand in until a replacement was named.

A government communique said Garcia was let go due to "her deficiencies manifested, especially in poor control of resources destined for investment and the productive process."

First Vice Minister Thomas Benitez was named as a temporary replacement "until a new minister can be appointed," the statement said.

The ministry is also in charge of the cement industry and domestic pharmaceutical industry.

The Cuban oil industry is preparing to drill with foreign partners in the Gulf of Mexico next year and in partnership with Venezuela is developing its refining and other oil related infrastructure.

Unrefined nickel is Cuba's most important export at around 70,000 tonnes per year and a joint venture with Venezuela plans to add 60,000 tonnes of ferronickel by 2013.

Garcia was the last economic minister inherited by President Raul Castro in 2008 when he replaced ailing brother Fidel Castro.

Raul Castro replaced the other ministers in 2009.

From: Reuters Africa

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Cuba may link up to Glonass system, Russia's satellite navigation system

Glonass receiver

Moscow and Havana plan to connect Cuba to the Glonass navigation satellite system, the Russian ambassador to Cuba said on Wednesday.

Glonass - the Global Navigation Satellite System - is the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use. Both systems enable users to determine their positions to within a few meters.

Russia and Cuba are currently developing cooperation in the sphere of advanced technology, Mikhail Kamynin noted.

"Our plans include a detailed work on connecting Cuba to the Glonass system," the ambassador said.

From:  RIA Novosti

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Cuba To Cut 500,000 Government Workers

Castro cutting jobs, but now Cubans allowed to cut hair

Cuba's communist government will lay off hundreds of thousands of workers and reduce restrictions on private enterprises to help them find work.

The Cuban Workers Federation -- the country's only trade union -- said some 500,000 jobs will be cut by early next year.

More than 85 percent of Cuba's workforce, or about 5 million people, are currently state-employed.

The plan is the most important reform undertaken since President Raul Castro took over from his brother Fidel in 2008.

The labor overhaul comes less than a week after Fidel Castro was quoted as saying Cuba's communist economy no longer works.

From: Radio Liberty

Video: 500,000 Cubans Booted Off Government Payroll

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Goldberg ratifies Fidel: “The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore”

Jeffrey Goldberg

The US journalist Jeffrey Goldberg from The Atlantic magazine ratified his version of the interview with Fidel Castro, when he confessed that the Cuban model is no longer working, not even in the island, in spite of the Cuban leader attempt to amend his words.

“Fidel Castro is claiming that I misunderstood his statement, ‘The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore’. In a speech at the University of Havana that was then broadcast on Cuban TV, Castro said he meant “exactly the opposite” of what was understood by Jeffrey Goldberg, who was interviewing him for The Atlantic...

On Friday, Castro said he was correctly quoted, but that, “in reality, my answer meant exactly the opposite of what both American journalists interpreted regarding the Cuban model. My idea, as the whole world knows, is that the capitalist system no longer works for the United States or the world,” he said. “How could such a system work for a socialist country like Cuba?”

Castro called Goldberg “a great journalist.” “He does not invent phrases, he transfers them and interprets them,” he said. “I await with interest his extensive article.”

First, thank you very much, Fidel, for the kind words. Second, I'm sorry to say it, but I think the expression, “The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore” means, “The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore.”

Fidel says that his answer meant “exactly the opposite” of what Julia Sweig heard him say. Just as a language experiment, here is what the opposite of his statement would sound like: “The Cuban model works so well for us that we want to export it.” But he didn't say this. What he said was -- well, you've read what he said. I'm not sure how this statement --accurately quoted, according to Fidel -- could mean anything other than what it means”.

From: MercoPress

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Video shows armed Cuban police breaking up student protest

A Cuban anti-riot squad, previously unseen but surprisingly well-equipped and with fixed bayonets, quelled a Pakistani student protest in Matanzas, a video of the event shows.

“Our hand will not tremble in the face of violence,” one Cuban official warns the medical school protesters in the video, broadcast on the Maria Elvira Live program on MegaTV.

The official adds that it’s the second protest by the Pakistanis but gives no dates for either, and says 15 leaders of the latest manifestation were to be flown home immediately.

A statement by the Cuban Embassy in Pakistan on Thursday, after parts of the video were posted on the Internet, confirmed the protests but did not mention the students’ complaints of inadequate education and living conditions.

“Unfortunately, since the first months of 2007 and until now, grave violations of discipline have repeatedly been committed by a small group of students,” the statement said.
“Such violations of discipline have included, among others, disrespect for their professors, disregard to the Cuban authorities, failing to attend class, misbehavior, physical aggressions . . . along with acts of violence,” said the statement, published by the online Pakistan Observer.
 
The video shows scores of members of the anti-riot squad dressed in black and equipped well for a country where riots are extremely rare — with tear gas guns, riot batons, dogs, face shields and U.S.-styled helmets. Several had bayonets fixed on their AK assault rifles.
About five squad members are seen briefly pushing back a group of a few dozen students, some wearing skull caps. But the video did not show any signs of violence.

WELL PREPARED
It’s not clear if the unit, previously unseen in public, belonged to the police or military, but its deployment signaled that the government is well prepared for street disturbances.

“This is a super well-equipped unit, which we have never seen before but which showed that it was ready for something serious,” said Camilo Loret de Mola, who appeared on the Maria Elvira Salazar program that broadcast the video.

Loret de Mola said the video was received from a Cuban he declined to identify. The program broadcast segments on Wednesday and Thursday.

The protest took place at the Maximo Santiago Haza Medical School in Jagüey Grande, in Matanzas province, where nearly 1,000 Pakistanis have been studying on scholarships arranged after a devastating earthquake hit Pakistan in 2005.

Pakistani media reports indicate that it occurred sometime before March, and that at least five of the students were sent home.

The video, apparently taken on cellphones, shows the riot squad virtually surrounding the campus and posted on rooftops as the students are warned by Rolando Gómez, a foreign ministry official who helped set up the scholarship program.

FUTURE AT STAKE
“Think well about what’s at play here,” Gómez cautions them, because “today is the day that you decide if you want to be doctors or you want to go home.”

El Nuevo Herald phone calls to a number listed for the embassy went unanswered.

Under the scholarship program, about 400 Pakistani students arrived in Cuba in 2007 and another 600 arrived a year later. They were sent to the Matanzas school rather than the better known Latin American School for Medicine near Havana, which has about 30,000 students from 126 countries.

A letter purporting to speak for the 1,000 Pakistani students in Cuba, posted Sept. 17, 2009 on the website Overseas Pakistani Friends, detailed a slew of complaints against Cuban and Pakistani authorities.

“We are very much frustrated and feel our future on stake, as we do not even know whether our degree is valid or not” once they return to Pakistan, the letter notes.

While the scholarship program touted Cuba’s medical education as “world leading,” the letter added, the Matanzas school “by no definitions of the word can be called a world leading university.”

The converted Spanish-language school lacks facilities such as a “library, proper laboratory, no specimens (The dead bodies etc) are available for the dissection, and even the nearest hospital is far away from our school.

“How can one think of a medical school without any hospital attached?” the letter asked.

Video (Spanish):

From: SignalFire

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Cuba's Soviet-style economic model no longer workable: Castro

This way! Or, maybe the other way...

London, Sept. 9 : Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro has said that Cuba''s Soviet-style economic model "doesn't even work for us anymore".

In an interview to the Atlantic Monthly magazine, Castro said that the modest reforms introduced by his brother, President Raul Castro to stimulate his country’s troubled economy, appeared to be a step in the right direction.

Castro also criticized Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for anti-Semitism and denying the Holocaust.

He criticized his own actions during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis when he urged the Soviet Union to launch nuclear weapons against the United States, telling Goldberg "it wasn''t worth it at all." (ANI)

From: Top News

Fidel Castro : "Cuban model doesn't work"

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Using Che Guevara image riles some Cuban Americans

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Some Cuban Americans in south Florida are upset to see a picture of revolutionary Che Guevara promoting an irreverent car race.

The “24 Horas de Cuba del Norte” — or 24 Hours of Cuba of the North — is part of a national circuit of farcical auto races called 24 Hours of LeMons. Drivers spend less than $500 and race junk cars decorated like Halloween floats.

Other races in the circuit have names like “The Can’t Get Bayou” in New Orleans and “The Rod Blagojevich Never-Say-Die 500″ in Chicago.

But the use of Cuban revolutionary Guevara’s image in the Dec. 30-31 race’s logo crosses the line for some native Cubans. Critics say it’s like using Ku Klux Klan imagery to advertise in the South.

Race organizers say they don't plan to change the campaign.

From: Cheat Games

Video - The Victims of Che Guevara

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Cuban Blogger Yoani Sanchez is Named IPI’s 60th and Final World Press Freedom Hero

Blogger "provides a glimpse into what is otherwise a closed world": IPI Interim Director

The International Press Institute today declared Cuban blogger Yoani Maria Sanchez Cordero its 60th World Press Freedom Hero.

Sanchez’s blog, Generation Y, is an acerbic critique of life in Cuba, and a telling reminder to the world of the restraints on free speech and expression on the Caribbean island.

Sanchez, a graduate of Havana University, left Cuba for Switzerland in 2002, but returned two years later. On her return, she set up, along with a group of other Cubans, the magazine “Consenso” as a forum for reflection and debate.

In 2007, spurred by what she saw as a growing repressive climate in her homeland, she launched her blog, Generation Y. Composed of reflections on daily life, politics and culture in Castro’s Cuba, the blog today boasts a readership of more than a million.

In early 2008, Sanchez reported that the site may have been targeted by government censors. In April 2008, the site became unavailable in Cuba.

Since then, Sanchez has resorted to extreme and creative measures to keep her blog alive. In a country where internet access is severely restricted and prohibitively expensive, Sanchez often poses as a tourist to access the internet, emailing her entries to friends outside the country who then publish them online.

Sanchez has been refused permission to travel outside of Cuba at least six times in the past two years alone, despite international acclaim for her blog. In 2008, “TIME Magazine” named her one of the world’s 100 most influential people, noting her “feisty dedication to the truth,” and pointing out that “under the nose of a regime that has never tolerated dissent, Sánchez has practiced what paper-bound journalists in her country cannot: freedom of speech.” She has also received the Ortega y Gasset Prize, Spain’s highest award for digital journalism; the Maria Moors Cabot Prize from Columbia University; and in 2009, TIME Magazine named her blog among the 25 Best Blogs of 2009.

In her own country, however, Sanchez has repeatedly faced harassment by authorities. In November 2009, the Daily Telegraph reported that she was beaten by a group of unidentified men while on her way to a peaceful protest. According to the article, after the attack, she was dumped “again in the middle of the street, (…) leaving her bruised, scared and sobbing.”

Sanchez says she has not been able to see her own blog since 2007. She reports on her blog that she is under continuous surveillance by state security agents. On 24 May, Sanchez’s blog reported that her name had been announced on Cuba’s state-run Roundtable program, “mixed with concepts such as “cyber-terrorism,” “cyber-commandos” and “media war.”

“To be mentioned in a negative way in the most official program on television is, for any Cuban, the confirmation of her social death,” says Sanchez in her blog.

However, Sanchez refuses to be silenced. “If you are insulted by the mediocre, the opportunists, if you are slandered by the employees of the powerful but dying machinery, take it as a compliment,” she says on her blog.

“Sanchez’s tremendously important work provides a glimpse into what is otherwise a closed world,” said IPI Interim Director Alison Bethel McKenzie. “It is perhaps fitting that our 60th and final World Press Freedom Hero represents a future where the power of the internet can be harnessed to promote free speech. We are proud to know Yoani and to award this prestigious prize to her.”

"Yoani's work has contributed tremendously toward a more wholesome understanding of the reality of life in Cuba. Her clear insights, beautiful use of language and tenacity have distinguished Yoani as an outstanding Caribbean journalist, blogger and citizen. We all look forward to the day conditions in her homeland change so that free expression can be more fully and abundantly facilitated, encouraged and exercised. Our congratulations on her achievement of this prestigious award," said Wesley Gibbings, President of the Association of Caribbean Media Workers, reacting to the announcement of the award.

From: IPI

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Cuba Video: The “Ladies in White” Steadfast Until Every Political Prisoner is Free

NEW YORK (September 1, 2010) – In order to provide an accurate backdrop with regard to the announcement of the Cuban government’s release and forced exile of 52 political prisoners, the Human Rights Foundation (HRF) releases an exclusive video documentary short of the “Ladies in White,” a civil society group inside Cuba that organizes peaceful Sunday marches for freedom and human rights.

The world-renowned group is formed by the wives, mothers, sisters, daughters, and supporters of political prisoners who were arrested during the “Black Spring” government crackdown on Cuban dissidents. During the four-day period that occurred in March 2003, 75 independent journalists, librarians, and democracy and human rights advocates were arrested and ultimately convicted with sentences ranging from 6 to 28 years.

Currently, 26 of the prisoners have been released and exiled to Spain, while another prisoner was released to the United States for medical treatment. At least five of the prisoners have refused to accept exile, meaning they choose to remain in prison unless they are granted unconditional release and allowed to stay in Cuba.

"The release of these innocent individuals is a welcome development and cause for celebration, but we must remember that the mechanism of repression remains firmly entrenched in Cuba. None of these arrests should ever have been made in the first place,” said Thor Halvorssen, president of HRF. “It should be made clear that their release does not indicate a reversal of conviction or pardon. These men are still considered treacherous criminals by the Cuban government. If they are allowed to stay in Cuba it shall be with the specter of certain and continuous political persecution and harassment,” he continued.

The Ladies in White have declared that they will continue protesting every Sunday until all of the Black Spring prisoners have been released. In the video, Laura Pollan, spokeswoman for the Ladies in White, relates the history of how the group formed following the Black Spring and discusses recent events that have brought international attention to Cuba’s political prisoners.

"The government states that there's a lot of freedom in Cuba, that it's a paradise,” said Pollan. “I'd invite those people who believe that Cuba is free to come and live here; to come and live here like a regular citizen, without bringing dollars; to come to work, and make what a regular worker makes; to come and live in a humble house, buy their food with a ration book, and express themselves here as much as they do in their own countries against their governments and other individuals, so that they see what the outcome is in Cuba,” she continued.

The Cuban government has been under pressure to release its political prisoners following the February death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, a political prisoner who went on a hunger strike to protest Cuba’s treatment of its prisoners. The death of Zapata prompted another dissident, Guillermo Fariñas, to launch his own hunger strike.

"The whole world is awakening and removing its blindfold with regards to Cuba,” said Pollan.

"The prisoners should be allowed to choose for themselves whether to remain in Cuba or leave the country. Those prisoners who have refused a forced exile are courageously willing to sacrifice their own freedom and stand up for freedom of expression for all,” said Halvorssen. “This is a powerful threat to a regime that has held power for 51 years and ruthlessly persecutes its opponents.”

With the release of the 52 political prisoners, Cuba’s criminal code—which allows the “pre-emptive” arrest of an individual before committing any crime—remains unchanged, as do laws allowing for the arrest of anyone writing anything critical of the Cuban government.

"The cyclical release of political prisoners in Cuba is usually followed by the arrest of more dissidents who have committed some kind of ‘thoughtcrime’ or who have done nothing but exercise their right to free speech. Further, there are still an untold number of political prisoners in Cuba’s jails, and Raúl Castro could simply replace these 52 prisoners with another crackdown on Cuba’s opposition voices tomorrow,” said Halvorssen. “Any significant reform involves more than window dressing to obtain European credits or editorial kudos from the foreign media. Why not a full transition to democracy and the respect of basic civil rights and civil liberties?” he added.

In May 2010, HRF also released videos of former prisoner of conscience Armando Valladares and world-renowned blogger Yoani Sánchez in honor of Global Cuba Solidarity Day. The videos were filmed exclusively for the 2010 Oslo Freedom Forum and are now available on YouTube.

Contact: Thor Halvorssen, Human Rights Foundation, (212) 246.8486 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (212) 246.8486      end_of_the_skype_highlighting, info@thehrf.org

From: HRF

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Cuban church leader arrested on questionable charges

A respected church leader in Cuba was unexpectedly arrested on Monday and taken to a town in Central Cuba where he is expected to stand trial. CSW believes the charges of “offensive behaviour” and “threats” against Reverend Roberto Rodriguez to be false.

Those close to Reverend Rodriguez, who is in his late 60s and in poor health, say he became a government target after the organization he led publicly withdrew from a government sanctioned religious umbrella group in the second half of 2008, and that the criminal charges against him are an attempt to discredit and silence him. His arrest was so sudden that Reverend Rodriguez was unable to take important medication with him. It is feared that without it, his health will continue to deteriorate.

Reverend Roberto Rodriguez

According to his family, state security officials arrived at the home without warning on 30 August and forced Reverend Rodriguez to go with them. The family understands that he will be taken to the town of Placetas where he will be put on trial sometime over the next few days. Prosecutors are asking that he be given a one-year prison sentence.

Charges were first brought against Reverend Rodriguez in late 2008 and he was given three trial dates over the course of 2009 but no trial ever took place. He and his family were forced to move after being subjected to constant verbal and physical abuse from their neighbours, apparently acting with the support of the government. He has spent the last 21 months under house arrest.

CSW is calling on the Cuban authorities to release Reverend Rodriguez immediately and drop all charges against him.

CSW’s National Director Stuart Windsor said, “The treatment of Reverend Rodriguez and his family over the past 21 months has been disgraceful. The European Union will be looking at the human rights situation and reviewing its Common Position on Cuba this month. While some heralded the release of some Cuban prisoners of conscience this summer as an improvement in the human rights situation, the arrest of Reverend Rodriguez this week demonstrates that the Cuban government is not interested in real human rights reform. We call on the EU to make urgent representations on behalf of Reverend Rodriguez to the Cuban government.”

From: Christian Today

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