Chronicle on Cuba - November 2008

Domestic Affairs

November 3: The performance by the Cuban National Ballet of Swan Lake in the Cathedral Plaza, in Old Havana, was considered by the audience as a beautiful gift to the community. Thousands of people attended the performance, which was danced on a natural colonial stage under the stars accompanied by the music composed by Tchaikovsky.  Among the audience were Cuban Vice-President Carlos Lage Davila, the Head of the Department for International Relations of the Cuban Communist Party, Fernando Remirez de Estenoz, and prima ballerina assoluta Alicia Alonso. Guests, including international tourists in a restaurant near the stage, left their plates on the table and rushed to the balconies to watch the ballet, while neighbours living on buildings surrounding the plaza did not miss the chance to watch the classic ballet live from home (ACN, 4/11/08).

November 4: Cell phone rates on the island are among the world's highest. Calls from one cell phone to another cost more than 50 cents a minute, while calls from a cell phone to a land line run more than 60 cents, according to Cuba's phone company. Users also pay more than 44 cents a minute to receive calls. Some Cubans rely on text messages, which cost less. Many rarely answer their cell phones, especially if they don't recognize the number. Instead, they use them as pagers: The caller ID reveals the number, and the user returns the call from a fixed phone as soon as one becomes available. The cost of calls is one reason Cuba has the fewest cell phones per person in the hemisphere: there are 11.2 million inhabitants and just 331,000 mobile lines, according to 2007 government telecommunications figures. Cuba's government blames the longstanding US economic embargo for the island's telecom deficit, saying it prevents Cuba from connecting to underwater fibre-optic cables and forces it to use expensive satellite links (Sun Sentinel, 4/11/08).

November 4: Brothers and leaders of the Movement of Cuban Youths for Democracy (MCYD), Néstor and Rolando Rodríguez Lobaina, were arrested in Guantanamo by State Security officers. The dissidents were at a friends' house when they were detained and led to the provincial police station. Although the reason for the arrest was to have "a routine conversation," both opposition leaders have remained in jail. That same day activists Idalmis Núñez Reinoso and Yordelis Duvalón were arrested at a bus stop in the city of Santiago de Cuba, as well as Alcides Rivera Rodríguez, Blas Fortún Martínez and Iris Pérez Aguilera, from Villa Clara (Cubaencuentro, 6/11/08).

November 4: Independent journalist José Agramonte Leyva, a resident of Camagüey, was visited by an officer who introduced himself as a first officer of the Department against Subversive Activities, and who threatened him with the application of Law 88, for offering information to the foreign press and collaborating assiduously with the newspaper Nueva Prensa Cubana and the US-based radio station Radio Martí. In the last few months, the opposition member reported on the devastating effects of hurricanes Gustav and Ike in his province and various human rights violations against political prisoners, their relatives, and citizens in general (Cubaencuentro, 6/11/08).

November 4: Cuban doctors working on a special mission in Venezuela returned to Cuba. The more than 400-member medical brigade had worked for more than one year in Venezuela on a research study on people with disabilities who need specialized care. That population included people suffering from mental illness, physically disabilities, blindness, and hearing and speaking disorders. The main objective of the study, led by the Cuban Deputy Health Minister Marcia Cobas, was to identify the risk factors leading to disabilities, and the social, medical and educational needs of people in the areas under the study, according to National Genetics Centre director Beatriz Marcheco. Hilda Hernandez, of the Cuban Public Health Ministry (MINSAP), said the mission covered all 24 states of the South American country. ”It was a beautiful job, a unique experience for us because we were able to attend every single impaired person, and they were very happy to know that somebody had finally noticed them, said disabilities expert Mayda
Reina Rodriguez to the press (ACN, 5/11/08).

November 6: Juan Blanco, a pioneer of electro-acoustic music in Cuba and one of the most important promoters of this kind of music in Ibero-America, died in Havana. Blanco was a founder and director of the National Laboratory of electro-acoustic music and a teacher for the younger generations since he became part of the Cuban music avant-garde of the 1960s. The artist, author of more than 200 pieces or materials for symphonic orchestras, instrumental groups and choirs, received numerous national and international awards (ACN, 5/11/08).

November 7: Boarding students in the provinces of Camaguey, Las Tunas and Holguin are being sent back home, as one of the first measures taken in those eastern provinces to protect human lives from Hurricane Paloma that is threatening to hit the island. More than 25,000 students in Camaguey and nearly 40,000 in Holguin are being sent back home as the Cuban civil defence council issued a hurricane watch for those provinces. The president of the Civil Defence Council in Camaguey, Julio Cesar Garcia, mentioned among the most pressing actions the return of all fishing boats sailing off the northern and southern coasts of the island. Shelters with a capacity for 6,000 people are being prepared, while the transportation is being coordinated for the evacuation of people from southern coastal towns to the city of Camaguey, located more than 100 km inland, said the official. People living in areas that were severely flooded by the two rivers that flow through Camaguey City will be taken to safer places (ACN, 7/11/08).

November 7: The 7th Congress of the Committees for the Defence of the Revolution (CDRs), which was schedule to take place on November 8-9 in Havana, has been postponed due to the threat that Hurricane Paloma poses for the Caribbean nation. According to a note published by Granma news daily, Raquel Rendon, an official at the National Executive Board of the CDRs, explained that they made the decision to avoid the transportation of delegates from other regions of the country to Havana (ACN, 7/11/08).

November 7: Cuba put aside the work of recovering from the two powerful hurricanes that have already struck this storm season to prepare for Hurricane Paloma spinning towards the eastern half of the island. While Paloma was less powerful than hurricanes Gustav and Ike, which raked Cuba two months ago, it posed a new threat to a region where homes, power lines, roads and other infrastructure were still being repaired and damage to agriculture has contributed to a national food shortage. The damage has come at a delicate time for Cuba as new President Raul Castro shepherds the communist country following the retirement of ageing, and ailing, revolutionary leader Fidel Castro earlier this year, and as world economic woes force Cubans to tighten their belts. Cuban officials said they had evacuated at least 85,000 boarding school students and would soon begin moving people from flood-prone areas ahead of the storm's landfall. State-run television showed workers covering stores of goods with plastic to protect them from the storm and young people hastily picking fruit from trees to salvage as much of the harvest as possible. In ranching areas, cattle were being moved to higher ground. To ease potential flooding, water was being released from reservoirs still full from Ike's torrential rains. Cubans in the projected storm path viewed Paloma's approach with resignation. "Bad luck, friend. Looks like this year they want to demolish us in every way," said Antonio Linares, a tourism worker in Holguin province. "There was already a lot of destruction (from the earlier storms). We don't get out of one hurricane before another one comes," said Genoveva Licea in Granma province. Paloma looked less forbidding, but still bad, said store worker Ofelia Hernandez in Camaguey province, where the storm was expected to make landfall. "It's a bad dream," she said. "Barely two months and once again in checkmate" (Reuters, 7/11/08).

November 9: Crashing waves and a powerful sea surge from Hurricane Paloma destroyed hundreds of homes in Cuba, the government said as the cyclone weakened into a tropical storm. On an island still reeling from the destruction of two recent hurricanes, early damage reports were limited. But state media said the late-season storm toppled a major communications tower, interrupted electricity and phone service and sent sea water almost a mile (1.5 kilometers) inland, ravaging Santa Cruz del Sur, a coastal community near where it made landfall. No storm-related deaths were immediately reported. Vicente de la O of Cuba's national power company told state television that damage to the power grid was far less than that caused by hurricanes Gustav and Ike in late August and early September. Waves more than 10 feet (3 meters) high leveled about 50 modest houses along the coast of Santa Cruz del Sur. Civil Defense authorities said 4,000 homes were damaged, and 435 homes in the community were destroyed. Javier Ramos rebuilt his simple wood-frame house in the town after Hurricane Ike, only to watch Paloma flatten it again. Touring Santa Cruz del Sur, Vice President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura said the area was among the hardest-hit nationwide. In the nearby community of Jagua, Herienso Rondon, a 50-year-old retired day laborer, said he was still trying to repair damage from Ike when Paloma tore away his wooden house's roof and pulverized the belongings inside, including a meager bed and mattress. "I don't have any hope," he said. "After Hurricane Ike (government officials) came to visit me and said they had no way to help and I had to buy the wood for repairs. "I have no money," said Rondon, who gets a monthly pension of 158 pesos, about $7.50 (AP, 9/11/08). 

November 9: Cuban First Vice President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura met at the University of Camaguey with citizens evacuated from the coastal area of La Playa in the town of Santa Cruz del Sur, where Paloma made landfall. An estimated 400 homes were totally destroyed in La Playa by the storm, which hit this area as a category 3 with maximum winds of 240 kms/h. Julio Cesar Garcia, president of the Camaguey’s Civil Defense Council, recalled that exactly 76 years earlier another hurricane hit Santa Cruz
leaving more than 3,000 dead. He asked for a minute of silence on their behalf. Machado Ventura spoke to the evacuees about the magnitude of the damage across the country from recent hurricanes Gustav and Ike. He also said an analysis should be made on whether the coastal neighbourhoods and towns should be rebuilt further inland, since the effects of climate change are expected to continue. Earlier in the day when he visited Santa Cruz del Sur, Machado Ventura said that solutions will be found for those who lost their homes to Hurricane Paloma. Amid the devastating panorama, Machado noted that not one human life was lost during the storm (ACN, 10/11/08).

November 10: Thousands of Cubans returned to homes demolished by Hurricane Paloma even as the once-powerful storm dissipated off the coast. The hurricane washed out fishing villages, ripped the roofs off factories and ravaged roads, but the government reported that no one was killed. "Everything is gone! Oh, my God!" gasped Xiomara Rivero, a 66-year-old retiree who burst into tears upon returning to her home. The single remaining wall was covered with seaweed. All around lay the ruined remains of her belongings, a table split in two, smashed chairs, a water-logged mattress. Juan Ramon Nunez lost everything but parts of the floor of his home. He pulled a hammer from the wreckage and held it up. "Look, this is what we saved," he said sarcastically. "I live here with my wife, my son and my mother," Nunez added. "My mother has had two heart attacks, so we will have to prepare her well before brining her here." Outside Santa Cruz del Sur, some homes were submerged up to their flimsy metal roofs. Banana crops and other farmland was washed out, though there were no official estimates on the loss to the island's dwindling food stocks (AP, 10/11/08).

November 10: Cuban deputies are analyzing the results of the debates by workers across the island about changes in the social security law proposed by the Cuban Labour and Social Security Ministry to face the aging of the population. According to Granma newspaper, social security experts are taking part in the debates that began on November 6 in several areas of the country, including Havana City and Isle of Youth. There are also leaders of the Cuban Workers Confederation and members of parliament participating.
During the months of September and October, meetings to discuss the changes proposed by the Cuban authorities were held in every single work place across the island. All the opinions and suggestions made at the debate sessions will be taken into consideration when drawing up the final bill to be submitted for approval at the National Assembly in December this year (ACN, 10/11/08).

November 10: Cuban President Raul Castro met with the people of El Guayabal community in the municipality of Amancio Rodriguez, Las Tunas province, and with evacuees from the municipality of Santa Cruz del Sur, in the province of Camagüey, where hurricane Paloma made landfall. Raul recalled that the most important aspect to bear in mind when facing this kind of natural phenomena is to preserve human lives.
Raul participated in a meeting of the Defence Council in Camagüey accompanied by First VP Jose Ramon Machado Ventura and by Army Corps Generals Ramon Espinosa Martin and Joaquin Quintas Solas. The Cuban president recalled that more than 1.2 million people were evacuated on this occasion, which avoided the loss of human lives in
contrast with what happened 76 years ago when a similar natural disaster swept Santa Cruz del Sur leaving nearly 3,000 people dead. After this meeting, Raul and the President of the Provincial Defence Council in Las Tunas, Jorge Cuevas Ramos, visited the community of El Guayabal, in the southern coastal area of Las Tunas, which was hardly hit by Paloma and where 110 houses were completely destroyed. Finally, Raul met at the University of Camagüey with citizens evacuated from the coastal area of La Playa in the town of Santa Cruz del Sur where an estimated 400 homes were totally destroyed (ACN, 11/11/08).

November 10: Non-violent opposition members Barbara Viera and José Ramón Borges were banished from the city of Fomento, in the Sancti Spiritus province, by two State Security agents. According to Viera, who is a member of the Party for Human Rights, stated that as he was headed to his brother's house on the town's main street and accompanied by his wife, the agents intercepted them and demanded that they leave town immediately. Before taking the bus back to the city of Sancti Spiritus, Viera told the agents he had to pick up his children, aged 5 and 7, who were at a relative’s house. “They told me I was playing with fire and that I could lose custody of my children if I continued my opposition activities.” Barbara added that the expulsion from Fomento was due to a fast they had carried out in Sancti Spíritus in support of hunger-strikers Orlando Zapata Tamayo, Yordi García Fornier, Julian Antonio Monet Borrero and Abel Lopez Perez (Cubanet, 10/11/08).

November 11: Cuba's communication minister Ramiro Valdes, and the head of the national civil defence council Ramon Pardo Guerra, led a meeting to discuss solutions to the damage caused by Hurricane Paloma in Camaguey, in particular in the communication sector. Paloma's strong winds broke the communication tower of the coastal town of Santa Cruz del Sur, where the storm made landfall, into two pieces.  The tower had been designed to resist gusts of up to 240 km/h according to local experts. In the meeting Juan Gustavo Cairo, director of Radio Cuba, said the town and the provincial radio stations can be now be heard on FM. In the meantime, resources are being mobilized to gradually restore television transmissions. Cairo said that the Cuban communication companies ETECSA and Movitel have been working on the design of more wind resistant towers. Maimir Mesa Ramos, ETECSA's executive president, talked about work to re-establish telephone communications in Santa Cruz del Sur. Likewise, he announced that the installation of fibre optic cable for this municipality scheduled to begin in 2009 has been brought forward to this year (ACN, 12/11/08).

November 12: A book titled Peace in Colombia by Fidel Castro will be presented at the Havana Convention Centre. The book reveals the content of important unpublished documents, interviews and Fidel’s personal experiences in the process, and bears proof of the sustained and noble efforts of Cuba to contribute to reaching peace in the sister nation, reported Granma newspaper. The presentation of Peace in Colombia will be broadcast live on Cuban national television channels and national radio station Radio Rebelde (ACN, 12/11/08).

November 12: Books will once again take over Cuban parks and squares when a festival will be held to put literature lovers in contact with the creative horizon of the most famous authors from Cuba and abroad. Under the name ‘Continuidad de los parques’ (Continuity at Parks), named after one of the best-known stories by Argentinean writer Julio Cortazar, the Cuban Book Institute and the Federation of University Students (FEU) have organized a wide-ranging program of activities. The fair will begin simultaneously in 14 parks in all of Cuba’s provincial capitals, including the Roberto Amaran Park (Pinar del Río); Vidal (Villa Clara); Carlos Manuel de Cespedes (Bayamo); José Marti (Guantanamo); Vicente García (Las Tunas); Ateneo Dionisio San Roman (Cienfuegos); and Maceo (Camagüey) (ACN, 12/11/08).

November 12: Cuban President Raul Castro has named United Nations Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca to be Cuba's minister of foreign investment, state-run television said. Malmierca, a 52-year-old economist, will replace the current minister, Marta Lomas, according to the report, which did not say if Lomas would move to a new government post or why the change was made. Cuba's foreign investment minister oversees the joint venture projects the government conducts with foreign companies, as well as the operations of nongovernmental organizations working in the Communist-run island. The change comes at a time when Cuba is facing economic challenges due to the global financial crisis and three hurricanes that inflicted nearly $10 billion in damages on the small Caribbean nation. Malmierca was previously a vice minister in the same department. The report did not say who will replace him as United Nations ambassador (Reuters, 12/11/08).

November 13: Last October 31, prisoner of conscience Conrado Rodriguez Suarez was released after serving out a 3-year prison sentence in Taco-Taco, a correctional facility in Pinar del Rio. Rodriguez, a human rights activist, was convicted of pre-criminal behavior posing a danger to society. Rodriguez Suarez, 57, is the president of the opposition organization Maximo Gomez National Civic Movement (Cubanet, 31/11/08).  

November 13: Fidel Castro looks thin and frail but alert in a photograph from October posted on the Web site of the Russian Orthodox Church. The ailing 82-year-old former president is seen standing and peering at the camera with a hint of surprise on his face. His gray hair is combed back and his wispy gray beard is neatly trimmed. As if for support, he is holding onto the arm of Metropolitan Kirill, the church's top foreign relations official. The church said the picture was taken on October 20, when Kirill was in Havana for the consecration of a new Orthodox cathedral. Cuban state media covered that meeting but did not release any images. It was the first image of Castro published since June 17, when government-controlled broadcasts showed him chatting in a garden during a visit by his close friend, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez (AP, 13/11/08).

November 14: The 2nd International Seminar on Nanosciences and Nanotechnologies opened in Havana, with 35 prominent experts from Germany, France, China, Japan, Britain, Spain and Russia attending. The meeting brought together experts of different professions and nationalities with young trainees to talk about the speedy development of nanoscience, and its use, according to organizers. At the opening session in the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, in Havana, scientific aide to the State Council of Cuba, Fidel Castro Diaz-Balart, gave the lecture, "The Great Challenge of the Tiny: Cuban Nanotechnology Strategy," an outlook about the current situation and future of the important project. Acting Minister of Science, Technology and Environment, Fernando Gonzalez, referred to the vertiginous boom of nanosciences and their applications in the 21st century (ACN, 15/11/08).

November 15: Cuban and foreign runners are taking part in the 9th annual marathon race, named Maracuba, in all the municipalities across the country. Carlos Gattorno, director general of the Marabana annual marathon held in Havana and scheduled for November 15, told the press that it is very likely that the number of participants in Marabana will increase after this race since Maracuba serves as a warm-up for the long-distance runners. He said this year’s national marathon race is a challenge for the organizers of the event, due to the damage caused by hurricanes Gustav, Ike and Paloma, which in one way or another have affected the whole country (ACN, 15/11/08).

November 15: The president of the National Assembly, Ricardo Alarcon, stressed the importance that Cuban workers understand the need for the new Social Security Law and support it. Speaking in a meeting with deputies of the provinces of Villa Clara, Sancti Spíritus and Cienfuegos to discuss the social security draft bill, Alarcon pointed out that the law had to be put into effect as a result of development -which entails a decrease in the number of births; and after a rigorous analysis made by workers across the country. Also attending the meeting, Work and Social Security Minister Alfredo Morales said that, when the new law is put into practice, mechanisms to increase efficiency, discipline and organization at work will have to be implemented as well (ACN, 15/11/08).

November 16: The Democratic Solidarity Party led by Fernando Sanchez Lopez, issued a declaration denouncing the arrest of six of its top members. According to the communiqué, such violations hinder the political dialogue process between the European Union and Cuba. Following the agreements reached last June 18, 2008 between Cuba and a European Union Council presided over by France, with respect to democracy, human rights and fundamental freedoms, the government of Raul Castro stepped up repressive measures throughout the country in the week of November 10-6, the DSP stated. It added that some fifty pro-democracy activists from different organizations considered illegal by the island’s regime were threatened and arrested by the political police (Cubanet, 24/11/08).  

November 17: The Roman Catholic Church will celebrate its first beatification on Cuban soil later this month. The Archdiocese of Havana's magazine says the November 29 ceremony declaring Friar Jose Olallo Valdes blessed will be in Camaguey, where he died at age 69. The Cuban church started the process to beatify Olallo in 1989, the 100th anniversary of his death. Beatification declares a departed person's ability to intercede on the part of the faithful who pray to him. It can be a step to sainthood. After Olallo's death, a Cuban couple prayed to him, and their 3-year-old daughter was cured of a tumor. The church last year held a beatification ceremony in Spain for Cuban Jose Lopez Piteira, who was shot in 1936 during that country's civil war (AP, 17/11/08).

November 17: Mirta Díaz-Balart, the first wife of Fidel Castro, is in Havana to visit family. Díaz-Balart, 80, joined her son Fidel Castro Díaz-Balart, 59, at the inauguration of the second International Seminar of Nano-science and Nano-technology that drew 35 leading scientists from Germany, France, China, Japan, Great Britain, Spain and Russia. The event is being held at the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, in the Havana neighbourhood of Siboney, where mother and son allowed themselves to be photographed by members of the press. The photos are the first of Mirta and Castro Díaz-Balart together in Cuba that have been published in decades. ''She looked radiant, very content to be together with Fidelito,'' noted one attendant of the ceremony in Havana. "She is a woman that has conserved herself extremely well despite her years.'' Castro Díaz-Balart, who is an engineering professor and scientific advisor to the Cuban Council of State, gave a talk entitled, ''The Great Challenge of the Small: The Cuban Strategy for Nano-technology'' and outlined the island-nation's projects in this field. After the presentation, Castro Díaz-Balart posed for pictures with his mother in the conference room where Fernando González, Cuban minister of science, technology and the environment, was also present. Though Mirta has traveled to the island on previous occasions, this was the first time she has attended a public function, having avoided the press for years, reluctant to speak publicly about her family. Mirta has lived in Madrid since 1968 and is the aunt of US Representatives Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart, both Republicans of Florida (The Miami Herald, 17/11/08).

November 17: Yoani Sanchez’s “Generation Y,” won the best blog award in Bitacoras.com 2008, a competition sponsored by “the largest Spanish-speaking social network for bloggers,” which boasts 250,000 users. The awards were announced during Blog España 2008, a bloggers’ event held in the city of Seville. In one of her blog entries Sanchez dedicated the prize to "those who cannot have access to the site in Cuba. To them, so that they can undertake their own marathons, I dedicate this prize" (Cubaencuentro, 17/11/08).

November 17: Dissidents Arturo Arias, Pedro Antonio Alonso and Pedro Carballosa, were arrested in Bayamo for visiting an opposition leader. The three dissidents, all members of the Rural Workers Party, spoke with RWP President Alberto Moreno in the head office of the organization. On their way back home in the municipality of Songo, Santiago de Cuba, they were intercepted at the bus terminal by members of the State Security forces. The officers confiscated books, pencils, pens, rubber bracelets bearing the word Change, key chains and themed stickers of the project “I do not cooperate with the dictatorship” (Cubanet, 21/11/08).

November 18: Cooperativism in Cuba, international experiences in the field, and women’s role in the management of this type of productive units are the main topics of the 3rd International Seminar on Cooperatives that began in Havana. Professionals and researchers, as well as Cuban and foreign farmers, participate in this meeting that opened at the Florencio Gelabert hall of the Habana Riviera hotel. Participants will also analyze the impact of neoliberal policies on cooperativism and they will visit production facilities to promote solidarity and cooperation among organizations of the sector. The program of the seminar, which runs through November 20, includes lectures by specialists from Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico, Italy and Cuba. The seminar is taking place under the auspices of the University of Havana, the Cuban ministries of Sugar and Agriculture and the national associations of Economists and Small Farmers, among others (ACN, 18/11/08).

November 18: A 21-year-old teacher in Cuba, accused of striking and killing a 12-year-old pupil in class with a chair leg, was convicted in a closed door trial in a Havana courtroom and now faces up to seven years in prison, said sources linked to the case. The trial of school teacher Joaquín Torres began on November 11 in the Provincial Tribunal of Havana under tight security. Only a limited number of family members were allowed into the courtroom. Torres is accused of throwing the chair leg at Daniel Castañeda Alayo. The chair leg lodged in the boy's skull. The incident happened in February in a classroom of the Domingo Sarmientos school in the Havana neighborhood of Lawton. The strong police presence prevented many family members of the young boy from entering the courtroom, according to a source close to the victim's family that asked to remain anonymous. The school principal and five students were called to testify. According to the friend of the victim's family, prosecutors said they are seeking a sentence of seven years in prison for the accused and have ordered the boy's parents not to speak about the trial. Torres became a teacher through the Emerging Teachers program established by the Cuban Government in 2000 to cover a deficit of teachers by training young people in an eight-month program. He first arrived in Havana in August 2007 and began teaching classes as an ''emerging teacher'' a month later. The incident called into question the maturity and preparedness of the program graduates who are entrusted with children after very little training. Two months after the tragedy, Cuban leader Raúl Castro replaced Education Minister Luis Gómez with school teacher Ana Elsa Velázquez Cobiella, who holds a doctorate in education (The Miami Herald, 18/11/08).

November 18: Outside the People’s Power building in the Regla municipality, several residents protested the shortages in the neighbourhood water supply. After 4 days without water or any word from the authorities, a large group of people showed up at the People’s Power building holding dirty pots and washable baby diapers and demanding an explanation. The protesters were appeased by the police and the top municipality authority, who explained that there had been a breakdown in the city waterworks, which would be resolved shortly (Cubanet, 24/11/08).

November 19: Heavy rains registered over the last few days in eastern Holguin province have made rivers burst their banks and caused flooding, which has made it necessary to evacuate more than 18,000 residents in the area as a preventive measure. The situation seems more complicated toward the regions of Sagua de Tanamo and Frank País, in the province’s mountainous area where water torrents abound, among them those of the mighty Sagua River. It’s precisely from these places where some 15,000 people have been evacuated to neighbours’ houses and to shelters. In the municipality of Mayari, there are 3,000 people protected in family houses and in 260 shelters fitted out by the territory’s Defence Council. A complex situation, caused the overflowing of Grande River, near the city of Sagua de Tanamo, is presently obstructing traffic by road between the east and west of the province (ACN, 19/11/08).

November 19: Cuban National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, was bestowed the honorary title of Emeritus Professor of the University of Havana in a ceremony. Ruben Zardoya, rector of the university, read the resolution that endorses the title in recognition of the academic and political merits of the Cuban parliament president, who is a tenured professor and holds a PhD from the University of Havana. The President of the Casa de las Americas cultural institution, Roberto Fernandez Retamar, talked about Alarcon's revolutionary career that began when he was a student. He said Alarcon has been an example for the ideological and political thought of the younger generations. Alarcon said he was honoured to receive the title which he dedicated to his late wife Margarita, to late university professor Vicentina Antuña, and to all the heroes that are part of Cuban history (ACN, 19/11/08).

November 19: Daniel Castellanos, a 9th grade student, was beaten by his teacher at the junior high school “Antonio Aucar Jiménez,” in the city of Santa Clara. One of his neighbours said that, according to the doctor that saw Daniel at the children’s hospital where he was taken after the assault, the young boy had a swollen cheekbone and several bruises on his head. Yaniel Basail Vera, one of hundreds of young adults trained as teachers to cope with a increasing shortage of educators in the island, beat Castellanos because he did not want to eat his so-called “healthy school snack”. Daniel's relatives were informed by the local authorities that, in accordance with the Code of Judicial Procedure, no investigation would be conducted because the medical certificate stated that the boy’s injuries had not required medical treatment (Cubanet, 19/11/08).

November 20: A women's group presented thousands of signatures petitioning Cuba's parliament to close the gap in the communist country's dual economy, which pays state workers in Cuban pesos but offers basics like toilet paper in another currency that few can afford. Four women wearing white "With the Same Money" T-shirts gathered outside the legislature and attempted to turn in proof of 10,000 new signatures, which they said complemented 10,837 signatures they gave lawmakers a year ago. Their leader, Belinda Sales, said legislative clerks refused to receive the new signatures, saying lawmakers were still studying last year's petition. She said more than a thousand members of her Latin American Foundation of Rural Women collected signatures across Cuba over the past two years, and found wide support even though authorities repeatedly seized petitions. "Because it does not include anything political, people aren't afraid to sign," she said. "Everyone who lives in Cuba wants to be paid in one currency and have that same currency meet all their needs." The group has not provided hard copies of the collected signatures, but Salas said legislative authorities are free to check their authenticity. She said her organization receives no funding from dissident organizations in the United States, surviving solely on donations from supporters inside Cuba (The Miami Herald, 21/11/08).

November 20: The prefect emeritus of the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints, Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, will preside at the Mass of Beatification of Brother Jose Olallo Valdez on November 29 in Camaguey, in the first such ceremony ever to take place on Cuban soil. In an interview with the magazine Palabra Nueva of the Archdiocese of Havana, Father Felix Lizaso Barruete, the general postulator of the Hospitable Order of St. John of God, pointed out that while Father Olallo will not be the first Cuban blessed, “He deserves to be recognized because Cuba needs him.  Cuba deserves to have a saint.” “I think he will be canonized soon because the people have a lot of devotion to him and that devotion will only grow. Olallo is today God’s blessing for Cuba,” he added.  The Mass will be celebrated by Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins and concelebrated by all the Cuban bishops, including Archbishop Juan de la Caridad Garcia Rodriguez of Camaguey, president of the Bishops’ Conference of Cuba (CNA, 20/11/08).

November 20: The first Thematic Festival of Poor Cinema, dedicated to pay tribute to Cuban filmmaker Humberto Solás, who died on September 17, began in Cienfuegos, as part of actions carried out by Cuba to promote films made with few resources. Present during the inaugural ceremony were important figures of Cuban films, like Verónica Lynn and Enrique Pineda Barnet, who will be in charge of the world premiere of the documentary “El Charentón del buen día”. The Festival, which will run until November 23, will also be attended by prestigious actors and actresses, like Isabel Santos, Violeta Cooper, Luisa Maria Jimenez, Eslinda Nuñez and Adela Legra, among others (ACN, 20/11/08).

November 21: Ace pitcher Yadel Marti and star outfielder Yasser Gomez have been thrown off Cuba's top league team for "a grave act of indiscipline," likely ending their hopes of playing in the 2009 World Baseball Classic. The one-sentence announcement in the Communist Party newspaper Granma offered no details on why Marti, picked to the all-tournament team at the 2006 WBC, and Gomez, a former Olympian, were released from Havana's Industriales. Two people close to the team said the action came after the pair was caught trying to defect to the United States. The two people spoke on condition of anonymity and did not elaborate, fearing it could lead to problems with the Industriales. Marti talked publicly about how Cuba would seek revenge during the 2009 WBC and he was expected to again be one of the national team's stars in the tournament this spring. But the announcement virtually guarantees neither he nor Gomez will play baseball for Cuba again in any capacity (AP, 22/11/08).

November 23: The sustained increase of the live-birth indicator reported in Cuba from January through October of 2008, compared to last year, is good news and it could turn the demographic course of the country. Preliminary information published by the National Statistics Office (ONE) reveals that the number of live births surpassed the figure reported in 2007 by 7, 996 children, standing for 8,8 percent on the birth rate; such an indicator is only comparable to the rate reported in 2005. All Cuban provinces saw their birth rates increase; though the phenomenon is more significant in the eastern territories of Guantanamo, Ciego de Avila, Granma and Holguin, while lower indicators were reported in western Havana City, Pinar del Rio and Cienfuegos. The statistics were compiled from figures collected in health centers and other data contributed by the Statistics Department of the Public Health Ministry, plus estimates made by ONE of births that took place out of health institutions. The ONE report says that such a growing trend could continue this year up to June 2009. Any prediction will be difficult to make later, since the birth rate will be affected by the impact by recent weather phenomena on many Cuban families (ACN, 23/11/08).

November 23: A large angry group of students roamed the hallways of the High School Institute for Exact Sciences Studies “Jose Maceo,” in Guantanamo city, protesting against the boarding school’s decision to quarantine the facilities due to a conjunctivitis outbreak. A group of students bearing placards voiced their disagreement with the school authorities' decision to cancel their weekend furloughs. The institute has been under quarantine for nearly a month due to an outbreak of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis and no students are allowed entry or exit. The poor hygienic and sanitary conditions, meager food and disruption of the furlough schedule has put the students on edge. Several school officials have been fined by the Hygiene and Epidemiology Department, but the students are expected to remain quarantined for the duration of the outbreak (Cubaencuentro,27/11/08).

November 25: Individual initiative is foundering in the shoals of collectivism, a critical article in the Cuban newspaper Trabajadores said. The government's plan to spur production by paying more to workers who produce more is running into "multiple reefs," the paper says, using a bakery in Villa Clara province as an example.  Workers there are complaining that although their bakery has been highly productive and has surpassed its own sales targets for the past nine months, the government has paid them stimulus wages only on four occasions. Why? Because there are 11 other bakeries in the area and the government rewards the 12 as a group, not each individual bakery or individual baker. So, if a few bakeries slack off, no workers are rewarded, no matter how hard they have worked. Is that fair?, the workers ask. Labor Ministry Resolution 9, which established the merit-pay system, set August 31 as the deadline for its application nationwide. That deadline was "notoriously unobserved," Trabajadores says. In fact, as of that date, the Labor Ministry "had no reliable information" as to how many companies were linking wages to production. "Faced with this bitter reality, [the ministry] had to extend the deadline for the redesign of the pay-for-results systems," Labor Minister Alfredo Morales Cartaya wrote in a letter to national labor leaders. The redesign is expected to continue until December 31 (The Miami Herald, 25/11/08).

November 25: The lengthy “apagones”, or blackouts, so familiar to Cubans just three years ago are rapidly becoming part of the island folklore. Generous deals with China and Venezuela averted the collapse of an obsolete and inefficient electrical generation and transmission system made up mostly of aging Soviet-bloc equipment. Moving in to a new apartment in Vedado neighbourhood though, brought a new reality: parts of the Vedado have been losing power sporadically much of the past month. The lights go out for 15- to 30-minute intervals, usually during the day. At times it will be down two to three hours. "I was stuck on an elevator for more than an hour," said Juana Espinal, 49. She was delivering eggs to a fifth-floor apartment near the Foreign Ministry when the lights went out Friday. "No one noticed I was on the elevator. I sat on the floor and waited calmly. These things happen. This is Cuba." Like many things on the island, there is no clear explanation for the blackouts. Some attributed the problem to local construction. A power company representative said the "sporadic outages could be caused by ongoing efforts to upgrade the power grid." Economic czar Carlos Lage said hundreds of new fuel oil generators will provide the island with some 1,700 megawatts of power by late 2010 (Sun Sentinel, 25/11/08).

November 26: Cuba leads Latin America and the Caribbean in Education for All (EFA) according to a report released by the United Nations Education, Science and Culture Organization (UNESCO). The document notes that Cuba and Aruba are the only countries of the region that have achieved the objectives of the EFA program approved during the World Education Forum held in Dakar in 2000. Cuba’s achievements in this field - which includes primary education, adults’ literacy, quality of education and gender equality, among other aspects - were recognized by UNESCO in 2007. The UNESCO report, entitled “Overcoming Inequality: Why Governance Matters”, makes an urgent call for a revision of policies in the sector to reduce the inequalities that exist in the region and in the world, in general (ACN, 26/11/08).

November 26: Cuba's governing body has named General Ulises Rosales del Toro to the long-vacant post of agriculture minister as it struggles with shortages following three hurricanes. Rosales moves from the post of sugar minister. He also is a member of the Communist Party's select Politburo. The announcement in the party newspaper Granma says Rosales was picked for his "wide management experience and political authority" and the need to improve agricultural production. Agriculture Vice Minister Maria del Carmen Perez Hernandez had been overseeing the ministry. The sugar minister's job now goes to Rosales' deputy there, agronomist Luis Manuel Avila Gonzalez (AP, 26/11/08).

November 26: From the Guantanamo prison known as ‘Combinado’, political prisoner Isael Poveda Silva declared that "a paramilitary group made up of highly dangerous inmates led by Alexander Lopez," has beaten the rest of the prisoners on several occasions. Poveda Silva said that the gang resorts to intimidation to rob other prisoners of their belongings with the tacit approval of prison authorities and claims to be harassed and threatened every day by Lopez, who is serving a 30-year sentence (Cubaencuentro, 26/11/08).

November 26: With the beatification of Brother Jose Olallo Vales just days away, the bishops of Cuba issued a message on November 1st, calling on Cubans to learn the lesson of charity and love of God from the future blessed. “We hope that the example of holiness of Father Olallo awakens in all Cubans the desire to turn towards God and remain in Him, and strengthens in each one the decision to go with Mary to encounter Jesus Christ, since He is the face of true love experienced by Father Olallo,” the bishops said. Most Cubans refer to Olallo as a priest even though he was a consecrated religious brother. According to the Fides news agency, the bishops underscored in their message how the virtue of charity “was lived out by him with a courageous and creative, generous spirit towards those who found themselves in desperate situations, never worrying about his life, his health, the wear on his body, or fatigue.” They recalled that Brother Olallo turned the hospital in which he worked into “a great family, in spite of the many differences among the patients,” and that he “prayed in the morning, afternoon, and evening, walking down the “Calle de los Pobres”’ a street that is now named after him, helping the poor materially and spiritually. He helped the imprisoned, gave food to the hungry, and evangelized through his famous evening talks in which he educated many in the faith, saving marriages and reconciling enemies. In this manner, he became a father and mother to a countless number of people” (Mensaje de los Obispos por la beatificación; CNA, 26/11/08)

November 27: The Cuban Democratic Directorate informed that political prisoner Abel Lopez Perez, who has sewn his mouth shut several times in protest, was allowed to continue to serve his sentence under house arrest after a 39-day hunger strike. Lopez Perez, a member of the Movement of Cuban Youths for Democracy and of the Council of Rapporteurs on Human Rights, was imprisoned last April in the Combinado correctional facility, in Guantanamo, for his activism with the Council of Rapporteurs on Human Rights. Due to his critical health, he had been allowed to serve time under house arrest for a limited period but was denied an extension. Lopez Perez went on a hunger strike to protest against the 3- year sentence imposed on him for challenging the authority of Fidel Castro (Cubaencuentro, 27/11/08).

November 27: Blogger again wins award she can't collect. Yoani Sanchez's "Generation Y" blog won the BOBs Award (for Best Of the Blogs) presented in Berlin by the German broadcast-media company Deutsche Welle. In April of this year, Sánchez's blog, which explores the lives of ordinary Cubans and is often critical of the Cuban government, won the Ortega y Gasset Award presented by the Spanish newspaper El Pais. In neither case could Sanchez travel abroad to accept her award; the government would not issue her an exit permit. “Yoani Sánchez gives voice to an entire generation of Cubans and provides the world with a window into Cuba through her clear and poetic writing”, the BOBs international jury of bloggers and media experts said. "Sanchez called the award a 'personal joy' and added that she hoped it would encourage more Cubans to begin writing and publishing their own independent blogs”. Deutsche Welle pointed out that "Sánchez is able to publish her blog [...] only by e-mailing her entries to friends outside Cuba, who put her words online" (The Miami Herald, 28/11/08).

November 27: Cuba reported that 0,1 percent of its population is infected with the AIDS virus, a figure that is considered by experts as the lowest in the Caribbean, though there is a trend towards an increase, according to local reports. “In the island the AIDS-related mortality rate and the mother-child transmission of the disease is very low,” said Rosaida Ochoa, director of the National AIDS Prevention Center in statements to a Cuban radio station. However, Ochoa explained that the epidemic is steadily spreading particularly among men. “Up to date, 80 percent of the Cuban cero positives are men, and of them 85 percent have sex with other men,” said the expert, as quoted by DPA. Currently, there are 8,607 people living with HIV-AIDS in the island, and more that 3,000 are receiving antiretroviral therapy, according to the National AIDS Prevention Centre’s director Manuel Hernandez. So far in 2008, 1,050 new cases have been reported, while more that 1.7 million diagnosis tests were carried out, Hernandez said (Radio Cadena Agramonte, 28/11/08).

November 28: After several visits to police stations and offices of the Ministry of the Interior, the authorities informed the members of Agenda para la Transición (APT) that they were not authorized to carry out any activities to celebrate Human Rights’ Day on December 10. Vladimiro Roca Antúnez, Guillermo Fariñas Hernández and Marcelo López Bañobre, members of the coordinating board of APT, tried to submit a permit request at a police station in Havana, but the authorities refused to accept it. Then, they tried the Revolution Square offices of the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) and they were told that the office was under orders not to accept any written request. APT described the government’s actions as “discriminatory” because "it multiplies its members by zero, turning them into ‘non-entities’ under the Constitution of the Republic." The request signed by Vladimiro Roca and Martha Beatriz Roque, asked for authorization to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights at a Nuevo Vedado residence, “with approximately a hundred people in attendance,” including members of the diplomatic corps and foreign press (Cubaencuentro, 28/11/08).