Source: Postcards from the Revolution.
by Eva Golinger, 24 July 2010
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez denounced this Saturday US plans to attack his country and overthrow his government. During a ceremony celebrating the 227th birthday of Independence hero Simon Bolivar, Chavez read from a secret memo he had been sent from an unnamed source inside the United States.
“Old friend, I haven’t seen you in years. As I said to you in my three prior letters, the idea remains the generation of a conflict on your western border”, read Chavez from the secret missive.
“The latest events confirm all, or almost all, of what those here discussed as well as other information that I have obtained from above”, the letter continued.
“The preparation phase in the international community, with the help of Colombia, is in plain execution”, manifested the text, referring to last Thursday’s session in the Organization of American States (OAS), during which the Colombia government accused Venezuela of harboring “terrorists” and “terrorist training camps” and gave the Chavez government a “30-day ultimatum” to allow for international intervention.
The letter continued with more details, “I told you before that the events wouldn’t begin before the 26th, but for some reason they have moved forward several actions that were supposed to be executed afterward”.
“In the United States, the execution phase is accelerating, together with a contention force, as they call it, towards Costa Rica with the pretext of fighting drug trafficking”.
On July 1, the Costan Rican government authorized 46 US war ships and 7,000 marines into their maritime and land territory. The true objective of this military mobilization, said the letter, is to “support military operations” against Venezuela
Read more...
Saturday, 24 July 2010
Friday, 23 July 2010
North West Premier of RATB Documentary 25 July 2010
Rock Around the Blockade (RATB) invites you to join us in our 26 July Movement celebrations on 24 and 25 July 2010 in Manchester! This revolutionary movement (Movimiento 26 de Julio/M-26-7) was led by Fidel Castro which overthrew the US-backed regime of Fulgencio Batista in Cuba (1959). Its name commemorates an attack on the Santiago de Cuba army barracks (Moncada Barracks) on 26 July 1953, marking it as the start of the Cuban Revolution.
The premier of our own documentary made during our 2009 RATB solidarity bridgade to Cuba, includes interviews with Cubans from all walks of life and shows inspirational footage of Cubans celebrating 50 years of the Revolution on Mayday 2009.
Filmshowing and speaker will be followed by questions and discussion. As always, all groups and individuals welcome. This is a free event but donations towards the cost of the room are always highly appreciated.
And this is what we have in store for you:
- Saturday 24 July
Piccadilly Gardens from 12pm, celebrating the M-26-7 anniversary with inspiring speeches, revolutionary music, Cuban dance and more! Please come along and celebrate with us out on the streets!!
- Sunday 25 July
Latin American Dayschool at the Cross Street Chapel, Cross Street, Manchester from 1.30pm. We will be showing for the first time in the North West, the new documentary film produced by RATB, Cuba: Defending Socialism, Resisting Imperialism (see trailer below), and have as a speaker Sam McGill, RATB activist and a Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! (FRFI) reporter, who has recently returned from Cuba and Venezuela. She will give an eyewitness report about Cuban-Venezuelan collaborations and the current atmosphere in Venezuela regarding the upcoming elections in September 2010.
The premier of our own documentary made during our 2009 RATB solidarity bridgade to Cuba, includes interviews with Cubans from all walks of life and shows inspirational footage of Cubans celebrating 50 years of the Revolution on Mayday 2009.
Filmshowing and speaker will be followed by questions and discussion. As always, all groups and individuals welcome. This is a free event but donations towards the cost of the room are always highly appreciated.
Cuban Spy Heroes Kendall and Gwendolyn Myers gaoled in the US
Source: The Seattle Times, 16 July 2010.
A confessed spy for Cuba was sentenced to life in prison and his wife to 81 months Friday after telling a judge that their "overriding objective" for 30 years of passing secrets to Cuba "was to help the Cuban people defend their revolution."
Former State Department employee Walter Kendall Myers, 73, and Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 72, agreed to forfeit $1.7 million in cash and property, including all of Walter Myers' federal salary over the years. He did not have to give up 38-foot sailboat he once said they might use in retirement to sail to the communist country.
"If you believed in the revolution, you should have defected," said a stern U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton.
Read more...
A confessed spy for Cuba was sentenced to life in prison and his wife to 81 months Friday after telling a judge that their "overriding objective" for 30 years of passing secrets to Cuba "was to help the Cuban people defend their revolution."
Former State Department employee Walter Kendall Myers, 73, and Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 72, agreed to forfeit $1.7 million in cash and property, including all of Walter Myers' federal salary over the years. He did not have to give up 38-foot sailboat he once said they might use in retirement to sail to the communist country.
"If you believed in the revolution, you should have defected," said a stern U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton.
Read more...
Tuesday, 20 July 2010
Cuban doctors saving life of ‘dissident’ hunger striker Guillermo Fariñas.
FIGHT FOR LIFE IS OUR DUTY
Source: Granma Newspaper, 3 July 2010
Translation: Maria, RATB.
Interview with Dr Armando Caballero, head of intensive therapy at the Arnaldo Milan Castro Hospital, in Santa Clara, Cuba.
Science, humanism, professionalism and the most advanced and expensive treatments are being used to save patient Guillermo Fariñas’ life. Science, because of the use of the latest and most modern treatments in this patient’s treatment; humanism and professionalism, because he is receiving the most prestigious services from specialists who think that the fight for life is the best and most they can do; and the most advanced and expensive treatments because the Cuban state has not restricted efforts to get the latest generation of medicines to this person, medicines that are being used in the most prestigious hospitals, many of which have to be acquired from abroad.
Fariñas was taken to the intensive care unit (ICU) at University Hospital Arnaldo Milan Castro on 11 March 2010 in the city of Santa Clara. He had started a voluntary abstention from food which today has put his life in serious danger.
As we were interested in his health, we went to the hospital, located in the Cuban central province and we spoke to the doctor Caballero, boss of ICU in that hospital.
The first question we asked the doctor, the founder of this special unit, was to explain from his experience, how it is possible that this person is alive after four months of abstinence.
‘That is what everybody is wondering’ he said, ‘a person who doesn’t eat cannot survive for so long, but this is not Fariñas’ case.’
The doctor explained that this person refuses to eat through his mouth, and he has been in this situation for 125 days, and he was at home in this situation for two weeks in which he says he did not eat at all before he was admitted into hospital, where he has now been for 110 days. ‘We admitted him with a certain physical deterioration, a reason for which he had to stay in hospital. Being conscious, he accepted nutrients and food which is delivered parenterally.’
‘The patient is receiving amino acids, [building blocks] for the proteins that the body needs, we also give him lipids, vitamins and minerals. Everyone on a balanced diet requires these to survive. Fariñas arrived at the hospital weighing 63 kg and now he is between 67 to 69 kg. There has been an increase in his weight and it is because of the parenteral feeding he is receiving.’
Source: Granma Newspaper, 3 July 2010
Translation: Maria, RATB.
Interview with Dr Armando Caballero, head of intensive therapy at the Arnaldo Milan Castro Hospital, in Santa Clara, Cuba.
Science, humanism, professionalism and the most advanced and expensive treatments are being used to save patient Guillermo Fariñas’ life. Science, because of the use of the latest and most modern treatments in this patient’s treatment; humanism and professionalism, because he is receiving the most prestigious services from specialists who think that the fight for life is the best and most they can do; and the most advanced and expensive treatments because the Cuban state has not restricted efforts to get the latest generation of medicines to this person, medicines that are being used in the most prestigious hospitals, many of which have to be acquired from abroad.
Fariñas was taken to the intensive care unit (ICU) at University Hospital Arnaldo Milan Castro on 11 March 2010 in the city of Santa Clara. He had started a voluntary abstention from food which today has put his life in serious danger.
As we were interested in his health, we went to the hospital, located in the Cuban central province and we spoke to the doctor Caballero, boss of ICU in that hospital.
The first question we asked the doctor, the founder of this special unit, was to explain from his experience, how it is possible that this person is alive after four months of abstinence.
‘That is what everybody is wondering’ he said, ‘a person who doesn’t eat cannot survive for so long, but this is not Fariñas’ case.’
The doctor explained that this person refuses to eat through his mouth, and he has been in this situation for 125 days, and he was at home in this situation for two weeks in which he says he did not eat at all before he was admitted into hospital, where he has now been for 110 days. ‘We admitted him with a certain physical deterioration, a reason for which he had to stay in hospital. Being conscious, he accepted nutrients and food which is delivered parenterally.’
‘The patient is receiving amino acids, [building blocks] for the proteins that the body needs, we also give him lipids, vitamins and minerals. Everyone on a balanced diet requires these to survive. Fariñas arrived at the hospital weighing 63 kg and now he is between 67 to 69 kg. There has been an increase in his weight and it is because of the parenteral feeding he is receiving.’
‘Dissident’ hunger striker Guillermo Fariñas at his home in Santa Clara. He is demanding the release of US-backed counter-revolutionaries gaoled in Cuba. Cuba has refused to be 'blackmailed'.
How bad is the patient’s health at this moment?
‘Feeding through the veins requires that some nutrients that have a high osmolarity (molecular weight) go through the major veins in the body. This means you have to use catheters in the most important veins in the upper body, such as the subclavian and interior jugular veins, which has its dangers and complications, mainly when food substances such as amino acids and hypertonic dextrose [solutions] go through these catheters.
‘In these cases, the risk of blood infection is very high. Patients who are being fed through the veins for a long time are prone to contamination of the catheters with bacteria and fungi, and they can also have other complications like the one this patient is suffering now.’
Do those complications have to do with treatment or with the attention he is receiving?
‘No these complications are common in patients that are fed in this way.
‘For example, in the last 110 days that Fariñas has been with us, we have had to change the catheter ten times. When he was last on hunger strike in 2006 for 251 days, we had to change the catheter 37 times. In the 37 years, I have been working in the ICU, I’ve never had a patient that this procedure has been applied to so many times.
‘In this patient we have cured infections that were detected on time, and we used the adequate antibiotics when we found Staphylococcus aureus in his blood. The bacteria in the blood were isolated immediately and cured with efficiency taking special measures and given the right antibiotics.
‘Since last weekend, the patient has developed another complication that is not an infection - it is much more serious. He developed thrombophlebitis [blood clot related vein inflammation] in the jugular vein in the neck. The clot is a big danger because it could fall and go straight to the heart and from there to the lungs and create pulmonary embolisms that can kill a person.
‘That complication is seen in hospitals very often and is the cause of sudden death, when clots are big, but it can also fall and dissolve with the treatments we are applying, based on antibiotics and anticoagulants. This time we have also isolated the causes that triggered the phlebitis in the central veins - in this case it is a clot in the jugular in the neck.
‘Since last Sunday we have seen an improvement, although we can not confirm that he will not have a much more serious complication. Nobody knows what will happen, neither here, nor anywhere else in the world - if that clot will fall or not.
‘For that we have all necessary medicines. When we discovered the situation last Saturday, we discussed the diagnosis and confirmed the pathology with the best technology.’
Are those the limits of medicine in the fight for the patients life?
‘We are at the limit, especially now. This is something we have been talking to him about quite a lot; we have good doctor-patient relationships, we want him to quit his voluntary abstention and to start eating to get the necessary energy. He needs it because he has developed a temperature because of his infection.
‘It is almost impossible to feed him through another catheter because there will be other complications, when we already have one. To eat is very important for him to save his life.’
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Indo-Bolivarian Ecosocialism
by Sam McGill, Rock Around the Blockade
Source: Venezuela Analysis.
Source: Venezuela Analysis.
In March 2010, I attended a national meeting in Caracas held by the forum for Bolivarian Ecosocialism. This conference developed plans and proposals for the Forum for Indo-Bolivarian Ecosocialism, which formed a part of the World People’s Summit on Climate Change in Cochabamba, Bolivia in April 2010. Natalie Lázaro Barrios presented the work of ANROS (National Association of Social Networks and Organisations) at this event and agreed to tell us more about her project.
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
British Petroleum (BP) attacks oil workers in Casanare, Colombia
Source: Colombia Solidarity Campaign, 6 June 2010
Since BP began oil exploration and production in Casanare, Colombia in the early 1990s, six thousand people have been assassinated and three thousand people disappeared. Every time there have been complaints or protests in opposition to BP's interests, the community leaders concerned have been killed. This indicates an elimination strategy of violent social control. The agents have been the military and paramilitary groups, but BP as a corporation has itself been complicit in the human rights violations.
Despite its public statements accepting the right of trade union organisation, in practice BP has refused to enter a collective agreement with the National Oil Workers Union (USO) or recognising any of the principal elements of trade union recognition. USO organisers that have tried, have been driven out of the region or into exile.
There has been an upsurge in workers and community protests against BP in Casanare since the beginning of 2010. Workers at the Tauramena Central Processing Facility (CPF) starting 22 January went on strike supported by USO, the National Oil Workers Union of Colombia. On 15 February riot police brutally attacked the picket line, sending three workers to hospital. Demonstrations and popular assemblies in support of the stoppage took place in Tauramena and surrounding villages from February onwards. The USO union and many different community sectors came together to form the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare. The strike ended after 30 days when BP promised talks.
BP agreed to enter negotiations and there have since been five commissions dealing with labour issues, the environment, local supply of goods and services, social investment and human rights. The community has deep and long standing grievances. Environmental damage, for example, is extensive stemming from BP’s production practices such as diverting water sources underground to pressure up the oil; contamination from gas flaring and ground failures from seismic testing.
Send complaints to BP Group Chief Executive Tony Hayward at
email: tony.hayward@bp.com
Send messages of solidarity to the workers and community
via email: movimientoporcasanare@yahoo.es
See also Public Hearing On BP’s Activities In Colombia.
Since BP began oil exploration and production in Casanare, Colombia in the early 1990s, six thousand people have been assassinated and three thousand people disappeared. Every time there have been complaints or protests in opposition to BP's interests, the community leaders concerned have been killed. This indicates an elimination strategy of violent social control. The agents have been the military and paramilitary groups, but BP as a corporation has itself been complicit in the human rights violations.
Despite its public statements accepting the right of trade union organisation, in practice BP has refused to enter a collective agreement with the National Oil Workers Union (USO) or recognising any of the principal elements of trade union recognition. USO organisers that have tried, have been driven out of the region or into exile.
There has been an upsurge in workers and community protests against BP in Casanare since the beginning of 2010. Workers at the Tauramena Central Processing Facility (CPF) starting 22 January went on strike supported by USO, the National Oil Workers Union of Colombia. On 15 February riot police brutally attacked the picket line, sending three workers to hospital. Demonstrations and popular assemblies in support of the stoppage took place in Tauramena and surrounding villages from February onwards. The USO union and many different community sectors came together to form the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare. The strike ended after 30 days when BP promised talks.
BP agreed to enter negotiations and there have since been five commissions dealing with labour issues, the environment, local supply of goods and services, social investment and human rights. The community has deep and long standing grievances. Environmental damage, for example, is extensive stemming from BP’s production practices such as diverting water sources underground to pressure up the oil; contamination from gas flaring and ground failures from seismic testing.
The workers and community report that BP has not taken the negotiations seriously. At first the corporation attempted to decide who the community and labour representatives would be, but this was thwarted by a letter signed by three thousand residents naming their representatives. Next BP threatened legal action because of complaints against it in a Petition of Demands presented to it by the union and the community. Then BP swamped the community with leaflets claiming what a great corporation it is. Finally, and despite other provocations, initial ‘pre-agreements’ were negotiated in the commissions concerning the environment, local supplies, social investment and human rights; but BP has continued to block substantive progress towards accepting the right of a collective agreement covering its workers, and those employed by its subsidiaries and contractors, at the CPF plant.
The workers and community wanted talks to resume on 12 May, but BP has delayed this until 23 June. Meanwhile threats against community and union leaders began to grow, which is grave indeed given the history of elimination of community leaders in the recent past. On 21 May workers involved in construction operations in the Tauramena installation entered into occupation demanding: a wage increase; the establishment a wage scale; due process in disciplinary decisions; and labour guarantees for the workers.
On 2 June army forces entered the plant and at time of writing are harassing the workers, who stay overnight chaining themselves to plant equipment so that they cannot be dislodged.
Send complaints to BP Group Chief Executive Tony Hayward at
email: tony.hayward@bp.com
Send messages of solidarity to the workers and community
via email: movimientoporcasanare@yahoo.es
See also Public Hearing On BP’s Activities In Colombia.
Obama ratchets up attack on Cuba
New dog, old tricks
by Helen Yaffe
In spring 2010, Cuba came under renewed attack as politicians and the corporate media worldwide portrayed the revolutionary government as a repressive dictatorship struggling to stem a growing tide of discontent. This offensive is orchestrated by the Obama administration which is continuing the 50-year war against Cuban socialism.
In spring 2010, Cuba came under renewed attack as politicians and the corporate media worldwide portrayed the revolutionary government as a repressive dictatorship struggling to stem a growing tide of discontent. This offensive is orchestrated by the Obama administration which is continuing the 50-year war against Cuban socialism.
The strategy is simple but effective: demonise the enemy to win public consent for an intensification of conflict. The backdrop to the current campaign is the global capitalist crisis, Raul Castro’s defence of the socialist system and the growing influence of Cuba in Latin America and around the world. In the face of this intensification of hostility, Cuba and its supporters have continued to fight back and expose the lies, distortions and hypocrisy.
Read more...
Friday, 4 June 2010
Brockley to Revolution Square
Source: East London Lines
by Cat Weiner.
A young amateur film-maker from Lewisham is to have his first feature film, a documentary on Cuba, premiered at the Venezuelan Embassy in London on 8 June. Anthony Bairstow, 25, from Brockley Rise, was inspired to make his film Cuba: Defending Socialism, Resisting Imperialism after joining a work brigade to Cuba organised by the campaign group Rock around the Blockade two years ago. As he puts it,
“It was the instinctive thing to do. After learning about Cuba’s revolutionary history, I became totally supportive of it as a movement forward for humanity. We brought a small video camera out with us to see what we could find out, and found the depth and range of political understanding amongst everyone we met about building socialism in a world dominated by imperialist powers phenomenal.”
US paid 'journalists' to write propaganda against the Cuban Five
Wednesday, June 2, 2010, National Press Club, Washington, DC
Good afternoon,
My name is Gloria La Riva, I am coordinator of the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five. We are here today at the National Press Club in Washington, along with Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the Partnership for Civil Justice, Heidi Boghosian of the National Lawyers Guild, and Brian Becker of the ANSWER Coalition, to present evidence of the U.S. government’s misconduct in relation to the Cuban Five’s case, and violation of the law banning domestic propaganda.
After our presentations, we will have a Question-and-Answer period.
I will present first.
For the first time, we are revealing today the payments made to the Miami journalists by the Office of Cuba Broadcasting and the Broadcasting Board of Governors, through Radio and TV Marti, during the time of the Cuban Five’s detention and trial. The dates of these payments are from November 1999 to December 31, 2001. We are also presenting today, the articles written during that time period, while the Cuban Five were in Miami detention or on trial, as well as commentary by these government-paid journalists. Although we have requested information as far back as 1996, the BBG has only given us data from November 1999.
What makes the secret payments so egregious is that they were made by the same government that was prosecuting the five Cubans. It is widely known that Radio and TV Martí are U.S. government propaganda. Their purpose is to try to influence the Cuban population against the Cuban government. It is also a thoroughly-documented fact that hardly anyone in Cuba sees TV Martí or hears Radio TV [Martí]. The largest audience by far of the U.S. State Department’s propaganda, is right inside the United States, in Miami, Florida, through means of the government-paid journalists.
For U.S. journalists to pose as independent, but receive payment from the government agency that transmits U.S. propaganda, in effect assures that this highly-inflammatory U.S. propaganda is illegally communicated to the very audience from which the jury for the Cuban Five trial was picked.
Thus, the Cuban Five were denied the most elemental right to due process in court. What we are disseminating today is a segment of the extremely prejudicial coverage that the Miami population was subjected to, including months before the trial began. There remains much more to be uncovered, and which we will divulge as we obtain the information. Mara Verheyden-Hilliard will detail more about our ongoing lawsuit and second FOIA to obtain more information, but first I would like to review just a sample of this highly prejudicial and false coverage, bought and paid for by Washington:
- Wilfredo Cancio Isla was a reporter for El Nuevo Herald, the newspaper with the highest Spanish language distribution in Miami. He received $4,725 from Sept. 30, 2000 to December 3, 2001. One article in that period was published the day the Jury began its deliberations at the conclusion of the trial. Keep in mind that this jury was unsequestered. The jurors went home every day of the seven-month trial. And BEFORE the jury was selected, the future members of the jury, as part of the larger Miami community, were subjected to 26 months of inflammatory coverage about the Cuban Five.
On June 4, 2001, the very day that the jury began its deliberations on the question of guilt or innocence, Wilfredo Cancio’s article appeared in El Nuevo Herald, with the headline, “Cuba used hallucinogens to train its spies.” The article claims, from an unnamed source – a supposed Cuban spy defector -- that Cuba gives its spies LSD and other hallucinogens, in order to train them for missions abroad. This claim is completely unsubstantiated. But that is not the real point of the story. The objective of the article is to taint the Five’s case. In a very clever distortion, Wilfredo Cancio manages to link the Five to this outrageous charge, by quoting the anonymous man named Alex, as saying, “I can assure you that the Wasp Network is just a part of the espionage work that was conceived to infiltrate the United States on a long-term basis.” As if to imply by mentioning them in an article about hallucinogens, that the Five were given drugs to control their minds.
This supposed “news’ article had no evidence, just outrageous lies. Yet Wilfredo Cancio received government money. He also wrote an article that appeared in the same paper on April 19, 2001, in which a discussion between the judge, prosecution and defense took place with the jury removed. The defense team had requested permission from the judge to return for a second trip to Cuba to take testimony from additional witnesses. The prosecution complained about the defense request, and in a statement that would not have been allowed in a courtroom with the jury present, said, “Cuba is constructing a fabricated version of the facts.” The jury may not have been present, but this article and the headline, “The prosecution fears Cuban control in spy trial” was available for all to see, including the jury, in El Nuevo Herald. Written by government-paid Wilfredo Cancio.
- Ariel Remos, who writes for Diario de las Américas, covertly received $11,700 during the period of November 1, 1999 to December 12, 2001, the period of the Cuban Five’s prosecution. He wrote extensively calling for Cuban President Fidel Castro’s arrest for the plane shootdown. But the part we will concern ourselves with today, is in the documented period of his payments, where Ariel Remos wrote biased and hostile articles, interviewing only members of the exile Cuban community who have a longstanding enmity with the Cuban leadership. On the U.S. payroll he published in the U.S. press the demand for prosecuting Fidel Castro. In one article he also condemned Gerardo Hernández, whom the U.S. government was prosecuting. He refers to the charge against Hernández and then says that the chain of command begins with Fidel Castro. This theme was a steady drumbeat of hysteria from 1996 all the way through the conviction of the Five. He never disclosed that he was being paid by the U.S. It was a theme repeated continuously by the next writer, Pablo Alfonso.
- Pablo Alfonso received $58,600.00 from November 1, 1999 to December 31, 2001, during the prosecution of the Cuban Five. He wrote quite a few prejudicial articles immediately after the Five’s arrest in 1998 through 2001 – which you can see from the documents here at the Press Club and on our website. Focusing on the documented period of payments, he gives voice to the rightwing Miami congress members, who lead a campaign to demand Fidel Castro’s arrest and indictment, during the Five’s prosecution, without disclosing covert payments from the United States government.
- Enrique Encinosa is news director of Radio Mambí, one of the most biased and vitriolic radio stations, whose commentators have been known to openly welcome violence against people in Miami who advocate normalization of relations between the U.S. and Cuba. Encinosa secretly received at least $5,200 during the period of the Five’s prosecution, at the same time that he was a public commentator on the station. Encinosa has a long terrorist past, and he has used the Miami and international airwaves to call for terrorist acts against the people of Cuba. Thus, the U.S. government was not only directly influencing the outcome of the Cuban Five’s case by paying Encinosa, Washington knowingly financed a terrorist.
- Helen Ferre received $1,125 from February 21, 2001 to December 13, 2001, the period of the prosecution of the Five. She is editor of the opinion page of Diario Las Américas, which published Ariel Remos, and other biased articles against the Five, including an article by the notorious terrorist Orlando Bosch, who carries a veiled threat against at least one of the defense lawyers.
The Cuban Five, Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González, and René González were irreparably harmed by the sea of prejudice generated by the Miami media. The government’s role in financing much of the vitriolic media coverage means that the government has the obligation to immediately remedy this wrong. The Cuban Five must be freed.
[Note: The background facts about our research is the following: The National Committee to Free the Cuban Five submitted a Freedom of Information Act request in January 2009 for information on payments made to Miami journalists by the OCB and BBG, from the date of Jan. 1, 1996 to December 31, 2001. We requested information from the date 1996, because in February 1996, the Brothers to the Rescue planes invaded Cuban airspace, and were shot down by Cuba as an act of state to protect its territory. Several months after the Cuban Five were arrested in 1998, one of the Five, Gerardo Hernández, was unjustifiably charged with murder conspiracy for the shootdown. Several months after our FOIA request, the OCB released some preliminary information, including the payments received by the journalists we are naming today. But since then, the agency has denied our request for the contracts and other information. However, while we continue to conduct our research, the National Committee already has substantial information that shows a systematic policy of government manipulation of the media in Miami.]
Wednesday, 2 June 2010
Cuban government statement on Israeli attack on Gaza-bound flotilla
Source: Granma
Statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Havana, May 31, 2010
THE Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cuba has learned with profound concern of the criminal attack perpetrated in the early hours of May 31 by the special forces of the Israeli Army on a flotilla of boats which, in international waters, was transporting humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people resident in the Gaza Strip, an attack that provoked death and injury among various members of that flotilla.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs expresses its most energetic condemnation of this devious and criminal attack on the part of the Israeli government and calls on the international community and peace-loving peoples to demand the immediate lifting by the Israeli authorities of the illegal, ruthless and genocidal blockade of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.
Cuba wishes to convey its most heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and reiterates its support for and solidarity with the just cause of the Palestinian people and their inalienable rights, which include the creation of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Havana, May 31, 2010
THE Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cuba has learned with profound concern of the criminal attack perpetrated in the early hours of May 31 by the special forces of the Israeli Army on a flotilla of boats which, in international waters, was transporting humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people resident in the Gaza Strip, an attack that provoked death and injury among various members of that flotilla.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs expresses its most energetic condemnation of this devious and criminal attack on the part of the Israeli government and calls on the international community and peace-loving peoples to demand the immediate lifting by the Israeli authorities of the illegal, ruthless and genocidal blockade of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.
Cuba wishes to convey its most heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and reiterates its support for and solidarity with the just cause of the Palestinian people and their inalienable rights, which include the creation of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Monday, 31 May 2010
Statement from CODEH on Extrajudicial killings in Honduras
Statement from the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras (CODEH)
25 May 2010
The Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras (CODEH), to the international community and the people of Honduras, denounces the following:
1 .- MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED homicides occurred during the days of illegitimate and illegal curfew, which includes minors and women. During the time of these killings, the army and the police have had total and absolute control of the streets of this country. The homicides listed here were carried out with firearms with 5.56 mm caliber, a size that corresponds to those used by the Armed Forces of Honduras and the National Police.
2 .- That because of its characteristics and within the context of a state policy, imposed against the will of the people, we can affirm these were extrajudicial killings perpetrated by agents of the State, armed forces and police, led by the Micheletti Bain and military and police leaders.
3 .- CODEH makes the following people responsible for these extrajudicial killings and summary executions: Roberto Micheletti Bain, Romeo Vasquez Velasquez (Chief of Joint Staff of the Armed Forces), Salomon Escoto Salinas (National Police Chief), Mario Perdomo (Deputy Secretary of Security), Rodas Gamero (Secretary of Security), Luis Alberto Rubi, (Attorney General’s Office) Roy Urtecho (Prosecutor), Jorge Alberto Rivera Aviles (President of the Supreme Court of Justice) and congresspeople in National Congress who illegally approved a decree on emergency measures that diminished people’s fundamental rights, as well as justices of the Supreme Court who tolerated and allowed these practices by denying injunctions and delaying the results in other cases.
4 .- The following are the names of people who have died in connection with this illegal practice by agents of the State: Table of homicides during curfew.
5.- A team of lawyers from the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CODEH) has prepared its investigation for the Public Ministry (the Attorney General of the Republic is linked to the coup), start the investigation, order the fiscal requirements. Knowing that the measures taken by the Public Ministry can’t be exhaustive, we have contacted international lawyers, so that these cases and others that characterize crimes against humanity, have a preliminary hearing before the International Criminal Court.
6 .- CODEH is documenting each of these cases, therefore we ask the relatives who have not yet made contact with CODEH to call the following number: (504) 237-9238 or contact us via email.
Executive Commission, CODEH
WE FIGHT FOR PEACE BY DEFENDING HUMAN RIGHTS AND JUSTICE
(RATB: See also Eight journalists murdered in Honduras, 27 May 2010)
1 .- MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED homicides occurred during the days of illegitimate and illegal curfew, which includes minors and women. During the time of these killings, the army and the police have had total and absolute control of the streets of this country. The homicides listed here were carried out with firearms with 5.56 mm caliber, a size that corresponds to those used by the Armed Forces of Honduras and the National Police.
2 .- That because of its characteristics and within the context of a state policy, imposed against the will of the people, we can affirm these were extrajudicial killings perpetrated by agents of the State, armed forces and police, led by the Micheletti Bain and military and police leaders.
3 .- CODEH makes the following people responsible for these extrajudicial killings and summary executions: Roberto Micheletti Bain, Romeo Vasquez Velasquez (Chief of Joint Staff of the Armed Forces), Salomon Escoto Salinas (National Police Chief), Mario Perdomo (Deputy Secretary of Security), Rodas Gamero (Secretary of Security), Luis Alberto Rubi, (Attorney General’s Office) Roy Urtecho (Prosecutor), Jorge Alberto Rivera Aviles (President of the Supreme Court of Justice) and congresspeople in National Congress who illegally approved a decree on emergency measures that diminished people’s fundamental rights, as well as justices of the Supreme Court who tolerated and allowed these practices by denying injunctions and delaying the results in other cases.
4 .- The following are the names of people who have died in connection with this illegal practice by agents of the State: Table of homicides during curfew.
5.- A team of lawyers from the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CODEH) has prepared its investigation for the Public Ministry (the Attorney General of the Republic is linked to the coup), start the investigation, order the fiscal requirements. Knowing that the measures taken by the Public Ministry can’t be exhaustive, we have contacted international lawyers, so that these cases and others that characterize crimes against humanity, have a preliminary hearing before the International Criminal Court.
6 .- CODEH is documenting each of these cases, therefore we ask the relatives who have not yet made contact with CODEH to call the following number: (504) 237-9238 or contact us via email.
Executive Commission, CODEH
WE FIGHT FOR PEACE BY DEFENDING HUMAN RIGHTS AND JUSTICE
(RATB: See also Eight journalists murdered in Honduras, 27 May 2010)
U.S. Government Paid Miami Reporters to Be Biased against Cuba
Source: Prensa Latina (Habana)
29 May 2010
A civic group will shortly disclose evidence on how the U.S. Government covertly paid tens of thousands of dollars to Miami journalists working for major media outlets to incendiary stories against Cuba and five Cuban antiterrorists.
The evidence has been uncovered by the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five, which next June 2 will make it public at a press conference. The stories were published during the federal government's politically-charged Miami prosecution, the organizations denounces in a press release.
Fernando Gonzalez, Rene Gonzalez, Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labanino and Antonio Guerrero, internationally known as the Cuban Five, are serving sentences varying from 15 years to double life, after being convicted of charges including unproven espionage conspiracy.
The press conference will reveal names of journalists, payment amounts, and will have available notebooks highlighting articles and propaganda by supposedly-independent journalists who were covertly on the payroll of the U.S. Government.
Speaking at the press conference will be attorneys with the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) that have filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of the National Committee.
The litigation filed by the PCJF asserts that the Broadcasting Board of Governors and its Office of Cuba Broadcasting are withholding information that will show that they have engaged in activities in violation of federal law, specifically the Smith-Mundt Act, which prohibits the BBG from seeking to propagandize the U.S. public, and may be continuing to do so.
The press conference will announce that a coalition of organizations is initiating a nationwide campaign that will call on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to take immediate action to provide remedy and relief to the Cuban Five based on the U.S. Government's misconduct and covert operations which deprived the Five of their fundamental right to a fair trial.
Gloria La Riva, coordinator of the Cuban Five committee who will speak at the press conference, said, "Many of the articles and commentaries by the government-paid journalists were highly prejudicial and biased, with the obvious aim of negatively influencing the Miami public and the jury pool, convicting the Cuban Five, and depriving them of the fundamental right to a fair trial."
The evidence has been uncovered by the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five, which next June 2 will make it public at a press conference. The stories were published during the federal government's politically-charged Miami prosecution, the organizations denounces in a press release.
Fernando Gonzalez, Rene Gonzalez, Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labanino and Antonio Guerrero, internationally known as the Cuban Five, are serving sentences varying from 15 years to double life, after being convicted of charges including unproven espionage conspiracy.
The press conference will reveal names of journalists, payment amounts, and will have available notebooks highlighting articles and propaganda by supposedly-independent journalists who were covertly on the payroll of the U.S. Government.
Speaking at the press conference will be attorneys with the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) that have filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of the National Committee.
The litigation filed by the PCJF asserts that the Broadcasting Board of Governors and its Office of Cuba Broadcasting are withholding information that will show that they have engaged in activities in violation of federal law, specifically the Smith-Mundt Act, which prohibits the BBG from seeking to propagandize the U.S. public, and may be continuing to do so.
The press conference will announce that a coalition of organizations is initiating a nationwide campaign that will call on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to take immediate action to provide remedy and relief to the Cuban Five based on the U.S. Government's misconduct and covert operations which deprived the Five of their fundamental right to a fair trial.
Gloria La Riva, coordinator of the Cuban Five committee who will speak at the press conference, said, "Many of the articles and commentaries by the government-paid journalists were highly prejudicial and biased, with the obvious aim of negatively influencing the Miami public and the jury pool, convicting the Cuban Five, and depriving them of the fundamental right to a fair trial."
Terrorist Network Operating Openly In The United States
Source: Jane Franklin.Info April 30, 2005
By Jane FranklinThree years ago [2002], President Bush said that his War on Terror would pursue terrorists "in any dark corner of the world," but no light has been cast on Miami where terrorists for decades have waged a campaign against Cuba of hit-and run attacks, sabotage, infiltration of armed agents, assassination, etc. After the failure of the CIA's 1961 invasion, using Cuban émigrés at the Bay of Pigs, the CIA tried another plan, Operation Mongoose, which also failed after leading directly to the 1962 October Missile Crisis. Then, for years, about 300 agents operating out of a CIA station housed at the University of Miami, with the code name JM WAVE, employed a few thousand Cuban émigrés in efforts to overthrow the Cuban government. These covert activities and the overt trade embargo and travel ban constitute a continuing State of Siege against the island 90 miles from Florida.
To this day, groups with names like Alpha 66 and F4 operate with impunity. They even brag about their exploits on TV. After a raid on a Havana hotel in 1992, Tony Bryant, the head of Comandos L, announced at a televised news conference plans for more raids on Cuba's tourist industry, which was becoming the mainstay of the Cuban economy after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Bryant warned tourists to stay off the island, declaring, "From this point on, we're at war," adding, "The Neutrality Act doesn't exist."
Last year on Channel 41, Oscar Asa, nephew of former Cuban Dictator Fulgencio Batista, hosted Comandos F4 leader Rodolfo Frómeta, who described continuing plans for armed attacks against Cuba. These days another nation has become a target of U.S.-based terrorists: along with F4 on Asa's program was former Venezuelan Army Captain Eduardo García, who was involved in the 2002 coup that briefly deposed Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. García praised Comandos F4 for their help in his continuing efforts to topple the Venezuelan government. They train together in the Florida Everglades.
Among the earliest Cuban émigrés to become CIA agents were Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch, two of the most notorious terrorists in the Western Hemisphere. As Posada boasted in 1998 to New York Times reporters, "The CIA taught us everything--everything." "They taught us explosives, how to kill, bomb, trained us in acts of sabotage."
When George Bush Sr. became CIA director in 1976, Bosch founded CORU (Commanders of United Revolutionary Organizations), an umbrella group for carrying out terrorist actions against Cuba as well as countries and individuals considered friendly to Cuba. Posada joined CORU in a rampage of bombs in various countries. Their most spectacular success came in October 1976 when two bombs blew up a Cuban passenger jet a few minutes after it took off from Barbados, killing all 73 people aboard. Bosch and Posada, who at one time had both worked with Venezuelan intelligence, were quickly arrested in Venezuela as masterminds of this massacre and tried by military, not civilian, courts.
In his autobiography, Los caminos del guerrero (The Paths of the Warrior), Posada named major financial supporters, extremely wealthy Cuban-Americans, pillars of terror: Jorge Mas Canosa, Pepe Hernández, and Feliciano Foyo. Mas Canosa became the chair of the Cuban American National Foundation founded in 1981 by the Reagan Administration. CANF, the wealthiest and most influential right-wing Cuban-American group, campaigned for Bosch's freedom. On March 25, 1983, with Mas Canosa leading a committee to intercede in his release, the Miami City Commission proclaimed "Orlando Bosch Day." In 1986, Otto Reich, a right-wing Cuban-American politician, was placed in Venezuela as the U.S. Ambassador. Bosch's release was thus assured.
When he was let out of prison the following year, Bosch returned to Miami, where he was detained because of a 1974 parole violation related to his conviction for firing a bazooka in 1968 at a Polish freighter docked in Miami. Greeted in Miami as a hero, Bosch's cause was championed in 1989 by Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, on her way to becoming the first Cuban-American in Congress, and Jeb Bush, the president's son who was Ros-Lehtinen's campaign manager. In 1990, President Bush Sr. freed Bosch from detention despite the fact that the Justice Department had ordered that Bosch be “excluded and deported” from the United States.
In his deportation order, Associate Attorney General Joe D. Whitley wrote, “For 30 years Bosch has been resolute and unwavering in his advocacy of terrorist violence. He has threatened and undertaken violent terrorist acts against numerous targets, including nations friendly toward the United States and their highest officials. He has repeatedly expressed and demonstrated a willingness to cause indiscriminate injury and death. His actions have been those of a terrorist, unfettered by laws or human decency, threatening and inflicting violence without regard to the identity of his victims.”
Living free in Miami, Bosch has continued his terrorist operations. In February 2004 during a long television interview on Channel 22, Bosch justified the bombing of the Cuban civilian airliner and boasted about his role in eleven attempts to carry out military attacks against Cuba in the previous ten years and his three attempts to assassinate President Castro, in Chile, Nicaragua and Spain. Bosch receives ovations in Miami whenever he appears on public stages with high-ranking politicians. He is a celebrity terrorist.
So now it is no wonder that Posada is asking for asylum, which he naturally would expect George Bush Jr. to grant him based on his devoted service, as his lawyer points out, to the CIA. After all, he is no less a terrorist than Bosch. In 1985, nine years after the bombing of the Cuban passenger jet, Posada escaped from Venezuelan prison thanks to a bribe paid by Mas Canosa. Posada went to El Salvador where he helped another Cuban-American CIA agent, Félix Rodríguez, direct aid to the contras in Nicaragua, an illegal operation directed from the White House by Colonel Oliver North.
Rodríguez, another Miami stalwart, was a CIA agent before the Bay of Pigs invasion. He boasts that he was present in Bolivia at the execution of Che Guevara and proudly wears Guevara's watch as a memento. In May 1987, Rodríguez testified to the congressional committees investigating the misnamed "Iran?Contra Affair" about his meetings with then Vice President Bush in 1985 and 1986. When he was asked about "Ramón Medina," Rodríguez boasted that "Medina" was Posada, a "good friend of mine." He testified that he brought Posada to El Salvador because this "honorable man" "deserved to be free." Not another question was asked.
During the period from October 1984 to October 1986 when U.S. aid to the contras was prohibited by the Boland Amendment, Phyllis Byrne, a secretary in Vice President Bush's office, prepared a routine request (April 16, 1986) for Bush to meet with Rodríguez so that Rodríguez could "brief the vice president on the status of the war in El Salvador and resupply of the contras." Soon after that, Byrne prepared a memo (April 30, 1986) to inform Bush about the meeting the vice president would be having on May 1: "Félix Rodríguez, a counterinsurgency expert who is visiting from El Salvador, will provide a briefing on the status of the war in El Salvador and resupply of the contras."
After the illegal "Iran-Contra Affair" was exposed, Posada worked for Guatemalan President Vinicio Cerezo, keeping an eye on Cerezo’s own military for signs of a possible coup or assassination. In 1997 the Miami Herald reported that Posada had been involved in a bombing campaign that targeted Honduran President Carlos Roberto Reina, who was disposed to improving relations with Cuba. Posada was forced out of Honduras in 1995 amid allegations that he set off 41 bombs there in one year--almost a bomb a week. In a long interview by New York Times reporters (published July 12-13, 1998), Posada boasted that he paid a mercenary from El Salvador to bomb Havana hotels in 1997, killing an Italian, Fabio di Celmo, and wounding several people before Cuban police captured the bomber. Of di Celmo, Posada shrugged, "That Italian was in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Back in 1960, the CIA launched a massive campaign to assassinate Fidel Castro, and Posada, like Bosch, repeatedly tried to kill the Cuban leader. In the year 2000, President Castro attended the Ibero-American Summit meeting in Panama City. Shortly after arriving, he announced that Posada and three other Cuban-Americans were at that very moment preparing to set off a bomb that would kill not only the Cuban president but hundreds of Panamanian people, mostly students, to whom he would be speaking in a university auditorium. Thanks to Cuban intelligence agents, their exact location was given to Panama's police, who arrested them and seized their C-4 explosives, fake passports, etc.
Because Cuban intelligence officials had learned of the plot, more than 2000 people attended Fidel Castro's speech without being killed or wounded. How did Cuba know about the plot and save all those lives? Through Cuban agents who infiltrate terrorist groups. In 1998, a year after Posada's bombing campaign in Havana hotels, Cuban officials received information about terrorism they thought the FBI should know about. They gave that information to the FBI. Did the FBI arrest the terrorists? No, the FBI arrested the Cubans in Miami who had gathered the information and called THEM terrorists. A change of venue was refused.
A Miami jury convicted the Cuban Five, and a Miami judge gave them long sentences: Gerardo Hernández (two life sentences plus 15 years), Ramón Labañino (life plus 18 years), Antonio Guerrero (life plus 10 years), Fernando González (19 years), and René González (15 years). They remain in separate prisons scattered around the United States, awaiting the decision of an Appeals Court. This is their reward for trying to protect people from terrorists. Cuban intelligence agents, of course, continued by necessity to investigate terrorists and were able to stop the major Panama City plot even as the Cuban Five were imprisoned.
Panama did not charge Posada and his gang with attempted murder but only with possession of explosives, illegal association in order to commit a crime, falsification of documents, and danger to public safety. After they were convicted, Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso, on her way out of office in August 2004, pardoned them. Posada's three co-conspirators were welcomed home to Miami as heroes. These three have hair-raising histories:
- Pedro Remón, an Omega 7 member, was charged in 1985 with two assassinations: Cuban-American Eulalio José Negrín, who supported El diálogo (the dialogue) in 1979 with Cuba, was shot to death in front of his young son at his home in New Jersey; Cuban United Nations diplomat Félix García Rodríguez was shot to death as he stopped for a red light in Queens, New York City. It was the killing of the Cuban diplomat that forced the FBI to make some arrests because of international repercussions. Remón plea-bargained to setting off a bomb at Cuba's United Nations Mission and attempting to assassinate Cuban UN Ambassador Raúl Roa Kourí. He was sentenced to 10 years.
- Guillermo Novo and his brother Ignacio Novo in 1964 fired a bazooka at the UN General Assembly building where Che Guevara was speaking. In 1979 Guillermo Novo was found guilty of the 1976 car-bomb killing in Washington, D.C. of Orlando Letelier, who had served in the government of Chilean President Salvador Allende, and his aide, Ronni Moffitt, but was acquitted in a 1981 retrial. The federal jury found him guilty of two counts of lying to a grand jury. Jorge Mas Canosa then hired him to work in CANF's "Information Commission."
- Gaspar Jiménez murdered a Cuban diplomat in Mexico. He was indicted for the 1976 car-bombing of Emilio Milián in Miami but charges were dropped. Milián, a radio commentator who had criticized terrorism by right-wing Cuban émigrés, lost both legs. Jiménez then worked for Dr. Alberto Hernández, Mas Canosa's physician and a financial supporter of Posada. In his interview by New York Times reporters, Posada said that Jiménez was the courier who took money from Mas Canosa to Posada with the message, "This is for the church."
What about Posada? He is still a fugitive and both Cuba and Venezuela want him extradited. In Cuba and other countries (for example, Guyana and Italy), families of Posada's victims await justice, either extradition to Cuba or to Venezuela or a trial in an international tribunal.
According to President Bush, any nation that harbors terrorists is a terrorist state. The United States has obviously already met that criterion, but without much attention being paid. Now, if Posada, whose request for asylum has received worldwide attention, is harbored by the United States, Bush will be blatantly proclaiming that the United States meets his own definition of a terrorist nation.
Tuesday, 25 May 2010
The Elected Delegate and the Dissident in Cuba’s Municipal Elections
by Arnold August, 21 May 2010.
Read the full article here about how BBC Mundo distorts 'to provide a false atmosphere of repression and fear exercised against those who do not agree with the revolution but who participate in elections in one way or another'.
Read the full article here about how BBC Mundo distorts 'to provide a false atmosphere of repression and fear exercised against those who do not agree with the revolution but who participate in elections in one way or another'.
USAID Against Cuba
New declassified documents reveal more than $2.3 million in propaganda against Cuba
By Eva Golinger, Caracas, May 14, 2010
Source: CubaDebate; Translation: StreetVisuals.
Records also recently declassified under the Law on Access to Information Act (FOIA, by its initials in English), show that USAID has invested more than $2.3 million to spread dirty propaganda against Cuba and finance journalists in the island since 1999.
The documents, including original contracts between USAID and the organization CubaNet, show a pattern of increased and intensified funding each year in its effort to promote distorted information about Cuba - all with the intention of provoking a "transition to democracy", or "regime change" in Cuba.
For fifty years, Washington has been running a dirty war against Cuba. A component of that aggression has been the use of media to manipulate and distort the reality of Cuba to the international public opinion, and at the same time, to infiltrate and disseminate false information in Cuba.
After the failures of Radio and TV Marti, which still exist and receive financial contributions from Washington, despite their futility, a new field of aggression against Cuba was established through the Internet. In 1994, CubaNet established itself as one of the first web pages made to disseminate propaganda against the Cuban Revolution on the Internet. Based in Miami, CubaNet uses money from USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) - which also receives multimillion-dollar contributions to finance "journalists" in Cuba, and promote international media campaign against the Cuban government.
Although it's no secret that CubaNet is funded and guided by Washington agencies, the documents declassified by USAID also recently demonstrated the close relationship of control that the U.S. agency maintained on the propaganda organization.
When it made the contract between USAID and CubaNet in 1999, the high initial money to bring Washington to the efforts of propaganda via the Internet was $98,000. The money was intended to "support a program for the expansion of a website for independent journalists in Cuba." The contract was for one year, with the possibility of extension to the time needed to run the program. The manager of the USAID program was David Mutchler, USAID Senior Advisor for Cuba.
The contract required a progress report on the implementation of the program every three months, submitted to USAID, and an annual report detailing all the work done during the previous period.
USAID is boss
In clause 1.6 of the contract between USAID and CubaNet, entitled "Substantial Involvement Understandings", control is evidenced by the U.S. maintained on the organization miamera.
Basically, the USAID official decides who will work in the draft CubaNet, their plan of work, and how to evaluate their progress; in other words, is the head of CubaNet.
Violate the laws of the United States
The documents that modify the original contract, which are 11 documents of the years 2000-2007, shows an increase in the annual project funding of CubaNet and reveal other information about the nature of the program. In a document dated April 19, 2005, authorized the sending of "private funds" to Cuba that were not from the USAID or other U.S. agency, to "advance the objectives of the Agreement." Due to the restrictions maintained by the Treasury Department in Washington on sending U.S. dollars to Cuba, according to the document from USAID, the "private funds" would hide in the authorization and had the U.S. Agency for funding the program CubaNet .
The same document also reveals that CubaNet not only does its work in Cuba, but also "continues to publish reports ... and promoting their spread in the mass media in the United States and the international press." It is against U.S. law to disseminate propaganda funded by the U.S. government and used as "information" in the media. However, the declassified document shows that the USAID is in full violation of that law.
More and more dollars
The documents also show that annually, USAID CubaNet increased its funding to continue its efforts to spread propaganda against Cuba. Here are the figures:
Year 1999: $98,000
Year 2000: $245,000
Year 2001: $260,000
Year 2002: $230,000
Year 2003: $500,000
Year 2005: $330,000
Year 2006: $300,000
Year 2007: $360,000
Total = $2.323 million
The campaign of aggression against Cuba is more intense today than ever, and this year 2010, USAID manages a budget of over $20 million dollars to fund groups within and outside Cuba that promote the agenda of Washington. CubaNet remains one of the main actors in the dirty war against Cuba.
Some of the declassified documents are available here:
Original Contract between the USAID-CubaNet
USAID Contract Modification-CubaNet, 2005
USAID Contract Modification-CubaNet, 2007
By Eva Golinger, Caracas, May 14, 2010
Source: CubaDebate; Translation: StreetVisuals.
Records also recently declassified under the Law on Access to Information Act (FOIA, by its initials in English), show that USAID has invested more than $2.3 million to spread dirty propaganda against Cuba and finance journalists in the island since 1999.
The documents, including original contracts between USAID and the organization CubaNet, show a pattern of increased and intensified funding each year in its effort to promote distorted information about Cuba - all with the intention of provoking a "transition to democracy", or "regime change" in Cuba.
For fifty years, Washington has been running a dirty war against Cuba. A component of that aggression has been the use of media to manipulate and distort the reality of Cuba to the international public opinion, and at the same time, to infiltrate and disseminate false information in Cuba.
After the failures of Radio and TV Marti, which still exist and receive financial contributions from Washington, despite their futility, a new field of aggression against Cuba was established through the Internet. In 1994, CubaNet established itself as one of the first web pages made to disseminate propaganda against the Cuban Revolution on the Internet. Based in Miami, CubaNet uses money from USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) - which also receives multimillion-dollar contributions to finance "journalists" in Cuba, and promote international media campaign against the Cuban government.
Although it's no secret that CubaNet is funded and guided by Washington agencies, the documents declassified by USAID also recently demonstrated the close relationship of control that the U.S. agency maintained on the propaganda organization.
When it made the contract between USAID and CubaNet in 1999, the high initial money to bring Washington to the efforts of propaganda via the Internet was $98,000. The money was intended to "support a program for the expansion of a website for independent journalists in Cuba." The contract was for one year, with the possibility of extension to the time needed to run the program. The manager of the USAID program was David Mutchler, USAID Senior Advisor for Cuba.
The contract required a progress report on the implementation of the program every three months, submitted to USAID, and an annual report detailing all the work done during the previous period.
USAID is boss
In clause 1.6 of the contract between USAID and CubaNet, entitled "Substantial Involvement Understandings", control is evidenced by the U.S. maintained on the organization miamera.
"It is understood and agreed that USAID will be substantially involved during the performance of this Cooperative Agreement as follows: Key Personnel: The USAID Senior Advisor for Cuba shall approve in advance, the selection of any key personnel and any alternates. Monitoring and Evaluation Plans: The USAID Senior Advisor for Cuba shall approve evaluation plans, and monitoring progress toward the achievement of program objectives during the course of the Cooperative Agreement."
Basically, the USAID official decides who will work in the draft CubaNet, their plan of work, and how to evaluate their progress; in other words, is the head of CubaNet.
Violate the laws of the United States
The documents that modify the original contract, which are 11 documents of the years 2000-2007, shows an increase in the annual project funding of CubaNet and reveal other information about the nature of the program. In a document dated April 19, 2005, authorized the sending of "private funds" to Cuba that were not from the USAID or other U.S. agency, to "advance the objectives of the Agreement." Due to the restrictions maintained by the Treasury Department in Washington on sending U.S. dollars to Cuba, according to the document from USAID, the "private funds" would hide in the authorization and had the U.S. Agency for funding the program CubaNet .
The same document also reveals that CubaNet not only does its work in Cuba, but also "continues to publish reports ... and promoting their spread in the mass media in the United States and the international press." It is against U.S. law to disseminate propaganda funded by the U.S. government and used as "information" in the media. However, the declassified document shows that the USAID is in full violation of that law.
More and more dollars
The documents also show that annually, USAID CubaNet increased its funding to continue its efforts to spread propaganda against Cuba. Here are the figures:
Year 1999: $98,000
Year 2000: $245,000
Year 2001: $260,000
Year 2002: $230,000
Year 2003: $500,000
Year 2005: $330,000
Year 2006: $300,000
Year 2007: $360,000
Total = $2.323 million
The campaign of aggression against Cuba is more intense today than ever, and this year 2010, USAID manages a budget of over $20 million dollars to fund groups within and outside Cuba that promote the agenda of Washington. CubaNet remains one of the main actors in the dirty war against Cuba.
Some of the declassified documents are available here:
Original Contract between the USAID-CubaNet
USAID Contract Modification-CubaNet, 2005
USAID Contract Modification-CubaNet, 2007
Hillary Clinton implies Castros like embargo
Source: CubaHeadlines
By Albor Ruiz - Ny Local, 17 April 2010
Hillary Clinton has been called many things, but dimwitted has not been one of them.
That's why comments last week by the secretary of state about the Cuban embargo were so surprising.
"It is my personal belief that the Castros do not want to see an end to the embargo and do not want to see normalization with the U.S., because they would lose all of their excuses for what hasn't happened in Cuba in the last 50 years," Clinton told a group of college students.
Wait, did I hear that right? Did Clinton actually imply that "the Castros" like the embargo although, they deny it? Think of it this way: The secretary of state has just declared that the central piece of our 50-year-old Cuba policy has done exactly the opposite of what it intended to accomplish. Washington, for all practical purposes, has been a loyal - if unwitting - ally of the Cuban regime.
This is big.
Someone needs to ask Clinton the question that is crying out for an answer: If the embargo is good for "the Castros" wouldn't it make sense to lift it ASAP?
"Posada Carriles continues to walk free, and the U.S. continues to list Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism," Stephens said. "And now that Luis Posada Carriles has marched with Ms. Estefan, Ms. Estefan is holding a fund-raiser for the President." Not good. What would have been good is for the Estefans to have used their 15 minutes with the President to ask him to end the cruel and hypocritical embargo. They missed the opportunity, though, and that is a shame.
After all, the secretary of state herself believes the blockade (as Cubans call it) is helping the communists next door.
By Albor Ruiz - Ny Local, 17 April 2010
Hillary Clinton has been called many things, but dimwitted has not been one of them.
That's why comments last week by the secretary of state about the Cuban embargo were so surprising.
"It is my personal belief that the Castros do not want to see an end to the embargo and do not want to see normalization with the U.S., because they would lose all of their excuses for what hasn't happened in Cuba in the last 50 years," Clinton told a group of college students.
Wait, did I hear that right? Did Clinton actually imply that "the Castros" like the embargo although, they deny it? Think of it this way: The secretary of state has just declared that the central piece of our 50-year-old Cuba policy has done exactly the opposite of what it intended to accomplish. Washington, for all practical purposes, has been a loyal - if unwitting - ally of the Cuban regime.
This is big.
Someone needs to ask Clinton the question that is crying out for an answer: If the embargo is good for "the Castros" wouldn't it make sense to lift it ASAP?
Last night [16 April], pop singer Gloria Estefan, a powerful leader in the Cuban-American community, may have missed the chance to put the question to the President himself.
Obama was to visit the Miami Beach home of the Cuban-born Estefan and her husband, Emilio. The power couple, known supporters of all things Republican and staunch opponents of better relations with their homeland, seem to have undergone a political epiphany: hosting Obama at a $30,400-a-couple cocktail reception to raise funds for the Democratic National Committee. Call it the President's most successful bipartisan effort. At those prices what did the Estefans expect in return? According to Miami Herald columnist Myriam Marquez they expected "to get Obama's ear on Cuba."
"U.S. policy toward Cuba - flawed and failed as it is today - should reflect both the national interest of the country and the views of all Americans, not just the fortunate few," said Sarah Stephens, executive director of the Center for Democracy in the Americas. Yes, it should, except that the DNC is getting a nice chunk of change - $1 million some say - thanks to the songstress and her friends. Political campaigns are expensive and the 2012 presidential race is getting closer. As they say, money talks "What Obama did was to thank Estefan and her group of wealthy expatriates for a cool million dollars," said Miami radio commentator Francisco Aruca. "Yet conversations with Havana are continuing and Obama doesn't want to antagonize conservatives at this time."
Recently Gloria Estefan organized a well-attended march in Miami to protest human rights conditions in Cuba, something Obama probably likes. What he may not like - and may not know about - is that one of the marchers was Luis Posada Carriles, the man behind the 1976 bombing of Cubana Flight 455, that killed the 73 people onboard, including the whole Cuban national fencing team.
Recently Gloria Estefan organized a well-attended march in Miami to protest human rights conditions in Cuba, something Obama probably likes. What he may not like - and may not know about - is that one of the marchers was Luis Posada Carriles, the man behind the 1976 bombing of Cubana Flight 455, that killed the 73 people onboard, including the whole Cuban national fencing team.
"Posada Carriles continues to walk free, and the U.S. continues to list Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism," Stephens said. "And now that Luis Posada Carriles has marched with Ms. Estefan, Ms. Estefan is holding a fund-raiser for the President." Not good. What would have been good is for the Estefans to have used their 15 minutes with the President to ask him to end the cruel and hypocritical embargo. They missed the opportunity, though, and that is a shame.
After all, the secretary of state herself believes the blockade (as Cubans call it) is helping the communists next door.
Human Rights in Cuba and Honduras, 2010: The Spring of Discontent
Source: Cuba-L Analysis (Albuquerque)
In synthesis, the issue of the hunger strike of Orlando Zapata (which resulted in his suicide), and the hostilities faced by the Damas de Blanco over a three-week period in the spring of 2010 resulted in an unprecedented barrage of media coverage in the spring of 2010. The media campaign was ferocious, and clearly focused. Perhaps the most thoughtful response to it came from an unexpected source - Cardenal Jaime Ortega of Havana, who criticized the "media violence" and the "verbal war by the media in the United States, Spain and other countries".[15]
Sadly, these extremely clear violations of human rights in Honduras have been commonplace, though the media in North America have largely ignored them. A quantitative analysis of the media attention paid to the three issues studied here - the hunger strike of Zapata, the treatment of the Ladies in White over a 3-week period, and the killings and beatings accruing in Honduras in recent months - is telling.
To be sure, the severity or extent of these issues has not been accurately portrayed in the media. Moreover, not only is information sadly lacking in the case of Honduras, but it is also often presented in a superficial way. Noticeably, for example three of the articles presented in these major media outlets were identical, and simply listed Honduras among several countries including Mexico, Colombia, Pakistan, and Nigeria as dangerous places for journalists to work.[22] The others briefly state that UNESCO, Amnesty International and some Honduran human rights groups are concerned about the level of violence and abuses of human rights throughout the country, particularly of those who oppose the government. Of all of these articles found, only one CNN report explained in any detail the prevalence and ferocity of violence that Hondurans have been facing since the coup of June 2009.
By contrast, the Cuban government was incessantly vilified for "letting" Zapata die and articles were particularly emphatic about the government's restrictions on the Damas de Blanco and the "repression" of its people. Political and celebrity figures including President Obama, Gloria and Emilio Estefan, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Senator John Kerry have also been widely cited in denouncing the Cuban government's treatment of its people. By contrast one sees no celebrities or politicians being cited to condemn the dozens of assassinations at the hands of the security forces in Honduras - sadly a case of selective indignation.
In a strongly worded statement condemning the treatment received by the Ladies in White, and reflecting on the suicide of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, President Obama called for "an end to the repression" in Cuba. He added "I remain committed to supporting the simple desire of the Cuban people to freely determine their future and to enjoy the rights and freedoms that define the Americas ".[23] Clearly he was not referring to the situation the rights and freedoms in Honduras.
Can we imagine what the U.S. government would say, or do, if within a few months 7 journalists had been assassinated in Cuba? Or if dozens of government opponents had been murdered by the Cuban military during the same time frame? A useful comparison of official United States position on the human rights abuses in both countries can derived from statements made by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on these issues. She has repeatedly condemned the Cuban government for the treatment of Zapata and others, stating "They're letting these hunger strikers die. They've got 200 political prisoners who are there for trivial reasons. And so I think that many in the world are starting to see what we have seen a long time, which is a very intransigent, entrenched regime that has stifled opportunity for the Cuban people, and I hope will begin to change and we're open to changing with them, but I don't know that will happen before some more time goes by".[24]
By contrast, directly following the Honduran coup in 2009, she refused to refer to the political situation as such, nor condemn the violence and gross and repeated violation of human rights in that situation.[25] Rather, she later stated "we believe that President Lobo and his administration have taken the steps necessary to restore democracy".[26] It is lamentable that she has not been able to lay aside political preference in order to criticize manifest abuses in Honduras.
On May 3, 2010 ("World Press Freedom Day") Ms. Clinton issued a noteworthy statement noting that "Wherever independent media are under threat, accountable governance and human freedom are undermined". [27] She passionately defended journalists risking their lives to provide "independent information" on government abuses, and singled out the efforts of Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez, an outspoken critic of the Cuban government, noting that President Obama had also praised her efforts. She concluded by noting that the United States was committed to "defend freedom of expression and the brave journalists who are persecuted for exercising it". One looks in vain, however, for any reference by leading U.S. government officials to the Honduran journalists who were assassinated for doing just that.
Apparently their contribution is less important. Clearly there is a double standard at play; sadly, mainstream US media reflect that same double standard.
On April 29, following the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, the National Lawyers Guild of the United States issued a statement that was widely ignored by mainstream media. In fact there is apparently no analysis of its significance in any of the leading U.S. media. It is unfortunate because it puts in context the crux of this issue-media treatment of the suicide of one individual in Cuba after rejecting medical assistance for weeks, versus an ongoing process of assassination and brutality in Honduras, a traditional US ally. The NLG Executive Director Heidi Boghosian closes the release in the following way: "The National Lawyers Guild opposes infractions of human rights anywhere, but Cuban prison officials acted properly when Zapata decided to go on a hunger strike. We urge the media to turn its attention to real human rights violations and deadly foreign policies in this country and elsewhere".[28]
Well said.
NOTES:
[1] See Will Weissert's report for AP, "Cuba Frees Backer of Dissident Group Amid Appeal," May 11, 2010 and Mauricio Vicent, "El gobierno cubano se compromete con la Iglesia Católica a permitir las marchas de las Damas de Blanco," El País, May 2, 2010.
[2] The International Republican Institute, "Democracy's Heroes: Orlando Zapata Tamayo," April 28, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010.
[3] Juan O. Tamayo, "Jailed Cuban Activist Orlando Zapata Tamayo Dies on Hunger Strike," The Miami Herald, February 23, 2010.
[4] In the March 1, 2010, national nightly news report on Cuban television she was shown addressing Cuban medical personnel: "Well, thank you very much. we have full confidence. we can see your concern and that everything that is being done to save him". See "Orlando Zapata Tamayo, A Case of Political Manipulation, " Granma Internacional Digital, March 4, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. Further evidence is provided in the article to show the extraordinary lengths to which Cuban officials went - even having a kidney ready in case his failed. His mother is seen also stating "I was able to see the doctors who were there before I went in, and there were doctors from CIMEQ (Center for Medical Surgical Research), the best doctors, trying to save his life."
[5] One Cuban academic has noted that he was in jail for "breaching the peace, 'public damage,' resistance to authority, two charges of fraud, 'public exhibitionism,' repeated charges of felonious assault, and being illegally armed". See Michael Parenti and Alicia Jrapko, "Cuban Prisoners, Here and There," Monthly Review, April 15. 2010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. See also "Campaña mediática contra Cuba. Cronología de los hechos," La Jiribilla, April 4, 1010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 4, 2010. A detailed analysis of the Zapata case can also be found in Salim Lamrani, "The Suicide of Orlando Zapata Tamayo," March 18, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. The French academic makes a telling point, noting that in France between January 1, 2010 and February 24 a total of 22 suicides in prison, with 122 in French prisons (2009) and 115 (2008) - without any apparent media interest.
[6] Juan O. Tamayo, "Jailed Cuban Activist."
[7] See the editorial, "Is the Castro-friendly Cuba Policy Working?," The Washington Post, February 26, 2010.
[8] See White House Statement on Orlando Zapata Tamayo, March 24, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. Also see Philip J. Crowley, "Death of Cuban Dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo," Accessed May 13, 2010.
[9] Juan O. Tamayo, "United by Pain, Cuba's Ladies in White Vow to Keep Marching," Miami Herald, April 24, 2010, and the editorial "Women Who Brave Mobs," Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2010.
[10] A very different interpretation is given by Cuban academic Enrique Ubieta: "The Ladies in White are a movie montage. The right wing had learned to take left-wing formulas of expression such as the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina, authentic women struggling in memory of their children and grandchildren, tortured and murdered. In Cuba there are no tortured or assassinated prisoners. The people in prison were judged by courts, following our laws. So, they take the wives and mothers of people who worked to subvert the constitutional order [.] they dress them in white - a color associated with peace and purity - they hand them some gladioli and take them to a Catholic church, a perfect scenario for them to be seen in Europe. And when they are ready they say "Cameras! Action!" And that's where we see CNN, Spanish TV cameras. What you are seeing is a film that is a fiction, while on the street away from the action are the European and US diplomats - the producers of the film, who are the ones paying for the show". See Fernando Arrizado, "Enrique Ubieta: 'Las Damas de Blanco son un montaje escenográfico, '" Cubadebate, April 27, 2010. Found at http://www.cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 28, 2010. (Translation by authors).
[11] See "Cuba's 'Ladies in White' March Blocked Again," Washington Post, April 25, 2010 and Will Weissert´s report for Associated Press of the same day. Available at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 25, 2010.
[12] "Cuba's Brutality," The Miami Herald, March 19, 2010. The editorial concluded: "Only a concerted effort by democratic governments - from the left and the right - can show Raúl and Fidel Castro that their free ride of terror is coming to an end".
[13] In a recent interview leading Cuban academic Rafael Hernández quotes the Royal Academy of Spain dictionary to show that many of the opposition figures who receive financial support from U.S. government officials are in fact mercenaries. The context of U.S. enmity needs to be considered, since Washington broke relations with revolutionary Cuba in January 1961, and has supported a variety of policies designed to bring about "regime change" in Cuba. See Mauricio Vicent, "Mauricio Vicent entrevista a Rafael Hernández, director de la revista Temas," El País, April 9, 2010.
[14] See "United States Department of State. Congressional Notification Program: Western Hemisphere. Appropriation Category: Economic Support Funds. Project Title: Cuba. Intended 2010 Obligation: $20,000,000". Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 5, 2010.
[15] "The tragic event of the death of a prisoner as he was on a hunger strike has resulted in a verbal war by the media in the United States, Spain and other countries. This strong media campaign contributes to further exacerbating the crisis. It is a form of media violence to which the Cuban government responds in its own way". See "A Call for Dialogue: Interview with Cardinal Jaime Ortega, Archbishop of Havana". Originally published in Palabra Nueva, journal of the archdiocese of Havana on April 19, 2010, and subsequently translated and published in Progreso Weekly, May 4, 2010. Accessed May 16, 2010.
[16] "Honduras: Human Rights and the Coup d'Etat". Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. 2009. Retrieved 2 May, 2010.
[17] Canadian Council for International Co-operation, "Honduras: Democracy Denied. A Report from the CCIC's Americas Policy Group with recommendations to the Government of Canada," Ottawa, April 2010, p. 16.
[18] Council on Hemispheric Affairs, "Washington 's Invented Honduran Democracy," April 22, 2010. Accessed on May 12, 2010. On April 26, 2010 Amnesty International issued a statement: "Journalists in Honduras are at serious risk. Six journalists, all men, have been shot dead in the last eight weeks, and numerous others have received death threats. No one has been held to account and no action taken to support and protect journalists". See UA: 94/10, AI Index: AMR 37/006/2010, "Honduras: Journalists Killed".
[19] See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.cnn.com/.
[20] See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.cnn.com.
[21] See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.cnn.com.
[22] "Media Group: 17 Journalists Killed in April". The Washington Post. 28 April, 2010. Retrieved 6 May, 2010.
[23] See White House Statement on Orlando Zapata Tamayo, March 24, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010.
[24] Clinton, Hillary Rodham. "US State Department - Secy. Of State Clinton: On Nuclear Nonproliferation". Remarks on Nuclear Nonproliferation at the University of Louisville as Part of the McConnell Center's Spring Lecture Series. 9 April, 2010. Accessed 15 May, 2010; Weissert, Will. "Castro: Cuba Will Resist Hunger Strike 'Blackmail'". Associated Press. 4 April, 2010.
[25] Sheridan, Mary Beth. "U.S. Condemns Honduran Coup". The Washington Post. 30 June, 2009. Retrieved 6 May, 2010.
[26] Rothschild, Matthew. "Hillary Clinton's Honduran Disgrace." The Progressive. March 5, 2010. Retrieved 7 May, 2010.
[27] Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, "World Press Freedom Day," May 3, 1010. Document located at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed May 3, 2010.
[28] National Lawyers Guild, "NLG Urges U.S. Media to Cease Misrepresentation of Cuba 's Human Rights Record," April 29, 2010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 29, 2010.
Emily J. Kirk will be an M.A. student in Latin American Studies at Cambridge University in September. John Kirk is a professor of Latin American Studies at Dalhousie University, Canada. Both are working on a project on Cuban medical internationalism sponsored by Canada's Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Professor Kirk co-wrote with Michael Erisman the 2009 book "Cuba's Medical Internationalism: Origins, Evolution and Goals" (Palgrave Macmillan). He spent most of February and March in El Salvador and Guatemala, accompanying the Henry Reeve Brigade in El Salvador, and working with the Brigada Medica Cubana in Guatemala.
by Emily J. Kirk, Cambridge University and John M. Kirk, Dalhousie University, 19 May 2010.
The spring of 2010 has witnessed a plethora of articles in mainstream US media on the human rights situation in Cuba, largely surrounding three issues - the hunger strike (and eventual death) of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, that of Guillermo Fariñas (still alive at the time of writing), and a series of demonstrations by opponents of the government (and family members of prisoners) known as the Ladies in White.
The facts are clear in all cases. Zapata died on February 23 after 85 days of a hunger strike-the first Cuban to perish in this manner in almost 40 years. The following day Fariñas started his own strike at his home, and has been hospitalized since March 11, demanding the release of 26 allegedly ill political prisoners. The Ladies in White are a group that was formed in 2003 to protest the imprisonment of 75 opposition figures and sentenced to lengthy terms. Some 53 of that number remain in prison. The women have been leading demonstrations for 7 years, marching on Sundays down Fifth Avenue in the Miramar district of Havana. In early April, however, they were confronted by large pro-government demonstrations, and security forces intervened to protect them.
For three Sundays in a row these confrontations continued until Cardinal Jaime Ortega negotiated with government officials, with the result that the Ladies were allowed to march wherever they wanted, and without official permission to stage a demonstration (normally required by Cuban law). What was negotiated was a return to the status quo ante that had existed prior to the first week of December 2009. On May 2 a dozen Women in White renewed their traditional march. [1]
The case of Zapata received a tremendous amount of media attention, in part because it was the first time in decades that an opponent of the Cuban government had died during a hunger strike. He was arrested in 2003, charged with contempt and public disorder and given a prison sentence of 3 years. Subsequent acts of defiance in prison led to further charges being laid. He started his hunger strike on December 8, 2009, and died on February 23, 2010. He was widely presented as a person imprisoned for his human rights beliefs, summed up in a release by the International Republican Institute entitled "Democracy's Heroes: Orlando Zapata Tamayo".[2]
Emotional descriptions were given of his prison conditions and the punishments he had received. His back was "tattooed with blows," and when he was transferred to hospital he was "skin and bones, his stomach is just a hole," his mother noted.[3] Emotionally disturbed by the deliberate suicide of her son, she lashed out at the treatment received, calling his death "a premeditated murder" by the Cuban government. Her criticism of the lack of medical care provided was highlighted in media reports, when it was clear that just the opposite was true. In fact a video shown on Cuban television shows her expressing gratitude to the medical staff attending him.[4]
Vocal denunciations of the abuse of human rights in Cuba were sprinkled among the many articles dealing with Zapata. The term "prisoner of conscience" was liberally used to describe his plight, and he was presented as a political activist who was protesting inhuman treatment in prison. In the media rush to show him as a person imprisoned for his political beliefs, little attention was paid to his long criminal record, involving domestic violence (1993), possession of a weapon and assault, including the use of a machete to fracture the cranium of Leonardo Simón (2000), fraud (2000), and public disorder (2002).[5] In sum, the issue of his imprisonment is somewhat murkier than might at first appear.
Mainstream US media covered the events in great detail - with over 80 articles published in a 3-month period. Interviews with leading dissidents in Cuba, exile politicians, Miami groups opposed to the Cuban government, U.S. politicians, resulted, all praising the courage and honesty of Zapata. The opinion was given that the Cuban government was fearful that the death would lead to massive protests, and so "an increased police presence was reported in the streets of several Cuban cities".[6] In various press reports mention was made of major demonstrations of grief, and concern by the government resulting in extreme security measures being adapted.
The Obama approach to Cuba was also linked with the Zapata case, and anger was directed to both Cuba and the president. A common impression given is that the Obama administration has tried to pursue a more flexible approach to Cuba, but has been met with Cuban intransigence and hostility. One editorialist of The Washington Post used the suicide to condemn Obama´s policy - which was seen as being too liberal: "Is the new, Castro-friendly approach working? A good answer to that question came Tuesday, when Orlando Zapata Tamayo, a 42-year-old Afro-Cuban political prisoner, died after an 83-day hunger strike".[7]
The U.S. government has recently issued outspoken condemnations of the Cuban government's approach to human rights, with statements by Philip J. Crowley (Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Public Affairs) and even President Barack Obama. The president condemned the "repression visited upon Las Damas de Blanco, and the intensified harassment of those who dare to give voice to the desires of their fellow Cubans", while noting that "Cuban authorities continue to respond to the aspirations of the Cuban people with a clenched fist".[8] One searches in vain, however, for any references by the president to the clenched fist of the Honduran government and the appalling human rights record since the removal of President Zelaya in June of 2009.
In a related matter, it is clear that US media has provided an extremely sympathetic portrayal of the 'Ladies in White,' as can be seen from the titles of a recent article in the Miami Herald, "United by Pain, Cuba's Ladies in White Vow to Keep Marching," and an editorial in the Wall Street Journal, "Women Who Brave Mobs".[9] The terminology in the latter leaves little to the imagination, with references to the women "getting leaned on by Havana's toughs," "Castro's goons," "the regime's desperation in the face of popular discontent," and the Ladies in White "walking in the face of an increasingly dangerous mob".[10]
The attention given to the "Damas de Blanco"[11] has in many ways mirrored that given to the cases of Zapata and, to a lesser extent, Fariñas. The fact that they have been protesting for several years in Havana without any significant repression (or media coverage) would indicate that the recent extensive coverage is due to an unusual conjunctural set of circumstances.
In Miami a demonstration in favor of Cuban human rights activists was held on March 25 in which Cuban-American singer Gloria Estefan and her husband music producer Emilio [participated], together with exile singers Willy Chirino and Olga Guillot, while a few days later Cuban exile, the actor Andy García, participated in a march in Los Angeles to show his support for the Damas de Blanco.
It would appear that, for a variety of reasons, opposition groups to the Cuban government decided in the spring of 2010 to ramp up their activities - and the media jumped on the bandwagon and followed suit. It is also clear that, as the Cuban government responded, US media became increasingly critical in their presentation of the human rights situation.
Typical of the reaction was a pointed editorial in The Miami Herald: "In a democracy, people can disagree. They can march to protest their government, they can chastise their elected officials in public forums, they can walk down the street carrying placards voicing their opinions [.] Not in Cuba. Never in Cuba".[12]
This massive media campaign against marches taking place by an opposition group-some of whose members have admitted to having been paid by U.S. government officials - during a few weeks had never been seen before. Again it must be emphasized that these weekly marches have been going on for seven years, and without any major harassment from government officials. That fact is ignored almost completely by the media.[13]
What is also ignored in U.S. media analysis is the recent approval by Washington of some $20 million to promote political destabilization in Cuba, with funds being earmarked "to provide humanitarian support to prisoners of conscience and their families. Funds may also be used to support democratic rule of law programs that promote, protest and defend human rights in Cuba ". Other funds are earmarked "to provide humanitarian support to families of Cuban political prisoners". In all $20 million is to be made available.[14] This of course follows on from five decades of U.S. government hostility after Washington broke off diplomatic relations on January 3, 1961, maintains the "Trading with the Enemy" act, and over the decades has supported a variety of hostile acts (including terrorism) against Cuba.
In synthesis, the issue of the hunger strike of Orlando Zapata (which resulted in his suicide), and the hostilities faced by the Damas de Blanco over a three-week period in the spring of 2010 resulted in an unprecedented barrage of media coverage in the spring of 2010. The media campaign was ferocious, and clearly focused. Perhaps the most thoughtful response to it came from an unexpected source - Cardenal Jaime Ortega of Havana, who criticized the "media violence" and the "verbal war by the media in the United States, Spain and other countries".[15]
If one contrasts those facts with events in Honduras during approximately the same time, and if one analyzes the nature of media coverage of events there, a very different picture emerges. Most of those developments follow on from the circumstances surrounding the coup d´état of June 28, 2009, when the democratically elected president, Manuel Zelaya, was ousted. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights confirmed that several hundred arbitrary arrests and beatings of supporters of the overthrown Zelaya government by the armed forces and police occurred.
The list of abuses was long and detailed: "killings, an arbitrary declaration of a state of emergency, disproportionate use of force against public demonstrations, criminalization of public protest, arbitrary detention of thousands persons, cruel, inhumane and degrading treatments, poor detention conditions, militarization of Honduran territory, an increase in incidents of racial discrimination, violations of women's rights, severe and arbitrary restrictions on the right of freedom of expression, and serious violations of political rights".[16]
State repression on streets of Honduras.
In just the first hundred days after the coup, the Committee of the Families of the Detained and Disappeared of Honduras (COFADEH) documented 4,234 violations by the de facto government, including 21 extrajudicial killings, 3,033 illegal detentions, and 818 cases of violence.[17] It is clear that the numbers of victims was in fact much higher, but that many have not made public their treatment at the hands of security forces out of fear of reprisal. From June 2009 to February 2010, COFADEH documented 43 politically motivated murders. Particularly chilling is the fact that in the spring of 2010 some 7 journalists were assassinated.[18] Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned the widespread abuses, echoing the conclusions of the Organization of American States.
Walter Trochez, 25, well-known activist in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community murdered in Tegucigalpa, Honduras on 13 Dec 2009
Sadly, these extremely clear violations of human rights in Honduras have been commonplace, though the media in North America have largely ignored them. A quantitative analysis of the media attention paid to the three issues studied here - the hunger strike of Zapata, the treatment of the Ladies in White over a 3-week period, and the killings and beatings accruing in Honduras in recent months - is telling.
Table 1: Media Coverage of Three Human Rights-Related Topics
| News Agency | No. of Posts regarding 7 murdered journalists and human rights abuses in Honduras (29-June-2009-6-May-2010) [19] | No. of Posts regarding Cuba hunger strike (10-Feb-2010-06-May-2010) [20] | No. of Posts on Ladies in White (10-Feb-2010-06-May-2010) [21] |
| CNN | 2 | 7 | 7 |
| New York Times | 1 | 8 | 1 |
Washington Post | 1 | 13 | 5 |
| Boston Globe | 1 | 4 | 2 |
| Miami Herald | 1 | 55 | 46 |
| Total | 6 | 86 | 61 |
As the table above indicates, there have been a large number of articles on the hunger striker, and very little on the murdered journalists, and much less on the widespread human rights abuses in Honduras since the overthrow of President Zelaya. In fact, of the news agencies examined above, there are over 14 times more posts published on the hunger striker in Cuba, than that of the murders of journalists and human rights abuses in Honduras. As noted earlier, it is clear that there is an abundance of material to be studied for the latter - should the media be interested.
A qualitative analysis also indicates an unequal representation of both issues. While the articles describe the slow death of Zapata, a man who was charged with various federal crimes and chose to ignore medical assistance, there has been almost no explanation of the vast and overarching abuses suffered by the Honduran people - including dozens of murders and thousands of arbitrary arrests and beatings.To be sure, the severity or extent of these issues has not been accurately portrayed in the media. Moreover, not only is information sadly lacking in the case of Honduras, but it is also often presented in a superficial way. Noticeably, for example three of the articles presented in these major media outlets were identical, and simply listed Honduras among several countries including Mexico, Colombia, Pakistan, and Nigeria as dangerous places for journalists to work.[22] The others briefly state that UNESCO, Amnesty International and some Honduran human rights groups are concerned about the level of violence and abuses of human rights throughout the country, particularly of those who oppose the government. Of all of these articles found, only one CNN report explained in any detail the prevalence and ferocity of violence that Hondurans have been facing since the coup of June 2009.
By contrast, the Cuban government was incessantly vilified for "letting" Zapata die and articles were particularly emphatic about the government's restrictions on the Damas de Blanco and the "repression" of its people. Political and celebrity figures including President Obama, Gloria and Emilio Estefan, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Senator John Kerry have also been widely cited in denouncing the Cuban government's treatment of its people. By contrast one sees no celebrities or politicians being cited to condemn the dozens of assassinations at the hands of the security forces in Honduras - sadly a case of selective indignation.
In a strongly worded statement condemning the treatment received by the Ladies in White, and reflecting on the suicide of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, President Obama called for "an end to the repression" in Cuba. He added "I remain committed to supporting the simple desire of the Cuban people to freely determine their future and to enjoy the rights and freedoms that define the Americas ".[23] Clearly he was not referring to the situation the rights and freedoms in Honduras.
Can we imagine what the U.S. government would say, or do, if within a few months 7 journalists had been assassinated in Cuba? Or if dozens of government opponents had been murdered by the Cuban military during the same time frame? A useful comparison of official United States position on the human rights abuses in both countries can derived from statements made by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on these issues. She has repeatedly condemned the Cuban government for the treatment of Zapata and others, stating "They're letting these hunger strikers die. They've got 200 political prisoners who are there for trivial reasons. And so I think that many in the world are starting to see what we have seen a long time, which is a very intransigent, entrenched regime that has stifled opportunity for the Cuban people, and I hope will begin to change and we're open to changing with them, but I don't know that will happen before some more time goes by".[24]
By contrast, directly following the Honduran coup in 2009, she refused to refer to the political situation as such, nor condemn the violence and gross and repeated violation of human rights in that situation.[25] Rather, she later stated "we believe that President Lobo and his administration have taken the steps necessary to restore democracy".[26] It is lamentable that she has not been able to lay aside political preference in order to criticize manifest abuses in Honduras.
On May 3, 2010 ("World Press Freedom Day") Ms. Clinton issued a noteworthy statement noting that "Wherever independent media are under threat, accountable governance and human freedom are undermined". [27] She passionately defended journalists risking their lives to provide "independent information" on government abuses, and singled out the efforts of Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez, an outspoken critic of the Cuban government, noting that President Obama had also praised her efforts. She concluded by noting that the United States was committed to "defend freedom of expression and the brave journalists who are persecuted for exercising it". One looks in vain, however, for any reference by leading U.S. government officials to the Honduran journalists who were assassinated for doing just that.
Apparently their contribution is less important. Clearly there is a double standard at play; sadly, mainstream US media reflect that same double standard.
On April 29, following the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, the National Lawyers Guild of the United States issued a statement that was widely ignored by mainstream media. In fact there is apparently no analysis of its significance in any of the leading U.S. media. It is unfortunate because it puts in context the crux of this issue-media treatment of the suicide of one individual in Cuba after rejecting medical assistance for weeks, versus an ongoing process of assassination and brutality in Honduras, a traditional US ally. The NLG Executive Director Heidi Boghosian closes the release in the following way: "The National Lawyers Guild opposes infractions of human rights anywhere, but Cuban prison officials acted properly when Zapata decided to go on a hunger strike. We urge the media to turn its attention to real human rights violations and deadly foreign policies in this country and elsewhere".[28]
Well said.
NOTES:
[1] See Will Weissert's report for AP, "Cuba Frees Backer of Dissident Group Amid Appeal," May 11, 2010 and Mauricio Vicent, "El gobierno cubano se compromete con la Iglesia Católica a permitir las marchas de las Damas de Blanco," El País, May 2, 2010.
[2] The International Republican Institute, "Democracy's Heroes: Orlando Zapata Tamayo," April 28, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010.
[3] Juan O. Tamayo, "Jailed Cuban Activist Orlando Zapata Tamayo Dies on Hunger Strike," The Miami Herald, February 23, 2010.
[4] In the March 1, 2010, national nightly news report on Cuban television she was shown addressing Cuban medical personnel: "Well, thank you very much. we have full confidence. we can see your concern and that everything that is being done to save him". See "Orlando Zapata Tamayo, A Case of Political Manipulation, " Granma Internacional Digital, March 4, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. Further evidence is provided in the article to show the extraordinary lengths to which Cuban officials went - even having a kidney ready in case his failed. His mother is seen also stating "I was able to see the doctors who were there before I went in, and there were doctors from CIMEQ (Center for Medical Surgical Research), the best doctors, trying to save his life."
[5] One Cuban academic has noted that he was in jail for "breaching the peace, 'public damage,' resistance to authority, two charges of fraud, 'public exhibitionism,' repeated charges of felonious assault, and being illegally armed". See Michael Parenti and Alicia Jrapko, "Cuban Prisoners, Here and There," Monthly Review, April 15. 2010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. See also "Campaña mediática contra Cuba. Cronología de los hechos," La Jiribilla, April 4, 1010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 4, 2010. A detailed analysis of the Zapata case can also be found in Salim Lamrani, "The Suicide of Orlando Zapata Tamayo," March 18, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. The French academic makes a telling point, noting that in France between January 1, 2010 and February 24 a total of 22 suicides in prison, with 122 in French prisons (2009) and 115 (2008) - without any apparent media interest.
[6] Juan O. Tamayo, "Jailed Cuban Activist."
[7] See the editorial, "Is the Castro-friendly Cuba Policy Working?," The Washington Post, February 26, 2010.
[8] See White House Statement on Orlando Zapata Tamayo, March 24, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010. Also see Philip J. Crowley, "Death of Cuban Dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo," Accessed May 13, 2010.
[9] Juan O. Tamayo, "United by Pain, Cuba's Ladies in White Vow to Keep Marching," Miami Herald, April 24, 2010, and the editorial "Women Who Brave Mobs," Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2010.
[10] A very different interpretation is given by Cuban academic Enrique Ubieta: "The Ladies in White are a movie montage. The right wing had learned to take left-wing formulas of expression such as the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina, authentic women struggling in memory of their children and grandchildren, tortured and murdered. In Cuba there are no tortured or assassinated prisoners. The people in prison were judged by courts, following our laws. So, they take the wives and mothers of people who worked to subvert the constitutional order [.] they dress them in white - a color associated with peace and purity - they hand them some gladioli and take them to a Catholic church, a perfect scenario for them to be seen in Europe. And when they are ready they say "Cameras! Action!" And that's where we see CNN, Spanish TV cameras. What you are seeing is a film that is a fiction, while on the street away from the action are the European and US diplomats - the producers of the film, who are the ones paying for the show". See Fernando Arrizado, "Enrique Ubieta: 'Las Damas de Blanco son un montaje escenográfico, '" Cubadebate, April 27, 2010. Found at http://www.cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 28, 2010. (Translation by authors).
[11] See "Cuba's 'Ladies in White' March Blocked Again," Washington Post, April 25, 2010 and Will Weissert´s report for Associated Press of the same day. Available at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 25, 2010.
[12] "Cuba's Brutality," The Miami Herald, March 19, 2010. The editorial concluded: "Only a concerted effort by democratic governments - from the left and the right - can show Raúl and Fidel Castro that their free ride of terror is coming to an end".
[13] In a recent interview leading Cuban academic Rafael Hernández quotes the Royal Academy of Spain dictionary to show that many of the opposition figures who receive financial support from U.S. government officials are in fact mercenaries. The context of U.S. enmity needs to be considered, since Washington broke relations with revolutionary Cuba in January 1961, and has supported a variety of policies designed to bring about "regime change" in Cuba. See Mauricio Vicent, "Mauricio Vicent entrevista a Rafael Hernández, director de la revista Temas," El País, April 9, 2010.
[14] See "United States Department of State. Congressional Notification Program: Western Hemisphere. Appropriation Category: Economic Support Funds. Project Title: Cuba. Intended 2010 Obligation: $20,000,000". Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 5, 2010.
[15] "The tragic event of the death of a prisoner as he was on a hunger strike has resulted in a verbal war by the media in the United States, Spain and other countries. This strong media campaign contributes to further exacerbating the crisis. It is a form of media violence to which the Cuban government responds in its own way". See "A Call for Dialogue: Interview with Cardinal Jaime Ortega, Archbishop of Havana". Originally published in Palabra Nueva, journal of the archdiocese of Havana on April 19, 2010, and subsequently translated and published in Progreso Weekly, May 4, 2010. Accessed May 16, 2010.
[16] "Honduras: Human Rights and the Coup d'Etat". Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. 2009. Retrieved 2 May, 2010.
[17] Canadian Council for International Co-operation, "Honduras: Democracy Denied. A Report from the CCIC's Americas Policy Group with recommendations to the Government of Canada," Ottawa, April 2010, p. 16.
[18] Council on Hemispheric Affairs, "Washington 's Invented Honduran Democracy," April 22, 2010. Accessed on May 12, 2010. On April 26, 2010 Amnesty International issued a statement: "Journalists in Honduras are at serious risk. Six journalists, all men, have been shot dead in the last eight weeks, and numerous others have received death threats. No one has been held to account and no action taken to support and protect journalists". See UA: 94/10, AI Index: AMR 37/006/2010, "Honduras: Journalists Killed".
[19] See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "murdered journalists, human rights abuses, Honduras". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.cnn.com/.
[20] See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "Hunger Strike, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.cnn.com.
[21] See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.miamiherald.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.boston.com. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from http://www.nytimes.com/. See search results for "Ladies in White, Cuba". Retrieved 6 May, 2010 from www.cnn.com.
[22] "Media Group: 17 Journalists Killed in April". The Washington Post. 28 April, 2010. Retrieved 6 May, 2010.
[23] See White House Statement on Orlando Zapata Tamayo, March 24, 2010. Accessed May 13, 2010.
[24] Clinton, Hillary Rodham. "US State Department - Secy. Of State Clinton: On Nuclear Nonproliferation". Remarks on Nuclear Nonproliferation at the University of Louisville as Part of the McConnell Center's Spring Lecture Series. 9 April, 2010. Accessed 15 May, 2010; Weissert, Will. "Castro: Cuba Will Resist Hunger Strike 'Blackmail'". Associated Press. 4 April, 2010.
[25] Sheridan, Mary Beth. "U.S. Condemns Honduran Coup". The Washington Post. 30 June, 2009. Retrieved 6 May, 2010.
[26] Rothschild, Matthew. "Hillary Clinton's Honduran Disgrace." The Progressive. March 5, 2010. Retrieved 7 May, 2010.
[27] Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, "World Press Freedom Day," May 3, 1010. Document located at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed May 3, 2010.
[28] National Lawyers Guild, "NLG Urges U.S. Media to Cease Misrepresentation of Cuba 's Human Rights Record," April 29, 2010. Found at http://cuba-l.unm.edu/. Accessed April 29, 2010.
Emily J. Kirk will be an M.A. student in Latin American Studies at Cambridge University in September. John Kirk is a professor of Latin American Studies at Dalhousie University, Canada. Both are working on a project on Cuban medical internationalism sponsored by Canada's Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Professor Kirk co-wrote with Michael Erisman the 2009 book "Cuba's Medical Internationalism: Origins, Evolution and Goals" (Palgrave Macmillan). He spent most of February and March in El Salvador and Guatemala, accompanying the Henry Reeve Brigade in El Salvador, and working with the Brigada Medica Cubana in Guatemala.
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