We were not summoned

To our readers and listeners

By Manuel Alberto Ramy

HAVANA, 30 July – (Radio Progreso Alternativa) – The thousands of listeners of Radio Progreso Alternativa and readers of Progreso Weekly, RPA’s version on the Web, may be surprised by the fact that our publication did not cover the just-ended press conference given by the Foreign Ministry on the subject of the tragic traffic accident that took the lives of Cuban citizens Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, an opposition leader, and Harold Cepero, also an opponent of the Cuban government.

The survivors, the Spaniard Ángel Carromero, under-secretary general of New Generations of the Spanish Popular Party, who drove the car, and Jens Aron Modig, leader of the Christian Democratic Youth League of Sweden, who sat next to Carromero in the car, made statements today. I do not know if they appeared in person or on video recordings.

This morning the International Press Center, an arm of the Cuban Foreign Ministry (MINREX) summoned to the press conference a select number of foreign correspondents, all of them powerful and capable of setting primary standards and criteria. All were taken to the place where the briefing was held.

Radio Progreso Alternativa was not invited, and that’s the reason why we’re unable to report on statements made or actions taken during that gathering, a journalistic task that we have often performed faster than many other news outlets.

We regret this situation, which prevented us from doing our job and presenting it to the listeners and readers who follow us, mainly in the state of Florida, and we hope you’ll understand the absence of information on this subject.

Our readers may gain information from the media outlets that attended said gathering.

Manuel Alberto Ramy is Progreso Weekly’s chief correspondent in Havana.