Cuba issues report to the United Nations General Assembly
Cuban
Radar Read Spanish Version
Cuba
issues report to the United Nations General Assembly
A
Service by the Radio Progreso Alternativa Havana Bureau
The
effects of the blockade imposed by U.S. administrations on Cuba have
reached the $89 billion figure.
During
a press conference held on Tuesday, September 18, Cuba’s Felipe
Perez Roque presented the Cuban study to journalists reported to the
UN General Assembly which will be held in October.
The
document titled “The need to put an end to the economic, commercial
and financial blockade imposed by the U.S. on the people of Cuba,”
compiles the effects of the blockade over the past year, which rose
to 1.3 billion U.S. dollars. Among the things that have caused this
upward movement, Perez Roque said, among others, is the search for
distant markets, the so-called Cuba risk and the expensive banking
transactions. The report also points at the prohibition that the
country use the dollar and the stealing of national brands.
More
than 30 countries reported being affected, penalties, threats,
notifications, among them Germany, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Great
Britain, Sweden, Spain, Japan, Norway, Switzerland, and others.
Complaints came from institutions and persons.
Tribute
to Noel Nicola
On
September 17 a tribute on behalf of Noel Nicola was held. The
musicians who died a little over two years ago, was a founder of the
Nueva Trova and an icon of Cuban popular music.
At
Casa de las Américas, singer/songwriter Silvio Rodríguez
presented an album with 37 of Nicola’s most significant songs by
great performers from Cuba and abroad. Considered a guitar virtuoso,
and with a special sensitivities, Nicola was, together with Silvio
Rodríguez and Pablo Milanés, one of the three
cornerstones of the new song on the island.
The
album, under the general production of Rodríguez and co-edited
by Ojalá and the Spanish SGAE (General Society of Authors and
Editors), had the collaboration of well known performers from Cuba,
Argentina, Peru, Spain, Venezuela and Uruguay.
The
album notes were written by Germán Piniella (who is assistant
editor of Progreso Weekly), a close friend of Nicola for 40 years and
producer of his first recording in the 70s.
Silvio
offered a vivid portrayal of Noel from their mutual experience in
performances, projects and trips together, and revealed how Noel,
already stricken by cancer, chose the first 20 songs in the album.
There
is water in the reservoirs
The
Island’s water reservoirs are at 83% of capacity, something that
has not happened since 1993.
In
its September 13 edition, Granma
reported that 10 of the country’s 15 regions “had rainfall over
100%, while the remaining five (La Habana, Havana City, Matanzas,
Granma and Santiago de Cuba) reported 89 to 98%, in respect to the
average recorded from January to August of the present year.”
For
years the island has been severely affected by drought which caused
damage to agriculture and animal breeding, as well as significantly
decreasing water supply to many towns. Now the situation has been
reversed.
Isle
of Youth and the ophthalmologic program
Until
now, 36,000 people from the Isle of Youth, south of Havana, have been
treated through the national ophthalmologic plan.
A
report by the National Information Agency (AIN) mentions the case of
102 year old Miguel Lamorú Linaza, who had a “total cataract
in his right eye and an irreversible lesion in the cornea of his left
eye.”
Lamorú
"was the 37th patient to be implanted with an intraocular lens”,
after extracting the damaged crystalline with the novel Blumenthal
technique.
Since
April 31, the ophthalmologic plan has been carrying out a complete
survey among the population at the Isle of Youth over 5 years old in
order to detect several eye diseases. According to AIN, up to
September 10,440 people had been surgically treated for several eye
affections.
Who
keeps families apart?
Reverend
Joan Campbell, a U.S. pastor, has written a letter to Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice in defense of Olga Salanueva and Adriana
Pérez, married to René González and Gerardo
Hernández, two of the Cuban Five who are serving jail
sentences for infiltrating terrorist groups in South Florida.
Both
women have applied for visas to visit their respective husbands in
prison, but the State Department has denied them for the eighth
consecutive occasion.
According
to Reverend Campbell, “as a pastor and as a person that has
personally met Olga and Adriana” they “are not women whose
objective is to overthrow the U.S. government or threaten our
freedom. Their concern is much more profound and personal. They love
their husbands and wish to visit them.”
The
letter, which has been printed by Cuban national media, exhorts the
U.S. Secretary of State to “opt for a humane way and allow these
women to visit their husbands”. Campbell also stated her
willingness to accompany both wives.
She
believes that “our continuous denial of that application is cruel
and politically motivated, not by concerns for our national
security”.
