Cuba to sign UN conventions
Cuban
Radar Read Spanish Version
Cuba
to sign UN conventions
A
service by the Radio Progreso Alternativa Havana Bureau
In
a Dec. 10 press conference, Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez
Roque announced that the island will “soon” sign the
International Agreement on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and
the International Agreement on Civil and Political Rights.
"The
decision attests to the fact that our country will always have a
close cooperation with the United Nations’ system, on the basis of
the right to our national sovereignty and the right of the Cuban
people to free determination,” Minister Pérez Roque said.
In
a clear reference to the situation caused by the U.S. at the former
UN Human Rights Commission, Pérez Roque added that Cuba does
not bend to impositions of any kind, and that the government decided
to sign now because the present Human Rights Council, which
substituted the extinct Commission, had acted to end the
discriminatory tactics against Cuba and Third World countries
advocated by the U.S. and its unconditional allies.
The
subjects contained in the documents that Havana will adhere to
include, among other things, the rights to freedom of association,
residence, speech and peaceful meeting. The issue has caught the
attention of diplomats on the island.
Susan
McDade, UN coordinator in Cuba, said that Cuba’s action on the
matter is “quite a significant signal.”
Observers
noted that the signing of the agreements is part of the delicate and
sometimes imperceptible process of change occurring in Cuba which
should be speeded up next year.
Demonstration
broken up
Around
11 a.m. on Monday, December 10, a demonstration of some 14 dissidents
was broken up by government supporters.
Physician
Darsy Ferrer had called for a protest in a park at Calzada Street in
the El Vedado neighborhood, across the street from the Cuban seat of
UNESCO. The protest was in relation to the commemoration of
International Human Rights Day.
Since
early morning, government supporters were waiting close to the park.
Meanwhile, the police detained some of the protesters.
At
the park, the few remaining demonstrators were called “mercenaries”
and “traitors” by government followers and were violently
expelled from the area.
Manuel
del Valle, a Spanish citizen who participated in the protest, was
detained by the police and whisked away in a car. Shortly thereafter,
del Valle was freed together with Cubans Fidel Mojena and José
Rodríguez.
This
is the third public demonstration by dissidents in less than a week.
The first was on December 4 at the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba.
The second took place on Sunday, December 9, when the Ladies in White
called for the freedom of their relatives at the doors of the
National Assembly of Popular Power (Cuban parliament).
New
provocations
The
official newspaper Granma
in its
December 11 edition accuses the Bush administration of fostering “new
provocations against the dignity of the Cuban people.”
Under
the title “New Provocations by the U.S. Government,” the article
claims that the dissidence’s latest demonstrations, such as the one
by the Ladies in White in front of the National Assembly of Popular
Power, and the protest in at El Vedado park on (December) the 10th,
are promoted by the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.
"Throughout
the year, Interest Section officials have had over 300 contacts of
different kinds in order to insure the submission of mercenary
elements,” says the article. A box shows a photo of a group of
dissidents outside the home of an Interest Section official.
In
reference to the photo, the article reports that “Hours after the
latest incident (December 10), the connivance between Washington and
its lackeys on the island was shamelessly obvious. About 60
mercenaries flocked obligingly to the home of one of the Interest
Section officials, at 7th
on 24th
Streets, Miramar, to pick up their invitations and board the vehicles
that took them to the residence of Michael Parmly, chief of the U.S.
mission. Once there, they were warmly feted for their services and
Parmly encouraged them to persevere in their servile and
annexationist attitudes.”
Oil
production
close to 1 million tons in central Cuba
Reynaldo
Ruíz, general manager of the Oil Drilling and Extraction
Enterprise in Central Cuba announced that on Monday, December 10, his
organization reached 948,755 tons of crude oil. The figure meets the
enterprise’s yearly expectation for the entity that operates in
that region of the island.
Ruiz
said the 1 million tons will be produced before the end the year.
Guilty
of damaging
public property
The
official daily Granma reported Wednesday, December 12, that the San
Miguel del Padrón Municipal Court, a suburb of Havana, handed
down a 4 year sentence for vandalism against Roylan F Alcalá.
Alcalá
threw a rock that shattered a glass section of a public bus’ middle
door because he was unable to get on it, causing the loss of several
trips by the public transport.
In
the past weeks the courts have tried and sentenced numerous people
for similar actions.
