Posts from — August 2008

A street covered by electrical posts and cables after Hurricane Gustav. (Photo: AP)

Via AP:

Gustav howled into Cuba’s tobacco-growing western tip as a catastrophic Category 4 hurricane on Saturday while both Cubans and Americans on the Gulf Coast scrambled to flee the path of the fast-growing storm.

Forecasters said Gustav was just short of becoming a top-scale Category 5 hurricane as it hit Cuba’s mainland after passing over its Isla de la Juventud province, where screaming 150 mph winds toppled telephone poles, mango and almond trees and peeled back the tin roofs of homes.

Isla de la Juventud civil defense chief Ana Isla said there were “many people injured,” but no reports of deaths. She said nearly all its roads were washed out and that some regions were heavily flooded.

“It’s been very difficult here,” she said on state television.

Authorities evacuated at least 300,000 people across Cuba, including western communities, cities near Havana and on the Isla de la Juventud, or Isle of Youth, an island of 87,000 people south of mainland Cuba.

[...]

Cuba’s top meteorologist, Jose Rubiera, said the hurricane’s massive center made landfall in mainland Cuba near the community of Los Palacios in Pinar del Rio - a region that produces much of the tobacco used to make Cuba’s famed cigars.

There, the storm knocked down power lines, shattered windows and blew the roofs off some small homes.

Rubiera said the storm brought hurricane-force winds to much of the western part of Havana, where power was knocked out as winds blasted sheets of rain sideways though the streets and whipped angry waves against the famed seaside Malecón boulevard.

Felled tree branches and large chunks of muddy earth littered roads that were largely deserted overnight.

Cuba grounded all domestic flights and halted all buses and trains to and from Havana, where some shuttered stores had hand-scrawled “closed for evacuation” signs plastered to their doors.

Authorities boarded up banks, restaurants and hotels, and residents nailed bits of plywood to the windows and doors of their houses and apartments.

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The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Country Risk Service publishes regular ratings on 120 sovereigns. The ratings for emerging markets are updated monthly while those for most developed countries are updated bi-annually. The sovereign rating measures the risk of a build-up in arrears of principal and/or interest on foreign- and/or local-currency debt that is the direct obligation of the sovereign or guaranteed by the sovereign.

Cuba’s rating:

Month: Jul-08 Rating: CCC Outlook: Stable

CCC = Questionable capacity and commitment to honour obligations.  Patchy payment record.

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A possible recovery of Cuba’s sugar industry through foreign investment is discussed in the following report from IPS:

Foreign direct investment in the sugar industry is acceptable to the Cuban government for producing alcohol and other derivatives, but it continues to be a topic that the authorities prefer not to talk about, at least in public, although experts regard it as desirable for the recovery of the industry.

At present there are seven joint ventures involving capital from Spain, Italy, Canada and Mexico, all of which concentrate on the diversification of the sugar industry, Liobel Pérez, the Sugar Ministry’s chief communications officer, told IPS.

Pérez said six of the joint ventures between Cuban and foreign capital are based in this Caribbean island nation, and one is based in Mexico, where it markets technological expertise and technical assistance for optimising sustainable sugar production.

Discreet approaches made some two years ago by foreign companies interested in investing in sugar production did not prosper. “Conversations were held, but they did not produce concrete results,” Deputy Minister Juan Godefoy of the Sugar Ministry responded to an enquiry by IPS, without elaborating. [Read more →]

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International campaign to Free Gorki

Gorki Águila, outspoken lead singer of the Cuban punk band Porno para Ricardo was arrested by the Cuban government on Monday facing charges of dangerousness.

Cuban law defines “social dangerousness” as behavior contrary to “communist morality,” and the police use it to detain offenders before they have a chance to commit a crime.

He faces four years in prison.

His trial is set for Friday at 9am at the Playa Municipal Tribunal, and an international campaign has been launched to secure his freedom.

An open letter to Pablo Milanes and other Cuban musicians has been sent by Penultimos Dias.

Spanish musicians Miguel Bosé y Alejandro Sanz have also added their signatures to the open letter and support for Gorki.

Further updates are available on the band’s web site, Cuba Underground and Penultimos Dias.

Update: A concert was held tonight in Anti-Imperialist Plaza in the Malecon featuring Pablo Milanes in which supporters of Gorki Águila voiced loudly their support for the singer’s freedom. Among the supporters were Porno para Ricardo band members Ciro (guitarist) and Hebert (bassist) as well as the band’s friends along with well-known Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez. They held up signs demanding the release of Gorki, according to Renay Kayrus, the band’s drummer who witnessed the event. Kayrus further added the concert rained chaos at first, then a battle ensued. Cuban state security, comprised of police and paramilitary units, descended on protesters and beat them without compassion causing a massive stampede amongst protesters and concert goers.

Yoani Sánchez had a telephone coversation with Penultimos Dias over her experience of the event.  According to Yoani’s calculation, for every five concert goer, three were part of the repressive force. Upon lifting a sign with Gorki’s name by supporters, instantly a circle of extreme violence was created in which civil police and those dressed in green beat women and men around the sign.

Update 2: Gorki’s trial has been moved to the afternoon, according to Black Sheep of Exile. He is in the detainee area of the tribunal and his defense attorney hasn’t received the case file. Furthermore, Amnesty International has taken up Gorki’s case.

Gorki Aguila is escorted by police officers upon arrival for his trial. Photo: AP

Update 3: The trial began at 5:30pm Havana time.

Update 4: Per Penultimos Dias, Gorki was freed and fined 600 Cuban pesos. He was accused of “disobedience” instead of “dangerousness”.

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Senator Joe Biden’s (D-Deleware), Democrat VP candidate, background on Latin America is examined by the Americas Society, and his Cuba policy is noted:

The issue of U.S. policy toward Cuba has served as a source of debate between Obama and presumptive Republican candidate John McCain. On this matter, Biden has demonstrated support for the U.S. embargo against Cuba and voted in favor of the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, which opened the door to suing foreign companies that benefit from confiscated American property in Cuba. Following the resignation of longtime Cuban leader Fidel Castro, the senator from Delaware proposed easing restrictions on travel and remittances from the United States, establishing direct mail, and supporting the creation of small businesses in the island without relaxing the embargo.

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Word cloud for CUBAPOLIDATA

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