Search Results for: Haroldo Dilla

When I heard that passports were going to be given to some opposition figures who had described the island as a prison, and later when a friend told me how easy it was for doctors to get permission to travel, I went back to my computer to read what I had been written on the subject since the Cuban president announced immigration reform.

Yesterday there were general elections in Cuba. Even without knowing the outcome, I think there was something interesting in them that we should pay attention to and that indicates the erosion of Cuba’s totalitarian system.

It’s not that Jose Marti was any kind of saint, but everyone agrees that he was a decent and upright person, which to me means a lot. He was a convinced democrat, but after almost 120 years since his death, he’s unable to protest or vomit. He has no choice but to swallow in silence before those tributes and admirers.

Enacted in 1966 and officially known in Cuba as the Ley Asesina (the murderous law), the Cuban Adjustment Act has been traditionally blamed for encouraging Cubans to risk their lives sailing across the Straits of Florida to reach US shores.

The recent immigration reforms enacted by the Cuban government were greeted with joy by intellectuals, foreign governments and international organizations. Now I I invite those doing the cheering to take a moment and pay attention to the case of Rosa Maria Paya.

Alan Gross should be released soon and unilaterally. Not because he’s innocent or because he’s some martyr of democracy, because obviously he’s not. His case involves an agent employed by a hostile foreign government to engage in illegal operations in Cuba.

The resulting impact on Cuba is predictable. Whatever the post-Chavez outcome in Venezuela, Raul Castro will have to expect worse conditions than those that are currently maintaining him in power and will have to obtain some access to the US market, accepting the condescending gesture from Obama.

Miami is undoubtedly a highly emotional issue for Cubans: Some because they love it, others because they hate it and to quite a few who simply fear it.

Almost two decades later, Jan Nijman didn’t hesitate in dubbing it the “Mistress of the Americas” and presenting his arguments about this new global city, which has never been relevant on a national level, and which owes its importance to its ability to coordinate hemispheric flows of everything that moves (goods, services, capital, people and cocaine).

The European Union — like the United States — has allies and half-friends with whom I’d avoid sharing a coffee. This is because they either have oil (the Saudi case), or because they are key geopolitical pieces (the Israeli case), or simply because they’re creditors (the in the case of China; which has no embargo or Common Position, not even the slightest bit of displeasure is shown).