Translating Cuba – English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island

Mourning for the Death of Ramiro Valdés Delayed San Juan Celebrations in Matanzas by One Day

Residents took part in a ritual that perfectly reflects the desire of all Cubans: to burn the old and make way for the new.

The effigy burned beside the river, following tradition. / 14ymedio

14ymedio, Matanzas, Pablo Padilla Cruz, June 26, 2026 — The official mourning period decreed following the death of General Ramiro Valdés postponed the traditional burning of the San Juan effigy in the Pueblo Nuevo neighborhood of Matanzas. The population, exhausted by the lack of electricity and water, the heat, and the mosquitoes, had eagerly awaited a few hours of escape from their grim daily reality and the chance to celebrate one of the festivities that best represents the longing of all Cubans: to burn the old and make way for the new.

“I’ve lived here for 65 years, and the burning of the effigy is a ritual that had disappeared but was revived years ago,” says Ania, a resident of the Callejón de las Tradiciones. “I’m the first to say these aren’t times for celebration, but these little moments are what make everyone equal: the person who has food and the one who doesn’t, the person who has solar panels to watch television during blackouts and the one who doesn’t. People deserve to forget how hard life is,” she argues.

The debate is out in the streets. Not everyone feels like celebrating, and many believe this is more a time for anger than rituals, but Ania sees no contradiction. “Still, one day people may decide to demand what they deserve, but just because they dance a little, even if afterward they don’t have water in their homes, you can’t force them to do what others think is right,” she insists.

Callejón de las Tradiciones, where the San Juan Day procession passes. / 14ymedio

“There isn’t much time for celebrating,” laments Yudania, another resident passing through the Alley, where the procession begins. The San Juan celebration originates in European pagan rites marking the summer solstice, which welcomed the warmth and, with it, good harvests after the cold winter. Fire was used for two reasons: it was believed to strengthen the sun and to purify, driving away evil spirits.

Today, Yudania needs fire for something else. “While some people enjoy themselves, I had to go get charcoal, and now I have to light it to cook. That doesn’t mean I’m against the tradition. It’s just that every year we ask for bad things to leave, but everything gets worse,” she laments. “Fortunately, we have our health, and that’s important. Everything else has to improve someday,” she concludes as she heads home carrying a bag of charcoal in her hands.

In Matanzas, where the pagan celebration later Christianized and blended with local culture, the ritual consists of making an effigy symbolizing all the bad things accumulated during the year. At nightfall, residents carry it in procession to the riverbank and set it ablaze in an act of collective purification: a bonfire in which everyday frustrations are burned with the hope that the flames will clear the way for renewal, health, and prosperity.

Along Calzada de Tirry, toward the riverbanks, walks Antonio, an elderly teacher who has spent more than twenty years waiting for a Cuban perestroika and has grown tired of celebrating. “I don’t go many places anymore, not even to the nearby danzón dances, much less to burn an effigy,” he comments.

The debate over whether it was time for celebration was out in the streets. / 14ymedio

“I have nothing against the celebration, but I became disillusioned with the divine a long time ago, although I’m not going to judge anyone. Yesterday I was one of those people dancing to the beat of the conga procession, and although I knew what should be asked of the effigy, I let it pass, just like my generation and the one that came after it. Now it’s up to you to decide what to do: stay beside the conga or bring it to a halt,” he says with an obvious double meaning.

On the night of the 24th, because of the general, the effigy was burned while residents recited:

Fire of San Juan, drive away all evil.

Fire of San Juan, take away all negativity.

Fire of San Juan, bring health and prosperity.

So it is and so it shall be.

Ania smiles when asked what she wishes for.

“I’m sure it’s the same thing you wish for, but instead of saying it aloud, let’s ask San Juan for it. Next year we’ll see whether he listened to us.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Havana: When the Water Comes, the Waste Begins

After several days without service, some Havana households leave their faucets running, while neighboring districts depend on sporadic water trucks

In a street in Guanabacoa, Havana, several children were spraying each other with jets of water this Wednesday. / 14ymedio

14ymedio, Havana, Dario Hernandez, June 25, 2026 / In a street in Guanabacoa, Havana, several children were spraying each other with jets of water this Wednesday and jumping barefoot on the wet pavement. For a few minutes, the return of service looked like a neighborhood party in the middle of June’s suffocating heat. When the water comes back* after so many days of absence, everything changes pace. Buckets, hoses, and basins appear. Floors are scrubbed, clothes are washed if a few hours of electricity happen to coincide, and families take the chance to bathe, fill their tanks, and take care in one go of everything that has piled up during the domestic drought.

“The waste that happens in those hours is like making up for all the days you had nothing,” a resident of the area tells 14ymedio. He understands his neighbors’ euphoria. With the blackouts, the high temperatures, and the long supply interruptions, he admits, “all you want is to stand under the tap and not move.” Yet he confirms that some people leave their faucets running even after filling their tanks or finishing their household chores.

When the water comes back after so many days of absence, everything changes pace. / 14ymedio

“I have some neighbors who just let it run for no reason. They’re not bathing, not cleaning, not watering the plants. They just leave it open for the pleasure of watching it flow,” he laments. In Centro Habana, Regla, and parts of Guanabacoa itself, many families depend on water tanker trucks or go several days without receiving a single drop. This week, residents of Regla took to the streets to protest the water shortage while demanding the arrival of a tanker.

The problem is not simply one of individual waste. On top of the power outages that shut down pumping stations, there are breakdowns and the deterioration of a water network incapable of holding the water it carries. “Every block has at least two or three leaks,” the resident says.

In earlier times, another neighbor recalls, inspectors would fine anyone who let water run needlessly.

The authorities call on people to save water, but the state’s own pipes pour out for hours quantities of water far greater than any household could waste. In earlier times, another neighbor recalls, inspectors would fine anyone who let water run needlessly. Now, she says, “there’s no oversight anymore.” The absence of enforcement combines with the erosion of a civic culture that can barely survive when every family has to fend for itself when it comes to food, electricity, garbage, and water supply.

The woman insists she is not trying to directly blame those who make the most of the brief water supply. “With this heat and no power, when the water comes it’s only natural to enjoy it,” she repeats. What she is denouncing is the loss of empathy toward those living a few blocks away who have been waiting for days.

“It hurts, because there are people who only see water when a truck comes,” she sums up. For her, the images speak to something that goes far beyond a leak or an open faucet. “In Havana, nobody lives in a community anymore. It’s every man for himself.”

*Go to the link to watch a movie, which refused to load here.

Translated by GH.

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Cuba Needs a Real Capitalist ‘Shock’

It is a fantasy to believe that the new measures pave the way for the Vietnamese or Chinese model

The conditions for this do not exist without changes to the political regime, the author argues / sohu

14ymedio, Luis R. Luis, Boston, June 25, 2026 / The 176 measures recently announced by the Cuban Government are intended to bring about a liberalization of the economy through the supposed privatization of companies, openness to investment and foreign trade, energy and agricultural reforms, and the opening up of banking and currency exchange agencies, among many other elements.

However, this is far from being a genuine liberalization of the economy, since no credible framework of conditions is being established to allow markets to function properly or to guarantee legitimate property rights – central elements of a free-enterprise system. The measures do not create the conditions for the investment needed to rebuild and return the economy to healthy functioning. Nor is it clear that the necessary fiscal and monetary adjustments will take place to ensure financial stability and control of the inflation that is decimating families’ purchasing power.

The primary condition required by a free-market economy is the subsidiary role of the State in the productive apparatus and in investment decisions. The new measures do not establish the mechanisms for this to happen. Transparent mechanisms for the assignment of state-owned enterprises that guarantee their autonomy are missing. Genuine financial decentralization is missing. A sound private banking sector requires diversified shareholders who are independent of the State.

In the Chinese case, the size of its market and the very high savings rate were highly favorable conditions for the economy’s takeoff. Vietnamese agriculture had propitious conditions for its reform

Talk has it that the new measures pave the way for the Vietnamese or Chinese model. That is a fantasy. Cuba does not have the structural characteristics of those two countries at the outset of their major reforms. In the Chinese case, the size of its market and the very high savings rate were highly favorable conditions for the economy’s takeoff. Vietnamese agriculture had propitious conditions for its reform and contributed greatly to the country’s initial boom. Cuba appears to be aligning itself more with the new Venezuelan model, in which the State retains control of the productive apparatus without genuine reforms, but with a partial continue reading

opening to foreign capital.

An ideal productive shift toward the free market requires consolidating the subsidiary role of the State, as has occurred in many Eastern European countries. This is not visible in Cuba. It is clear that changes implying a new political regime are needed. There are various modalities for regime change, whether through internal dynamics, system collapse, or popular pressure. This is not predictable.

External pressures such as US sanctions and the energy blockade alter the internal dynamic, but it is not possible to discern the trajectory ahead in terms of political conditions. Again, the example of Venezuela inspires limited confidence that external pressure will provide the crucial impetus for the implementation of economic and political reforms. Perhaps the US Administration will learn a great deal from the recent Venezuelan experience.

External pressures such as US sanctions and the energy blockade alter the internal dynamic, but it is not possible to discern the trajectory ahead in terms of political conditions

Real reforms require an overarching design. The most important point is the role of the State in enabling reforms to be carried out. The realities of various elements of influence within society alter the possibilities for reform and, thereafter, their sequencing. It is possible and healthy to design some optimal sequence of reform, but the most important thing is to create the conditions for its success. Above all, opportunities for opening should not be discarded even when their sequencing is not optimal. The moment of food price reforms is generally not a good one for families. Private funds such as remittances, as well as public funds, will be needed to maintain basic consumption levels on the Island.

In sum, Cuba needs a genuine capitalist shock. What is underway with the 176 measures is the appearance of a major move toward the free market. The conditions for this do not exist without changes to the political regime that guarantee the limited function of the State. This capitalist shock can happen. Perhaps Cuba will achieve it.

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Editorial note: The author has served as Chief Economist at the OAS and Director for Latin America at the Institute of International Finance in Washington.

Translated by GH.

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Miami Doctors and Business Leaders Prepare a Healthcare Plan for a Cuba in Transition

The 911 Cuba initiative brings together several exile organizations, but it still lacks public funding, government agreements, and a known operational structure.

Cuban healthcare professionals gathered at La Colonia Medical Center in Hialeah to evaluate the plan. / El Nuevo Herald / SSF

14ymedio, Havana, June 26, 2026 — A network of doctors, humanitarian organizations, and healthcare-sector business leaders in Miami has begun preparing a plan to address the healthcare emergency and rebuild Cuban hospitals in the event of political change on the Island. The initiative, called 911 Cuba, was presented on June 17 at La Colonia Medical Center in Hialeah, according to a report published Thursday by El Nuevo Herald.

The project is led by Solidaridad Sin Fronteras and Cruz Verde Internacional, with support from La Colonia Medical Center and Miami Medical Team Foundation. Its organizers envision an initial phase of free humanitarian assistance, followed by hospital rehabilitation and the creation of a model that combines private healthcare with subsidized services for vulnerable populations.

Its organizers envision an initial phase of free humanitarian assistance, followed by hospital rehabilitation and the creation of a model that combines private healthcare with subsidized services for vulnerable populations

“In Cuba, not only are the hospitals in ruins, but primary care is completely at zero,” Julio César Alfonso, president of Solidaridad Sin Fronteras, told the Miami newspaper. The physician stated that the organization includes 58,000 healthcare professionals among its members and believes that between 15,000 and 20,000 could participate as volunteers in an emergency continue reading

situation.

Solidaridad Sin Fronteras is a nonprofit organization founded in Florida in 2004. Its regular activities have focused on training, certification, and workforce reintegration of healthcare professionals who have arrived in the United States, as well as aid campaigns and advocacy for Cuban doctors who left official overseas missions in third countries.

Cruz Verde would be responsible for the logistics of medicines and first-aid supplies. Taimy Alfonso told El Nuevo Herald that the organization has spent years sending healthcare products to the Island, some donated by U.S. pharmaceutical companies, but that its network has lost capacity because volunteers have been targeted by State Security. The organization describes itself as a humanitarian entity founded by medical professionals in 2013 and dedicated to providing healthcare assistance in vulnerable communities.

The most tangible business support comes from La Colonia Medical Center, directed by Cuban physician Jorge Acevedo. The company operates 12 healthcare centers in Miami-Dade and Broward counties, from Pompano Beach to Homestead, and provides primary care, diagnostic services, pharmacy services, medical specialties, and patient transportation. La Colonia therefore has clinics, healthcare personnel, and experience managing medical services.

The company operates 12 healthcare centers in Miami-Dade and Broward counties, from Pompano Beach to Homestead, and provides primary care, diagnostic services, pharmacy services, medical specialties, and patient transportation

Miami Medical Team Foundation, led by orthopedic surgeon Manuel Alzugaray, has also joined the effort. The organization, registered in Florida since 1989, has participated for decades in medical and humanitarian missions throughout Latin America and other countries affected by disasters or crises.

Alfonso suggested that a potential emergency operation could include field hospitals and U.S. hospital ships such as the USNSComfort, on which he worked after the 2010 Haiti earthquake.

“These ships have burn units and facilities for patients with respiratory conditions, as well as ambulances and helicopters,” he explained.

The second phase of the project calls for evaluating healthcare facilities, rebuilding hospitals, and establishing a private healthcare system for those who can afford it, alongside care subsidized by a future government for vulnerable sectors of the population.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Teenager Jonathan Muir Released After More Than Three Months in an Adult Prison in Cuba

International pressure increased amid the deterioration of his health and the risks to his safety.

The teenager slept on mattresses infested with bedbugs, suffered from hypoglycemia, and did not receive adequate medical care. / Facebook

14ymedio, Havana, June 24, 2026 — Cuban teenager Jonathan David Muir Burgos was released from prison this Wednesday after spending more than three months deprived of his liberty for participating in the protests last March in Morón, Ciego de Ávila. CubaNet confirmed his release through a phone conversation with the young man himself, who turned 17 while incarcerated at the Canaleta provincial prison.

In a brief phone conversation with journalist Camila Acosta, Jonathan confirmed that he was already out of prison. 14ymedio attempted to contact his father, evangelical pastor Elier Muir Ávila, but his phone remained switched off or out of service range. It is common for State Security to try to prevent released political prisoners and their relatives from speaking with the independent press, denouncing the conditions of their imprisonment, or publishing their testimonies on social media.

So far, the Cuban authorities have not announced the release or specified under what precautionary measure Muir Burgos was freed. It is also unknown whether the Prosecutor’s Office has withdrawn the sabotage charge against him or whether the criminal proceedings will continue while he remains out of prison.

The young man was arrested on March 16, three days after the March 13 protest in Morón, which was sparked by prolonged blackouts, food shortages, and deteriorating living conditions. Jonathan appeared, accompanied by his father, evangelical pastor Elier Muir Ávila, in response to a State Security summons. Both were detained, but the pastor was continue reading

released a few hours later.

The release comes after an intense international campaign on behalf of the teenager, whose health and safety had generated concern

The teenager, who was then 16 years old, was later transferred to Canaleta, an adult prison in Ciego de Ávila, where he remained in pretrial detention. He was being prosecuted for sabotage, a criminal offense that can carry lengthy prison sentences.

The release comes after an intense international campaign in favor of the teenager, whose health and safety had raised concerns among family members, human rights organizations, and foreign officials. Amnesty International called for his immediate release in May and denounced the fact that he was being held with adults.

The organization recalled that the deprivation of liberty of minors should be used only as a last resort and for the shortest possible period. It also demanded that, while he remained detained, Jonathan be protected from violence, receive medical care, and have regular access to his family and a lawyer of his choice.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights granted precautionary measures in favor of the teenager on April 24, considering that his life, personal integrity, and health were at risk of suffering irreparable harm while in the custody of the Cuban State.

Jonathan was not the only minor detained after the protests in Morón

The family repeatedly reported that Jonathan suffered from dermatological and immunological problems, as well as episodes of weakness that required treatment. After a visit in May, his father said he found him very weak, without the necessary medication, and deeply affected by confinement.

Prisoners Defenders later reported that Muir Burgos slept on mattresses infested with bedbugs, suffered from hypoglycemia, and did not receive adequate medical care. The organization also stated that the minor had been assaulted and harassed inside the prison.

Jonathan turned 17 on May 28 at Canaleta. In the weeks before his release, his case received renewed attention from the United States. The U.S. Embassy in Havana noted on June 16 that the young man had been imprisoned for three months, while Cuban-American Congressman Mario Díaz-Balart demanded his immediate release this Wednesday.

Jonathan was not the only minor detained after the protests in Morón. The imprisonment at Canaleta of 16-year-old Christian de Jesús Crespo Álvarez, also accused of sabotage, has likewise been documented. Human rights organizations maintain that both youths were prosecuted without the special safeguards required for minors. Muir Burgos’s release brings an end, for now, to his stay in an adult prison, but it does not remove the uncertainty surrounding his legal future.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Havana Chronicles: Under the Shadow of a Giant Syringe, Cuba Remains the Land of Waiting

Mosquitoes continue to bite near the monument to the scientist who fought yellow fever

From the sidewalk, I look at the obelisk again and think of Finlay, the scientist who dedicated his life to fighting mosquito-borne diseases. / 14ymedio

14ymedio, Yoani Sánchez, Havana, June 25, 2026 / Some monuments take on a different meaning over time. This Wednesday, I was walking near the Marianao Obelisk, that stone needle erected in homage to Dr. Carlos J. Finlay, and I couldn’t help but notice the irony. The structure stands elegantly, with a shape reminiscent of a giant syringe, but in its shadow, in Cuba in 2026, obtaining a simple hypodermic needle or an antibiotic often depends on having relatives abroad or venturing into the informal market.

It was mid-morning when I arrived at that large area where several healthcare facilities are concentrated: the Pando Ferrer Hospital, which many still call the League Against Blindness; a polyclinic; and the popular Workers’ Maternity Hospital. A little further on is also Ciudad Libertad, formerly Camp Columbia. It’s a fragment of the city where the constant flow of patients, their companions, and healthcare workers puts to the test transportation networks that long ago ceased to function normally.

I see a woman with a bandaged eye approach an old Chevrolet that has just stopped to pick up passengers. To take her to Infanta and San Lázaro, in Central Havana, the driver tells her the trip costs 1,000 pesos. The price is enough to dissuade her. She takes a step back and returns to the sidewalk. A few meters away, a young pregnant woman tries to convince the driver of a beat-up Ford to take her to the bridge over the Almendares River. “I can’t give you more than 300,” she explains. The man shakes his head and drives off.

The thieves also took “the yellow outfit the boy was going to wear when he left the hospital, in honor of the Virgin of Charity”

The true protagonists of the avenue are the electric tricycles. They’re so overloaded they can barely move. Their narrow seats carry recently discharged patients, nurses finishing a 24-hour shift, relatives laden with bags of toiletries, doctors trying to make their shift change on time, and elderly people returning home after appointments they waited months for. Some are so tired or so old they can barely manage the high step to get on the tricycle.

A few surviving classic cars and a handful of motorcycles are still circulate. The rest of the traffic seems to have vanished along with the fuel. The nearby bus stop has the aspect of a medical observation room. Exhausted faces, improvised fans fashioned from X-rays, and conversations that inevitably lead to blackouts, gasoline, or hospitals. A woman recounts how her cell phone was stolen while she was caring for her newborn daughter at the maternity ward. “I went to the bathroom, and when I came back continue reading

, it was gone.” The thieves also took “the yellow outfit the baby was going to wear when she left the hospital, in honor of Our Lady of Charity.”

The line outside the nearby Banco Metropolitano is so long it spills over the sidewalk and almost reaches the roundabout at 31st and 100th streets. Customers crowd together under the flowering flamboyant trees while they wait for the electricity to return so the branch can resume paying out pensions and salaries that will lose much of their value before the week ends. Some elderly people have brought folding chairs; others, bottles of water; one even a book. Waiting has become the activity that occupies most of our time.

A friend says she wakes up every morning gazing at the horizon, convinced that one day she’ll see a huge silhouette approaching from the sea. A neighbor on Tulip Street says he’s been waiting for three years for one of his two sons to send him a package with frozen chicken, oil, and those soda crackers he sees advertised online but hasn’t tasted in decades. My old history teacher lives anxiously awaiting her email, hoping one day she’ll get the news that her visa has been approved, allowing her to travel to one of those countries that serve as the first step on the journey south, the same route thousands of Cubans continue to travel every month.

It’s not just the mosquitoes. The relentless heat during the blackouts bites; the endless lines bite; the prices bite, the uncertainty bites, the shortages bite, and that unmoving clock that seems to have settled over the country bites.

We have become a country of waiting, a nation of suspended rhythm. Some wait for the electricity to return; others, for water to flow through the pipes; many await the bus that never arrives, the medicine that never reaches the pharmacy, the call from abroad, the permit, the package, the money, the news that will change the course of their lives. We wait so much that the verb has ceased to be an action and has become a place we inhabit.

From the sidewalk, I look anew at the obelisk and think of Finlay, the scientist who dedicated his life to fighting mosquito-borne diseases. As I walk past the monument, I feel a couple of bites on my ankles. I hop around to shoo the insects away, hit my legs with my closed umbrella, and scold myself for forgetting to put on insect repellent before leaving home.

A nurse witnesses my outlandish dance and laughs. “Mosquitoes don’t just bite anymore, they sting now,” she jokes.

She’s right. It’s not just the mosquitoes. The relentless heat during the blackouts bites; the endless lines bite; the prices bite, the uncertainty bite, the shortages bite, and that unmoving clock that seems to have settled over the country bites. Reality as a whole has become an insatiable mouth that tears away small pieces of us every day. We are fragments of people trying to get somewhere while we long for the vaccine against so much national paralysis to finally appear.

Previous Havana Chronicles:

The Time For Reforms Has Passed

Surrounded by Garbage, Miramar Is No Longer the Glamorous Neighborhood It Once Was

A Circus Facing Off Against Power, and a City Growing Increasingly Lonely

Chronicle of a Monday That Feels Like Wednesday

“We Used to Complain About the ‘CUC’, But Now We Miss It”

The Roar of Despair of a Cuban Woman Returning to Her Country After Many Years

The Tulipán Market Closed: “They’ve Given the Order To Go to the March for Raúl”

Along Carlos III Street and towards Ethiopia

Sleeping Is Also a Privilege in Havana

A Desperate Plea in the Middle of the Dark Havana Night: ‘Light!’

The Refuse of Disenchantment

Under a Picture-Postcard Blue Sky, the Country is Crumbling

Fatigue Barely Allows One to Enjoy the ‘Lights On’ in Havana

Dollars, the Classic Card, and a Havana Without Tourists

A Journey Through the Lost Names of Havana

The Shipwreck of a Ship Called “Cuba”

Havana Seen From ‘The Control Tower’

In Havana, the Only Ones Who Move Are the Mosquitoes

Reina, the Stately Street Where Garbage is Sold

Searching for Light Through the Deserted Streets of Havana

The Death Throes of ‘Granma’, the Mouthpiece of a Regime Cornered by Crisis

The Anxiety of the Disconnected Cuban

One Mella, Three Mellas, Life in Cuba Is Measured in Thousands of Pesos

It Is Forbidden To Leave Home in Cuba Today Because It Is a “Counter-Revolutionary Day”

Vedado, the Heart of Havana’s Nightlife, Is Now Converted Into a Desert

Havana, in Critical Condition

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‘Trump Does Not Rule Cuba,’ Says Díaz-Canel in an Interview with a Dominican Media Outlet

The president admits that U.S. pressure contributed to “accelerating” the reforms aimed at “perfecting socialist construction, not restoring capitalism.”

Díaz-Canel was interviewed by journalist Roberto Cavada, a Cuban exile in the Dominican Republic, where he is a leading television news anchor. / Presidency of Cuba

14ymedio, Madrid, June 25, 2026 — Miguel Díaz-Canel rejected in an interview broadcast this Wednesday the idea that the economic reforms he announced last week were adopted because of U.S. pressure. “Trump does not rule Cuba, nor does the U.S. government rule Cuba. Cuba is sovereign,” he told Cuban journalist Roberto Cavada, anchor of Telenoticias in the Dominican Republic. Nevertheless, the president admitted that the current “situation of maximum pressure” also “leads us to accelerate a bit, to decide more quickly, to have to do something.”

The centerpiece of the interview was those reforms, whose legitimacy Díaz-Canel spent a long introduction defending. The president cited Fidel Castro’s dollarization measures in the 1990s and Raúl Castro’s 2011 economic guidelines as previous turning points in the Cuban economy. “Things were approved that today seem very normal to us, but that under those conditions had a tremendous impact,” he said. Having established that foundation, he justified the current shift. “These are times of transformation.”

The president maintained, lest there be any doubt, that the inspiration has been China, though adapted to the particular circumstances created by the sanctions on Cuba. He also noted that economists have been consulted and emphasized that the process remains open to new contributions, in addition to the foundations that still need to be established. This became evident when Cavada asked him what guarantees exist for potential investors. Díaz-Canel could only offer generalities and ultimately admitted that they have yet to be defined. “It is one of the areas where I believe we need to make more progress,” he said. When pressed again about the legal framework, he stated that one exists but that “it needs to be expanded in terms of concessions,” referring primarily to usufruct rights.

The president argued for going even further in providing flexibility and incentives for investment by Cubans living abroad—Cavada himself emigrated from Ciego de Ávila to Havana and later to the Dominican Republic—and left behind a statement that calls into question the policies of his predecessors, especially continue reading

the most recent one. “If you support foreign investment, it makes no sense not to support investment by your own nationals in any of its forms.”

“If you support foreign investment, it makes no sense not to support investment by your own nationals in any of its forms”

Díaz-Canel also raised a fundamental issue. The approved measures may run into limitations imposed by the United States, a point also highlighted by independent economist Pavel Vidal in his latest analysis for the Observatory of Currencies and Finance (OMFi). “The second executive order of May 1 restricts companies from trading with Cuba or doing business with Cuba. And that part is never discussed,” he pointed out.

Cavada further pursued the issue of Washington and reminded the president that only days ago Donald Trump’s vice president, JD Vance, indicated that there were conversations with the Cuban regime. “If they make smart decisions, we’ll have a much better relationship,” Vance said. Díaz-Canel cast doubt on the possibility of improved understanding because, in his view, “they will never understand what we do nor accept what we do because what they aspire to is a different Cuba. They aspire to a Cuba that is completely dependent on the U.S. and completely privatized.”

Nevertheless, he again acknowledged that conversations are taking place and that a communication channel remains open, without providing new details, but he insisted that there can be no pressure and that if Cuba yielded to it, the demands would never end. “There is room for U.S. entities and entrepreneurs to invest. There is every possibility of working together on issues of common interest in terms of cooperation,” he said.

Díaz-Canel did not appear to view an invasion as the most likely scenario, but he admitted it was entirely possible and cited two recent precedents, close both in time and political distance: Venezuela, where the United States interrupted talks in an attempt to capture Nicolás Maduro, and Iran, where negotiations were halted by a bombing campaign. “There is a whole combination of media warfare and psychological warfare aimed at intimidating us,” he argued, adding that Cuba is preparing not to attack, he emphasized, but to defend itself. He also left a message: his rhetoric is not threatening but intended “to ensure we are respected and that they understand the cost of a military adventure.”

Another large portion of the interview focused on the daily drama of the energy crisis. Díaz-Canel tried to dispel what he called the “myth” of subsidies. “They have said that we refused to pay for fuel and that we went around begging for fuel. That is not true,” he began, explaining the barter mechanisms Cuba used with the Soviet Union—sugar in exchange for fuel—and with Venezuela, through medical services. Later, because of sanctions on Caracas, Cuba had to “go out into the international market.”

“And nobody gave us fuel for free,” he repeated three times. Now, he complained, those who used to sell fuel to Cuba are prohibited from doing so. He added that there have even been ships headed to Cuba that were prevented from arriving.

Even so, he defended his administration’s work on renewable energy. “If that were not in place, we would be living from one blackout to another because the system would be completely unstable, and during daylight hours it would not be capable of supplying electricity to even 20% of the population,” he argued. This despite the fact that solar parks remain underutilized, largely because the thermoelectric plants are so fragile that photovoltaic output must be restricted to avoid destabilizing the grid, as Cuban authorities themselves have explained.

Particularly striking was his reference to withholding data on domestic oil production, framing it almost as a matter of national security. “I’m not going to give figures because I don’t want anyone calculating our needs or determining how far we can or cannot go. But it is crude that is being produced. It has always been said that it is heavy crude with a high sulfur content, but during the Special Period our thermoelectric plants were adapted to process it,” he said when asked about production levels.

Díaz-Canel admitted that the companies working to drill wells and increase crude oil and natural gas production have had to leave because of sanctions, referring to the Canadian company Sherritt and the Australian company Melbana

He also insisted that scientific advances have made it possible to refine Cuba’s extra-heavy crude and that it is being used, although production volumes remain limited. Regarding fuel imported by private actors, he said that no more than 40,000 tons have entered through that route, equivalent to “one ship out of the many ships Cuba needs in a single month.”

Another reference to the U.S. arose in the context of humanitarian aid. Here the president did provide some concrete figures, stating that of the initial $3 million announced by Marco Rubio after Hurricane Melissa and distributed through Caritas, between $2.6 million and $2.8 million has been spent so far, reaching about 8,000 families. “Then they announced an additional $6 million in aid that is only now beginning to be implemented,” he added.

As for the subsequent $100 million package, Díaz-Canel questioned the State Department’s plan to begin distributing it after September. “Why? We don’t know,” he said. He also noted that food and medicine would not be included. “Then what is the aid for? We’ll have to see, because they haven’t defined it, they haven’t clearly said what it’s for,” he protested, while also insisting that the cooperation is appreciated and accepted, though he still described it as “hypocritical.”

“It means nothing compared to the damage the embargo has caused Cuba,” he reproached.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba’s Foreign Minister Accuses Marco Rubio of Promoting a ‘Crime From the World’s Greatest Power’

Ricardo Herrero, of the Cuba Study Group: “Repression and sanctions continue using the people as cannon fodder. And their suffering continues without end.”

Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez says his Government has proven itself “stronger, more capable and more effective than the U.S. expected.” / Cubadebate

14ymedio, Madrid, June 24, 2026 – “Ruthless aggression,” “collective punishment” and now “crime”: the Cuban foreign minister is working his way through the dictionary to express his outrage at the sanctions that the U.S. keeps adding day after day against the Cuban regime. And for Bruno Rodríguez, the greatest criminal is the Cuban-born Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, against whom he directs all his anger, to the point of forgetting the existence of Donald Trump, who is not mentioned a single time in Tuesday’s tweet in which he describes his nemesis and alter ego as “dishonest and deceitful.”

“What this individual is promoting from the greatest power in the world is a crime,” the foreign minister wrote in reference to the sanctions announced a few hours earlier against five state entities on the Island and the wife of General Alejandro Castro Espín, son of Raúl Castro. However, Rodríguez boasts that his Government has proven itself “stronger, more capable and more effective than the U.S. expected in the face of ruthless aggression and collective punishment against the people and their living conditions.”

The Minister of Foreign Affairs has been the only member of the Government to comment so far. President Miguel Díaz-Canel and Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz spent the day immersed in tribute ceremonies for the late commander Ramiro Valdés, a “humble, upright and loyal hero, protagonist of the extraordinary work that is the Revolution,” according to the head of government, on social media. continue reading

We pay heartfelt tribute to Commander Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, as part of the Cuban people’s homage to this humble, honorable, and loyal hero, a key figure in the extraordinary achievement that is the Revolution. /Manuel Marrero Cruz

In contrast, all officials subordinate to the Foreign Ministry joined the narrative. “The anti-Cuban mafia has assigned him the task of executioner of the Cuban people. The Secretary of State is anxious because he has failed to achieve the surrender he promised. That is how political corruption works in the U.S., with not the slightest respect for the human condition,” said Carlos Fernández de Cossío. Embassies and their chiefs also posted messages condemning the decision and attacking Rubio, whom they regard as the spokesman and executor of pressure from the exile community in Miami.

Among the most visible Foreign Ministry figures, only Deputy Foreign Minister Josefina Vidal, who is beginning to be mentioned in some circles as the possible Cuban counterpart to Delcy Rodríguez sought by Washington under the model applied in Venezuela, remained on the sidelines and shared on social media the interview she granted to the Mexican newspaper La Jornada, in which she discussed talks with the U.S., without specifying who the interlocutors are on either side. “There is a channel, there have been meetings, there have been exchanges, but there has not been significant progress,” she said. In that conversation, the diplomat mentioned a dynamic that summarized exactly what was about to happen. “There have been occasions when we sit down to talk and, a few days later, a new sanction arrives.”

A few hours later, new measures indeed arrived, affecting financial, logistics, mining and steel companies, and threatening third parties that maintain relations with them. One of the most notable cases is the International Financial Bank (BFI), used, among other things, to channel payments for the Cuban doctors that the regime still exports, mainly to Mexico, Calabria (Italy), and somePersian Gulf countries. Several Cuban economic analysts have offered their views on the latest measures.

Several Cuban economic analysts have offered their views on the latest measures

Ricardo Herrero, executive director of the Cuba Study Group, noted that “the domino game is blocked” in reference to the talks between Havana and Washington and that the only thing that can break the deadlock is “sufficient political concessions that Trump and Rubio can sell as a victory in Florida.” The expert, known for his opposition to the embargo and sanctions, makes clear that Trump will decide what is sufficient, but he believes Rubio is advocating for a “social explosion that changes the calculation in Washington in favor of military intervention,” because so far the regime has not moved enough. “Meanwhile, repression, control, and sanctions continue using the Cuban people as cannon fodder. And their suffering continues without end,” he argued.

For his part, Cuban-American historian Michael Bustamante considered that the measures announced yesterday represent a rebuff to Havana’s economic proposals but, although he supports the end of GAESA, the regime’s military conglomerate, he doubts they will be useful because they are discouraging any exit strategy. He does, however, see two possibilities: that the intention is to provoke “impoverishment in order to trigger a social explosion and a military operation,” or alternatively “to devalue the assets of the Cuban state to such an extent that Havana agrees to dismantle GAESA and sell off parts of it for next to nothing to U.S. bidders, ironically something that the new reforms announced last week could facilitate.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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If Cuba Does Not Implement a Radical Change Like Gorbachev Did in the USSR, Then Washington Will Do It

Former Mexican ambassador to Cuba Ricardo Pascoe says the reforms announced on the Island are a “desperate attempt” to buy time.

“Cuba urgently needs to open its economy in a rapid manner because it is in a state close to extinction,” Ricardo Pascoe Pierce tells 14ymedio. / EFE

14ymedio, Mexico City, Ángel Salinas, June 24, 2026 — “Cuba urgently needs to open its economy in a rapid manner because it is in a state close to extinction,” Ricardo Pascoe Pierce, who served as Mexico’s ambassador to Cuba between 2000 and 2002, tells 14ymedio. The political analyst spoke with this newspaper about the 176 reforms grouped into 23 areas, announced last week by the Regime in what he describes as a “desperate attempt” to steer its economy.

However, he adds, “the conditions are not in place for what they have proposed to work, and it is certainly not going to be enough to address the Island’s problems.”

The problem with the country, Pascoe says, is that “it no longer has time; the bell has already rung, the adventure is over, the model has failed for whatever reasons.” The Regime is backed into a corner: either it “implements a radical internal transformation, as Mikhail Gorbachev did in the Soviet Union, or Washington will do it.”

14ymedio. There is talk of deeper institutional changes and opening up to private investment in an attempt to mitigate the economic crisis. Are the conditions to attract foreign investors being created?

Ricardo Pascoe Pierce. What the Cuban leadership is trying to do at this moment is absolutely overdue. They are attempting, at a time when they are backed against the wall and drowning, a perestroika (the economic reform undertaken by Gorbachev in the former USSR) while trying to avoid political reform. The problem is that the Cuban proposal actually leaves intact the entire structure of control exercised by the Army and the Cuban State.

Who is going to be interested in investing as a capitalist in an economy with a rigid monopolistic structure?

In reality, no one is going to be interested unless they see, for example, a genuine possibility of generating an adequate return on investment. But that takes many years, and Cuba does not have years available. Cuba has months, possibly a year at best.

No one is going to invest in Cuba, much less Cubans in Miami, if there is no continue reading

political reform and change, especially regarding political prisoners, which is an open wound. Ninety percent of businesspeople simply will not do it, or if some naïve person does, it’s because they are willing to lose their money.

No one is going to invest in Cuba, much less Cubans in Miami, if there is no political reform and change, especially regarding political prisoners, which is an open wound

14ymedio. Nevertheless, some people are enthusiastic. In Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum says the opening represents an “important change” and has even spoken of incentives to encourage investment in the Island. Which Mexican sectors or companies would be interested?

Ricardo Pascoe Pierce. As ambassador to Cuba, I dealt with Mexican businesspeople from 2001 to 2003. Investors no longer saw investing on the Island as particularly attractive because there was no security of any kind. The Cuban government did not pay its debts and even appropriated their operations once they were established and officials saw how they worked. Sheinbaum can indulge in whatever fantasy she wants, but not even Carlos Slim, who supports Sheinbaum’s anti-liberal policies despite being Mexico’s richest businessman, is going to want to invest in the Island.

Carlos Slim accompanied then-President Vicente Fox when I was in Havana, and he told me: “There is no guarantee of any profitability here.”

Among other things, because the Cuban government’s practice has always been that when it sees a private business progressing and prospering, it immediately appropriates it. That model will continue because the reforms are not affecting the political structure, and while that may have worked, I insist, in China and Vietnam, which spent decades developing the model, Cuba does not have decades.

Sheinbaum’s proposal regarding Cuba is simply because she does not understand the situation and is promoting things based on the fantasies of advisers favorable to the Cuban regime, but it is not going to work. It is not realistic.

14ymedio. Mexico’s relationship with Cuba is more than close. Under Sheinbaum, oil shipments stood out, and now she has announced the resumption of crude deliveries through “private companies.” How would this work, selling fuel through private firms? Could Pemex be the seller, or would it have to create subsidiaries such as Gasolina Bienestar to avoid U.S. sanctions?

Ricardo Pascoe Pierce. First of all, what Mexico did was give oil to Cuba. It was not a sale, even though they said it was and claimed that somewhere in the Mexican Republic the invoices exist. No one knows where they are or for what amount. Obviously, it would be useless to try to look for those payments because they do not exist and never will because the Island does not have the purchasing capacity.

This idea that they are going to resume oil shipments through private companies simply means that the Mexican government is looking for some mechanism. However, they are not going to do it because there is currently no private company in Cuba capable of importing significant quantities of crude oil for its operations.

In reality, it would all amount to pretending that one private company is selling oil to another private company when neither of the two actually exists. I do not think Mexico will be able to do that. Furthermore, Washington’s scrutiny at this moment is such that there are really no conditions for carrying out an operation of that kind.

Ultimately, this is not going to solve the Island’s urgent needs, especially now that the U.S. has decided to seriously tighten the Cuban issue, particularly after what was voted on in the Senate, which already prohibited President Donald Trump from resuming the war in Iran, meaning they are completely shutting down that spectacle.

What Mexico did was give oil to Cuba. It was not a sale, even though they said it was and claimed that somewhere in the Mexican Republic the invoices exist

14ymedio. You say one option for Cuba is an internal transformation like the one carried out by Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union. Can you explain?

Ricardo Pascoe Pierce. We have to look at the historical experiences that transformed this peculiar phenomenon. Karl Marx would die again if he saw what is happening: countries that implement socialism returning to capitalism or a market economy. From a Marxist perspective, this is impossible, and yet we have seen it. We saw it in the case of the Soviet Union, which became Russia. China, which is largely a market-based economic model with a strong state presence but a one-party political system. And Vietnam as well.

The processes seen in those countries, although different, took years to consolidate, and the process was very complex. China, for example, began a transformation during the presidency of Deng Xiaoping that lasted more than 20 years.

The Gorbachev model involved his personal decapitation. In the last years of his life, he was repudiated by Russia’s new leaders, notably Vladimir Putin, who refused to attend his funeral. Gorbachev had to pay that price in order to make the change and break the system.

Gorbachev paved the way for the creation of the Russian Federation, as well as for his economic reforms (perestroika) and political reforms (glasnost).

The big question is whether Cuba’s political leadership is willing to be decapitated in order to save Cuba; that is, to carry out reform internally, without Washington’s intervention, which would involve both economic and political reform. In addition, they must change the Constitution themselves to create a democratic republic with guaranteed freedoms.

That is what the political leadership must do if it does not want Washington to intervene. They are trapped in that dilemma. I repeat, they do not have the 20 years that Deng Xiaoping had.

Fidel Castro explained to me, during a conversation in Havana in 2002, that Cuba “will never make Gorbachev’s mistake.” Therein lies the Island’s existential dilemma. The decision to change must come from the political leadership because, just as in Russia, there is no organized society in Cuba capable of rising up and changing things.

14ymedio. Is Cuba trying to buy time?

Ricardo Pascoe Pierce. These measures they have just approved are a desperate attempt to buy time they do not have. The political leadership has the same fantasy as the Mexican government, though it is a different matter. Both are fantasizing that things will change in November because Trump will suffer an electoral defeat and therefore change his policy. They are absolutely mistaken, especially in Cuba’s case.

The U.S. is not going to stop increasing pressure, so it seems to me that they are betting on an illusion, and it is not going to work.

The problem with the midterm elections is that Washington cannot reach any agreement with Havana that does not satisfy Miami, which is demanding both economic and political reform.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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A Mexican Congressman Asks His Government to Rescue 15 Medical Students in Cuba Affected by the Crisis

If the scholarship holders cannot complete their training on the Island, the government should facilitate their safe return home through diplomatic channels, proposes Fernando Rodriguez

Foreign students at the Latin American School of Medicine, in Havana. / ELAM/Facebook

14ymedio, Madrid, 24 June 2026 / Mexican congressman Fernando Rodriguez Gonzalez has asked President Claudia Sheinbaum to intervene to protect a group of 15 doctors from the state of Coahuila – which he represents – who are based in Cuba to pursue specialized studies. The doctors are suffering the effects of the Island’s economic crisis, which has not only disrupted the courses they came to complete, but also their daily lives.

The doctors come from cities such as Monclova, Saltillo, and Torreon, and are studying cardiology, pulmonology, and traumatology, but the situation has now become “unsustainable,” the congressman warns. Rodriguez Gonzalez is a representative of the state party Mexico Avante (center-left).

“These are Mexican professionals who responded to a federal program – the government offered them the opportunity to specialize in Cuba, and today they are being forgotten over there,” he said on Tuesday. Rodriguez Gonzalez noted that the doctors had already sent a letter to the Mexican president, but had so far received no concrete response. “The hardest part is that they say that if they return from the Island, they could lose the years they have dedicated to their training and postgraduate studies,” he said.

Rodriguez Gonzalez noted that the doctors had already sent a letter to the Mexican president, but had so far received no concrete response.

Rodriguez Gonzalez stressed that, given the good relationship between the two countries, a quick response would be the natural expectation, and argued that, since Mexico is open to hiring Cuban doctors, it should uphold its “moral obligation continue reading

to protect its own citizens abroad.”

The lawmaker urged that a decision be made as soon as possible, and that if the doctors cannot complete their training on the Island, they should be given safe passage home through diplomatic channels, without any penalty to the recognition of their qualifications.

Although no further details have been provided about the doctors’ programs of study, they may be receiving their specialization at the Latin American School of Medicine, located in Havana and designed for the training of foreign students.

This institution is being given energy support through institutional and European aid from MediCuba Europa, a Switzerland-based network of around twenty organizations sympathetic to Castroism, which has raised funds for various projects. Just two weeks ago, the network announced that a new project is now operational, covering half of the school’s energy needs.

In any case, the Cuban healthcare system is under severe strain, complicating the daily lives of patients and, by extension, of medical professionals.

On Monday, Claudia Sheinbaum announced that her government is working to deliver fuel to Cuba through “private companies that hold the necessary permits.” The president noted that work has been underway for some time – since Cuba and the United States each authorized, on their respective sides, the opening of the fuel market to the private sector – and she hopes that trade “can resume on a commercial basis soon.” She also clarified, in order to deflect criticism within Mexico over the free supply of oil to the Island, that the matter “is not a humanitarian issue.”

Translated by GH.

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The ‘War of the Corners’ Against Havana’s Garbage Begins, with Guards Hired by Residents

On unmonitored streets, enormous dumpsites grow large enough to block vehicle traffic

At the corner of San Martín and Escobar streets, ’14ymedio’ witnessed a heated argument between residents and a woman who was attempting to violate the new rules for the area. / 14ymedio

14ymedio, Dario Hernandez, Havana, 24 June 2026 / At the corner of San Martin and Escobar in Centro Habana, anyone who dares toss so much as a scrap of paper in the street is asking for trouble. After months of living alongside a dumpsite that had grown large enough to block traffic, residents cleaned everything up, posted warning signs, and hired improvised guards to stop anyone from dumping garbage there again.

Several notices stand out on the walls: “No dumping. 50,000-peso fine.” The signs bear the signature of the National Police and add that waste must be taken to Lealtad and Dragones. With no fuel for the trucks responsible for cleaning the city, residents have taken matters into their own hands to solve a serious public health problem on their own street.

After months of living alongside a dumpsite that had grown large enough to block traffic, residents cleaned everything up and posted warning signs. .

The corner referenced on the signs, just a few blocks away, sits next to the Zanja police station and hosts one of the largest dumpsites in the area. The accumulation of waste occupies virtually an entire block and in some spots reaches two meters in height. In front of the Dragon Chino restaurant, passage is impossible due to the volume of refuse, and the smell forces pedestrians to cover their faces with masks.

At San Martin and Escobar, 14ymedio witnessed a heated argument between residents and a woman who tried to ignore the corner’s new rules. The woman wanted to get rid of an old cooking pot at the spot where she used to dump her garbage. Residents confronted her. One of them grabbed her by the arm while warning her that he would alert the block supervisor and report her to the police. The argument escalated over several minutes – the woman even threatened to hit the neighbor with the same pot – until she gave up and went to dump her garbage somewhere else.

Streets without hired guards have turned into enormous dumpsites.

“We had to take care of it ourselves because nobody was doing anything,” explained one resident, still agitated from the confrontation. A bicitaxi driver passing by at that moment took the rule-breaker’s side: “What’s the big deal? If the Government does nothing…”

The garbage problem is turning neighbors against each other. Every corner tries to protect itself on its own. Those that manage to stay clean simply push the problem onto nearby blocks. Some residents hire these guards and put up signs threatening fines. On one corner, there is even a notice that security cameras are in operation. [view video here] continue reading

Faced with months of accumulated waste, residents and the Communal Services agency themselves had taken to setting it on fire, with all the toxic consequences for the population. “Now we’ve entered a new phase,” sums up one neighborhood resident: “It’s the war of the corners.”

Images captured by this newspaper reflect what has already become an everyday reality in Centro Habana. Each community has begun to invent its own ways of surviving the garbage. Streets without hired guards have turned into enormous dumpsites, and it is common to see elderly people there picking through the refuse in search of food.

Some residents hire guards and put up signs threatening fines. [Multa=fine. Basura=Trash. P.N.R. = National Revolutionary Police] / 14ymedio

Facebook user Enrique de la Osa recently shared images of San Martin and Escobar before the cleanup organized by residents. The photographs show a solid mass of garbage accumulated over weeks, with fire and smoke rising from the waste, while residents try to go about their daily lives around it.

The corner is clean today, but the garbage has not disappeared – it has simply piled up somewhere else. Like the country’s structural problems, which move around without ever being solved and grow larger with each passing day.

Translated by GH

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Félix Navarro, Luis Manuel Otero and Maykel ‘Osorbo’ Receive the 2026 Democracy Award

“As political prisoners and dissident artists, they have challenged the control of the Cuban regime,” the National Endowment for Democracy points out.

Political prisoners “have challenged the Cuban regime’s control over public expression,” notes the National Endowment for Democracy. L: Maykel Castillo *Osorbo*, R: Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara] / Facebook

14ymedio, Havana, June 23, 2026 / Cuban political prisoners Félix Navarro, Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, and Maykel Castillo Osorbo are among the winners of the 2026 Democracy Awards, granted by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). The awards, announced this Monday, recognize individuals and organizations from various countries for their defense of fundamental freedoms against repressive regimes.

The U.S. organization reported that the award recipients were chosen for defending freedom of religion, expression, press, assembly, and petition. Regarding the Cuban dissidents, it emphasized their “courage” and noted that “as political prisoners and dissident artists, they have challenged the Cuban regime’s control over public expression.” The NED also stated that they “have inspired greater civic participation and exposed the fear behind state censorship.”

Félix Navarro is serving a nine-year prison sentence, accused of “assault, contempt and public disorder” for events related to the massive popular protests of July 11 and 12, 2021. His daughter Saylí Navarro is also imprisoned, sentenced to eight years, for the same crimes as her father, plus “disobedience”.

Félix Navarro is serving a nine-year prison sentence, accused of “assault, contempt and public disorder”

Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, leader of the San Isidro Movement, was arrested on 11 July 2021, just before joining the protests on Havana’s Malecón. He was sentenced to five years in prison for the crimes of desecrating national symbols, contempt, and public disorder, in a closed-door trial. His sentence is scheduled to end on July 9.

Musician Maykel Castillo Osorbo, winner of two Latin Grammy Awards for the song “Patria y Vida” [youtube] was arrested on May 18, 2021. In June 2022, he was sentenced to nine years continue reading

in prison. The charges included contempt, public disorder, and attacking and defaming institutions, organizations, heroes, and martyrs.

Regarding Otero Alcántara and Castillo Osorbo, Amnesty International on Tuesday condemned the Cuban government for using the penal system as a tool to “punish dissident artists and silence their right to freedom of expression.”

Four years after the sentencing of the artists, the organization stressed that both continue to face the consequences of an arbitrary judicial process incompatible with international human rights standards, which “also demonstrates how repression can particularly impact Afro-Cuban people who publicly challenge power.”

The organization stressed that both continue to face the consequences of an arbitrary legal process.

In addition to Cuban activists, the National Endowment for Democracy, founded in 1983, recognized this year the German organization Friede Allen for its support of Russian clergy members opposed to the war in Ukraine. Also recognized were the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression, the Ethiopian newspaper Addis Standard, and the pro-democracy community organizers of the so-called Spring Revolution in Burma.

Peter Roskam, chairman of the NED board of directors, noted that “this year’s honorees embody the courage and perseverance needed to defend those rights in their own communities. Their work reminds us that America’s commitment to freedom is strongest when we support those who keep that promise alive.”

The Democracy Awards ceremony is scheduled for September at Mount Vernon, George Washington’s historic residence in Virginia, USA. The award is a replica of the Goddess of Democracy statue erected by protesters during the Tiananmen Square protests in China in 1989.

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“There’s No Way To Continue Living Like This”: Challenges to the Regime Are Growing Throughout Cuba

Residents of Guanabo demand solutions in front of the People’s Power headquarters, and in Santiago de Cuba, the house-museum of “martyr” Orlando Pantoja is set on fire.

Residents of Guanabo met with authorities to demand solutions to problems that go beyond the lack of electricity. / Screenshot

14ymedio, Havana, June 23, 2026 / The wave of protests against blackouts, water shortages, and the worsening crisis continues to spread throughout Cuba. Pot-banging protests are now a common sight in neighborhoods, even in broad daylight, but the discontent has also begun to reach government buildings, where a growing number of citizens are demanding explanations for the deterioration of their living conditions.

This Monday, dozens of residents of Guanabo, in East Havana, gathered in front of the People’s Power headquarters to demand solutions to their “unsustainable” situation, after weeks of unanswered complaints. The residents managed to meet with officials, but the outcome was equally disappointing.

“The people of Guanabo are uniting to demand answers because what they are doing to us is abusive,” wrote Sisi Aguilera, a user who posted a video on social media showing a large group of neighbors talking about the situation affecting them. They denounced that it is not simply the lack of electricity, which the whole country suffers from, but also basic things like a motor that doesn’t work and has left them without drinking water for weeks, among continue reading

other issues.

One of the participants, activist María Elena Mir, told the independent media outlet Cubanet about the reasons for the accumulated discontent and details of the meeting in front of the government building. One of the main causes of the discontent is the inequality between protected and unprotected circuits. Guanabo is divided into two such areas, although even that is no longer a guarantee of anything.

In the circuit subject to cuts in basic services, the affected area includes essential services such as healthcare facilities, banks, the post office, and other public utilities. The most critical case is the emergency room of the polyclinic, which operates using solar panels and whose backup for the intensive care unit was not provided by the government but purchased by local residents. “It was the community that solved the problem,” Mir explains, adding that residents had to pool their money to buy an EcoFlow system after serious incidents related to the power outages.

Residents are denouncing the lack of public transportation, gas, and water supplies, which are compounded by 45-hour consecutive power outages. “The population, exasperated, tired, exhausted, and dehydrated, gathered at the location,” stated one resident, where the police were also present.

“I had to clarify that what we were protesting were social and human issues, not political ones. Nevertheless, the police arrived,” Mir recounted. “I was on the front line and I knew that if I took out my phone they could take it from me.”

After several hours in the sun, the residents received a frustrating response from officials, who claimed to be unaware of the magnitude of the problems reported – even though the residents had brought documents as evidence of their complaints for days – and promised to meet with provincial authorities before offering solutions.

After the meeting ended, there was a brief flash of electricity. The water, however, still hadn’t appeared. “There’s nothing else to ask for. There’s no way to go on living like this,” Mir concluded.

The protest in Guanabo adds to the wave of pot-banging demonstrations reported in recent days in numerous Havana neighborhoods. Early Tuesday morning, there were also pot-banging protests and burning of trash in El Vedado, although nothing as striking as what happened on Sunday in Santiago de Cuba, when residents of the Santiago municipality of Contramaestre set fire—according to videos circulating on social media—to the Orlando Pantoja Tamayo House-Museum, an institution administered by the Communist Party in honor of one of its “martyrs.” In the videos, slogans such as “Turn on the electricity!”, “Freedom!”, and “Contramaestre doesn’t want any more communism” can be heard.

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US Sanctions the Wife of General Alejandro Castro Espín and Five Cuban State Entities

The following companies have been added to the OFAC list: Banco Financiero Internacional, Almacenes Universales, Rafin, Geominera and Antillana de Acero

Alejandro Castro Espín, son of Raúl Castro, is also on the OFAC sanctions list. / Swiss Association of Cuba (ASC)

The Trump Administration announced on Monday a new round of sanctions against Cuban state entities linked to the military conglomerate Gaesa and against an individual related to the Castro family, following the offensive initiated after the signing of Executive Order 14404 on May 1.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), part of the U.S. Treasury Department, added five Cuban companies to its Specially Designated Nationals List (SDN List): Almacenes Universales SA, Banco Financiero Internacional (BFI), Geominera SA, Empresa Siderúrgica José Martí (Antillana de Acero), and Rafin SA

In addition to the companies, the sanctions also include Annalie Lilliam Rueda Cardero, wife of General Alejandro Castro Espín – son of Raúl Castro – who was also sanctioned in early June .

Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted on X: “Today I sanctioned new entities in the Gaesa network linked to both the movement of its funds and the management of its physical assets, as well as entities responsible for exploiting Cuba’s mineral and metallic reserves to obtain illicit profits.”

“The situation in Cuba continues to deteriorate as the island’s corrupt, brutal, and anti-American communist regime continues to prioritize its absolute control over freedom.”

Rubio warned that any person or entity providing services to the sanctioned actors risks being sanctioned as well, and that, therefore, foreign banks and other entities that maintain commercial relationships with these entities must cease their activities immediately.

“The situation in Cuba continues to deteriorate as the island’s corrupt, brutal, and anti-American communist regime continue reading

continues to prioritize its absolute control over the freedom, opportunities, and basic well-being of the Cuban people,” the Secretary of State said.

With this decision, Washington makes it clear that the economic reforms recently announced by the Cuban government have not altered its strategy or pressure. Although the package of 176 resolutions has been presented as the most significant reform of the Cuban economic structure in decades—including the legalization of private banking, the opening of state-owned enterprises to private and foreign capital, and a greater expansion of private enterprise—the US maintains that the core of the economic system remains under the control of the military leadership.

According to the AFP agency, a US State Department spokesperson dismissed the Cuban government’s package of measures as “smoke signals” and demanded “far more substantial economic and political reforms that make Cuba attractive to investors” and offer its citizens “the freedom, dignity, and opportunities they deserve.”

Washington dismissed the Cuban government’s package of measures as “smoke signals” and demanded “much more substantial economic and political reforms.”

Since the signing of the Executive Order on May 1, 2026, Washington has deployed a strategy of pressure against the economic pillars of the regime.

First, it sanctioned Gaesa, its president, General Ania Guillermina Lastres Morera, and the state-owned mining company Moa Nickel, which precipitated the withdrawal of foreign companies such as the Canadian company Sherritt International and several hotel chains associated with the military conglomerate, including Blue Diamond Resorts, Iberostar, Meliá and Archipelago International.

Major international shipping companies, including France’s CMA CGM and Germany’s Hapag-Lloyd, suspended all services to Cuba in compliance with the new secondary sanctions regime. The decision brought a significant portion of cargo traffic to the island to a standstill and forced operators to abandon routes or renegotiate contracts.

The measures also affected Fincimex, with the suspension of Visa and Mastercard operations on the Island.

In previous actions, Washington had already expanded sanctions to include figures in the political and family circle of power in Cuba, including Miguel Díaz-Canel.

On June 11, the inclusion of Cupet on the OFAC sanctions list thwarted the operation of Florida-based Vanguard Energy, which had hoped to finalize one of the largest private fuel sales to Cuba in recent years. The sanctions against Cupet also led to the withdrawal of Australian oil company Melbana, which boasted of working on one of the most promising crude oil exploration projects, although it never presented convincing data.

In previous actions, Washington had already extended sanctions to figures in the political and family circle of power in Cuba, including Miguel Díaz-Canel, his wife, Lis Cuesta Peraza and his stepson, Manuel Anido Cuesta, as well as Alejandro Castro Espín, among other members of the ruling elite and their support networks.

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The IACHR Demands That Cuba Annul the Conviction of Maykel ‘Osorbo’

The regime disappeared and arbitrarily imprisoned the artist, the commission noted in a resolution.

Maykel ‘Osorbo’ was sentenced to nine years in prison for “contempt, public disorder, attack and defamation of institutions, organizations, heroes and martyrs” / X

14ymedio, Havana, June 23, 2026 — The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) [‘CIDH’ in Spanish] demanded that the Cuban government overturn the nine-year prison sentence of artist and political prisoner Maykel Castillo Osorbo, investigate his enforced disappearance for 14 days, and reform the laws that punish protest and dissent. Based on a complaint filed by the organization Prisoners Defenders (PD) in 2021, the Commission concluded that the regime violated the activist’s rights to liberty, integrity, artistic expression, assembly, association, justice, and due process.

In a statement released this Tuesday, PD celebrated the ruling outlined in Report No. 78/26 and noted that the IACHR resolved that the arrest of the co-founder of the San Isidro Movement on May 18, 2021, was illegal. “Maykel Osorbo was not committing a crime, he was not caught in the act, there was no record of an arrest warrant, there was no proven risk of flight, and pretrial detention had not even been ordered yet. He was arrested while having lunch.”

Furthermore, the Commission emphasized that “one of the most serious aspects of the resolution is the enforced disappearance” suffered by the artist. The IACHR concluded that between May 18 and 31, 2021, Maykel Osorbo’s whereabouts remained unknown. “During those 14 days, friends, family members, and advocates sought information at police stations and state agencies without obtaining any real answers.” According to the Commission, by failing to provide precise information about his whereabouts, “the State effectively refused to reveal his location. This, coupled with the fact that the detention was carried out by state agents, constitutes enforced disappearance.” continue reading

“During those 14 days, relatives, family members, and advocates sought information at police stations and state agencies without obtaining a real answer.”

The organization also stated that the artist’s subsequent pretrial detention was arbitrary. “The Cuban Prosecutor’s Office upheld the deprivation of liberty without justifying a risk of flight or obstruction of justice, and even refused to replace it with a non-detention measure, despite acknowledging that there was no danger of Maykel leaving Havana, in violation of his personal liberty and the presumption of innocence.”

The IACHR also indicated that the criminal proceedings “were a series of violations.” Castillo was unable to adequately meet with his lawyer during a decisive stage. In addition, his imprisonment far from Havana hampered his defense, his lawyer was disbarred three days before the trial, and another lawyer had to assume representation without sufficient preparation time. The commission also noted that the trial was held behind closed doors, preventing access for diplomats and citizens. Therefore, the IACHR concluded that the Cuban government “failed to guarantee due process or an effective defense for Osorbo,” who was sentenced in May 2022 for “contempt, public disorder, and attacks and defamation of institutions, organizations, heroes, and martyrs.”

Prisoners Defenders emphasized that the commission upheld the core of its complaint: the co-author and performer of ” Patria y Vida,” a song that won two Latin Grammys, was not imprisoned for committing crimes, but for exercising his rights. Therefore, the Madrid-based organization asserted that “the nine-year sentence is legally illegitimate,” as the commission concluded that it resulted from a process lacking due process and that it criminally punished conduct protected by human rights.

The organization demanded that the regime, in addition to overturning the conviction, fully repair the declared violations.

Finally, the organization demanded that the regime, in addition to overturning the sentence, fully repair the declared violations, as well as guarantee physical and mental health care for Osorbo , his daughter – who has been prevented from visiting the rapper in prison – and his partner Anamely Ramos.

In addition, he urged a “diligent and effective” criminal investigation into the enforced disappearance he suffered in 2021; he called for accountability of the officials involved and for them to refrain from arresting, prosecuting, or convicting the musician again for his activities.

He also called for guarantees that such a case would not be repeated, reform of pretrial detention, ensuring real access to defense, repealing the crime of contempt, modifying the crime of public disorder so that it is not used against protest, and refraining from using the crime of assault or other criminal offenses to persecute dissidents, artists, and human rights defenders.

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