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CUBA POLITICS SECTION - Havana Journal
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Rob Sequin | Havana Journal
Maybe it is premature to declare the end of a US policy that is almost fifty years old but the Havana Journal is closely watching developments that appear to lay a path towards lifting the travel and/or trade Embargo against Cuba. We are listing events, although may not appear to be immediately related to changes in US Cuba policy, we think collectively the events below are related to the big picture of changing US Cuba policy.
We will update this article as events develop.
May 23, 2008: Presidential candidate Obama says he…
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RELENTLESS PERSECUTION AGAINST THE FOREFRONT FOR CHANGE
The Cuban government has used the following repressive resources against citizens who support the Varela Project legal initiative and its organizers:
The State Security sends agents to the homes of citizens who have signed the Varela Project, officers then pose as Varela Project activists to mislead and confuse supporters.
Through letters with falsified signatures, the State Security has offered money to those that have signed the Varela Project and requests that they go to the Project Coordinator’s home to receive this money.
Some of the signatories have been expelled from their work…
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President Obama: Thank you for this opportunity to exchange views with you and your readers in Cuba and around the world and congratulations on receiving the Maria Moore Cabot Prize award from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism for coverage of Latin America that furthers inter-American understanding. You richly deserve the award. I was disappointed you were denied the ability to travel to receive the award in person.
Your blog provides the world a unique window into the realities of daily life in Cuba. It is telling that the Internet has provided you and other courageous Cuban bloggers with…
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AFP
The United States and Cuba will hold a second round of talks on migration issues in Havana at a yet undetermined date, a State Department spokesman said Monday.
“We are currently exploring dates that would work for both delegations to discuss the migration accords in Havana,” said Charles Luoma-Overstreet.
“This would be the second high-level meeting on migration issues during the Obama administration,” he added, referring to President Barack Obama’s stated intention of improving relations with Cuba’s communist regime.
An administration official, who asked to remain anonymous, said the second round of talks would take place next month.
The…
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BY RICHARD G. LUGAR and HOWARD L. BERMAN | lugar.senate.gov
U.S. law lets American citizens travel to any country on earth, friend or foe—with one exception: Cuba. It’s time for us to scrap this anachronistic ban, imposed during one of the chilliest periods of the Cold War.
Legislation to abolish restrictions on travel to Cuba has been introduced in both chambers of Congress. And on Thursday the House Foreign Affairs Committee will hold a hearing examining the rationale for the travel ban.
This ban has prevented contact between Cubans and ordinary Americans, who serve as ambassadors for the…
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By DAVID GOLDSTEIN and LESLEY CLARK | McClatchy Washington Bureau
Republican Congressman Sam Graves, a farmer from a rural northwest Missouri congressional district, was once a consistent supporter of easing trade and travel restrictions on Cuba.
But a campaign watchdog group said he began accepting campaign contributions from an anti-Castro, pro-trade embargo political action group and eventually reversed field on Cuba.
Public Campaign, a nonpartisan, nonprofit reform group that backs public financing of campaigns, said in a report released today that Graves cast seven votes between 2003 and 2005 to…
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Nine Cuban protesters holed up in a Havana home for 36 days are now taking part in a liquids-only fast.
Protester Lazaro Yuri Valle Roca told CNN Friday after beginning the fast this week, a doctor urged one protester engaged in a full hunger strike to begin consuming fluids.
Valle Roca said despite the doctor’s recommendations, the protesters remain committed to calling for increased rights for citizens of the Communist island nation.
“We remain firm in our decision and our disposition is to go forward,” he said.
Ann Louise Bardach, author of “Without Fidel: A Death Foretold…
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By Will Weissert
The husband of an internationally known dissident Cuban blogger is challenging the presumed state security agents who roughed up his wife to a verbal duel on a Havana street corner.
Reinaldo Escobar said Thursday he feels compelled both as a husband and open critic of the communist government to avenge an incident last week, when two men in plainclothes allegedly forced political blogger Yoani Sanchez into an unmarked sedan, pulled her hair and kicked her.
The confrontation was so violent, Sanchez said she thought the men might kill her, but instead they dropped her off near her…
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By PAUL HAVEN | Associated Press
Cuba has cut two staple foods from the monthly ration books that most islanders depend on, edging closer to a risky full elimination of the decades-old subsidies.
Potatoes and peas were dropped from the list of rationed foods this week, meaning Cubans can buy as much of the products as they want _ as long as they are willing to pay as much as 20 times more than they used to.
The move comes amid efforts by Raul Castro’s government to scale back Cuba’s subsidy-rich, cash-poor economy. Nearly free lunches were eliminated from…
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By LESLEY CLARK | McClatchy Newspapers
Opponents of opening Cuba to American tourists are touting a letter signed by 53 Democrats in the House of Representatives, saying it shows that they have the votes to derail an effort to lift the ban on travel to the island.
The letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., urges the House leadership to maintain the current U.S. policy on Cuba, seeking to blunt the momentum that proponents of lifting the travel ban have claimed under a Democratic president and Democratic-led Congress.
“Any legislation that would seek to ease or lift sanctions ... would…
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