Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

The data on the impact of the decades-long embargo ranges from a ‘negligible’ effect to ‘an extreme’ one. “Since 1992, the UN General Assembly has passed a non-binding resolution every year, except for 2020, condemning the ongoing impact of the embargo and declaring it in violation of the Charter of the United Nations and of international law. There was no voting on this issue in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Israel [surprise! surprise!] is the only country that routinely joins the U.S. in voting against the resolution…187 countries voted in favor of the resolution in 2023, with only the United States and Israel voting against it and Ukraine abstaining.”  ( Wikipedia )

 One among the rare ones

José Martí lived for much of his life as an exile in the United States.  Here is what he said about the US:  I know the Monster, because I have lived in its lair – and my weapon is only the slingshot of David.

A valuable insight on Cuba since the early 1990s. I find it strange though that someone trained in ‘Marxist historiography’ calls the pre-1989 eastern European countries / the USSR ‘socialist countries’ and defends the ‘Western’ sanctions on Russia.

A liberal view

“Nearly  425,000 Cubans have fled for the United States  in fiscal years 2022 and 2023, shattering previous records.  Instead of moving to stem the flow by focusing on root causes in Cuba, the Biden White House has been signalling support in recent days for Republican-backed border policies.” Biden is sticking with Trump’s policy

Fall in line, be ‘a liberal free-marketeer’ and open your country to our capital. If we don’t invade you, we make sure we kill you slowly. “Cubans have lived under a US economic embargo since 1962. Now, following a disastrous currency reform, inflation is spiralling, food and medicines are in short supply, and the black market is rampant. Food scarcity drives prices up: queueing for vegetables, Havana, 31 March 2023.  Adalberto Roque · AFP · Getty After a period of relaxation during Barack Obama’s second term (2013-17), Donald Trump brought in 243 new sanctions. In 2019 alone, 54 ship owners and 27 companies were fined for carrying fuel to Cuba.  That same year, the US Treasury Department sanctioned 34 vessels operated by the companies Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), Ballito Bay Shipping (headquartered in Liberia) and Proper In Management (registered in Greece). Trump expanded the embargo, enabling individuals and companies to be prosecuted for investing in former American com...

Companies are scared to sell medicine to Iran

How hardship and hopelessness have been exploited by the US. And it is acknowledged by the liberal the Guardian . “Cuba launched mobile internet late, in 2018, but more than 4 million people now access the web via their phones. The internet – and particularly social media – has altered the power balance between citizens and state. After hundreds of people came out in the western town of San Antonio de los Baños on Sunday morning, videos were viewed by people in Havana within minutes. The approximately $20m a year of US federal funds spent on “democracy promotion” factors into the way Cubans experience the internet. Anti-Castro news websites funded by US tax dollars advertise heavily on Facebook and YouTube . VPNs are needed to make purchases with credit cards in Cuba, and to download many apps. When using the popular VPN Psiphon, for example, adverts for Cubanet, ADN Cuba and Diario de Cuba – all financed by the state department – pop up as paid content. Articles from these outlets are...

The best article I have read so far  about the current situation in Cuba. “When the Cuban government responded with violence to the claims of the people whose interests they are supposed to defend, it acted like any other government anywhere in the world, rather than following the socialist character that once defined the revolution. For some, this is a difficult truth to accept.” “I year for more solidarity from the global left” Related My diary of a visit to Cuba

“ [W]hat is needed is political discussion, revolutionary ideological rearmament, accountability and workers’ democracy.” I don’t think that would be enough. How to feed the people and providing them with a decent standard of leaving is tied up with how developed and productive the economy is and what class re-alignment is possible. In the current circumstances as in the previous decades Cuba as an isolated island with limited resources, lack of technological means and embargo is unable to provide for the majority of its people.

Release Frank García Hernández and his comrades

“Last month, the United Nations voted  overwhelmingly  to call on the United States to lift the embargo. Only the United States and Israel voted no. (Ukraine, Colombia, and Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil were the only abstentions.) And 184 nations voted yes.” I think if the Cuban regime wants to survive both foreign intervention and not being overthrown, it must cease repression and open complete dialogue with all different bodies in the Cuban society. However, given the nature of the regime, I doubt that such a move would happen. The recent examples in Belarus, Egypt and others show that the opposite is usually the case. The US must end its brutal sanctions on Cuba

Five Covid-19 Vaccines

  Smarter Empire 

“We have driven Cuba inch by inch into alliance with the Soviet,’ Norman Mailer wrote, ‘as deliberately and insanely as a man setting out to cuckold himself.’ Castro never wanted to be beholden to the Soviets. He had downplayed the role of the local Communist Party (Partido Socialista Popular) in preparing the ground for his own revolution. But there were only so many options for a single-crop economy of seven million people ninety miles from the Florida coast.”  Fidel Castro and the Making of the 1960s

This might look like what China did when it opened its economy . But Cuba is not China. My guess–and it is just a guess– is that the biggest industries will remain under state control. Other businesses will be privatised, some will be partially privatised. If this opening allows the state to accumulate capital through taxes and maintain its good healthcare system and improve others., the lives of a few Cubans will improve.  Cuba needs a modern transport system and renovation of hundreds of thousands of homes, for example. Carts and camiones are used as means of transport, the Internet is not affordable to everyone, schools needs pencils, many flats in Havana are derelict, etc, etc. That’s just some of what I witnessed in my visit in 2015. And it is definitely not a communist economy or a communist country as it is always portrayed. All what the country has is some socialistic elements. Cuba already has a small private sector. A Spanish luxury hotel chain, private restaurants, smal...

 Another proof that socialism  - cannot be built in one country - cannot be build in a poor country - cannot be build while being strangled by imperialism The best Cuba has been able to do it to survive and preserve few gains. Day Zero in Cuba

 From Ishmahil Blagrove diary: Cuba December 2020 Related Internet fuels rate protests

 1960’s covert activities in Latin America