The Cuban Center for Advanced Studies (CEA) for the development of nanoscience and nanotechnologies was inaugurated this Thursday as the national headquarters for research in this field, focused mainly in the areas of biotechnology and medicine. Located west of Havana, the CEA is a multidisciplinary center and one of its main purposes is to promote the presence of the Caribbean country in the international market of bionanotechnology, a discipline that seeks to build nanometer-scale machines using the knowledge of molecular biology. The opening of the "first stage" of the institution was presided over by Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel, who reported on this and other visits to different Cuban institutions on his official Twitter account. Photo: EFE (taken from eldiario.es). According to the site of the Presidency of the island, the CEA is a "dream" of deceased former President Fidel Castro, "conceived and promoted by the leader of the Revolution and by Fidel Castro Díaz-Balart," his eldest son, who served as scientific adviser to the island’s Council of State until his death in February 2018. Under construction since 2006, its opening was scheduled for 2016, according to reports from the state press, which reported four years ago on the progress of...

A transgender couple became the first to legally formalize their union in Cuba, the National Center for Sex Education (CENESEX), led by sexologist Mariela Castro, daughter of former President Raul Castro, reported this Thursday. The wedding between the transgender Dunia and Ramces was formalized on July 16 at the Marriage Palace of San Francisco de Paula, in the municipality of San Miguel del Padrón, in Havana. "This legal ceremony does not violate what is established in the Cuban legal system because it is about two people whose legally registered gender is female and male although they are not coherent with the gender identities of Ramces and Dunia," the note explains. https://www.facebook.com/cenesex/posts/2444516088945787 It also points out that this event "takes on special relevance" given that the Marriage Palace, belonging to the Ministry of Justice, "respected the way in which they express their gender identity." The CENESEX noted that the "obstacle" of the parties’ gender identity was "surpassed" after "a failed first attempt in that institution (the Marriage Palace) that required the advice of CENESEX’s Legal Guidance Services." It indicated that "to date, both receive attention by the National Commission of Comprehensive Care for Transsexual Persons and are waiting, by their own...

Cuba has reactivated the Alficsa Plus distillery, producer of fine alcohols from sugarcane, which has been rehabilitated with Spanish investment and technology, the island’s state media said this Tuesday. The plant, located in Cienfuegos, is in the start-up phase after being paralyzed for six years and is expected to become the most modern of its kind in Cuba. Alficsa produces alcohols necessary for the pharmaceutical and perfume industries, and for the production of rums. Mayra Rivero, executive vice-president of the Cuban-Spanish joint venture Alficsa Plus, affirmed that all the tests carried out so far have been completed successfully, so they hope to distill the first volumes of alcohol this month, according to the local television channel Perlavisión. The rehabilitation of this industry has required an investment of six million Cuban pesos (1 CUP = 0.04 dollars) and convertible pesos (1 CUC = 1 dollar), according to official data, which does not specify the amount in both currencies. This has served to assemble a new steam boiler with a generation capacity of 20 tons, a water treatment plant and a cooling tower in the distillation area. With state-of-the-art Spanish technology, the enterprise is able to provide "very high quality" alcohols for...

The Cuban National Assembly approved this Saturday in a plenary meeting a new Electoral Law that maintains the process of direct election of deputies and reduces the composition of Parliament and the Council of State, a little more than three months after the island’s Constitution was proclaimed. "This is the first legal provision that expresses the mandate of the Constitution of the Republic, proclaimed on April 10," said Secretary of the Council of State Homero Acosta, quoted by the official website Cubadebate in its report on the parliamentary session, to which the foreign press doesn’t have access. The voting was presided over by former Cuban President Raúl Castro, leader of the ruling Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), and the current president, Miguel Díaz-Canel. The new Cuban Electoral Law was approved in half the time proposed by the Magna Carta and comprises 16 titles, 45 chapters, 32 sections, 5 final provisions, 6 transitory provisions and a total of 290 articles. Its main changes include the creation of the National Electoral Commission as a permanent organ, which should be formed in this plenary session. https://twitter.com/AsambleaCuba/status/1150132921086464000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1150132921086464000&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Foncubanews.com%2Fcuba%2Fcuba-aprueba-ley-electoral-que-mantiene-eleccion-directa-y-reduce-parlamento%2F It also modifies the proportion of deputies to 1 for every 30,000 inhabitants or for more than...

On Friday, three months after the kidnapping of two Cuban doctors in northern Kenya by alleged members of the Somali Al-Shabaab jihadist group without any news about the captives, the operation to rescue them continues. The track of surgeon Landy Rodríguez and general medicine specialist Assel Herrera Correa was lost on April 12, when they were traveling in an official vehicle to work at the Mandera Hospital, near the border with Somalia. That day, Rodríguez and Herrera were escorted "as usual," Kenyan Police spokesman Charles Owino confirmed at the time to EFE new agency. However, the convoy was intercepted by armed men who, after a shootout in which one of the policemen who watched over their safety died, kidnapped the doctors and took them to Somali territory. The governor of Mandera County, Ali Roba, at the time noted that "alleged members of Al-Shabaab" had kidnapped the doctors. To date, the kidnappers have not provided any evidence about the fate of Rodríguez and Herrera, although the Kenyan and Cuban authorities reiterate they are still alive. "The efforts continue to rescue the doctors, but I don’t know when they will be released. What I do know is that they are alive wherever...

Cuban artist Carmen Herrera, aged 104, went unnoticed until a little over a decade ago, but this Wednesday she reached a new goal with the exhibition of a group of her large-scale sculptures in the gardens of New York’s City Hall. "I love that she is finally being recognized and that she is being seen as a historical artistic figure," said to EFE news agency the curator of the show, Daniel Palmer, of the New York Public Arts Fund. And it is that the exhibition, titled "Estructuras Monumentales" and that is formed by five large-scale monochromatic aluminum sculptures, is being exhibited in the middle of Manhattan, in view of the more than eight million inhabitants of New York, a city considered the world epicenter of art. Thus, Palmer points out, one of Herrera's great dreams is coming true, to bring her work to the people and that they enjoy it for free, after decades of frustration in which the Cuban woman was constantly relegated to the background for the mere fact of being a woman. Daniel Palmer, curator of the New York exhibition of sculptures by Cuban artist Carmen Herrera. Photo: Kena Betancur / EFE. "The gallerists told her clearly...

The leader of the ruling Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), Raul Castro, and the country's president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, this Tuesday discussed with Vietnamese Vice President Dang Thi Ngoc Thinh the increasingly close bilateral relations and agreements between both countries. During the meeting, the top Cuban leaders and the Vietnamese vice president held talks about "the close bonds of friendship that unite the two peoples, parties and governments," according to a state television report accompanied by images of the meeting. Castro, Díaz-Canel and Dang also discussed experiences in "the construction of socialism" in both countries and about the implementation of bilateral agreements, the television news report added. https://twitter.com/PresidenciaCuba/status/1148751005019975681?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1148751005019975681&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Foncubanews.com%2Fcuba%2Fraul-castro-y-diaz-canel-se-reunen-con-vicepresidenta-de-vietnam%2F The Vietnamese vice president began an official visit to Cuba on Monday as part of the frequent political, economic and commercial contacts between the two countries. The first meeting on her agenda was held with Cuban First Vice President Salvador Valdés, with whom she reviewed bilateral relations and agreements and spoke in favor of strengthening economic, trade, investment and cooperation ties. She also visited the Mariel Special Development Zone, the Cuban government's flagship project to attract foreign investments, where Vietnam has several projects underway. Ngoc Thinh toured this Tuesday areas of Los Palacios...

With the inclusion of 10,000 new "self-employed workers" last May, Cuba already registers 605,908 workers who operate outside the State sector, according to statistics revealed this Tuesday by the island’s Ministry of Labor and Social Security (MTSS). Out of the Cuban self-employed 35% are women and 32% are young, specified the minister of MTSS, Margarita González, during the sessions of the permanent commissions that the National Assembly is holding with a view to next Saturday’s plenary meeting. In the first five months of 2019, 185,903 new licenses were approved, nearly half in Havana, Villa Clara (center) and Holguin (east), she said. Among the most requested modalities are the preparation and sale of food, passenger and freight transportation and home rentals, González said, according to a report by the Cuban News Agency about the sessions, which the accredited foreigner press on the island does not have access to. https://oncubanews.com/cuba/cuba-amplia-el-trabajo-privado-y-adopta-modificaciones-para-su-ejercicio/ The minister of labor added that until last May there were 77,522 dropouts, concentrated mainly in the sectors of gastronomy, construction, beauty services and hired workers, in some cases at their own request and in others for breach of tax obligations. A total of more than 1.4 million people in Cuba currently...

Spanish Acting Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities Pedro Duque concluded his two-day agenda in Havana on Tuesday with a visit to the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology and a meeting with Cuban Minister of Science, Technology and Environment Elba Rosa Pérez. The minister and former astronaut toured the largest research, development, production and commercialization of biological products complex in Cuba, where he participated in a meeting with local authorities in what was his last official activity in the Caribbean country before returning to Madrid. Spanish Acting Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities Pedro Duque (from the back), meets with Cuban Minister of Science, Technology and Environment Elba Rosa Pérez Montoya (l), on Tuesday at Havana’s Hotel Nacional de Cuba. Photo: Yander Zamora / POOL / EFE. He previously had a date with Pérez to look into ways to expand bilateral cooperation after signing yesterday a framework agreement for cooperation between Spanish and Cuban universities. The memorandum of understanding for educational and scientific collaboration, signed on Monday by Duque and Cuban Minister of Higher Education José Ramón Saborido will serve to institutionalize cooperation between universities of both countries, which until today is limited to specific agreements between different centers....

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said this Saturday to the island’s delegation that will participate in the 18th Pan American Games in Lima, at the flag-bearing ceremony for the 420 athletes who will compete in the Peruvian capital, that their performance will be "triumphant." "I wish you success. I know you are prepared, these days we have had good news about our athletes’ performances in different international competitions and that also gives us the certainty that this will be a triumphant delegation," said the Cuban leader to the athletes at the end of the ceremony in Havana. Díaz-Canel told the athletes that the Cuban people will be "very attentive" to their performance at the continental meeting and also pointed out that the island is experiencing a moment of U.S. "aggressions," but affirmed that in Cuba "no one is losing sleep" over this and said that the country will continue "advancing." Check Tweet Cuba is going to the Pan American Games hosted by the Peruvian capital from July 26 to August 11 with the main goal of surpassing the fourth place and the 36 gold medals obtained in the previous continental meeting in Toronto 2015, according to the country’s sports authorities. According...

This week Spanish films and series are invading Havana’s main theaters in the largest film show from that country in Cuba, from the last film by Pedro Almodóvar, Dolor y Gloria (2019), to the acclaimed La isla mínima (2014), by Alberto Rodríguez. Rodríguez, who brought to Cuba the feature film with which he made off with the Goya Awards in 2015 (10 awards) and his most recent series La peste, from 2018, was the protagonist this Thursday in the opening ceremony of the show with producer Manuela Ocón and actresses Susi Sánchez, Bárbara Lennie and Aura Garrido. https://youtu.be/Q9w1ikDjveI "It is a film that has brought us joy since the day we premiered it," said the director, when asked by EFE news agency about the reception of La isla mínima outside Spain and more specifically in Latin America and Cuba. Regarding the Cuban public, he said that "it has more cinematographic culture than the Spanish" and confessed to having the feeling that in Spain "we aren’t being able to form new generations to enjoy cinema." Spanish film director Alberto Rodríguez in Havana, during the Spanish film show in Cuba. Photo: Yander Zamora / EFE. Another of the highlights of the show...

The U.S. Department of the Treasury announced this Wednesday the imposition of sanctions against the Cuban state-owned enterprise Cubametales for its continued import of Venezuelan crude oil and support for the government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin said in a press release that Maduro relies on Cuba to stay in power, buying military equipment and intelligence in exchange for oil. He added that the sanctions "will disrupt Maduro’s attempts to use Venezuela’s oil as a bargaining tool to help his supporters purchase protection from Cuba and other malign foreign actors." Cubametales is responsible for guaranteeing all imports and exports of fuel to and from Cuba, according to the U.S. Government. https://twitter.com/USTreasury/status/1146426199482261504?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1146426199482261504&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Foncubanews.com%2Fcuba-ee-uu%2Feeuu-sanciona-a-empresa-cubametales-por-comprar-crudo-de-venezuela%2F As a result of this measure, assets that the company may have under U.S. jurisdiction are frozen and financial transactions with U.S. entities are prohibited. The Treasury Department noted that since January 2019, when it announced sanctions against the state-owned company Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA), Cubametales and other Cuba-based entities have continued to support Maduro through oil shipments from Venezuela. Likewise, Washington indicated that it had delisted PB Tankers S.p.A. (PB Tankers), based in Italy, from its blacklist after it broke its...

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel denied this Tuesday that the imminent and substantial increase in state wages is a populist measure and he affirmed it will be accompanied by other economic reforms, such as the long-awaited elimination of the dual currency. In an unusual appearance in the evening debate Cuban TV program Mesa Redonda, the president said that the increase in wages, that will benefit starting this month more than 2.7 million public workers, "has nothing to do with populism." Díaz-Canel thus responded to "the attacks of some who have never been interested in the people’s well-being," referring to the critical voices that, mainly from social networks, considered that it was a populist measure to quell the growing complaints over the low wages and high prices of some products in the country. The wage increase stipulates that minimum monthly salaries will increase from 225 Cuban pesos or CUP (equivalent to about 9.3 dollars) to 400 (16.6 dollars), average wages from 767 Cuban pesos (about 30.6 dollars) to 1,067 pesos (44.4 dollars) and the maximum will go up to 3,000 pesos (about 125 dollars). In Cuba the CUP coexists with the convertible peso (CUC), at parity with the dollar and equivalent to...

The director general of the FAO, Brazilian José Graziano da Silva, this Monday thanked Cuba for its "commitment" to eradicate hunger and malnutrition, during a meeting with the island's foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez. Graziano da Silva, who will leave his position at the head of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on July 31, traveled to Havana to attend the 7th Continental Congress of the Latin American Coordinator of Rural Organizations and Farmers Road, which ended this Sunday in the Cuban capital. The official posted an image of the meeting on his official Twitter account, where he thanked Rodríguez for "the country's commitment to the eradication of hunger and malnutrition." "The right to food must be a priority for all the world’s governments," he affirmed. Check Tweet Here In the same social network, the Cuban foreign minister said that during the talks they both ratified "the good state of the historic relations of cooperation" between FAO and Cuba, and "the common interest of continuing to strengthen them." Rodriguez highlighted "the valuable and committed work" of Graziano da Silva at the head of the organization, "particularly in favor of food security and the fight against hunger in the world,"...

The Cuban sports authorities blamed the government of Washington’s decision to cancel the agreement reached by the island’s Baseball Federation and the Major Leagues for the defection of two other baseball players in the United States. Players Norge Carlos Vera Aldana and Orlando Acebey Gutiérrez "also decided to not meet their commitment and left the Cuba team after the last game in the CanAm Baseball League," the Cuban Baseball Federation (FCB) confirmed this Monday on its Twitter account. "Reprehensible attitudes such as these are caused by the U.S. government’s cancellation of the agreement between the FCB and the MLB," the message added. It also considered that what happened "is part of the war we are still facing." Check Tweet Here The vice president of the island’s National Sports Institute, Roberto León Richards, wrote in the same social network that "the authors of the cancellation of the MLB-FCB Agreement knew and were precisely looking for this: the irregularities in the arrival of our players to the Major Leagues. Nothing further from the Olympic spirit." The defections of Vera and Acebey were added to that of young player Yoelkis Céspedes during the participation of the Cuban team in the Canadian-American League (Can-Am)...

The Galician government will collaborate with UNICEF ​​Galicia in a project of this organization in Old Havana, to support the personal development and social inclusion of children and adolescents in the Cuban capital. The vice president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, and the president of UNICEF ​​Galicia, Myriam Garabito, signed this Monday in Santiago de Compostela the agreement by which the government is committed to contribute a total of 40,000 euros in two annual instalments for the development of this humanitarian action. https://twitter.com/elcorreogallego/status/1145643861697617920?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1145643861697617920&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Foncubanews.com%2Fmundo%2Feuropa%2Fgobierno-y-unicef-de-galicia-impulsan-inclusion-social-de-jovenes-en-la-habana%2F UNICEF ​​Galicia has launched this project thanks to the contribution of European funds and the collaboration of the Office of the City of Havana Historian. It includes different workshops related to health, communications and journalism, among others, so that young people can develop their skills and training in different subjects. The president of UNICEF ​​Galicia, Myriam Garabito, explained that the idea is that "the most vulnerable adolescents in places of poverty and exclusion have a point of reference and a place where they can develop fully." For his part, the vice president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, who was accompanied by the director general of foreign relations and the European Union, Jesus Gamallo, recalled that since 2012...

The Cuban government warned this Friday that it will control retail prices after the increase in state salaries and pensions, which will begin next July as part of a package of measures to stimulate the economy, overwhelmed by serious tensions. During a speech broadcast by the state-run television at the end of a government visit to the western province of Pinar del Rio, President Miguel Díaz-Canel called for "controlling" the prices of goods and services starting with the next wage increase to avoid "inflation."  "We have to control, there can be no price increases in the state sector, nor in products or services, nor in the non-state sector. And we’re going to discuss it with the non-state sector so that it understands," he stressed, offering details about the new economic measures announced last Thursday. The wage increase stipulates that minimum monthly salaries will rise from 225 Cuban pesos (equivalent to about 9.3 dollars) to 400 (16.6 dollars), the average from 767 Cuban pesos (about 30.6 dollars) to 1,067 pesos (44.4 dollars) and the maximum will rise to 3,000 pesos (about 125 dollars). The expected salary increase that will benefit more than 2.7 million people refers to salaries in Cuban pesos...

The general director of the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS), Zoé Robledo, reaffirmed this Friday his commitment to collaborate on health issues with Cuba after a working meeting with Cuban Minister of Health José Ángel Portal Miranda. During the meeting, the officials shared experiences and exchanged views on the main health issues shared by both countries, especially focused on primary health care, the IMSS said in a newsletter. In that regard, Robledo said that progress should be made in updating the memorandum of understanding on technical cooperation between the IMSS and the Cuban Ministry of Public Health. https://twitter.com/Tu_IMSS/status/1144408621318492160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1144408621318492160&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Foncubanews.com%2Fcuba%2Fmexico-y-cuba-buscan-fortalecer-lazos-en-salud-publica%2F This, in order to give validity and continuity to the main issues of the common agenda as in the case of Mexico is the issue of the universalization of public health services. "It is a shared effort that is being built as one of the priorities of the new government, of this administration, to achieve the universalization of services," Robledo explained. He recalled that in Mexico the model of health care for the population at large is provided through the IMSS-BIENESTAR program, which has more than four decades of experience and has the particularity of linking community participation. In that sense,...

The Celia Cruz Foundation and the Celia Cruz Legacy Project presented a scholarship this Wednesday to the young and "very versatile" Cuban-American percussionist David Carmona, who "plays Celia's repertoire very well." The Foundation that bears the name of "La Reina de la Salsa" (The Queen of Salsa) chose Carmona, who lives in Miami and takes lessons in two of the city’s conservatories, as a depository of 5,000 dollars in support of his musical studies. The scholarship also serves as recognition "of his great musical talent," said Omer Pardillo, founder and director of the Celia Cruz Foundation and executor of the patrimony of the "Guarachera de Cuba" (1925-2003). "We have been following him (Carmona) for four years. He studies kettledrum, plays very well and has a great future, because he also plays all the Cuban percussion instruments, and plays the piano," said Pardillo to EFE. Photo: Abel Ferro / Versal Studio. The cash prize is given to the chosen student to buy instruments or take private music lessons, explained Pardillo. Carmona, who is 14 and the son of Cubans, said that "receiving this scholarship from the Celia Cruz Foundation is an honor and a great blessing." "Playing music is an art;...

Cuba’s National Assembly of People's Power will meet starting July 13 to address the draft of the Electoral and Fisheries laws, and the country’s economic situation during the first half of the year, among other issues. The 10 permanent commissions of the National Assembly will previously hold regular working meetings on July 8, 9 and 10, according to the convocation for the third ordinary session of the Assembly, in its 9th Legislature, published this Monday in the state media. The convocation doesn’t give details on the topics that the Cuban deputies will address in this meeting, one of the two that is held annually in July and December by the island's Parliament. Last week, the Constitutional and Legal Affairs Commission of the Assembly presented to the deputies through a videoconference the draft Electoral Law and debates were opened to collect their opinions, suggestions, modifications and doubts. According to parliamentary authorities, the population can also participate in the debates. https://oncubanews.com/cuba/cuba-presentan-proyecto-de-nueva-ley-electoral/ The draft of a new Electoral Law, which was analyzed by the National Electoral Commission and reviewed by another Parliament group, must be approved at its next meeting in accordance with the schedule established after the new Cuban Constitution was endorsed...

The passion for American novelist Ernest Hemingway is again bringing together scholars from Cuba and the U.S., who are arriving in Havana to participate this week in a colloquium on the Nobel Prize for Literature despite Washington’s recent travel restrictions. "Some people who were coming to the event canceled, but they were the least. Hemingway is an important bridge between the two nations and has been joining us for many years," Grisell Fraga, president of the Organizing Committee of the meeting, which is also being attended by researchers from Japan, Israel, Argentina and Spain, told EFE. Fraga, director of the Finca Vigía house-museum, the Havana home where the writer spent his last 20 years, added that despite President Donald Trump administration’s new prohibitions, many Americans "for a long time have had strong ties to Cuba and they always find the way to come." The eagerness to preserve the legacy of the writer (1899-1961), much loved on the island, where he was called "Papa Hemingway," has kept open a channel of dialogue between Cuba and the United States, even in times of great tension between both countries, which reestablished links in 2015 after more than half a century of bitter enmity....

Cuba registered 595,559 private or self-employed workers, as they are known on the island, mostly grouped in six of the island’s 15 provinces, the Ministry of Labor and Social Security (MTSS) reported on Thursday. According to the data released, which correspond to the end of last April, of that number of self-employed workers, 32% are young, 35% are women, 10% are retired and 14% are also employed in the state sector. The provinces of Havana, Matanzas, Villa Clara, Camagüey, Holguín and Santiago de Cuba account for 65% of the total number of self-employed workers, according to the report published by the island’s state media. Some 148,796 people joined the private sector during the first four months of 2019 in activities related to transportation, beauty services, producers or sellers of diverse items and as hired employees, the modality with the highest demand and for which more than 153,000 people have opted. https://oncubanews.com/cuba/cuba-amplia-el-trabajo-privado-y-adopta-modificaciones-para-su-ejercicio/ The most requested modalities are the elaboration and sale of food (9%), cargo and passenger transportation (8%), the rental of houses, rooms and spaces (5%), telecommunications agents (5%); and the contracted workers (25%), mostly associated with the first two activities. In the analyzed period, it was reported that 60,596...

Guatemalan security forces intercepted last Wednesday 56 undocumented immigrants, most of them Cuban and Haitian nationals. The Ministry of the Interior indicated that the immigrants were located by agents of the National Civil Police (PNC) when they were traveling as "passengers" on buses through the east of the Central American country. The security forces located 41 people, 24 Cubans, 15 Haitians, one Salvadoran and one Honduran, on a bus that was intercepted at kilometer 41 of the route to the Atlantic, in the department of El Progreso. The other group, some 15 migrants of Haitian origin, was found on a bus at kilometer 145 of the Inter-American Highway, in the department of Zacapa. The two groups, which initially intended to get to Mexican territory, were transferred to a shelter run by the Guatemalan Migration Institute to resolve their legal situation. Due to its geographical position, Guatemala is used as a bridge for the traffic of people to the United States and since last year several caravans of migrants, mostly Hondurans and Salvadorans, seeking an opportunity on U.S. soil, have passed through the territory. The government of Guatemala recently signed with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security an agreement to bilaterally...

The foreign ministers of the European Union (EU) addressed this Monday in Luxembourg the diplomatic efforts to achieve a political solution to the Venezuelan crisis and the consequences of the application of the U.S. Helms-Burton Act on Cuba, among other current affairs. The High Representative of the EU for Foreign Policy Federica Mogherini informed the ministers about the first contacts made by the special adviser for Venezuela, Enrique Iglesias. Likewise, it rendered account on the meeting recently held by the international contact group―boosted by the EU to promote conditions in which fair presidential elections can be held in Venezuela―with the Lima group, composed of American countries critical of the government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. The EU supports any dialogue that allows finding a peaceful and political solution to the crisis in Venezuela, such as the negotiations between the government and the opposition taking place in Oslo, as long as they are complementary to its diplomatic efforts. The contact group, which will meet again soon, has access to all parties involved in this conflict, as well as to civil society. Several diplomatic sources considered that the time is not right to speak of sanctions, although the Council of the EU...

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel ratified that starting 2020 the economic plans "will not come from above" and that it will be the workers who will design the goals of the state enterprises, a "bold measure" by the government to try to revive the island’s damaged economy. The president referred to the new directive when giving the closing speech of a congress of economists, who are necessary "to successfully implement the decision," Granma daily reported this Saturday in a front-page story. With the decentralization of its economy, Cuba ends decades of verticality in its economic plans, a method that although effective in the first years of the Revolution, today has become a burden for the Caribbean nation, determined not to fall back on an intense crisis like that of the "special period" of the 1990s. For many specialists the main challenge of this transformation lies in changing the culture of "verticality" that doesn’t question the orders from a higher structure. "A change of mentality is necessary for this much-demanded measure to be effective. To take a leap to the new moment and know that the Plan will not come from above. It is an audacious and revolutionary measure that demands objectivity,...