[News] What the US media isn’t telling you about the protests in Cuba

[Anti-Imperialist News]

peoplesdispatch.org
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2024/03/19/what-the-us-media-isnt-telling-you-about-the-protests-in-cuba/>
What the US media isn’t telling you about the protests in Cuba
Peoples Dispatch
March 19, 2024
------------------------------
[image: cuban-flag-2.jpg]

On March 17, people in Santiago, a city in Eastern Cuba, took to the
streets to protest the increased blackouts and food shortages they have
been experiencing. The protest occurred as shortages generated by the US
blockade of Cuba have worsened across the island. Instead of lifting the
blockade or taking Cuba off the state sponsors of terrorism list, the US
government and corporate media have once again exploited the spontaneous
protest to launch “a new counterrevolutionary media offensive”, claim US-based
Cuba solidarity activists
<https://twitter.com/PeoplesForumNYC/status/1769568607950758391>.

“If Biden really wants to stand by the Cuban people, if the US government
were to actually care about the Cuban people, they would immediately end
this blockade,” said
<https://x.com/PeoplesForumNYC/status/1769568607950758391?s=20> People’s
Forum Executive Director Manolo De Los Santos. “In fact, with the stroke of
a pen, they could immediately take Cuba off the State Sponsors of Terrorism
list, which prevents Cuba from accessing financial services around the
world and be able to trade freely.”

Immediately upon learning of the Santiago protest, the US Embassy in
Havana posted
on X <https://twitter.com/USEmbCuba/status/1769531742631727202>, “We urge
the Cuban government to respect the human rights of the protestors and
address the legitimate needs of the Cuban people.”

In fact, the Cuban government immediately responded to the protests.
Beatriz Jhonson Urrutia, the highest level authority in Santiago, along
with other provincial authorities went to the streets to engage in dialogue
<https://twitter.com/DvidTwit/status/1769496686349423062> with those that
had participated in the protest and listened to their concerns.

The response is a stark contrast to the “respect to human rights
of…protesters” seen in the United States. For the past six months, hundreds
of thousands have been mobilizing in cities and towns across the country to
demand a ceasefire in Gaza, and national and local leaders have repressed,
ignored, and ridiculed protesters and their demands.

US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Brian Nichols wrote
on X <https://twitter.com/WHAAsstSecty/status/1769796493706231986>, “The
Cuban government will not be able to meet the needs of its people until it
embraces democracy and the rule of law and respects the rights of Cuban
citizens.”

Maria Elvira Salazar, a far-right member of Congress, who in March
2023 attempted
to codify Cuba’s designation
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/03/29/conservatives-in-the-us-want-the-cuban-people-to-overthrow-their-own-government-or-else/>
as a state sponsor of terror wrote about the Santiago protest, “It is 65
years of socialism; of repression, prison, death and exile; of blackouts,
sicknesses and hunger. Cuba wants freedom!”
*Media war*

Meanwhile, international corporate media has also been quick to capitalize
on the Santiago protest to push their own long standing narrative about
Cuba. For example, in its report
<https://www.infobae.com/america/america-latina/2024/03/18/crisis-en-cuba-la-ocdh-advirtio-al-regimen-que-si-no-hay-cambios-las-protestas-terminaran-en-una-tragedia/>
on the protests, Argentina-based right-wing regional media outlet *Infobae*
referred to Miguel Díaz-Canel as a “dictator”, and called the government a
“regime” and “a Castrist dictatorship”. It also heavily quotes a statement
from the Madrid-based Cuban Observatory of Human Rights, which is a
recipient of funding
<https://www.ned.org/region/latin-america-and-caribbean/cuba-2021/> from
the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a US government funded
foundation. While the piece is mostly focused on unsubstantiated
allegations of repressive actions carried out by Cuban security forces, it
reserves one line at the end of the article to mention the real reasons
that Cubans are dealing with challenging material conditions: “The
pandemic, the toughening of US sanctions, and endogenous errors in the
economic and monetary policy have intensified the structural problems of
the Cuban system in the last three years.”

This general narrative is repeated in other news outlets across the region
like NBC-owned *Telemundo*
<https://www.telemundo.com/noticias/noticias-telemundo/internacional/cubanos-protagonizan-las-protestas-mas-masivas-desde-el-11j-el-hambre-rcna143889>
which also referred to the Cuban revolution as when “the Castro brothers
took power in 1959”. The *Telemundo *article stated: ‘The protests, which
are a rarity in a Cuba where power usually quickly suffocates any public
outcry, are the largest since July 11, 2021 when thousands of Cubans from
the island took to the streets to cries of ‘We want freedom!’”
*Cuba and Latin America reject US attempts at meddling*

For many both on the island and outside, the response by US officials and
corporate media to the protest on March 17 represents a clear attempt to
weaponize the real material challenges facing Cubans due to the tightening
of the blockade in order to push regime change. In fact, as many point out,
this is precisely a goal of the blockade.

ALBA-TCP, a Latin American and Caribbean regional platform for economic and
political cooperation, released a statement
<https://cubaminrex.cu/es/alba-tcp-rechaza-intentos-de-desestabilizacion-contra-cuba>
on March 18 in response to the statements of US officials, to “ratify our
strong solidarity with the government and the Cuban people”. “The member
countries of ALBA-TCP…support their legitimate denunciation against the
enemy campaigns, and we recognize their tireless efforts to overcome all
the difficulties, a consequence of the brutal and illegal economic,
commercial and financial blockade imposed by the US government, which since
the Lester Mallory Memorandum
<https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/document/27400-document-1-state-department-memorandum-decline-and-fall-castro-secret-april-6-1960>
has been causing deprivation for the Cuban people to justify external
intervention.” The regional platform declared it “categorically rejects the
permanent hostility, incitement to subversion and interference of the
United States against [Cuba].”

The Foreign Ministry of Cuba released a statement on March 18 informing
that Deputy Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío had summoned the US Chargé
d’Affaires Benjamin Ziff to convey the “firm rejection of the interference
and slanderous messages of the US government and its embassy in Cuba
regarding the internal affairs of the Cuban reality.”

In the statement the ministry declared: “If the US government had a minimal
and honest concern for the welfare of the Cuban population, it would remove
Cuba from the arbitrary list of States that allegedly sponsor terrorism; it
would put an end to the persecution of fuel supplies that the country needs
to import; it would stop pursuing every financial transaction of Cuba in
the world; it would put an end to the rude persecution against Cuba’s
medical cooperation programs in the world; it would stop intimidating
businessmen, visitors, artists and any person who feels the interest and
the right to interact with the Cuban people.”
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