Latin America on The Huffington Post

Melquisedet Angulo: Gunmen Kill Family Of Mexican Drug War Hero

2009-12-22T14:08:27Z

MEXICO CITY — Gunmen mowed down the family of a Mexican marine just hours after the military honored him as a national hero for losing his life during a raid that took down powerful drug kingpin Arturo Beltran Leyva.

The brazen attack happened shortly before midnight Monday at the home of fallen marine Melquisedet Angulo in the town of Paraiso in the Gulf coast state of Tabasco, police said.

Norberto Fuentes: Saturday Night with Fidel Castro (Part I of III)

2009-12-22T13:20:43Z

Editor's note: After a daring escape attempt in 1989, celebrated Cuban journalist Norberto Fuentes was imprisoned by his former friend Fidel Castro. Twenty years later, Fuentes has gotten his revenge: by telling the history of the revolution in Castro's own voice. Fuentes' new book, "The Autobiography of Fidel Castro", has just been published. This three-part series describes how he came to write it.

Fidel had four black telephones on his desk, off to the left. They delivered his orders, appointments, commitments, and--few are privy to this--he often used them to communicate with members of Congress, his tone taking on all the vehemence of "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?," to tell them about his yearning for peace and the end of injustice on Cuban soil. Entire nights were devoted to this activity. "Senator, excuse me. Long distance. From Havana. He says he's Fidel Castro. No. It's no joke. Fidel Castro."

On a couple of occasions, when I was on the other side of that desk, I had the opportunity to witness his clumsiness with the machines. He has long, thin fingers with carefully groomed and polished nails, as only mafia Dons in 1950s Havana would allow themselves. At the moment a call is received he pushes the button, tapping the keypad, nearly pecking, so not to damage the nails.

"This piece of shit," he said to me one of these times, telephone in hand.

In the adjoining cubicle, manning the switchboard, was Lieutenant Colonel Cesáreo, a veteran member of Fidel's security detail, who had done me the honor of turning his back while I spoke with el Comandante, a gesture that suggested I either enjoyed the utmost trust or was not viewed as a potential threat.

This piece of shit, I came to know, referred to every telephone whose keys had to be pressed.
It had been quite an evening. I felt very close to him, but my admiration for him and his achievements didn't seem to be enough. He wanted something else. This was on a Saturday in either February or March of 1984. Fidel showed me his latest trophy: a huge cigar, about a meter long, placed on a wooden base, sent by the union at a cigar factory. "What do you think? Hmm? They surpass their goals and send me this big cigar. How noble of them."

There was something more than childish pride at stake. Something that, you'll excuse my saying so, was not only disturbing but required compassion. By that time, I had learned Hemingway's lesson that a writer has to become used to his solitude. Fidel was no writer; he was a killer, as ruthless as he was temperamental. He could not be a writer because he lacked any real capacity for abstraction and, as such, could not conceive of morals. In the coming years, there would be reasons enough for us to become deadly enemies--to the death, compañero--but on that night, I with my standard-issue Levi's jeans and jacket and he with his ever-present jungle fatigues, we were two shipwrecked men exchanging desperate greetings across a vast ocean.

"Goddamn," I said to myself, "this man's solitude is vast."

He returned his cigar trophy to the bookcase behind him and--having failed to awaken the admiration in me he desired--he gave a deep sigh and asked me, authoritatively, "What time is it?"

As if he didn't have a watch.

I calculated that I needed to give him room for his next move.

"Seven o'clock, comandante."

"Around seven," he said, reflective.

Apparently the hour was too early still.

"Well, soon enough it will be around nine, Saturday night, and here I remain, working!"

It's very difficult to respond to a statement like that without falling into the most absolute--and unnecessary--adulation, to ignore a person of this caliber, asking you to praise him, to tell him that he is sacrificing himself for the people and that there is no end to his devotion to his country, in reality, to all of humanity. He was desperate to be fussed over. For me to fuss over him, over Fidel Castro.

"That's a bitch, Comandante," I said, as if offering condolences. Then, lost in my thoughts, pensively, almost involuntarily, I found the necessary declarative precision and said: "No one in the world would believe this."

Oh, how he liked that sentence.

In reality, I was thinking that no one in the world would believe that I was in the situation of not knowing how to flatter Fidel Castro and I accidentally uttered the phrase out loud.

"Really?" He exclaimed, his face lit up.

"No one," I insisted, convinced.

"Saturday night and here I am, working, while the people are out and about, partying. Really, no one would believe it."

No one. No one believed it. Or even knew of it. But, in any event, that night I became aware that banality, despite occupying such a high percentage of our existence, is never acknowledged in History. The problem then was whether I'd be able to write about it.

Colombia To Chavez: Maybe 'Spy Plane' Was Santa's Sleigh

2009-12-22T09:58:09Z

BOGOTA — Colombia's defense chief joked Monday that Venezuelan troops might have mistaken Santa's sleigh for a spy plane, dismissing accusations by President Hugo Chavez about drones flying over Venezuela.

Chavez on Sunday accused the United States of violating Venezuela's airspace with an unmanned spy plane and ordered his military to be on alert and shoot down any such aircraft.

Yoani Sanchez: Two Castros Decide Everything, Our "Representatives" Simply Applaud

2009-12-21T21:13:34Z

"The impasse is the dynamics of deterioration," my friend said, part philosophic part pessimistic after listening to Raul Castro's speech in the National Assembly yesterday. The rope of our prognostications had not stretched tight waiting for a possible announcement of changes, but we had some expectation around certain long-promised measures. However, on pronouncing the official words to close out 2009, the second Party secretary seemed to be hanging more on the brake than the rudder, more cautious than enterprising, far more conservative than daring.

Our parliamentarians, for their part, again lost the chance to ask uncomfortable questions, to oppose a ballot, or engage in heated discussions. They may have let the last opportunity go by to impel an opening from above and to break with this image of the mute chorus they have shown for more than three decades. The debates that took place in the Palace of Conventions, which were shown on television, seemed to happen in a distant country, a country with enough time to defer -- over and over again -- the needed transformations. Not even the euphemism of "updating the economic system" included the most important demands of the weighty popular agenda.

In this fourth regular session, they didn't even clarify the name of the new year*, the growth in GDP, though reduced, still seems inflated to us, and there is a threat of future cuts that nobody will confirm. Despite certain pragmatic turns of phrase delivered in the final speech, volunteerism and orders handed down from above continue to shape the principal strategy for governing the country. So, the parliamentarians continually lose importance because the master plan is cooked up in one office alone, and endorsed with barely a pair of signatures. I would not be surprised if in February or March they implement a package of cuts and adjustments, which will not be passed through the hands of even these -- highly complacent -- deputies.

In the middle of next year the National Assembly will meet again to applaud -- their usual dose of complicity and silence.

Translator's note
The name of the year: The Cuban regime names each year. For example 1961 was "The Year of Education."

Yoani's blog, Generation Y, can be read here in English translation.

Chavez Wants To Rename Angel Falls, World's Tallest Waterfall

2009-12-21T18:07:52Z

CARACAS, Venezuela — President Hugo Chavez said Sunday that the world's tallest waterfall has been called Angel Falls too long and should revert to its original indigenous name instead of commemorating the U.S. pilot who spotted it in 1933.

He called for renaming the Venezuelan falls Kerepakupai-Meru, saying during his weekly television program that Indians had a name for the majestic waterfall long before adventurer Jimmie Angel flew over it.

Makenna Goodman: What Book is Hugo Chávez Reading?

2009-12-21T16:56:12Z

It's four days before Christmas. If you're like the other snowed-in 40-something percent of consumers this year, you're probably way behind on gifts. If so, you may want to give the (last-minute) gift of...the book that Hugo Chávez is reading.

Let me back up a minute. When browsing for books, are you the kind of person who goes to the "New Nonfiction" tables at Borders? Perhaps you get genius ideas from the New York Times Top Ten lists? The Holiday Book Review? For a gift, do opt for a classic, or the new Sue Grafton? Something people will actually read, or a book that will make you feel well-read, as you hand it to your whatever-in-law? The queries could go on, but quite frankly, book giving is rife with politics and projection. So when you stop and think about it (even if only for a moment), your best bet may be to look at what a President is reading -- he/she runs the country for crying out loud, so you know the book on his or her nightstand is worth the time.

Because let's face it; consumers by and large base their choices on other "more important" people's choices. Whether it's book reviewers, the people who choose what's featured on the front tables at B&N, and last but not least...celebrities. The stars who are photographed up the wazoo (along with their accessories), and worshiped more than most spiritual leaders.

We're not above this game. The book business is partly based on this paparazzi-fiendish, adolescent idolatry of celebrity. If you can get Oprah to hold up your book on her show, or it's found in Tiger Woods' crashed car, or perhaps falls out of Angelina Jolie's bag on her way to Darfur--hell, if you can get Posh Spice herself to tote it around in her Birkin bag--you're golden. And so, people in publishing spend weeks figuring out ways to get the book into the right person's hands. And with good reason--when it works, it seriously works. Look at what happened when Obama named Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals as one of his favorites. Boom. Bestseller list.

But what about the indie publisher? How are we, Chelsea Green--a small group of folks working in an old Vermont factory--supposed to get our books into the hands of the leaders of nations? The leaders who, in many cases, support the corporate model, and therefore corporatized titles from large-scale houses who have a much heftier budget than we do? How can we get our soy-inked books into the Birkin bags of Us Weekly's pages? Into the carry-on bags of the worldly and influential? Into the Oval Office...even better.

How, for example, did one of our books get into the hands of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez?

At the international climate talks in Copenhagen last week, Hugo Chávez railed against capitalism. According to him, in order to reverse the downward spiral of our climate, we need to change the system itself. He pointed out the product driven capitalist system that commodifies true democracy, and results in a global hegemony ruled by a few rich and powerful nations, who perpetuate the top-down model of iron-fisted rule.

President Chávez then held up a copy of How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth (Spanish language edition), which was given to him personally by author Hervé Kempf in Copenhagen, and proceeded to read from the author preface:

To the ecological principle that was so useful at the time we first became aware-- "Think globally; act locally"--we must add the principle that the present situation imposes: "Consume less; share better."

Watch the video here.

A best seller in France--and already translated into English, Spanish, Italian, Greek, and Korean--Hervé Kempf's How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth describes the invincibility that many of the world's wealthy feel in the face of global warming, and how their unchecked privilege is thwarting action on the single most vexing problem facing our world. And Hugo Chávez--yes, Hugo Chávez!--held the dang thing up in the air, pointing directly at the title, describing why it was the book everyone needs to read, and all but gave ordering information and advice on gift wrap.

So as we think about where our company is going in 2010...we're incorporating sleeping bags into the budget. For our authors. To camp out on Presidents' lawns. World leaders, man. They sell books.

Mexico City Approves Gay Marriage

2009-12-21T16:28:31Z

MEXICO CITY — Mexico City lawmakers on Monday made the city the first in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage, a change that will give homosexual couples more rights, including allowing them to adopt children.

The bill passed the capital's local assembly 39-20 to the cheers of supporters who yelled: "Yes, we could! Yes, we could!"

Lionel Messi Wins BIG Award: FIFA World Player Of The Year

2009-12-21T15:20:41Z

FIFA today announced Lionel Messi as its World Player of the Year.

The Barcelona star and Argentine forward is just 22 years old and guided Barcelona to a Club World Cup on Saturday.

Messi said of the honor, "A magnificent year for me and Barca has ended in the best way."

Last year's winner Cristiano Ronaldo was denied a repeat victory, finishing in second. Messi won by more than 700 votes out of more than 1,500 ballots.

Messi is the first Argentine to win the award, which debuted in 1991, per BBC.

More from the AP:

ZURICH — Lionel Messi added FIFA's World Player of the Year award to his growing list of accolades Monday, completing a nearly perfect campaign in which his club won an unprecedented trio of Spanish and European titles.

Messi received the award at a gala ceremony in Zurich, easily outdistancing the last two winners – Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka – along with his Barcelona teammates Xavi Hernandez and Andres Iniesta in voting among national team captains and coaches.

Messi also received the Ballon D'Or as the best player in Europe after FC Barcelona won the Spanish league and cup and the Champions League. He sealed the team's first Club World Cup on Saturday with an extra-time goal to beat Estudiantes 2-1.

All that's missing from the 22-year-old Argentine's resume is a World Cup title.

Jane Guskin: It's Holiday Shopping Time, while the Peace of the Graveyard Marches on

2009-12-21T14:57:58Z

In Colombia there is an expression: la paz del cementerio - the peace of the graveyard.

This is the kind of peace that powerful forces enjoy when everyone who resists them is dead and buried.

Colombia's government and its military and paramilitary forces have spent decades working diligently for this kind of peace. The country is so intent on achieving it that its even dispensed with the graveyard. According to Senator Gloria Inés Ramírez, more than half a million people have been forcibly disappeared in Colombia in the past 33 years. The government's own "Justice and Peace Unit" has reports of 210,000 forced disappearances, based on complaints lodged by family members between 2006 and mid-2009. That suggests the 500,000 figure may be low; Yanett Bautista of the Nydia Erika Bautista Human Rights Foundation -- named for one of the disappeared -- estimates that family members have filed complaints in only 10% of the disappearance cases. Of the cases investigated so far, fewer than 2,500 bodies have been located, mostly in mass graves.

Israel, meanwhile, has spent six decades building its own brand of graveyard peace in Palestine. December 27 marks one year since Israel began a massive attack on the residents of Gaza, killing more than 1,400 people, including nearly 400 children and transforming the tiny strip of land from a de facto prison into a cemetery. Israel continues to strangle Gaza through a blockade, and greets nonviolent protesters with tear gas and bullets.

In Honduras, the rightwing elite and military high command, which have close ties to the extremist Catholic group Opus Dei, seem similarly committed to a graveyard peace. Last June 28 they toppled an elected president who in their eyes had bowed too far to pressure from progressive grassroots sectors. Already strong, the country's diverse social movements--including indigenous, African-descended, unionists, and lesbian and gay activists--responded to the coup by uniting and launching a coordinated nonviolent struggle from the streets.

Since the coup, 18 gay and transgender Hondurans have been among those murdered in a campaign of repression against the resistance movement, according to data compiled by the lesbian activist and research group Cattrachas. Killings of transgender women in Honduras were already rampant: in four years from 2005 through 2008, Human Rights Watch reports that 17 transgender women were killed. Now in just six months the coup government has doubled the number of victims.

On December 13, just two days after I met Cattrachas activist Indyra Mendoza at a New York City event organized by the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, Indyra's friend and fellow activist Walter Tróchez was shot to death in Tegucigalpa. A human rights defender for the gay community and for people living with HIV/AIDS, and an active member of the National Resistance Front Against the Coup, Tróchez had been threatened repeatedly, and on Dec. 4, four armed men in civilian clothes had attempted to kidnap him. "Walter used to go with me to recognize the bodies of our transgender friends when they were killed," said Indyra. "Now I had to go on my own to identify his body."

This is the peace of the graveyard. It is also known as genocide.

And if it makes you uncomfortable to read this while you would prefer to think about your last-minute Christmas shopping, that's fine, as long as your discomfort leads you to action. Because genocide is not exactly in the holiday spirit, and it's happening right now--in your name, and with your tax dollars.

You can start by picking up the phone and calling your representative and senators and telling them you believe that people have a right to protest peacefully without getting attacked or murdered, and you would like the US government to stop supporting regimes in Colombia, Israel and Honduras that are violating that right. Following the links in this article will lead you to more sources that can help you stay informed and get involved.

Diane Francis: Chavez Confiscates Justice in Venezuela

2009-12-21T14:49:13Z

American oil, businessmen, Canadian mining companies, and now the rule of law are being attacked by Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez.

Anyone thinking of going there or doing business, think again.

Here's the latest injustice. On December 16, United Nations judicial experts condemned Venezuela's arrest of a judge as a "blow by President Hugo Chavez to the independence of judges and lawyers in the country".

This condemnation follows the release by Judge María Lourdes Afiuni of banker Eligio Cedeño. According to human rights activist and Cedeño lawyer, Bob Amsterdam of Toronto, Chavez went "crazy".

Judge Afiuni has been jailed and denied a lawyer, and Cedeño and his defense team are being sought by police.

The banker, accused of embezzlement, has become a cause celebre among human rights activists and attempts to have his case aired through due process have been fought along the way by the regime, wrote Amsterdam. Here is the time line of events:

In 2007, the charges were brought against Cedeño without sufficient evidence. This was corroborated recently by to an affidavit by the lead prosecutor Yoneiba Parra. She said under oath that there was prosecutorial misconduct and other irregularities in Cedeño's case. She was fired by the Attorney General and fled to Colombia where she now has political asylum.

In February 2007, Judge Yuri López issued a ruling that tangentially favored Cedeño. That judge was also immediately relieved of her responsibilities and was subsequently granted political asylum in the United States.

Last month, after an appellate panel in Caracas determined that Cedeño's pretrial detention had exceeded the maximum legal duration, the appellate judge who wrote the opinion was demoted. The appellate court's decision was subsequently suspended by the Supreme Court.

Now, the release of Cedeño by Judge Afiuni.

Tragedy unfolding

"Given the disproportionate response of the Chavez regime to Cedeño's conditional release - which was an independent judicial decision rendered in compliance with Venezuelan law - it is clear that Judge Afiuni is in grave danger," wrote Amsterdam.

"They are talking about a 30-year sentence for the judge and threatening to burn her alive," said Amsterdam in an email over the weekend.

Statements by the UN's human rights judges in Geneva, and Venezuela's own bar association, have condemned the jailing.

"The key points she [the judge] made were that: (1) when she sought Eligio's detention, there was insufficient evidence to incarcerate him, or to indict him; and (2) she sought his detention under pressure from the Attorney General, who indicated that the source was Chavez himself."

On September 1, 2009, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention declared Cedeño's detention arbitrary, citing violations of the right to fair trial. His counsel team introduced the UN experts' opinion at the hearing before Judge Afiuni on 10 December 2009, following which he was conditionally released after almost three years in detention without trial.

The UN's memo this weekend:

"We are particularly troubled about allegations that President Hugo Chavez attacked both Mr. Cedeño and Judge Afiuni, calling them 'bandidos' (bandits) and accusing Judge Afiuni of corruption," stressed the UN experts.

Jake Schmidt: Key Countries Agreed to Copenhagen Accord to Address Global Warming

2009-12-21T13:36:37Z

In the late morning hours Saturday in Copenhagen, the overwhelming majority of countries adopted a new framework for addressing global warming. This new agreement -- called the Copenhagen Accord (available here) -- was hammered out by 28 of the world’s key countries. These countries represent over 80% of the world’s global warming pollution (both energy emissions and deforestation) and the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

This agreement was hammered out Friday evening by Heads of Government on Friday from key countries, including the US, China, India, Brazil, South Africa, UK, France, Australia, Germany, the EU, Japan, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, Russia, Mexico, Spain, South Korea, Norway, the Maldives, Columbia, and Indonesia. The Accord is now open for other countries to sign-up, but by our count the vote (at least in the open debate) was 188-5 for its adoption (as we noted here) as a handful of climate laggards were the only countries that voted against its adoption (as my colleague Heather Allen compiled here).

As NRDC’s President said in a statement:

This agreement is not all we had hoped for. There's still more work to be done. But it strikes a credible blow against the single greatest environmental ill of our time. It gathers all nations around the common goal of ending this scourge that imperils us all. And it sets the stage for further action in the months ahead. Now the Senate can take up clean energy and climate legislation in the certain knowledge that Americans won't act alone.”

From afar it is a little hard to figure out what exactly happened (and probably even for people that watched it first hand as “this was not your regular climate negotiations”). My head is blurry from lack of sleep and the craziness of the last day, but here is what was accomplished (I’ll try to post more detailed pieces on each aspect later).

1. Heads of Government from key Countries are engaged. This meeting brought together 115 Heads of Government to discuss global warming. And they weren’t just there for speeches, but to reach a deal. In fact, they were doing more than that as a key sub-segment of leaders were actually negotiating with other leaders, arm twisting, and pushing for agreement.

In my years of these negotiations I’ve never seen such a high-level commitment to the substance of action (usually when these leaders get together they just make speeches and leave). World leaders -- most notably President Obama -- took over these negotiations and used everything in their power to push forward an agreement in Copenhagen (as you can read this coverage from the Washington Post about how Obama worked with and nudged the Chinese).

2. All major emitting countries will have to commit to take action and solidify them in the international agreement. As I discussed (here and here), all major emitting countries will now have to internationally commit to specific efforts to reduce emissions. And by the end of January 2010 those commitments will be brought forward and established officially in the Accord (in Appendix I and Appendix II).

So you may be looking at the agreement as void of commitments to reduce emissions, but that will come in just over one month from now. But by the end of January we’ll have commitments enshrined in the agreement at least the 28 key countries that drafted this agreement. And as countries undertake greater action they will report them (as I discuss in point 3) and these actions will be inscribed in the Copenhagen Accord. So we’ll effectively create a means for countries to undertake increasing commitments that are inscribed in the Accord and if done right we’ll create an ongoing negotiation on the stringency of those actions.

So now the countries representing more than 85% of the world’s global warming pollution will commit domestically and internationally to take action to reduce their emissions. That is a first and a very significant move (as my colleague also noted here).

3. We will have a system to regularly know whether or not countries are making progress towards their commitments. This turned out to be one of the key sticking points going into the final days of the negotiations -- in particular between the US and China (as my colleagues discussed here, here, and here).

And there was a very significant breakthrough on this front in Copenhagen. Every two years developing countries will have to report national emissions inventories and emission reduction actions based upon internationally agreed guidelines. Those emissions reduction actions:

will be subject to their domestic measurement, reporting and verification the result of which will be reported through their national communications every two years…they will communicate information on the implementation of their actions through National Communications, with provisions for international consultations and analysis under clearly defined guidelines that will ensure that national sovereignty is respected.

The reporting of emissions and actions every 2 years, as well as the international consultation under defined guidelines will both add greater transparency to developing country commitments.

4. We secured real commitments to finance for investing in efforts in developing countries to reduce deforestation emissions, and adapt to the impacts of global warming. Countries agreed to support $10 billion over the next 3 years for these actions -- $5 billion of which is going to deforestation reductions. And developed countries agreed to a goal of mobilizing jointly $100 billion per year by 2020 “in the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation” (a proposal supported by Sec. Clinton in the final days of the negotiations which was a shot of adrenaline).

Not done yet, but the world built the foundation for a big step forward. While some people seem to be focused on what is not agreed in the Copenhagen Accord, we have to separate our expectations for Copenhagen with what we need in the final agreement. After all, we weren’t going to get a legally binding treaty out of Copenhagen as was recognized by key world leaders back in October (as I noted here).

Going into Copenhagen, I stressed that there were six key elements to the international agreement (as I outlined here). And on each of those fronts we made progress. Are we done yet on these issues? Of course not, we can and must do more on each element if we are going to truly address global warming. Did we get all the details that we need on each element? No, unfortunately for political reasons (e.g., lack of US Senate action) and due to the blocking of a small number of countries, the agreement reached in Copenhagen will have to be further fleshed out in the coming months (and years). On some issues there is less work to do than on others, but on all we only finalized part of the details necessary.

But despite these caveats, this Accord was a very significant step in the world’s efforts to address global warming. For the first time, all major economies, including China, India, Brazil, the United States, Russia, Japan, and the European Union, have made commitments to curb global warming pollution and report on their actions and emissions in a transparent fashion.

-------

Raul Castro: Obama Seeking To Topple Cuban Communism

2009-12-21T11:55:48Z

HAVANA — Raul Castro gave the strongest signal yet his government's would-be honeymoon with the Obama administration is over, delivering a harshly worded speech Sunday charging that the White House endorses efforts to topple the island's communist system.

Offering Cuba's first public acknowledgment of the arrest of an American contractor, Castro said the case shows "the United States won't quit trying to destroy the revolution and bring a change to our economic and social regime."

Tijuana's Drug War: An Inside Look At The Most Aggressive Police Reform To Date

2009-12-21T09:42:53Z

EDITOR'S NOTE: AP reporter Elliot Spagat follows Tijuana's new public safety chief, Julian Leyzaola, for eight months as he launches the city's most aggressive police reform to date, in the middle of a raging drug war.

___

Chavez: US Spy Plane Violated Venezuela's Airspace

2009-12-20T19:07:55Z

CARACAS, Venezuela — President Hugo Chavez on Sunday accused the U.S. of violating Venezuela's airspace with an unmanned spy plane, and ordered his military to be on alert and shoot down any such aircraft in the future.

Speaking during his weekly television and radio program, Chavez said the aircraft overflew a Venezuelan military base in the western state of Zulia after taking off from neighboring Colombia. He did not elaborate, but suggested the plane was being used for espionage.

Yoani Sanchez: The Coca-Cola of Forgetting or The Cane Juice of Nostalgia

2009-12-19T15:41:37Z

For Roberto San Martin

I've lived here and there. I've been a voice asking permission to leave my country and an exile waiting for permission to enter. The machine has crushed me between both sides of its serrated cogs: for being outside of, and for deciding to stay in, my Island. I went to the consulate to pay the high monthly tariffs to stay in another country, and have also faced the costs of return, the enormous personal sum of being a returnee. For two years I looked at the Island in the distance and faced the dilemma of whether I could drink the "Coca-Cola of forgetting" or the "cane juice of nostalgia", but neither of the two went down my throat. I preferred the bittersweet taste of this reality.

I have nightmares where I go through Cuban customs and someone in uniform leads me to a grey room. Surrounded by unpainted walls and a huge photo of Fidel Castro, they take my passport and tell me that if I come in I can never again travel to another destination. All this is explained to me by an official with a sweaty face, a pistol on his hip, and a ballpoint pen sticking out of his pocket. I have a presentiment that I will spend eternity facing this being of sullen words, with no opportunity to pass through the door into the room where my family is waiting for me. The anxiety rises to the point where I wake up and verify that I am in my house, still prey, but happy to be back.

This obsessive dream alternates with another where they will not let me fly to my own country. I am in a far away airport, trying to board a plane destined for Havana. The girl who checks the tickets tells me I cannot depart. "We have orders not to let you board", she concludes, without the dramatic weight of someone who has just notified another of their expatriate status. There is no one around to appeal to while the electronic blackboards display the next departures for New York, Buenos Aires, Berlin. I sit and put my suitcase between my legs so I can lean on it and try to sleep. This can't be true, I tell myself, I have to rest and when I wake up I'll be in the cabin thousands of feet in the sky.

I've tried tea with lime, reading stories of pilots before going to bed, playing relaxing music in the room. But the only thing that will end this oneiric sequence of being shut in and forced out, is the end of the immigration restrictions for Cubans. I want to have the right to travel, like I want to be able to sleep without seeing someone in uniform taking my passport, and without hearing the roar of an airplane as it takes off, leaving me in a foreign land.

Yoani's blog, Generation Y, can be read here in English translation.