Dissident rapper

Cuba: Imprisoned dissident rapper calls on Cubans to continue fight for freedom

Aug 28, 2013 | Posted by: roboblogger | Full story: Babalu Blog

The plight of imprisoned Cuban dissident rapper El Critico could be a great cause for Jay-Z and Beyonce to take on and show the world they are not an insensitive, elitist American celebrity couple only interested in enjoying fine cigars and expensive cognac while visiting Cuba as VIP guests of the Castro brothers' apartheid dictatorship.

Pieces of the Island

"Pieces of the Island"-An Inglés Translation

Relatives of jailed dissident rapper call on artists and activists to demand his freedom (Video)

1 CommentPosted by Pieces of the Island on June 25, 2013

Yudisbel Roseyo Mojena , wife of rapper dissident and political prisoner Angel Remon Yunier Arzuaga "The Critic" , has-been passing through some very difficult moments These During three months in her husband Which has-been behind bars. She has had to raise Their newborn child (only 4 months old) on her own, while she has had to go through to try and Countless Difficulties visit Remon Arzuaga in Las Mangas Prison of Bayamo.

The musician was violently arrested by the political police on the 26th of March Because he handed out pamphlets pro-freedom, anti-regime messages painted outside his home and Carried out to public discourse in behalf of human rights. Friends have Also assured That Remon's protest music Within the hip-hop duo The Children That Nobody Wanted (The Unwanted Children) is another of the Reasons Why I has-been taken to prison, Considering That his music has Attracted much attention from locals, Especially the youth.

Inside of Las Mangas Prison, The has-been Confronting Critical multitude numerous complications.

" Right now, Angel Yunier is not receiving medical attention although I Suffers from an ulcer and chronic gastritis , "Explains Yudisbel to this blog," Also his jailers are Refusing to grant him access minutes of phone Which he is supposed to receive . "

In Addition, the young mother denounces That When She travels to the prison to visit her husband, " State Security always forms a problem. Each time I visit him it's a different scenario. Sometimes they say They Can not bring him out one at that moment, other times They tell me I have to leave first, etc ".

Another tactic of the Authorities is to try and blackmail and Involve the rapper into common Committing a crime, a practice employed by regime Authorities Often against prisoners of conscience. He has-been completely resisting These Pressures.

" jailers are trying to find him a problem with a common prisoner to accuse him of a crime common Considering That They have nothing else to accuse him of. The accusation For Which I have is in prison is for 'attempt' but there is absolutely no proof. In reality, State Security Attempted against his life in March , "said Yudisbel. Police forces raided Remon Arzuaga's home and beat him and other relatives, his aunt Among them Jaqueline Garcia , a member of the Ladies in White .

The main aggressor That day was the State Security Chief Known as Julius Caesar, the same person who is now trying to Involve Angel Yunier in a common crime. This agent has taken up the task of personally persecutting the activist as well as other members of the opposition in Bayamo.

That Explains Yudisbel Julio Cesar Also PARTICIPATED in a beating against her during an act of repudiation When she was 8 months pregnant, Causing her injuries and leading to a sharp rise in her blood pressure, producing health complications. She Feared That her pregnancy would be interrupted and aborted.

" Julio Cesar Physically assaulted me in an attempt to take my cell phone.I've hurt me on my stomach and I had to rush to the hospital, Where They refused to give me a medical certificate. I almost lost my pregnancy and I was hospitalized, Needing a blood transfusion , "she said.

Fortunately, Yudisbel was able to give birth without complications furhter, but now her husband have not Been able to spend time with Their young son.

Yudisbel is calling on all Cubans in and out of the island to demand freedom for her husband. She has called on independent Especially musicans and the community of exiled artists.

" I would like to ask everyone, Especially the artists, to please raise your voices to Achieve the liberation of Yunier as well as the rest of the political prisoner unjustly behind bars. That kind of support would be an enormous help , "she Declared.

The Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU) , a dissident organization Which Angel Yunier Also belongs to, has published a series of videos on Their YouTube channel Which Demonstrate the musician's wife as well as other relatives and friends demanding his release.

This is an edited version (with subtitles Inglés) of some of These videos, where relatives and friends show solidarity with angel Yunier Their Remon Arzuaga, "The Critic"

http://pedazosdelaislaen.wordpress.com/2013/06/25/relatives-of-jailed-dissident-rapper-call-on-artists-activists-to-demand-his-freedom-video/

Decadencia

Cuban Generation Y Blogger Mocks Che T-shirt Wearers

By P.J. Gladnick | August 25, 2009 | 11:14

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Attention all you folks who think of yourselves as counterculture types who demonstrate your rebelliousness by wearing Che Guevara T-shirts. The author of the most popular blog from Cuba, Yoani Sanchez who not only talks the talk but walks the walk, thinks you are absurd. The Generation Y blogger was the subject of a Miami Herald story on Saturday. We will get to her marvelous quote on the subject of Che T-shirts below the fold but first some fascinating information on the person who provides an inside look at what is really happening in Cuba which is often missed by news agencies on that island:

Yoani Sánchez, the blogger who has gained an international following detailing the absurdities of daily life in Cuba, is on the phone from her 14th-floor apartment in Havana, where the elevators rarely work. She speaks plainly, boldly, with none of the hemming and hawing common among folks on the island who fear their phones are tapped.

Sánchez is certain hers is. She is constantly followed, too. None of this stops her from finding ways, despite government attempts to block her, of continuing to post to Generación Y, the blog she launched in April 2007 and for which she has won several awards. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2008.

...With her skinny frame and dark hair, she looks a tad like Olive Oyl. But that's where the comparison to Popeye's weak-kneed girlfriend ends. Sánchez is a much tougher figure, a tech-savvy representative of a growing youth-oriented Cuban counterculture who tells it like it is -- about having to feed her family rice with bouillon cubes when there is nothing else, about the surging number of women on the island who deny their realities by popping black-market Valium, about the cops who are assigned to tail her.

...Sánchez may be the best-known blogger in Cuba, but she is part of a multiplying roster of critics who have joined what she calls ``the virtual raft.' In fact, she has inspired several to turn to Web-based journalism and activism and offers training on how to keep a blog and circumvent the Cuban laws that keep most of the populace unplugged.

Although Raúl Castro decriminalized ownership of computers, cellphones and other technological gadgets in 2008, only professionals, academics and officials are allowed to surf the Web, and they are monitored. Some islanders are hooked up through black-market accounts, but the general population is allowed only to send and receive e-mails from public spots.

Sánchez and other bloggers go to cyber cafes and hotel access points meant mostly for tourists, where an hour of connectivity costs about $8, out of reach for the average Cuban with a monthly salary of $15 to $20. (Sanchez and her husband, independent journalist Reinaldo Escobar, make ends meet by working as private tour guides and translators).

Okay, now for the Yoani Sanchez money quote for you counterculture "rebels" and hip types such as the "Che Spotting" girls who think it is so cool and non-conformist to wear Che Guevara T-shirts:

"I am part of the counterculture, and the counterculture is growing, but it is very diverse. Maybe one thing we all have in common is that we don't wear Che T-shirts, like foreign kids who consider themselves counterculture do,'' she says. ``In Cuba, Che represents the government. In Cuba, only tourists and members of the Young Communist League wear Che shirts.''

Got that? The true counterculture rebels in Cuba shun the Che Guevara T-shirts that the wannabees in the West seem so fond of wearing.

Blogger: Cubans use creativity to get info online

By COLLEEN SLEVIN

— Oct. 20, 2013 8:22 PM EDT

DENVER (AP) — Most Cubans remain cut off from the Internet but are still using creative ways to access and spread information online, a dissident blogger told journalists from around the Americas Sunday. Yoani (YO'-ahn-ee) Sanchez gave a largely grim report of the state of the press in Cuba at a meeting of the Inter American Press Association in Denver. She said President Raul Castro's regime has been aggressive in arresting and beating people who speak out against the government and has failed to document those actions, as his brother Fidel did. However, she said neither is better than the other.
"They play the good and the bad policeman but in the end they are two policemen," she said to applause.
While over 200 Internet cafes opened on the island nation this year, she said the cost of using the slow and censored service for just an hour is about $5 — about a third of the average Cuban's monthly salary.
Despite that, she said people are sharing information on thumb drives and can use their cellphones to text and post messages to Twitter blindly, which she compared to sending a message in a bottle since she doesn't know who is reading what she wrote. She joked that when Cuba is free, the country will have to build a monument to the thumb drive, which she said has done more to help the country than many of the people now honored by statues there.
Sanchez said those and other methods of "extreme creativity" to deal with limited Internet access aren't surprising in a nation where people were forced to come up with a way to make the spicy ground beef dish picadillo without meat.
"We do the same with information," she said.
At 38, Sanchez is among the second generation of Cubans born under communism. She has taken advantage of a new reform ending a longtime requirement that all Cubans obtain permission to travel abroad. Under the old rules, government critics were routinely denied exit visas.
Earlier this year, she also visited more than a dozen countries in Europe and the Americas and gave speeches criticizing Cuba's Communist-led government. Her travels have helped her pick up more Twitter followers but she remains less well known at home.

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/blogger-cubans-use-creativity-get-info-online