Thursday, November 26, 2009

DSI and the visitors


Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan

I remember the visitors of Pantaleon and can’t help but find a connection between the new pursuits of the security services and the name of the novel by Mario Vargas Llosa, Captain Pantoja and the Special Service. In less than two weeks almost all my friends have been “visited.” The “meetings” have varied in their degree of formality – not by their legality since the organs of State Security are not ruled by the legislation in force for the rest of us mortals – and range from the Official Citatation without previous explanation, passing through the kidnapping, and arriving at the disconcerting message, “Do me a favor, tell him to drop by.”

Luckily my friends are taking it in stride, some even with a tremendous sense of humor. They have received messages of all kinds, but among the most pathetic are these two:

- Good night. Tell your friends to be quiet, you can go now.
- What Vallín the lawyer teachers at the Blogger Academy is all a lie. (We’re finishing Greek philosophy, the last two classes have been about Aristotle.)

I find the situation of the intelligence service painful: fighting with a group of young people who devote themselves to study, painting or writing must be disappointing enough. I suppose that when they graduated they believed they would save the country from external aggressors, protect society from organized crime and fight against social and governmental corruption. How sad it must be to look back and see that the only thing so much force has been good for is to reprimand and harass kids! How they must envy their security service counterparts around the world, dismantling criminal networks and saving civilians; while they, year after year, scrub the hands of power without managing to remove the damp red spot that covers their face and clothes.

3 comments:

Humberto Capiro said...

FIDEL AND RAUL ARE FLEXING THEIR DESPERATE MUSCLES!! THEY ARE SO AFRAID OF THE BLOGGERS WITHIN!!

ASSOCIATED PRESS ARTICLE: Cuba military exercise guards against US invasion

"Analysts say Cuba is more concerned with sending a message to those who would seek to destabilize the country than with an actual military assault."

"Such a show of force is particularly important, Klepak said, given the open question of who would succeed Fidel and Raul Castro, aged 83 and 78, and because of Cuba's current economic difficulties."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jLeMbNfSPDy1VP2YkbvLYE8gnH8QD9C7DBJ01

Humberto Capiro said...

CUBA, NORTH KOREA & IREAN ARE!
N U T S!! A SIGN OF THE END!!
AFP ARTICLE: Cuba repels mock US attacks in major war games

HAVANA — "Cuban President Raul Castro ordered his troops to "never give up" on Friday as his Caribbean island nation carried out war games designed to train for the possibility of a US attack.
"Never give up the battle, regardless of the situation, even if you don't have any information. Fight and fight until you wear down the enemy and you defeat them," said Castro.

"The objective is to never surrender, never to abandon the fight," local media quoted the Cuban leader as saying."

"Since US President Barack Obama took office he has toned down US rhetoric against Cuba and ordered policy changes.
But Cuba's government said the measures, which include the end of travel restrictions for US citizens with Cuban family, fall short and demand the full lifting of sanctions and restoration of diplomatic relations severed in 1961.

Obama has said fully-restored ties depend on Cuba improving its human rights record and moving towards democracy."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jxh00-Y_CWJC29I9z4NHfuiAhJxQ

Humberto Capiro said...

TELEGRAPH U.K. ARTICLE: Blogger Yoani Sanchez is threat to Cuba

"Attacking a blogger might seem an unnecessary strategy in Cuba, where access to the internet is amongst the lowest in the world and only a small number of carefully vetted individuals are allowed to have internet accounts at home. Ms Sanchez believes her roughing up was a signal that the days of tolerance of Cuba's embryonic blogging community are over. "The Cuban government is currently nervous, as a result of the dire state of the economy", she said."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/cuba/6678937/Blogger-Yoani-Sanchez-is-threat-to-Cuba.html