Fara Armenteros, UPECI
LA HABANA, May - In Cuba, like in any other part of the world, the deaths
from violent acts fill the homes of many families with mourning and grief. But
here the national press, absolutely controlled by the communist government, does
not touch the subject. The violence increases in the island for different
motives, amongst the most common ones the loss of ethical values, the politics,
the education and the general absence the people suffer from.
Violent acts take place in any province of the country, and the capital, of
course, is not an exception.
Recently, on April 4, the neighbors of the Santa Amalia Complex, in Arroyo
Naranjo, witnessed how an individual stabbed his ex wife. The victim, pleaded
for him to please stop harming her, but the man continued to sink the knife
deeper into her body. "The young woman died from the wounds", stated a
witness of the bloody incident. Disidentes in Havana still laments the death of
the independent unionist Johanna Gonzalez, also stabbed to death by her ex
husband.
There are also other forms of violence. There's violence in the line to buy
the bread, at the bus stop, at the markets, at the schools, and at homes, where
most fights start over a tube of toothpaste or for some laundry detergent.
On occasions the violence is sutil, others tragic and brutal like in the
case of these two women, and many times it is police brutality. Like what
happened to Ramón Santiago López, leader of Partido Democrático
"30 de Noviembre" in the early morning hours, when political police
agents stopped him in Regla. They dropped him off in the outside of the capital
and upon making his way back home was suspiciously jumped by two young men on
bicycles. Two months after the aggression, he still hasn't completely recovered
from the wounds.
The violence, in all it's manifestations, exists in Cuba. The difference
with other countries is that the government and the media manipulate all the
information on this matter.
Translated by: April Solís
Versión original
en español
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