Lines stretched for blocks outside phone centers on Monday as the government allowed ordinary Cubans to sign up for cellular phone service for the first time.
The contracts cost about US$120 to activate — half a year’s wages on the average state salary. And that does not include a phone or credit to make and receive calls.
“Everyone wants to be first to sign up,” said Usan Astorga, a 19-year-old medical student who stood for about 20 minutes before her line moved at all.
Getting through the day without a cellphone is unthinkable now in most developed countries, but Cuba’s government limited access to mobile phones and other so-called luxuries in an attempt to preserve the relative economic equality that is a hallmark of life on the communist-run island.
Cuban President Raul Castro has done away with several other small but infuriating restrictions, and his popularity has surged as a result — defusing questions about his relative lack of charisma after his ailing older brother Fidel formally stepped down in February.
An article on Friday in the Communist Party newspaper Granma said it was Fidel Castro’s idea all along to lift bans on mobile phones, and that he was behind recent government orders easing restrictions that had prevented most Cubans from staying in hotels, renting cars, enjoying beaches reserved for tourists and buying DVD players and other consumer goods.
In the latest change, Orlando Lugo, president of the official National Association of Small Farmers, said on Monday night on state television that small farmers can now freely buy formerly controlled agricultural tools such as machetes, wire, boots and herbicide. He said the government is also examining new ways for farmers to commercialize goods.
“They are part of a process initiated and called for by Fidel,” Granma said of the recent changes.
Fidel Castro has not been seen in public since undergoing emergency intestinal surgery in July 2006, but he has continued to pen essays every few days. He wrote on Saturday that the country may be going too far in easing some restrictions.
“As in Cuba, there are those with theories about easy access to consumer goods,” he wrote, dismissing those people as “imperial ears and eyes hungry for these dreams.”
Cuba’s state-controlled telecommunications monopoly, a joint venture with Telecom Italia, charges US$2.70 per minute to call the US and US$5.85 per minute to Europe and most of the rest of the world. Making or receiving local calls costs US$0.30 a minute.
Only foreigners and Cubans holding key government posts had been allowed to have cellphones since they first appeared in the country in 1991.
Thousands of ordinary Cubans already had mobile phones through the black market, but could activate them only if foreigners agreed to lend their names to the contracts.
REVENGE: Trump said he had the support of the Syrian government for the strikes, which took place in response to an Islamic State attack on US soldiers last week The US launched large-scale airstrikes on more than 70 targets across Syria, the Pentagon said on Friday, fulfilling US President Donald Trump’s vow to strike back after the killing of two US soldiers. “This is not the beginning of a war — it is a declaration of vengeance,” US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wrote on social media. “Today, we hunted and we killed our enemies. Lots of them. And we will continue.” The US Central Command said that fighter jets, attack helicopters and artillery targeted ISIS infrastructure and weapon sites. “All terrorists who are evil enough to attack Americans are hereby warned
Seven wild Asiatic elephants were killed and a calf was injured when a high-speed passenger train collided with a herd crossing the tracks in India’s northeastern state of Assam early yesterday, local authorities said. The train driver spotted the herd of about 100 elephants and used the emergency brakes, but the train still hit some of the animals, Indian Railways spokesman Kapinjal Kishore Sharma told reporters. Five train coaches and the engine derailed following the impact, but there were no human casualties, Sharma said. Veterinarians carried out autopsies on the dead elephants, which were to be buried later in the day. The accident site
RUSHED: The US pushed for the October deal to be ready for a ceremony with Trump, but sometimes it takes time to create an agreement that can hold, a Thai official said Defense officials from Thailand and Cambodia are to meet tomorrow to discuss the possibility of resuming a ceasefire between the two countries, Thailand’s top diplomat said yesterday, as border fighting entered a third week. A ceasefire agreement in October was rushed to ensure it could be witnessed by US President Donald Trump and lacked sufficient details to ensure the deal to end the armed conflict would hold, Thai Minister of Foreign Affairs Sihasak Phuangketkeow said after an ASEAN foreign ministers’ meeting in Kuala Lumpur. The two countries agreed to hold talks using their General Border Committee, an established bilateral mechanism, with Thailand
‘POLITICAL LOYALTY’: The move breaks with decades of precedent among US administrations, which have tended to leave career ambassadors in their posts US President Donald Trump’s administration has ordered dozens of US ambassadors to step down, people familiar with the matter said, a precedent-breaking recall that would leave embassies abroad without US Senate-confirmed leadership. The envoys, career diplomats who were almost all named to their jobs under former US president Joe Biden, were told over the phone in the past few days they needed to depart in the next few weeks, the people said. They would not be fired, but finding new roles would be a challenge given that many are far along in their careers and opportunities for senior diplomats can
RSS