the protests due to lack of light Havana continued on Saturday night, after the state company Electrical Union said that the service had been restored in 94.53% of homes.
Several young people were arrested in a central avenue. It is the third night of focused demonstrations in the capital, of 2.1 million inhabitants, after the violent passage on Tuesday of Hurricane Ianin the west of the island, which left serious damage and a widespread blackout throughout the country.
At least two young people were detained by state security agents dressed in civilian clothes, when they demonstrated in Línea, a central avenue, to demand the restoration of electricity, AFP journalists confirmed.
Agents carried a young man in suspense, while another policeman tried to take a girl who was recording with her cell phone and who managed to get away, lying on the sidewalk, amid screams and claims.
Thus, the protest of hundreds of people that had taken place peacefully in the crowded neighborhood of Vedado, where the demonstrators exchanged words with neighbors in favor of the government, was dissolved.
“We are here because apparently for no reason there is a lack of electricity, five days ago (…) there are many families affected by food,” Cossette Artola, a 36-year-old speech therapist, told AFP.
‘The Cuban is tired’
The demonstration took place in a block of Vedado that remains in the dark, despite the fact that almost the entire neighborhood already has the service.
“The most important thing is to give them information about everything that has been done, in order to restore electricity,” Leira Sánchez Valdivia, president of the Plaza municipality’s Defense Council, told AFP, dressed in her olive green uniform.
The workers have worked non-stop and in the area of this protest there are six breakdowns that have not been repaired, he added. Daniela Santana, a 19-year-old speech therapy student, considered that “the Cuban people are tired of the current situation.”
Police forces, plainclothes officers and brigades of like-minded people to the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC, unique) were deployed throughout the city.
During the day another cacerolazo had been registered in that neighborhood and in Guanabacoa, in the east of the city, one more protest continued, according to images broadcast on the internet.
The electric company of the capital, a subsidiary of the state-owned and monopolistic UNE, said on Saturday on its Facebook account that in “Havana, with a total of 854,074 customers, 46,719 (and) 807,360 with electrical service are affected, for a 94.53% recovery” of the service.
Meanwhile, in the province of Pinar del Río, the westernmost of the island and most affected by Ian, electrical restoration is only 3.12% and in neighboring Artemisa 38.11 of the total users.
The government announced that it will finance 50% of the materials, tanks and mattresses for the affected population. In the midst of the nightly protests on Thursday and Friday, the internet service suffered a general outage.
“Internet has been cut in #Cuba for the second night in a row,” said NetBlocks, a London-based site that monitors internet blockades around the world.
The authorities did not confirm the general fall of the two nights. Protesters are desperate for blackouts that endanger the little food they keep in their freezers and also prevent the pumping of water.
Application to Washington
“Protesting is a right,” but instead of helping, they delay recovery work, the first secretary of the ruling Communist Party (PCC, sole), Luis Antonio Torres, said on Friday.
This week’s protests in Havana They are the largest expressions of this type since the historic demonstrations of July 11, 2021, which left one dead, dozens injured and nearly 500 protesters serving sentences, some serving more than 20 years in prison.
The US government received an unusual request from the Cuban government to provide emergency aid after the devastating impact of Hurricane Ian, according to The Wall Street Journal.
A State Department spokesman told AFP that Washington continues to communicate with the Cuban government about “the humanitarian and environmental consequences of both Hurricane Ian and the August 5 fire” at a major fuel storage center in Matanzas, 100 km from Havana.
“We are evaluating the ways in which we can continue to support the Cuban people, in accordance with the laws and regulations of the United States,” he said.
Washington has maintained an embargo against Cuba for six decades, tightened since the Donald Trump administration (2017-2021), which hinders this flow.
AFP
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