Al Jazeera sends undercover reporter into Cuba to document repression

The Arab news agency Al Jazeera sent an undercover reporter into Cuba to spend time with the Ladies in White and other members of the opposition on the island and document the repression suffered under the tyranny of the Castro dictatorship. That is something that other “reputable” news organizations, such as the AP, CNN, ABC, etc., have repeatedly failed to do for more than five decades.

Cuba’s Ladies in White

An undercover reporter finds out what it is like to live in a culture of fear and surveillance.

After 53 years of revolution, Cubans are increasingly exasperated by the restrictions imposed on them by the country’s change-averse communist regime.

In spite of, or perhaps because of, recent modest economic reforms, activism is growing as the government’s opponents overcome their fear of arrest and take to the streets.

But it is not easy. Today, even the church-based Ladies in White – a group of female relatives of imprisoned activists – say they are routinely spied on and arrested.

This year they achieved brief international notoriety when they were prevented from meeting Pope Benedict XVI during his visit to the island, but for the most part their activities are carried out under the ever-present threat of harassment and intimidation by Cuba’s internal security police.

Nevertheless, inspired by the Arab Spring, the Ladies are determined to keep up their protests, sensing that the regime’s grip on power is fading and that sooner rather than later it will be forced to give way.

But what is it like to live in such a pervasive culture of surveillance and fear? People & Power sent an independent undercover journalist to find out. He has asked us not to reveal his identity because he may wish to visit Cuba again in the future, but in the article below he describes what it was like to make the film and the many difficulties facing the activists he met.

Continue reading HERE.

2 thoughts on “Al Jazeera sends undercover reporter into Cuba to document repression”

  1. I’m really impressed by this report. Alberto, as you mention, other mainstream news agencies have failed to do something similar,in fact, they do the opposite. They constantly file reports that are favorable to the regime. Well, Aljazeera will likely now be banned from Cuba, while CNN, AP, Reuters and others that unceasingly report on the wonderful [er, uh] Perestroika type reforms shaking Cuba from top to bottom, will continue to earn the right to report from inside Cuba.

  2. Those other media outfits are too busy covering, you know, official news from official Cuban sources, as well as the endless stream of “local color” stories like the guy with extra fingers and the one with the world’s tallest bicycle. Besides, Cuban dissidents are too boring–but then again, anti-leftist elements always are. If they don’t have human rights, let them hit up their relatives in Florida for a plasma TV.

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