Toronto man, 78, pleads guilty to child sex crimes in Cuba

Toronto Star

James McTurk, 78, pleaded guilty to child sex tourism charges in a Toronto court Friday.

By: Jennifer Quinn Robert Cribb, Julian Sher Staff Reporters
An elderly Toronto man became the first Canadian convicted of sex crimes committed against children in Cuba after he pleaded guilty Friday to six counts, including little-used child sex tourism charges.

James McTurk admitted to offences against girls as young as 3 during a brief appearance.

Prosecutors are now considering seeking a dangerous offender order against the 78-year-old — a move which could see various measures taken against McTurk, including keeping him behind bars for the rest of his life.

When asked by Mr. Justice Charles Vaillancourt how he pleaded to the charges — one count of making child pornography, another of importing child pornography, three counts of sexual interference and a final count of invitation to sexual touching — McTurk replied “guilty,” in a soft voice.

McTurk was the first person to be charged by Toronto Police with the little-used child sex tourism offences.

His case was the subject of a Toronto Star investigation which examined how sex offenders are largely free to travel abroad to commit crimes, despite the amendment of the Criminal Code by the Canadian government to allow the prosecution of people who travel abroad to seek sex with children.

On Friday, the retired postal worked becomes just the sixth known conviction under the law — and the first whose offences were committed in Cuba.

Despite two previous convictions for child pornography — in 1995 and 1998 — and being placed on the sex offender’s registry, McTurk was free to travel. The court was told that he made 31 trips to the island, between 2009 and his arrest in July 2012.

Toronto Police began investigating McTurk when he went to a North York Loblaws to have pictures from a trip to Cuba printed, and what the photo clerk saw — images of unsmiling, topless little girls — alarmed her.

“The employee at the photo lab became concerned about these photos because the girls appeared to be frightened,” prosecutor Anna Stanford said. Police were called, and detectives executed a search warrant at McTurk’s address.

Officers arrested McTurk on July 24, 2012, at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport, as he returned home from yet another trip to Cuba.

Graphic evidence of the images and videos discovered in his North York apartment and on digital cards carried by McTurk when he was arrested were entered into evidence in court. Stanford quietly read detailed descriptions of what detectives found.

They included close-up images of the body parts of young girls, and McTurk in sexual situations with the same children. In one video, Stanford said, McTurk is seen forcing his tongue into a 3-year-old girl’s mouth.

“He continuously pulls her to him as she appears to resist, and repeatedly inserts his tongue into the child’s mouth,” she said, reading from an agreed statement of facts. “He then gives the child a candy and lets her go.”

In an interview with detectives after his arrest, McTurk said he knew one of the grandmothers of the girls in the images, who he met two decades ago in Cuba.

“She was on the beach and was hungry, so he fed her,” Stanford told the court. “He maintained contact with her and stayed with her and her family regularly when he visited Cuba. He gave her a couple hundred pesos — approximately $240 — each time he visited.”

McTurk’s case is to return to court in August, when the Crown will ask for the dangerous offender order. Six other charges against McTurk are to be withdrawn.

Eduardo Sebrango: el cubano inmigrante, el goleador del Impact, el "suertudo"

Noticias Montreal

Cuando Eduardo Sebrango pisa el terreno del estado Olímpico de Montreal cerca de 60 mil personas se paran para aplaudirlo. En La Habana, capital de su Cuba natal, es un ciudadano común y corriente.

La vida del futbolista de 38 años ha estado marcada por los goles que ha hecho en tierras canadienses, con la camiseta del Impact de Montreal o de los Whitecaps de Vancouver. Pero aún así, su historia no dista de la de cualquier inmigrante, ha vivido los mismos retos y ha tenido que digerir las mismas diferencias.

“Los dos primeros años fueron muy difíciles, quería regresarme a Cuba. Vivía con mi ahora exesposa en un lugar residencial de Ottawa y recuerdo los primeros días salir de la casa y no ver a nadie”, comenta sobre sus pasos iniciales fuera de la isla. “En Cuba yo salía a la calle y era encontrarme con todos, amigos, vecinos, familiares”.

Su travesía canadiense comenzó en 1996. En esa época defendía a su país natal y vino a jugar dos partidos de eliminatoria al Mundial 1998 en Edmonton, frente al que se convertiría en su nuevo hogar, Canadá.

Regresó a casa con dos derrotas 2-0, pero ahí conoció a quien fuera su esposa. “En ese momento ella trabajaba para la Asociación Canadiense de Fútbol, así que empezamos a vernos, en distintos lugares, aquí, en Cuba, en Estados Unidos”.

El enamoramiento se convirtió en planes de vida y en un nuevo reto para Eduardo. “Finalmente nos casamos en Cuba en el 97. Ahí hice todos mis papeles para mudarme a Canadá”, cuenta. “Se demoró un poco porque era medio complicado en esa época para los cubanos pero finalmente llegué aquí en el 98”.

Durante la conversación, Eddy, como es conocido por sus amigos, utiliza una palabra una y otra vez: “suerte”. Admite haber tenido suerte para adaptarse y se siente afortunado por todas las puertas que se le abrieron.

“Al llegar acá fue todo muy fácil. Cuando jugué contra la selección de Canadá el técnico era Bob Lenarduzzi. Cuando llegué aquí era el Gerente General de los Whitecaps. Era amigo de mi esposa así que lo contacté, me vio y me dijo para que firmara con los Whitecaps”.

La parte laboral estaba cubierta, pero lo más difícil estaba fuera de la cancha.

Eduardo vivía con su familia en un suburbio de Ottawa, rodeado por una tranquilidad que llegaba a perturbarlo en cierta manera… además estaba el tan temido invierno canadiense.

“La primera vez que intenté salir a correr en el invierno duré dos minutos”, recuerda entre risas. Como cubano tenía que lidiar con una nueva realidad, esa que va más allá de lo cultural. “Tuve que aprender de credit card, debit card, cosas que no teníamos en Cuba. Tampoco hablaba nada de inglés, ni ‘hello’”.

Ha vivido en varias ciudades del país y a sus ojos, cada una es especial.  Aún así, admite que a orillas del Saint-Laurent se siente más cómodo, más adaptado. “Montreal para los cubanos es mucho mejor, hay muchos latinos, muchas culturas y hasta puedes comer cualquier tipo de comida. A los québécois le gustan mucho los cubanos”, comenta, aprovechando para hacerle publicidad al que se ha convertido en su sitio favorito.

“Ya tengo mi restaurant aquí, en Beaubien, Café Cubano, ya le estoy haciendo publicidad”, dice entre risas. “Es como si estuviera comiendo la comida de mi mamá. Voy como dos veces por semana y llevó a los chicos, a los americanos y se vuelven locos”.

Nunca ha dejado de ser cubano, de sentir nostalgia por su tierra y su gente. “Luego de 13 años acá todavía sigo extrañando la esquina del barrio, mis amigos, tomarme un cafecito con mi mamá en la mañana, la música”.

Pero la estabilidad que ha conseguido en el norte, esa “suerte” de la que habla tan orgulloso, le ha permitido mantenerse en contacto con su tierra, adonde va cada año. Además, se siente feliz de ser parte de dos culturas.

“Me siento muy orgulloso de ser canadiense. Me encanta el hockey (sobre todo los equipos canadienses), incluso sé más que muchos de los chicos que son de acá. Para nosotros los cubanos, que somos tan diferentes al resto del mundo, es bonito venir a un país como Canadá, un país capitalista, y ver que tienen muchos valores que tenemos nosotros, el respeto a la persona, no hay violencia, son muy distintos a las otras potencias mundiales”, comenta, metiéndose un poco en política e ideología.

Si bien en La Habana puede pasar como un ciudadano común y corriente, en su pueblo natal, Sancti Spíritus, es reconocido. “He llevado muchas donaciones y he tratado de ayudarlos, así que si vas, verás las camisetas de Sebrango de los Whitecaps o del Impact”.

Mantener las raíces

Desde el primer momento que pisó Canadá, Eddy ha estado abierto a adoptar una nueva cultura y una nueva visión de vida. Aunque eso no significa que sea algo fácil.

Amigos, idiomas, cultura. Todo eso ha tenido que cuidarlo.

“Con el tema de la lengua tuve mucho más tiempo, porque en el fútbol no necesitas hablarlo perfectamente, así que fui poco a poco”, comenta el jugador, quien declara normalmente a los medios en inglés con total fluidez. “Nunca me sentí québécois, no pensé que tenía que aprender el francés, pero desde que regresé de Vancouver hace tres años me siento más parte de la cultura de acá, así que estoy aprendiendo”, comenta sobre la marca registrada de Quebec: su idioma.

“Empecé a trabajar con la academia del Impact, en donde todo es en francés: los entrenadores, los chicos, así que me tocaba escuchar reuniones de tres horas sin una palabra en inglés. Entiendo 90% y me puedo comunicar de a poco. Quiero aprender de verdad”, confiesa.

Una de los retos más difíciles para Sebrango ha sido mantener su legado, ese que tiene origen en el Caribe. Su idioma, sus costumbres y tradiciones.

Tiene dos hijos ya entrando en la adolescencia. Nacidos en Canadá, conscientes de sus orígenes cubanos, pero con problemas para mantenerlos. Una realidad que viven muchos inmigrantes.

“Es una parte que no estoy muy contento. Cuando eran pequeños estaba todo el tiempo con ellos y les hablaba en español y me entendían todo. Ahora no hablan nada”, comenta sobre sus hijos, quienes viven con su madre en Kingston, Ontario.

Por lo menos los ve una vez al mes. Es una oportunidad para compartir pero también para reforzar  todo su bagaje cultural, ese que los pequeños Sebrango llevan en la sangre. “Es complicado porque viven lejos y cuando estoy con ellos, como es por pocos días, no quiero presionarlos hablándoles en español”.

“Mi niña acaba de cumplir 12 años y su regalo fue un programa de recetas en español. Además, ellos se dan cuenta: mi mamá viene de visita y se dan cuenta que su abuela no habla una palabra de inglés, así que saben que lo necesitan”.

Eduardo, el “suertudo”, el que siempre está sonriendo, mira hacia atrás y no tiene dudas de que ha dado los pasos correctos en su vida, como jugador, como padre y como inmigrante.

“Estoy muy contento. Tengo casi 39 años y llega un momento en el que te das cuenta de todas las experiencias que has vivido, las buenas y las malas y puedo decir que estoy contento con mi vida. El apoyo que he recibido de la gente, del Impact como organización, de mi familia, ha sido muy importante”.

Admite que no es fácil salir de un país e integrarse a otro. Sabe que su caso ha sido mucho más sencillo al de muchos inmigrantes, por tanto no duda en dar sus tres consejos.

“Lo más importante es que hay que trabajar. Tienes que involucrarte en la cultura sin olvidar tus raíces y lo otro es buscarte un buen grupo de amigos”, esa es su Trinidad de inmigrante. “Muchos inmigrantes vienen solos, sin familia, así que es importante formarte un buen grupo de amigos. Pero lo más importante es trabajar duro y no dejar que nadie te trate mal y siempre hacerte respetar”.

Cierra la conversación tal cual como la empezó, con una gran sonrisa y su acento cubano mucho más suelto que cuando el grabador se prendió. Eduardo el “suertudo”, el que se gana la vida marcando goles.

161 Canadians have been arrested or detained for various periods in Cuba since 2005

Toronto Star

By: Julian Sher Staff Reporter, Juan O. Tamayo El Nuevo Herald/
When Sarkis Yacoubian walks into a courtroom in Havana Thursday to face serious corruption charges that could send him to prison for 12 years, the North York businessman will have a high-powered diplomat keeping a close eye on his trial — Canada’s ambassador to Cuba.

As the Toronto Star revealed last week, Yacoubian, who ran a successful $30 million transport and trading company called Tri-Star Caribbean, was handed a 63-page indictment by Cuban prosecutors in April accusing him of three counts of bribery, tax evasion and “activities damaging to the economy.”

After almost two years in custody without charges, Yacoubian’s fate will be decided by a panel of five judges in a hearing that is expected to last no longer than two days at the Criminal Court of the Peoples’ Tribunal for Havana Province.

Other jailed foreigners and diplomats are nervously watching to see how far the Cuban justice system, not known for its transparency or independence, will go in pursuing a case that has become an international political flashpoint.

In an apparent signal about just how seriously Ottawa views the case, the Department of Foreign Affairs this week informed Julian Falconer, Yacoubian’s lawyer in Canada, that Ambassador Matthew Levin will attend both days of the trial along with the Consul General at the embassy.

“It is very rare for the ambassador to show up in a courtroom,” said Gar Pardy, a former director general of consular services for Canada. “It sends a message to the Cuban authorities: this is a case of direct interest to the government of Canada.”

Levin had previously visited Yacoubian at least four times while he was in La Condesa prison on the outskirts of Havana.

Yacoubian was arrested in July 2011 as part of the Cuban Communist Party’s highly-charged political campaign against corruption.

A second GTA entrepreneur, Cy Tokmakjian, who runs a rival transportation firm, was arrested in September 2011 and remains in jail with no specific charges filed against him.

Yacoubian told the Star in a series of lengthy jailhouse phone interviews that he confessed and cooperated closely with his Cuban interrogators, pointing the finger at what he called the “bigger crooks” — a wide network of foreign companies engaged in widespread corruption and bribery.

“I just wanted to talk, I just wanted to tell them, to correct things,” he said.

Yacoubian said he had hoped that his close co-operation with the Cubans in exposing the web of corruption would help his case.

“I told them everything, I told how these schemes were done,” he said. “I was expecting anytime these things will clear up.”

But after nearly two years in detention, that has not happened.

“They expect me in court to say I am sorry and I will say that,” he said. “But I’m not going to lay quietly and be the victim.”

“Sarkis is ready for anything,” said Krikor Yacoubian, who has been in almost daily contact by phone with his brother. “Sarkis is a guinea pig. His trial will be a test of how Canada is going to react.”

Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Emma Welford told the Star Ottawa will not comment on the now very public case “to protect the privacy of the individual concerned.”

She said that 161 Canadians have been arrested or detained for various periods in Cuba since 2005, but she said the department did not know how many Canadians have ever faced trial there.

“The information is not captured,” she said.

A database search of news archives going back more than two decades found only two cases of publicly-known trials for Canadians, both of which involved allegations of sex crimes against minors.

Dr. Jaime Suchlicki, director of the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami said Sarkis Yacoubian faces a justice system that is “capricious and authoritarian.”

“All the judges are appointed by the government, all the lawyers are on the government payroll or approved by the government,” he said. “So you are at the mercy of a very horrible political system.”

Alex Neve, secretary-general of Amnesty International Canada, said it was crucial for Canadian embassy officials to put on a strong show of force at trials of Canadians abroad, especially in countries like Cuba where “the issue of a fair trial is a serious concern.”

“It’s incredibly important to Canadians to be able to rely on an assurance that the Canadian government will be there for them, pressing relentlessly so that fundamental human rights requirements be complied with in any proceedings against them,” he said.

Certainly there will be political undertones to Yacoubian’s trial, given the shock waves the anti-corruption campaign and the resulting scandals have caused in Cuba and abroad.

Yacoubian’s case was in the hands of the powerful Agency for Investigating Crimes against the Security of the State.

In the past two years, more than a dozen Cuban officials and deputy ministers have been arrested and several of them convicted on various corruption-related charges.

In addition to the two Canadians, state authorities have jailed two British businessmen and detained several of the foreign employees of targeted Canadian and British firms — even though Cuban depends on foreign investment from friendly Western countries in the face of a punishing American economic blockade.

In the indictment, prosecutors charged Yacoubian and his employees “falsely claimed that they ran a great personal risk in doing business with our country and that their objective was to violate the criminal economic, financial and commercial blockade of the United States of America against Cuba . . . when in reality they were taking advantage of that cruel policy.”

Prosecutors allege Yacoubian or other employees bribed at least a dozen officials from a vast array of government departments and state enterprises — from the Ministries of Communications, Construction, Transportation and Tourism to the government’s telecommunications monopoly — for advance information on government purchases or to favour Tri-Star’s business.

Krikor Yacoubian says his brother will plead guilty to the charge of bribery, even though his brother insists he never initiated any payments but was forced to give money to Cuban officials to keep contracts he had already legitimately won.

“Sarkis never introduced payments in anyway,” said Krikor Yacoubian. “He had to pay.”

But he says his brother will “vehemently deny” the more serious counts of tax evasion and damage to the economy that could bring seven- and 12-year jail terms.

The Yacoubians have launched a Facebook campaign — which has garnered more than 400 supporters in a few days — to keep the case in the public spotlight.

Cuban authorities told the family that no media will be allowed into the courtroom.

The Canadian businessmen imprisoned by the Castro regime

capitolhillcubans

The Toronto Star and The Miami Herald have published an exclusive interview with one of the Canadian businessmen, Sarkis Yacoubian, imprisoned by the Castro regime.
It is a textbook example of the Castro brother's tactics.

Yacoubian has been clearly broken by the Castro regime, after being held in undisclosed locations and interrogated (and probably worse) for nearly two-years without charges or trial.
He's now serving as a ruse for one of the Castro brother's classic purgings, pointing his finger (better yet, having his finger pointed) horizontally -- but not straight to the top.
Yacoubian will plead guilty and play off Castro's script, hoping he will be allowed to return home soon.
Yet everyone knows that Yacoubian's business activities in totalitarian Cuba were conducted at the highest levels.
The closing quote says it all:
“Don’t be a hero,” Yacoubian says. “Heroes are so sad.”
Here are some excerpts from the story:
Speaking over a scratchy telephone line from inside a Cuban prison, Sarkis Yacoubian’s voice goes suddenly silent. He’s crying.
“I was so depressed at times, I wanted to commit suicide,” says the 53-year-old entrepreneur.
In exclusive interviews from the La Condesa prison, Yacoubian provides an insider’s view of a sweeping anti-corruption campaign by the government of Raúl Castro that has seen several foreign businessmen — including himself and another Toronto-area businessman — jailed.
A joint investigation by The Toronto Star and El Nuevo Herald has found that in a corruption-plagued country described in secret U.S. government cables as “a state on the take,” the two jailed Canadians are embroiled in a high-stakes diplomatic and legal stand-off between Havana and Ottawa, potentially jeopardizing millions in taxpayer dollars that underwrite Canada’s trade with Cuba.
Arrested in July 2011 and detained for nearly two years without charges, Yacoubian, who ran a transport and trading company, was finally handed a 63-page indictment last month accusing him of bribery, tax evasion and “activities damaging to the economy.”
A suspect who says he quickly pointed the finger at widespread wrongdoing by other Canadian and foreign businesses, Yacoubian now faces up to 12 years in prison after he pleads guilty at his trial set to begin next Thursday. The charges were filed in a special Havana court for Crimes against the Security of the State, which can effectively hold trials in secret [...]
[T]heir Havana offices are shuttered, their fortunes frozen and their future in limbo.
Cuban authorities in Havana and at the country’s embassy in Ottawa declined to be interviewed for this story.
Complicating matters is that millions in Canadian taxpayer dollars funded by the Canadian Commercial Corporation (CCC) — a kind of broker that underwrites contracts between the Cuban government and select Canadian firms — may be at stake [...]
Whisked away to a “safe house” for questioning and allowed outside for only one hour a day, Yacoubian says he slipped into desperation and depression. “I had lost my mind,” he says. “I was talking to myself, banging my head.”
Then Yacoubian made a fateful choice: He blew the whistle. “Maybe in my conscience I wanted my company to be brought down so that I could tell once for all things that are going on,” he says. “It was just eating me alive.”
He told his interrogators that he had little choice but to hand over money to bureaucrats or officials to secure contracts or even to ensure they were honored after winning a bid.
“If I didn’t pay, at the end of the day they would just create problems for me,” he says. Prosecutors allege in their court filing that Yacoubian or his employees bribed at least a dozen state officials with everything from nice dinners and prepaid phone cards to cash — $300 for a tip on a deal, $50,000 for a 2008 contract on earth movers.

Canadian entrepreneur who blew whistle on Cuban corruption faces 12-year term

Toronto Star

Sarkis Yacoubian

By: Julian Sher Investigative News reporter, Juan O. Tamayo El Nuevo Herald, Published on

Speaking over a scratchy telephone line from inside a Cuban prison, Sarkis Yacoubian’s voice goes suddenly silent. He’s crying.

Behind his muffled sobs, the din of the crowded jail outside of Havana can be heard.

“I was so depressed at times, I wanted to commit suicide,” says the 53-year-old entrepreneur.

In exclusive jailhouse interviews with the Star from Cuba’s La Condesa prison, Yacoubian provides an insider’s view of a sweeping anti-corruption campaign by the government of Raul Castro that has seen several foreign businessmen — including himself and another Toronto-area businessman — jailed.

A joint investigation by the Star and El Nuevo Herald, the Spanish-language affiliate of the Miami Herald, has found that in a corruption-plagued country described in secret U.S. government cables as “a state on the take,” two jailed entrepreneurs from the GTAare embroiled in a high-stakes diplomatic and legal standoff between Havana and Ottawa. It potentially jeopardizes millions in taxpayer dollars that underwrite Canada’s trade with Cuba.

Arrested in July 2011 and detained for nearly two years without charges, Yacoubian, who ran a transport and trading company, finally was handed a 63-page indictment last month by Cuban authorities accusing him of bribery, tax evasion and “activities damaging to the economy.”

Yacoubian, a suspect who says he pointed the finger at widespread wrongdoing by other foreign businesses as well as his own, now faces as many as 12 years in prison after he pleads guilty at his trial set to begin next Thursday.

The charges were filed in a special Havana court for Crimes against the State, which can effectively hold trials in secret.

“They found out this was an epidemic going all over the place and I was the fall guy,” says Yacoubian. “They want to give an example to the rest of the businessmen. They want to scare them to death.”

The second GTA man — 73-year-old Cy Tokmakjian, who runs a global transportation firm

Cy Tokmakjian

called the Tokmakjian Group — was picked up by Cuban authorities in September 2011 and remains in jail with no specific charges filed against him.

“We’re as worried as anyone would be if their father is in a place where they shouldn’t be,” said his son and company president, Raffi Tokmakjian, in an interview at their corporate headquarters in Concord, Ont.

Raffi Tokmakjian and his two sisters say they are in daily phone contact with their father.

“He worries more about us. He says: ‘You guys stay strong, I’m OK,’ ” said Anni Tokmakjian, the company’s director of sales. “We’re just focusing on getting him home, that’s all we really care about.”

But that might not be easy. The two Ontario entrepreneurs of Armenian origin, one-time business associates turned bitter rivals, ran multimillion-dollar trading companies that sold heavy equipment, vehicles and supplies to Cuban state companies in the transport, construction, nickel and other industries.

Today, their Havana offices are shuttered, their fortunes frozen and their future in limbo.

Cuban authorities in Havana and at the country’s embassy in Ottawa declined to be interviewed for this story. Complicating matters is that millions in Canadian taxpayer dollars funded by the Canadian Commercial Corporation — a kind of broker that underwrites contracts between the Cuban government and select Canadian firms — may be at stake.

From 2011 to 2012, the corporation signed 38 contracts in Cuba worth more than $68.4 million, the latest in its $650-million business with Cuba since 1991.

Much of that financial support — for privacy reasons, the agency won’t disclose its client list — went to back deals made the Tokmakjian Group.

Now that Tokmakjian is in prison and the Cuban government has officially revoked his company’s licence to operate, there are questions about what the Cubans will do if their courts rule that Tokmakjian contracts backed by the CCC were tainted by corruption.

The Tokmakjian Group is reported to be the second-largest Canadian operation in Cuba, with at least $80 million in annual sales in the country.

Raffi Tokmakjian says his father “fell in love with the place” when he began investing in Cuba during the 1960s. Yacoubian, too, had big dreams when he first came to Cuba in 1993. He quickly became fluent in Spanish and, after working briefly for Tokmakjian, he built his company, Tri-Star Caribbean, into a flourishing $30-million-a-year enterprise.

It all came crashing down when plainclothes security officers swept into his offices in Havana in July 2011. “They started yelling: ‘Nobody move!’ ” Yacoubian says. “I didn’t know what was happening.”

Eventually whisked away to a “safe house” for questioning and allowed outside for only one hour a day, Yacoubian says he slipped into desperation and depression.

“I had lost my mind,” he says. “I was talking to myself, banging my head.”

Then Yacoubian made a fateful choice: he blew the whistle. “Maybe in my conscience I wanted my company to be brought down so that I could tell once for all things that are going on,” he says. “It was just eating me alive.”

He told his interrogators that he had little choice but to hand over money to bureaucrats or officials to secure contracts or even to ensure they were honoured after winning a bid.

“If I didn’t pay, at the end of the day they would just create problems for me,” he says.

Prosecutors allege in their court filing that Yacoubian or his employees bribed at least a dozen state officials with everything from nice dinners and prepaid phone cards to cash — from $300 for a tip about a contract, to $50,000 for a 2008 deal on earth movers.

Yacoubian disputes many of the details in the charges. But he says what bothered him was that some of the foreign businessmen were “bigger crooks” than the Cubans, profiting unduly from shady business dealings — often, he says, with support or subsidies from Western governments.

Yacoubian says he spent the next few months turning what could have been a police grilling of him into a kind of Corruption 101 class for his interrogators.

“I tried to explain to them systematically how things could be done,” he says. “I gave them drawings, designs. I gave them names, people, how they do it, why, when, where, what.”

Yacoubian did not know that his tell-all tale would become fodder for a campaign against corruption led by President Raul Castro.

Reuters reported in February 2012 that Yacoubian’s videotaped confession was the centrepiece in a video titled “Metastasis” that describes payoffs and bribes “spreading like cancer” into high levels of the Cuban government.

In the video, shown only to top government and Communist Party officials, “Yacoubian confesses he passed packets of money to Cuban officials,” Reuters reports. Tokmakjian is also featured and accused of corruption.

At least two of the Cuban officials tied to Tokmakjian in the video have been arrested.

But his children say Tokmakjian firmly denies any wrongdoing, insisting there have been yearly audits of their business partnerships with the Cubans with “no issues.”

“The only thing that I have heard my father preach is: keep your nose clean in Cuba and you can do business here for a long time,” says Raffi Tokmakjian.

As the video was making rounds, Tokmakjian and Yacoubian were eventually transferred to La Condesa, a prison reserved for foreigners and disgraced government officials — although the Canadians have been kept apart in separate barracks.

Bishop Bagrat Galstanian, the Primate of the Diocese of the Armenian Church of Canada who got to know Yacoubian and his family because of their charity work in the community, flew to Havana last fall to visit the prison.

“It was kind of unbelievable that would happen to Sarkis, he was very much in love with Cuba,” the bishop says. “He cried, he opened his heart. He told me: ‘This is what I have done for years and now they are trying to convict me as a traitor to this country.’ ”

The families of both men say they have received support from the Canadian Embassy in Havana and assurances that Foreign Minister John Baird and Minister of State of Foreign Affairs Diane Ablonczy have pushed the Cubans “at the highest levels” to provide justice for the jailed Canadians “in a more timely matter.”

Canada is one of Cuba’s largest trading partners and its single largest source of tourism revenue. Close observers of Canadian business and political affairs in Havana say Ottawa and the CCC have to be concerned when a major player like Tokmakjian, backed by federal money, runs afoul of the Castro regime.

One longtime Canadian investor with many years of experience in Havana said “a lot of people” were frustrated that CCC was an exclusive club The investor, who asked to remain anonymous because of the uncertain political climate there, said most of CCC’s money was being “eaten up by a handful of companies,” including the Tokmakjian Group.

Last month, the Cuban government’s Official Gazette announced that the Ministry of Foreign Commerce and Investment had revoked the licence of the Tokmakjian Group because it carried out “activities . . . contrary to the (proper) principles and ethics” — in effect, slamming the door shut on a major Canadian corporation endorsed by a federal Crown corporation.

For now, the CCC says it is not worried. “The corporation has consistently been paid by the Government of Cuba on time regardless of the external environment,” says Joanne Lostracco, the CCC’s manager of government relations.

Asked about the perils of a Crown corporation operating in a Cuban economy tainted by corruption, Lostracco said the CCC has a “strong due diligence process” that imposes “full financial disclosure” on Canadian companies and allows the CCC to withdraw from any contract “obtained through illicit means.”

The Tokmakjian children remain optimistic their father will be home soon, taking heart from the fact that 10 other foreign employees of their company who were detained by Cuban authorities have been released during the past four months.

For his part, Yacoubian says he hopes to get a reduced sentence after he pleads guilty at his trial next week “because I collaborated closely” — a collaboration acknowledged by Cuban authorities in his indictment.

Yacoubian takes anti-depressants during the day and sleeping pills at night, but he says the poor ventilation in the stifling heat and the lack of chairs for his bad back are taking a toll.

Reflecting on the role he has played in unravelling Cuba’s corruption scandals, he has mixed emotions. “It’s a victory because now how things were done has been unwrapped,” he says.

But he also recalls the lyrics from a rock song that was popular when he and his family lived through the difficult years of civil war in Lebanon:

“Don’t be a hero,” Yacoubian says. “Heroes are so sad.”

Cuba cancela licencia a poderosa corporación canadiense [Tokmakjian Group]

Cafefuerte

Por Wilfredo Cancio Isla

El gobierno cubano canceló oficialmente las operaciones del poderoso Grupo Tokmakjian, una de las mayores empresas extranjeras que operó por los últimos 25 años en la isla.

Una resolución del Ministerio del Comercio Exterior y la Inversión Extranjera -publicada en la Gaceta Oficial- indicó que decidió revocar la licencia del conglomerado canadiense por ser presentada extemporáneamente la renovación, el pasado 8 de marzo, y por violaciones incurridas en sus actividades comerciales en territorio cubano.

"En el proceso de análisis de la solicitud formulada por la citada entidad se ha concluido desestimar la misma, al haberse comprobado la realización, en el territorio nacional por la sucursal de esta y sus directivos, de actividades que no se corresponden con las autorizadas por la Licencia que oportunamente le fuera otorgada, las que resultan contrarias a los principios y ética que deben caracterizar la actividad comercial y contravienen el ordenamiento jurídico cubano", indica el decreto ministerial, divulgado el pasado 18 de abril.

El documento es la primera declaración oficial del gobierno cubano sobre el escándalo de corrupción que desembocó en el cierre de las oficinas de la compañía en La Habana, así como en el arresto de su principal ejecutivo, el empresario canadiense Cy Tokmakjian, a finales del 2011.

Enmarañada trama de corrupción

En septiembre del 2011, agentes de la Seguridad del Estado ocuparon y sellaron los locales de la firma en el cuarto piso del edificio Barcelona del Miramar Trade Center de la Habana. Tokmakjian fue detenido y permanece desde entonces bajo cuestodia de las autoridades cubanas mientras se investiga una enmarañada trama de corrupción y actividades ilícitas. 

La medida fue acompañada entonces por una comunicación del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y el Consejo de Estado, enviada a las empresas cubanas, para que detuvieran todas sus operaciones comerciales con el Grupo Tokmakjian.

Pero hasta el momento no se había hecho un anuncio oficial sobre el asunto por parte de las autoridades cubanas. Tokmakjian, de 71 años, permanece aún bajo arresto, sin que se le hayan formulado cargos.

Inicialmente estuvo detenido en una casa de seguridad en La Habana, pero a comienzos del pasado año fue trasladado a la prisión de La Condesa, destinada a extranjeros.

A mediados del pasado año, un alto ejecutivo de la compañía reveló que el gobierno cubano les había permitido reiniciar ciertas operaciones en Cuba. El Grupo Tokmakjian había renovado su licencia ante los registros de la Cámara de Comercio de Cuba en mayo del 2010, un año antes de estallar la investigación gubernamental sobre sus transacciones.

Pero el decreto firmado a comienzos de este mes por Rodrigo Malmierca, ministro del Comercio Exterior y la Inversión Extranjera, marca el portazo final a la presencia de la corporación canadiense en la isla.

Millonarias operaciones

Radicado en Ontario, el Grupo Takmakjian era la segunda empresa extranjera con mayores operaciones comerciales en Cuba después de Sherritt International. Facturaba anualmente unos $80 millones de dólares en ventas de equipamiento para la construcción y la minería.

La compañía era además la distribuidora exclusiva de Hyundai en Cuba y estaba asociada con otras dos empresas para el remplazo de motores de equipos de transporte de la era soviética.

Las autoridades cubanas tienen también bajo arresto a un segundo empresario canadiense, Sarkis Yacoubian, presidente de Tri-Star Caribbean, desde julio del 2011. La firma de Yacoubian era considerada la competencia más fuerte del Grupo Tokmakjian, y realizaba negocios con numerosos organismos y empresas estatales cubanas en los sectores de la construcción, la minería y la salud pública.

Ambos empresarios -de origen armenio- comenzaron juntos sus negocios en Cuba y luego decidieron seperarse. Tokmakjian firmó su primer contrato con el gobierno cubano en 1988.

El Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores de Canadá señaló que conoce la situación de los dos emporesarios retenidos en Cuba y que sus respectivos casos están siendo monitoreados.

Versiones extraoficiales consideran que la investigación sobre las empresas canadienses es de gran envergadura, pues vinculó a numerosos ministros y funcionarios de alto nivel, así como a un tercer empresario británico de origen libanés, Amado Fakhre, ejecutivo de la firma Coral Capital Group Ltd, todos aparentemente asociados a  transacciones ilegales en la expansión de la industria de níquel y cobalto en el oriente de Cuba.

Canada & US Anglican financed Cuban Church controlled by the government

what is doing a bolivian-born priest in cuba? she is married to who?
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episcopaldigitalnetwork

Episcopal Diocese of Cuba Bishop Griselda Delgado del Carpio and a community worker with prized tomato from a community garden in Itabo, one of the diocese’s projects that promote self-sufficiency. Photo: Ali Symons/General Synod Communications

[Anglican Journal] A proposal to fund an office of integrated development for the Episcopal Diocese of Cuba will be submitted for approval this April to a program review committee of Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund (PWRDF).

The office will launch a three-year “capacity-building” project to train 25 community leaders annually, at the end of which they are expected to create a project proposal for their locality, said Adele Finney, executive director of PWRDF, the Anglican Church of Canada’s relief and development agency. Fourteen projects will eventually be chosen for funding by the diocese.

The U.S.-based Episcopal Relief & Development (ERD) agency is expected to also fund the office over a three-year period, said Archdeacon Michael Thompson, the Anglican Church of Canada’s general secretary. “What a wonderful rich network of Anglicans working together to make a new thing happen,” Thompson said in his report to the spring meeting of CoGS March 14-17.

“One of the exciting things about this is that the PWRDF’s strategic plan has a lot about dynamic partnerships” and this is one of them, said Finney in an interview. “There are all sorts of connections that can hopefully not only breathe new life and new work in Cuba, but also connect us in new ways.”

These connections involve the primate, Archbishop Fred Hiltz, who chairs both the Metropolitan Council of Cuba and the PWRDF board. But other parts of the Canadian church, among them the Diocese of Niagara, also enjoy a long-standing companion relationship with the Cuban diocese, Finney noted. Most recently, the Diocese of Niagara — through PWRDF — sent about $30,000 for Hurricane Sandy relief to Cuba.

Last year, Diocese of Cuba Bishop Griselda Delgado Del Carpio attended the Sacred Circle, the triennial meeting of indigenous Anglicans in Canada. Delgado, herself an indigenous person from Bolivia, “was profoundly moved by the circle, as were the people by her ministry,” Finney noted.

Jose Zarate, PWRDF Latin America/Caribbean coordinator, was actively involved in helping the diocese establish its proposal for the office of integrated development, said Finney. He is expected to sit at its advisory council — along with his Episcopal Relief & Development counterpart — if PWRDF participation is approved.

Thompson said the relationship between the Anglican Church of Canada and the Cuban diocese is an example of “faithful partnership in a global communion.” The relationship began when former primate Archbishop Ted Scott “took an interest in how the Cuban church, separated from its province [the U.S.-based Episcopal Church] by the economic blockade and travel restrictions, could sustain a sense of participation in the wider Anglican Communion,” he said.

This relationship involves Canadian leadership in the Metropolitan Council of Cuba, “which offers support and counsel to the bishop and people of the Cuban church,” explained Thompson. Aside from Hiltz, council members also include Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and Archbishop John Holder, primate of the Church in the Province of the West Indies. Thompson acts as secretary of the Metropolitan Council, which typically meets a day before the Cuba diocese’s annual synod.

The Diocese of Cuba’s music festival, which some Canadian Anglicans have supported through “Gifts for Mission,” the Anglican Church of Canada’s gift guide to support ministries in Canada and overseas, is having a positive impact, Thompson also reported. Held for a week each summer in the Anglican cathedral in Havana, the festival “has had a dramatic impact on the song of the church, a song that we encountered and that lifted our spirits at the diocesan synod,” he said.

Cuba's regimen allowed a Canadian sex offender travel to Cuba 31 times

capitolhillcubans

Toronto man James McTurk, 78/ Read on Toronto Star

Part Two of the joint investigative report by The Toronto Star and The Miami Herald:

Foreign tourists, especially Canadians and Spaniards, are travelling to Cuba in surprising numbers for sex — and not just with adult prostitutes. They are finding underage girls and boys, a joint investigation by The Toronto Star and El Nuevo Herald has found.

Havana’s conspicuous scenes of street-level prostitution are the outward face of a hidden prostitution trade in minors, some as young as four, some with families complicit in their exploitation, the newspapers found.

Cuba holds unique allure for Western sex tourists. It is closer and cheaper than other sex destinations, such as Thailand. And HIV rates are lower than in other Caribbean sex tourism hot-spots, such as the Dominican Republic or Haiti.

While the size of the island’s underage sex market remains a mystery — the communist government denies it is a problem and fosters the image of an island free of the social ills that plague other nations — it clearly goes on.

• A confidential Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) report in 2011 showed Cuba was one of the main destinations in the Americas for Canadian sex predators, along with the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Brazil and Mexico. More than one million Canadian tourists visited Cuba last year.

• Cuba’s government “made no known efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex,” noted the 2012 version of the U.S. State Department’s annual report on global Trafficking in Persons (TIP).

• The 2003 version noted that some officials of Cuban state enterprises such as restaurants and hotels “turn a blind eye to this [child] exploitation because such activity helps to win hard currency.”

• A dispatch by U.S. diplomats in Havana in 2009 noted that “some Cuban children are reportedly pushed into prostitution by their families, exchanging sex for money, food or gifts,” but gave no overall numbers.

Pimps, cabbies and tourist hotel staffers can procure discreet meetings with underage prostitutes, according to the RCMP report.

“That’s prohibited here in the hotel,” a security chief at a Havana hotel told a journalist posing as a tourist in search of underage girls. But, he added helpfully, they can be found “in houses waiting for the call from pimps.”

Clients can take them to private homes, known as “casas particulares,” the security man noted, where tourists can rent rooms for $10 a night and do “whatever you want. Orgies, anything.”

The Castro Regime and Child-Sex Tourism

capitolhillcubans

Riddle me this:

The Castro regime can track down a flash-drive or a copy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) from the most remote home of a pro-democracy activist.

The Castro regime can track down an older American man who travels to Cuba to help ordinary citizens connect to the Internet and exercise their fundamental right to receive and impart information.

Yet, the Castro regime cannot track down older Canadian and European men that travel to Cuba to sexually prey on young children in "casa particulares," which it closely monitors?

Please.

Fortunately, U.S. travelers are not contributing to this problem, for as The Miami Herald notes this morning:

"Perhaps the key reason for the lack of U.S. sex tourism to Cuba is Washington’s trade embargo on the communist-ruled island, which has limited travel there for more than half a century.

Cuban Americans can visit anytime, but they know 'that the police can throw them in jail anytime' and that U.S. consular officials in Havana 'cannot protect them,' said Cason, now the mayor of Coral Gables.

Non-Cuban Americans are barred from tourist trips and can go only on group “educational” trips that are tightly guided and can cost upwards of $5,000 a week. Only about 67,000 went to Cuba in 2011. In contrast, more than one million Canadians visited the island in 2012, and a week in Varadero beach can cost them as little as $600."

Who do you think the people of a future democratic Cuba are going to recall as their friends -- the Canadians and Europeans that took advantage of their suffering or the Americans that stood up for their freedom?

Canadian dies in Varadero, Cuba

680news

VARADERO, Cuba – A Canadian died in Varadero, Cuba, Foreign Affairs confirmed to 680News.

Foreign Affairs would only confirm the death of a Canadian citizen but did not release a cause of death.

The identity of the tourist and province of origin have not been released. However, there are reports the victim is from Montreal.

680News learned of a death after Kirk Nesbitt, the vice-president of engineering at Rogers Radio, witnessed a drowning at a beach.

“There were quite a few people on the beach sunbathing but only one person in the water,” he said.

“Very shortly after we had arrived there, the fellow in the water started waving his arms and we could hear him yelling.”

“Three [lifeguards] went running into the water to go after him and the waves were quite high.”

“You could see him floating face down. The lifeguard had to give up and let go of him to get in safely himself. The other two lifeguards were never able to make it anywhere close to him,” he said.

According to Nesbitt, a Good Samaritan also went to the victim’s aid. The man, believed to be from Cuba, drowned.

Canadian consular officials in Varadero are working with Cuban authorities, according to reporter Cormac MacSweeney.

La sociedad civil cubana para Canada [Ministro de Exteriores se reune con agentes]

La Embajada de Canada en Cuba publica una breve nota de la reunion sostenida por el ministro de relaciones exteriores de ese pais con la "sociedad civil" cubana. no  relacionan los nombres de los que el honorable ministro considera representantes de la sociedad civil en cuba, pero no es dificil identificar en las fotos a rafael hernandez, agente de la contrainteligencia cubana desde los tiempos del cea [centro de estudios america del comite central del partido] y director de la revista temas; y a omar everleny perez villanueva del centro de estudios de la economia cubana [universidad de la habana], explicador "akademico" oficial de la actualizacion del modelo economico neocastrista en cuanta universidad norteamericana tenga la oportunidad y por ello -al menos-, agente de influencias en el exterior. 

no leen la prensa en la oficina del honorable -como es obligatorio referirse en canada a estas personalidades- ministro de relaciones exteriores canuck, o cierran los ojos y van a lo que les conviene.

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everleny y rafael [1ro y 2do de izq. a der.]

 

baird con everleny

con adela dworin, la presidente del jewish community centre que testifico contra alan gross

la nota de la embajada:

February 15, 2013 - Havana - Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird participates in a round-table discussion with members of Cuban civil society. The exchange gave the Minister an opportunity to discuss Cuba’s economic liberalization process and prospects of this leading to greater political freedom on the island, which remains under authoritarian control.

Although there have been some advances with respect to human rights in recent years, much remains to be done.

The Minister conveyed Canada’s view that all Cubans should have a role in building for their country a better, brighter and more prosperous future. This meeting was a chance for the Minister to hear what is being done by civil society groups and to get their assessment of the current human rights situation in Cuba. He pledged Canada’s support for efforts to secure freedom, democracy, human rights and the rule of law in the only remaining Communist country in the Western hemisphere.

Canada Gave Cuban Dissidents Silent Treatment

Capitolhillcubans

Canada's Foreign Minister John Baird talked a big-game before heading to Cuba last week.

Prior to leaving, Baird's spokesman said "he [would] use this opportunity to press the need for economic liberalization and respect for human rights."

One columnist in Canada appropriately asked, "human rights organizations in Cuba and abroad have reported an increase in the number of arbitrary detentions for political reasons over the past year (up to more than a thousand a month). Shouldn't our government condemn that publicly, and depart from a long bipartisan policy of silence on Cuba?"

Well, John Baird went to Cuba, and did exactly that.

He met with Castro regime officials to discuss tourism, natural resources and mining investments -- then quietly got on the plane and left. 

Baird didn't have the decency to meet with a single pro-democracy activist, not The Ladies in White, not independent journalists, not bloggers.  Nada.

It's not that he didn't have time to meet with anyone.  After all, the Venezuelan government cancelled his visit there, which was scheduled after the Havana stop.

He didn't do it because he didn't want to risk Canada's business deals with the Castro regime.

(Let's be clear: Canada does not have a single business partnership in Cuba with any entity that is not owned and operated by the Castro regime.  Cubans are prohibited from engaging in foreign commerce -- it's an exclusive monopoly of the dictatorship.)

John Baird gave Cuban dissidents the same treatment Canadian tourists and businessmen have been giving the Cuban people for two decades -- a shameful snub.

Sadly, this is what many advocates of normalizing relations with Cuba would like to see the U.S. do as well.

So what "influence" has doing business and sucking up to the Castro regime "bought" the Canadians?

None.

To the contrary, it has allowed the Castro regime to blackmail Canada into a collusive silence

Canada Foreign Minister on Cuba

The Canadian Press 

In Cuba, Baird said he had frank discussions with his counterpart, Bruno Rodriguez, who at 54 is a political spring chicken compared the octogenarian holdovers from the 1959 revolution who still occupy high offices.

Since taking charge, Raul Castro has allowed a series of small, free market reforms, and eased travel restrictions on Cubans.

“I think there’s a long way to go,” said Baird. “They’re beginning to make some significant economic reform, so I think there’s some reason for optimism there.”

He also said Cuba is beginning a transition to new leadership.

“There is beginning to be a change of the guard in the cabinet, and among the senior leadership — just a beginning — I think that gives us some reason for optimism,” he said.

“Obviously, we want to see people in Cuba live in freedom and prosperity.”

Baird said Canada still opposes Cuba’s return to the Organization of American States when it holds its next summit in 2015, saying the country needs to go further on its reforms. Canada and the U.S. oppose the return of Cuba to the 35-country Western Hemisphere club.

But Canada supports Cuba’s calls for the United States to end its five-decade long economic embargo.

“Obviously, we don’t share views with our closest friend and ally on that issue,” said Baird, who noted that the Obama administration has eased some of the provisions of the embargo in recent years.

Despite the embargo, Baird said he was surprised by the U.S. presence in Havana.

The American Interest Office, he said, which houses U.S. diplomats, “is the biggest foreign office in the country. There were Americans everywhere I went — in the elevator at the hotel.”

Canadian shame: Canada legitimiza el Neocastrismo de Castro

capitulo ignominioso para la politica exterior canadiense cuando pasa por alto los mas de 54 anos de crimenes y violaciones de los derechos humanos de los castros, por sentarse al convite de las inversiones a que lo convoca el dictador raul castro.

---------------------------

La Habana, 16 feb (EFE).- El ministro de Asuntos Exteriores de Canadá, John Baird, y su homólogo cubano, Bruno Rodríguez, se pronunciaron hoy en La Habana por "mantener e impulsar" los vínculos bilaterales en áreas como el comercio, la inversión y el turismo, informaron medios locales.

Baird y Rodríguez sostuvieron hoy conversaciones oficiales en la sede de la Cancillería en La Habana, donde también trataron temas de la agenda regional y multilateral, indicó la agencia estatal Prensa Latina.

Según la fuente, el ministro canadiense se refirió a "las potencialidades existentes para diversificar las actuales relaciones económico-comerciales y de cooperación" bilateral.

Por su parte, el canciller cubano destacó el lugar de Canadá como principal emisor de turistas hacia la isla, que en 2012 recibió a más de un millón de visitantes de ese país.

Canadá ocupa además el tercer puesto en cuanto a la cantidad de inversiones en diversos sectores estratégicos de Cuba, como minería, agricultura, turismo y producción de alimentos.

Durante el encuentro de cancilleres, Cuba también agradeció al país norteamericano por su apoyo contra el bloqueo económico y comercial que Estados Unidos aplica a la isla desde 1962.

Baird llegó a La Habana ayer para una visita de trabajo que comenzó ese mismo día con una reunión con el vicepresidente y coordinador de las reformas del modelo económico cubano, Marino Murillo.

Cuba es la segunda escala de la gira latinoamericana que el ministro canadiense inició en México, y que después continuará por Perú, Panamá, Venezuela y la República Dominicana.

Se disparan las acciones de Castro en el mercado inversionista mundial

las acciones en los mercados inversionistas internacionales de subcastro el administrador de la finca biranica han subido a niveles jamas sonados por el magno paciente de su hermano, luego de su proclamacion como presidente pro temporare de la celac.

el canuquito biranico en medio del mar caribe se multiplica cientos de veces en el feudo por demas expandible servido en bandeja bolivariana con la anuencia complice de los sebastian pineras de letrinoamerica.

el premier canadiense tomo la delantera y mando a la'bana a su ministro de exteriores algo que no ocurria desde el ano 1998, mientras putin envia a su partner Dmitri Medvédev la semana próxima >>

Derechos Humanos y Negocios: Canada, Cuba y la Celac [Update]

confirmando la opinion inicial de los propositos de Canada, Cuba y la Celac en la gira latinoamericana del canciller canadiense john baird, el anfitrion del mismo es el [sub]zar de las reformas economicas de kubichelandia, marino murillo.

el  granma  da cuenta de ello en los siguientes terminos:  "Durante el encuentro, ambas partes dialogaron sobre el favorable desarrollo y las perspectivas de las relaciones bilaterales, en el ámbito comercial, la inversión y el turismo".

una nota del gobierno de canada habia senalado que  "En Cuba y Venezuela, Baird se centrará especialmente en la democracia, los derechos humanos y la liberalización económica"; igualmente el ministro señaló que "como parte de nuestra política exterior, también vamos a entregar mensajes fuertes sobre las reformas económicas y un mayor respeto por los derechos humanos y la democracia, según corresponda".
el comunicado canuck tambien afirma que ademas de reuniones con bruno rodriquez y otros funcionarios, el ministro baird "se reunirá con organizaciones de la sociedad civil y miembros de la comunidad de negocios canadienses".

baird que es canadiense pero no idiota, tiene una clara comprension que la sociedad civil castrista nada tiene que ver con la existente en canada y es el conjunto de las "correas de transmision" conformadas por los cdr, la fmc, la uneac and so on. 

el gobierno conservador de canada tiene la oportunidad de sentar un precedente de politica exterior pragmatica pero responsable que, sin perder oportunidades para el desarrollo de las relaciones comerciales, se atenga a los principios basicos de la democracia y los derechos humanos en sus negociaciones frente a un regimen totalitario que se renueva para no desaparecer.

canada tiene la oportunidad de fortalecer su prestigio internacional pero tambien asume el riesgo de engrosar la larga lista de ignominias si acepta acriticamente la farsa que le tienen preparada.
solo recordar que en el pasado mes abril en la cumbre de las americas el primer ministro canadiense Stephen Harper expreso: “We do believe that the Summit of the Americas should be restricted to democratic countries and that Cuba should be encouraged to come as a democratic country in the future”. estamos en las visperas de conocer cuan firmes son las convicciones del honorable prime minister of canada.

Canada, Cuba y la Celac

by the way, nuestro honorable residente del 24 sussex drive se apura y manda corriendo al otro honorabilisimo a cargo de exteriores a reunirse con la comparsa del presidente pro tempore de la celac para que le den permiso para invertir en los extendidos y extendibles nuevos predios biranicos. va y si acaso nuestro honorable le hace una mencion a brunito el infame sobre los derechos humanos y ya este le tiene preparada la respuesta: figurese excelencia, con los mercenarios pagados por sus vecinos tenemos que tomar medidas para defender nuestra soberania e integridad nacional y el buen canuck va y hasta le da las quejas a kerry que esta desesperado por recibir tales requerimientos.
no solo crearon una organizacion para excluir exprofeso a eeuu y canada donde aun la decencia humana es una valor a considerar, sino que cogen pa'l trajin al canuck para aislar mas a los yumas. va y hasta le proponen que seamos observadores de la celac con el money por delante sonando en la caja central se sobreentiende y con el encargo de invitar a los vecinos del sur.

Canadian foreign affairs minister making rare visit to Cuba, Venezuela

By Laura Payton, CBC News

John Baird is making the first-ever visit to Venezuela by a Canadian foreign affairs minister and the first official visit to Cuba since 1998, his office announced Thursday.

Baird is spending the next few days in Latin America, visiting six countries over the next week. While his first stop was Thursday in Mexico, Baird will be in Havana, Cuba's capital, on Friday morning.

The trip to Cuba will be the first trip to the country by a Canadian foreign affairs minister since Liberal Lloyd Axworthy visited in 1997. Then-prime minister Jean Chrétien went in 1998.

Baird will visit Venezuela next Wednesday, the first-ever bilateral visit by a Canadian foreign minister. Axworthy attended an Organization of American States meeting in the country in 1998.

Both Venezuela and Cuba restrict personal freedoms and repress political opponents.

The news release announcing the trip mentioned Mexico, Peru, Panama and the Dominican Republic in the second paragraph, but left Cuba and Venezuela until the end of the brief advisory.

A spokesman for Baird says "he will use this opportunity to press the need for economic liberalization and respect for human rights."

'Need for action on civil rights'

"Canadian interests and Canadian values are very much intertwined, and the minister will be using this opportunity to express Canada's view on the need for action on civil and political rights in particular," Rick Roth, Baird's press secretary, said in an email.

"While in Venezuela, the minister will meet with government officials and opposition figures, as well as civil society groups, to discuss human rights, free and fair elections, and fundamental freedoms such as freedom of speech …. Venezuela has an opportunity to make great strides on these issues, and Canada will be a willing partner to see through this transformation."

He added: "Canada and Canadian businesses can also participate in and prosper from these changes."

NDP foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar says he hopes Baird doesn't just lecture Cuban and Venezuelan officials, but listens and engages with them.

"We've let the relationship languish and just at the time when things are opening up in Cuba," Dewar said.

About one million Canadians travel to Cuba every year, according to Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs.

Canada is Cuba's largest source of tourists, making up almost 40 per cent of visitors to the country. While the U.S. strictly limits trade with Cuba, Canadian companies can do business there, and the Canadian International Development Agency runs aid programs in the country.

To meet Venezuelan opposition

Carlo Dade, a senior fellow at the University of Ottawa's school of international development and global studies, says the visits come as a surprise.

"There's not much on the agendas with other countries, free trade agreements and other stuff," Dade said. "Obviously, he's going to have to say something about human rights and governance in the countries."

The trip will be useful, he said, to remind Latin America that Canada's policies on Cuba and Venezuela are different from those of the United States.

"We'll talk to them, we'll engage with them, but we have real concerns about human rights," Dade said.

While he's in Caracas, Venezuela's capital, Baird will meet with the country's foreign minister, Elias Jaua, and Vice President Nicolas Maduro, as well as the executive secretary of the opposition coalition. Baird will also meet with civil society and pro-democracy groups, as well as Canadian business representatives.

In Cuba, Baird will visit a synogogue, meet with Vice President Ricardo Cabrisas and Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez, and meet with Canadian business representatives.