Mariela Castro speaking at the conference on population and development in Montevideo. Credit: David Puig/UNFPA

By Raúl Pierri
MONTEVIDEO, Aug 15 2013 (IPS)

Latin America and the Caribbean cannot hope to have truly advanced, progressive policies in sexual and reproductive health as long as women do not have the right to decide to interrupt their pregnancy, says Mariela Castro.

“To me it is shameful that many women in the region are still forced to decide between prison or death,” said Castro, director of Cuba’s National Centre for Sex Education (CENESEX) and a member of the high-level task force for the International Conference on Population and Development.

The sexologist, who is the daughter of Cuban President Raúl Castro, said there is a “witch hunt” against women in Latin America and the Caribbean by governments that describe themselves as democratic.

Castro sat down with IPS during lunch break at the first session of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, which is being held Aug. 12-15 in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay.

As director of CENESEX, Castro has led campaigns in Cuba against the spread of HIV/AIDS and to advocate the rights of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community.

Thanks to a draft law she sponsored, Cuba became the first country in the region to offer free sex reassignment surgery to transgender people.

Excerpts of the interview follow.

Q: What do you think are the biggest advances in Cuba in recent years, in sexual and reproductive health and sex education?

A: Very important work has been done, starting with the efforts of the Federation of Cuban Women in the 1960s. In 1965, abortion began to be provided free of cost by the national public health system, carried out by experts in the health system’s institutions, with the woman’s consent.

Abortions were available in Cuba before the (1959) revolution, but the procedure was very expensive and was practiced in private clinics. Unsafe clandestine abortions were a major cause of maternal mortality.

So the Cuban state decided to make it a service provided by the public health system. There is no law on abortion. It was established by a Public Health Ministry resolution.

The National Family Planning Programme was created in 1964 and the National Sex Education Programme began to be designed in 1972.

When the Communist Party of Cuba held its first congress in 1975, sex education was established as a state policy, with the primary responsibility put on the family and schools.

In 1988 and 1989, the National Centre for Sex Education was created under the Public Health Ministry.

Q: What is the situation today in Cuba in terms of respect for sexual diversity?

A: Cuba, like the rest of the countries in the world, reproduced the homophobic system that cultures and the sciences also helped impose.

The medical sciences imposed the view that homosexuality was an illness and that these people should undergo therapy aimed at turning them into heterosexuals.

It wasn’t until May 17, 1990 that the World Health Organisation (WHO) ‘depathologised’ homosexuality. My country was homophobic like the rest, but what is said about Cuba in that sense is exaggerated.

The idea of a project based on the principles of social justice and equality and solidarity among human beings created the foundations for us to continue the struggle against discrimination, within the revolutionary process itself.

In January 2012, when the Communist Party conference was held, the objective of fighting all forms of discrimination, including on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity, was included for the first time.

Q: What can Cuba contribute to the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean?

A: Last year, Cenesex organised a meeting of experts on sex education from Latin America and the Caribbean with the aim of sharing experiences and forging alliances to help push these issues forward in the region, and we approved a declaration.

We also want to exchange materials and information. We keep a close eye on new legislation in the region, so that we can also incorporate elements that can be useful for us.

Q: Very important steps towards equal marriage have been taken in Latin America. What’s the situation in Cuba?

A: As a Latin American, I feel very proud that Argentina, Uruguay and the Federal District of Mexico City have legalised the right (to same-sex marriage). I think it’s fascinating. What I am constantly advocating is for this to also happen in other countries, including Cuba.

The thing is that in Cuba, marriage is not considered very important, since most couples just live together, and they enjoy the same rights as married couples.

So the LGBT movement doesn’t put an emphasis on this; they are more interested in defending their economic rights. But if we’re going to talk about rights, we have to talk about the same opportunities, including marriage.

Q: What role should the media play in sex education?

A: I advocate an ongoing strategy of education, accompanied by constant communication. We are training journalists, communicators and artists all the time.

One example that showed that the media are not prepared to deal with an issue was what happened in 1988, when the first free sex change surgery was performed in Cuba.

The doctors who did the operation presented their experience at a congress. A journalist who was there published it in his newspaper, which triggered a debate. Many people sent letters to the government saying it was appalling.

The Health Ministry, which didn’t have the tools to defend itself, decided to suspend the operations, and we had to wait 20 years.

Today we’re the only country that has a strategy for integral care for transsexuals, with free specialised sex services to carry out the transformations that they need in their bodies to bring them into line with their gender identity.

There is also an overall strategy to modify policies, awareness and laws, so that transsexuals are respected.

Q: What are the expectations for this conference in Montevideo?

A: It’s very important for our region to at least reach agreement on a declaration where (the countries) commit themselves to respect, protect, and comply with sexual and reproductive rights.

We want this conference to take a stance in favour of access to quality information, education and services, so that all young people have universal access to sex education provided within and outside of school.

We cannot accept crumbs when it comes to rights. We cannot expect advanced or progressive policies in health if we don’t mange to establish agreements on issues like these.

Q: And with regard to abortion?

A: My hair stands on end when I see that in our continent only Cuba, Guyana and now Uruguay have laws that respect women’s rights to decide about their bodies in situations involving reproductive health, such as the voluntary interruption of pregnancy.

To me it seems like a witch hunt. I think it is shameful that many women in the region are still forced to decide between prison or death, or that countries that define themselves as democratic talk about democracy without having advanced on issues like these.

Excerpt:

A family inside their home in Cannon Camp in Haiti. Credit: Susan Robens-Brannon/IPS

By Fabíola Ortiz
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jul 18 2013 (IPS)

Several years after the start of the economic crisis in the United States and Europe, which led to a shift in migration patterns, Latin America still lacks a more inclusive view of the phenomenon of people seeking a better life abroad.

This is seen as a critical factor to be discussed at the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, to be held Aug. 12-15 in Montevideo, the Uruguayan capital.

In the two decades since the September 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, demographers have insisted on territorial inequality as one of the key factors in Latin America driving people to leave their homes in search of better quality of life.

The ICPD redirected the emphasis from demographic goals to rights, said Jorge Rodríguez of the Latin American and Caribbean Demographic Centre.

“The focus became more social, and above all, more about rights,” Rodríguez told IPS. “The conference installed the question of rights on the agenda. And in the last 20 years, the importance of international migration for the region changed.”

Since the economic crisis hit Europe in 2008, there have been signs of slowing emigration from this region, and signs that immigrants are returning, Rodríguez said in Rio de Janeiro, at a Jul. 15-17 preparatory meeting for the regional conference.

“Now we are facing an emerging issue: the return of emigrants due to the economic crisis,” he said. “Latin America extended its migration networks. We are always looking at migration to the United States and Europe, but within the region there is a great deal of migration as well.”

This mobility has taken on more specific features in the case of environmental migrants – people forced to leave their home regions due to sudden or long-term changes to their local environment such as natural catastrophes.

“Now the concept is taking on much greater diversity, and it requires special treatment,” Rodríguez said.

Twenty years since Cairo, progress must be made towards respect for migrants, regardless of their legal status, said demographer and economist Duval Fernándes of the Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais in southeast Brazil, who is also a member of the Latin American Population Association.

The situation of immigrants from Haiti, who fled their country after the devastating January 2010 earthquake, is a reflection of the challenges facing Latin America today.

Haiti’s severe environmental crisis was aggravated by the quake, which killed 200,000 people and destroyed tens of thousands of homes, besides public buildings and infrastructure.

To make matters worse, a number of storms may hit the country in the current Atlantic hurricane season (June to November).

Brazil appeared as an alternative destination for Haitian migrants immediately after restrictions were put in place in the neighbouring Dominican Republic – which shares Hispaniola Island with Haiti – and in the United States.

“The children of undocumented Haitians born in the Dominican Republic are not registered at birth, and are left stateless,” Fernandes said. “This prompted people to seek different destinations, and that’s where the possibility of travelling to Brazil emerged.”

Since November 2010, thousands of Haitians without the proper documents have entered Brazil across the northern border. Small cities in the Amazon hinterland were not prepared for the influx of immigrants, who arrived after complex, often harsh, journeys.

“It has become a calamitous situation,” the Brazilian demographer said. “Our countries don’t know how to deal with this problem.”

The legal process in Brazil has been slow-moving, because Haitians were not granted refugee status. An estimated 10,000 have arrived so far.

“They pay ‘coyotes’ (people smugglers) between 2,500 and 4,000 dollars, for the journey,” Fernandes said. “Multiply that by 10,000 people and we’re talking about 30 million dollars or so. This people trafficking racket has to be dismantled. The Haitians are deceived – they believe they’ll earn 2,000 dollars a month in Brazil.”

The solution found by the government was to grant them humanitarian visas. When they cross the border, the Haitians apply for asylum, and in six months the National Refugee Council rejects the request and refers them to the National Immigration Council, which issues the visas.

“The Haitians may be environmental refugees, but there is no official recognition of that condition. The big problem is that when the visas are finally granted, the people are somewhere else, and in some cases they don’t even find out.”

Fernandes proposed humanitarian policies and measures for Haitians and the creation of special mechanisms to regularise their migration status.

A regional agreement is needed to tackle the question of immigration in a more orderly fashion, said another expert interviewed by IPS, Gabriel Bidegain, technical adviser to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in Haiti.

“A new human geography” was built in Haiti, because of the high levels of migration to the Dominican Republic and the United States, and later, Brazil, he said.

“Because of the crisis in the United States and Europe, Brazil became the new mecca: it began to be promoted as the ‘golden route’ and Portuguese started to be taught; it made sense that they would come,” he said.

However, the number of Haitians in Brazil is still a far cry from the size of the Haitian diaspora in the Dominican Republic – around 800,000 – and the United States – some 600,000.

And in Haiti, an estimated 400,000 environmental refugees are still living in camps around Port-au-Prince.

Bidegain called for a regional agreement on migration capable of providing a response to the vulnerability of those who are forced to leave their countries, especially because of environmental catastrophes.