HAVANA, Sep 4 (IPS) - After an interruption of over a year, the Criterios theoretical-cultural centre has resumed a series of lectures analysing the impact of the Cuban government's cultural policy on the arts, one of the tangible outcomes of the debate that shook society here in early 2007.

HAVANA, Sep 3 (IPS) - Dissident groups in Cuba are attempting to open up a debate on the problem of racism in the country, in order to promote "full integration" of all the island's citizens, without discrimination on the grounds of ethnicity or skin colour.

PORT OF SPAIN, Sep 2 (IPS) - A court order lifting the threat of execution hanging over 52 convicted killers in Trinidad and Tobago has put the government under renewed pressure from the opposition, death penalty supporters, the public and lawyers to set out clearly its position on the ultimate sentence.

HAVANA, Aug 29 (IPS) - In the new school year, which begins next Monday, Cuba’s educational system will be trying out several changes aimed at overcoming the decline in the quality of teaching, blamed on a shortage of teachers and other problems.

HAVANA, Aug 29 (IPS) - Foreign direct investment in the sugar industry is acceptable to the Cuban government for producing alcohol and other derivatives, but it continues to be a topic that the authorities prefer not to talk about, at least in public, although experts regard it as desirable for the recovery of the industry.

HAVANA, Aug 26 (IPS) - Cuba has had a rude awakening from a three-decade dream as undisputed Olympic games leader in Latin America and the Caribbean, turning in the worst performance since Mexico City in 1968.

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Aug 25 (IPS) - Eight months after congratulating themselves for having become the first region within the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) grouping to conclude negotiations with the European Union on a new trade and economic pact, Caribbean leaders are getting cold feet as the time draws near to affix their signatures to the document.

HAVANA, Aug 21 (IPS) - When leafy vegetables like watercress or cabbage showed up at the local market in the 1970s and 1980s in Alamar, a suburb east of the Cuban capital, locals would say "here’s grass for the Chileans."

HAVANA, Aug 18 (IPS) - Miriam Leiva, one of the founders of the Cuban movement Women in White, announced Monday that she was leaving the group of wives, mothers and sisters of imprisoned dissidents to dedicate herself to "independent journalism."

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Aug 18 (IPS) - You have to hand it to Patrick Manning, Trinidad and Tobago's prime minister, when it comes to persistence.

MONTEVIDEO, Aug 15 (IPS) - Financial costs and lack of information are the main hurdles that public defenders must overcome in order to bring cases before the Inter-American Court on Human Rights, which ended its XXXV extraordinary period of sessions Friday in the Uruguayan capital.

HAVANA, Aug 14 (IPS) - In Cuba, when talk turns to the housing problem, the personal anecdotes that pour out are as large in number as the country's housing deficit, accumulated over years during which building efforts have not kept up with the need, while the existing houses and buildings continue to crumble.

HAVANA, Aug 12 (IPS) - Prisoners in Cuba who were facing the death penalty but have had their sentences commuted to life imprisonment or 30 years in jail are still being treated like death row inmates, a dissident organisation complained on Tuesday.

HAVANA, Aug 7 (IPS) - Cuba’s prestige among the global sports élite for the past three decades testifies to the effectiveness of a mass, free physical education system which the government has supported through the ups and downs of the national economy.

HAVANA, Jul 30 (IPS) - Urban farming has taken off in Cuba over the last two decades, based on low-cost agro-ecological practices and a stable labour force, and could serve as a model for the rest of the agriculture sector in this period of reforms.