Cuban academics hoping to attend a gathering of Latin America experts in Puerto Rico were denied visas by the US government.
Some 55 philosophers, economists and historians were told last week they would be unable to travel to this month's Latin American Studies Association congress in San Juan. Requests for four others were still pending, academics associated with the congress said.
"These people represent strong scholars who think critically, and who are often experts in their area where there are no others," Sheryl Lutjens, an American political science professor at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona, said on Wednesday.
Academic exchange between Cuba and the US has diminished over the last two years since the administration of US President George W. Bush started tightening long-standing trade and travel regulations against Cuba.
The "Cubans not welcome" message has reached new extremes recently, with the US government provoking outrage after denying Cuba participation in this month's World Baseball Classic -- a decision that was later reversed -- and pressuring a major US-owned hotel in Mexico to kick out 16 Cuban officials attending a meeting with US oil executives last month.
Fewer US scholars are traveling to Cuba, wary of complicated US rules that can lead to hefty fines and punishment if broken.
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number
Australian police yesterday said a 40-year-old itinerant with mental illness was behind a Sydney shopping center stabbing rampage that killed six people, including a new mum whose nine-month-old baby is still in hospital with serious wounds. New South Wales Police Assistant Commissioner Anthony Cooke said the assailant — who was shot and killed by a senior police officer at the scene on Saturday — was Queensland man Joel Cauchi. Five women and one male security guard were killed in the attack as Cauchi roved through a packed shopping center in the city’s Bondi Junction neighborhood with a large knife. Twelve more people