The official note released at the end of last week by the Republic of Cuba's Attorney General's Office, reporting on the criminal investigation against former Vice Prime Minister and former Minister of Economy and Planning Alejandro Gil, has generated a quite polarized debate here, which has even been controversial among those who sincerely defend the Cuban Revolution. From abroad, many Cuban-born critics of the current national political system are presenting Gil as a scapegoat with which the government intends to wash away its guilt for the humongous crisis shaking the Island, although without exonerating the accused of fierce blame or wrongdoing. In this sense, it is interesting how the demand for an open and transparent trial is shared by some of those critics—always with suspicion—but also by people who do not oppose the system, even if they have different perspectives and criticisms about its configuration and development. I will focus on this latter segment of the political spectrum, because it seems more valuable for obtaining productive readings.
A key case that serves me for this analysis is that of René González, a former Cuban intelligence agent who served sentence in the United States, and who now heads the Cuba Aviation Club—a civil society organization. González is among those who have defended the need for "a public, open, and transparent trial" because "[we] are not in a position to ask people to believe on faith alone." But many orthodox defenders of the Cuban revolutionary process have interpreted this as a not-so-subtle way of questioning the supposed purity of the institutions, particularly the Ministry of Interior and the Attorney General's Office, and have argued that there is no need for a "public show" around the case, because our authorities always do the right thing and stand for us.
Here there is a clear discussion about the rules of due process, or the rule of law from a more general perspective, which involves defending the presumption of innocence under any circumstances, especially when there is no public evidence yet supporting the accusation. Those who preach an almost blind faith in the political institutions, which can be very sincere, do not understand the current context, marked precisely by an entrenched negative social assessment of the institutions and the leadership, which, to a large extent—and this is also true—has its biases, but it is the actual context. And it is with this unmeasured level of cognitive and political dissonance, and sullen international scrutiny, that the judicial process will be evaluated by the people.
Thus, many people fail to fully understand that, whatever the reasons, if something can succeed from a revolutionary perspective, it is a strategy based on data and evidence, which itself carries a high degree of uncertainty given the current sociopolitical balance. The latter shows that this demand for data and evidence is not imposed on those narratives opposed to the current political regime. So, while the law offers broad discretion to hold this kind of trial involving alleged espionage behind closed doors, the Cuban state must weigh its interest as a specific institution against the public one.
Alejandro Gil, former Cuban Vice Prime Minister and former Minister of Economy (source of the image).
Regional news brief
A wonderful timing or just a matter of well justice being served? 👇 The case of Jeanine Áñez has always been in a gray area. The Supreme Court does not absolve her of responsibilities, but rather, as is customary, it attacks alleged procedural irregularities.
Bolivian top court annuls former interim president sentence and orders her immediate releasehttps://t.co/Tu3OJ6d9lC
— Dave Agar (@dave1agar) November 5, 2025
Disturbing: Mexico President Sheinbaum presses charges after street groping incident 👇
Mexico's Prez Sheinbaum launches WAR on sexual assault epidemic after being groped in Mexico City
— RT (@RT_com) November 5, 2025
'If this happens to the president, what happens to young women?
It’s a matter of defending all Mexican women'
'I filed a complaint because I experienced this before as a student' pic.twitter.com/jLh03xsygN
This is all for today’s report.
