Monday, January 29, 2024

Egypt Patches Up and Sends Off Bulker After Houthi Missile Strike

bulker patched up after missile strike — Patched in the area of the number two crane, Zografia departed Egypt (Suez Canal Authority)

Egyptian authorities are reporting that they completed repairs to the Malta-registered bulker Zografia in record time. The vessel, which was hit by a Houthi missile on January 16, finished repairs and departed Egypt over the weekend.

The repairs to the bulker were completed at the Suez Shipyard Company and showed the extent of the damage from a single anti-ship missile strike. The hit on the Zografia appeared to come from above hitting the ship near the No. 2 cargo hold and leaving an exit wound below the waterline in the vessel’s boot topping. The bulker was empty at the time of the attack or it might well have left the ship open to the water.

The shipyard reports that it replaced hull plating and some internal steel structure in the cargo hold. In addition, they carried out repairs to piping, including the hydraulic control pipes, in what they called record time. The vessel arrived at the shipyard on January 22 with a large hole visible in the hull and departed on January 27 with the yard saying the work was completed in four days. In addition, ClassNK inspected the ship and the repairs, approving all the maintenance work carried out by the shipyard. The yard reports it worked around the clock to complete the repairs.

Inbound to the shipyard last week with the visible hole from the missile (SCA)

The master of the vessel, Captain Borys Basenko, is quoted in a statement by the Suez Canal Authority. He thanks the yard for its rapid response and understanding of the emergency situation.

Lieutenant General Rabie, Chairman of the Suez Canal Authority, affirmed in the same statement the authority’s constant readiness to cooperate with its customers, including shipping lines and agencies. He says they are ready to “reduce the impact of the current conditions in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab, by providing all necessary navigational services and repair and maintenance services that transiting ships may need in the event of breakdowns or emergency situations.”

This comes as reports are that the Suez Canal has experienced a nearly 50 percent decline in transits since the onset of the Houthi attacks.

The vessel seen departing Egypt was riding high when the missile struck (SCA)

The bulker is shown to be owned and managed from Greece, where she is now heading. Online databases however reflect that she had been in Israel in May 2023, possibly accounting for why she was targeted by the Houthi. The 58,894 dwt bulker was built in China in 2010 and appears to have always been Greek-owned. She is 623 feet (190 meters) in length.

After arriving in Piraeus on Wednesday, January 31, some databases are showing that the vessel reports it will be traveling back through the Suez Canal. It is unclear if the information is accurate but it says she would be heading to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia where she is due in March. After last week’s close call, it is unclear if they would attempt another Southern Red Sea passage.

Video: Giant Bulker Hits Bridge Near Buenos Aires

A large bulker has struck a support pillar for a key road bridge connecting Buenos Aires with Argentina's northern Entre Rios province, shutting down the Parana River waterway.

AIS data provided by Pole Star suggests that En May allided with the southwestern pylon (on the Zarate side of the river) at about 2100 hours on Sunday night. She was making about 10 knots as she lined up to pass under the bridge.

Chart courtesy Pole Star (Note: AIS position does not represent position of the bow)

Bystander videos show that the bulker suffered extensive damage on the port side, with a gaping hole extending above and below the waterline on the port bow.

The bridge pylons are protected by defensive buttresses on the upstream side. En May approached from the downstream side, where the bridge has no defenses.

The cause of the allision is still under investigation, but local maritime media outlet Paraguay Fluvial has reported it as a rudder failure. The ship is said to be stable and flooding is limited to a single hold forward.

Maritime traffic through the waterway has been shut down for safety. Vehicles are still allowed to pass over the bridge deck, but traffic is restricted for trucks over 50 tonnes in total weight. The speed over the bridge has been limited to about 40 miles per hour.

As of Monday afternoon, En May still held position next to the bridge pylons, according to AIS.

En May is an 85,000 dwt bulker built in 2017 and operated by a firm in New York.

Energy Consultancy Sees Profound Uncertainty Ahead for Offshore Wind

Westwood's high and low bookend scenarios for investment by 2030 are $800 billion apart

London-based energy consultancy Westwood believes that up to 40 percent of the pre-FID development pipeline for global offshore wind is at risk of being suspended. It is the latest sign of fallout from inflation and changing market conditions.

According to Westwood's analysts, non-specialist new entrants like TotalEnergies and BP have the highest risk of dropping out because they have large development pipelines but little existing operational capacity. Dedicated renewables companies, like Orsted and RWE, have longer track records in offshore wind and are less likely to jump ship on their portfolios, Westwood assessed. (Orsted recently took a $4 billion writedown and terminated its Ocean Wind megaproject off New Jersey.)

"Growing diversity of developers in the marketplace, combined with evolving development and commercialization approaches has created a complex landscape. This is compounded further by the diversification of the investor landscape, with oil and gas majors, public investment funds, and even fashion houses entering the sector," said Westwood senior analyst Bahzad Ayoub. "Our current projections reveal a pipeline that faces sizeable risks before reaching FID, with only 9% of capacity ‘Probable’ with the remaining 51% ‘Possible’ and 40% ‘Risked.'"

Though risk has been highly visible in the U.S. market, with multiple offtake contract suspension announcements, Westwood believes that the number of projects in the pipeline that are threatened is actually relatively small. The U.S. industry has been delayed by rising supply chain costs and interest rates, but multiple analysts expect that it will bounce back and that many offtake agreements will simply be rebid at higher prices.

Westwood sees little threat to projects in China, where a commitment to national offshore wind policy is motivating more investment. The consultancy also cites China's isolation from the supply chain cost pressures found elsewhere in the world, and the continued subsidy support from provincial governments on the coast.

The report sees elevated risk for Taiwan, which has a large number of unawarded leases and stringent rules for local content. The requirement to procure materials and make parts locally raises cost, disincentivizing investment. These rules have been revised in the latest lease round and may improve the outlook, but at present a large share of its pipeline can be classified as "risked" in Westwood's view.

Depending on market developments and the degree of real risk to project FID, Westwood has prepared three scenarios for offshore wind capacity by 2030. The top-end forecast is about 500 gigawatts worldwide, while the low-end is less than 200 gigawatts. The vast difference reflects a massive 10-fold spread in capex investment between the most active and least active scenarios.

Royal Navy Helps Study Tourism's Impact on Antarctica

The Royal Navy took scientists on an Antarctic research mission to analyze the increasing impact of tourism and climate change on the frozen continent.

HMS Protector was joined by two University of Portsmouth researchers who collected water and rock samples as the first phase of the ice breaker’s annual polar mission took her from the Falkland Islands south along the western edge of the Antarctic Peninsula.

The work of the university’s Professor of Environmental Pollution, Fay Couceiro, and Dr Clare Boston, will ultimately contribute to understanding the impact on Antarctica as record numbers of tourists continue to visit the delicate region.

Professor Couceiro collected water samples at the Falkland Islands, Anvers Island, Port Lockroy, Detaille Island and Pourquoi Pas Island and at the Rothera Research Station, Britain’s biggest facility in Antarctica.

Those samples will be tested for concentrations of microplastics, metals and nutrients, providing insight into the impact humans may be having on Antarctica.

Dr Boston, meanwhile, is examining the glacial advances during the last 5,000 years by taking rock samples from Pourquoi Pas Island and, with help from Protector’s hydrographers, collected data in Marguerite Bay to look at landforms created by the Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet around 20,000 years ago.

She said: “I’ve had an amazing experience joining HMS Protector, seeing the Antarctic wildlife and collecting data. The crew have worked hard to get me ashore and help me find some rocks.”

On her voyage south, Protector recorded more than 1,000 square miles – an area the size of Dorset – of seabed data in areas that were either uncharted or poorly charted.

This work will increase the safety of seafarers sailing through this region at a time when maritime traffic is significantly increasing – between 2011 and 2020 the number of voyages to Antarctica almost doubled from 234 to 408. The data collected will all be given to the UK Hydrographic Office for inclusion in charts and navigation publications.

The ship also delivered 1.5 tonnes of timber, steel and conservation supplies to Port Lockroy to help the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust (UKAHT) members complete structural works on the roof of the historic building there, protecting it from the elements for years to come.

“I was really looking forward to going ashore for my first time in Antarctica and seeing some of the wildlife,” said Writer Emma Whittingham. “Whilst walking around Port Lockroy, I noticed some penguins with eggs and was delighted when one of them began to hatch right in front of me. What an experience.”

It wasn’t all work and no play in Port Lockroy as the ship’s company became the first from a Royal Navy vessel to paddleboard in Antarctica's waters.

Sailors explored the stunning natural icy waters of the harbour, the shoreline of which is home to a living museum, shop and the most southerly operational Post Office in the world. Curious penguins investigated the paddle boarders, swimming right up to the group to say hello.

Onward Protector went to Detaille Island, where the UKAHT members would stay for several weeks to carry out conversation work on Base W, a former research station of the British Antarctic Survey that was quickly vacated in 1959 after unstable ice around the island cut scientists off from their supply ships.

Three tonnes of stores and supplies were ferried ashore by Protector’s Zodiac boats over 48 hours in arduous conditions. Protector will return to Detaille Island in the second phase of her deployment, before returning the UKAHT team back to the Falkland Islands.

“It was a huge privilege to have the opportunity to collaborate with members of the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust and support their mission in delivering essential building materials and supplies for the conservation of historic buildings around the Antarctic Peninsula. An experience I will never forget,” said Lieutenant Commander Lindsey Gascoigne, Protector’s Logistics Officer.

“The team in Protector have willingly worked extremely hard, often in extreme environmental conditions in terms of freezing temperatures, near gale force winds and of course ice,” said Commander Mark Vartan, Protector’s Executive Officer. “All have put in many long days whether that be feeding hungry mouths, avoiding ice bergs, launching and driving boats or keeping the machinery running without fail, to achieve the mission."

OOPS
Israel-Hamas war: US failed to stop drone after mistaking it for its own

WW3.0

Harriet Barber

THE TELEGRAPH
Mon, 29 January 2024

The US failed to prevent a deadly attack on American troops in Jordan because it was unable to identify an incoming enemy drone, officials said.

The UAV used in Sunday’s attack by Iran-backed militants approached the Tower 22 outpost at the same time a US drone was also returning to base, the US officials told the Wall Street Journal.

Three American troops were killed and dozens of others wounded in the assault.

The Iran-backed Islamic Resistance in Iraq umbrella group claimed responsibility for the attack.

A US defence official told the Wall Street Journal Washington was yet to find evidence that Iran directed the strike. Tehran has publicly denied doing so.

Houthi Rebels Claim to Have Attacked U.S. Navy Sea Base USS Pulle

The U.S. military has denied claims of a Houthi missile attack on the sea base USS Lewis B. Puller, a special-ops platform currently operating off Yemen.

"In vindication to the oppressed people of Palestine, and within the response to the American-British aggression against our country . . . [Houthi forces] have launched a suitable naval missile towards the US Naval 'Lwis B Puller' vessel [sic] in the gulf of Aden," said Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree in a social media statement Monday. "The burning of Israeli, American and British ships will continue until the blockade on Gaza ends."

A U.S. official denied that the Puller had been attacked by Houthi missiles and said that there had been no reported attempt.

Saree noted that the Puller has been involved in supporting U.S. military operations against Houthi interests. The vessel was the platform used to launch the ill-fated boarding of a dhow off Somalia on January 11. This action resulted in the seizure of Iranian-made missile components, according to defense officials, but it cost two U.S. Navy SEALs their lives.

Over the past three months, Yemen's Houthi rebels have repeatedly attacked merchant ships and naval vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. Just last Friday, the group targeted and hit the LR2 tanker Marlin Luanda, which was under charter to Trafigura and carrying a cargo of Russian naphtha. One cargo tank was ruptured in the strike, and the resulting fire took a day to put out.

In November, the group seized a car carrier, the Galaxy Leader, as it transited the Red Sea. The vessel remains anchored under guard near Hodeidah. Negotiations over the release of the ship's crew are under way.

War Of The Worlds composer Jeff Wayne says show still ‘occupies so much time’

Charlotte McLaughlin, PA Senior Entertainment Reporter
Mon, 29 January 2024

The composer of the musical version of The War Of The Worlds has said the adaption of the story “occupies so much” of his time, he is unable to make more music for other works by HG Wells.

Jeff Wayne’s The War Of The Worlds will be touring across arenas in the UK and Ireland next year as the musical experience, which began life as an album musical in 1978, continues to draw large audiences.

The series of shows has been getting bigger over the years with six production trucks in 2006 and after 19 years of touring in 2025, will be up to 12 trucks.

The series of shows has been getting bigger over the years (Jeff Wayne/PA)

Wayne, 80, told the PA news agency: “After The War Of The Worlds came out and was really exploding up the charts and getting a lot of attention, I received from I think two different publishers who controlled all of HG Wells’s stories, first editions, and (them) saying ‘Fancy doing this one of HGs, another musical work?’

“And some are brilliant and probably adaptable in the same way I adapted The War Of the Worlds, but it’s taken over so much of my life, The War Of The Worlds, and it’s not that I haven’t done a lot of other things.

“But it was a span of about three years’ commitment, when I did The War Of The Worlds, and I don’t think I’d have three years at this point because The War Of The Worlds occupies so much of our time and my time certainly over the next few years, as it has been since the original double album came out, but you never know and because there are a couple of great stories that he wrote.”

New York-born Wayne had success writing commercial music for television shows and adverts before releasing the album, with narration by Welsh actor Richard Burton and also featuring Thin Lizzy star Phil Lynott.

Wells, one of the pioneers in 19th century science fiction, also released The Time Machine, The Invisible Man and The Island Of Dr Moreau.

A Martian fighting machine on stage (Simon Lowery/PA)

When asked about what he thought of other The War Of The Worlds adaptions that were not set in 19th century England, Wayne said most had been “big blockbusters, or TV series, and most have been set in contemporary America”.

He added: “There was a TV series a couple of years ago on the BBC that was set in Victorian times, but with no disrespect whatsoever, it was criticised a lot because it wasn’t very accurate to the story and I just know that I made a promise to Frank Wells to stay true to his dad and I believe we’ve done that, and I’ll leave it there.

“There’s a lot of effort that goes into anybody’s productions and if it’s good, it’s good.”

A 2019 BBC adaption saw Pete Versus Life star Rafe Spall and Poldark actress Eleanor Tomlinson in leading roles, while a 2005 film featured Tom Cruise.

Wayne said his musical version of The War Of The Worlds ‘occupies so much’ of his time, he is unable to make more music for the works of HG Wells (Simon Lowery/PA)

The musical conducted by Wayne, now features Northern Irish actor Liam Neeson in 3D holography as The Journalist, who recounts his story of survival from the Martian invasion of 1898.

Wayne said that the “very loyal fans from the beginning” had passed seeing the production onto their families so they always had new people coming and the next tour would see “a major step forward in excitement and emotion”.

He also said the reasons for the continued relevancy had been that the themes of the work were beyond the alien invasion.

“All of HG Wells, his rights have been in the public domain for about eight years now,” Wayne also said.

“My rights, everything I created in music and artwork, everything about it, that’s very much in copyright and will remain so until 70 years until after I snuff it.

“So anybody who wants to do a musical version can, they certainly can, they just need to be careful not to touch on our domain, sight and sound. Otherwise, I’ll be on them.”

For more see thewaroftheworlds.com

Barbara Pickering Takes the Helm at Chevron Shipping

Chevron Shipping has tapped a longtime insider to steer the division after the impending retirement of Mark Ross, who has served as president since 2015 and has been in the company for 33 years.

The global marine subsidiary of Chevron Corp. announced that Barbara Pickering will assume the role of President on May 1. She is currently the Vice President of Operations, having risen through the ranks since joining the company over three decades ago as a ship charterer in London.

“I take immense pride in what we have accomplished in transforming Chevron Shipping Company into a world-class marine organization. Words cannot properly express how I feel about our organization and the deep appreciation I have for the people who run it – onboard our ships, at our terminals, and ashore. I have known Barbara for 30 years and I am thrilled she will now lead our company,” said Ross.

Holder of a bachelor’s degree in Maritime Studies from Liverpool University in the United Kingdom, Barbara has held positions of increasing responsibility with Chevron in the UK, Australia and the U.S since joining the company in 1991. She also currently serves as a Vice Chairman of the Oil Companies International Marine Forum.

It is a baptism by fire for Pickering, who will be taking over the leadership of Chevron Shipping at a crucial time. The industry is grappling with pressure to decarbonize and is facing a bigger threat from Iran-allied Houthi rebel attacks in the Red Sea.

While Chevron has continued transporting crude through the volatile Red Sea region, working in close collaboration with U.S and other naval forces, the company has admitted the crisis poses serious risks to global oil flows and prices. These could have impacts on its operations of transporting crude oil, liquefied natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, refined petroleum products and chemicals.

Though Chevron does not have significant control over the worsening Red Sea crisis, the company - which operates a fleet of 30 ships and charters third-party ships - is under pressure to cut its emissions. Chevron is already investing in a ship modification project designed to reduce the carbon intensity of its LNG fleet operations. The project, which is expected to be completed by mid-2025, seeks to install new technologies aboard Chevron vessels to support their energy transition goals.

Women to be part of ‘jarl squad’ for first time at annual Shetland fire festival

Ryan McDougall, PA Scotland
Mon, 29 January 2024

An annual fire festival in Shetland is to have women involved in its “jarl squad” for the first time.

Lerwick Up Helly Aa is held on the last Tuesday of January, and this year’s event will see men and women leading the torchlight procession.

It was previously only men who were allowed to lead the procession, but Up Helly Aa officials changed the rule in 2022.

Jenna Moar will be one of the first female participants in this year’s jarl squad.

The 16-year-old is the daughter of Richard Moar, the chief jarl.

The organisation is run by a voluntary committee of 17 members, each selected by the guizers – or costumed participants – with one new member elected each year.

The members don Viking-style clothing as more than 1,000 torches are lit on the day

Women working in music industry face 'endemic' misogyny and discrimination, MPs say

Sky News
Updated Mon, 29 January 2024

Musicians have to sit beside sexual abusers at award ceremonies, MPs have said as they warned that misogyny and discrimination is "endemic" in the industry.

The Women and Equalities Committee has held an inquiry into the sector, where it found sexual harassment and abuse was common.

But it said many women did not report the incidents as they worried about whether they would be believed - or if their careers would be over as a result.

The cross-party group has recommended a number of measures to be put in place, including changing the Equalities Act to offer more protections to freelance workers and increased investment to get more women into the sector.

"People in the industry who attend award shows and parties currently do so sitting alongside sexual abusers who remain protected by the system and by colleagues," the report said.

It added: "The music industry has always prided itself on being a vehicle for social change; when it comes to discrimination, and the harassment and sexual abuse of women, it has a lot of work to do."

Committee chair, Conservative MP Caroline Nokes, called for a "shift in the behaviour of men" in the industry to ensure the "transformative change" needed.

The committee gathered evidence from a range of people within the sector, from industry bodies and festival organisers, through to artists.

They concluded women were underrepresented in key roles across the industry - shown most clearly in the number of female artists signed by record labels or on festival line ups.

And while the numbers were "improving", in certain areas progress is "slow and shackled by discrimination, misogyny and sexual abuse in an industry that is still routinely described as a 'boys' club'".

They also said for women trying to get into the industry, they faced "unjustifiable limitations in opportunity, a lack of support, gender discrimination and sexual harassment as well as the 'persistent issue of equal pay' in a sector dominated by self-employment" - which was even worse for women from other minorities.

And while the MPs said abuse and discrimination was not unique in music, it was "amplified" by the high number of freelance workers, the informal nature of many workplaces, and "late-night working, often in places where alcohol and drugs are available, can result in women working in environments that are unsafe".

The committee has called on the government to change the Equality Act to give the same support against discrimination to freelance workers, and impose a duty on employers to protect workers from sexual harassment by third parties.

The also want non-disclosure agreements to be banned when it comes to cases of sexual abuse, harassment or misconduct.

The MPs called on ministers to increase investment in talent from a range of backgrounds, including through official schemes, and create pathways for women in male-dominated careers, such as sound engineering and production.

And they said record labels should regularly publish statistics about the diversity on their books.

Ms Nokes said: "Women's creative and career potential should not have limits placed upon it by 'endemic' misogyny which has persisted for far too long within the music industry.

"Our report rightly focuses on improving protections and reporting mechanisms, and on necessary structural and legislative reforms.

"However, a shift in the behaviour of men - and it is almost always men - at the heart of the music industry is the transformative change needed for talented women to quite literally have their voices heard and be both recognised and rewarded on equal terms."

Fixing food could produce trillions in annual benefits: report

AFP
Mon, 29 January 2024

Economists and scientists have warned of massive hidden costs from global food systems (Anatolii Stepanov)

The ways food is produced and consumed across the world is racking up hidden costs in health impacts and environmental damage amounting to some 12 percent of world GDP a year, according to a new report Monday.

In the research, a consortium of scientists and economists found that transforming food systems across the world could prevent 174 million premature deaths, help the world meet its climate goals, and provide economic benefits of $5 trillion to $10 trillion.

While intensive food production has helped to feed a global population that has doubled since the 1970s, the report found that this has come with a growing burden on people and the planet.

Poor diets lead to obesity or undernutrition and associated chronic illness, while polluting farming practices drive global warming and biodiversity loss, threatening potentially catastrophic climate impacts that would whiplash back on the world's ability to produce food.

"We have an amazing food system," said Vera Songwe, an economist with the Africa Growth Initiative at the Brookings Institution, and part of the Food System Economics Commission (FSEC), which produced the report.

"But it has done that with a lot of cost to the environment, to people's health, and to the future and to our economics," she said.

Researchers estimated total underappreciated costs from food systems of up to $15 trillion a year. That includes around $11 trillion each year from the loss in productivity caused by food-linked illnesses like diabetes, hypertension and cancer.

Environmental costs are estimated at $3 trillion from current agricultural land use and food production methods, which scientists say account for a third of planet-heating greenhouse gas emissions.

- 'Dramatic' costs -

The authors also compared computer modelling of the consequences by 2050 of continuing current trends and of a hypothetical food system transformation.

They said that on the current pathway, food systems alone will push global warming above the Paris Deal's more ambitious threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius since preindustrial times.

Heating could reach a catastrophic 2.7C by 2100, they said, while food production would be increasingly battered by climate change.

Obesity would also increase globally by 70 percent, they said, while around 640 million people would still be underweight.

Imagining a better system, the report's authors said more effective policies could improve diets, drastically reducing diet-related deaths due to chronic diseases, while transforming food systems into a source of carbon storage by 2040, helping the world stay within its climate goals.

But the report, which comes as farmers across parts of Europe stage protests over a variety of grievances including incomes and environmental regulations, acknowledged that change would be challenging.

The authors urged policymakers to compensate those left behind by a shift to a more sustainable system, noting that promoting healthier diets would have different priorities and focus in different parts of the world.

The authors policymakers to work to compensate those left behind by changes.

The report comes after the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization released research in November estimating that the hidden costs of food systems across the world were around $10 trillion a year, or nearly 10 percent of GDP.

Johan Rockstrom, of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the FSEC, said the fact that both groups had come up with a "very dramatic number", exceeding $10 trillion, was reason to have confidence in the findings.

But he warned that the future projections were "conservative" because even if the world manages to transition away from fossil fuels, the food system can push the world above 1.5C on its own.

"(That) likely means irreversible changes to major life support systems on Earth, which means that the price tag correlated to the food system would accelerate very rapidly for hidden costs that are not included in these analyses," he said.

klm/js

END THE EMBARGO

'There was nothing': Ailing economy fueling record exodus of Cubans

NO DIFFERENT THAN OTHER CARCOM COUNTRIES

Leticia PINEDA
Mon, 29 January 2024

Cubans queue to enter the Spanish embassy in Havana on January 9, 2024 (Yamil LAGE)

Even as her home country of Cuba crumbled around her, Elsa resisted joining the growing US-bound exodus until she felt she had no options left.

But the 30-year-old finally packed her bags last year, and after a long and dangerous journey made it to Miami in November.

She's among the nearly five percent of the island's population that has fled to the United States in the past two years, the biggest wave of emigration since Fidel Castro's revolution.

"It was very difficult to meet even one's basic needs. There was nothing," Elsa told AFP of her reasons for leaving, asking her last name not be shared.

"The (electricity) blackouts became unbearable and then there was (the price of) food."

The communist island is in the grips of its worst economic crisis in decades, with sky-high inflation and shortages of fuel, medicine and basic foodstuffs -- and US sanctions -- aggravating an already dire situation.

Like thousands before her, Elsa flew to Managua, Nicaragua, and from there made her way 3,000-odd kilometers (about 1,900 miles) to the US border.

On Saturday, the US Customs and Border Protection agency said it had registered more than 153,000 irregular entries from Cuba in 2023.

Another 67,000 entered legally under a humanitarian parole program, introduced a year ago by President Joe Biden's administration in a bid to slow illegal migration.

Together with the 313,506 who left in 2022, this mass movement represents "the largest number of Cuban migrants recorded in two years since the beginning of the post-revolutionary Cuban exodus in 1959," said Jorge Duany, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University.

These 533,000 Cubans represent almost five percent of the island's 2022 population of 11.1 million.

- 'A substantial loss' -

Other historic migration waves included the so-called Mariel boatlift in which about 130,000 left Cuba as refugees in the 1980s, and the 35,000-odd who fled in a "raft exodus" in 1994.

"Many young people with high educational and occupational levels" left in the last two years, creating "a substantial loss of human resources" for Cuba, said Duany.

The country already has one of the oldest populations in the region.

The latest mass exit started in November 2021, when Cuban ally Nicaragua lifted its visa requirement for Cubans.

Last year, there was a surge in chartered flights to the Central American country, a waypoint for those making their way to the United States -- an increase so noticeable that Washington sanctioned the carriers involved.

- 'There's everything here' -

Not all Cuban migrants head for the United States, however. Latin American countries and Europe are also popular destinations, though there is no official global figure.

Some 36,574 paperless Cuban migrants sought refuge in Mexico in 2022 and 2023, while at least 22,000 entered Uruguay and hundreds arrived in Chile in the same period, according to official figures from these three countries.

Radibel Pena, a 28-year-old carpenter, flew last April from Havana to Georgetown, Guyana, which does not require a visa from Cubans.

He then crossed the jungles of Brazil and made it to Bolivia, from where he entered Chile illegally on May 1.

"There's everything here. One can work with dignity and live well," he told AFP in Valparaiso, where he lives with his girlfriend and works in construction.

In Europe, Spain is a favorite Cuban destination, especially since the passage in 2022 of a so-called "Grandchildren's Law" that allows Spanish descendants to obtain nationality.

Marco Antonio Napoles Alvarez, a 24-year-old waiter from the Cuban province of Holguin, hopes to make a new life in Madrid with his sister.

"We plan to settle down there to see if we do well," he told AFP as he left the Spanish embassy in Havana with a big smile -- and a Spanish passport in hand.

bur-lp/mlr/fb/nro

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment