HAVANA, Cuba. – Only hours passed between the surprising departure for Miami of the sports narrator Sergio Ortega ―son of Manolo Ortega, known as “Fidel’s announcer”―, and the escape of the young journalist Elizabeth Borrego Rodríguez from the emblematic Prensa Latina (PL) correspondent in New York to an unspecified place in the United States.
“I had only been in the PL correspondent at the United Nations headquarters for just over a year. And he called the Havana Central to say that he was not turning,” he confirmed to CubaNet an employee of the Cuban news agency, located in El Vedado.
According to the site The Watcher of Cuba, who initially broke the news, Borrego, who had previously been a correspondent in other countries, took by surprise the management of the agency, which had not suffered the loss of a journalist in the square since the “escape” of Néstor Marín, formerly a correspondent in London.
While they are looking for a replacement for the 31-year-old reporter from Sancti Spiritus, PL maintains active the Washington correspondent with Daisy Francis Texidor, of “very discreet professionalism as she demonstrated in Mexico, but a long-time collaborator of Cuban intelligence,” recalled the source in Havana. . “She was very linked to the environment of The Five“He added in reference to the case of the five Cuban spies from the Wasp Network returned to Cuba by Barack Obama.
In recent times, Prensa Latina has lost almost fifty journalists, many of whom went to the United States or other countries in the world, in search of better living conditions, according to The Watcher of Cuba.
The list includes everything from managers to editors, while most of the offices that the state agency still maintains abroad are going through complicated financial situations, often unable to pay rent and salaries.
Throughout its history, the Cuban regime has also used PL offices as an important source of intelligence collection, according to US analysts on Castro’s propaganda apparatus.
Currently, PL has 36 branches in major cities around the world.
Until now, numerous young and veteran journalists from the agency have decided to distance themselves from the Cuban Government. The list includes experienced professionals such as Miguel Lozano, a former senior PL official and correspondent in Madrid before arriving in Miami.
Elizabeth Borrego was the daughter of journalist Juan Antonio Borrego Díaz, who died from complications associated with COVID-19 in 2021, who was director of the official newspaper of Sancti Spíritus for more than 20 years. Escambrayfor almost 30 years the newspaper’s correspondent Granma in that province. Likewise, he was a collaborator of Cubadebate and deputy to the National Assembly of People’s Power.
