Cuban ambassador to take part in university Q&A

Her Excellency Barbara Montalvo Alvarez will be in conversation with Prof James Tooley, the university’s vice-chancellor, at the event organised by the university’sCentre for Cuban Studies and Centre for UN Studies.

Cuba is chairing the powerful G77 member states group this year. The ambassador will be discussing Cuba's foreign policy and role in the world and its position in the UN General Assembly.

Ms Montalvo Alvarez said: “As harshly as Cuba has been attacked, the greater the solidarity Cuba has found. Inevitably, my first reaction has to be one of gratitude, because I always think, ‘How can they understand us, being so different from the way we are and not having such a direct contact with our reality?’

That is due to the work of the people that are driving forward solidarity and promoting solidarity with Cuba everywhere, but particularly in Britain.”

The United States continues a policy of isolation towards Cuba, including a decades-long embargo on trade with Cuba. According to Human Rights Watch thousands of Cubans took to the streets in July 2021 to protest against the Covid-19 response, scarcity of food and medicines and long-standing restrictions on rights.

A month ago a group of Buckingham students visited Cuba on a study tour where they met HE George Hollingbery, the British Ambassador to Havana at his residence.

The undergraduates were from a variety of disciplines and the tour was organised by the university’s Centre for Cuban Studies.

The tour leader, Dr Stephen Wilkinson, senior lecturer in Politics said: "It was a wonderful opportunity to hear first-hand from the ambassador about relations between Britain and the communist government."The event is on Tuesday, October 17 at 6pm at the Radcliffe Centre, Church Street, Buckingham MK18 1EG. Tickets are available online from eventbrite.co.uk