29/08/2026
🏴🇨🇺 Glasgow and Havana: history, cooperation and twinning
As part of her visit to Glasgow marking the centenary of the birth of Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, the Ambassador of Cuba, Ismara Mercedes Vargas Walter, held a meeting at the City Chambers. Glasgow's Lord Provost, Councillor Jacqueline McLaren, received the Ambassador, in an exchange that touched on the ties between the two twinned cities, as well as the current situation in Cuba.
As part of the celebrations dedicated to the thought and legacy of the Commander-in-Chief, Room 584 of the University of Glasgow's Adam Smith Building hosted the symposium "Glasgow and Havana: Past Connections and Present Research." Researchers and academics examined the historical and academic links between the University of Glasgow and Cuban institutions across the country.
Researchers from the Beniba Centre for Slavery Studies opened the conversation, tracing the role of colonial-era trade and industry that first connected Scotland with the Caribbean. Professor Harriet Thomson and Professor Helen Yaffe, together with colleagues from politics, film and linguistics, continued the exchange with research on Cuban political economy, energy transition and culture amid the blockade imposed by the United States Government.
Ambassador Vargas Walter addressed the academics and highlighted the cooperation links between the University of Glasgow, the University of Havana and the Universidad Central "Marta Abreu" de Las Villas, as well as other collaborative work carried out in provinces such as Matanzas and Holguín. All of this shows the many possibilities for academic and cultural cooperation, which help strengthen the deep bonds of twinning and affection uniting Glasgow and Havana.
She also paid tribute to Professor Helen Yaffe, whose three decades of research on Cuba were recently recognised in Havana, where the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples awarded her the Medal of Friendship.
➡️ 2002: Glasgow and Havana formally twin — 24 unbroken years of ties this year
➡️ 2024: the University of Glasgow and Cuban institutions sign a Memorandum of Understanding
➡️ June 2024: the Rector of Universidad Central "Marta Abreu" de Las Villas visits Glasgow
➡️ February 2026: Fidel Antonio Castro Smirnov, Fidel's grandson, meets researchers at this same university
🎬 Cuba's history and the achievements of the Revolution also reached the Glasgow Film Theatre, where Eirene Houston opened the 11th Havana Glasgow Film Festival with the UK premiere of Fidel Castro: ¡VENCEREMOS!
Eighty-three days after the triumph of the Revolution, on 24 March 1959, the new government's first cultural law created the ICAIC, Cuba's film institute. Fidel understood, before almost anyone, that cinema was not merely entertainment: it was also consciousness.
Restored from Santiago Álvarez's newsreel archive — material UNESCO has declared Memory of the World — the 38-minute film has no outside narrator. It is Fidel's own voice that carries across the screen the Literacy Campaign, universal healthcare and national sovereignty: achievements Cuba continues to defend today against the US blockade.
Roz Foyer, General Secretary of the STUC, joined Professor Yaffe and the Cuban Press Counsellor, Orestes Martínez, on stage for the Q&A that followed the screening.
✊ A farewell call, an afternoon of honest history, an evening of restored film.
Glasgow and Havana are still talking. 🇨🇺
