Santiago de Cuba

Santiago de Cuba, July 27 (RHC)—The secretariat of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has chosen the Eastern Cuban city of Santiago de Cuba as a candidate for its Creative Cities Network in 2021.

The news emerged during the gala on occasion of the city’s 506th anniversary and the 68th anniversary of the revolutionary attack on the Moncada barracks, held Monday at the iconic Heredia Cultural Complex, in strict compliance with health measures in place in times of Covid-19.

At the gala, Yaneidis Hechavarría Batista, president of the municipal assembly of people’s power, read the letter sent by the UNESCO secretariat, in which the UN agency acknowledged the receipt of the documentation submitted by the Cuban eastern city, and also informed that an expert team will review each and every proposal and will announce the results in November.

The campaign to include Santiago de Cuba as a member of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network is supported by local and national authorities and the Mexico-based Latin Music Institute, which has just declared it a Musical Reference City in Ibero-America, in recognition for its sustained contribution over more than three centuries to Cuban and Ibero-American music and culture development.

Santiago de Cuba is the birthplace of countless world-class Cuban cultural figures, among them Miguel Matamoros, Eliades Ochoa, Eduardo ‘Tiburón’ Morales and Septeto Santiaguero. It treasures a rich musical heritage and tradition, which includes son, trova, conga, bolero and comparsa, and boasts a strong, solid network of cultural centers and teaching institutions in the most diverse artistic manifestations.