In advance of Wednesday’s news that the United States and Cuba are establishing full relations, The New York Times was publishing Spanish versions of its editorials advocating freer diplomatic relations between the two countries.
The New York Times has written seven Cuba editorials to date, including one that explicitly called on President Barack Obama to end the embargo on Cuba, wrote Ernesto Londoño, who was hired in September by the New York Times to write editorials about foreign affairs.
All of those were translated into Spanish, Londoño said. Many were “published verbatim, or extensively quoted, in Cuba’s official press,” and were republished or covered by other outlets including the BBC, Univision, Venezuela’s Telesur and El Tiempo.
“We decided to publish the Cuba editorials in Spanish because we felt it was important to make them accessible to Cubans and readers elsewhere in Latin America,” Londoño wrote. “We’ve been pleased by how much attention and interest they have sparked on the island and among readers whose primary language is Spanish.”
Londoño wrote that the Times is translating its editorials on “a case-by-case basis when we think doing so gives them significantly broader reach.” This is part of a broader effort to attract more readers globally, he wrote.
Offering Spanish-language versions of stories isn’t new for The Times. Last year, Andrew Beaujon reported the paper had been occasionally publishing in Spanish for special projects or when it aligned with the paper’s editorial priorities.
