Please send this text to: christian.leffler@eeas.europa.eu and add your signature to mine if you wish. Thank you!
Friday 9 January 2015
Your Excellency Mr. Christian Leffler, Managing Director for the Americas of the European External Action Service
christian.leffler@eeas.europa.eu
After the meetings held in Havana (29-30 April 2014) and Brussels (27-28 August 2014), Raul Castro’s government unilaterally suspended the third round of negotiations for Agreement on Political Dialogue and Cooperation between the European Union and Cuba that were to take place on 8-9 January 2015, in Cuba.
The previous rounds were described by you as “fruitful and construction,” where both parties worked to “advance the confidence, respect and mutual understanding.” Just when the theme of human, political and institutional rights was to be addressed, the Havana government postponed the dialog, without taking the Cuban people into consideration in this disappointing decision.
By way of this letter we would like to let you know that Cuban civil society is more than ready to continue these discussions, now that the ministers and armed forces of the Cuban government have not taken continued responsibility, after the abrupt death of Fidel Castro and the restoration of diplomatic relations with the United States.
As Cubans committed to democracy and the development of our country, we formally invite you, on whatever date and at whatever location most convenient for the European Union’s negotiators, to follow up on the agenda of including my country in the free world, which to be legitimate from the beginning cannot exclude the voices and will of Cuban citizens.
Yours faithfully,
Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo
orlandoluispardolazo@gmail.com
