When Díaz-Canel is among the guests at the ceremony, it will be like a stinger piercing the pain of our migrants and political prisoners
14ymedio, Yoani Sánchez, Generation Y, Havana, 27 September 2024 — The incendiary controversy that has been unleashed between Mexico and Spain upon learning that King Felipe VI has not been invited to Claudia Sheinbaum’s inauguration has overshadowed the names of the leaders who have been invited to the October 1st ceremony. In the official list that has been released among the press, the name of Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel stands out, a figure frequently entertained in recent years by outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Raúl Castro’s successor has been a frequent guest at official ceremonies and public events in the neighboring country during this six-year term. In September 2021, a few weeks after the historic popular protests that shook the island on July 11 of that year, López Obrador not only hosted Díaz-Canel for several days but also shared the stage with him during the celebration of Independence Day in Mexico, the famous “Grito de Dolores.”
The rapprochement, which has served as a diplomatic buttress for the Havana regime, has also included economic support through large shipments of oil. In 2023, the Mexican state-owned company Pemex sent crude oil to Cuba worth close to 400 million dollars. López Obrador has also contributed to calming the criticisms from foreign ministries and governments in Latin America after the repression of the demonstrations that, shouting Freedom! and Homeland and Life!, swept through the Cuban streets more than three years ago. The Mexican leader has played an active role in diluting the accusations against Castroism for the more than a thousand political prisoners it holds in its prisons, the suffocation of independent journalism and for forcing so many activists and opponents into exile.
Mexican authorities have not even expressed their concern to the island for the thousands of Cubans forced to cross its territory.
Now, when the presidential replacement knocks on the door of the founder of the Morena party, Sheinbaum’s assumption of power seems to be marked by the same imprint of the elderly leader towards the authoritarianism imposed in Cuba more than six decades ago. The winks between both governments, the complacency in the face of the excesses of the Palace of the Revolution in Havana and the complicit silence in the face of the misdeeds of the Castro regime will continue to be the tone that will mark the relationship between both countries. In this diplomacy of complicity, the Mexican authorities have not even conveyed their concern to the Island’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the thousands of Cubans forced to cross their territory escaping from their country due to the lack of freedoms and the chronic crisis that grips their lives.
Next Tuesday, when Miguel Díaz-Canel appears among the faces of the guests at the official ceremony that will open Claudia Sheinbaum’s term, it will be like a stinger piercing the pain of our migrants, political prisoners and victims of official intolerance. Will the Mexican president ever apologize for this offense? Will she be willing to change the course of a bilateral relationship that only enthrones authoritarianism? Does she think that time will make us forget the names of those who supported the dictator who muzzles us?
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Editor’s note: This article was originally published on DW and is reproduced under license from the author.
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