14ymedio, 24 March 2016 — The freelance reporter Yuri Valle Roca was released Thursday after being detained for five days in a police station. The activist was arrested last Sunday and Freedom House, an organization in support of human rights, today asked the government of Cuba for his immediate release.
Police authorities informed Valle Roca that he was being charged with the crime of “attack,” but the journalist complained that it was he who was beaten in the face and other body areas during the arrest. In the police station of Santiago de las Vegas, where he was held, he remained in isolation, without contact with other detainees, he says.
Last Sunday, hours before arrival to the island by United States President Barack Obama, some 60 dissidents were arrested in Havana after the traditional weekly march of the Ladies in White. Most were released hours later, but Valle Roca remained missing until Wednesday when he was about to contact his family by phone.
Freedom House said in its statement Thursday that “despite President (Raul) Castro saying that it respects human rights, the Cuban government continues its shameless repression of freedom of expression, press freedom and the right to peaceful protest.”
The delivery of the more than 10,000 signatures for the Varela Project, on Thursday, to Cuba’s National Assembly of People’s Power. (Facebook)
14ymedio, 24 March 2016 – On Thursday morning several activists delivered 10,000 signatures on the Varela Project, which are in addition to the 25,404 signatures previously provided to this legislative body. Participating in the delivery were Rosa Maria Rodriguez from the Christian Liberation Movement (MCL), Saily Navarro and Rosa Maria Paya, members of the Cuba Decides campaign, along with former political prisoner of the 2003 Black Spring, Felix Navarro.
The dissidents transported the signatures to the headquarters of the National Assembly on 42nd Street in Havana’s Playa district, in a box on which was written “Proyecto Varela” with the logo of Cubadecide. This afternoon Rosa Maria Paya will hold a press conference in the municipality of Cerro, about the current status of the initiative, which was promoted by her father Oswaldo Paya, leader of the MCL.
The activists commented that initially the National Assembly officials seemed “confused” at the delivery of the signatures. However, after making several call, they accepted the signatures in the Assembly’s Department of Correspondence.
The Varela Project seeks to promote political reforms on the Island aimed at “greater individual freedoms,” according the press release from its organizers. The text reaffirms the “constitutional right” of Cubans to push for a change to “democratic pluralism.” To achieve this, “more than 35,000 Cubans, with residence in the country, signed their names,” along with their identity card numbers “as a way of supporting the Varela Project.”
After delivery the of the signatures, Rosa María Payá, president of the Latin American Network of Youth for Democracy, said that “we are advocating for them to respond to thousands of signatories of the Varela Project and to the rest of the Cuban people, with the holding of a binding plebiscite for citizens to decide their future in freedom.”
The National Assembly of People’s Power of Cuba’s Committee on Constitutional and Legal Affairs did not respond to more than 25,000 signatures presented initially by the Varela Project and instead amended the constitution to make socialist character of the Cuban state irreversible.
14ymedio, Mario Penton, Miami, 22 March 2016 — “If it were not for the many who have died trying, it would be funny: Obama is in Cuba and we Cubans are leaving it.” In his sweaty mestizo face you can see small wrinkles, no doubt accentuated by the days spent in the journey along the dangerous route from Ecuador to Colombia. “I had to, I was desperate, no papers, no money, I had no other option to not go back to Cuba or die,” says the migrant.
For several weeks thousands of Cubans have been flocking to the Panamanian border, both in the east (Puerto Obaldia) and west (Paso Canoas), hoping Costa Rica and Nicaragua will allow the migratory flow to pass and offer them humanitarian safe conduct passes. Costa Rica closed its borders to Cuban migrants after negotiating with Mexico the departure of thousands who were stranded late last year when Nicaragua closed its borders. Something similar is happening now in Panama, only the solution is far off.
Orislandy Diaz Marrero, a young Cuban of 26 who recently managed to cross the jungle through the Darien Gap, in the central area of the country, tells 14ymedio his opinion about the visit of the president of the United States to the island. “I don’t know what Obama’s intentions are, but I am sure that nothing good is going to come of it. Those people (the Cuban government) have nothing good in mind.” He explains that his decision to abandon the country is the same as “everyone else’s.” Orislandy pauses for a long moment, sighs and adds, “It’s because they don’t let us breathe there.”
For Adrian Cedeño, a communications specialist who decided to emigrate to Ecuador, Obama’s visit “marks a before and after,” but he questions, beyond diplomacy and protocol, what the real benefits are to ordinary Cubans. “The Cuban people want to believe that this is a hope,” said Cedeno while pointing out that the issue of emigration on the island goes beyond a purely political matter. “It’s about the dignity they have taken from us. They have left a people, a culture, a country with nothing,” he says and asks that the rulers think “the about common good and not political interests of yesteryear.”
Yordanis Garcia is one of the representatives of the Cuban National Alliance of Ecuador, a civil society group that has recently been formed to defend the rights of migrants from the island in that country. “Actually, I would like to believe that the arrival of Obama in Cuba would be a big change for my Cuba” he says. “His arrival has shocked Cubans on the island as well as those who are not there.” Garcia adds that he feels “proud” that an American president is in Havana because of the powerful message of freedom that gesture sends.
Dozens of Cubans have held vigils, rallies and protests, both in Panama and Ecuador in recent days, asking to be allowed to continue their trip to the United States. On Monday, a group of them sent a letter to President Obama and his wife Michelle asking them to intervene in the current immigration crisis.
A video accompanying the letter was filmed on 19 March, in the middle of a vigil called “Towards Freedom.” The video, just two minutes long, contains the main reasons why they decided to leave Cuba. “We want to make them (the authorities) understand that we are fleeing from Castro’s dictatorship in which for half a century we have never voted, where there are no free elections (…) where we can not speak out as we do here. The only thing we saw for ourselves was fleeing from our country leaving many of our loved ones behind.” The message ends quoting José Martí between shouts of freedom: “When the people flee, the leaders have no purpose.”
In the past fiscal year (between October 2014 and September 2015) more than 43,000 Cubans reached US territory, taking advantage of the so-called Wet foot/Dry Foot law, that allows them to stay legally until, at the end of a year and a day since their arrival, they can submit an application to reside in the United States. Since last October, 2,420 Cubans have been intercepted at sea by the Coast Guard and more than 10,000 have entered through the southern border.
14ymedio (with information from agencies), 23 March 2016 — Three days before their concert in Havana on March 25, The Rolling Stones have released a video greeting Cubans in Spanish.
“Hello Cuba! We are very happy to play for you. We have been to many amazing places, but this concert will be historic for us and hopefully for you too. Thanks for having us in your beautiful country, we hope to see you on March 25 in Sports City of Havana,” says Mick Jagger in the video. The concert will be free.
The show, which will start at 8:30 PM local time, will last more than two hours, and will be closing concert of the Olé Tour of Latin America, produced by the American company AEG Live.
The planned capacity for the concert area is about 200,000 people, for security reasons, but the announcement affirms that, being outside, free and open to everyone, it is hoped that the space outside facility will allow a similar number of fans to enjoy the spectacle of their “Satanic Majesties.”
The US president, Barack Obama, in a public speech Tuesday from the Gran Teatro de La Habana. (Fotograma)
14ymedio, Pedro Campos Havana, 23 March 2016 – Cuban National Television’s (Dis)Information System collected opinions from members of the “official” civil society who went to the Alicia Alonso Gran Teatro to hear, on the final day of his visit, United States President Barack Obama’s speech to the people of Cuba.
The vast majority of those selected to comment highlighted their differences with the United States on topics of politics and human rights. Almost all sought to distance themselves from the words of the visitor although a few recognized his ability to master the stage and as a communicator, and his courage in having decided on rapprochement.
“He didn’t talk to us of the Martí we know.” “Here he said one thing and I’m sure that now in Argentina he is going to say something else,” were some of the expressions heard. continue reading
Some indicated that behind the apparent good intentions of the president was his desire to impose his policies. “He said Cubans were the ones who have to decide our future, but he wants to impose on us his vision of human rights.” One of those interviewed got to the climax, “We can’t get confused, because the enemy is the enemy.”
Even some academic commentators said they felt sorry for the discourse of the extremist bureaucracy, leading some to say that speeches are one thing and actions are something else.
There were few references to the conciliatory and constructive intentions of Obama’s speech. The best offered by the “opinionated” chosen was that we should admit our differences and live with them.
Those interviewed rejected looking forward, “You can’t forget the past like he is trying to do,” said several of them, with a Manichean viewpoint.
It reminded me of the positions assumed by the extremists in Miami who do not want to come to any arrangement, all they want is to “do away with the Castros,” precisely because “you can’t forget the past.” Between these two extremes trapped in the past, Cuba’s present and future is hijacked.
Cuban National Television’s (Dis)Information System did not interview any dissident, any opponent, anyone who had a different thought, while the government only invited to the Gran Teatro the “civil society” that supports their policies.
It was an irrefutable example of the attempt to project the idea that everyone in Cuba, unanimously, has the same position as the extremist bureaucracy that dominates the official media.
If, unfortunately, such is the discourse in the official press, in redress it must be said that such positions do not represent the majority of the population. Several videos and commentaries uploaded to social networks projected this other reality.
Many people with whom I spoke showed a totally different spirit, felt warmly toward the United States president, applauded his speech and felt that he had shown a constructive position that should be honored by the Cuban side.
Many, like the visitor, felt that human rights are universal, that there is no justification for failing to uphold some because others are upheld, that there must be freedom of expression and association and that the leaders should be freely and democratically elected. They liked his words about the future, about the work of entrepreneurs and the importance of the internet to fostering development.
Ordinary people, who were never invited to the president’s official activities, those who cheered at the few opportunities where they could, making a mockery of the wide circle drawn to try to avoid any contact between the people and the visitor, never shouted “Down with Obama!” or “Down with Imperialism” as some groups shout in chorus in other parts of the world where he goes: here the chorus and the words were of respect and friendship.
Not even in the White House could Obama be safer than he is in Cuba. The echoes of this historic visit will not be easily or quickly smothered. The “imperialism” in the figure of a black man, of humble origin, but elegant, with his family, with a wide smile and his friendly and relaxed character, is nothing like that snarling white-bearded face under a striped top hat with long bloody fingernails that is always presented as our neighbor to the north.
The Cuban people outside the chambers of the Cuban National Television’s (Dis)Information System, in no way resemble the cold faces of most of those chosen to be interviewed.
Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro on arrival at the Latin American Stadium. (Fotograma)
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, 23 March 2016 – The last street closings in Havana ended just after Air Force One took off from José Martí Airport for Argentina. The Tuesday on which Barack Obama said goodbye to Cuba some produce markets couldn’t open because the trucks could get past the security barriers with their cargoes of fruits and vegetables. Thousands of people who were mobilized – the official “invitees” – to go to the Latin American Stadium, didn’t finish watching the Cuban national team lose 4 to 1 against a professional team from the United States, because their commitment was to remain in the stands as long as “el yuma-en-jefe” – the American-in-chief – was present.
A deep sigh of relief was shared by police officers, hotel doormen, leaders and Communist Party cadres. The world did not stop, life goes on and “the party continues.” However, Obama’s words in his memorable speech at the Gran Teatro de La Habana will continue to echo painfully in some ears and joyfully and with hope in others. Obama’s aplomb and Raul Castro’s nervousness during the press conference after their nearly two-hour closed-door conversation will be the subject of comments for a long time to come. To state it common terms, the visit of the United States president will go down in history.
We have yet to see the consequences. The metaphoric millimeters of the governing elite ensures that it will never retreat to find its corresponding unit of measurement in political terms. How long is, what is the weight of, a change in the Constitution of the Republic, a new Electoral Law, the configuration of a new Central Committee, a modification of the Law of Foreign Investment, the acceptance of small- and mid-sized enterprises? If any of these things is less than a millimeter, what would be the dimension of an opening in freedom of expression or allowing free association?
At each step, starting from now, the general president will be wondering if what he does annoys or pleases Barack Obama. The drunkenness is over, the hangover is going to last a long time.
Ben Rhodes (left) with independent journalist Augusto Cesar San Martin of CubaNet. (14ymedio)
14ymedio, Havana, 22 March 2016 — Ben Rhodes, senior adviser to President Barack Obama on policy toward Cuba, said Tuesday that today connection to the internet is “the right to access information. There are no limitations now from the United States on Cubans connecting to the internet, there are no justifications now for the Cuban government to say that we are putting limits on connectivity,” said the official.
Rhodes will give a lecture exclusively for the independent press in the United States embassy in Havana, which is a boost to the unofficial media on the island.
With regards to the blockade that the Cuban government maintains on 14ymedio – which cannot be viewed from Cuba-based ISPs – the official said that he raised his “concern” to the authorities with regard to their treatment of independent media on the island and, he explained, they “essentially reject the presence of certain media that are not to their liking; continue reading
they identify them with political activities that they also find not to their liking. What we have said and what we have emphasized,” he continued, “is that journalism is journalism; it is not dissent, it is journalism.
“What we can do as the United States government,” he said, “is to treat all media equally.”
Rhodes returned to the need to expand internet access for Cubans, an issue also addressed by President Obama on Tuesday in his speech from the Alicia Alonso Gran Teatro in Havana.
“We have eliminated many of the justifications that the Cuban government has used to say that we are putting limits [on the internet],” he explained. He added, “We have no secret agendas or plans for Cuba, we are saying what we are doing.”
Rhodes acknowledged that the fear that the Cuban Adjustment Act will be revoked has caused a sharp increase in migrants to the US. However, he reiterated that there will be no changes in the rules for now, but hopes that the United States government has an opportunity to reform the immigration system as a whole. “It is important that people understand that they should not emigrate because they are expecting [this law] will disappear,” he added.
“Frankly, the best thing that could happen to prevent migration is that there are reforms in the economy of Cuba to open more opportunities, but, clearly, it is a process that will take time”, he said.
The official was optimistic about the lifting of the embargo on the island and revealed that it “may happen sooner than people can imagine now.
“The question people should ask is how far can this go. I think there is support in the sense of lifting the embargo, but it will also depend on the actions of the Cuban government,” he said, and an improvement of the situation of human rights on the island or wider access to Internet could facilitate Congress voting in favor of a rule change.
Barack Obama meeting with dissidents in Havana on Tuesday. (14ymedio)
EFE (14ymedio), Havana, 22 March 2016 – Several dissidents who met with President Barack Obama in Havana this Tuesday, assessed the meeting as “positive” and “frank,” and one of them delivered a list of 89 political prisoners recorded by the group he leads.
Elizardo Sanchez, spokesman for the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN), said Obama was “very clear” and reiterated to the participants at the meeting “his commitment to the cause of human rights and democratic freedoms.”
Sanchez explained that during the dialogue with the US president, he handed him a copy of the list of 89 political prisoners prepared by his group, continue reading
the only one that undertakes an ongoing documentation of these cases in Cuba.
For veteran government opponent, the balance of Obama’s visit to the island was “favorable to the cause of bilateral democracy” but he lamented that far from encouraging an “atmosphere of calm” the Cuban government unleashed “a wave of political repression” which, according to the records of his group translates to between 450 and 500 arrests across the island between Saturday and today.
For his part, the former political prisoner of the 2003 Black Spring “Group of 75,” Jose Daniel Ferrer, one of the thirteen government opponents invited to the meeting, described as “very positive” the meeting because “it was a show of solidarity with those of us who are fighting for the reconstruction of the nation.
“We talked about the process initiated with the Cuban government to normalize bilateral relations, also about his visit, and we also had the opportunity to make suggestions and give opinions on issues that we believe should continue to be pursued and what should not be done in this case,” said Ferrer, leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU).
Miriam Leiva, also invited to the event, considered it “very open” because the president listened to the participants who “could express their views on the current situation of repression and human rights in Cuba” and also he made comments.
“There were some who raised positions contrary to the policies of President Obama, but in the end he expounded on his views about what he is doing and what he can do to benefit the Cuban people,” said the independent journalist.
In her opinion, the fact that Barack Obama set aside a space in his busy schedule of about 48 hours in Havana for this meeting at the US embassy, represented “recognition and support” for the Cuban opposition.
Antonio González-Rodiles, who heads the Independent Estado de Sats (State of Sats) project, said the meeting was “very frank” and led to a debate in which “everyone raised their point of view and President Obama heard the different positions.”
Rodiles, critical of the new US approach to Cuba, said he told Obama his doubts about the process of normalization of relations and the “enormous level of violence and repression” in recent times.
He also criticized that “we have not heard from their government a clear condemnation regarding these excessive violations against the dissidence.”
Also at the meeting dissidents and activists such as the leader of the Ladies in White, Berta Soler; Guillermo Fariñas; Manuel Cuesta Morua, of the Progressive Arc; and the critical intellectual Dagoberto Valdes.
In brief remarks to reporters about the meeting, Obama said that one of the objectives of the normalization begun with Cuba is to be able to “hear directly” from the Cuban people and ensure that they also “have a voice” in the new stage initiated between the two countries fifteen months ago.
Note: Cuban dissidents, independent journalists and human rights activists present at the meeting were: Angel Yunier Remon, Antonio Rodiles, Juana Mora Cedeno, Jose Daniel Ferrer, Laritza Diversent, Berta Soler, Dagoberto Valdes Hernandez, Guillermo Fariñas, Nelson Alvarez Matute, Miriam Celaya Gonzales, Manuel Cuesta Morua, Miriam Leiva Viamonte, Elizardo Sanchez.
14ymedio, Pedro Campos, Havana, 21 March 2016 — Although there is a close relationship of interdependence between democracy and human rights, they are often treated as if they were something independent of the political system, when objectively only a fully democratic system can fully guarantee them.
A friend wrote me, totally correct, that in other countries whose governments have signed and ratified the Covenants on Human Rights, they are still violated in many ways because the political system did not guarantee their exercise and defense with laws, institutions and real democratic power, truly in the hands of the people.
It being legitimate to demand respect for human rights, in Cuba we could be very happy were the government, tomorrow, to ratify the international Covenants continue reading
on civil and political rights and on economic, social and cultural rights, and even enshrine them in Cuban laws; but what would happen in practice?
The current political system would be incapable of enforcing them, so first there would have to be a change in the Constitution, its development and content, passing new laws on freedom of expression, association, labor and property, and even addressing the philosophy of why and for what there is a police force.
The problem is how to achieve this process of democratization, with the essential differences within the opposition, the different thinking, including even among government officials who are aware of the need for changes in these directions.
This returns to the forefront a fundamental philosophical problem: there is a relationship of interdependence between means and ends. The means must be identical to those ends. We cannot achieve democracy by undemocratic means. Violent methods, or provocateurs of violence, have never brought such results. Such attempts have always ended up engendering new cycles of violence, when they don’t maintain the existing one.
The wars of independence and the intervention of the United States in 1898 resulted in a flawed democracy of strongmen, militarism and violence, whose most terrible, cruel and shameful episode was the “little war against blacks” in 1912. The revolution against Machado generated new violent cycles until a democratization process led to the Constitution of 1940, with participation of all political views, the elections of the same year, and the beginning of a period of democratic stability until the coup of 1952, which opened another cycle of violence.
Then, attempts to find a negotiated democratic solution were thwarted by the appearance on stage of “revolutionary violence.” Since then violence has prevailed, resulting in what we still have today: more violence to sustain what has been achieved in this way.
An example of which, I had yesterday, Sunday, March 20, the day Obama arrived. From the early hours a State Security official was in my house, dressed in plainclothes, and with great respect telling me that he would be with me until the afternoon, to make sure that I did not leave the house. House arrest for eight hours, with no reason and without the involvement of the justice system.
The only possible exit from the political, economic and social gridlock that is Cuba is to create an atmosphere of relaxation and harmony in the nation, with the support of all parties to take us to the establishment of an inclusive national dialogue, along with the restoration of fundamental freedoms.
Thus, would be created the conditions for a broad horizontal and free democratic debate that leads us not to an accounting of the past or to revenge, but to building together, from diversity and respect for differences, new legal institutions, comprehensively integrating human rights.
This would imply a new Constitution, approved by referendum; a new electoral law allowing multiparty democratic elections of all public offices; the establishment of a modern state of law with proper separation of powers and fully functional and informative transparency, under popular control, with municipal autonomy, participatory budgets and submission to referendum of laws that affect all citizens.
The humanist and supportive Democratic Republic, with full social justice, where there is room for all of us, would be achieved through a gradual process and not as an act of “democratic restitution.”
To achieve this will require that all parties assume full readiness for dialogue.
14ymedio, Havana, 22 March 2016 – President of the United States Barack Obama called on his Cuban counterpart Raul Castro to not “to fear a threat from the United States [or] the different voices of the Cuban people.” In his speech from the Alicia Alonso Gran Teatro in Havana, the president also said “voters should be able to choose their governments in free and democratic elections.”
Obama insisted – he said in Spanish – that the future of the island “must be in the hands of the Cuban people,” and that “citizens should be free to speak their mind without fear to organize, and to criticize their government, and to protest peacefully.” However, he admitted that, “It isn’t always pretty, the process of democracy. It’s often frustrating.” And he added that Washington does not want to impose its “political or economic system.”
“It is time for us to look forward to the future together,” said the president, “we should not fear change, we should continue reading
embrace it.”
“I believe in the Cuban people,” Obama said, and added that the United States has, “not just a policy of normalizing relations with the Cuban government. The United States of America is normalizing relations with the Cuban people.” He told the audience, “I have come here to extend the hand of friendship to the Cuban people.
The differences between our governments … are real and they are important… we also need to recognize how much we share… the United States and Cuba are like two brothers who’ve been estranged for many years.”
“I offer the Cuban people el saludo de paz [a greeting of peace]” addressing the audience and President Raul Castro who had accompanied him into the theater. Obama began his speech quoting, in Spanish, José Martí’s poem, Cultivate a White Rose. The leader reviewed the history between the two countries and then said, “I know the history, but I refuse to be trapped by it.” He said that his father came to the United States from Kenya in the year of the Cuban Revolution and that he himself came into the world during the events of the Bay of Pigs. “I have come here to bury the last remnant of the Cold War in the Americas,” he said.
The president reviewed some of the similarities between the Cuban and the American people. “The United States and Cuba are like two brothers who have ben estranged,” he recalled before citing baseball, patriotism, pride, love of family and children as common values. “Todos somos Americanos [We are all Americans],” he concluded.
Then Obama also noted the differences between the two countries, starting with the economic system and continuing with the one-party system in Cuba versus the multi-party system in the United States. Despite this, he recalled “on December 17th 2014, President Castro and I announced that the United States and Cuba would begin a process to normalize relations between our countries.” He said since been the embassies had been reopened, and direct flights and mail service resumed, among many other things.
At this point, the US president called for an end to the embargo. “What the United States was doing was not working. The embargo was only hurting the Cuban people instead of helping them,” he said. Obama took advantage of the opportunity to call for relaxing the measures to support essential changes on the island. ” But even if we lifted the embargo tomorrow, Cubans would not realize their potential without continued change here in Cuba.”
Barack Obama also spoke of Cubans living in the United States. ” so many Cuban exiles carry a memory of painful — and sometimes violent — separation. They love Cuba. A part of them still considers this their true home,” he said. For them, the process of restoration of relations is not a political issue, “This is about family.”
The president directed himself to young people, asking that they look to the future with hope, and he commented on the importance of expanding access to internet on the island. ” I also know that Cuba will always stand out because of the talent, hard work, and pride of the Cuban people. That’s your strength,” he added.
He also referred, at the international level, to the bombings this Tuesday in Brussels and to the peace process between the Government of Colombia and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) observed Monday by Secretary of State John Kerry.
Obama’s speech at the Gran Teatro de La Habana was attended by about a thousand people, most of them invited by the United States government, among whom was the ballerina Alicia Alonso. The speech was the first event of the day on his calendar, which will continue with a meeting with representatives of independent civil society and dissidents in the United States Embassy, and a friendly baseball game between Cuba’s national team of Cuba and the Tampa Bay Rays.
US President Barack Obama meets with representatives of Cuban independent civil society in Havana (14ymedio)
EFE (14ymedio), Havana, 22 March 2016 — The president of the United States, Barack Obama, praised the “courage” of the dissidents and representatives of independent civil society Cuba at the beginning of the meeting held with them at the headquarters of the United States Embassy in Havana this Tuesday.
In brief remarks, Obama stressed that one of the objectives of normalization with Cuba is to be able to “hear directly” from the Cuban people and to ensure that they also “have a voice” in the new stage initiated between the two countries.
The meeting with president of the United States was attended by Berta Soler (Ladies in White), Miriam Celaya (activist and freelance journalist), Manuel Cuesta Morua (Progressive Arc), Miriam Leiva (freelance journalist), Guillermo Fariñas (former political prisoner and 2010 Sakharov Human Rights Prize recipient), Antonio G. Rodiles (State of SATS), Elizardo Sánchez (Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation), Nelson Matute (Afro-ACLU president, defense organization for black people discriminated against because of their sexual orientation), Laritza Diversent (Cubalex), Dagoberto Valdes (Coexistence ), Jose Daniel Ferrer (UNPACU), Yunier Angel Remon (rapper The Critic ) and Juana Mora Cedeño (Rainbow Project).
“It often requires great courage to be active in civil life here in Cuba,” Obama said, adding he said.
“There are people here who have been arrested. Some in the past and others very recently,” stressed the president.
On Monday, at least a dozen dissidents were arrested in Cuba, according to the dissident Cuban National Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN), which also counts nearly 90 political prisoners on the island.
Participating in the meeting with Obama were government opponents who support the new US policy toward the island, as is the case of Cuesta Morua, and others who criticize it, as is the case with Berta Soler of the Ladies in White.
14ymedio, Regina Coyula, Havana, 11 March 2016 — I remember clearly my mom in her militia uniform, kneeling beside me, instructing me to get under a bed, cover myself with a wet towel and bite the stick of cedar she had hung around my neck when the bombs began to fall. I remember nothing more of those days. The intensity of those recommendations was recorded in the precocity of a six-year-old girl.
They were useless recommendations for what was expected. My parents and my brothers were mobilized and I was left in the care of my grandmother. The Americans were coming. We Cubans expected to be disintegrated under a mushroom cloud.
This simple view of the October crisis took on form with the years. So I disagree with another myth of Cuba’s relations with the United States: “Cuba brought the world to the brink continue reading
of a worldwide holocaust in October of 1962.”
I will focus on the analysis of the overblown letter of 26 October 1962 that Fidel Castro delivered to the Soviet embassy to get it to the hands of Nikita Khrushchev; but not on what everyone usually comments on, that the USSR should never allow the United States to take the lead and set off the first nuclear strike.
What interests me is what it says a little later: …if the United States should “manage to carry out an invasion of Cuba — a brutal act in violation of universal and moral law — then that would be the moment to eliminate this danger forever, in an act of the most legitimate self-defense. However harsh and terrible the solution, there would be no other.”
If anything defines these high-level messages it is the use of very precise terms to leave no doubt about the idea to be expressed. Without any errors in translation, it speaks of an invasion and not of an attack on Cuba, it being understood that this would be a conventional invasion with the landing of troops and air support. In the face of such action, it asks the Soviet leadership that its response “eliminate such danger forever.”
It does not mention eliminating the Pentagon; it does not mention eliminating the Capitol, the White House, the intercontinental ballistic missile silos closest to Cuba, it does not even mention another target previously agreed to by the parties, no.
Those words must have produced stupor in the Soviet hierarchy. While the Russians were already negotiating with the US government, the leadership of the Cuban Revolution was willing to immolate its own people if, with that, Yankee imperialism would disappear from the face of the earth.
In Fidel Castro’s words, the consideration does not appear that a military invasion by the United States would have received immediate condemnation from the international community, given that it is a small island whose Revolution enjoyed enormous sympathy among the global intelligentsia and opinion leaders. The Cold War and the pro-American blockade were not enough to observe such a scenario impassively. Nor should the diplomatic route be contemplated as a solution to the crisis, as is laid out at the end of the paragraph: “However harsh and terrible the solution, there would be no other.”
Probably, Khrushchev had a profound effect on the psychology of the Cuban leader when he made the offer to place the R-12s and other strategic weapons on our territory. While Fidel Castro was looking for an open and defiant installation, the Soviets, excellent chess players and with more political experience, were aware that the United States would not allow with impunity that installation so close to its shores; the Soviets were looking not to the Caribbean, but to the Mediterranean, specifically to the missiles aimed at the USSR from stations in Italy and Turkey.
With Operation Anadyr the Soviet leadership put on Cuban soil the war material necessary to then negotiate the withdrawal of the Titan and Minuteman missiles from Turkey, which, according to the political divisions of the time, had borders with Armenia and Azerbaijan, territories of the USSR, and to achieve a moratorium on US aggressions against Cuba for a period of 15 years.
The end of the crisis was a setback for the Cuban leadership in general and for Fidel Castro’s pride in particular. Despite the so-called Five Points, the truth is that he was not taken into account in the negotiation; he was not even consulted, and most likely the Soviet side made that decision knowing that the Cuban leadership would be against the removal of the weapons and rationality indicates not opening several fronts of conflict if they could not be managed.
I bring up again the Soviets and chess, because Khrushchev took advantage of the impulsiveness and inexperience of the Cuban leader to move the pieces according to his own interests and to achieve – collaterally – guarantees for his new Caribbean ally.
In the center, with white cap and telephone, the young man who was mistaken for Barack Obama
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 22 March 2016 — A crowd of Havanans that nobody had summoned formed two rows on Prado Street to greet President Barack Obama. It was not possible to determine who gave rise to the rumor that the illustrious visitor would spend Monday afternoon in front of the newly renovated Alicia Alonso Theater, where he has an appointment Tuesday with guests from the “Government authorized” civil society.
Young and old, men and women, workers, tourists, in short, everyone who for one reason or another passed near Central Park or the Capitol building around four in the afternoon joined in the enthusiasm caused by the strong desire of the people to see the US president in person and to greet him. continue reading
Police officers tried to persuade those gathered there not to spill into the street, because vehicles continued to circulate normally. One of them put forward the argument: “Do you think that if Obama were going to come by here there would be so few of us police officers looking after him?” To which a lady who looked like a schoolteacher replied: “And don’t you think that all these people are here because they know that he is going to come by, or at least because they want him to come by?”
Just after five in the afternoon a young man pointed at student in a high school uniform with a certain resemblance to the visitor and shouted, “Here is Obama!” and suddenly the lines fell apart; journalists fell on the student and everyone walking by with a camera or a cellphone was left with the face of the involuntary imposter on its memory card. Almost everyone knew it was a joke, but took the teasing good naturedly and there was a memorable hullabaloo.
At that point the “securities” – i.e. State Security agents – started to arrive, among them a nasty tempered guy known as Volodia, who stands out for his corpulence and for the mistreatment he doles out to dissidents. But nobody paid him much attention. Greeting Obama was permitted. There was no fear. If he had happened to pass this stretch of the Prado at that hour, I believe they would have ended up taking him out of “The Beast,” carrying him on their shoulders and heading off among cheers for Central Park.
Cuban activists marching in Havana hours before the arrival of President Barack Obama “Obama traveling to Cuba is not entertainment. No more violations of Human Rights. We All March”. (@Jangelmoya/Twitter)
EFE/14ymedio, Havana, 21 March 2016 – At least a dozen government opponents were arrested this Monday in Cuba, according to the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN), which also identifies nearly 90 political prisoners on the island.
Among those arrested for the second day are the leader of the Ladies in White, Berta Soler, and some members of that women’s group, along with her husband, former political prisoner Angel Moya, according to Elizardo Sanchez, spokesman for the CCDHRN, the only group regularly documenting such incidents in Cuba.
Also on Monday the arrest of Antonio González-Rodiles, who heads the independent Estado de Sats (State of Sats) project, along with his partner, activist Ailer González, near continue reading
their home, a family source confirmed.
Elizardo Sanchez said his group is trying to specify the number of arrests on the island since Sunday, when US president, Barack Obama arrived in Cuba.
That same day, some 60 dissidents were arrested several hours after the Ladies in White’s habitual Sunday march.
With regards to the number of political prisoners in Cuba, Sanchez said he currently has in his record to 77 prisoners convicted for political reasons plus one who is serving a sentence of house arrest.
He explained that that group adds the 11 released under a “furlough,” a legal concept that does not annul the sentences imposed during the crackdown of the “Black Spring” of 2003 that led to the jailing 75 dissidents on the island.
Cuban President Raul Castro denied on Monday that there are political prisoners in the country, in the press conference he gave in Havana with President Obama.
Castro challenged a journalist to present a list of political prisoners and assured him that if they really existed they would be freed that very night.
“Give me the list of political prisoners to release them now,” Castro said in answering the reporter’s question.
Counterclockwise from top left: Jose Daniel Ferrer, Dagoberto Valdes and Miriam Celaya.
14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, 21 March 2016 — A group of government opponents and activists from independent Cuban civil society have scheduled a meeting with President Barack Obama on Tuesday morning. This newspaper has contacted three of them to ask them what they plan to say at that meeting.
Jose Daniel Ferrer is one of the eleven former prisoners of the 2003 Black Spring who remains in Cuba and is also the leader of the Cuban Patriotic Union (UNPACU), one of the opposition organizations with the most members and one that maintains permanent action in support of human rights. Every time he crosses the capital city he has to do so almost clandestinely because State Security pursues him to deport him to continue reading
the province of Santiago de Cuba where he has permanent residence.
“In UNPACU we greatly appreciate President Barack Obama’s gesture of inviting us to a formal meeting at the United States Embassy in Havana and we also appreciate the gesture of solidarity of having invited colleagues from diverse civil society organizations, the opposition and independent journalists who have as a common cause the fight for the respect for human rights and for a free, just, democratic and fraternal Cuba.”
Jose Daniel Ferrer brings a charge from his comrades in the struggle. “This time that we are with the distinguished visitor we will use first to congratulate him for his bold decision to start this process of normalization of relations that has led even to his visiting the island. We are going to also congratulate him for the incredibly novel initiative he took to talk with the Cuban humorist Pánfilo which has had a tremendous effect on the population.”
I will ask that this position of solidarity that he is taking with the Cuban people be maintained even beyond his term as president, because being a high-ranking figure in the world, and even a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, he can continue to positively influence relations between the two nations and move others to support the suffering Cuban people who lack rights and freedoms and are living in deep misery.
Dagoberto Valdes is an agronomist who likes to present himself as a “yagüero” for the years he was sentenced to perform the humble work of collecting the “yaguas” (fronds) that fell from the palms in his province of Pinar del Rio. He is the director of the Coexistence Project, and the magazine with the same name, and of a Study Center that professes to be an authentic group of thinkers on Cuban matters.
“In the first place, I believe that the meeting with President Obama puts things in their place. It opens a new stage in which the historic enemy, necessary for these totalitarian systems, is turned into a visiting friend and therefore attention begins to focus on the real problem which is nothing more than the normalizations of democratic relations between the Cuban people and their government,” he told 14ymedio by phone.
He says he does not intend to ask for anything at the meeting. “The time our meeting lasts, at least the part that involves me, I will use to tell the president of the United States about the possibilities, the abilities, the projects with which the Cuban people are capable of being the protagonists of their own history.”
Miriam Celaya worked for a long time as an anthropologist, but obviously was born to be a journalist. She moved into the profession by way of blogs and now her byline is solicited by diverse media who request her penetrating analysis of Cuban society.
She says that the fact of being invited to a meeting of this kind, at this level, is an exceptional opportunity: “In addition to being a historical event, it is an opportunity to share with very valuable people about paramount topics.”
Asked if she has already noted what she wants to say this Tuesday, she clarifies, “I know that others will focus on repression, and the general issue of human rights and many other problems, including mentioning the concern that many have about how this rapprochement has advanced on the American side without seeing advances on the Cuban side. But I would like to concentrate on something that seems fundamental in the work of re-weaving our civil society and that is the issue of freedom of expression.
“It is not about our going there to ask for funding, like the official propagandists believe, but helping us with the desire to raise awareness about the need to support independent Cuban journalism. To empower the people they have to empower themselves with information, to be well informed at this stage when the government has an almost absolute monopoly on the media. And for people to know in depth the real scope of the measures the United States government is taking now, it is essential that an independent press has the ability to reach the citizens.”
14ymedio, 24 March 2016 — The freelance reporter Yuri Valle Roca was released Thursday after being detained for five days in a police station. The activist was arrested last Sunday and Freedom House, an organization in support of human rights, today asked the government of Cuba for his immediate release.
