The Executive Committee of the Party for an Independent and Democratic Cuba (CID) has launched an appeal calling on all Cuban women to unite in demanding their rights and freedoms, in a statement read out by Santa Clara activist Gladys Beatriz Medina González and the Ladies in White, after attending the Sunday mass and march along 5th Avenue in the Miramar district of the capital. She also thanked all those who had paid tribute to Laura Pollán on 10 December.
In the statement, the CID national leader said: “Today we are calling on all Cuban women to unite in this endeavour which she and a group of brave women (referring to the Women in White) began with determination and constancy; all we need to do is to take the decision to safeguard our children from the poverty,abuse and lack of opportunities they face, because of an insensitive, abusive and despotic government. There are millions of us women who have a duty to defend our families and we intend to do so. We do not grant an illegitimate government the authority to carry on committing abuses and errors; economic changes are not enough, it’s not a question of feeding ourselves better in the prison in which we live. The time for political change in Cuba is NOW…
I want to thank all those in different parts of the world who have paid tribute on this 10 December to our founder Laura Inés Pollán Toledo, as by doing so they are paying tribute to all the Cuban women who have fought for freedom since the days of independence; they are paying tribute to all the political prisoners of the past who challenged Castroism and suffered prison and exile; they are paying tribute to the daughters, wives and mothers of the Cubans who were murdered by this regime…I should like, on behalf of the Party for an Independent and Democratic Cuba, to thank all those throughout the world who have shown solidarity with the family of Laura Pollan and the Ladies in White Movement which today bears her name and I wish them well on this International Day for Human Rights.”
Subsequently, the women were violently arrested by the political police and not released until hours later
Katia Sonia Martín Véliz
Translated by Paul Knopinski
December 13 2011
