Your Holiness Francisco,
I write to you, once more, to ask you, if it is possible, to make an appeal to the leaders and delegations of the member countries of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States which will hold its Summit in Havana on the 28-29 January, and which the Castro dictatorship, as has been its custom for 55 years, will use, having chosen as the most important topics the region’s hunger and poverty, to add to its false fame as humanists concerned with social dramas, while doing nothing more than consolidating the repression and the violation of human rights on the island against those who dare to speak out against it.
This 2nd Summit of Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) to be held in Cuban will be another opportunity for the brutal dynastic dictatorship of the Castros, so that, along with its recent designation as “guarantor of Human Rights” on the United Nations Human Rights Council, continues tormenting its people, preying especially on the most humble, including women and children.
Ángel Santiesteban Prats is one of the hundred political prisoners who dared confront the tyranny. And only his national and international recognition as a writer, makes him a visible prisoner. And nor has the expenditure of resources on hiding the harassment from the repressive agents of which he is a victim for more than a month and which has its objective punishing him so to avoid his leaving prison on a pass during the days leading up to the Summit. It is easy to imagine how much greater is the cruelty and brutality against the “invisible” prisoners.
The world turns its back on the Cuban people. Commercial interests are more powerful than human reasons. And meanwhile the dictatorship has undermined every effort of union to achieve the only end everyone yearns for: Freedom and Democracy.
The Cuban people are alone and isolated. Only you, Holy Father, in your infinite love, mercy and wisdom, could appeal to the leaders of the governments that, once again, legitimate with their presence in Havana, the longest and bloodiest dictatorship on the continent, to demand that the dictator put an end to his crimes against his own people.
With all my affection and gratitude,
(The Editor)
Note: This letter was sent to His Holiness Francisco via fax on the morning of 14 January 2014.
