Castro regime one of five against holding Assad regime accountable for atrocities in Syria

 “Dime con quién andas y te diré quién eres”. ["Tell me with whom you walk, and I will tell you who you are."] - Spanish proverb

Bashar Hafez al-Assad and Raul Castro

 The Associated Press reported that the U.N. Human Rights Council voted overwhelmingly on Thursday, September 25, 2014, to share its evidence of Syrian atrocities in hopes it will be forwarded to the world's war crimes tribunal. By a vote of 32-5, with 10 abstentions, the 47-nation council adopted the resolution condemning the lack of cooperation by President Bashar Assad's government with a U.N. commission investigating rights violations since March 2011 in Syria, whether by the government or the opposition or the Islamic State group that controls broad areas along the Syria-Iraq border. 

Vote today on sharing evidence of Syrian atrocities with war crimes tribunal

 The five countries who voted against sharing evidence of gross and systematic human rights violations in Syria are: Algeria, China, Cuba, Russia, and Venezuela. The Castro regime that has ruled Cuba for the past 55 years has close ties with the Assad regime that goes back decades and since 2011 has repeatedly backed the Syrian government in what has been described as an "unholy alliance" ignoring evidence of torture and mass killings. This has raised questions as to why these countries are on the Human Rights Council.

Hafez al-Assad and Fidel Castro

On September 16, 2014 addressing the UN Human Rights Council I stated that "the disaster in Syria did not arise yesterday but is the long term result of the failure to have human rights respected there" and should also have added along with the failure of the international community for too many years to denounce the atrocities committed there."

At the same time the belief now that the situation has deteriorated that an expanded military response will solve the problems there is at best fool hardy if not just plain stupid.  There is another alternative between waging war and looking the other way as Syria burns and that is nonviolent resistance and solidarity.