Cuban-Americans at FIU Ask Hillary Clinton to Stop Beatings of Cuban Women by Raul Castro’s Police

"History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Over FIU : HILLARY, STOP BEATINGS OF CUBAN WOMEN BY RAUL CASTRO

Cuban-Americans Ask Hillary Clinton to Stop Beatings of Cuban Women by Raul Castro’s Police

Text taken and adapted from Center for a Free Cuba press release

Today, Saturday, July 23, 2016, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic Party candidate for president visited Florida International University (FIU) in Miami, FL in her first joint public address with her vice-presidential candidate Senator Tim Kaine. The Center for a Free Cuba distributed fliers asking Mrs. Clinton to bring an end to the systematic beatings of Cuban mothers, wives, and sisters of political prisoners that continue to take place on the island. 

The Center for a Free Cuba is a non-partisan human rights organization dedicated to the promotion of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law in Cuba. The Center’s president is Ambassador James C. Cason, former Chief of the American Mission in Havana. The Center’s Board of Directors and Research Counsel brings together several former American ambassadors, professors, business and community leaders. The Center repeats its call on President Barack Obama to condition any concessions to Raul Castro’s government on stopping the beatings of the Ladies in White, the abuse of political prisoners, and to allow Amnesty International and the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit Cuban jails.

The Ladies in White is a group of peaceful women dissidents who were honored in 2005 by the European Parliament with the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought. The founder of the group Laura Pollan died under mysterious circumstances in a Cuban hospital in 2011, at a time when Raul Castro and Barack Obama where Heads of State.

Four years ago today, one of the most prominent opposition leaders, Christian- democrat Oswaldo Paya was murdered on a Cuban highway when Cuban political police forced his car off the road. Together with Paya, human rights activist Harold Cepero was also murdered. The regime has not provided a timeline from the moment that they were forced off the road, when they allegedly were taken to the hospital, when they were given medical attention, what type of attention, and when they died. Oswaldo Paya’s family continues to request the release of the autopsy report.

There are more human rights activists that have been killed by Raul Castro’s regime, and to date, while other issues have been dealt with, the United States has not made these murders a high priority in its relations with Havana.

When the announcement of the re-establishment of an American embassy was announced, Amnesty International noted that if only a few political prisoners were to be released, and the repressive decrees remained in place, then the rapprochement between the two governments would be but a “smokescreen.”

All lives matter—all American lives matter, including the lives of Cuban Americans. Mrs. Clinton has yet to speak about several American terrorists enjoying the hospitality of Raul Castro in Havana after they killed American police officers and fled to Cuba. Mrs. Clinton has said that she supports Mr. Obama’s policy and remains silent to this day about the return to Cuba by President Obama of a Cuban spy who was serving two life sentences in an American prison for his role in planning the murder of three American citizens and one Florida resident by Cuban war planes that obliterated their two single-engine airplanes in international airspace while they were searching for refugees fleeing Cuba.

Mrs. Hillary has said nothing about current Washing speculation that an American spy who worked for the Castros for years while serving at the Defense Intelligence Agency would be freed and returned to Havana. Ms. Ana Belen Montes’ treason resulted in the death of several individuals, friends of the United States.

Today, an aircraft towed a banner over Florida International University with this message: HILLARY, STOP BEATINGS OF CUBAN WOMEN BY RAUL CASTRO

Mrs. Clinton spoke months ago at FIU, but she took no questions. We urged students and faculty at FIU to ask Mrs. Clinton earlier today to call on Raul Castro to stop the beatings of innocent women.

Sadly once again today she did not take questions and her vice-presidential candidate mentioned learning Spanish in Honduras but made no mention of ongoing crises in Cuba or Venezuela.