Fourteen years of the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy: A look back

"The world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it." - Albert Einstein

The 14th Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy convenes in Switzerland on April 6, 2022. Over the past fourteen years this summit has been and continues to be a vital space for dissenting voices to gather and engage in an important conversation: to diagnose the problems challenging human rights and dignity and to do better and be better in order to turn around the 16 year global decline in human rights.  

 

The first edition was held on April 19, 2009, "one day before the international community gather[ed] in Geneva to address racism, intolerance and persecution in the High-Level Segment of the UN Durban Review Conference (DRC)" and it had a longer title, "Geneva Summit for Human Rights, Tolerance and Democracy" and the tag line, "Stop Discrimination, Go for Human Rights." UN Watch, a Geneva based NGO whose mission is "to monitor the performance of the United Nations by the yardstick of its own Charter", brought together an international coalition of nineteen organizations to co-sponsor the summit. 

Founding members of the Coalition are: The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), AVEGA (Rwanda), CADAL (Argentina), Directorio (Cuba), Darfur Peace and Development Center (Sudan), Fondation Généreuse Développement (Cameroon), Freedom House (USA), Freedom Now (USA ), Groupe des Anciens Etudiants Réscapés du Genocide (Rwanda), Global Zimbabwe Forum (Zimbabwe), Human Rights Without Frontiers (Belgium),  International Federation of Liberal Youth, (United Kingdom), Ingenieurs du Monde (Switzerland) LICRA (France), SOS Racisme (France), Stop Child Executions (Canada), Becket Fund for Religious Liberty (USA), East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project (Uganda), UN Watch (Switzerland). Fourteen years later the partners coalition has grown to 27.

Arielle Herzog, Leon Saltiel, Hillel C. Neuer and other UN Watch staff were the chief organizers of the first six editions and responsible for their great success and establishing this space for dialogue. UN Watch today continues to lead this coalition and build on this great legacy, but it is important to return to the beginning to see how we arrived were we are today.

The UN Durban Review Conference (DRC) of 2009 was one more example of the ongoing moral bankruptcy of the United Nations. The star speaker, and apparently the only head of state invited to speak, was Iran's notorious president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who engages in holocaust denial and has called for the destruction of Israel. This conference, ostensibly to confront the problem of racism, began a gathering point of the worse dictatorships on the planet to legitimize themselves and demonize Israel.

Meanwhile, in marked contrast, the Geneva Summit for Human Rights, Tolerance and Democracy was held at the Centre International de Conférences Genève, just down the street from the Palais des Nations UN compound where the DRC was being held. Human rights defenders, victims of repression and political dissidents gathered to share their experiences, bear witness, and attempt to wield real political force from the power of human conscience. This is what the martyred Czech dissident and philosopher Jan Patočka called the "solidarity of the shaken". This coalition called for an end to discrimination and for human rights promotion.

The first summit's inaugural speech was given by by Iranian Activist and President of Stop Child Executions, Nazanin Afshin Jam, who outlined the human rights situation in Iran. She addressed that under Iranian laws the life of a woman is worth half of a man's and other sexist practices, the execution of homosexuals, and the executions of minors. The Iranian activist also gave an overview of the summit that began at 9:00am and ended at 6:30pm.

The inaugural summit was divided into four sessions that were tied into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Session I was titled "Racism, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity: Assessing the Genocide Convention After 60 Years" and the panel was made up by Irwin Cotler, Counsel for genocide victims and dissidents, Canadian MP, Gregory Stanton, President of Genocide Watch and International Association of Genocide Scholars, Ester Murawajo, Tutsi survivor, founder of AVEGA and Dominique Sopo, President of SOS Racisme.  

Session II was titled "Resisting Authoritarianism: Human Rights, Democracy, and the Dissident Movement" with speakers Bo Kyi, Burmese dissident and winner of the Human Rights Prize from Human Rights Watch, Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Egyptian dissident, José Gabriel Ramón Castillo, Cuban dissident and prisoner of conscience, and Esra'a Al Shafei, dissident blogger, Mideast Youth - Thinking Ahead.

Session III was titled "Torture and Cruel and Inhuman Treatment" with speakers Nazanin Afshin-Jam, president of Stop Child Execution,  Parvez Sharma, Producer of the documentary Jihad for Love, and Ahmad Batebi, Iranian dissident.

Session IV was titled "Freedom of Expression and 'Defamation of Religion'" with panelists  Mohamed Sifaoui, Journalist, Algeria, Floyd Abrams, U.S. advocate for First Amendment press freedom,  Patrick Gaubert, President of LICRA and Member of the European Parliament.

The 2nd Geneva Summit was held on March 8-9, 2010, strategically timed to coincide with the main annual session of the U.N. Human Rights Council. The objective of the 2010 Geneva Summit was to give voice to victims of the world’s worst abusers, empowering those who suffer repression under closed systems of government.

The program featured plenary sessions, workshops and training sessions over two days. A large portion of the program was dedicated to presentations—personal and compelling testimony—from victims of the world’s worst abusers.

On March 8, 2010 gave the opening address on behalf of the Geneva Summit Coalition for the second edition of the Geneva Summit. Sadly, these words remain relevant today, but now the global decline in political freedoms and civil liberties has expanded from four to thirteen years in a row.

Regrettably, the chief international body charged with protecting human rights is failing to live up to its mission to stop these and other abuses. The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council—as acknowledged in a recent report by 17 of its 47 member states, supported by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the International Commission of Jurists—falls short in its handling of country situations, in the efficiency of the process involved in highlighting violations, and in its reactivity to crisis situations. Strong politicization of the Council, driven by bloc-based voting patterns, has led to inaction in face of atrocity and abuse. We saw this sad spectacle last week within the Council, first with the secretary general of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights denying the documented and rampant instances of torture, executions, and mass detentions of Iranians followed by the Cuban Foreign Minister’s speech who echoing his Iranian colleague also denied Cuba’s horrible human rights record and to add insult to injury went on to blame the United States for the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo as well as slander the deceased Cuban prisoner of conscience as a criminal.

Little wonder that the March 1st magazine issue of Newsweek contains an article titled “The Downfall of Human Rights.” The article highlights Freedom House's report "Freedom in the World," released in January, and reveals a global decline in political freedoms and civil liberties for the fourth year in a row, the longest drop in the almost 40 years that the survey has been produced.

According to Summit organizers, "[m]ore then 800 people registered to attend the summit and over 1600 watched the live webcast. 35 dissidents and human rights activists took the floor to condemn and testify about some of the worst human rights situations around the world and issued a joint call for Internet Freedom around the world."
Cuban dissident Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina was denied an exit visa by the Castro regime despite being invited to attend the Geneva Summit, but the coalition did not stop there and started a campaign for him to attend.

30 NGOs from this Summit called on the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to intervene on behalf of Cuban human rights defender Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina barred by the Cuban dictatorship from attending this meeting. The Cuban ambassador protested loudly when Hillel Neuer of UN Watch raised the matter in an interactive dialogue with the High Commissioner, but Nestor on the other hand was grateful that the UN Watch representative spoke up for his human rights.

In the end Nestor addressed the summit by phone, and would attend and address the 2012 Summit in person. Still remember the powerful and haunting testimony of Caspian Makan, human rights activist, and fiancé of Neda Agha-Soltan, who was murdered in Iran by pro-regime agents months earlier on June 20, 2009. Another speaker who made a powerful impression was Yang Jianli, activist in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest, a former political prisoner, and founder of Initiatives for China and today a friend. The Geneva Summit created network of activists that remain in contact and continue to collaborate.

Cuban human rights defenders and victims of repression have had a voice at this gathering over the past fourteen years to denounce their plight and call for human rights and freedom for Cuba. Former Cuban prisoners of conscience and human rights defenders Jose Gabriel Ramon Castillo (2009, 2010), Luis Enrique Ferrer Garcia (2011), Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina (2012), Regis Iglesias (2013), and Juan Francisco Sigler Amaya (2015), human rights defender and daughter of martyred actvist Rosa Maria Paya (2013, 2016), human rights defender Damarys Moya Portieles (2014), human rights defender and social democrat Manuel Cuesta Morua (2015), former prisoner of conscience, human rights defender and artist Danilo Maldonado El Sexto (2017), Sakharov laureate Guillermo Fariñas Hernández (2018), human rights lawyer Juan Carlos Gutiérrez representing Cuban prisoner of conscience Dr. Eduardo Cardet (2019), Cuban lawyer, journalist, and human rights defender who serves as Executive Director of the nonprofit Cubalex Laritza Diversent (2020), Cuban political performance artist Tania Bruguera (2021), and Cuban visual artist and political activist Hamlet Lavastida (2022).

2013 was the last time I addressed the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy during the fifth edition of the gathering and less than seven months after Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante had been murdered by State Security on July 22, 2012. Present in the room were Rosa María Payá Acevedo, and Regis Iglesias Ramírez of the Christian Liberation Movement. Both had addressed the meeting.

The 5th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy today is an opportunity for reflection. Unfortunately, the human rights situation around the world has not improved over the past five years and in many instances worsened. The question is why? Cuban democratic opposition activist, Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, when awarded the Sakharov prize for Freedom of Thought on December 17, 2002 observed that “The cause of human rights is a single cause, just as the people of the world are a single people. The talk today is of globalization, but we must state that unless there is global solidarity, not only human rights but also the right to remain human will be jeopardized.” The past decade has demonstrated that he was right.

Cuban state security has worked for decades trying to discredit and silence authentic dissident voices and continues to today with their spies and agents of influence.  It is a constant struggle to frustrate their efforts. They are willing to lie, slander, assault and even murder those who have the courage to dissent. The 2012 killings of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero and the firing on unarmed protesters during the 11J protests in Cuba demonstrate this.

For decades Cuban victims of repression said that nobody listened, and in 1987 an award winning documentary titled "Nobody Listened" interviewed Cuban political prisoners and human rights defenders describing the lack of international solidarity.  

Over the past fourteen years thanks to the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy their voices have been and continue to be heard.  

The next summit begins on Wednesday, April 6, 2022 at 9:00am Central European Time. For more information visit the Geneva Summit website here. Use hashtags #GenevaSummit2022 and #GS22

 

Ten Years of the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy: Reflections on the first decade

Reflection on ten years of summits and a call to attend the next one

The 10th Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy convenes in Switzerland on February 20, 2018. Over the past decade this summit has been a vital space for dissenting voices to gather and engage in this important conversation to diagnose the problems challenging human rights and dignity and to do better and be better in order to turn the global decline of human rights around.

The first edition was held on April 19, 2009, "one day before the international community gather[ed] in Geneva to address racism, intolerance and persecution in the High-Level Segment of the UN Durban Review Conference (DRC)" and it had a longer title, "Geneva Summit for Human Rights, Tolerance and Democracy" and the tag line, "Stop Discrimination, Go for Human Rights." UN Watch, a Geneva based NGO whose mission is "to monitor the performance of the United Nations by the yardstick of its own Charter", brought together an international coalition of nineteen organizations to co-sponsor the summit.

The founding members of the Coalition are: The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), AVEGA (Rwanda), CADAL (Argentina), Directorio (Cuba), Darfur Peace and Development Center (Sudan), Fondation Généreuse Développement (Cameroon), Freedom House (USA), Freedom Now (USA ), Groupe des Anciens Etudiants Réscapés du Genocide (Rwanda), Global Zimbabwe Forum (Zimbabwe), Human Rights Without Frontiers (Belgium),  International Federation of Liberal Youth, (United Kingdom), Ingenieurs du Monde (Switzerland) LICRA (France), SOS Racisme (France), Stop Child Executions (Canada), Becket Fund for Religious Liberty (USA), East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project (Uganda), UN Watch (Switzerland). Ten year later the partners coalition has grown to 26.

Arielle Herzog, Leon Saltiel, Hillel C. Neuer and other UN Watch staff were the chief organizers of the first six editions and responsible for their great success and establishing this space for dialogue. UN Watch today continues to lead this coalition and build on this great legacy, but it is important to return to the beginning to see how we arrived were we are today.

The UN Durban Review Conference (DRC) of 2009 was one more example of the ongoing moral bankruptcy of the United Nations. The star speaker, and apparently the only head of state invited to speak, was Iran's notorious president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who engages in holocaust denial and has called for the destruction of Israel. This conference, ostensibly to confront the problem of racism, began a gathering point of the worse dictatorships on the planet to legitimize themselves.

Meanwhile, in marked contrast, the Geneva Summit for Human Rights, Tolerance and Democracy was held at the Centre International de Conférences Genève, just down the street from the Palais des Nations UN compound were the DRC was being held. Human rights defenders, victims of repression and political dissidents gathered to share their experiences, bear witness and attempt to wield real political force from the power of human conscience. This is what the martyred Czech dissident and philosopher Jan Patočka called the "solidarity of the shaken'. This coalition called for an end to discrimination and for human rights promotion.


The first summit's inaugural speech was given by by Iranian Activist and President of Stop Child Executions, Nazanin Afshin Jam, who outlined the human rights situation in Iran. She addressed that under Iranian laws the life of a woman is worth half of a man's and other sexist practices, the execution of homosexuals, and the executions of minors. The Iranian activist also gave an overview of the summit that began at 9:00am and ended at 6:30pm.

The inaugural summit was divided into four sessions that were tied into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Session I was titled "Racism, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity: Assessing the Genocide Convention After 60 Years" and the panel was made up by Irwin Cotler, Counsel for genocide victims and dissidents, Canadian MP, Gregory Stanton, President of Genocide Watch and International Association of Genocide Scholars, Ester Murawajo, Tutsi survivor, founder of AVEGA and Dominique Sopo, President of SOS Racisme.  

Session II was titled "Resisting Authoritarianism: Human Rights, Democracy, and the Dissident Movement" with speakers Bo Kyi, Burmese dissident and winner of the Human Rights Prize from Human Rights Watch, Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Egyptian dissident, José Gabriel Ramón Castillo, Cuban dissident and prisoner of conscience, and Esra'a Al Shafei, dissident blogger, Mideast Youth - Thinking Ahead.

Session III was titled "Torture and Cruel and Inhuman Treatment" with speakers Nazanin Afshin-Jam, president of Stop Child Execution,  Parvez Sharma, Producer of the documentary Jihad for Love, and Ahmad Batebi, Iranian dissident.

Session IV was titled "Freedom of Expression and 'Defamation of Religion'" with panelists  Mohamed Sifaoui, Journalist, Algeria, Floyd Abrams, U.S. advocate for First Amendment press freedom,  Patrick Gaubert, President of LICRA and Member of the European Parliament.

The 2nd Geneva Summit was held on March 8-9, 2010, strategically timed to coincide with the main annual session of the U.N. Human Rights Council. The objective of the 2010 Geneva Summit was to give voice to victims of the world’s worst abusers, empowering those who suffer repression under closed systems of government.

The program featured plenary sessions, workshops and training sessions over two days. A large portion of the program was dedicated to presentations—personal and compelling testimony—from victims of the world’s worst abusers.


On March 8, 2010 gave the opening address on behalf of the Geneva Summit Coalition for the second edition of the Geneva Summit. Sadly, these words remain relevant today, but now the global decline in political freedoms and civil liberties has expanded from four to thirteen years in a row.

Regrettably, the chief international body charged with protecting human rights is failing to live up to its mission to stop these and other abuses. The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council—as acknowledged in a recent report by 17 of its 47 member states, supported by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the International Commission of Jurists—falls short in its handling of country situations, in the efficiency of the process involved in highlighting violations, and in its reactivity to crisis situations. Strong politicization of the Council, driven by bloc-based voting patterns, has led to inaction in face of atrocity and abuse. We saw this sad spectacle last week within the Council, first with the secretary general of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights denying the documented and rampant instances of torture, executions, and mass detentions of Iranians followed by the Cuban Foreign Minister’s speech who echoing his Iranian colleague also denied Cuba’s horrible human rights record and to add insult to injury went on to blame the United States for the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo as well as slander the deceased Cuban prisoner of conscience as a criminal.

Little wonder that the March 1st magazine issue of Newsweek contains an article titled “The Downfall of Human Rights.” The article highlights Freedom House's report "Freedom in the World," released in January, and reveals a global decline in political freedoms and civil liberties for the fourth year in a row, the longest drop in the almost 40 years that the survey has been produced.

According to Summit organizers, "[m]ore then 800 people registered to attend the summit and over 1600 watched the live webcast. 35 dissidents and human rights activists took the floor to condemn and testify about some of the worst human rights situations around the world and issued a joint call for Internet Freedom around the world."

Cuban dissident Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina was denied an exit visa by the Castro regime despite being invited to attend the Geneva Summit, but the coalition did not stop there and started a campaign for him to attend.

30 NGOs from this Summit called on the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to intervene on behalf of Cuban human rights defender Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina barred by the Cuban dictatorship from attending this meeting. The Cuban ambassador protested loudly when Hillel Neuer of UN Watch raised the matter in an interactive dialogue with the High Commissioner, but Nestor on the other hand was grateful that the UN Watch representative spoke up for his human rights.

In the end Nestor addressed the summit by phone, and would attend and address the 2012 Summit in person. Still remember the powerful and haunting testimony of Caspian Makan, human rights activist, and fiancé of Neda Agha-Soltan, who was murdered in Iran by pro-regime agents months earlier on June 20, 2009. Another speaker who made a powerful impression was Yang Jianli, activist in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest, a former political prisoner, and founder of Initiatives for China and today a friend. The Geneva Summit created network of activists that remain in contact and continue to collaborate.

Cuban human rights defenders and victims of repression have had a voice at this gathering over the past decade to denounce their plight and call for human rights and freedom for Cuba. Former Cuban prisoners of conscience and human rights defenders Jose Gabriel Ramon Castillo (2009, 2010), Luis Enrique Ferrer Garcia (2011), Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina (2012), Regis Iglesias (2013), and Juan Francisco Sigler Amaya (2015), human rights defender and daughter of martyred actvist Rosa Maria Paya (2013, 2016), human rights defender Damarys Moya Portieles (2014), human rights defender and social democrat Manuel Cuesta Morua (2015), and former prisoner of conscience, human rights defender and artist Danilo Maldonado El Sexto (2017). 

2013 was the last time I addressed the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy during the fifth edition of the gathering and less than seven months after Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante had been murdered by State Security on July 22, 2012. Present in the room were Rosa María Payá Acevedo, and Regis Iglesias Ramírez of the Christian Liberation Movement. Both had addressed the meeting.

The 5th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy today is an opportunity for reflection. Unfortunately, the human rights situation around the world has not improved over the past five years and in many instances worsened. The question is why? Cuban democratic opposition activist, Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, when awarded the Sakharov prize for Freedom of Thought on December 17, 2002 observed that “The cause of human rights is a single cause, just as the people of the world are a single people. The talk today is of globalization, but we must state that unless there is global solidarity, not only human rights but also the right to remain human will be jeopardized.” The past decade has demonstrated that he was right.

Cuban state security has worked for decades trying to discredit and silence authentic dissident voices and continues to today with their agents and agents of influence.  It is a constant struggle to frustrate their efforts. They are willing to lie, slander, assault and even murder those who have the courage to dissent. The 2012 killings of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero and the aftermath demonstrate this.

For decades Cuban victims of repression said that nobody listened, and in 1987 an award winning documentary titled "Nobody Listened" interviewed Cuban political prisoners and human rights defenders describing the lack of international solidarity.  Over the past ten years thanks to the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy their voices have been heard. 

This is the first reflection on the past decade of Geneva Summits.  The next summit begins on Tuesday, February 20, 2018 at 9:00am. For more information visit the Geneva Summit website here.

Rolling Stones in Cuba: Sympathy for the Devil

On March 3, 2016 also known as Music Freedom Day I posted a blog entry on the upcoming Rolling Stones concert in Cuba on March 25th and the continued censorship in Cuba of iconic music artists such as Celia Cruz and Olga Guillot.What the Castro regime did to rock n rollers in Cuba in the 1960s who listened to the Rolling Stones is reflected in the art work below by Sergio Lastres. Today I read, in Spanish, the following essay by rock fan, former Cuban prisoner of conscience and Christian Liberation Movement spokesman Regis Iglesias. Below is a translation of the essay. 

Artwork by Sergio Lastres

Sympathy for the Devil

by Regis Iglesias

I remember how difficult it was to have one of the latest albums of the Rolling Stones in the Cuba of the 80s.It always had been, even now that maybe in stores run by military and Interior Ministry officials their CDs maybe on sale, when usually any musical production of their satanic majesties costs around 15 euros and the average monthly salary of Cubans on the island.

We listened to their songs using a thousand homemade contraptions to have the signal from the rock stations in South Florida that eventually came to Cuba in a semi-clandestine manner. Neither on TV stations or local stations, all-government, broadcast their videos or their successes, except perhaps once their old hymn "(I Can not Get No) Satisfaction". Of course not.
 
The Stones were, or that is the image they sold, a rebel band, a cry against the established and totally irreverent with power. In a communist system they were definitely not welcome. But still they were in Tito's Yugoslavia in the late 60s, where they were defrauded by their presentations, which ended in youth riots. Incidentally, most Yugoslav spectators were youth linked to the Communist Party and the official nomenklatura who detested the music of the Stones. 

Not chastened, a few years ago they returned to play in a square behind the Bamboo Curtain. The Chinese could see the Rolling and almost without any prior announcement, as the opening act, a dissident artist, Cui Jian, the father of rock in the empire of paper, youth idol during the Tiananmen demonstrations in 1989. Nevertheless, communist leaders succeeded in vetoing two songs of the rebels Mick and Keith, as sexist "Lets Spend the Night Together" and "Honky Tonk Woman", of course! 

I never spent more than one day without hearing the music of the Stones, as it touches every good follower of the oldest and best distillation of rock and roll in the universe. Still, rock lovers we made do with a thousand difficulties to delight us with our musical idols. Never, until I spent seven and a half years in Cuban prisons cells.
 
Then I could not listen to the Rolling Stones, but asked friends to send me the lyrics of their songs, and could in the solitude of my cell set up an imaginary scenario and tried to follow the riffs of Richards, the shrieks of Jagger in my mind. I had a black shirt with the famous logo designed by John Pasche, that raunchy red tongue that seems to mock everything. Two posters with the five Stones adorned my cell. It was a matter of rock honor to keep as a symbol of my inner freedom in the middle of those walls, in front of some jailers who were trying to stop me and also prevent me keeping my hair  with the Jagger cut. 

All these whims I was able to keep them with determination. I was in that place for demanding that Cubans could decide, for being a manager of a demand for a referendum for laws that guarantee the right to popular sovereignty. I would not let them also continue to prevented listening to the music of the Rolling Stones in my mind and being free, as much as I could, to do what I please with respect to my musical and spiritual preferences. 

Exiled in Madrid, I was able to see them at the Bernabéu a couple of years ago, all my life and that of my friends passed before my eyes.

The Rolling Stones are an industry that poses as rebels, but they are an industry. Also rock and roll, does not lack jockeys (jineteras) - the regime's euphemism for prostitutes and thus deny their existence, official rockers or regaton fans who at the last minute are willing to memorize "Gimme Shelter" for a kiss by the old snouts of Mick and have something to take home to eat. 

It is not the '80s when everyone was embarrassed to be invited to give concerts in countries where citizens were segregated by their skin color, their ideas or beliefs, where citizens had no right to prosper economically, and less a choice to elect and be elected to be part of a fair and democratic government. Now it does not matter because, no matter in China or Cuba people are segregated and oppressed, imprisoned, exiled and murdered. We are in the world of posers, in the world of interests, and the Rolling Stones are no exception on this point.

I will rejoice that some of my friends on the island will enjoy, if they can, the concert of the Rolling Stones. I say "if they can" because surely the grounds of the Sports City will be filled by the regime with young communists, students of military academies, informers, rapid response brigades (the paramilitaries) and "reliable" people for the security of the system. 

It would not be the first time, and to the baseball game between the Major League team of the United States, Tampa Devil Rays (I think, after all, there is something, a mocking allusion to the devil behind all this) and a selection of the regime -part of all this show designed from Washington by the Obama Administration - already announced that the tickets would be "by invitation". A hidden swallow does not make spring, but if it at least to be in the place, no matter if it is 200 or 300 meters from the stage, I will rejoice, but it would not leave me satisfied with the Rolling Stones.

Cuban Opposition Leader Denounces: The Cuba they want to make fashionable.

"Cuba is fashionable to vain politicians who want to take their photo with the last dinosaurs on earth." - Regis Iglesias

The Cuba they want to make fashionable.

By Regis Iglesias, spokesman Christian Movement Liberation

Published in Spanish in El Nuevo Herald on February 16, 2016

Cuba is in fashion. No, not Cuba, Cuba is more than 11 million people without rights that seem forgotten by the free world, by those countries with a long democratic tradition. Even those countries that after many sacrifices and a lot of solidarity and international support were able to obtain for their peoples rights long denied just two decades ago.

Cuba is fashionable to vain politicians who want to take their photo with the last dinosaurs on earth. So they go to Cuba and spend hours listening to the very feverish official version of how due to the fault of a democracy, the largest and oldest in the world, that they the saurian-commanders had to convert a whole nation into a military camp in the middle of the sea, surrounded by barbed wire with nuclear missiles pointed at the heart of America. The same America, as it does with every fashion trend it adopts, now tries to sell to the world its mistaken policy for the longest dictatorship in the Western Hemisphere.

But in our island nothing has changed, nor will it change on the current path even though from Washington they want to sell us that.

The Cuban regime is only recycling itself. The old oligarchy gives continuity to the new oligarchy that with their offspring, heirs of a military economic junta, the architects of fake change, as Oswaldo Paya of the Christian Liberation Movement denounced before being assassinated.

Cuba is not changing nor will it change with more foreign investment because the capitalists of the world go there to compete amongst themselves, not with Cubans who are not allowed the possibility to promote some important business. They will accept the policy conditions of exploitation and segregation that are imposed by the regime on authorized employees. In any case, Liu Xiaobo remains a hostage of Beijing. Tibet remains occupied by China. Millions of people are starving outside the major economic centers promoted by the Chinese Communist Party. All this despite the Asian nation having most favored nation status in trade with the United States. Is that what they want to sell to us Cubans? No thanks.

Cuba is not changing nor will change because Ozzy Osbourne and the Rolling Stones visit or give a concert. Nor will it change because Rihanna poses naked in a room with the aesthetics of a 1950s brothel. Beyonce, smoking habanos in the streets of Vedado, or Marc Antonty recreating a party in a fictional Old Havana will not bring change. The New York Yankees, Atlanta Braves or the Tampa Devil Rays going to train on the island is not change nor will it bring change. Not even because Don King goes to Cuba to recruit fighters or the saga of Fast and Furious attempts to film on the battered roads of the island.

Cuba will change and be in style when Cubans finally decide to demand, as over 25,000 citizens have already done so legally, their right to think and act freely, associate to form economic ventures that allow them to thrive, when they can choose their own government and be part of it. But even today it is not possible in the island stopped in time. Even today this is overlooked by those who look at us and only see an island of beautiful beaches, a stale museum where any Marlon Brando played bongos and had sex with any native within his reach, according to the memories of the most elderly.

But that is not Cuba, not the Cuba that we want.

***

La Cuba que quieren poner de moda  

REGIS IGLESIAS

Cuba es la moda. No, no Cuba, Cuba somos más de 11 millones de personas sin derechos que parecen olvidadas por el mundo libre, por esas naciones con una larga tradición democrática e incluso por aquellas que luego de muchos sacrificios y mucha solidaridad y acompañamiento internacional lograron alcanzar para sus pueblos los derechos hace apenas dos décadas.

Lo que está de moda es que las celebrities ociosas con más dinero que talento, los aspirantes a una santidad mediática que dando la espalda a las víctimas toman café con el victimario, los beodos iconos musicales de una generación que padeció persecución, segregación, cárcel y hasta la muerte por escuchar de manera semi clandestina sus éxitos en discos entrados a la isla de contrabando o en estaciones musicales del sur de la Florida que eventualmente llegaban con su señal a nuestras costas, los mercaderes ansiosos de fácil ganancia, no importa que el éxito de sus jugosos negocios se deba a una mano de obra esclava a la que le es prohibitivo sindicalizarse o contratarse directamente sin la mediación de un régimen militar-empresarial que se lleva el 95% de su salario y solo paga el equivalente de 25 dólares mensuales a los “privilegiados” cubanos que pueden trabajar para alguna firma extranjera. Eso es lo que está de moda, que vayan a nuestra isla, la isla en la que por muchas décadas leer revistas del corazón, escuchar rock, ser homosexual o practicar alguna religión era poco más que un pecado mortal que debía ser purgado en campos de concentración, la isla donde sus ciudadanos no tienen derechos y son segregados de las oportunidades de negocios solo por ser precisamente cubanos.

Cuba está de moda para políticos vanidosos que quieren hacerse la foto con los últimos dinosaurios sobre la tierra. Por eso van a Cuba y pasan horas escuchando la muy afiebrada versión oficial de cómo por culpa de una democracia, la mayor y más antigua del mundo, tuvieron que convertir los saurio-comandantes toda una nación en un campamento que en medio del mar, rodeado de alambradas con misiles nucleares apuntando al corazón de América, esa misma América que al igual que hace con cada tendencia de moda que adopta, ahora vende al mundo su equivocada política respecto a la dictadura más longeva del hemisferio occidental.

La época en que los deportistas eran tildados de traidores, porque prefirieron ganar millones en los circuitos profesionales de Estados Unidos, quedó atrás solo con un par de declaraciones para la TV norteamericana de algún que otro mandamás de la oligarquía y ahora pueden regresar y, por supuesto, llevar dólares a sus antiguos jueces para que continúen condenando, encarcelando, desterrando y asesinando a personas que solo disienten, que solo quieren vivir en un país, su país, con libertad para expresarse, para asociarse, para tener sus propios negocios, para elegir y ser elegidos, para entrar y salir libremente de su propio país o residir en cualquier punto de la geografía de ese archipiélago llamado Cuba.

Pero en nuestra isla no ha cambiado nada, ni por el actual camino cambiará nada aunque incluso desde Washington nos quieran vender eso.

El régimen cubano solo se recicla a sí mismo. Da continuidad la oligarquía vieja a la nueva oligarquía que son sus vástagos, los herederos de la junta económica militar, los artífices del cambio fraude, como denunció antes de ser asesinado Oswaldo Payá.

Cuba no está cambiando ni cambiará con más inversión extranjera porque los capitalistas del mundo irán allí, a competir entre sí mismos, no con los cubanos a los que no se les permite tener la posibilidad de fomentar algún importante negocio. Aceptarán las condiciones de explotación y segregación política que a los empleados autorizados imponga el régimen. En todo caso, Liu Xiaobo continúa siendo un rehén de Pekín, los tibetanos ocupados por China y millones de personas mueren de hambre fuera de los grandes polos económicos fomentados por el partido comunista chino a pesar de que la nación asiática tiene trato de nación más favorecida en su comercio con Estados Unidos.

¿Eso es lo que nos quieren vender a nosotros los cubanos? No, gracias.

Cuba no está cambiando ni cambiará porque Ozzy Osbourne y los Rolling Stones la visiten o den algún concierto, porque Rihanna pose desnuda en una habitación con estética de prostíbulo cincuentero, Beyonce se contonee fumando habanos por El Vedado o Marc Antony simule andar de fiesta en una ficticia Habana Vieja. No está cambiando ni cambiará porque los New York Yankees, los Bravos de Atlanta o los Tampa Devil Rays vayan a entrenar en la isla. Ni siquiera porque Don King vaya a contratar boxeadores o la saga de Fast and Furious se intente filmar en las maltrechas carreteras de la isla.

Cuba cambiará y estará de moda cuando finalmente los cubanos decididos hayan reclamado, como ya lo han hecho legalmente más de 25,000 ciudadanos, su derecho a pensar y actuar libremente, asociarse para formar empresas económicas que les permitan prosperar, cuando puedan elegir su propio gobierno y formar parte del mismo. Pero aun hoy eso no es posible en la isla detenida en el tiempo. Aun hoy esto es pasado por alto por todos aquellos que nos miran y solo ven una isla de playas paradisíacas, un museo añejo donde cualquier Marlon Brando tocaba bongoes y tenía sexo con cuanto nativo y nativa estaba a su alcance, según recuerdan los más viejos.

Pero eso no es Cuba, no es la Cuba que queremos.

Nuestra libertad es solo responsabilidad nuestra y por eso vamos a continuar trabajando. Otros Estados y personas sean quienes se definan si están a favor de apoyar nuestro derecho a los derechos o sus intereses y los de una tiranía.

Portavoz del Movimiento Cristiano Liberación.

Read more here: http://www.elnuevoherald.com/opinion-es/opin-col-blogs/opinion-sobre-cuba/article60955702.html#storylink=cpy

http://www.elnuevoherald.com/opinion-es/opin-col-blogs/opinion-sobre-cuba/article60955702.html

Cuba: How democracies debase themselves legitimizing a tyranny

The promises of change by the regime, until now, are nothing but another farce to try to gain time and consolidate oligarchic privileges. - Regis Iglesias

 

Regis Iglesias at the White House

Excerpt from "No changes on the horizon"  

By Regis Iglesias

No changes on the horizon, enthusiasts should well know the manner in which the mafia has carried out their businesses on the island for over half a century. Enthusiasts should know, as the Spanish know, that if a system does not demonstrate its willingness to recognize all the freedoms of citizens, to dialogue and respect popular sovereignty, there will not be a transition or changes.

The Christian Liberation Movement will mark 27 years on September 8th. Our approach has always been consistent: that Cubans be the ones to decide their own destiny. That a civilized and respectful dialogue prevail over the violence and hatred that from a position of power has been exercised over the people.

There can not be changes if the pacts are made behind the backs of the people. We hope that both Washington and Madrid not forget this. Do not forget that Cubans have been oppressed and continue to be oppressed, that the economic and military junta is trying to legitimize its continuity and to be recognized as an equal by democratic and civilized nations.

If so, whether from Madrid or Washington this backing is given to the oppressive regime of the Castro family, then we the Cuban democrats will see as equals of a tyranny, governments that perhaps we have mistakenly considered friends and brothers.

Regis Iglesias is the spokesman of the Christian Liberation Movement, organization led by Oswaldo Payá. 

Original and complete article in Spanish:
http://www.libertaddigital.com/opinion/regis-iglesias/no-hay-cambios-en-el-horizonte-76571/

XI Anniversary of Project Varela

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, Regis Iglesias and Tony Díaz Sánchez

Eleven years ago today on May 10, 2002 Project Varela, an initiative signed by 11,020 Cuban citizens, demanding a plebiscite is presented before the National Assembly.

Together with Oswaldo at the time of the presentation of the signature (and seen in the photo above) were Regis Iglesias and  Tony Díaz Sánchez. Less than a year later during the Black Cuban Spring both would become prisoners of conscience and spend the next seven plus years unjustly imprisoned.

Ten years, two months and twelve days later Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas was killed in a car crash under suspicious circumstances.

The demand for a plebiscite continues as does now the demand for an international investigation into the deaths of Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and youth leader Harold Cepero.

Today, let us remember that day eleven years ago when the voices of 11,020 Cubans were heard loud and clear around the world with this act of civic courage.

The Washington Post Demands Probe into Cuban Dissidents deaths

The Post’s View

Obama administration should urge a probe of Oswaldo Payá death

 By Editorial Board, Thursday, March 14, 12:47 AM

NELSON MANDELA was locked up on Robben Island. Andrei Sakharov was exiled to Gorky. Vaclav Havel was thrown into a Prague jail cell. Aung San Suu Kyi was repeatedly placed under house arrest. All of these courageous, dissident voices were muffled at some time by authoritarian regimes, but in the end, they found their way back to freedom. Oswaldo Payá of Cuba never got that chance.

Mr. Payá, who pioneered the Varela Project, a petition drive in 2002 seeking the guarantee of political freedom in Cuba, was killed in a car wreck July 22, along with a youth activist, Harold Cepero. The driver of the vehicle, Ángel Carromero, a Spaniard, was convicted and imprisoned on charges of vehicular homicide; in December, he was released to Spain. He told us in an interview published on the opposite page last week that the car carrying Mr. Payá was rammed from behind by a vehicle with government license plates. His recollections suggest that Mr. Payá died not from reckless driving but from a purposeful attempt to silence him — forever.

 

Rosa Maria Payá and Regis Iglesias

On Wednesday, his daughter, Rosa Maria Payá, appeared before the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. Speaking for the group U. N. Watch, Ms. Payá presented an appeal signed by 46 activists and political leaders from around the world, urging the United Nations to launch an international and independent investigation into Mr. Payá’s death. The signatories declared, “Mounting and credible allegations that the Cuban government may have been complicit in the murder of its most prominent critic, a leading figure in the human rights world, cannot go ignored by the international community.”

The Varela Project was summarily and arbitrarily crushed by Fidel Castro. Ms. Payá told the council that Cuban authorities imprisoned the majority of its leaders. She said that Yosvani Melcho Rodriguez, 30, has spent three years in prison as punishment for his mother being a member of the movement with Mr. Payá.

Ms. Payá was interrupted in Geneva by the Cuban representative, who accused her of being a “mercenary who has dared to come to this room.” His attempt to silence her drew support from China, Russia, Pakistan, Nicaragua and Belarus. The U.S. representative spoke up for her right to address the group. She was then allowed to finish.

After Mr. Payá’s death, the White House paid tribute to him, saying, “We continue to be inspired by Payá’s vision and dedication to a better future for Cuba, and believe that his example and moral leadership will endure.” When pro-democracy activists were arrested and beaten at his funeral, the White House again spoke up. But in the past week, since Mr. Carromero’s interview was published, the administration has not uttered a word. What if it had been Sakharov, Aung San Suu Kyi, Mandela or Havel who was run off the road? Would it have said nothing? At this critical juncture, with new information at hand, the United States ought not to be complicit in silence about who killed Oswaldo Payá.

 
 

Read more on this issue:
Ángel Carromero speaks out about the crash that killed Payá

The Post’s View: An eyewitness to Oswaldo Payá’s death speaks out  

Jackson Diehl: The Oswaldo Payá mystery continues

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obama-administration-should-urge-a-probe-of-oswaldo-paya-death/2013/03/13/34f2a0fe-8b7e-11e2-b63f-f53fb9f2fcb4_story.html

Oswaldo Paya’s daughter addresses UN Human Rights Council

 On March 12, 2013 at the United Nations Human Rights Council the Castro regime with some of the other of the worse human rights violators of the world tried to censor this two minute speech. What where they afraid of? Read on and you be the judge. 

Rosa Maria Payá at the United Nations Human Rights Council

 Rosa Maria Payá, daughter of late Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá, took the floor today at the UN Human Rights Council and presented an appeal by 46 public figures calling for an inquiry into her father's suspicious death in July. Organized by UN Watch. Full story here. UN Watch has a transcript of the presentation along with the interruptions. Below we offer the text without them.

Thank you, Mr. President.

My name is Rosa Maria Payá, of the Christian Liberation Movement and daughter of its national coordinator Oswaldo Payá, opposition leader and Sakharov Prize laureate of the European Parliament.

My father dedicated his life to working for legal and nonviolent change for Cubans to enjoy all their rights.

He promoted the Varela Project, a referendum supported by over 25,000 citizens, who have defied repression to demand changes in the law that guarantee freedom of expression, association, free elections, freedom of nonviolent political prisoners and the possibility of having private companies.

So far the government has refused to realize this plebiscite and imprisoned the majority of its leaders.

Yosvani Melchor Rodríguez is 30 years old and has spent three in prison as punishment because his mother is a member of our movement.

Cuban authorities said my father and Harold Cepero, a youth activist, died in a traffic accident. But after interviewing the survivors, we confirmed that their deaths were not accidental. The driver of the car told the Washington Post, that they were intentionally rammed from behind. The text messages from the survivors on the day of the event
confirm this.

The Cuban government’s state security calls my family home in Havana to say: We're going to kill you. They are the same death threats that were made to my father. The physical integrity of all members of my family is the responsibility of the Cuban government.

Today we present an appeal, signed by 46 political leaders and activists from around the world. We urge the United Nations to launch an independent investigation into the death of my father.

The truth is essential to the process of reconciliation that the transition to democracy in Cuba needs. We do not seek revenge, we have a right to know:

Who are responsible for the death of my father?

When will there be a response to the demands of human rights of the people of Cuba to enjoy democracy and basic freedoms?

Thank you, Mr. President.

At 01:11:48 the video begins for this item: 31. United Nations Watch, Rosa Maria Paya - (Point of Order: Cuba, USA, China, Russian Federation, Pakistan, Belarus) http://webtv.un.org/watch/item:4-general-debate-contd-30th-meeting-22nd-regular-session-human-rights-council/2220338624001/# 

Former Cuban prisoner of conscience addresses UN Human Rights Council

Thank you Mr. President

My name is Regis Iglesias, Christian Liberation Movement spokesperson, poet and columnist. To defend human rights in my country, Cuba, I was arbitrarily arrested and sentenced to 18 years in prison in April 2003 along with 74 other activists. I was in solitary confinement for a year and a half, sent to a prison hundreds of kilometers from my family, and I suffered the inhumane conditions of the prisons in Cuba.

Cuba, has been suffering for more than half a century a totalitarian and autocratic regime. The lack of political and civil liberties is critical, even when their own laws on the island leave loopholes for citizens to exercise and demand respect these inalienable rights of every human person.

Popular sovereignty has been hijacked by an oligarchy that refuses to respect the will of the people.

I was jailed for demanding, from these constitutional loopholes, a plebiscite in which the people express their sovereign will and claim their rights. After 7 years of captivity I was deported to Spain directly from prison.

The Cuban regime pursues, threatens, kidnaps, exiles, and uses violence with impunity against nonviolent opponents, kills them.

The military junta that has economic power in the island does not recognize or respect the the right of Cubans to freely enter or leave their own country, they are not walking towards reconciliation and the recognition of all rights for all Cubans. They are laying the groundwork to secure the continuity of its oligarchic project and creating greater social differences in the desolate and increasingly poor population of the island.

The voices of the victims of this repressive system, of those killed, Oswaldo Paya, Harold Cepero, Orlando Zapata, Roberto Ribalta, the voices of the prisoners and the repressed Sonia Garro, Yosvani Melchor, Calixto Martinez, Osvaldo Rodriguez, Gorky Aguila, Yris Pérez and many Cubans over 54 years of dictatorship demands solidarity so that we can begin the urgent process of liberation that brings reconciliation and happiness to all the children of Cuba.
 
Join us on our path to freedom, the path of the Cuban people.

Thank you.

Regis Iglesias spoke at 01:57:50 on item 49. for Ingenieurs du Monde http://webtv.un.org/watch/item:4-general-debate-contd-30th-meeting-22nd-regular-session-human-rights-council/2220338624001/#

Cuban dissident Regis Iglesias at 2013 Geneva Summit for Human Rights

Yes, Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero were killed, they were victims of an attack that cost them their lives and this we know from the first day by the reports that both victims and witnesses made reached their friends in and out of the island. - Regis Iglesias

Regis Iglesias

Spokesman of the Christian Liberation Movement

Cuba

In May 2002, for the first time since the dictatorship of Fidel Castro came to power in 1959, more than 11, 020 Cubans legally demanded a plebiscite for their rights to be recognized.

I was one of those Cubans who signed and gathered the necessary signatures, as established by the Cuban Constitution, to make valid the citizen petition to the authorities.

I was one of the managers of the Varela Project and was privileged with Oswaldo Payá and Antonio Diaz to present this demand at the headquarters of the Cuban Parliament.

In Cuba the right of citizens to freely express their thoughts, or to associate freely according to their interests is not respected. Not even economic freedoms, despite cosmetic measures that as a concession, not as a right established and guaranteed, authorities now announce to the world and are nothing more than fraudulent change to maintain the privileges of a caste in power.

In Cuba there are no free elections and what the Cuban regime calls "participatory process" is simply the ratification of 612 individuals selected by organizations related to the dictatorship, to fill the 612 seats of national Deputies.

For this we,75 leaders and activists for the rights and freedoms of Cubans, were abducted and sanctioned in a grotesque judicial farce.

We were arrested and stayed for 30 days in sealed cells, hot and crowded with individuals charged with drug trafficking. In 30 days I was only able to see the sun once and was constantly subjected to interrogations in air conditioned offices with low temperatures, to intimidate me and in vain try to make me confess to the infamous calumnies with which our captors accused us.

Later, we were transferred hundreds of miles away from our homes and jailed with common criminals in prisons across the island. We were nearly not allowed visits or communication with our families, our correspondence was violated, we were not allowed in those first years to read the Bible or books about the history of Cuba and everything else.

More than a few of us were victims of savage beatings by our jailers. Our food was meager and of very poor quality. Insects, rodents and the stench swarmed in those unsanitary conditions constantly exposing us to all kinds of diseases.

Eventually something changed, although very little this shameful punishment, but for some of our colleagues in the same case the extreme conditions of detention remained almost unchanged.

Finally for many of us there was no choice but to decide at the request of our exhausted families in 2010 to go into exile. They too were also victims of inhuman treatment by having to move in the difficult conditions of public transport in Cuba, hundreds of kilometers to be able to see us and bring books, pens, some food and medicine. Our families were also mistreated and humiliated by our captors.

The promises of change by the regime, until now, are nothing but another farce to try to gain time and consolidate oligarchic privileges.

What, if not, is this supposed "freedom of travel" that still leaves to the Cuban political police to deliver the final decision to the person who intends to travel, the passport authorizing or not to do so? Blackmail, one more method of selective repression based in the regime's interests and in many cases does not depend on the benefits or lack of benefit to the individual.

Same goes with the measures to revive the broken economy and agriculture of the island. It is ultimately State Security who decides whether the person can engage in a small business of services or have a lease for a limited time of some parcel of land to make produce.

Oswaldo Payá fought against this fraudulent change, as he called it and as we call it. He fought against the perpetuation of the oligarchy that maintains the Cuban people subject.

This honest and consistent position of the founding leader of the Christian Liberation Movement was shrill to the ears of the island’s Military-Economic Junta and the interests of those both inside and outside the island who are interested in pacts of privileges and not rights.

This is why they killed him together with Harold Cepero on Sunday July 22, 2012 while traveling with two youths in solidarity from Spain and Sweden who had gone to the island to explore the feelings and aspirations of the Cuban people.

Yes, Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero were killed, they were victims of an attack that cost them their lives and this we know from the first day by the reports that both victims and witnesses made reached their friends in and out of the island. These facts we have been able corroborate with surviving witnesses to this crime. With them, who they have tried to impose a fierce gag upon even when they are out of Cuba but remain hostage to the dictatorship’s blackmail of their governments, democratic governments, that are silent and try to silence the truth they have known from the first moment of the incident.

We therefore call upon the international community, and people of goodwill to support us in creating an independent commission to investigate the events of July 22, 2012 and bring to light the truth that we have known and has been confirmed by all the witnesses.

Oswaldo and Harold on that day were visiting leaders and activists in the east of the island that are distributing and working on The People’s Path initiative.

This proposal, which has been signed by over 2,000 activists from more than 70 organizations working to defend human rights, most of them on the island, is the response of Cuban democrats to these attempts of fraudulent change that ignore the people's rights and tries to ignore and disparage the nonviolent Cuban opposition.

We want our democratic brothers in the world to know this, know that in Cuba in the midst of the most terrible repression they are working, without hatred but without fear, for real changes that bring closer the day of freedom.

We want you to listen to us, that solidarity go to that incipient civil society that grows and multiplies, that is able to agree on the essentials for our people: civil, economic and political liberties, social justice first and free elections. This is the change that we are working for, the change that many Cubans have already offered, in over half a century of dictatorship, their generous lives.

It cannot be either in America or Europe the prerogative of a party, or government the quotas of solidarity with the Cuban people, or at what moment it is more appropriate according to their own national interests to be supportive or not. We do not need this hypocritical exclusivity.

We want as an independent nation, that we be supported in a timely and sincere manner to return our sovereignty, kidnapped by a tyranny, to the Cuban people, as we ourselves design our own present and future project.

We want our friends around the world to join us on the path that we have designed and that we are already walking the People’s Path.

We Request Solidarity with our Liberation.

Thank you. 

Discurso original en castellano