Senate Subcommittee to hold hearing on 24 U.S. government officials and spouses attacked in Havana, Cuba in 2016-2017

The mystery continues and answers are needed.

U.S. Embassy in Havana, Cuba

 Senator Marco Rubio will be presiding over a public hearing titled "Attacks on U.S. Diplomats in Cuba: Response and Oversight" at the Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Transnational Crime, Civilian Security, Democracy, Human Rights, and Global Women's Issues on January 9, 2018 at 10:00am. There are numerous questions that have not been answered but there is one fact that has been established that is disturbing. Twenty four U.S. government officials and their spouses based in Havana were the victims of 50 attacks between November of 2016 and September of 2017 that caused serious harm.

It’s a documented FACT that 24 U.S. govt officials & spouses were victims of some sort of sophisticated attack while stationed in Havana 1/3

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) January 7, 2018

 It is also known that Canadian diplomats were also impacted and their diplomatic cables were describing the incidents as attacks, months before the U.S. publicly acknowledged them, on April 26, 2017. CBS News reported on these newly declassified cables on January 6, 2018.

This is bad timing for Senator Jeff Flake, who has worked for years in pushing normalized relations with the Castro regime, who on January 5, 2018 tried to spin that there was "no evidence of  a sonic attack." Whether sonic or not, the fact remains that two dozen American government officials and their dependents have been harmed.

The Associated Press reported on January 5, 2018 in an interview with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson that the danger to diplomats is not over in Havana:

Tillerson said he's not convinced that what he calls the "deliberate attacks" are over. He defended his September decision to order most U.S. personnel and their relatives to leave Cuba and said he won't reverse course until Cuba's government assures they'll be safe.
"I'd be intentionally putting them back in harm's way. Why in the world would I do that when I have no means whatsoever to protect them?" Tillerson told the AP on Jan. 5. "I will push back on anybody who wants to force me to do that."

Four months earlier on October 12, 2017 White House Chief of Staff John Kelly stated, "[w]e believe that the Cuban government could stop the attacks on our diplomats."

How did we get to this dismal point in U.S. - Cuba relations?

On December 17, 2014 President Barack Obama claimed that the previous U.S. - Cuba policy of containment had been static and not achieved anything, but the new policy not only coincided with a rise in repression in Cuba, the deaths of high profile dissidents, but also this insidious attack on U.S. diplomats.

News reporting indicates that beginning in November 2016 U.S. diplomats suffered injuries to their health following odd sounds being directed at them. The story did not go public until August 9, 2017 when CBS Radio was going to break the story leaked by angry victims, who believed that not enough had been done, and that the State Department was ignoring their suffering.

Last year on January 2, 2017 Cuban troops marched in a parade over which Castro presided chanting that they would repeatedly shoot President Obama, the first African-American president, in the head so many times that they would make a “hat of lead to the head.”  

In September of 2017, it was announced that non-essential U.S. personnel would be evacuated from the U.S. Embassy in Havana. Prior to December 2014, a fully staffed U.S. Interests Section (an embassy all but in name) in Havana had been doing a lot of good work in Cuba since 1977. There is now a skeleton crew.



 

Cuban dissident's testimony that led to his beating and arrest

Transcript from last week's testimony in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee by Cuban pro-democracy leader Jorge Luis Garcia Perez "Antunez" first published online by Capitol Hill Cubans. Castro regime's response to this testimony was to beat up Antunez and his wife then disappear the opposition leader for four days before international outrage was able to obtain his release. Antunez now faces charges of "resistance," "disobedience" and "spreading false information."

Jorge Luis Garcia Perez "Antunez" file photo Reuters

JORGE LUIS GARCIA PEREZ "ANTUNEZ": Good afternoon, everybody. Good afternoon, Mrs. Jacobson, assistant secretary of state, Senator Menendez and everybody else present here. Very special greetings to my friend, Normando Hernandez Gonzalez, who is there with you.

It makes me very proud and excited to see Normando Hernandez Gonzalez there today because we shared political prisons. We both suffered beatings, oppression and hunger. He is like the best example of our homeland because he is a self-taught journalist that used to disseminate information in the prison. And I am very proud to see him represent us there today because he suffered all the oppression with a lot of dignity and decorum.

Something very important that my colleague Sarah Marta Fonseca just said was that we found out about this event with very short notice. And I think that shows the degree of oppression that we are under. And that speaks volumes of the repression that we feel. I had to, like she said, walk kilometers, hide behind trees and bushes, as if I was some kind of criminal, to attend an event that, in any other free and democratic country in the world, would be an everyday thing.

But thank God and thanks to the interests section for all the support given to us, we are here. It's been hard, but we are here and we are involved. I want you to know that a few days ago, as a result of brutal repression in an act of repudiation, I witnessed the death of Antonia Rodríguez Mirabal in the city of Santa Clara where a group of pro-democratic, peaceful activists, myself included, were gathered to talk about liberty, freedom, justice and human rights.

But that's not all, Mr. Senator. At this very moment, there's a black woman that has been on hunger strike for several days in Santa Clara. And hear me out here: Ms. Damaris Moya Portieles is on a -- thank you -- is on a hunger strike because the political police threatened to sexually abuse and rape her six-year-old daughter.

And we're not talking about the Cuba from before 1959 or any other country in Latin America or the South Africa of Botha. We're talking about the Cuba of the 21st century when horrible killings happen, such as the ones of Mr. Zapata Tamayo, Wilmar Villar Mendoza, Juan Wilfredo Soto and abuela -- which is grandmother -- Antonia.

And we need to bear in mind that no increase in remittances, no increase in the number of trips, no increase in the cultural exchanges can speed up the democratization process in our country. This only serves to strengthen the repression and to grant impunity to the people that commit these acts of repression.
It has been proven that -- and for this, I have my witnesses here, this Cubans that recently left the island, Mr. Normando Hernandez Gonzalez and my colleague here, Sarah Marta Fonseca -- that these increases in trips both from North Americans to Cuba and Cubans themselves have not helped at all with the democratic process in our country because those persons come to our country on matters that have nothing to do with what we're doing.

I would like to clarify that I fully respect President Barack Obama's Administration, and I know that everything that they are doing is with their best intentions. And both the Democratic and the Republican Parties are allied to the cause of liberty in Cuba. But Mr. Senators, when the opposition is increasing, both in qualitative as well as in quantitative terms, when there is an increase in the number of public protests all over the country, this is the time and these are the opportunities to support the resistance forces.

This is because the Cuban resistance forces are embarked on a head-on battle with the state. We suffer beatings. We suffer undue treatment -- harassment even -- in our own homes, torture and all kinds of systematic violations of our human rights.

To conclude, because I have already said a lot and those who spoke before me have done so very eloquently -- maybe even more so than me -- like Jose Marti said, the truth is to be said, not to be hidden.
And in this regard and in terms of the visas, I find Mariela Castro's visit to the United States being an official functionary of the regime that oppresses, that kills and that harasses the Cuban people, a complete insult and an utter offense to us. Now, Mariela Castro is out there visiting the United States.

And I would like to ask: Could we, the opponents in Cuba, the leaders of different organizations and different initiatives, go to the United States and return to the island freely?

Thank you very much.