The case of the German tourist who went missing: A mystery partially solved

Body of German tourist found 24 years later in Cuba.

Claudia von Weiss de Venegas

Eleven years ago this blog highlighted the case of a German woman who went missing in Cuba, and followed up a year later in 2014. Her name was Claudia von Weiss de Venegas.

Husband and wife: Miguel de Venegas, Claudia von Weiss de Venegas

On November 20, 1999 Claudia von Weiss de Venegas, disappeared while on holiday in Cuba. She left the hotel on a bicycle with $500 and was never heard from again. Her husband, Miguel de Venegas, circulated fliers about his missing wife in Cuba and for his troubles was expelled from the country. Ten years later in a Hamburg news publication, Claudia's case resurfaced and her fate remains unknown but Miguel hopes one day to find out what had happened to his wife, but he has given up on finding her alive.  

Her grave was apparently discovered in Cuba in December 2023, and an undertaker who buried her 24 years ago confirmed her identity, but Cuban officials barred an exhumation to confirm dental records, and DNA according to the report below.

Earlier this year Dark Curiosities provided an overview of Claudia's case, and the mystery that still surrounds it.

 

Remembering some of the victims of Cuban communism: Yuriniesky Martínez Reina

"Whoever destroys a single life is considered by Scripture to have destroyed the whole world, and whoever saves a single life is considered by Scripture to have saved the whole world." - Mishnah  (1135-1204)

Yuriniesky Martínez Reina, shot in the back and killed by state security

Some psychologists argue that as the number of victims increase into the hundreds, and thousands that compassion collapses out of the human fear of being overwhelmed. Soviet dictator Josef Stalin put it more succinctly: "When one man dies it's a tragedy. When thousands die it's statistics." In the case of Cuba the communist regime has killed tens of thousands, and many have become numb in the face of this horror. Therefore on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the first communist regime in Russia, that caused so much harm around the world, will focus on the small corner of Cuba and on an infinitesimal sampling of some of the victims of Cuban communism. 

The eighth entry focuses on a young men shot in the back and killed by a state security agent. His "crime"? Building a boat with other friends to flee the Castro dictatorship and live in freedom.

Previous entries in this series were about Cubans trying to change the system nonviolently. The first entry concerned Orlando Zapata Tamayo, a humble bricklayer turned courageous human rights defender who paid the ultimate price in 2010 for speaking truth to power.  The second entry focused on Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, a Catholic lay activist, nonviolence icon, husband, father of three and the founder of a Cuban opposition movement that shook up the Castro regime with a petition drive demanding that human rights be respected and recognized in Cuba. This action and speaking truth to power led to his extrajudicial killing in 2012. The third entry focused on one of the great crimes of the Castro regime that has been well documented by international human rights organizations and reported on ABC News Nightline that claimed the lives of 37 men, women, and children. They were trying to flee the despotism in Cuba to live in freedom and were extrajudicially executed. In the fourth focused on an act of state terrorism when two planes were shot down on a Saturday afternoon at 3:21 and 3:27 on February 24, 1996 over international airspace while engaged in a search and rescue flight for Cuban rafters killing four humanitarians. Their planes were destroyed by air-to-air missiles fired by a Cuban MiG-29 aircraft on the orders of Raul and Fidel Castro.  

In the fifth focused on Amnesty International prisoner of conscience Wilman Villar Mendoza who died on hunger strike protesting his unjust imprisonment on January 19, 2012 at the age of 31 left behind two little girls, a young wife and grieving mother. The sixth entry focused on one of the many non-Cuban victims of Cuban communism. Joachim Løvschall was studying Spanish in Havana in the spring of 1997. He was gunned down by a soldier of the Castro regime in Havana, Cuba twenty years ago. The identity of the soldier was never revealed to Joachim's family. No one was ever brought to justice.  The seventh entry focused on a young woman, Yunisledy Lopez Rodriguez, who tried to warn a friend who was being targeted by the secret police for a violent end. They went to the authorities to make a formal complaint, but nothing happened. Four months later she was murdered in front of her two children stabbed 18 times. Eight months later her friend was the victim of a brutal machete attack and nearly killed. Yunisledy was just 23 years old.

Yuriniesky Martínez with his dad, son, and on (right) how he was found

Yuriniesky Martínez Reina (age 28) was shot in the back and killed by state security chief Miguel Angel Río Seco Rodríguez in the Martí municipality of Matanzas, Cuba on April 9, 2015 for peacefully trying to leave Cuba. A group of young men were building a small boat near Menéndez beach to flee the island, when they were spotted trying to leave and were shot at by state security. Yuriniesky was left for two days in the lagoon, before being found by his brother. Unlike the families of many other victims who are intimidated into silence, Yuriniesky's family spoke out, identified his killer and demanded justice in a video published on April 27, 2015 by Libertad Press.

The extrajudicial killing of fleeing refugees has been an ongoing practice of the Castro dictatorship in Cuba for decades. Well documented cases, prior to this one, included a formal complaint in 1993 by the United States government when snipers, sand bags, and gaff hooks, were used by Cuban officials on fleeing Cuban refugees.

Rosa Maria Paya in Cuba to honor legacy of Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero on fifth anniversary of attack that killed them.

Advisory from Cuba Decide that has been modified to reflect that Rosa is already in the island. 

Returned to Cuba to honor memory of her dad and friend both killed on July 22, 2012

Rosa Maria Paya returned to Cuba today, to honor the legacy of Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero on the 5th anniversary of the attack which killed them both.

Today July 17, 2017, Rosa Maria Paya returned to Cuba to honor the legacy of Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero on the 5th anniversary of the attack which killed them both.

Desde La Habana hoy recordamos el crimen del Estado cubano contra @HCepero y @OswaldoPaya el 22/7/2012. No habrá impunidad! @CUBADECIDE pic.twitter.com/s0KCBGQB7s

— Rosa María Payá A. (@RosaMariaPaya) July 17, 2017

[The tweet above reads: "From Havana we remember the crime of the Cuban State against @HCepero & @OswaldoPaya on 7/22/2012. There will not be impunity!"]

Friends, relatives, members of the opposition and Cubans in general will be honoring their lives and legacy at a Mass in Havana. Oswaldo Paya, Cuban opposition leader, winner of the Sahkarov award and youth leader Harold Cepero lost their lives on July 22, 2012 in an attack provoked by officers of the Castro regime.

Rosa María Payá, along with other members of the opposition and Cuban citizens, promotes the Cuba Decide initiative that gives continuity to the campaign initiated by her father Oswaldo Payá before dying to change the system in Cuba through the realization of a plebiscite with the participation of all Cubans.

Cuba Decide's Vision:

We want Cuba to be a prosperous and happy nation of free citizens.

A nation open to the world that you can always decide to return to.

A home where everyone counts and we are accepted without fears or hypocrisies.

A place where  Cubans can realize our dreams with our work, creativity and own effort.

It's possible, Cuba Decide.

To monitor developments in Cuba during this visit please follow Cuba Decide on our website, Twitter and Facebook.

Tibetan monk who died in Chinese prison cremated against family’s wishes, suspect he was murdered

"Chinese authorities denied us our right to pay our final respect to Tenzin Delek Rinpoche and refused to return his body to us for Buddhist rites. My family believes he was murdered.” - Geshe Nyima, Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s cousin

BREAKING: Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s body cremated in Chinese prison against family’s demands

July 15, 2015
 

Today, Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s body was cremated at a secret prison, located approximately 5km from Chuandong prison in Chengdu, at around 7am local Beijing time by the prison authorities as reported by his family members. The cremation took place against the wishes of his family to release the body in order to perform the final Buddhist rites in his hometown Lithang.

Around 30 Tibetans who were Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s immediate family and students were allowed inside the secret prison to see the body before the cremation and perform a short prayer. The cremation follows unsuccessful negotiations over the release of the body between Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s family and prison authorities, which was followed by more than 100 Tibetans staging a peaceful sit-in protest outside Chuandong prison.

No cameras or phones were allowed inside the undisclosed prison where Tenzin Delek Rinpoche was cremated. His family described the prison conditions as despicable and “worthy for a beggar”. All of Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s belongings were reportedly burned and the family and mourning crowd were not permitted to hold on to any remains.

Geshe Nyima, Tenzin Delek Rinpoche’s student and cousin says in a phone message: “I am heartbroken, but also extremely angry. My family cannot accept this. We will not stop demanding justice until we have answers. Chinese authorities denied us our right to pay our final respect to Tenzin Delek Rinpoche and refused to return his body to us for Buddhist rites. My family believes he was murdered.”

Tenzin Dolkar, Executive Director of Students for a Free Tibet, says: “Injustice was committed against Tenzin Delek Rinpoche and his family by the Chinese government. With his death, Tibetans in Tibet lost their beloved leader and teacher. Today, their right to perform the last Buddhist rites for Tenzin Delek was taken away. Chinese authorities cremated his body with complete disregard to the family's wishes. It is a failure of world governments to allow the Chinese government to get away with committing such violence against Tibetans.”

For more information contact:

Tenzin Dolkar, tdolkar@studentsforafreetibet.org, +1 (917) 664-5530 (English)

Padma Dolma, padma@studentsforafreetibet.org, +1 (917) 664- 3315 (English, German)

https://www.studentsforafreetibet.org/media-center/press-releases/press-releases/breaking-tenzin-delek-rinpoche2019s-body-cremated-in-chinese-prison-against-family2019s-demands

86 Students Taken in Latin America 2014: 43 in Mexico and 43 in Venezuela

“Those who falsify history do not protect the freedom of a nation but, rather, constitute a threat to it.” – Vaclav Havel, The Salzburg Festival, July 26, 1990 

 The situation in Mexico demands concrete attention and actions in the hopes that a resolution can quickly be reached such as:

• Over social media there are numerous opportunities to demonstrate one's solidarity using hash tags such as: #AyotzinapaSomosTodos #JusticeforAyotzinapa #AccionGlobalporAyotzinapa #WeAreAllAyotzinapa #JusticeForAyotzinapa and #GlobalActionForAyotzinapa. 
• In Miami on November 20, 2014 at 5pm in the Mexican Consulate in downtown (1399 SW 1st Avenue Miami, FL 33130) join with Mexican activists in a nonviolent protest denouncing the crime while demanding justice and the return of the 43 missing students to their loved ones. Please dress in black Protests also planned in Santa Ana, CA; Dallas, TX and elsewhere.
• Signing an online letter from Amnesty International calling on the Mexican government to bring all responsible to justice, acknowledge that this is not an isolated case, and for the government to uphold 2012 commitment to eradicate torture and ill treatment of all detainees.
• Writing opeds, letters to the editor, spreading the word over social media on the internet in order that others may take concrete action on behalf of these 43 students.

Meanwhile efforts by political partisans to take advantage of the situation to advance a particular agenda needs to be quashed while truth and justice serve as a guide to action on behalf of the 43. For example,  Venezuelan Analysis republished an article of Tamara Pearson of the Venezuela and Cuban sponsored television network TELESUR titled 43 Lives, 2 Countries slandering the victims of the Maduro government killed during anti-government protests in 2014 while at the same time failing to mention that in the case of the 43 disappeared students in Mexico the government officials identified as having colluded with a drug gang in taking the students are members of a left wing political party with ties to both Venezuela and Cuba.

Both Mexico and Venezuela are in the grips of waves of violence that have claimed tens of thousands of lives. Mexico with a population of 122.3 million according to the preliminary numbers published by the National Statistics Institute, (Inegi) had 22,732 homicides in 2013, equivalent to 22 per 100,000 inhabitants.  Meanwhile, Venezuela with a population of 30.41 million according to the Venezuelan Observatory on Violence, estimates that 24,000 people were murdered in 2013, according to the United Nations and the World Bank the number per capita is 54 per 100,000 inhabitants and is considered the second most likely place to be murdered on the planet with Honduras in first place. The bottom line on murder rates is that you are 2.5 times more likely to be murdered in Venezuela than in Mexico.

Some of the Venezuelan youth shot in the head in 2014 during protests

 However, the questions surrounding the 43 Venezuelans and 43 Mexicans murdered in a political context in 2014 resonate in both countries and raise fundamental questions of governance.

The mayor of Iguala, José Luis Abarca, and his wife Maria de los Angeles Pineda are suspected of ordering the disappearance of 43 students which took place on September 26, 2014 and colluding with a drug gang called Guerreros Unidos (United Warriors) who allegedly murdered the students.  The governor of Guerrero state, Angel Aguirre has taken a leave of absence due to growing criticism over his role in the affair. Both the mayor and governor are members of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD). Leaked diplomatic cables of the U.S. embassy in Mexico indicate that the Mexican president Calderon believed that Hugo Chavez's government had secretly funded the PRD candidate's election in 2006.  The PRD also has good relations with the Cuban dictatorship.

Since February 12, 2014 forty three Venezuelans have been killed during protests against rising insecurity and vanishing rights in their country. Over 5,000 have been injured and 3,000 arbitrarily detained. Among them is the opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez who advocated for nonviolent protests and remains arbitrarily detained despite the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on August 26, 2014 calling for his immediate release.The students shot and killed in the demonstrations by government soldiers and paramilitaries that work with the Maduro government.

The pattern of conduct and impunity that took place in Venezuela and Iguala with their respective 43 students is troublingly similar. A government official unhappy with student protesters orders troops to put down their demonstration and uses non-government para-military groups as shock troops to terrorize nonviolent students. This includes unarmed Venezuelan students shot and killed at point blank range. The difference between what happened in Mexico and in Venezuela is that in the Mexican case it is a local official while in the Venezuelan case national officials are involved.

What happened in Venezuela?
The series of events that sparked the student demonstrations in Venezuela began in Táchira on February 4, 2014 when a student at the University of Los Andes in the Botanical Garden of the University was the victim of an attempted rape. Students protested that "insecurity had taken over the campus." The protest was repressed and a number of students arrested and physically mistreated by the authorities. The news of the abuse by government officials sparked additional protests. 

The February 10th open letter tweeted by student leader Juan Requesens, who has more than 528,000 followers the message is one that is open to dialogue with the government on two conditions 1) that students who were arrested exercising their legitimate right to protest be freed and 2) that calling them "coup plotters" or "terrorists" for engaging in nonviolent protests to demand their rights is unacceptable.

February 12 in Venezuela is a national youth day and students across the country organized nonviolent mass demonstrations in response to the earlier repression and were met with violence by regime officials working in coordination with paramilitary groups known as "colectivos." Students were shot in the head and killed. This escalated the protests and as the violence increased the demands expanded and began to focus on Maduro. These facts are conveniently ignored by Ms. Pearson in her article.

What happened in Mexico?
Students trashed City Hall in Iguala in 2013 after the slaying of a leftist social activist. Iguala is located 80 miles south of Mexico City in the state of Guerrero. The murdered activist's widow, Sofia Mendoza, a City Council member, blames Mayor Abarca for that killing. The Mayor and his wife, Maria de los Angeles Pineda, were believed to have ordered local police to intercept and do away with the students who were en route to Iguala and might have disrupted a party and speech by Ms. Pineda on September 26, 2014 and were attacked before reaching their destination: six were killed, 25 were wounded and 43 went missing and have not been seen again.

More than 50 people have been arrested in connection with the disappearances, the majority of them police officers or members of the local drug gang Guerreros Unidos, all of whom authorities say were working together. It now appears that the mayor's wife, Pineda was the “principal operator” of Guerreros Unidos in Iguala.

The governor, Angel Aguirre, took a leave of absence because of the scandal, which has also handed President Enrique Peña Nieto his worst crisis during his presidency. Several top leaders of the left who had given Abarca their support have now distanced themselves from the tainted mayor. 

The Mexican government is saying that those arrested have admitted to killing the students and burning their remains. Family members are questioning the official version as one parent stated: "We are not going to believe anything until the experts tell us: You know what? It is them,"

International Coverage
Searching Google 212 reports mention protesters killed in Venezuela versus 220 reports mentioning 43 students killed in Mexico. Unfortunately, the campaign by Maduro apologists to slander the student movement in Venezuela while restricting the access of independent international human rights organizations to investigate what has taken place in Venezuela in stark contrast to the cooperation by the national Mexican government welcoming the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to investigate and not expelling or demonizing human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch.


From Military Dictators to Populists

Forty years ago military dictatorships in Latin America were murdering left wing students and in 2014 in Venezuela and Mexico populist left wing politicians are using police, para-militaries and gangs to murder left wing students who do not obey them. One constant during these 40 years is that the dictatorship in Cuba has had and continues to have good relations with regimes that murder students.

This is Latin America in 2014.

Venezuelan students showing their solidarity with their Mexican counterparts

Murdered human rights defender Natalia Estemirova: Four years later her killers are still free

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest. - Elie Wiesel

Murdered on July 15, 2009 for her work as a human rights defender

 Never met Natalia Estemirova and thanks to some unknown thugs I never will. She was a human rights defender in Russia defending the rights of the people of Chechnya. Four years ago today, on July 15, 2009 she was abducted at around 8:30am local time. Natalia was dragged into a white car (VAZ-2107) and driven off in an unknown direction. According to witnesses, Natalia Estemirova managed to shout out that she was being abducted.  

 

According to staff members of Memorial, she was on the way to a business trip to the Stavropol region of Russia. Her colleagues started to worry when she didn't arrive at the scheduled meetings. The same day at approximately 5.20 pm, Natalia Estemirova was found dead near Nazran in Ingushetia with evidence of two shots to the head.

Speaking in Germany on July 16, 2009 as her funeral was being held in Chechnya, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev promised a thorough investigation and pledged those responsible would be caught, reported the BBC at the time also observing that Medvedev said it was "obvious" to him that her murder was linked to her professional work. Forty days after her murder friends gathered in the Caucasus to remember Natalia.  

Four years later and her killers still remain at large. The government has now claimed in 2013 that it has ascertained the motive and that the murder probe was never suspended. "Investigators believe the crime was committed in connection with Estemirova's professional activity and with the view of unsettling the situation in Ingushetia and Chechnya."

Today protests are being held around the world in her memory and in France, the Paris based group ACAT, Amnesty International, Comité Tchétchénie, Le Convoi Syndical, l’Union des Electeurs russes, FIDH, Reporters Without Borders, and Russie-Libértes have called for a joint protest at “Place Igor Stravinsky (Beauborg)" in Paris at 6:30pm.

 

Two years ago Amnesty International announced that little progress had been made and 2939 messages were sent to Russian authorities calling on them to effectively investigate the murder of this human rights activist. In the urgent action, Amnesty International briefly outlined Natalia's work:

Natalia Estemirova was one of the leading researchers in the Grozny office of the Russian human rights organization Memorial. Since 2000 she had exposed numerous human rights violations committed during the second Chechen conflict and documented extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, torture and other human rights violations committed by law-enforcement agencies and government officials in post-conflict Chechnya. She was fighting injustice and refused to leave the Republic despite the criticism and frequent threats she received from Chechen officials.

There is a link of solidarity between Natalia Estemirova and Cuban exile activists and that is the Russian human rights organization Memorial. Back in 1997, a member of the student group Free Cuba Foundation visited Russia and met with members of Memorial who joined the campaign to obtain the freedom of a Cuban political prisoner, a member of the Cuban Committee for Human Rights. Thanks to international solidarity he was freed a short time after the campaign began. This act of solidarity with an imprisoned human rights defender was in keeping with Natalia Estemirova's core beliefs expressed in testimony she gave in September 2003 at Steps to Protection: The Second Dublin Platform for Human Rights Defenders, organized by the Irish nonprofit Frontline where she wrote about Zura Bitieva, a human rights defender who had been murdered along with her family. Natalia's testimony is reproduced below:

Chechnya I would like to tell you about a woman of whose life and death, I believe, the people must know.
Her name was Zura Bitieva. She lived in a small Chechen village. During ‘95-‘96, when the Russian army occupied Chechnya, she was actively involved in anti-war protests. She was not afraid of the fatal consequences. In 1999, the Russian army again invaded Chechnya, and in February 2000 she and her son Idris, were taken into the Chernokozov prison by a Russian soldier. Conditions of this prison were appalling in their brutality. Torture, killing, assault and human degradation were all part of this institution.

Zura was a small, aged and very sick woman. But her soul and the strength of her spirit, withstood the threats and beating of her captors. She defended other inmates in prison, with this strength. Zura went on hunger strike. She was released in a very ill condition. Her friends helped her go to Turkey. But once her health was slightly better, she went back to Chechnya, and began collecting evidence of crimes committed by the Russian soldiers and militia against the peaceful citizens of Chechnya. This evidence she submitted to UN and organizations for human rights. In the middle of a spring night 2003, her house was broken into by camouflaged and masked men. These men were part of the Russian forces. They killed her, her son Idris, her husband and her brother. Her one year-old grandson was gagged and left in a puddle of blood. Only her other son, escaped death by hiding in time.

Half a year passed, and the crime has still not been investigated.

Exactly two years before this event, Islamic fundamentalists in conjunction with the Russian forces, mortally wounded human rights defender Viktor Popkov. Still, the killers have not been brought to justice, even though this is quite possible.

In spring this year, men in camouflage and masks kidnapped a defender Imran Ezhiev. The press raised a storm, and after a few days Imran was dropped and left on a dirt road. To this day, he does not know where he had been, as he was gagged and cuffed. But he does know that his kidnappers were part of the Russian forces. He was saved by the press outcry.

I suggest that whenever a human rights defender is suffering, we should hold massive press gatherings to free the defender and lead proper investigations into their arrests. I also think that the Frontline website should have current and detailed information and news of human rights defenders – to be discussed by participants of this conference.

We owe it to Natalia and to human rights defenders in Russia and around the world that her killers be brought to justice. Other journalists continue to be killed with impunity in Russia. On July 9, 2013  Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev, a journalist whose work was critical of local authorities was shot and killed in Degestan. We maybe powerless to prevent these injustices but we must never stop denouncing them.

This is why in the Cuban context, 19 years after the "13 de Marzo" tugboat massacre and 17 years after the Brothers to the Rescue shoot down there are still protests and vigils demanding justice.  This is also why we must remember and protest these murders in Russia and say a prayer today for Natalia Estemirova and why on July 22 we will be doing the same for Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero.

The Case of Joachim Løvschall: Danish Student Gunned Down by Soldier in Cuba

Joachim Løvschall, a Danish student studying Spanish at the University of Havana gunned down by an AK-47 wielding Cuban guard as he walked home on the evening of March 29,1997. The body remained hidden for days. The shooter was never identified. Ten years after his son's extrajudicial execution, Christian Løvschall spoke at a parallel forum in Geneva Switzerland about what had happened. Below is the statement he made in 2007 at the United Nations.

 Joachim Løvschall

The Case of Joachim

Ladies and Gentlemen.

First of all thank you for giving me the opportunity to address you at this meeting here today, where I shall be talking to you about the terrible loss of our son Joachim on the 29th of March 1997, when you have listened to what I have to say I trust you will realize that 1997 will always stay as an "Annus Horibili" in the mind of our family.

To give you an understanding of our feelings and also of what made Joachim travel to Cuba, I will, as a start tell you something about the background of my boy and family.

 We are a quite international oriented family, my wife being a Norwegian national, the children and myself Danish. Our youngest daughter, however, is adopted from India, and joined us in 1978 when she was 3 years old. For about 8 years, in the eighties, we lived in the Middle East, where the children attended international schools. Before going abroad, my wife was for 12 years employed by a traveling agency, which resulted in numerous tours, also for the children, to destinations all over Europe. Furthermore we have hosted 2 international students - Each for a 1/2 a year period - in 1972 and 1974. In my present job I have for the last 17 years been traveling to more than 70 countries all over the world, having thereby established good contacts and, must I say, good friendships. Fortunately the friendships do not exclude anybody because of racial or political differences. On top of this our oldest daughter and two grandchildren are working and living in Norway.

And why do I want to enlighten you on this? My reason is that I want you to understand that Joachim was very much focused on international human relations and enjoyed making friendships across borders. You should know that he spoke seven different languages, and that the purpose of him going to Cuba was to learn the Spanish language. He did so well that he learned that language.

 In 3 months moving from no knowledge to almost speaking Spanish fluently and, as mentioned, all picked up during the 3 months he lived in Havana.

Although the killing took place on the 29th of March, we only came to know about it on the 6th of April - I.E. after 8 days were we had the feeling that the Cuban authorities were unwilling to inform anything about the incident. Only because of good relations with Spanish speaking friends in other Latin American countries did we succeed in getting into contact with the family with whom Joachim stayed and the repeated message from their side was that they could reveal nothing, but that the situation had turned out very bad and that we had to come to Cuba as soon as possible. At the same time all contacts to the responsible authorities turned out negatively, and worst of all we really felt nobody in Havana dared take contact to the police.

Only after continued pressure from our side on the Cuban embassy in Copenhagen, things suddenly changed and the sad information was given to us by our local police on the evening of the 6th of April.

We are, however, 100% convinced that had we not made use of our own contact and had we not continued our pressure on the embassy in Copenhagen, we might have faced a situation where Joachim would have been declared a missing person, a way out the Cuban authorities have been accused of applying in similar cases.

 So where does that leave us:

 We do feel we were (and still are) left with no answers except to maybe one of the following questions: Where, When, Who, Why

Starting out with the where we were told that Joachim was killed by the soldiers outside the Ministry of Interior.

What we do not understand is why no fence or signs did inform that this is a restricted area? I have been on the spot myself, and the place appears exactly like a normal residential area. So you may question whether this in fact was the place of the killing? Contrary to this the authorities keep maintaining that the area was properly sealed off, and the relevant sign posts were in place.

As to when Joachim was killed we only have the information received from the police because of the delay informing one might believe that this is another forgery made up to cover the truth.

The who was in our opinion has never been answered by the Cuban authorities. We understand that a private soldier on duty was made responsible for the killing, and also it has been rumored that his officer in charge has been kept responsible. This is of course the easy way out, but why can't we get to know the whole and true story? 

 Finally the why? Why would somebody kill a fine young man who was serious about his studies and without absolutely and criminal record whatsoever?

 Why is it that you are left with the terrible feeling that the truth has never been told, and why is it that the authorities are backing out and covering up?

Why did the soldiers have to fire two shots, one to his body and one to his head, to murder him? Was Joachim violent and did he, an unarmed individual, attack the armed soldiers? Or is it simply that the instruction to Cuban soldiers are: first you shoot and then you ask? But again: Who can explain why two shots were needed?

It is very difficult to understand that in a country working hard to attract tourists from abroad - many of whom are European non-Spanish speaking people - At the same time does not warn you about their special security rules and regulations as well as the non presence of signs of warnings around a building like the Ministry of Interior. I mean if, as a host, I allow somebody into my house, is it then not my responsibility to inform this somebody about the house rules and in case of misunderstandings warn them instead of shooting them?

To me such circumstances demonstrates the complete irresponsibility from the Cuban authorities side, and for sure may cause the reason for future incidents.

We lost our 27 years old boy, and whatever is done from the day he passed away, will never bring him back.

I have been raised in the faith that you are judged by your actions, and I do feel that this should apply to everybody - including a government in power, and you can't help being left with the feeling, that in Cuba the government and the authorities are above any law, resulting in disrespect and contempt for human life.

 I did visit Cuba twice, and from my observations I can only add that I do feel sorry for a people living their lives under a regime not respecting fundamental human rights.

All honor to my son, Joachim, he was a good son and we still miss him very much.

Thank you for listening to me.