Remembering Cuban opposition leaders, Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero, both murdered by Castro regime on July 22, 2012

Cuba is a place where the government imprisons, forcibly exiles, or kills citizens who peacefully petition for change within the existing constitutional framework in defense of human rights.

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, and Harold Cepero Escalante, two martyrs for democracy in the Americas, were killed on July 22, 2012 by Castro's secret police.

Oswaldo Payá was sixty years old at the time that he was murdered by agents of the Castro regime. He was a family man and lay Catholic from Havana, an engineer, who in September 1988 founded the Christian Liberation Movement with fellow Catholics in the neighborhood of El Cerro, and over the next 23 years would carry out important campaigns to support human rights and a transition to democracy in Cuba.He would speak out against human rights violations and demand dignity for victims, even if it meant criticizing the US for the mistreatment of Al Qaeda prisoners at the Guantanamo Naval Base prison in 2002.

Oswaldo was a consistent defender of human rights.

Harold Cepero was 32 years old at the time he was killed together with Oswaldo. He was from the town of Chambas in Ciego de Ávila. At age 18, he began to study at the University of Camaguey, and in 2002, together with other students, Harold signed the Varela Project. It was an initiative that was legal within the existing Cuban constitution that had been authored by the Christian Liberation Movement.

Despite this, Harold and other students were expelled from the university for signing it and sharing it with others. The secret police would organize a mob to "judge", scream at, insult, threaten and expel the students who had signed the Varela Project. Following his expulsion on November 13, 2002, Harold wrote a letter in which he cautioned that "Those who steal the rights of others steal from themselves. Those who remove and crush freedom are the true slaves."

Expelled from the university for signing the Varela Project together with other students. He entered a seminary and began studying to enter the priesthood, but left to join the Christian Liberation Movement and became a human rights activist. 

Harold was a seminarian who became a human rights defender.

On May 10, 2002, Oswaldo, along with Regis Iglesias and Tony Diaz Sanchez of the Christian Liberation Movement, turned in 11,020 Varela Project petitions, and news of the petition drive was reported worldwide.

Regis Iglesias and Tony Diaz Sanchez were sentenced to long prison sentences in March 2003 following show trials, along with 73 other Cuban dissidents. Many of them had taken part in the Varela Project and, nearly eight years later, were forced into exile as an alternative to completing their prison sentences.

In spite of the crackdown, Oswaldo would turn in another 14,384 petition signatures with Freddy Martini on October 5, 2003. He would spend the next eight years campaigning for the release of his imprisoned compatriots and continuing campaigns to achieve a democratic transition in Cuba.

Ten years, two months and twelve days after turning in the first Varela Project petitions while traveling with two international visitors in Eastern Cuba on a Sunday afternoon on July 22, 2012, Oswaldo and Harold were killed. Cuban state security bumped into the car they were driving, and when the vehicles stopped, with everyone still alive in the car, they approached the driver, striking him in the temple with the butt of a pistol. Within hours, the lifeless and brutalized bodies of both men would appear.

 

 

These are somber times with a pandemic raging across the world, killing millions, in part, due to the lack of transparency of the Chinese Communist Party. Thousands have died in Cuba from COVID-19, in part because of the decision of the Cuban Communists to highlight their domestic vaccines, waiting months to inoculate their populace while vaccines were being distributed across the rest of Latin America.

 

Oswaldo Payá, when awarded the Sakharov prize for Freedom of Thought on December 17, 2002, spoke prophetically when he said: "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."

In the midst of darkness, it is important to remember these points of light that give us hope and a path to freedom and improved human rights in Cuba, and around the world.

Oswaldo Payá, Harold Cepero, and others living and dead have laid the groundwork that made possible the nonviolent character of the mass nationwide protests that marked a new before and after in Cuban history on July 11, 2021. 

Remembering Harold Cepero Escalante: the seminarian who became a human rights defender

"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)

Harold Cepero Escalante (January 29, 1980 - July 22, 2012)

Harold Cepero Escalante was born in the town of Chambas, in the province of Ciego de Ávila on January 29, 1980. He was drawn to his local Catholic Church in Chambas while in High School. 

In 1998, at age 18 he moved to Cuba's third largest city, Camagüey, and began his studies at the University of Camagüey. He also began, along with other university students, to take part in informal conversations with Father Alberto Reyes Pías.

Student expelled for signing the Varela Project

In 2002 Harold together with other university students signed the Varela Project.

The Varela Project, named after the 19th century Cuban Catholic Priest Felix Varela who resisted Spanish colonialism, was a citizen initiative that gathered signatures to hold a referendum to change existing laws in order to reform the Cuban legal system to bring it in line with international human rights standards. The Christian Liberation Movement (MLC) had followed the letter of the law in organizing the campaign.

 On May 10, 2002, after MLC turned in 11,020 signatures exceeding the 10,000 required by the regime,  the dictatorship's response to the nonviolent citizen's initiative was to first coerce Cubans into signing another petition declaring the Constitution unchangeable.

Harold knew that this regime pushed petition drive was a direct reaction to the Varela Project and refused to sign it. He also began to explain this among students at the university in the dormitories and hallways without fear. This is when the threats of expulsion from the university began.

The dictatorship's "petition" quickly passed through the rubber stamp legislature without debating the Varela Project, which according to the Cuban law drafted by the regime meant that it should have been debated by the National Assembly.

On November 13, 2002 State Security organized a mob to judge and expel Harold Cepero and Yoan Columbié, another youth who signed the Varela Project. They were screamed at, insulted, threatened and finally expelled.

This is a 2002 interview with Harold Cepero, and other students expelled from school for signing the Varela Project.

This is the letter that Harold wrote in protest following his expulsion from the University.

 With all due respect and the sincerity that they deserve, I think the arguments abound for our defense. Apparently the motive for this act, or I do not know how to call it, is our bad attitude towards the politics that prevail in our country today. The other, our approval of the Varela Project.I will start by saying that said project is a project of law signed by over eleven thousand Cubans (electors) and gathers up the fundamental needs of our people. I do not know why they are attempting (you who are now in a privileged situation with respect to us and those who think like us) to repress something that is not motivated by, nor has its origin in the hatred of the people, but rather in  openness, mutual respect, and dialogue.

They from their condition as: students, professors, PCC, UJC, etc., are breaking the law of the Republic. They are trying to trample on our dignity, that is of equal worth to theirs, a recognition and legal status to develop fully. Therefore, I think it totally unfair what they are attempting to do. This is a violation of international law, the Constitution and above all against our people.

The Varela Project is totally legal and recognized publicly by Fidel Castro. Also, if we support it because we believe it is just and so I would like them to consider it. The things we ask for do not exclude anyone, we simply want a space (which belongs to us) in the social life of Cuba.

Expelling us is not the solution neither for them or for us, it would be better to ask yourself why are there young people who are filled with concern and worry for the welfare of the country. It would be good that they explain to the students and to the people what the Varela Project is, what does it ask, and so give everyone the right to think and choose.

Today we are kicked out of the university for this. Tomorrow it could be one of you for just being different, for permitting yourself to think.

They are wanting to perpetuate something that it is not even known if it is fair, and in this manner they are denying the progress of a society that wants something new, something that really guarantees a dignified place for every Cuban. They are pressuring people or preventing them from expressing their true feelings, they are cultivating fear in the nation.

Under the pretext of defending freedom they are attacking it. Martí would say it like this: "The knife that is stabbed in the name of freedom is plunged into the chest of freedom". They should think if at the bottom of this attitude there is a real respect for freedom, because to say freedom, to be free, is not to snatch the freedom of others. I therefore ask that before they expel us ask themselves how long can they keep silent the mourning and the reality of Cuba, and remind them that the damage they can do to us is damage that they do to themselves. And more: it is a direct threat to every Cuban.

Those who steal the rights of others steal from themselves. Those who remove and crush freedom are the true slaves. 

Scores of Varela Project activists were arrested less than a year later in a crackdown that started on March 18, 2003 and became known as the Cuban Black Spring. Within days 75 human rights defenders, independent journalists, and Varela Project organizers were sentenced to long prison terms and recognized as prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International. Other Varela Project petitioners were threatened with the death penalty.   

Leaves seminary, and becomes a human rights defender

In 2003 Harold entered  the Seminary of the City of Camaguey and spent the next two years there. In 2005 he is transferred to the San Carlos and San Ambrosio Seminary in Havana. 

In 2009, Harold left the seminary and joined the Christian Liberation Movement and begins to coordinate its youth group and became a member of the Coordinating Council of the MLC.  He organized workshops on leadership training.

Harold understood that those who engaged in repression were also not free stating "[t]hose who remove and crush freedom are the real slaves."

Martyred ten years ago today.

Three years later on July 22, 2012 Harold Cepero Escalante was killed in Bayamo, Granma with Oswaldo Payá, the founder of the Christian Liberation Movement while on their way to conduct trainings in Eastern Cuba. 

Investigations, and a hearing over the past decade

On July 22, 2015, Javier El-Hage and Roberto González of the Human Rights Foundation released a 147-page report titled The Case of Oswaldo Payá concluded it was "the result of a car crash directly caused by agents of the State, acting (1) with the intent to kill Oswaldo Payá and the passengers in the vehicle he was riding, (2) with the intent to inflict grievous bodily harm to them, or (3) with reckless or depraved indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to the life of the most prominent Cuban activist in the last twenty-five years and the passengers riding with him in the car."

On December 14, 2021 a hearing was held at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on "Case 14.196 - Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, Harold Cepero and others vs Cuba." 

On May 19, 2022 the documentary short, "The truth about the murder of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero" premiered worldwide and was streamed over Youtube. 

Take action

People of goodwill that wish to send a message to the international community that the deaths of Oswaldo and Harold need to be investigated should sign the petition circulated by the Christian Liberation Movement. They are demanding truth and justice for their murdered founder Oswaldo Payá, and murdered youth leader Harold Cepero.

Please use the hashtags #PayáVive #OswaldoYHaroldViven along with quotes by Oswaldo and/or Harold Cepero with a link to the petition.

Remembering Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas: The Consistent Human Rights Defender

“For the dead and the living, we must bear witness...” Elie Weisel 

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas spent his entire adult life defending the human rights of the Cuban people. He founded the Christian Liberation Movement (MCL) in 1988 and used nonviolent means to demand that human rights be respected in Cuba. He mobilized tens of thousands of Cubans through the Varela Project on the need for a democratic transition. However, he did not only focus on the human rights violations of the Castro regime and consistently defended human rights in stark contrast to the current government in Oswaldo's homeland.

Two instances separated by a decade involving the United States and Iran demonstrate this courageous consistency in speaking truth to power.

On January 12, 2002, the Cuban Communist Party's daily newspaper Granma offered the official position of the dictatorship on the prison camp in Guantanamo: "We will not create any obstacles to the development of the [U.S. military] operation, though the transfer of foreign prisoners of war by the U.S. government to the base—located on a space in our territory upon which we have been deprived of any jurisdiction—was not part of the agreement that the base was founded upon."

The first Cuban on the island to criticize and denounce the United States for housing Afghan prisoners in Cuba and demanding they be treated with dignity was Cuban opposition leader Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas on December 17, 2002:  

"It's obviously a matter of shame that our land is being used for that purpose, having foreign prisoners brought to Cuba. Even if they are terrorists, they deserve respect. Their human rights should be respected."

Ten years later, on January 11, 2012,  Oswaldo Paya was criticizing the honoring of the Iranian despot Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, denouncing both his antisemitism and brutal human rights record:

"Tyrant lizard on the hill. Currently, Ahmadinejad speaks at the University of Havana. It is an insult to the students and an outrage to the sacred remains of Father Varela, and against the virtue and homeland of the Cubans."

"Mahmoud, why do you deny the Holocaust? Would you repeat it? Never again against any people."

Ten years ago on July 22, 2012 this consistent human rights defender was killed in what was a premeditated state security operation that led to the car crash, together with the killing of MCL youth leader Harold Cepero Escalante. Over the past decade his family and friends have demanded an investigation into these two deaths. 

Seven years ago, on July 22, 2015, Javier El-Hage and Roberto González of the Human Rights Foundation released a 147-page report titled The Case of Oswaldo Payá that concluded.

"Information that emerged in the months that followed and that was not at all considered by the Cuban court that convicted Carromero – consisting of witness statements, physical evidence and expert reports – suggest direct government responsibility in the deaths of Payá and Cepero. Specifically, the evidence deliberately ignored by the Cuban State strongly suggests that the events of July 22, 2012 were not an accident – as was quickly claimed by authorities in the state-owned media monopoly and later rubber – stamped by Cuba’s totalitarian court system – but instead the result of a car crash directly caused by agents of the State, acting (1) with the intent to kill Oswaldo Payá and the passengers in the vehicle he was riding, (2) with the intent to inflict grievous bodily harm to them, or (3) with reckless or depraved indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to the life of the most prominent Cuban activist in the last twenty-five years and the passengers riding with him in the car."

Less than a year ago on December 14, 2021 a hearing was held at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on "Case 14.196 - Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, Harold Cepero and others vs Cuba." 

On May 19, 2022 the documentary short, "The truth about the murder of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero" premiered worldwide and was streamed over Youtube.

The Christian Liberation Movement will hold a Tribute for Oswaldo and Harold on the tenth anniversary of their murders at 3:00pm on July 22, 2022 at the Westchester Regional Library located at 9545 Coral Way, Miami, Florida. They have also announced masses to be held in Poland, France, Spain, Mexico, and Costa Rica. 

Cuba Decide announced the presentation in Spanish of the Biography of Oswaldo Payá. With Pulitzer Prize winner David Hoffman on Friday, July 22, at 6:30pm at the Varela Hall of the Ermita de la Caridad. Mass in celebration of the lives of Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, and Harold Cepero Escalante will commence at the Ermita at 8:00pm.

People of goodwill that wish to send a message to the international community that the deaths of Oswaldo and Harold need to be investigated should sign the petition circulated by the Christian Liberation Movement. They are demanding truth and justice for their murdered founder Oswaldo Payá, and murdered youth leader Harold Cepero.

Please use the hashtags #PayáVive #OswaldoYHaroldViven along with quotes by Oswaldo and/or Harold Cepero with a link to the petition.

"Those who remove and crush freedom are the real slaves." - Harold Cepero Escalante (January 29, 1980 - July 22, 2012)

"They have told me that they will kill me before this regime ends, but I will not flee." - Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas (February 29, 1952 - July 22, 2012)