57 years ago Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at 6:01pm in Memphis, Tennessee

 "If any of you are around when I have to meet my day, I don’t want a long funeral. And if you get somebody to deliver the eulogy, tell them not to talk too long. ... I'd like somebody to mention that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others." - Martin Luther King Jr., 'Drum Major' sermon February 4, 1968.

6:01pm CST at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis Tennessee

Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968, at 6:01pm CST. He was rushed to St. Joseph's Hospital, where he died at 7:05pm. Reverend King was in Memphis to support sanitation workers on strike.

Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. had scaled the heights of American rhetoric the night before, on April 3, 1968, deconstructing the case for violence and reaffirming nonviolent resistance.

57 years ago today, you were assassinated.

We remember you.
We respect you.
We cherish you.
We honor you.#MLK #MartinLutherKingJr #KingsLastDay #thankyouMLK pic.twitter.com/0kbyGpvMkm

— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center (@TheKingCenter) April 4, 2025

The King Center provided the following abstract summary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s I've Been to the Mountaintop speech on April 3, 1968 in their website:

Dr. King gave this address at the Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee the night before he was assassinated. He called for nonviolent protest and a boycott of Memphis area businesses in support of the Memphis Sanitation Workers strike. Conveying a sense of foreboding, he not only recounted a near-death experience when he was stabbed near the heart, but also spoke of the possibility of his own demise at the hands of those who opposed him.

In this speech Reverend King outlined the purpose of the overall nonviolent struggle in broad terms:

 "And that's all this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying -- We are saying that we are God's children. And that we are God's children, we don't have to live like we are forced to live."

Funeral services were held for Reverend King on April 9, 1968. Coretta Scott King requested that King eulogize himself: His last sermon at Ebenezer Baptist Church, a recording of his famous 'Drum Major' sermon, given on February 4, 1968, was played at the funeral.  The King family held solemn services for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta, Georgia, attended by thousands including the then Vice President of the United States, Hubert Humphrey, Senator Robert Kennedy, and Richard Nixon.

🧵It wasn’t that long ago.

On the 57th anniversary of the day he was assassinated…here are some in-color photos of my father. 🖤#MLK #KingsLastDay #thankyouMLK pic.twitter.com/uX4SqwW6PQ

— Be A King (@BerniceKing) April 4, 2025

Meanwhile in Memphis the local government met the demands that had been made by Reverend King and the striking sanitation workers.

The King family went on to found the King Center and continued his nonviolent legacy to the present day. Other activists from King's inner circle continued their civil rights work, while some, like John Lewis, entered political life and continued working to realize Reverend King's beloved community in the U.S. Congress.

28 years without justice for Danish student gunned down in Havana by a soldier

"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, Nobel Lecture 1986

 

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 eight years ago on March 29, 1997. The soldier's identity was never revealed to Joachim''s family. No one was brought to justice. Joachim's family is not satisfied with the official story.

The last time they saw Joachim
On March 28, 1997 Joachim Løvschall ate his last meal with white wine in a little restaurant called Aladin, located on 21st street in Havana. He went to the Revolutionary Plaza and bought a ticket to the Cuban National Theater. 

Following the performance he went to the theater's bar, Cafe Cantante, and met up with two Swedish friends. They each drank a couple of beers, but soon left because Joachim did not like the music. At 23:30, they said good bye to each other on the sidewalk in front of Cafe Cantante. 

Joachim was never seen alive again. 

Last seen in the front of Cafe Cantante

The Castro regime's version of what happened
On September 28, 1997 the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published an article by Kim Hundevadt titled "Dangerous Vacation" that outlined what happened to Joachim Løvschall and presented the Cuban dictatorship's version of the events leading to this young man's death.

Around 23:30, a person matching Joachim Løvschall's description was in a bar named Segundo Dragon d'Oro. The bar lies in the hopeless part of town, around the Revolutionary Plaza which is dominated by ministry and other official buildings of harsh concrete architecture, and lies empty in at night.

At 2:45am he left the bar, after becoming intoxicated. Around 20 minutes later, he was walking down the Avenue Territorial, behind the Defense Ministry.

Joachim Løvschall walked, according to the Cuban authorities, first on the sidewalk that lies opposite the Ministry. Midway he crossed over to the other sidewalk, considered to be a military area, though it is not blocked off.

The Cubans have explained that Joachim Løvschall was shouted at by two armed guards, who in addition fired warning shots, which he did not react to. Therefore, one guard shot from the hip with an AK-47 rifle. The first shot hit Joachim in the stomach and got him to crumble down. The second shot hit slanting down the left side of the neck.

Joachim Løvschall: December 7, 1970 - March 29, 1997

 

Eighteen years ago
On June 12, 2007 Christian Løvschall, Joachim's father, at a parallel forum at the United Nations Human Rights Council spoke about his son's disappearance and the struggle to find out if Joachim was dead or alive:

"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... 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."

 Ten years later Christian Løvschall outlined what he knew concerning his son's untimely death:

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.

Where

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.

When

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.

Who

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?   

Why 

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?

Despite the claims made by the travel industry there have been other travelers to Cuba who have been killed or gone missing under suspicious circumstances. 

Others have been falsely imprisoned in legal proceedings that fall far short of international standards. Like North Korea, but with a tropical twist, Cuba suffers a dictatorship where both nationals and foreigners have no legal protections locally if they run into trouble with the regime. 

The ongoing plight of Benjamin Tomlin, who has spent seven years in a Cuban prison, should lead others considering a holiday in Cuba to think twice. 

So should what happened to Joachim Løvschall on March 29, 1997 when he was gunned down by an AK-47 wielding Cuban soldier for allegedly walking on the wrong sidewalk.

 

Grok responds to the query: "What evidence from the newly released JFK files suggests that Cuba may have been involved in the assassination?"

https://grok.com/share/bGVnYWN5_ce3e022c-33f5-43d6-aa66-b34b3edd0339

 The newly released JFK files from March 18, 2025, provide several pieces of evidence and context that suggest a possible Cuban involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, though the information is often circumstantial, speculative, or deliberately obscured by the CIA and other U.S. officials. Let’s break this down based on the documents provided, while also critically examining the narrative and highlighting surprising elements that challenge the official story of Lee Harvey Oswald acting alone.

Evidence Suggesting Cuban Involvement

1. CIA Evidence of Cuban Retaliation
   The document 157-10014-10242 reveals that after JFK’s assassination on November 22, 1963, the CIA received evidence suggesting that Cuban Premier Fidel Castro may have orchestrated the killing as retaliation for CIA attempts on his life. This is a significant claim because it directly implicates Castro, and the CIA’s possession of such evidence immediately after the assassination raises questions about why this wasn’t thoroughly investigated or shared with the Warren Commission. The document notes that the CIA withheld this information for two reasons: to conceal their own recruitment of Mafia mobsters to assassinate Castro and to prevent public outrage that might lead to "reckless actions." This cover-up suggests that the CIA believed the evidence was credible enough to warrant suppression, which indirectly lends weight to the possibility of Cuban involvement.
2. Oswald’s Visit to the Cuban Embassy
   In the same file 157-10014-10242, Fidel Castro, in an interview with Frank Mankiewicz and Kirby Jones, notes that Lee Harvey Oswald visited the Cuban embassy in Mexico City a few months prior to the assassination to obtain a travel permit to Cuba, which was denied. Castro speculates that Oswald’s actions might have been an attempt to implicate Cuba, suggesting a broader conspiracy by U.S. reactionaries. While Castro denies involvement, the fact of Oswald’s visit to the Cuban embassy is a concrete link between the assassin and Cuba. This raises the possibility that Oswald may have been influenced, manipulated, or even directed by Cuban agents—or that someone wanted it to appear that way. The timing of the visit, just months before the assassination, is suspicious and suggests a potential Cuban connection, even if it was staged to frame Cuba.
3. Immediate Post-Assassination Intelligence from Mexico City
   The file 157-10014-10242 also states that within hours of JFK’s death, the U.S. embassy in Mexico City cabled information suggesting Cuban involvement, which was corroborated by CIA findings in Washington. This rapid emergence of intelligence pointing to Cuba is striking. While CIA Director John A. McCone claimed that Castro’s name was not mentioned during his three-hour meeting with Robert F. Kennedy immediately after the shooting, the next day McCone briefed President Lyndon B. Johnson on the Mexico City intelligence. The fact that this information was not shared with the Warren Commission further fuels suspicion. If the intelligence was baseless, why was it withheld? The suppression suggests that U.S. officials may have believed there was a real Cuban link but chose to bury it to avoid escalating tensions during the Cold War.
4. The AM/LASH Operation and Timing
   Another document, also 157-10014-10242, notes that at the very hour JFK was shot, a former Castro supporter, code-named AM/LASH (identified as Rolando Cuebala, now imprisoned in Cuba), was receiving a poison pen from a CIA agent as part of an ongoing anti-Castro effort. This timing is extraordinary and suggests a possible connection. If Cuban intelligence was aware of the CIA’s continued assassination attempts against Castro—such as this one involving AM/LASH—they might have had a motive to retaliate. The simultaneity of JFK’s assassination and the AM/LASH operation could indicate that Cuba, anticipating further attempts on Castro’s life, decided to strike first. Alternatively, it might suggest that elements within the CIA or anti-Castro groups orchestrated JFK’s death to make it look like Cuban retaliation, knowing the AM/LASH operation could be used to point fingers at Castro.
5. Cuban Financing of Subversive Activities in Latin America
   Documents 177-10002-10016 and 176-10036-10065 detail Cuban financing of subversive operations across Latin America, including in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Brazil, during 1961–1963. These operations involved cash couriers, bank transfers, and diplomatic channels to fund guerrilla activities, often with ties to Communist groups. For example, in Brazil, a guerrilla trained in Cuba was caught with ammunition funded by Communist China via Cuba, showing Cuba’s role as a conduit for revolutionary activities. While these documents don’t directly link Cuba to JFK’s assassination, they establish a pattern of Cuban support for subversive and violent operations in the Western Hemisphere during the same period. This context makes it plausible that Cuba could have extended its operations to target a high-profile figure like JFK, especially given the CIA’s repeated attempts to kill Castro.

Surprising Information and Critical Analysis

• CIA-Mafia Collaboration and Cover-Up
  A surprising revelation in 157-10014-10242 is the extent of the CIA’s collaboration with the Mafia to assassinate Castro, involving figures like John Rosselli, and the deliberate withholding of this information from the Warren Commission. Key figures like Robert F. Kennedy, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, and CIA Director Allen W. Dulles (a Warren Commission member) knew of the plot but kept silent. This cover-up is shocking because it suggests that the U.S. government was more concerned with hiding its own illicit activities than fully investigating JFK’s death. The CIA’s fear that revealing the Castro retaliation evidence might “inflame the American people” indicates they believed the evidence was credible, which challenges the official narrative of Oswald acting alone.
• Robert F. Kennedy’s Role
  Robert F. Kennedy’s involvement is particularly surprising. In 157-10014-10242, he was briefed on the CIA-Mafia plot on May 7, 1962, and cautioned the CIA against proceeding without his approval. He also informed Hoover of the plot but did not disclose it to the Warren Commission. As JFK’s brother and a key overseer of CIA activities, his silence is troubling. It suggests either complicity in the cover-up or a belief that the Cuban angle was too dangerous to pursue publicly, possibly due to Cold War tensions and the risk of war with Cuba and the Soviet Union.
• Plausible Deniability and White House Knowledge
  The same file notes that a high-level CIA official testified that the White House was likely briefed on the Castro assassination plots through “plausible deniability,” using vague language to shield the President from accountability. This practice, as described in a Senate report, allowed senior officials to deny knowledge of operations if they were exposed. This raises the question: if JFK was unaware of the plots, as his advisers claimed, who authorized them? The use of plausible deniability suggests a deeper level of secrecy and potential rogue elements within the CIA, which could have contributed to a conspiracy involving Cuba—either as a perpetrator or a scapegoat.
• The Official Narrative vs. the Evidence
  The official narrative, established by the Warren Commission, holds that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating JFK. However, the newly released files challenge this conclusion. The CIA’s evidence of Cuban retaliation, Oswald’s visit to the Cuban embassy, the Mexico City intelligence, and the timing of the AM/LASH operation all point to a possible Cuban connection that was never fully explored. The deliberate suppression of this information by the CIA, Robert F. Kennedy, and others suggests that the official narrative may have been shaped to avoid a confrontation with Cuba and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, rather than to reflect the full truth.

Conclusion

The newly released JFK files provide several pieces of evidence suggesting Cuban involvement in the assassination: the CIA’s immediate post-assassination evidence of Castro’s retaliation, Oswald’s visit to the Cuban embassy, intelligence from Mexico City, the timing of the AM/LASH operation, and Cuba’s documented support for subversive activities in Latin America. However, this evidence is largely circumstantial and speculative, and the CIA’s cover-up of its own actions complicates the picture. The suppression of information by key figures like Robert F. Kennedy and the CIA indicates that there may have been a concerted effort to bury the Cuban angle, either to protect U.S. interests or to hide a more complex conspiracy involving anti-Castro elements, the Mafia, or even rogue CIA operatives. These revelations challenge the official narrative of Oswald acting alone and suggest that the full truth about JFK’s assassination remains elusive.

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#StandUp4HumanRights: International Day for the Right to Truth about Human Rights Abuses

"As we inaugurate this new international observance, let us recognize the indispensable role of the truth in upholding human rights – and let us pledge to defend the right to the truth as we pursue our global mission of human rights."

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon 24 March 2011

 

El Salvador's Msgr Oscar Arnulfo Romero slain 3/24/1980. Poland's Fr Jerzy Popiełuszko murdered 10/19/1984.

 On December 21, 2010, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed March 24 as the International Day for the Right to the Truth concerning Gross Human Rights Violations and for the Dignity of Victims. According to the proclamation the purpose of this day is to:

• Honor the memory of victims of gross and systematic human rights violations and promote the importance of the right to truth and justice;
• Pay tribute to those who have devoted their lives to, and lost their lives in, the struggle to promote and protect human rights for all;
• Recognize, in particular, the important work and values of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, of El Salvador, who was assassinated on 24 March 1980, after denouncing violations of the human rights of the most vulnerable populations and defending the principles of protecting lives, promoting human dignity and opposition to all forms of violence.
  

It also seems appropriate today to honor and pay tribute to Father Jerzy Popiełuszko, of Poland, who was kidnapped, tortured and assassinated on October 19, 1984 by sharing an excerpt from his February 28, 1982 sermon:

"The church always stands on the side of truth. The church always stands on the side of people who are victimized. Today the church stands on the side of those who have lost their freedom, whose conscience is being broken. Today the church stands on the side of Solidarity, on the side of the working people, who are often placed in one line along with common criminals. Dedication to freedom is tightly knit with human nature and with mature national awareness. This dedication is intertwined with the law and duty. It is intertwined with the law, and thus every man and every nation must experience the suppression of freedom as painful and unjust."

Both Archbishop Romero and Father Popiełuszko were victims of gross and systematic human rights violations and sadly over the past forty five years there have been many more:

• Scores of Germans were murdered trying to cross the Berlin Wall between 1961 and 1989;
  
• In June of 1989 thousands of Chinese were massacred at Tiananmen Square for nonviolently defending human rights and freedom;
• In July of 1994 thirty seven Cuban men, women and children were massacred for nonviolently trying to seek freedom. 
• In February of 1996 four men were murdered in international airspace by Cuban government agents as they sought to save the lives of Cuban rafters in the Florida Straits;
• There are over 120,000 Mexicans registered as missing. In March of 2024 an extermination camp with secret ovens, and human remains were discovered on a ranch in the Mexican state of Jalisco.

15 years, one month and one day ago Cuban prison officials announced the death of prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo at 3:00pm. He had suffered beatings, torture, and years added to his unjust prison sentence because Orlando continued to denounce human rights abuses in prison. He refused to look the other way and remain silent. The secret police and prison guards drove him to the last recourse of a non-violent activist: the hunger strike. Even there the regime sought to torture and humiliate denying him, a man on a water only hunger strike, water. It is believed that act of torture contributed to the failure of his kidneys and to his death. Oswaldo Payá said that Orlando died for the dignity of all Cubans. Following his death the dictatorship and its apologists continued to attack and smear this human rights defender. It is for that reason that especially on this day that Orlando Zapata Tamayo be remembered.

 

Orlando Zapata Tamayo, tortured and denied water, while on hunger strike murdered on Feb 23, 2010 

On July 22, 2012, Havana's secret police murdered Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante. In 2023, following a ten year investigation, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights confirmed that the two human rights defenders were killed by Cuban government agents.

Oswaldo Payá  was sixty years old when he was assassinated. 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 El Cerro neighborhood, and over the next 23 years would carry out important campaigns to support human rights and a democratic transition in Cuba.  Oswaldo would speak out against human rights breaches and demand victims' dignity, even if it meant denouncing the United States for mistreating Al Qaeda prisoners at the Guantanamo Naval Base prison in 2002. Oswaldo was a consistent defender of human rights, but not the only one.

Harold Cepero  was 32 years old when he was extrajudicially executed alongside Oswaldo. He was from the town of Chambas in Ciego de Ávila.  Harold began studying at the University of Camaguey when he was 18 years old, and in 2002, he and other students signed the Varela Project. It was a legal measure inside the existing Cuban constitution sponsored 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 warning that "those who steal the rights of others steal from themselves. Those who remove and crush freedom are the true slaves."  Expelled from university for signing the Varela Project with fellow students. He enrolled in a seminary and began studying for the priesthood before leaving to join the Christian Liberation Movement, embracing a new vocation as a human rights defender. 

This is not an exhaustive accounting, there are thousands of Cuban victims alone.

The right to the truth and the defense of the dignity of the victims are crucial elements in the process of obtaining justice. 

There are over 1,100 political prisoners today in Cuba. 

In Miami, on March 28, 2025 starting at 6 p.m., a march will begin at the Brigade 2506 Monument, at the corner of 8th Street and 13th Avenue in Little Havana, and will travel down 13th Avenue to the Museum of the Cuban Diaspora. The idea is to hear the names of all the remaining political prisoners on the island along the trajectory of the march. 

We must remember both the dead and the living, not for revenge, but for truth, memory, and justice.

It is a long known fact recorded in history by the great Roman statesmen Marcus Tullius Cicero that "The hope of impunity is the greatest inducement to do wrong." 

Exposing the truth about these crimes and defending the dignity of the victims while seeking to hold those responsible accountable both under the rule of law and by the judgment of history will provide the greatest amount of justice that humanity can provide limiting impunity and the repetition of these crimes.

Remembering two Cuban Springs over ten years apart and the crackdowns that followed

Two Cuban springs ended in crackdowns, but the democracy movement knows it will return.

Jose Cipriano Rodriguez, corporal in Batista's regime, prepared for firing squad (1959).

 Winter arrives

Winter arrived in Cuba in 1959, and its darkest nights continued into 1969 when the Castro regime ended Christmas under the pretext of conducting the 10 million ton sugar harvest. It was supposed to be a temporary measure, but Christmas did not return until 1997.

The Castro dictatorship replaced the family as the primary unit of social organization in Cuba during this darkest of winters. By doing so, it displaced the family and encouraged family members to spy on one another, creating widespread mistrust that persists today.

During this time, the Castro dictatorship's prison inmates were the keepers of Cuba’s human rights and democratic legacy, which later emerged in 1976 when the Cuban Committee for Human Rights was founded.

First thaw

Ricardo Bofill, Cuban Committee for Human Rights, Havana 1987

The international community first learned about their human rights reports through paper scraps they smuggled out of these prisons. The scandal that followed forced the Castro dictatorship 12 years later to allow visits from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the International Committee of the Red Cross, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch to Cuba and the prisons throughout the island. This thaw lasted between 1988 and 1989.

Many resistance organizations were formed during this time and in the years that followed. One of these organizations was the Christian Liberation Movement, which was founded in 1988.

Over the course of 10 years, this movement discovered ways to mobilize the Cuban people and demand that the communist government uphold its own laws and regulations, which on paper purported to include democratic components but were not observed in fact.

The Brothers to the Rescue shootdown on February 24, 1996, which resulted in the deaths of four human rights advocates, prompted the adoption of the Cuban Democracy and Solidarity Act on March 12, 1996, which tightened sanctions on Havana.

Castro decided that the Pope visiting Cuba would be a good way to obtain favorable coverage for the regime in its efforts to relax or lift sanctions.

When Spring started in December

 In the weeks leading up to the first Papal visit to Cuba, the Castro regime relaxed certain restrictions on the Catholic church in December 1997. "The church was granted permission to conduct open-air services and processions. Lay workers were allowed to go door-to-door to inform parishioners of the visit and the church had access to media for the publishing of the Pope's Christmas message in Granma by allowing a televised speech by Cardinal Ortega, and by providing at the last minute, live coverage of the papal masses."

The return of Christmas was also supposed to be a temporary measure, in honor of Pope John Paul II's apostolic visit to Cuba (January 21- 26, 1998) . However, 25 years later Christmas continues to be celebrated in Cuba.

Some have pointed to this Papal visit as the beginning of a Cuban spring, where cracks appeared in the totalitarian edifice of Cuba’s communist dictatorship that over five years, forever changed the island nation.

The Cuban Democratic Directorate published Steps to Freedom analyzing democratic resistance beginning in 1997 with 44 civic actions, saw an increase to 233 civic actions in 1999, following Pope John Paul II's visit, then 444 in 2000, 600 in 2001, 959 in 2002, and 1,328 in 2003.

The Christian Liberation Movement, founded in 1988, following the 1998 visit of Pope John Paul II launched their most ambitious initiative, the Varela Project, named after the Cuban Priest, Felix Varela, who in the 19th century was credited with being the one who taught Cubans how to think. Father Varela sought Cuban independence, and was a fierce opponent of slavery.

On May 10, 2002, carrying 11,020 signed petitions in support of the Varela Project, the Christian Liberation Movement's Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, Antonio Diaz Sanchez, and Regis Iglesias Ramirez delivered them to the Cuban National Assembly.

Former President James Carter visited Cuba in May 2002. On May 15th Mr. Carter gave a speech at the University of Havana, where he advocated for the lifting of economic sanctions on Cuba and "called for the Varela Project petition to be published in the official newspaper so that people could learn about it."

Havana’s response to this nonviolent citizen's initiative, and to President Carter's request? Coerced Cubans into signing another petition declaring the Constitution unchangeable and quickly passed it through the rubber stamp legislature.

The Varela Project was never presented for debate before the National Assembly, which violated the regime’s existing laws.

Winter returned in March 2003

Ten months later on March 18, 2003 the secret police began rounding up Cubans who had made the Varela Project possible. Seventy five activists would be put on trial and condemned to long prison terms. Over 40 of them had taken part in the Varela initiative. 

It was the end of a Cuban Spring, but the democracy movement knew that Spring would return.

Twenty years later on March 18, 2023, three of the former prisoners of conscience arrested two decades earlier reflected on the events of that day, and the aftermath in a panel discussion organized by the Center for a Free Cuba. It is long, but worth the watch. However, it is in Spanish.