Yes to the UN Human Rights Council and No to UNESCO

 The US should stay in the UN Human Rights Council but leave and defund UNESCO like President Reagan did in 1984.

Stay

 There is a discussion underway on whether or not the United States should remain in the UN Human Rights Council. Recognizing that the UN Human Rights Council was founded on a small moral compromise that sacrificed human rights oversight in Belarus and Cuba in what UN officials called the dawn of a new era; that the worse of the worst have been elected to this human rights body and these bad actors have gutted human rights standards, furthermore that the moral authority of the Council has been compromised and there is an international human rights crisis due to the politicization of human rights by the radical left. This culminated in the UN Human Rights Council paying homage to the memory of Fidel Castro after he died in what was an act of moral corruption. It is understandable why some would want to leave the Council but that would be a mistake.

This ongoing human rights crisis presents an opportunity for conservatives to save international human rights standards. Conservatives must reject the mistaken left wing narrative that claims that human rights emerged out of the French Revolution. The Revolution in France rejected traditions, established truths and declared war on the Church. The end result was terror, genocide and a military dictator (Napoleon Bonaparte) This would involve a public education campaign exploring the roots of modern human rights thought that stretches back to debates within the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages, and during the European Age of Discovery in the debate over the rights of Native Americans by the Salamanca School following Colombus's arrival in America to British liberties beginning with Magna Carta, conservatives who led the international anti-slavery fight in Great Britain such as William Wilberforce and Edmund Burke's conservative defense of Indian civilization offered an important contribution that considered the role of providence.

Contrast this with the Obama Administration's pursuit of a radical agenda turning human rights upside down: declaring abortion a human right, was on more than one occasion not only on the wrong side of the human rights conversation but also taking (or refusing to take action) at the UN Human Rights Council. The Obama White House praised Raul Castro, refused to defend US sanctions on Cuba, although it is the law, but demonized Israel and and did not support them at the United Nations before resolutions presented by hostile countries. Obama's Cuba legacy is one of legitimizing tyranny, marginalizing dissidents and a dramatic escalation of human rights violations in Cuba. This trend has continued to manifest itself world wide throughout his Presidency with human rights deteriorating over the past eight years. To be fair this trend predated the Obama White House but only worsened during their tenure.

If it were up to me the United States would stay in the UN Human Rights Council but engage in aggressive diplomacy placing the anti-American dictatorships in the Council on the defensive in public debates and in the bureaucracy.

It is China, Cuba and Venezuela that do not belong on the UN Human Rights Council.The world's oldest continuous constitutional democracy, the United States needs to be on the Council to take the fight to human rights violators and expose their hypocrisy.

Nevertheless, the White House should immediately pull out of  UNESCO and defund it. The United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) is so out of touch with what it mission should be that on June 18, 2013 it added “The Life and Works of Che Guevara” to the World Registrar. UNESCO is providing funds to preserve Che Guevara’s papers. Guevara in addition to promoting communist ideology, is best known as an advocate for guerrilla warfare who viewed terrorism as a legitimate method of struggle against an enemy. U.S. tax dollars are paying for some of this and they shouldn't be.

Ronald Reagan defunded and left UNESCO in mid 1984 because the hard left was using it to spread its anti-American and radical left ideologies but George W. Bush brought the United States back into UNESCO after a twenty year boycott believing it had reformed and took the United States out of the Human Rights Council. Returning to UNESCO was a mistake, the organization is back to its old tricks that are hostile both to U.S. values and national security interests.

Meanwhile leaving the UN Human Rights Council would leave the attacks against the United States in this body unanswered and new resolutions set possibly pernicious to the United States. The Reagan Administration took the offensive on human rights after the US had played defense and they were successful in placing outlaw regimes on the defensive.

Defund and leave UNESCO not the UNHRC

Cost of dictatorship and indifference: Cuban political prisoner Hamell Santiago Más Hernández died on February 24, 2017

As we observe martyrs who died 21 years ago on February 24th and 7 years ago on February 23rd the Castro regime is still creating new ones such as Hamell Santiago Mas Hernández.

Hamell Santiago Más Hernández age 45 died in a Cuban prison on February 24, 2017

 Hamell Santiago Más Hernández, a political prisoner and an activist of the Unión Patriótica de Cuba (Unpacu), died on Friday, February 24, 2017 in the Combinado del Este prison located in Havana. Jose Daniel Ferrer over twitter charged that ill treatment and torture had led to Hamell's untimely death.
 
In the midst of observing the anniversaries of two grave injustices in Cuba last week ( the death of prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo on February 23, 2010 after years of torture, beatings and ill treatment and the February 24, 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shoot down when the Castro brothers ordered the destruction of two civilian planes in international air space killing Carlos Costa, Pablo Morales, Mario De La Peña and Armando Alejandre Jr. Hamell's passing got minimum media coverage.

Meanwhile as Latin American democrats were barred from entering Cuba because of their solidarity with Cuban democrats shamefully American members of Congress remained publicly silent about  these human rights concerns and focused on engaging in commerce with the Castro regime and military that controls the national economy of Cuba. Both The Washington Post and National Review called them on this lack of solidarity with democrats and appeasement with a communist dictatorship.

But what of Hamell Santiago and his family? Another name added to the long list of victims of the Castro dictatorship that too many in the world ignore in order to pursue their business deals with his killers. Sadly this is not unique to Cuba but has also been repeated in China, Vietnam, Iran, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere to the detriment of international human rights standards over the past 15 years.

Despite the claims of some apologists for the opening to the Castro regime, Amnesty International in its 2017 country report does not report advances on human rights and notes that Cuba is the only country in the Western Hemisphere that does not allow them to visit.

That should not come as a surprise. If they Castro regime can't even tolerate a human rights award ceremony in a private home then how would they tolerate human rights monitoring in their repressive island prison?

It also means that there will be more Hamell Santiagos, Orlando Zapatas, Pedro Luis Boitels, and Oswaldo Payás that is not only the price of dictatorship but also of the indifference of too many of the world's democracies.

Rosa María Payá went to the Ministry of Justice in Cuba to review the case of her dad Oswaldo Payá and friend Harold Cepero

 Justice for Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero

Rosa María Payá at the Cuban Ministry of Justice (twitter)

Today, February 27, 2017 at 10:30 am Rosa María Payá delivered to the Ministry of Justice of Cuba an appeal for a judicial review to Maria Esther Reus González, Minister of Justice. In accordance with the procedures of Cuban criminal law, she presented an appeal for a judicial review of the conviction of Angel Carromero for the events that caused the death of her father, Oswaldo Payá, and her friend Harold Cepero.

Rosa María expressed that:

"According to Cuban law, anyone can request a review of a criminal case and I decided to do it not only because Angel Carromero alleged that another car had intentionally hit the car he was driving, but also because the rules of due process were violated when he was prevented from providing expert evidence which would determine if the event was provoked. I submit the request for judicial review to the competent authorities: the Minister of Justice, the President of the Supreme Court and the Attorney General. With this process, the last legal possibility of discussing the case in Cuba is exhausted. By law, one of these authorities must respond within 90 days. Consequently, we remain waiting, without prejudice to the allegations and with evidence that we will present in various international legal forums.

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, and Harold Cepero Escalante died under circumstances that point to an extrajudicial killing carried out by the Castro regime's intelligence services on July 22, 2012.  World leaders and human rights defenders in 2013 called for an inquiry into deaths of Oswaldo and Harold, among them was South African Nobel Peace Laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante killed on 7/22/12

On July 22, 2015, the third anniversary of the death of Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá, the New York based Human Rights Foundation released a report:

"...highlighting the inaccuracies and inconsistencies of the official government investigation following Payá’s death in 2012. HRF has documented numerous due process violations, including damning witness accounts, a grossly inadequate autopsy examination, and other key pieces of evidence that were overlooked by the Cuban judicial system. HRF’s report concludes that the “evidence, which was deliberately ignored, strongly suggests that the events of July 22, 2012 were not an accident, but instead the result of a car crash directly caused by agents of the state.”

Later in the day Rosa María Payá delivered copies of the appeal also to the Supreme Court and the General Prosecutor's Office. Over Facebook she streamed a live video explaining what she was doing. For more information, visit CubaDecide and the Latin-American Youth Network for Democracy or e-mail red@juventudlac.org 

The February 24, 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shootdown remembered

Truth, memory, and justice for Carlos, Pablo, Mario, Armando and their loved ones.

 
Twenty one years ago today on a sunny Saturday afternoon over the Florida Straits three civilian planes of Brothers to the Rescue engaged in a search and rescue mission for fleeing refugees. At the same time they were being hunted by two Cuban MiGs and two of the planes were destroyed by air to air missiles on the Castro brothers orders killing four men: Carlos Costa, Pablo Morales, Mario De La Peña and Armando Alejandre Jr.  The third plane was able to escape the fate of the other planes and the survivors bore witness to what had happened.

Later on it was learned that the Cuban dictatorship had planned this attack months in advance, with the aid of Cuban spies operating in South Florida and that this was an act of state terrorism. The families of the four men have waged a steadfast effort to obtain justice for their loved ones.

Source: Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Report Nº 86/99 Case 11.589 Armando Alejandre Jr., Carlos Costa, Mario De La Peña, and Pablo Morales Cuba September 29, 1999

7 years ago on February 23 after years tortured, Orlando Zapata Tamayo died on hunger strike

"He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it." - Martin Luther King Jr.

Orlando Zapata Tamayo
Human Rights Defender

May 15, 1967 - February 23, 2010

Cuban prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo died on February 23, 2010 after years of torture and a prolonged water only hunger strike in which prison authorities over the course of more than two weeks on and off refused him water. 
    Following his death the Castro regime and its agents of influence sought to slander Orlando's memory. However, activists who knew Orlando had already spoken on the record as had Amnesty International.
     For example, on the same day Orlando Zapata died, Cuban opposition leader Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas in a heartfelt message explained the circumstances surrounding his untimely death: 

Orlando Zapata Tamayo, died on this afternoon, February 23, 2010, after suffering many indignities, racist slights, beatings and abuse by prison guards and State Security. Zapata was killed slowly over many days and many months in every prison in which he was confined. Zapata was imprisoned for denouncing human rights violations and for daring to speak openly of the Varela Project in Havana's Central Park. He was not a terrorist, or conspirator, or used violence. Initially he was sentenced to three years in prison, but after successive provocations and maneuvers staged by his executioners, he was sentenced to more than thirty years in prison.

     The slander campaign has failed because people of good will paid attention and refused to remain silent. In Canada, a punk rock band composed and played a song titled Orlando Zapata that placed his death in context. A video accompanying the song was edited by the Free Cuba Foundation. Orlando's death focused attention on Cuban prisoners of conscience and was a factor in their release between 2010 and early 2011.



Background

Orlando Zapata Tamayo was born in Santiago, Cuba on May 15, 1967. He was by vocation a brick layer and also a human rights activist, a member of the Movimiento Alternativa Republicana, Alternative Republican Movement, and of the Consejo Nacional de Resistencia Cívica, National Civic Resistance Committee. Orlando gathered signatures for the Varela Project, a citizen initiative to amend the Cuban constitution using legal means with the aim of bringing Cuba in line with international human rights standards.

     Amnesty International had documented how Orlando had been arrested several times in the past. For example he was temporarily detained on 3 July 2002 and 28 October 2002. In November of 2002 after taking part in a workshop on human rights in the central Havana park, José Martí, he and eight other government opponents were arrested and later released. He was also arrested on December 6, 2002 along with fellow prisoners of conscience Oscar Elías Biscet and Raúl Arencibia Fajardo.  
     Dr. Biscet just released from prison a month earlier had sought to form a grassroots project for the promotion of human rights called "Friends of Human Rights." State security prevented them from entering the home of Raúl Arencibia Fajardo, Oscar Biscet, Orlando Zapata Tamayo, Virgilio Marante Güelmes and 12 others held a sit-in in the street in protest and chanted "long live human rights" and "freedom for political prisoners." They were then arrested and taken to the Tenth Unit of the National Revolutionary Police, Décima Unidad de La Policía Nacional Revolucionaria (PNR), in Havana.
    Orlando Zapata Tamayo was released three months later on March 8, 2003, but Oscar Elias Biscet, Virgilio Marante Güelmes, and Raúl Arencibia Fajardo remained imprisoned. On the morning of March 20, 2003 whilst taking part in a fast at the Fundación Jesús Yánez Pelletier, Jesús Yánez Pelletier Foundation, in Havana, to demand the release of Oscar Biscet and the other political prisoners. Orlando was taken to the Villa Marista State Security Headquarters. 
     He was moved around several prisons, including Quivicán Prison, Guanajay Prison, and Combinado del Este Prison in Havana. Where according to Amnesty International on October 20, 2003 Orlando was dragged along the floor of Combinado del Este Prison by prison officials after requesting medical attention, leaving his back full of lacerations. Orlando managed to smuggle a letter out following a brutal beating it was published in April of 2004:

My dear brothers in the internal opposition in Cuba. I have many things to say to you, but I did not want to do it with paper and ink, because I hope to go to you one day when our country is free without the Castro dictatorship. Long live human rights, with my blood I wrote to you so that this be saved as evidence of the savagery we are subjected to...

    On May 18, 2004 Orlando Zapata Tamayo, Virgilio Marante Güelmes, and Raúl Arencibia Fajardo were each sentenced to three years in prison for contempt for authority, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest in a one-day trial. Orlando Zapata Tamayo would continue his rebelliousness and his non-violent resistance posture while in prison and suffer numerous beatings and new charges of disobedience and disrespect leading to decades added to his prison sentence in eight additional trials.

The importance of remembrance
     Friends of freedom all too often are on the defensive explaining who and what they are against. The lives of courageous nonviolent activists such as Orlando Zapata Tamayo, Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, Harold Cepero Escalante, Laura Inés Pollán Toledo and the four men murdered in the Brothers to the Rescue shoot down who were martyred by the Castro dictatorship should be remembered and told to others. The enemies of freedom do not like to have such heroes remembered and honored.  For example on May 24, 2010 in Oslo, Norway a Cuban diplomat attacked and bit a 19 year old Cuban-Norwegian girl who was filming her mother's protest on behalf of Orlando Zapata Tamayo outside of the Cuban embassy. The whole episode was a public relations disaster for the Castro dictatorship in Norway.

Take action
     People of good will around the world who wish to remember can join in a 24-hour water-only fast starting at 3 p.m. on Feb. 23, the day and time that Orlando Zapata Tamayo died on hunger strike followed by a silent vigil the following day from 3:21 p.m. to 3:27 p.m. to correspond with the times Carlos Costa, Pablo Morales, Mario De La Peña and Armando Alejandre Jr. were shot down on February 24th.
    Fasting for 24 hours is a limited way to step, albeit briefly and incompletely, into Orlando Zapata Tamayo's shoes. Beginning the fast at 3:00pm on February 23 and completing it on February 24 at 3:00pm just in time to honor and remember the four members of Brothers to the Rescue seems an appropriate way to pay homage. 
     They all demonstrated with the lives they led and by how they died that the Bible passage, John 15:13 is as relevant as ever: "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends." Please use all the means at your disposal through social media and word of mouth to let others know about them.

 
The price of indifference
     The failure of solidarity with Cubans in the island has led to the Castro regime not only increasing repression at home but also projecting itself elsewhere in the Americas and sadly now Venezuelans are also dying or being killed for defending freedom in their country.

#PayaPrize: Castro regime reveals its totalitarian and repressive nature before region's democrats

Our interest is to bring Cuba closer to Inter-American values and principles and expand its achievements in science, health and education. - Luis Almagro, the Secretary General of the OAS

Award ceremony in Havana at 11:00am this morning

At 11:00am with her home surrounded by Cuban State Security and with the names of Mr. Luis Almagro and Ms Mariana Aylwin taped to two empty chairs Rosa Maria Payá and a small group of activists who had managed to evade the security cordon carried out the award ceremony. At the same time in Miami, Ofelia Acevedo and other Cuba Decides activists held a press conference to update what had been going on and she explained to The Miami Herald: “We have seen their level of intolerance, arrogance and contempt for others,” she said. “They feel attacked because other personalities in the world recognize not only the Oswaldo Payá award, but also because in Cuba there are people who think differently and have different alternatives.”

Ofelia Acevedo, Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas's widow addresses the press

Earlier this morning Luis Almagro, the Secretary General of the Organization of American States reported over social media that he had been denied entry to Cuba by the Castro regime's immigration authorities.

Letter from @Almagro_OEA2015 to @RosaMariaPaya after being denied visa to travel #Cuba to receive #OswaldoPayá prize https://t.co/GTGfcMNSPt pic.twitter.com/EcvztU91Mw

— OAS (@OAS_official) February 22, 2017

He was the third high ranking Latin American democrat to be blocked from entering Cuba in the past 72 hours. A day earlier on February 21, 2017 former Mexican president Felipe Calderón was also told he would not be able to enter Cuba and on the evening of  February 20, 2017 former minister and member of parliament Mariana Aylwin, who is also the daughter of the former Chilean president Patricio Aylwin was declared inadmissible by the Castro regime's immigration machinery. The past seventy two hours should have dispelled any notions that the Castro regime has changed.

Cuba under General Raul Castro remains a totalitarian communist state that only legally recognizes the communist party, one educational system that it controls, one centrally planned economy that it also controls, regime monopoly over all media, and a communist moral code. Independent grassroots organizations are illegal and critical thought is punished.

Hannah Arendt, the political scientist who wrote The Origins of Totalitarianism, in a lecture on the profound difference between authoritarianism and totalitarianism delivered at Oberlin College on October 28, 1954: “If we look at it as a form of government, it rests on two pillars: on ideology and on terror. It is no tyranny because tyranny is lawlessness and because it is content with the political sphere in the more narrow sense of the word.” ...“Authoritarianism in many respects [is] the opposite of totalitarianism."

This is why a private award ceremony in Havana is turned into an international crisis because the totalitarian regime in Cuba refuses to tolerate international political figures recognizing dissidents, even if it is only to accept an award. Secretary General Almagro in a letter to Rosa Maria outlined the Castro regime's objections:

Last Thursday, OAS official Chris Hernandez-Roy was called to a meeting by the Consul of Cuba in Washington and the First Secretary of the Consulate during which the following was conveyed to him:

1. The surprise of the Cuban authorities at the reason for the visit
2. That they would not grant us the visa
3. That our entry to Cuba would be denied, (even in the case of traveling with a Uruguayan diplomatic passport)
4. Their “astonishment” at the involvement of the Secretary General of the OAS in anti-Cuban activities
5. That the reason for which we requested the visa is considered “an unacceptable provocation”
6. That the prize is not recognized by the Cuban state
7. They characterized the activities of “Cuba Decides” as undermining the Cuban electoral system.

Presenting a human rights award named after a nonviolent Cuban activist is according to the Castro dictatorship an "anti-Cuban activity" furthermore that the prize "is not recognized by the Cuban state" and "an unacceptable provocation." Finally the "Cuba Decides" campaign for a plebiscite within existing Cuban law according to the dictatorship is "undermining the Cuban electoral system." Cuban citizens cannot independently create a prize and offer it to someone for their good works without the permission and recognition of the Castro regime. Seeking to give Cuban citizens a voice to exercise their sovereignty is considered subversive by the Castro dictatorship.

Friends of Cuban Decides following the award ceremony in Havana.

 The Castro regime's embassy in Chile issued a statement worth analyzing to better understand the nature of the system being confronted by Cuban democrats that repeated many of the same points raised with Almagro but went further in libeling Cuba Decides: ... “as an illegal anti-Cuban group that acts against the constitutional order and that provokes the repudiation of the population, with the collusion and financing of politicians and foreign institutions, in order to generate internal instability and, at the same time, affect our diplomatic relations with other countries.”

The facts of the matter are that the dictatorship does not respect its own constitutional order if it in any way limits the regime. Furthermore dissidents are systematically disenfranchised from the economy to keep them marginalized. Finally there is no freedom of assembly or association and citizen initiatives such as the Varela Project are never aired over the official media which is the only mass media on the island. This is why some in the opposition have to seek funds outside of Cuba and access to international media with the hope that it will bounce back into the island.  Nevertheless the dangers of dissent far outweigh any benefits as the untimely deaths of Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero Escalante would demonstrate and still need to be investigated five years later.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article134256469.html#storylink=cp

Communist regimes have a century long track record of killing dissidents and Cuba is no different, but it is important to remember that there are two types of executions. Thousands have been placed against the wall and executed by firing squad in Cuba, others have been victims of extrajudicial killings using a variety of methods ranging from poison, car "accidents", drowning or a shot in the back. However there is what Cuban writer Carlos Alberto Montaner called the "other wall"  and subtitled it "the assassination of character in Cuba" and his presentation in Spanish is available online that describes the killing of reputations.

Orlando Zapata Tamayo: May 15, 1967 - February 23, 2010

Even worse Cuban dissidents have been subjected to both types of execution. The case of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, an Amnesty International prisoner of conscience, who died on February 23, 2010 is a case in point. He was beaten down repeatedly and tortured over seven years in Cuban prisons for his human rights activism. Orlando Zapata Tamayo had collaborated on the Varela Project with Oswaldo Payá and engaged in human rights education campaign with Dr. Oscar Elías Biscet. His death while on hunger strike drew international attention and led to a posthumous campaign of slander by Castro regime agents to deny Orlando Zapata's history as an activist seeking to portray him instead as a violent criminal.

Today while taking part in a television program I heard first hand this execution by character assassination by a Castro regime apologist. The attack to slander and destroy the reputation of  Rosa Maria Payá using logical fallacies is underway. Under the vast majority of moral and ethical systems the ad hominem attacks, slanders and libels directed against Rosa are profoundly evil.

Communist morality has no problem with any of it because as the communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin observed in a speech to Russian communist youth on October 2, 1920:

"The class struggle is continuing and it is our task to subordinate all interests to that struggle. Our communist morality is also subordinated to that task. We say: morality is what serves to destroy the old exploiting society and to unite all the working people around the proletariat, which is building up a new, communist society."

Ronald Reagan understood the full significance of communist morality as defined by Lenin and identified how this was applied by the communist regime in Russia in 1983:

... "I pointed out that, as good Marxist-Leninists, the Soviet leaders have openly and publicly declared that the only morality they recognize is that which will further their cause, which is world revolution. I think I should point out I was only quoting Lenin, their guiding spirit, who said in 1920 that they repudiate all morality that proceeds from supernatural ideas -- that's their name for religion -- or ideas that are outside class conceptions. Morality is entirely subordinate to the interests of class war. And everything is moral that is necessary for the annihilation of the old, exploiting social order and for uniting the proletariat."

This is Machiavelli's the ends justify the means on steroids. Communist morality views revolution via class struggle as a moral imperative while at the same time dismissing traditional moral and ethical systems based in metaphysical absolutes as an instrument to control the working class.  

The outcome of this morally flawed system has been over a 100 million killed and counting, generations living in misery and the emergence of totalitarian dictatorships the world over preaching egalitarianism but delivering hardship and slavery to billions.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article134256469.html#storylink=cpy

Oswaldo Payá and his legacy of life and liberty

"We say that what you have to do is give the vote to the Cuban people." - Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, 2011

Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas: martyred icon of nonviolence

Today marks four years and seven months since Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, and Harold Cepero Escalante died under circumstances that point to an extrajudicial killing carried out by the Castro regime's intelligence services. It will also mark the presentation of the the first Oswaldo Payá Liberty and Life Prize in Havana in an event organized by the Latin America Youth Network for Democracy and the Cuban citizen initiative Cuba Decide. This award ceremony will recognize both Mr. Luis Almagro, Secretary General of the Organization of American States and, in a posthumous manner, Don Patricio Aylwin with an honorable mention that was to be received in his name, by his daughter, the former member of parliament and former Chilean minister, Mariana Aylwin. However the Castro regime denied her entry to Cuba at the last moment.

Nevertheless the ceremony will take place Wednesday, February 22, at 11:00 am at the Payá residence located at: 221 Peñón Street, between Ayuntamiento St. and Monasterio St in Havana, Cuba. This is taking place amidst a massive state security operation that seeks to silence Rosa María Payá shutting off her cell phone and limiting her internet access. The dictatorship has even generated an international crisis refusing for the first time to allow a former Mexican president, Felipe Calderon, to enter Cuba. Independent journalists and activists on the island have been detained or denied access to transportation in order to impede their covering or attending the award ceremony in Havana. These tactics are not new and have been applied to other activists such as the Ladies in White.

The question that arises observing all these regime machinations is why? Consider for a moment Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas never advocated violence, rejected hatred, organized a petition drive for democratic reforms that fell well within the legality of the Castro regime. Nevertheless, he was the victim of harassment, death threats, and an untimely death.

Why is the Castro regime behaving this way?
The answer is that paradoxically totalitarian regimes are quite resilient at confronting and crushing a violent resistance, but nonviolent resistance and speaking truth to power are existential threats to that kind of dictatorship.

Oswaldo Payá spoke plainly about regime crimes such as the "13 de Marzo" tugboat massacre of July 13, 1994 and exposed the fake change being engineered by the Castro regime in 2011 and 2012 speaking truth to power. This is what the Castro dictatorship fears: a decent and plain spoken opposition leader that can inspire and mobilize Cubans with a message of justice and reconciliation:

"Let the silenced bells toll. But let them toll for all the victims of terror that in reality is only one sole victim: the Cuban people that without distinctions, suffers the loss of each one of their children." 

For decades the regime has sought to divide Cubans inside and outside of the island. It is a very old tactic that goes back millennia: divide and rule. Oswaldo Payá  shattered the artificial division recognizing that "Cubans in the Diaspora and those of us who live in Cuba, are one people, victims of the same oppressive regime and we have the same hope and the same claim to liberty."

Even in death they fear the power of his example and regime agents are scrambling now to do everything possible to minimize his legacy and erase Oswaldo Payá from Cuba's national memory, but the dictatorship is failing. The panic over this award ceremony is evidence of the regime's fragility, weakness and failure when confronted by the legacy of this nonviolent icon. Fidel Castro is dead and the regime must repress and terrorize in order to maintain the semblance of order and respect for the old tyrant. The current head of the Christian Liberation Movement, Eduardo Cardet, faces a three year prison term for speaking truth when he summed up the legacy of Fidel Castro as follows: “Castro was a very controversial man, very much hated and rejected by our people.”

What might happen today?  

My friend Mica Hierro of the Latin America Youth Network for Democracy offered a summary of three possible scenarios two days ago that on two counts seem remarkably optimistic and the one prescient with an exception:

This trip can have 3 results: 1) Cuba acts with authoritarian practices as always and tries to prevent the trip of Latin American politicians on the one hand and on the other, stops and threatens Cuban activists to prevent them from attending the awards ceremony. The event can not be done or at least not with all the guests as planned because the Government of Cuba violated the fundamental right of assembly. 2) The Cuban Government does not repress, does not threaten the guests neither foreigners nor Cubans and the meeting is carried out successfully. 3) The Cuban government is pleased with the visit of Almagro and takes advantage initiating the dialogue required for its reintegration to the OAS.

All evidence points to the first result outlined, but the practices are not authoritarian but totalitarian. Ta-Nehisi Coates, a correspondent for The Atlantic presented a classical definition of totalitarianism in his March 26, 2014 essay titled The Meaning of Totalitarianism:  

Strictly defined, a totalitarian regime is one that bans all institutions apart from those it has officially approved. A totalitarian regime thus has one political party, one educational system, one artistic creed, one centrally planned economy, one unified media, and one moral code. In a totalitarian state there are no independent schools, no private businesses, no grassroots organizations, and no critical thought.

Hannah Arendt, the political scientist who wrote the opus The Origins of Totalitarianism offered further insights into how totalitarian functions at a lecture in Oberlin College on October 28, 1954 and the abyss between authoritarianism and totalitarianism:    

“If we look at it as a form of government, it rests on two pillars: on ideology and on terror. It is no tyranny because tyranny is lawlessness and because it is content with the political sphere in the more narrow sense of the word.” ...“Authoritarianism in many respects the opposite of totalitarianism."

However when Oswaldo Payá stood up before the European Parliament in Strasbourg in December of 2002 and proclaimed: 

The first victory we can claim is that our hearts are free of hatred. Hence we say to those who persecute us and who try to dominate us: ‘You are my brother. I do not hate you, but you are not going to dominate me by fear. I do not wish to impose my truth, nor do I wish you to impose yours on me. We are going to seek the truth together’.

The opposition leader in this speech and by the example of his life rejected the product of terror which is fear and embraced the pursuit of truth that transcends shallow ideology. This is why the dictatorship still fears Oswaldo Payá  and these ideas because they threaten the very pillars of totalitarianism in Cuba.

Totalitarianism is rooted in death and subjugation and Oswaldo Payá advocated and embodied the opposite for a lifetime celebrating while at the same time defending life and liberty. Friends of freedom the world over should honor this man and share his writings because they remain relevant today.

"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."

Christian Democrats denounce Castro regime blocking political leaders travel to Cuba

Castro regime shows its dictatorial nature

ODCA REJECTS PROHIBITION OF ENTRY TO CUBA OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL LEADERS

 In response to the decision of the Cuban authorities to impede an act of recognition of international figures for their struggle in favor of democracy and human rights, the Christian Democratic Organization of America (ODCA) declares:

1. Our solidarity with the Latin American Network of Youth for Democracy and its president Rosa María Payá, daughter of the late Christian Democrat leader Oswaldo Payá, before the decision of the Cuban authorities to prevent the ceremony of awarding the Oswaldo Payá Prize in Havana.
2. We support the initiative of young Latin Americans whose main objective is to recognize the former President of Chile Patricio Aylwin and the Secretary General of the Organization of American States Luis Almagro for their commitment to democracy and human rights.
3. We protest the decision of the Cuban authorities to ban the entry of former Mexican President and former ODCA Vice-President Felipe Calderón, who was traveling as a special guest, and former Chilean Minister of Education Mariana Aylwin, who was traveling to receive the posthumous award for the former Chilean president.
4. Our solidarity with former minister Mariana Aylwin and former president Felipe Calderón and we value the formal protest of the governments of Chile and Mexico, since the measure of the Cuban government is unacceptable for the terms of respect and reciprocity that must exist between States that maintain diplomatic relations and consular posts.
5.  ODCA reiterates its historic position in favor of the respect for the human rights and public liberties of the Cuban opposition seeking to peacefully promote a process of democratization in Cuba, a struggle historically promoted by Christian Democratic leaders such as Oswaldo Payá, who died in 2012 under unexplained circumstances.
6. ODCA subscribes to the words of the former president of Mexico and former vice-president of ODCA, Felipe Calderón, who, being prevented from traveling, declared: "I yearn and I pledge to fight so that one day all Latin Americans can live in Freedom, Justice and Democracy".

ENGINEER JUAN CARLOS LATORRE

ODCA President

FRANCISCO JAVIER JARA 

Executive Secretary

MARCO ANTONIO ADAME 

Vice President of Political Issues 

Santiago Chile, February 21, 2017 

Original Spanish text

Castro regime refuses entry to former Mexican President Felipe Calderón and Chilean Minister Mariana Aylwin to attend Oswaldo Payá Prize ceremony

OAS Secretary General and Chile's President Patricio Aylwin to be presented Oswaldo Payá Liberty and Life Prize in Havana

Rosa María Payá with President Patricio Aylwin and Secretary General Luis Almagro

Former president of Mexico Felipe Calderón banned from entering Cuba by the Castro dictatorship's immigration authorities announced the news in a series of tweets on February 21, 2017. First that "I am also invited to the anniversary of the death of Oswaldo Payá. I ask the Cuban government to rectify this absurdity and allow us to remember it. In a later tweet embedded below cited AeroMexico: "We are informed by Immigration of Cuba that FCH passenger is not authorized to enter Cuba and requests that he not be documented in flight AM451."

AMX: Nos informa Inmigración de Cuba que pasajero FCH no está autorizado para entrar a Cuba y solicita que no sea documentado en vuelo AM451

— Felipe Calderón (@FelipeCalderon) 21 de febrero de 2017

This is the first time that a former Mexican President has been denied entry to Cuba reports journalist Joaquín López-Dóriga.  Other high ranking officials from Latin America have also beeen barred from entering Cuba. Last night, February 20, 2017 at 9:15pm, Mariana Aylwin, daughter of the former Chilean president Patricio Aylwin tweeted "I can not embark to Cuba because of a ban issued by immigration from Cuba." A short while later Rosa María Payá posted the document prohibiting Mariana from traveling to Cuba by order of the Castro dictatorship's immigration department.

"Please don't invoice or send passenger who is inadmissible in Cuba. Information issued by Cuban immigration"

 Rosa María Payá Acevedo returned to Cuba on February 15, 2017 to receive Luis Almagro, the Secretary General of the Organization of American States at her home a week later on February 22, 2017 at 11:00am in Havana, Cuba.  The purpose of the encounter is the presentation of the annual Oswaldo Payá Liberty and Life Prize to Luis Almagro also present at the ceremony will be Mariana Aylwin, daughter of the former Chilean president Patricio Aylwin who will receive the posthumous award on behalf of her late father. Patricio Aylwin was the president who oversaw the democratic transition in Chile following General Pinochet's military rule and passed away on April 19, 2016.
 
Unfortunately the repressive nature of the regime was already on display with Julio Álvarez and Félix Fara two promoters of the Cuba Decide initiative, a campaign for a plebiscite led by Rosa María Payá Acevedo, were taken and have been under arrest since February 18, 2017 at 11:00am.

In addition communication has become much more difficult with the telephones out of service and all matter of obstacles to prevent that the information surrounding this event be made known inside Cuba. Despite this there is optimism that the word has gotten out and that civil society will be well represented on Wednesday.

Rosa María Payá Acevedo laying a flower at her dad's tomb

What can you do?
First sign a petition supporting this event and secondly let others know what is happening and encourage them to follow Rosa Maria over twitter, demand the release of Julio and Félix, the restoration of communications, and keep an eye out between now and February 22nd and follow the awards ceremony in real time. This event is being hosted by Cuba Decide and the Latin American Youth Network for Democracy.


The Castro dictatorship shows no indication of opening up and the denial of entry to President Patricio Aylwin's daughter is an outrage. Will it be repeated with OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro? We must be vigilant and hold the regime accountable for what it does next.

Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy: Venezuela, Cuba Under U.N. Spotlight as Political Prisoners Gather

 

Venezuela, Cuba Under U.N. Spotlight as Political Prisoners Gather

Just released from Cuban prison 3 weeks ago, artist and dissident Danilo Maldonado (aka El Sexto) will be in Geneva to testify at the U.N.

Activists to address human rights in Venezuela, Cuba, Russia, Turkey, Tibet, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Vietnam, Iran, Mauritania, Maldives

GENEVA, Feb. 14, 2017 –  A coalition of 25 non-governmental human rights groups announced today that Cuban dissident and graffiti artist Danilo Maldonado (aka El Sexto) who was just released from prison, and the daughter of the jailed Mayor of Caracas will be in the United Nations to turn an international spotlight on rights abuses by Cuba and Venezuela, at the opening of the 9th annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights & Democracy, which takes place on February 20-21, 2017.

El Sexto, known for his provocative performance art criticizing the Castro regime, was just released from prison after spray painting “He’s Gone” in Havana on the day of Fidel Castro’s death. El Sexto was also imprisoned two years ago for painting the names “Raul” and “Fidel” on two pigs. He recently called out Cuba for sitting on the U.N. Human Rights Council while it oppresses its own people.

Testifying on the dire situation in Venezuela—another country on the U.N. Human Rights Council—will be Antonietta Ledezma, daughter of the imprisoned Mayor of Caracas, Antonio Ledezma.

On the second anniversary of her father’s arrest, Antonietta will call for his release, and for freedom for all Venezuela’s political prisoners. As a UNHRC member, Venezuela is obliged to respect the highest standards of human rights.

Antonietta Ledezma (left), pictured with sister Oriette, will be speaking at the U.N. to mark
two years since her father, Mayor of Caracas Antonio Ledezma, was arrested.

El Sexto and Ledezma will join some of the world’s most courageous champions of human rights: dissidents, activists, victims and relatives of political prisoners from Iran, Russia, Turkey, Tibet and Vietnam, who will be testifying on the human rights situation in their countries. A high-profile North Korean defector, and a young Yazidi woman who wrote a book about being raped by ISIS terrorists, will also speak.

Mohamed Nasheed, the veteran human rights activist who was elected president of the Maldives only to be arrested and jailed as a political prisoner, will be one of the keynote speakers. Amal Clooney, his lawyer, has received death threats for defending Nasheed. See selected presenters below.

The acclaimed annual conference is timed to take place in Geneva days before foreign ministers gather to open the 2017 U.N. Human Rights Council session.

“It’s a focal point for dissidents worldwide,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based UN Watch, which for the ninth year in a row will be organizing the annual event together with a cross-regional coalition of 25 other human rights groups.

The global gathering is acclaimed as a one-stop opportunity to hear from and meet front-line human rights advocates, many of whom have personally suffered imprisonment and torture.

“The speakers’ compelling and vivid testimonies will aim to stir the conscience of the U.N. to address critical human rights situations around the world,” said Neuer.

Subjects on the program this year include discrimination against women, jailing of journalists, prison camps, Internet freedom, religious intolerance, and the persecution of human rights defenders.

Videos of past speaker testimonies are available at www.genevasummit.org.

Admission to this year’s February 21, 2017 summit is free and open to the public, but registration is mandatory. For accreditation, program and schedule information, visit www.genevasummit.org. The conference will also be available via live webcast.

For media inquiries or to request interviews, please email secretariat@genevasummit.org

9th Annual Geneva Summit Agenda

February 2017

21

Tuesday

9:15  Welcome

• Hillel Neuer    (@HillelNeuer)
  Executive Director of UN Watch

9:25  Opening Address

• Irwin Cotler    (@IrwinCotler)
  Chair, Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights

9:45  The Return of Authoritarianism 

Moderator: Jakub Klepal    
Executive Director, Forum 2000

• Can Dündar    (@candundaradasi)
  Exiled former editor of Turkey’s Cumhuriyet
• Zhanna Nemtsova    (@ZhannaNemstova)
  Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom
• Anastasia Zotova
  Human rights activist, wife of jailed Russian dissident Ildar Dadin

10:45  Presentation of Geneva Summit 2017 Women’s Rights Award

Presenter: Tamara Dancheva
Liberal International

• Shirin
  Freed Yazidi sex slave of the Islamic State, author of “I Remain a Daughter of the Light”

11:15  Fighting Oppression, Defending Human Rights
Moderator: Jared Genser    (@JaredGenser)
Perseus Strategies

• Antonietta Ledezma    (@anleca15)
  Human rights activist, daughter of imprisoned Mayor of Caracas Antonio Ledezma
• Chito Gascon
  Chair, Philippines Human Rights Commission
• Taghi Rahmani
  Journalist, former Iranian political prisoner, husband of jailed human rights activist Narges Mohammadi

12:15  Do Human Rights Matter?

• Ambassador Alfred H. Moses
  Chair of UN Watch

———————— 12:30   Networking Lunch ————————

13:00  Side Event – Youth, the Media and Human Rights Activism: Uses and challenges

With: Zhanna Nemtsova
Journalist, founder of the Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom

14:00  Art for Human Rights

• El Sexto
  Cuban graffiti artist, dissident, jailed for criticizing Castro, just released from prison four weeks ago

14:20  The Fight for Freedom and Democracy

Moderator: Maria Alejandra Aristeguieta
Coordinator, Iniciativa por Venezuela

• Nyima Lhamo
  Escaped Tibetan activist, niece of Buddhist leader Tenzin Delek Rinpoche who died in Chinese prison
• Biram Dah Abeid
  Leader of anti-slavery fight in Mauritania

15:00  Presentation of Geneva Summit 2017 Courage Award

Presenter: Astrid Thors    (@AstridThors)
Former OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities, Finnish Minister, MP & MEP

• Mohamed Nasheed    (@MohamadNasheed)
  Former President of the Maldives, country’s leading human rights activist, former political prisoner

15:30  Voices for the Voiceless

Moderator: Médard Mulangala    (@medardmulanala)
Opposition leader in DRC

• James Jones    (@jamesjonestv)
  Producer of film “Saudi Arabia Uncovered”
• North Korean Defector
  (Identity concealed for security purposes)
• Dang Xuan Dieu
  Vietnamese human rights activist, political prisoner for 6 years, just released last month

———————— 16:30   End of Summit  ————————