Exposing the Castro regime's record of not reporting epidemics, and when an attack backfires

Engaging in the conversation over the human rights situation in Cuba leads to ad hominem attacks against ones character, in order to avoid a substantive conversation of the facts presented and the arguments put forward. 

Yesterday, The Washington Post published a letter to the editor on the important topic of the regime in Cuba covering up past epidemics and punishing whistleblowers with prison, and tweeted it out upsetting some folks. The letter is reproduced below.

The Washington Post, April 5, 2021

Letters to the Editor

Opinion: Cuba’s powerhouse status comes through repression

April 5, 2021 at 4:35 p.m. EDT

Patient receives Sputnik V vaccine dose against Covid-19 in Almaty, Kazakhstan. (Pavel Mikheyev/Reuters)

The March 31 news article “Cuba could become a vaccine powerhouse” pointed out that Havana wants to soften its image as a “broadly authoritarian country” that has done “some pretty bad things.” Cuban doctors and journalists who raised the alarm in prior outbreaks on the island were locked up and punished.

Desi Mendoza Rivero was arrested on June 25, 1997, for warning about a dengue epidemic in Cuba. On Nov. 24, 1997, he was sentenced to eight years in prison for “enemy propaganda.” Amnesty International declared him a prisoner of conscience and campaigned for his freedom. Dr. Rivero’s claims were eventually confirmed, and he was forcibly exiled.

On Sept. 2, 2016, the Associated Press reported that Cuba had “remarkable success in containing Zika virus.” On Jan. 8, 2019, New Scientist reported the whole story when the facts became known: “Cuba failed to report thousands of Zika virus cases in 2017.”

Repression patterns during this pandemic in Cuba indicate officials seek to downplay covid-19’s severity on the island. According to Duane Gubler at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, “Cuba has a history of not reporting epidemics until they become obvious,” and that is pretty bad.

John Suarez, Falls Church

The writer is executive director of the Center for a Free Cuba.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/letters-to-the-editor/cubas-powerhouse-status-comes-through-repression/2021/04/05/5956ab80-93c6-11eb-aadc-af78701a30ca_story.html

 

Cuba’s powerhouse status comes through repression, writes @johnjsuarez https://t.co/YZsDVTx84U #PostLetters

— Washington Post Opinions (@PostOpinions) April 6, 2021

This led to attacks against the author, including for being formerly of Freedom House, raising questions about the organization because it has received public funds. It is a ridiculous argument, because the organization has also been critical of the U.S. government and human rights deficits in the United States.

Anti-Nazi, Anti-Communist, Pro-Freedom org founded 1941

On May 30, 2006, The New York Times announced the death of one of the founders of Freedom House, George Field, and in the obituary revealed the pedigree of this human rights and pro-democracy organization.

"George Field, who fought isolationism, Fascism, Communism, racism, McCarthyism, anti-Semitism and other extremisms for three decades as the guiding spirit behind Freedom House, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to democracy and human rights, died Friday in Kennett Square, Pa. He was 101."

It is ironic that Castro regime apologists question the bonafides of Freedom House, but not surprising because they have done the same to Amnesty International in the past. Meanwhile conservatives are upset with Freedom House because it has also viewed with a critical eye Western Democracies, including the United States.

Civil rights icon Bayard Rustin was called by some "the unknown hero" of the civil rights movement. He was a "tireless crusader for justice, a disciple of [Mohandas] Gandhi, a mentor to Martin Luther King Jr., and the architect of the legendary [1963] March on Washington." Rustin debated Malcolm X in 1962 from both a principled and strategic nonviolent position and would go on to play an important role at Freedom House.

It is doubly ironic because of Soviet Communism's and Castroism's alliances with Nazism and embrace of antisemitism and other extremisms to create new levels of misery for those unlikely enough to fall under their rule.

Sorry, but the fight against tyranny, racism, and other bigotries over the past 80 years beginning in 1941, the same year that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union began still allied together to conquer the rest of the world imposing the perpetual darkness of totalitarianism, and Freedom House came into existence to resist both of them, and their ideologies on October 31, 1941.

Being linked to Freedom House is high praise, now defending the Castro regime on the other hand is shameful.

 

 

 

 

Déjà vu surrounds progressives' failures to be in solidarity with pro-democracy movement in Iran

Solidarity with Iranian pro-democracy demonstrators.

"An unveiled woman in Iran stands defiantly at anti-government rally." - Andy C. Ngo

Protests broke out in Iran in the city of Mashhad on December 28, 2017 and have spread to 50 cities and towns including Tehran. The regime is threatening demonstrators with the death penalty. The protesters demands are clear unambiguous and familiar to democrats everywhere.

President Rouhani says #IranProtests have no demands Not true: Try 1) Free Elections, 2) Equality between men and women 3 )Fair distribution of national wealth 4) End to corruption 5) Independent judiciary and a Free press

— masih alinejad (@AlinejadMasih) January 2, 2018

The rhetoric of some commentators and political leaders about the Iran protests is reminiscent of what Cuban pro-democracy activists heard over the years about "reformers" and "hardliners" to justify marginalizing the democratic resistance or create a false equivalence between victims of the regime and the dictatorship. In the case of Cuba, some "experts" claim that Raul Castro is a reformer, despite the rise in repression and the murder of dissidents on his watch.

Meanwhile Washington think tanks are still consumed by the debate over "reformists" vs "hardliners" 😂😂 https://t.co/LBjrW3uuqW

— Weddady (@weddady) January 2, 2018

It was Secretary Kerry who on August 20, 2015 said, "the United States and Cuba are talking about ways to solve the Venezuelan crisis." This implied that the U.S. was on board with Maduro continuing in power in Venezuela while trying to find ways to stabilize the country. This is a top down approach that ignores the pressures emerging from a dissatisfied populace and that the Castro regime bears a fair amount of responsibility for the deteriorating situation in Venezuela. An approach that prefers to preserve a terrible status quo rather than support democratic aspirations. It also ignores the changing situation on the ground and the nonviolent tactics of the protesters.

This map shows all the areas in Iran where protests occurred in the past three days. Via @hra_news pic.twitter.com/WAE7vE7yDK

— Maryam Nayeb Yazdi (@maryamnayebyazd) December 30, 2017

In the effort to reach an accommodation with an outlaw regime all too often Western democracies make unacceptable deals. Newsweek reported on December 18, 2017 that the "Islamist militant group Hezbollah, backed by Iran, exploded into a major cocaine trafficker for the United States over the past decade—and it happened under former President Barack Obama's watch to help score a nuclear deal with Iran."

The Obama White House had a poor track record of politicizing reports to pursue political objectives. In the case of Cuba this meant watering down reports on human trafficking, looking the other way on connections to drug trafficking, terrorist groups and downplaying Cuba's role in Venezuela's crisis and attempt to smuggle tons of heavy weapons to North Korea. It now appears that the practice has also been repeated with Iran. What is often ignored is that the Castro regime is a crucial linchpin to relations between Venezuela and Iran. The dictatorship in Cuba has had close relations with Iran's revolutionary Islamic regime for decades.

Iran's Hassan Rouhani (Left) shakes hands with Cuba's  Raul Castro in Havana, Cuba 9/19/16

Human rights have been downgraded internationally with the rise of China as an international power over the past twenty years. Dissidents and victims of repression have joined together in nongovernmental networks of solidarity. On 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Amnesty International produced a video at the United Nations titled "The Price of Silence."

This is how the United Nations in Iran responds—they’re completely oblivious to the regime’s brutal suppression of the human rights of the Iranian people. Look at the tweets of @UN_Iran; they’re silent & refuse to speak out for #IranProtests victims. pic.twitter.com/YSGKima5y7

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) January 2, 2018

The past decade has found the United Nations failing all too often to protect victims of human rights violations while honoring their oppressors. It  is being repeated now in Iran. The regimes that systematically violate the human rights of their nationals now share worse practices.

Neda Agha Soltan and Génesis Carmona

The Basij, formed in 1979 in Iran, murdered nonviolent demonstrators like Neda Agha Soltan in 2009 during the Green Revolution. Hugo Chavez copied the Basij and formed Colectivos in Venezuela. Both are pro-government militias with long track records of repression and murder. The Colectivos in 2014 did the same thing in Venezuela murdering nonviolent protesters like Génesis Carmona during mass anti-government protests.

Furthermore the mistake of replacing short wave radio transmissions of uncensored news with internet broadcasts is revealed a mistake once again, as it was in Egypt during the Arab Spring, as the Iranian regime shuts down the internet. As a result, the images of nonviolent protests slow to a trickle but some continue to emerge, along with reports of the price paid by protesters for their courageous dissent. We cannot remain silent when students are being rounded up by secret police.

#Iran: 14 students have been arrested by regime security forces. https://t.co/bXhn3SQOJz #MAKTUB_REPORTS pic.twitter.com/ZrpwKRzeBj

— Sheema Kalbasi (@IranianWoman) January 3, 2018

Former political prisoner and journalist Ahmad Batebi ‏reported over twitter on protesters gathered front of Evin prison, one of the most horrific in Iran, to put pressure on the Iranian government to release political prisoners on the sixth day of anti-government protests in Iran.

Iranian #Sufis and people gathering front of the #Evin prison, (one of the horrific prison in Iran) to put pressure on Iran government and release political prisoners on sixth day of anti mullahs corrupt regime#Tehran capital of #Iran
Jan,01,2018#IranianProtests#IranProtests pic.twitter.com/RPVAJ9sEul

— Ahmad Batebi (@radiojibi) January 2, 2018

This is a time for people of good will to get the message out about what is happening in Iran and to demonstrate solidarity with the democratic aspirations of millions of Iranians. Russian chess champion and human rights defender Garry Kasparov is right, now is a time to be counted.

Support the people of Iran, and of Russia and other authoritarian regimes, by condemning their rulers. Draw a bright line between the people and the regimes that oppress them. The people will remember if you do. And if you do not.

— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) January 2, 2018

We cannot, must not remain silent. The price in lives lost and the stain on our character is too great. Spread the word on what is happening and use the hashtag #IranProtests.