Wednesday, August 31, 2016

The Voice of the Martyrs calls for prayer for Christians in Cuba in midst of crackdown

Over twitter today The Voice of the Martyrs made public the following image:


These are difficult times for Christians around the world. The oldest communities of Christians in the world are being driven to extinction in the Middle East. Meanwhile in Cuba where the persecution and harassment of Christians had continued for decades things have gotten worse. Christian lay persons Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas and Harold Cepero were killed under suspicious circumstances on July 22, 2012.

In 2014, Raul Castro announced a reform that beginning in 2015 led to the seizure of Church properties. Maranatha First Baptist Church, a historic Church property was taken in May of 2015 under this new "law."

On August 16, 2016 Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) reported that the pace of church demolitions in Cuba was increasing. According to CSW in their latest report on freedom of belief or religion there were 1,606 separate violations between January and July 2016.  This worsening situation compound the explosive growth of repression last year. In 2015 there was a tenfold increase in religious repression compared to 2014 with 2,300 separate violations recorded in 2015 compared to 220 in 2014.

Pastors have been harassed and beaten up by Castro regime agents. Christians are being dragged away from their homes and Churches. Scores of Churches are being destroyed.

These are some of the reasons why The Voice of the Martyrs says: Pray for Christians in Cuba as a crackdown against religion continues.

All eyes on Venezuela September 1st: “The Grand Taking of Caracas”

"Cuba is the sea of happiness. Towards there goes Venezuela. " - Hugo Chavez, March 8, 2000
“The Grand Taking of Caracas: Gathering Points”
 The democratic opposition in Venezuela having received an electoral mandate late last year that gave it control of the National Assembly has confronted a regime that has undermined the rule of law, allowed Cuban military and intelligence officials to call the shots in repression, and that has engaged in maneuvers to undermine the Assembly's capacity to govern. This has led to the call for a recall on the rule of Nicolas Maduro and free election for his replacement in accordance with the constitution.

Ignoring the demands of the citizenry the Maduro regime is attempting to block or delay the recall to maintain Chavista control. In response, the democratic opposition has called on the citizenry to nonviolently gather on September 1st in the capital of Caracas in order to pressure electoral boards to allow the recall vote.  This protest is called "The Grand Taking of Caracas" and has seven different gathering points across the Venezuelan capital.

The Maduro regime has responded preemptively arresting nonviolent democratic opposition activists and manufacturing false charges against them. The arrest of Yon Goicoechea, a young political leader and family man, forcibly taken by men in unmarked vehicles Monday morning is a chilling example compounded by the sinister and manufactured slanders against him by Diosdado Cabello later that same day.

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights issued a press release in which it describes some of the other repressive tactics used by the Maduro regime against the democratic opposition.
At around 3AM on August 27, political leader Daniel Ceballos, who was at his home under house arrest, was transferred to the prison “26 de julio” in San Juan de los Morros. Likewise, on August 28 at 10PM SEBIN agents raided the home of political leader Lester Toledo without a warrant. 
Opposition leaders in 2016 are still being murdered in Venezuela and the international community must pay attention to this disturbing trend especially with this upcoming opposition protest on September 1st. There is every reason to fear for Yon's life as well as the lives of other prisoners of conscience.

Venezuelan activist Yon Goicoechea (center) kidnapped this past Monday
Venezuela is in the midst of a profound crisis as the Maduro regime, with the help of their Cuban advisors, transform the country into a totalitarian dictatorship. This is taking place in an international environment that over the past decade has seen a retreat both in human rights and the defense of democratic institutions. The leftist regime in Nicaragua is also becoming a dictatorship along the Chavez model.

Despite the claims made by Nicolas Maduro that the United States is behind the September 1st protest organized by Venezuela's democratic opposition and is promoting a coup d'etat against his regime the reality is that Western Democracies, including the United States have abandoned Venezuela's democrats.

In Latin America the center-right government of Macri in Argentina is blocking efforts to censure the Venezuelan regime for its anti-democratic practices in favor of backroom deals to obtain the support of Caracas at the United Nations on a key vote.

Obama with Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro  (April 2009)
The Obama administration and the Kerry State Department have abandoned democracy promotion for the pursuit of stability and maintaining the status quo, and are willing to collaborate with whoever can accomplish that realpolitik objective. It is important to remember that Secretary of State John Kerry in  August of 2015 said "the United States and Cuba are talking about ways to solve the Venezuelan crisis." The news today that the Chavista judge who sealed the fate of Venezuelan hunger striker Franklin Brito in 2010 now pursuing political asylum in the United States speaks volumes about the Obama administration's posture to the regime in Venezuela.

The Washington Post Editorial Page Editor in his August 28, 2016 OpEd "What the world could lose in America’s presidential election" highlighted the Obama administration's global abandonment of human rights and democracy promotion beginning in 2009:
But democracy promotion faded as a goal once Obama moved into the White House. In negotiations with China, Iran, Cuba and North Korea, human rights were never a priority. [...] How far the administration evolved from Obama’s 2007 vision can be measured in an article by Vice President Biden in the current issue of [Foreign Affairs] that barely mentions democracy or human rights. Biden sets tasks for the next administration to achieve a “more peaceful and prosperous future,” none explicitly related to freedom: deepening alliances in Asia and the Western Hemisphere, addressing climate change and terrorism, improving ties with regional powers.
What is taking place in Venezuela is the result of the decision by both Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro to impose the Cuba model on the Venezuelan people, not a U.S. conspiracy as the Venezuelan regime claims. This sham can be seen by Maduro's response to neutral third parties that could objectively document the September 1st protests: rejecting the presence of international observers, and deporting international journalists.

Leopoldo Lopez with supporters on February 18, 2014 when he turned himself in
 The future of Venezuela will be decided by Venezuelans, but sadly the forces of dictatorship have international backing that the democrats do not. This means that Venezuelan democrats have only one possible path to success and that is via a carefully though out strategy of civic nonviolent resistance. The path laid out by Leopoldo Lopez through his nonviolent example has shaken the international legitimacy of the Maduro regime, earned Leopoldo the good will of tens of millions of his countrymen in Venezuela and should be followed.

Free Venezuelans may not be able to depend on democratic governments, but people of good will can and should take action by organizing, speaking out and raising awareness. For example the The Latin American network of Youth for Democracy is denouncing the ongoing wave of repression in Venezuela.  People of good will around the world need to take to social media and follow events in that South American country.

All eyes on Venezuela!
Free Leopoldo!
Free Yon!
Free all of Venezuela's prisoners of conscience!

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

#FreeYon: 2008 Milton Friedman Prize Laureate kidnapped in Venezuela

#FreeYon

Venezuelan classical liberal Yon Goicoechea disappeared in Venezuela

 Yesterday morning Yon Goicoechea, a young political leader and family man, was forcibly taken by men in unmarked vehicles.  Later that same aftenoon, Diosdado Cabello at a pro-regime rally called Yon an assassin and accused him of transporting explosives. Cabello has no official role in law enforcement and is also suspected by U.S. prosecutors of being in charge of the infamous drug-trafficking organization, "Cartel de los Soles." The rule of law has not existed in Venezuela for many years and the Leopoldo Lopez show trial in 2015 was but one of many examples of its absence. Where does one find an honest man in Venezuela today who defends the rule of law and liberty? Either protesting on the streets, in prison, dead or exiled.  Yon, who is a classical liberal in the tradition of Milton Friedman, is a nonviolent advocate for liberty, free markets and the rule of law. These are ideas despised by the Chavista regime in Caracas.

Yon is the 2008 laureate of The Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty
Today marks six years since the death of Franklin Brito, a man who died on hunger strike on August 30, 2010 defending the rule of law and property rights in Venezuela.  Today the judge who followed the instructions of the regime that contributed to Brito's death is seeking political asylum in Miami. Franklin Brito's daughter took to social media to denounce the outrage. Unfortunately, once again Cubans will recognize this practice having seen it themselves with Cuban human rights violators granted "asylum" by the Obama administration.  The problem is not the Cuban Adjustment Act but the State Department, the U.S. Embassy in Cuba and the Obama administration that reward these criminals with visas and residency in the United States. Hopefully, the outcry  Ángela Brito will cause them to back off in this instance.

Following the downward spiral of Venezuelan democracy over the past 15 years and the efforts by young Venezuelans to stand up to the criminal and totalitarian onslaught first by Chavez and now by Maduro (with their Cuban handlers) is often a case of deja vu in the methods of defamation, repression, and terror used against them. Experience in the Cuba case is that remaining silent is deadly for the victims of repression. One must speak out in solidarity with them quickly to save them.

This is why there must also be an outcry now for Yon Goicoechea before it is too late. The alert republished below was passed on to me by social media and apparently originated by Ana Collado.


International Alert:
Political Activist Yon Goicoechea Forcibly Disappeared by Venezuelan Political Police

Yon Goicoechea, kidnapped and missing since yesterday
 Caracas, August 30, 2016. 2:00.p.m.

Yon Goicoechea, political leader and member of the Volutad Popular political party, was taken into custody by presumed agents of SEBIN, the Venezuelan political police, with no arrest warrant, no explanation and no information as to his whereabouts.

Around 9:30 am on Monday, August 29, Goicoechea was in his car, along with driver Peter Salas, on his way to pick up furniture in Caracas. He was intercepted on the highway by two unmarked vehicles. Both Goicoechea and Salas were forcibly removed from their car and taken away to an unknown location. The car was seized.

Diosdado Cabello, a highly influential figure in the government, alleged on Monday afternoon that Goicochea was transporting “detonators for explosive devices,” and referred to Goicoechea as an assassin. The allegation was made in the context of a pro-government political rally. No documentation has been made available to support these claims, and Cabello plays no formal role in law enforcement.

It has been more than 30 hours since Goicoechea and Salas were last seen. They have not been given access to council, their families have not had any contact with them. No official information has been produced as to their whereabouts, the charges levied against them, or the evidence to support them. Under the Venezuelan constitution, Goicoechea has the right to contact with his family and lawyers immediately upon detention.

Goicoechea, a 31 year old lawyer and political activist, especially focused on non-violent activism, won the Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty in 2008. He was a key leader during the 2007 student movement. He founded Futuro Presente, an NGO dedicated to the advancement of leadership and democratic values among Venezuelan youths.

Yon had recently moved back with his wife and children to Venezuela, after having spent four years abroad studying and working, in order to continue his political activism in favor of democracy. He is the fourth member of Voluntad Popular to be either detained or issued an arrest warrant in the past week.

Goicoechea is the father of two young children, Salas is the father of a baby girl.

Yon Goicoechea and Peter Salas are two more victims of an unscrupulous and repressive regime. Any evidence of wrongdoing is fabricated. The Venezuelan authorities must ensure their physical safety. We urge you to denounce these obscene and systematic violations of human rights in Venezuela so that repression and persecution of dissidence come to an end once and for all.







Franklin Brito: A Martyr for Liberty and Human Rights in Venezuela

"I’ve learned of the death of hunger striker Franklin Brito. It appears that Hugo Chavez now has his own Orlando Zapata" - Yoani Sanchez, August 31, 2010 on twitter

Franklin Brito ( September 5, 1960 – August 30, 2010)
Hunger strikes are the ultimate recourse in the arsenal of non-violent resistance, and over the years around the world it has succeeded at times but in places like Cuba, Ireland, and six years ago in Venezuela a human being died on hunger strike.

In Cuba the names of Pedro Luis Boitel, Orlando Zapata Tamayo and Wilman Villar Mendoza are remembered as is Bobby Sands of Northern Ireland (who the Cuban dictatorship built a memorial to in Cuba) and on August 30, 2010 Venezuela's Franklin Brito joined this select grouping that demonstrated the ultimate price when engaging in a hunger strike.

Franklin Brito was a farmer and a biologist whose land was expropriated by Hugo Chavez in 2000 according to CNN. Other news agencies place the date of expropriation anywhere between 2003 and 2004. He exhausted every recourse and was driven to the final option: the hunger strike in 2005.  A chronicle of Brito's odyssey is available in Spanish on Wikipedia. In the video below taken three months prior to his death the hunger striker describes his condition and his struggle for justice:



Despite its widespread violation there is a right to private property enshrined both in the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Organization of American States' American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man. It is an internationally recognized human right and clearly stated:
Article 17 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: (1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Article XXIII of the American Declaration states: "Every person has a right to own such private property as meets the essential needs of decent living and helps to maintain the dignity of the individual and of the home."
When Franklin Brito's family said that he stood for "the struggle of the Venezuelan people for property rights, access to justice, for living in freedom," they were simply stating the facts of the matter. In the video below taken on November 19, 2009 Franklin Brito declares that:
"I am not doing this strike for something material or because persons have behaved badly towards me - that one could say are corrupt. I am doing this strike for dignity and justice. I believe that these are the greatest values that a human being should have."


The Venezuelan tyranny* said that Franklin Brito was mentally unstable because he had sown up his mouth and cut off one of his fingers on live television. The Red Cross, Caracas Clinical Hospital and the Venezuelan Psychologists' Association said that Franklin Brito was of sound mind.

The tactics Mr. Chavez used and Nicolas Maduro is now using, questioning the mental stability of their adversaries, and smearing them, even in death, is straight out of their Cuban mentor's repertoire. Friends and family of Franklin Brito had best continue to organize the facts and evidence surrounding his case, protect it, and duplicate it so that it cannot be seized and destroyed. They should engage in speaking out anywhere and everywhere to counter the avalanche of slander and libel from regime apologists against a man who can no longer defend himself.

Hugo Chávez has nationalized 2.5 million hectares as part of a “land reform drive.” The so-called reform, combined with increased government control over the economy, has exacerbated food shortages in Venezuela with Chavez forced to step up imports despite abundant land and a tropical climate just like Cuba did years ago.

It is not madness to take extremes in the defense of liberty and justice, but it is madness to repeat the same failed policies that have bankrupted and destroyed nations the world over and expect a different outcome in your own homeland.


 "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice; moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue." - Marcus Tullius Cicero

*Use of the term tyranny is not a rhetorical exercise but defines what Hugo Chavez's democratically elected government has descended into a tyranny. There are two dictionary definitions of tyranny which are often related to each other. For example in the case of Cuba with Fidel Castro it is the state ruled by an absolute ruler but in the case of Venezuela it is the "arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority" that applies.

Military takeover of Havana: Another sign things are getting worse in Cuba

In spite of the normalization of relations between the Castro regime in Cuba and the Obama administration the situation has not improved, and the military continues to consolidate its control over the Cuban economy as the Castro brothers prepare their generational succession with the de facto approval of the White House. The former British Ambassador to Cuba, Paul Hare, explains below how things are getting worse for reformers in Cuba.


Former British Ambassador to Cuba, Paul Hare
 
 The Miami Herald, August 29, 2016

More bad news for new ideas in Cuba


Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article98547802.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article98547802.html#storylink=cpy

Saturday, August 27, 2016

Victims of Communism Memorial Commemoration 2016: Cuba and how to educate Americans about communism

Revisiting the 2016 Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation Commemoration 


Every June the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation hosts a Commemoration on the anniversary of the dedication of their Memorial. Their purpose is to honor the memory of the more than 100 million victims of communism, to celebrate liberty where it has triumphed, and to further the pursuit of a world free from communism.

In 2016 they started off with a briefing on the state of human rights and political developments in Cuba, featuring Mauricio Claver-Carone executive director of Cuba Democracy Advocates;  Sirley Ávila León, Civil and Human Rights Activist; Julio M. Shiling, author and director of Patria de Martí; and John Suarez, international secretary of the Cuban Democratic Directorate.




This was followed by a panel discussion by distinguished experts on the monumental task of educating Americans about communism which included: Murray Bessette, PhD Director of Programs and Publications, Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation; Bruce Cole, PhD Senior Fellow, Ethics and Public Policy Center; Hope M. Harrison, PhD, Associate Professor of History and International Affairs, The George Washington University; Mackubin Thomas Owens, PhD Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor, The Institute of World Politics.



Paul A. Goble was awarded the 2016 Truman-Reagan Medal of Freedom. He gave an important speech on the continued relevance of anti-communism in the 21st century.

Thursday, August 25, 2016

Zika, Cuba travel and Miami: a reflection

 Cuban officials have a poor record on timely reporting of epidemics



According to the August 17, 2016 Department of Defense Global Zika Surveillance Summary in the Western Hemisphere (spanning January 1, 2015 through August 13, 2016) there have been 106,246 confirmed cases of Zika with 457,894 suspected cases and 1,817 microcephaly cases. 44 countries have been impacted by Zika virus.

Brazil has borne the brunt of the outbreak reporting 78,421 cases of confirmed Zika infection and 1,749 microcephaly cases. This was followed by 8,682 cases in Colombia with 22 cases of microcephaly and Puerto Rico with 8,766 cases and one microcephaly case. The Dominican Republic has 252 cases confirmed.

Meanwhile Cuba is now reporting three confirmed cases and 30 cases brought in from abroad while having mounted a propaganda campaign in February 2016 claiming to have deployed 9,000 troops in a preventive battle against Zika reported The Guardian.

Daniel Chang of The Miami Herald reported on August 17, 2016 in the article "How Cuba is fighting Zika" in the first paragraph a claim that should raise concerns:
"After Cuba was ravaged in 1981 by an epidemic of hemorrhagic dengue fever — a mosquito-borne illness — the island nation’s communist government launched an aggressive response that created the framework for its reportedly successful fight against Zika, according to an article published Wednesday in the scientific journal Nature."
Tragically, the so-called aggressive response to dengue by 1997 involved arresting at least one doctor for enemy propaganda who correctly warned of a Dengue outbreak sentenced him to eight years in prison then forced him into exile after an international outcry.  Eventually when the bodies started to pile up and it was no longer possible to cover up the epidemic the regime admitted they had a problem.

This pattern of denial and lack of transparency was repeated with a cholera outbreak in 2012. With Zika the Castro regime can fall back on a tried and true method that it has also used to reduce infant mortality rates and that is the aggressive use of abortion, even without the mother's consent. The dictatorship will be able to cover up cases of microcephaly with abortions.

 Consider that 3.5 million people visited Cuba in 2015 and tourism to the island in 2016 so far is 15 percent higher than last year. The crisis in Venezuela is impacting Cuba economically making tourism a priority source of hard income. In the past the regime has demonstrated a resistance to reporting or it has under-reported on the outbreaks of diseases in the island. The trouble is that the lack of transparency and the spread of the virus will pose a danger to tourists visiting the island who not being advised of the danger may return home as asymptomatic carriers of the virus spreading it in their country unknowingly.

According to the New York Times there are 491 cases in New York City alone, four believed to have been contracted through sex, accounting for about a quarter of all Zika cases in the United States, and the blame is being placed on the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, but what if Cuba is under reporting the number of infections while the number of tourists from the United States increases?

Consider for a moment that according to The Miami Herald on August 24, 2016 Florida has reported 43 local Zika infections, with almost all in Miami-Dade except for one case each in Broward and Pinellas counties and the two in Palm Beach. The entire state of Florida has reported 523 travel-related Zika cases and 70 infections involving pregnant women.

Considering all this can U.S. health officials rely on their counterparts in Havana to accurately diagnose cases of Zika and report on the Zika situation on the ground if they are caught up in a political narrative that possibly presents them with the choice of under reporting or risking prison?

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article97582607.html#storylink=cpy



Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article96170442.html#storylink=cpy

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Black Ribbon Day 2016 and the Struggle Against Forgetting

Never Forget 
Nazi and Soviet soldiers greet one another in Poland (1939)

Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau today, August 23rd issued an official statement recognizing Black Ribbon Day in an important act of remembrance that, in part, read:
Today, we honour the victims and survivors of Communism and Nazism in Europe, and all those around the world who continue to endure and fight against the oppression of totalitarian regimes. Black Ribbon Day marks the anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. This pact, signed in 1939 between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, allowed for the illegal political and territorial rearrangement of Eastern and Central Europe.
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and Nazi German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, officially called the Treaty of Non-aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was signed 77 years ago today. Made public on August 23, 1939 the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact was a Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact with secret protocols setting out how the two regimes would divide Poland and the Baltic States.

World War 2 would begin with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany on September 1, 1939. The Soviet Union invaded Poland from the East on September 17, 1939. The double invasion is dramatized in Andrzej Wajda's 2007 film Katyn. This important date in history and cautionary tale for democrats remains largely ignored.


However the Victims of Communism through their blog Dissident speaks truth to power calling on people of good will not only to remember the crimes of the Nazi regime but to take on a new task that remains to be done:
Unlike in the case of the Nazis, however, there has yet to be a comprehensive reckoning of all of the past Soviet crimes. Moreover, in Putin’s Russia we see concerted efforts to reclaim Soviet glory and to justify Soviet repression and mass murder. Now more than ever it is imperative the world recognize the fundamentally and necessarily evil character of socialist systems. Just as we would rightly reject the contention that national socialism was simply improperly implemented, so too we should reject the same assertion in the case of international socialism. No experiment in government has been run more often in more places at different times and under different conditions while leading every time to the same results—death, depravity, degeneration, and degradation of the human soul and the natural environment alike.
 It is important to recall that the worse war in human history with a loss of life not seen before or since was planned for in a diplomatic agreement with secret protocols between the regime of the National Socialist German Workers' Party and the  regime of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Furthermore that although Nazi Germany was brought to an end in 1945 the brutality of Communist Russia continued through 1991 and today a former KGB intelligence officer rules in Russia.

The Czech writer Milan Kundera observed that "the struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting." This observation is especially relevant on this day and the efforts to erase this dark chapter of history must be resisted.



Sunday, August 21, 2016

Oswaldo Payá, Václav Havel and Cuba's future: A Dialogue

13 years after Cuban opposition leader Oswaldo Payá and Czech president Václav Havel exchanged views by letter today Rosa María Payá Acevedo, the daughter of Oswaldo laid a photo of her martyred father at Havel's tomb in the Czech Republic.

At Vaclav Havel's tomb we placed a picture of my dad. 2 friends the world needs in these days.

Exchange
THE CZECH PAST AND THE CUBAN FUTURE
Oswaldo Payá/Václav Havel 

Oswaldo Payá is founder of the Varela Project, a Cuban pro-democracy movement, and the 2002 recipient of the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought. His letter was translated from the Spanish by Fernando Ruiz.

Václav Havel is former president of Czechoslovakia and later the Czech Republic, prior to which he was a prominent dissident in communist Czechoslovakia. David Heyrovsky translated his letter from Czech. 

From Oswaldo Payá to Václav Havel
(Havana, 31 October 2003)

Dear Friend, It is with great emotion that I remember those short days spent in Prague when I received the Sakharov Award—the meeting we had—and our conversation about Cuba. At the time, according to what people told me, you were very concerned because the process of electing the new Czech president had been delayed. Among the many contrasts with my past experience I then witnessed, this was another: a president worried that he could not abandon his post, since there was as yet no agreement among those charged with electing his successor. In my country, by contrast, as in all countries that have been dominated by communism, the term of such a post appears to be lifelong, and “socialist democracy” always guarantees unanimous reelection.

As you know, real democracy has “complications,” such as free elections and a choice among various candidates, that real socialism does away with. In Cuba, there are no such problems. The Cuban electoral law allows only one candidate per assembly seat, and the candidates are previously proposed by candidacy commissions that are formed by “organizations of the masses.” But what is most striking is that voters can only vote yes; a no vote does not count. In the end, the affirmative votes are totaled up, and as you know, the solo candidates are always “elected.” In turn, they always elect the same person [Fidel Castro] to the presidency of the Council of State. I believe that in North Korea, just as in Albania previously, there is a similar system, much less complicated than the one that the Czechs and Slovaks adopted after November 1989.

I have not forgotten either the Czech friends who welcomed me, including Miloslav Cardinal Vlk and Bishop Václav Malý. During the communist era, both of those men suffered discrimination because they were not sympathetic to the regime. Afterward, Bishop Malý, who was your partner during the shining time of Charter 77, came to visit Cuba. He brought support to the relatives of the “Prisoners of Cuba’s Spring,” jailed since March of this year. Here he was able to relive his time as a priest discriminated against for expressing his solidarity with the persecuted.

During my short stay in Prague, I told my friends there that the experience was like traveling in a time machine. It was like that for me because I still live in an environment formed by the culture of fear that the communist regime generates throughout society, whereas in Prague I encountered Czechs and Slovaks who had suffered this same experience and are now free. It was like traveling to the future and finding proof that liberation is possible. I do not mean to say that we wish to copy the Czech model of transition, but its faith and determination are an inspiration for us.

My friend Bishop Malý time-traveled in the opposite direction, toward the past, from liberty to a world of totalitarianism and slavery. He was not here as a tourist. He did not come with the odious desire of feeling superior here, where Cubans are discriminated against and humiliated in their own land and foreigners come to enjoy privilege. He did not come to have fun or to abuse a disadvantaged people who live under a regime that respects none of their rights.

We always thought that the European peoples who had been subjected to communism, including the Russians, would understand our situation and, once liberated, would start movements of solidarity with Cuba. Sadly, however, many East Europeans seem to have suffered memory loss or to have plunged so rapidly into the freedom of the market that they have no time for their outcast Cuban brothers and sisters, who share a plight that was once the East Europeans’ own. That is why I value Czechs, Slovaks, Hungarians, Poles, and others with sound memories and generous hearts who have extended their solidarity to us over the years.

No one could better understand and interpret our reality than you, President Havel, because you lived it. You greatly help Europe and the rest of the world to grasp the reality of Cuba. I am grateful for the open letter that you, along with Poland’s former president Lech Wa³êsa and Hungary’s former president Arpád Göncz, published on September 19, demanding the liberation of our brothers, the “Prisoners of Cuba’s Spring,” and supporting the Varela Project’s civic campaign.* Your “Cuban Democratic Fund” initiative is very positive and will be very useful to the Cuban people during the period of transition. But we shall reach that stage through our continuing peaceful civic movement, which has already begun. It is a movement made up of thousands of Cubans struggling on in spite of discrimination, persecution, poverty, the harassment of their families, and a lack of resources with which to continue their peaceful work. It is a movement that needs help now, but prejudice and the regime’s propaganda make initiatives in support of it few and far between. Nonetheless, we will continue this fight using our principal resources: our faith, our love for our people, and our determination to achieve liberation.

Let us go back to the subject of “transition.” In the Latin American context, this term can be interpreted as the path toward models that have achieved nothing for some peoples, resulting only in an increase in poverty for the majority, corruption, and nagging doubts about the legitimacy of formal democracy. That is not our goal. The Cuban regime’s propaganda and its systematic disinformation have adjusted themselves since the fall of the myth of the invincible Soviet empire. The aim now is to scare the Cuban people. This has been done with some efficiency. The population has been frightened with an image of the chaos and misery that have supposedly resulted from the transitions in the European countries once dominated by communism. (Note that there has never been a communist Europe, just as there is not a communist Cuba.) I believe that this fraud may have confused many people.

Allow me to explain: Communism is an exclusionary regime. This is not theory. It is the living experience of these regimes from the moment of their inception to their demise. When communism comes to an end, it leaves a dispossessed majority without property, money, resources, labor unions, parties, or social organizations capable of protecting anyone. It leaves behind a corrupt legal system that negates the basic principles of the rule of law, it kills off the work ethic, and it institutionalizes corruption, turning the economy into a hybrid of a collectivist concentration camp and savage capitalism. This is “savage communism.” To describe it fully would take too long, but let us note that in the European countries where communism once held sway, it has left behind a few big capitalists who, until just the day before, had been officeholders or otherwise very powerful figures within the communist regime. These “new rich” had previously been the “only rich,” as under communism there can be only one of everything: one party, one doctrine, one opinion, one union, and one governing individual. In Cuba, where people are told “Socialism or death,” these powerful regime figures will also become the “only” capitalists, the future business class.

Part of the conversation about transition should revolve around the legacy of cultural and human genocide perpetrated by the Soviet empire. It scarred entire societies, which are still suffering its consequences and paying with the pain and blood of whole peoples and nations. This is not widely discussed nor a preferred topic of conversation, since the dictatorship of lies still holds sway in many places.

The fraud lies in presenting the destructive and abhorrent fruit of communism and its consequences as evils of the nascent democracies. It is like telling a recently liberated slave, “Look at what freedom has done to you! It would have been better to have remained as you once were.”

It will be clear to you that my interpretation of the transition in the part of Europe once dominated by communism is far from the image portrayed by the regime’s official propaganda. But I also believe there is a danger that, as communism ends, some may say to the mass of former slaves, “The market economy is here, you too can be an entrepreneur.”

Here, if I may return to the topic of Cuba, is a ready-made irony, for most Cubans have neither money, property, resources, nor training. We have nothing. The business people of the future can only be the rich individuals of the present. Only they have or can have anything now.

Under a so-called market economy, they would remain in charge and the majority would remain powerless. By this I mean to say that change in Cuba cannot become a prolongation of the disadvantages of the majority, because a new society cannot be built on the basis of these disadvantages. And in a totalitarian state, the majority of the population is totally disadvantaged. So, although we do not reject the concept of transition, we remember that the process which Cubans have initiated is one of liberation.

In this we are radicals. We are radically peaceful because we do not accept violence as a means of achieving change, because we are motivated not by hate but rather by love for our Cuban brothers. The phase of Cuban history now coming to an end has been very complex in human terms, and another of the bitter fruits of this regime would be to continue pitting Cubans against one another over what has happened up to now. We would thus continue submitting ourselves to the hate and injustice that totalitarianism has sown. Forgiveness and reconciliation are vital in this process of liberation, and that is why peaceful struggle is not only our method but our aim. We want to put violence, hatred, and insults behind us once and for all. We believe this to be possible because most Cubans harbor the same feelings that we have. Even those who are part of the power structure are trapped by a system that does not respect their own rights, although it grants them privilege.

I keep thinking about today’s Czech Republic. You have achieved change and liberation. You have done it and, most importantly, done it on your own terms. We will achieve this in Cuba. We are already doing it, among Cubans, among everyone, those of us who live on the inside, and those who live in exile and are an inseparable part of our nation.

The Varela Project is already a citizens’ movement for peaceful change. It goes forward thanks to the courage of those who take the step of personal liberation and overcome fear. But it is also a step toward solidarity with their own people, since they demand respect for the rights of all. Therein lies the fundamental change that we seek—the participation of citizens in the political, economic, and cultural life of the country as free people. This is the first step in the Varela Project, but it is not the only one. We must prepare—and are preparing—the transition for Cuba. This will be a transition toward democracy, social justice, development, and peace.

The human person, family, and community will be most important, above and beyond any general model of how society ought to be organized. Poverty and disparities in Cuba are the result of the dearth of rights. Given this situation, the transition process will liberate the potential of Cubans for creative work. Economic freedom means the right to operate business enterprises and to enter freely into contracts. Yet as I have tried to explain, this right cannot be fully exercised without a democratization of the economy, which will open up opportunities and possibilities for all. During this phase, we do not intend to privatize basic health care and educational services. We want to make them more efficient. Citizens should receive these services as a right, not as a concession from those in power, who demand unconditional political support in exchange. What they do not tell us is that those services are supported by the work and contributions of the citizens themselves.

I believe there is a consensus in Cuba that the transition must not only throw open the doors of economic freedom to the now-excluded majority, but also be able to maintain and transform free social services into highly efficient systems. This is a great challenge for our society, but we are sure that Cubans, as free men and women, will make the transition and build a future where democracy, social justice, and the free exercise of rights are a reality.

Cubans never chose to live under this regime that denies their rights. The “Prisoners of Cuba’s Spring” are currently serving jail terms of up to 26 years for peacefully defending the rights of all Cubans. Most of those imprisoned belong to the Varela Project’s citizens’ committees. Others are independent journalists and leaders of civic associations.

They are jailed in cages 1.6 meters wide and 3 meters long, many with boarded doors, full of insects and rats, and they must endure concentration-camp rations, the restriction of visits to no more than once every three months, and frequent bouts of humiliating treatment. Nevertheless, the regime has been unable to break their spirits, and they continue to illuminate us with their words of encouragement from prison. We hope that people around the world will speak out for their liberation. These “Prisoners of Cuba’s Spring” bear witness to the “power of the powerless.”

I know that you understand very well the times of danger and hope through which we Cubans are now living. The Cuban people are in need of solidarity—solidarity with the civic campaign for peaceful change that has expressed itself in the Varela Project and that continues to spread in the midst of repression, which is no longer able to paralyze us.

My dear friend Václav, I would like you to transmit to the Czech people our greetings of solidarity and our gratitude to all those who support our peaceful fight with their voices and their work.
Thank you for the support you have given to me by nominating me for the Nobel Peace Prize. Many Cubans welcomed it as a show of support for the cause of Cuba’s freedom, which is also the cause of peace.

Receive my fraternal embrace,
Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas

Václav Havel and Oswaldo Payá (2002)


From Václav Havel to Oswaldo Payá 
(Prague, 17 November 2003) 

Dear Friend,

I was delighted to read your letter and to find in it some observations that hit very close to home. These days, even I am wandering through a “time machine,” as you put it in your letter. But I have the indisputable advantage of doing so only in my memory and in my thoughts. Your letter actually arrived just before the anniversary of November 17—the day on which Czechs and Slovaks commemorate the beginning of the overthrow of the communist totalitarian regime. This occasion always inspires me to a deeper reflection on the experiences of those days and a contemplation of what turned out well—and what did not.

A Czech journalist recently asked me why I am so particularly interested in Cuba rather than, for example, North Korea. I answered that I felt a deeper connection with Cuba. I have had the opportunity to meet and talk with you and other opposition activists, and my views are well known in Cuba, because much of my work has been translated into Spanish and I know that it is imported or published in samizdat form. The main reason for my interest in Cuba, though, lies in the fact that, of all the remaining totalitarian regimes, the one in Cuba is probably closest to my own experience. The number of parallels is the highest, and the advanced state of collapse there is similar to that of our country in the years prior to 1989.

My friends from the dissident movement and I have numerous experiences which—God willing—we can offer you; we may even be able to give you advice on various issues, so that you may avoid repeating at least some of our mistakes. Although Cuba’s path to freedom, shaped by its own unique conditions, is and will be distinctive, there are stages and patterns of behavior that one sees unfailingly repeated during regime changes the world over. In this context, I take the liberty of offering you a few observations, considering in turn the currently ending totalitarian era, the transfer of power, and finally the formation of a democratic society. Each of these stages requires special attention, and even though all of them share a common ethos, each also calls for a different series of practical steps.

In this letter, let me discuss the first period—the end of the totalitarian era of the communist regime. The end of the totalitarian era in the former Czechoslovakia was marked by an extreme nervousness on the part of the regime. Those who had long thought they would hold their posts in perpetuity began to lose their footing. Some of them probably had already started to sense that they would have to plan, if not for political survival, then at least for responding to societal change. The handful of previously scorned dissidents started to be taken seriously when a growing number of citizens began publicly displaying sympathy toward them. Even the totalitarian regime had already stopped pretending that these dissidents were merely a few fanatics supported by foreign intelligence; and in the two years before its collapse, the regime had to intervene with brute force against a growing number of citizens during demonstrations linked to the anniversaries of significant political events. The citizens of Czechoslovakia thus saw in the streets, for the first time in twenty years, armored police cars together with emergency squads armed to the teeth.

In these moments, everyone perceived the totalitarian reality of everyday life. The propaganda in the media still managed to keep everything under wraps for some time, because the first demonstrations were concentrated mainly in the capital. Nevertheless, the spirit of the citizens grew more radical and their self-confidence increased. The regime responded with various restrictions, but these only elicited ever bolder steps on the part of my fellow citizens. I recall, for instance, the important decision by many artists, including the world-famous Czech Philharmonic, to refuse to perform for domestic media unless those media provided scope for people with dissenting political opinions.

Several months before the collapse of the regime (which we obviously did not expect at the time), we wrote up a petition called “Several Sentences,” calling on the country’s political leadership to initiate a dialogue with the opposition. Tens of thousands of people signed the petition without hesitation. I also remember the important role of a Voice of America announcer, a friend of mine, who every day in his broadcast to Czechoslovakia read out the names of those public figures who had added their signatures to the petition. The regime had no problems dealing with a handful of dissidents in its prisons, but it was taken by surprise at the new numbers of publicly declared opponents. Until then, it had tolerated different opinions expressed in private, but it had brooked no public opposition. In the new situation, however, more and more fellow citizens gathered the courage to step out of anonymity.

The regime had a hard time responding in its usual way—by imposing bans and criminalizing its opponents. Citizens’ confidence grew, and the previously concealed confrontation became omnipresent. In addition, there emerged a generational confrontation, as children stood up against their parents’ world of empty phrases.

The behavior of totalitarian regimes has been described many times— even I have attempted to do so. I recall these well-known facts here only because I see Cuban society, notwithstanding its distinctive features, as being precisely in this period of totalitarianism’s final years. The Varela Project that you embody takes its inspiration from our Charter 77 movement. Even though the Varela Project originally involved only a small number of oppositionists, it has recently gained in power. I was delighted to hear that a few weeks ago you handed over fourteen thousand more signatures on your petition calling on the regime to observe the civil rights granted by the Cuban Constitution. This is a remarkable accomplishment. It is well known that a totalitarian regime characteristically has nothing but disrespect for law. Insisting that it adhere to the legal standards it has itself adopted can drive a totalitarian government mad.

What can be done in such a situation?

Based on my experience, international solidarity is important at this time. Such solidarity should be expressed by free governments as well as by individuals. Democratic countries should make their relations with the totalitarian political leadership conditional on the release of prisoners of conscience and on the relaxation of inhibitions on free nationwide discussion. Democratic countries should consider as their partners all democratically minded people, irrespective of whether or not they hold any political offices. In this context, I expect a lot from the founding of the International Committee for Democracy in Cuba, which is preparing for its inaugural meeting.

In addition, there must be economic solidarity. For that purpose I recently suggested the establishment of a Cuba Fund for supporting families afflicted by repression, as well as other activities of the democratic opposition. I strongly believe that the European Union will come to a general agreement on steps to give practical support to Cuba’s democrats. I hope that there is no need to assure you that I will do whatever I can—in part, to pay back the debt that I feel to those democrats who helped me and my friends for many years, or who expressed their solidarity in various ways during their visits to communist Czechoslovakia.

I would like to draw your attention to an observation of mine: Whatever your merits, however brave and respectable as dissidents you may be, even though you may have spent years in prison or written clever books—in spite of all that, pragmatic politicians in the democratic world may suspect that you are mere grumblers, inveterate complainers, slightly crazy and constantly carping. Such a suspicion might lead to the following opinion: We may support them symbolically, but from the point of view of realistic politics there is no need to rely on them; they are not the right partners for us. And yet the opposite is true. It is important to convince politicians in democratic countries about this, which I have been trying to do for many years.

Let me add a few more comments. Please accept them as the product of hard-earned experience. You and your friends will surely know how to make use of them and whether or not they will be applicable under Cuban conditions.

As you know, the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia caught us dissidents totally unprepared to take over power from the hands of the regime, which collapsed within a couple of weeks. If I would emphasize one thing in particular, it is this:
Each democrat who opposes a totalitarian regime should behave today as if power were to be handed over tomorrow!
We were caught by surprise at how fast the exhausted communist system collapsed, and we were not prepared for an immediate takeover of power. We were thus forced to make all essential decisions, under pressure of circumstances, in a matter of days—sometimes even hours. But it was precisely the first moments in the transfer of power that were the most important. At that time, decisions were made that would affect the fate of the country for years to come. Whatever we did not deal with at the beginning we had to catch up on later, with much greater difficulty. We ran up against the fact that we had not prepared a shadow cabinet, and that we had not selected competent people who could be presented to the public as credible replacements for the old dysfunctional parliament. It turned out that, for the most part, we had not prepared the basic legislation for nascent democratic structures and for securing the country’s economy during the coming months. Without clear laws, the quickest to come to the fore were the kind of people you mentioned in your letter—those for whom any system serves merely as a veil for their own ambitions, crooks capable of anything and who have economic advantages based on the functions they previously held. Last but not least, it is also worth considering who among the current politicians would make the best negotiating partners if the occasion for a handover of power should arise.

The proximity of the United States of America is surely perceived as a threat by many Cubans. The regime’s propaganda is very active in this respect. Yet there is no need to worry too much about such a world power—provided it remains democratic. One has to be apprehensive primarily about totalitarian states, whether near or far. Of course, a superpower like the United States exerts the sort of natural gravitation that will always greatly influence smaller neighboring countries. I believe that I can understand these worries, being from a small Central European nation myself. The main thing, however, is for Cubans to be able to decide for themselves about their future—with whom and under what conditions they do or do not want to cooperate. This must be an unmanipulated decision made by Cubans alone. No country has the right to impose anything on you or to restrict your choices.

Dear friend, I think that, in spite of all the difficulties, it is worth treading this path. I firmly believe that, despite the communist state’s propaganda, a majority of Cubans realize that the countries of Central Europe started off in the right direction 14 years ago, and that it would be good to follow their example.

Yours sincerely,
Václav Havel

Taken from the Journal of Democracy, April 2004, Volume 15, Number 2










Friday, August 19, 2016

What Leopoldo Lopez, Amnesty and HRF said about his appeal being rejected

"A decision by a court of appeals in Venezuela to uphold a 13-year jail sentence against opposition leader and prisoner of conscience Leopoldo López is yet another stain on the country’s crumbling human rights record." - Amnesty International on August 13, 2016

Unjustly imprisoned since February 18, 2014 and still jailed today
 Amnesty International has recognized Leopoldo López as a prisoner of conscience. A prisoner of conscience is anyone imprisoned for the non-violent exercise of their beliefs. The Venezuelan democratic opposition activist was arrested in Caracas on February 18, 2014 in what was a nonviolent moment. The Metta Center for Nonviolence defines a nonviolent moment as follows:
Coined by Yehudhah Mirsky, a nonviolent moment is a climactic event in a campaign when all of the resistors’ forces are pitted against all of the oppressor’s forces in an open confrontation. The oppressor has two choices: escalate the oppression in a way that is repugnant to the rest of humanity, or back down and concede.
The arrest, continuing arbitrary detentions and show trial of Leopoldo López is an unfolding nonviolent moment that began on February 18, 2014 and has continued for the past 2 years, 6 months, and 2 days.

Leopoldo was arbitrarily detained on February 18, 2014
The latest round has been the Venezuelan regime's appellate court ratifying the unjust 13 year and nine month prison sentence issued in a show trial on September 10, 2015.

Entering the Palace of Justice on August 18, 2016

Leopoldo himself denounced the process over twitter beginning with a grainy photo of him arriving at the Palace of Justice for the rigged judgment of the court of appeals on August 18, 2016 at 8:58am.

The Venezuelan opposition leader went on to make a number of devastating observations regarding his case:
Only in a dictatorship can it be considered a crime being committed to achieve the best Venezuela. It has always been clear to me that there will be no judge or any court of this dictatorship that will grant me freedom. With our case the unjust justice has been laid bare in front of Venezuelans and the world ...  Ironic. One of the judges today executioner, Jimai Montiel, was that boy who sang to Pope John Paul II in 1985. Brothers, Venezuelans, I ask that we turn all our indignation into action and mobilization! They can't break our fighting spirit! They can't force Venezuelans to submit! Let us go forth to conquer change and democracy. At this time, the solidarity that I ask is with our beloved Venezuela! Let us go forth with all our force next September 1st!
 Javier El-Hage, chief legal officer of Human Rights Foundation stated in a press release denouncing the appellate court's decision stating:
“Terms like ‘kangaroo court’ or ‘sham trial’ do not begin to describe what has happened to López since his arrest in 2014. After the lead prosecutor confessed to having falsely charged López, the conviction would have been vacated immediately if Venezuela were a democratic nation,” said Javier El-Hage, chief legal officer of HRF. “López is part of a group of prominent pro-democracy activists under dictatorial regimes worldwide who have been sentenced to dozens of years in prison for advocating basic human rights. In 2009, the Chinese dictatorship jailed Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo on charges of ‘inciting subversion of state power’ after he wrote a democracy manifesto, while in 2012 Kazakhstan’s authoritarian regime convicted the leader of the democratic opposition, Vladimir Kozlov, of ‘inciting social hatred.’ Kozlov, whose case is very similar to that of López, was also convicted for ‘creating and managing an organized criminal group,’ which is the label the regime gave to Kozlov’s political party, in a move very similar to the one Venezuela pursued against López’s party, Voluntad Popular.” 
 Amnesty International condemned the ruling in the strongest terms:
A decision by a court of appeals in Venezuela to uphold a 13-year jail sentence against opposition leader and prisoner of conscience Leopoldo López is yet another stain on the country’s crumbling human rights record, Amnesty International said.
“Leopoldo López is the victim of a vicious ‘witch hunt’ against anyone who dares to disagree with the Venezuelan government. He is a prisoner of conscience and must be released immediately and unconditionally,” said Carolina Jimenez, Americas Deputy Director for Research at Amnesty International.
 Friends of human rights and freedom need to makes this known to other American citizens and the international public. Please help to spread the word: Free Leopoldo López!