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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14195587039189752452016-05-29T18:16:23.570-04:00Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter"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'. THIS IS THE LIBERATION WHICH WE ARE PROCLAIMING."
 Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas (2002)John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-59182480545579659672016-05-29T18:14:00.002-04:002016-05-29T18:16:23.594-04:00The Obama Legacy: Lowering standards and betraying human rights in Cuba

Cartoon by Rob Rogers - Cuba Libre

There is a fundamental error by analysts that look at the Castro regime solely through the prism of U.S. - Cuba relations defined by economic sanctions without looking at the larger regional and international context. This is especially the case with regards to human rights and the so-called "principle" of consistency in the light of perceived double standards. It seems that all who argue against double standards inevitably advocate lowering standards to the lowest common denominator never raising them.

Paying lip service to human rights in China

Double standards as a code phrase for lowering standards
United States foreign policy in Saudi Arabia and China have, in the name of realpolitik, not been principled on the human rights front and led to outcomes disastrous for the United States. At the same time one must recognize that narrow and powerful interests have benefited financially from these arrangements. The argument advanced by those seeking to repeat the regrettable approach used in Saudi Arabia and China with Cuban foreign policy is one of consistency that results in ending a principled human rights policy in Cuba bringing it into line with other disastrous policies that have not served the just interests of the United States. To suggest that foreign policies in Saudi Arabia and China advance human rights at the expense of narrow economic interests is to be ignored or ridiculed. Meanwhile the President visits Vietnam and opens up weapon sales to the communist dictatorship while claiming to promote human rights there.

Both help to propagate a radical brand of Islam worldwide

The Castro Regime's War on Human Rights
In the larger international context historically providing the Castro regime a free pass in its outlaw behavior has negatively effected not only countries in the Americas and Africa, but also led to more international terrorism and the decline of international human rights standards.

Cuban governments prior to the Castro regime played an important role in advancing human rights regionally and internationally punching above their weight. Sadly the Castro regime has been successful in undermining this positive legacy.

This is not an accident but to be expected for a totalitarian dictatorship that has sought to duplicate its political model around the world and has been successful in Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador.

The decline of regional human rights instruments in the Americas is the result of the expansion of Cuban influence in the region during the Obama administration. Welcoming the Castro regime back into the Organization of American States in 2009 did not have the desired effect.

Human rights across the world have been in decline for the past decade. The policy of normalizing relations with the Castro regime in Cuba has been a contributing factor.

White House in Cuba betrayed human rights everywhere
President Obama's failure on human rights is having serious consequences that will be felt for decades to come. The claim made by the White House that human rights are a priority in its Cuba policy are not backed up by its actions: freeing Cuban spy guilty of murder conspiracy that claimed four lives, snubbing dissidents, watering down reports to place regime in more positive light, visiting the dictatorship and legitimizing it.

Human rights activist Aaron Rhodes, writing in the Huffington Post, describes the failure in harsher terms focusing on the President's speech, which was foolishly praised by some in the Cuban American community at the time:

Obama missed an opportunity to explain and defend that idea of human rights, which animated America's founders, and which they bequeathed to Americans and to people all over the world in the Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution. Instead, Obama "personally" embraced an interpretation of human rights at variance with the philosophy of the U.S. Constitution. What is more, Cuba has arguably done more than any other nation to subvert respect for authentic human rights in the United Nations. With his response, Obama indirectly but clearly endorsed that program. If his words indeed reflect the U.S. approach to human rights, it is bad news for those who defend human rights as natural rights to basic freedoms, and who look to America for support and as an example of the success of freedom.

Cuba has consistently defended the world's worst human rights abusers, like North Korea, from criticism in international forums, claiming that such criticism is "political" and "biased." In fact, Cuba is the most vocal member of the United Nations seeking to blunt the UN's already blunt instruments for investigating grave human rights violations and putting pressure on governments to reform, favoring anodyne, "thematic" issues instead. Cuba has been a leader in proposing bogus human rights mandates in the UN Human Rights Council, like the "Independent Expert" on the "Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order," which is nothing but a platform for ideological attacks on free societies and free enterprise — in the name of "human rights."
Thanks in large part to Cuba, the international human rights system has become hopelessly clogged up with such institutions.
Just after the President's visit to Cuba I gave an analysis of the speech and found it a disappointment and that former President Carter in 2002 had made a more compelling case for human rights in Cuba. Rhodes in his essay describes the depth of Obama's betrayal of human rights

Obama's betrayal of the idea of natural rights was also a betrayal of Cuban human rights campaigners, and indeed people around the world living under dictators who exploit the conflation of human rights and welfare rights in order to defend oppression.
Rhodes left out an even more problematic part of President Obama's speech to the Cuban people. The President equated the ideals of the American rebellion that ended British rule and established the United States with the ideals of the Castro revolution that lied itself into power, claiming to be democratic, only to install a communist tyranny that 57 years later remains in power through terror and repression. Despite President Obama's claim, they are profoundly different and to equate the two not only confusing but offensive.

This trend did not begin on the Obama Administration's watch but has reached a new low that bodes ill for the future.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-66970286636380388782016-05-28T16:27:00.000-04:002016-05-28T16:40:18.668-04:00Human Rights Decade Long Decline Worldwide: IACHR in Crisis
#IACHRinCrisis: The latest blow to human rights worldwide

 Human rights and democracy have been in retreat worldwide for the past decade. Between 2006 and 2016 there has been a steady decline in global liberty and human rights. The Associated Press reported that the Obama administration "is blaming a global crisis in governance as well as atrocities committed by non-state actors for a decline in human rights standards around the world."

Now the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, a pioneering regional human rights organization founded in 1959 may be drastically scaled back or could even shut down due to a lack of support in the Americas if present trends continue. The attacks on regional human rights organizations in the Americas have been ongoing for years. An important highlight was Venezuela rejecting the American Convention on Human Rights and pulling out of the Inter-American Court  in 2012. Now this financial crisis which in reality is a human rights crisis in the Americas exposes the hollowness of national commitments in this hemisphere towards human rights. The United States, unfortunately, has not been immune to these trends.

Severe Financial Crisis of the IACHR Leads to Suspension of Hearings and Imminent Layoff of Nearly Half its Staff

IACHR Press Release

May 23, 2016

Washington, D.C. - The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) is going through a severe financial crisis that will have serious consequences on its ability to fulfill its mandate and carry out its basic functions. The Commission deeply regrets having to report that on July 31, 2016, the contracts of 40 percent of its personnel will expire, and at this time the Commission does not have the funds—or the expectation of receiving the funds—to be able to renew them. The Commission is also very sorry to report that it has been forced to suspend the visits it had planned for this year, as well as its 159th and 160th sessions, which had been scheduled for July and October.

The IACHR is alarmed by the fact that this situation will result in the dismantling of areas essential to its mandate. The IACHR is also distressed for the victims, petitioners, and civil society organizations that had planned to participate in hearings, working meetings, and other forums scheduled for the October session. The IACHR also expresses its deep concern because the suspension of sessions has a direct impact on the Commission's capacity to make progress in processing complaints of human rights violations, since it is during these sessions that the Commissioners analyze, debate, and approve reports on petitions and cases.

Moreover, it is disturbing that thousands of victims of human rights violations will be left unprotected. The total dismantling of some work teams and the cutbacks mean that it is inevitable that the procedural backlog the Commission had been trying to reduce will increase again and will reach a point where it is incompatible with the right of access to justice. The IACHR also deeply regrets having to face an imminent situation in which it could lose valuable employees who have worked tirelessly for the rights of victims and have brought a sense of duty and devotion to the cause of human rights.

In the last few months and weeks, the IACHR and its Executive Secretariat have tried its best to confirm donations that had been previously talked, but unfortunately these did not succeed. The IACHR will continue to make every effort within its power to turn this situation around immediately, to prevent the loss of 40 percent of its staff and to be able to reschedule its sessions, visits, and all the other activities planned for 2016. To this end, the Inter-American Commission calls on the member countries, observer countries, and other potential donors to make urgent financial contributions that can be immediately available.

To avert this dire situation, the IACHR would need to receive funds, or at least commitments in writing for donations, before June 15.

Beyond the immediate financial crisis, the Inter-American Commission suffers from a structural, systematic lack of funds that must be addressed and resolved. There is a deep discrepancy between the mandate the Member States of the Organization of American States (OAS) have given the IACHR and the financial resources they allocate to it. The regular budget of the IACHR this year is less than 5 million dollars, which amounts to $0.005 per person in the hemisphere per year. The staff of the Commission financed by the OAS regular fund consists of 31 people; in other words, it has fewer employees than countries under its jurisdiction. The other 47 employees are financed with donations, which can be unstable and unpredictable, as the current crisis shows.

In the last two decades, the Commission has made ongoing efforts with the OAS Member States to secure a budget that would enable it to work effectively to fulfill its mandate. As a result of these efforts, the OAS General Assembly has approved a number of resolutions expressing a commitment to address the situation; however, these have not been reflected in a significant increase in resources. While the Council of Europe earmarks 41.5 percent of its budget to the promotion and protection of human rights, the OAS earmarks 6 percent of its budget to the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights.

 In this regard, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights strongly urges the OAS Member States to take on their responsibility to the inter-American Human Rights System. The IACHR hopes that the next OAS General Assembly, which will be held in June, will adopt a historic and far-reaching decision, one that reflects the States' commitment to the defense of human rights in the region. This means radically increasing the budget of the OAS regular fund and allocating to the IACHR and the Inter-American Human Rights System in general the resources needed to fulfill the mandate the States themselves have handed down. It is essential, imperative, and urgent for the States to adopt a sustainable solution to this serious, chronic problem and demonstrate their commitment to the respect and guarantee of human rights with deeds and not just words.

The IACHR expresses its firm commitment to continue to work in the fulfillment of its functions, inspired by the words of the American Convention on Human Rights, which states that "the ideal of free men enjoying freedom from fear and want can be achieved only if conditions are created whereby everyone may enjoy his economic, social, and cultural rights, as well as his civil and political rights."

A principal, autonomous body of the Organization of American States (OAS), the IACHR derives its mandate from the OAS Charter and the American Convention on Human Rights. The Inter-American Commission has a mandate to promote respect for human rights in the region and acts as a consultative body to the OAS in this area. The Commission is composed of seven independent members who are elected in an individual capacity by the OAS General Assembly and who do not represent their countries of origin or residence.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-46690869673895341752016-05-27T23:30:00.000-04:002016-05-28T13:57:24.859-04:00Paying homage and giving thanks to Patricio Aylwin Azócar
"Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others." ― Marcus Tullius Cicero

Patricio Aylwin Azócar with Vaclav Havel in 2004 in Prague, Czech Republic

Patricio Aylwin Azócar passed away on April 19, 2016 in his beloved Santiago, Chile. Don Patricio presided over the unification of the democratic opposition in Chile, the No Campaign, and the democratic transition following 17 years of military rule under Augusto Pinochet.

We would have to be grateful to him for that example alone, but free Cubans owe him for much more. President Patricio Aylwin met with pro-democracy Cubans over the years in Santiago, Chile at his private home and freely gave his advice, but he did more.

Rosa Maria Paya meets with Patricio Aylwin Azócar at his home (2013)

 In 2004 Don Patricio was a founding member of the International Committee for Democracy in Cuba. The former Chilean president traveled to the Czech Republic at age 85 to spend three days with other Latin American and European leaders in an act of solidarity with a free Cuba that will long be remembered. At the time of his passing Orlando Gutierrez of the Cuban Democratic Directorate remembered President Aylwin's role. We also know that the best way to honor his memory of solidarity is through following his example.

Patricio Aylwin, Luis Alberto Lacalle, Petr Pithart, Philip Dimitrov, Luis Alberto Monge, José María Aznar, Václav Havel, Mart Laar close the meeting of former presidents and prime ministers at the ICDC Summit.

Free Cubans are grateful, and today in Santiago, Chile when members of the Christian Democrat Organization of America gathered to pay homage and pray for Patricio Aylwin Azócar at the Frei family mausoleum, where he is being temporarily laid to rest, the above episode was remembered and given thanks for by the representative of the Cuban Democratic Directorate.

On May 27, 2016 ODCA laid flowers to Ex-presidents Eduardo Frei & Patricio Aylwin.

The Christian Democrat Organization of America held its 21st Congress in Santiago, Chile from May 25 -27, 2016.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-33235572284173610782016-05-25T05:23:00.000-04:002016-05-25T22:19:19.800-04:00Ladies in White leader Berta Soler threatened with unjust trial for "resistance"
#SolidarityWithBerta

Berta Soler

Berta Soler, leader of the Ladies in White, who has suffered physical assaults in the past, has had her passport taken and is being charged with "resistance" and faces a regime show trial following her detention this past Sunday, May 22, 2016, during a nonviolent protest.

Berta was given the court docket number 30-260 of 2016. She explains the motive behind the regime's action: "What they are seeking is to have power of control over me so that I can not leave the country temporarily." She refused to sign the sign the indictment drafted by the police. Nor was the document handed to Berta Soler.

However, the activist said to Cubanet, "I will continue to live my life normally as always," and further noted that if this leads her to jail that she will "go as a prisoner of conscience, because I'm sure I have not done anything."

"These are the images of arrest (last Sunday), and I did not raise my hand for anything," and Berta Soler added that this action would not stop her from trying to travel outside of the country if she needed to raising the challege: Let Immigration at the airport tell me that I cannot travel."

On May 24, 2016 the streets surrounding the headquarters of the Ladies in White were blocked by state security agents to prevent members and friends of the Ladies in White from attending their monthly literary tea.

Blocking streets around Ladies in White headquarters (Angel Moya)

 This needs to be placed in the current context in Cuba and the history of her movement.

Repression is worsening in Cuba and the Ladies in White are not exempt from this trend. Earlier this month Rosa Escalona, member of "The Ladies in White", a human rights group in Cuba, along with her husband and three sons were subjected to a savage beating by Castro agents. All four family members suffered great bodily injury, with her husband Alberto Pedro Freire Leiva being the most critically injured. This unprovoked attack took place Sunday, May 8th in the city of Holguín, Cuba. Rosa made the following statement by way of telephone to the Cuban Democratic Directorate:

"Yesterday I was detained as I was heading to church. I was once again threatened by members of the State Security who stated that they would "finish with me and my family". Two men came out of Lenin Hospital with iron bars and proceeded to attack us. My 25 year old son's head was broken in two places and he received a skull fracture, my two small sons received blows throughout their bodies and I sustained direct blows to my ribs and a broken head. My husband, Alberto Pedro Freire Leiva is currently in grave condition and it is not known if he will survive. His spleen was broken in two places and as a result, he has had massive internal bleeding with more than 1,000 millimeters of blood throughout his abdomen. My son Yunior Alberto Freire Escalona is under observation in neurosurgery where he might need to be operated. During the attack, one of the men disclosed knowing that I was a member of the "Ladies in White" and a counter revolutionary, he warned me to be very careful of him because when he catches me on the street again he will run me and my sons over with a truck."

Lady in White Daisy Cuello Basulto denounced that her 21 year old daughter was arrested, violently stripped and forced to urinate in front of police officers in a police station in Cotorro. The 21 year old was arrested along with her mom and other family on September 27, 2015 while on their way to attend the Sunday march of the Ladies in White. The young woman was locked in a cell with a strong smell of hydrochloric acid and now suffers from a sore throat. "She has a fever and feels very bad," reported her mother.

The founding leader of the movement Laura Inés Pollán Toledo died under suspicious circumstances in 2011 in the midst of a wave of suspicious deaths of opposition leaders. Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, a Cuban medical doctor and human rights defender, called it a case of purposeful medical neglect.

Demonstrating support for the Ladies in White, even outside of Cuba, is not without risk. On May 22, 2010 Norwegian media reported that Cuban diplomat, Carmen Julia Guerra, insulted, threatened, and bit a young Norwegian woman, Alexandra Joner age 19, of Cuban descent on her mother's side while she was across the street from the Cuban embassy in Oslo. She was filming a non-violent demonstration in solidarity with the Ladies in White and in remembrance of martyred Cuban dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo. The main national newspaper in Norway, Aftenposten,  photographed the young girl with bite marks on her hand.

It is important to recall how the Ladies in White came into existence in 2003 in the midst of the Black Cuban Spring. Days after one of the worse crackdown's on Cuba's national civic movement that began on March 18, 2003 the wives, sisters and daughters of these unjustly imprisoned human rights defenders formed the Ladies in White. An association of women seeking the release of their unjustly imprisoned husbands, sons, brothers and fathers.

In addition to their weekly marches demanding the release of Cuban political prisoners the Ladies in White would also gather together for a monthly "literary tea." Each Lady in White would participate reading letters from their jailed husbands, poems, and literature with the objective of raising their spirits. During these gatherings there are moments of laughter and also of tears.

Amnesty international has denounced the climate of fear and repression directed by regime officials against the Ladies in White. This movement has also been recognized internationally with important honors.The Ladies in White were awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in 2005 and were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2013.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-54639632580918018072016-05-23T09:16:00.001-04:002016-05-24T15:24:39.096-04:00Why are some folks not blessing Obama's trips to Cuba and Vietnam?
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. - Matthew 5:9

Reverend King has the answer to the question

David Beeson over twitter asked an important question: "Blessed are the peacemakers, we're told. Obama has been to Cuba and now to Vietnam. So why aren't his Bible-thumping critics blessing him?"

The trip to Vietnam is still ongoing, but there are already shadows on the visit that would give peacemakers pause. First rescinding a decades-old ban on sales of lethal military equipment to Vietnam is not a nonviolent act or the action of a peacemaker. The response by China, warning the White House to not spark a "regional tinderbox" is ominous pointing to an arms race or even conflict.

In answering the question with a focus on the Cuba half there have been a couple of months since the visit and time to further reflect on it.

First, since the December 17, 2014 announcement by President Obama and General Castro the level of repression in Cuba has grown exponentially.

Secondly, Christian Solidarity Worldwide has compiled figures that reveal a tenfold increase in religious repression in Cuba with 2,300 separate violations recorded in 2015 compared to 220 in 2014.

Cuban Americans warned that this would happen in an open letter in February of 2015 published in The Washington Post but were completely shut out and ignored.

Furthermore, the Obama administration signed off with Carnival on an agreement with the Castro regime that discriminated against Cuban Americans that prompted mass protests.

Obama in Cuba and in Vietnam being photographed in front of communist icons

Lastly, the visit to Cuba in and of itself had some very troubling aspects that could prolong the life of the dictatorship and send the wrong message internationally on the figure of Che Guevara. Within the context of the Cuba visit being photographed in front of the Ministry of the Interior with image of the Argentine guerilla in the background is unfortunate.

Now in Vietnam, President Obama is photographed in front of the statue of the murderous Ho Chi Minh. That the U.S. ambassador would also be hanging out in the Vietnamese regime's Ministry of Public Security in a smiling photo opportunity with the head of that organization, despite that buildings history of persecuting and torturing dissidents, is again unfortunate.

Vietnam's Minister of Public Security To Lam and US Ambassador to Vietnam Ted Osius

The Obama administration's Cuba policy has reduced tensions between the United States and Cuba but it has not addressed the presence of injustice or the fact that it has increased during this time of reduced tension. The failure of this policy can be measured by the tens of thousands of Cubans voting with their feet and leaving the island. This is a dramatic increase over previous years and can only be compared with other attempts to reach an accommodation with the Castro regime.

It is important to recall that the United States lifted economic sanctions on Vietnam on February 3, 1994 and normalized relations on July 11, 1995. Twenty two years later the Obama administration has opened the sale of weapons to Vietnam, but unlike in Cuba that still has economic sanctions, President Obama was not able to meet with Vietnamese dissidents in a scheduled meeting.

Ending sanctions reduces leverage and normalizing relations with abnormal regimes such as Vietnam and Cuba leads the United States in being complicit with the injustice taking place there. Perhaps that is why some Americans guided by biblical principles are so upset.

Human Rights Watch's Kenneth Roth tweeted the following caricature summing up President Obama's visit to Vietnam.

Sadly, this pretty much sums up Obama's lifting the Vietnam arms embargo for no real progress on human rights. pic.twitter.com/EmXTFZs3Vu
— Kenneth Roth (@KenRoth) May 24, 2016

There is an alternative and it is the road less traveled of nonviolence which has a great record of success. Unfortunately, neither the Bush policy of preemptive wars or the Obama policy of neo-appeasement follows this path.
John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-32623253162776759942016-05-22T19:40:00.000-04:002016-05-23T08:23:51.515-04:00Lessons from Cuba and Vietnam
Vietnam and Cuba remain totalitarian regimes

President Obama has arrived in Vietnam for an official visit, hopefully it will be more productive than his visit to Cuba. As was the case during the Cuba visit, public protests in Vietnam have been put down with force by the regime's security.

Human Rights Watch reports that Vietnam's human rights record remains dire in all areas. This in spite of the United States lifting economic sanctions on Vietnam on February 3, 1994 and normalizing relations on July 11, 1995.

US companies are investing in Vietnam and doing business with the Vietnamese dictatorship. Its totalitarian nature has not changed, but there is now a possibility of the United States selling weapons to this regime that represses its own people.

For example, Amnesty International reported on October 29, 2012 that two Vietnamese songwriters faced prison for writing songs criticizing their government. Vo Minh Tri, known as Viet Khang, 37, and Tran Vu Anh Binh, known as Hoang Nhat Thong, 41 were both held in custody since late 2011. According to Amnesty International both stood accused of "conducting anti-state propaganda under Article 88 of Viet Nam's Criminal Code – an offense that carries a sentence of up to two decades." On October 30, 2012 Tran Vu Anh Binh (aka Hoang Nhat Thong) and Vo Minh Tri (aka Viet Khang) were sentenced to six and four years in prison respectively.

Young man arrested and throttled in Saigon for peaceful protest

Tri, a.k.a. Viet Khang, was freed on December 13, 2015 and driven by police escort to his family's home outside of Ho Chi Minh City. Tran Vu Anh Binh a.k.a. Hoang Nhat Thong who was jailed at the same time remains in prison.

There are many other political prisoners in Vietnam just as there are still many in Cuba.

Cuba, like Vietnam, also has a law 88 that carries up to a 20 year prison sentence. The fact that the laws and even the article numbers are the same may be a sign that Cuba and Vietnam are collaborating and sharing worse practices to maintain repression in their respective countries.William J. Dobson has described how this process occurs in his book, The Dictator's Learning Curve.

This leads to the conclusion that economic engagement with the United States has not led to political liberalization in Vietnam and it will not do so in Cuba. Meanwhile the sanctions policy on Burma did play a role in generating reforms.

Questions about violent repression in Vietnam against peaceful protesters

Human Rights Watch is calling on President Obama to press the regime in Vietnam to end its crackdown on peaceful activists and to hold free elections. Amnesty International is calling on the U.S. President to urge the Vietnamese communist dictatorship to free over 80 political prisoners during his visit to the country.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-49736661422387419342016-05-22T10:58:00.000-04:002016-05-22T10:58:31.460-04:002016 Oslo Freedom Forum: Catalysts

"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." - Oswaldo Paya, December 17, 2002

 "A single spark can start a raging fire, which is why this year, the Oslo Freedom Forum is dedicated to catalysts: women and men who have realized that while individuals can't change the world on their own, the world can't change without individuals. That even if you are the first person to stand up, you won't find yourself standing alone for long."

- Oslo Freedom Forum

The 2016 Oslo Freedom Forum for the seventh time brings together human rights activists for a three-day summit (May 23 - 25) to promote human rights worldwide. Since 2009 Oslo Freedom Forum has been a gathering point for grassroots activists, policy makers and artists with themes focused on advancing human rights and freedom for all. In 2012 the Václav Havel Prizes for Creative Dissent was inaugurated at the Oslo Freedom Forum. The Oslo Freedom Forum has an archive of past presentations of all the Freedom Forums available online.

The event will be broadcast live over Livestream.

Two Cuban speakers will be addressing the Oslo Freedom Forum this year:

.@RosaMariaPaya won't stop fighting for democracy in Cuba & justice for her father. #OsloFF https://t.co/znWEHTxD2O pic.twitter.com/yxXLqHvefg
— Oslo Freedom Forum (@OsloFF) May 15, 2016

Rosa María Payá, daughter of the deceased democracy activist Oswaldo Payá, is one of Cuba's most vocal political dissidents. Payá serves as the president of the Latin American Network of Youth for Democracy, and is a member of the Cuba Decides campaign. In April 2014, Payá was detained in Panama before the Summit of the Americas in what has been criticized as a move of political intimidation. Since her father's passing in a mysterious car accident in 2012, Payá has repeatedly called for a formal investigation into his death, speaking around the world on his behalf and addressing a public letter to President Obama following the change in U.S. policy toward Cuba in 2014.

Jailed for painting Raul & Fidel on pigs, @dmmelsexto talks dissent through art at @OsloFF https://t.co/nW7Os8XdFv pic.twitter.com/h8PgBNd8eM
— Oslo Freedom Forum (@OsloFF) May 17, 2016

Danilo "El Sexto" Maldonado is a Cuban graffiti artist and activist whose public work has subjected him to ongoing repression and imprisonment at the hands of the Castro dictatorship. A target of the Cuban government, he has been detained numerous times for his protest art. In December 2014, El Sexto was arrested on his way to put on a performance art piece called "Rebelión en la Granja," with two pigs decorated with the names "Fidel" and "Raúl." El Sexto was charged with contempt and imprisoned for 10 months without a trial. He was finally released on October 20, 2015, following pressure from international human rights groups.

Oslo Freedom Forum 2016 events are underway and can be followed over twitter.

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-36373525340053005582016-05-21T12:20:00.000-04:002016-05-21T16:34:19.902-04:00North Korean, Cuban and Chinese military forces in Venezuela
"Our government, our people, our party, in addition to condemning any imperialist attack, will fight with Venezuelans to safeguard the Bolivarian Revolution" - North Korean Ambassador Jon Yong Jin, 10/3/13

A report appeared on May 18, 2016 that North Korean Special forces and the Chinese People's Liberation Army are in Venezuela conducting military exercises with their Venezuelan counterpart. Days before the head of the opposition National Assembly of Venezuela on May 15, 2016 was complaining, over social media, of the presence of 60 Cuban officers. This included a Cuban general, who he identified by the last name Gregorich, who had a leadership role that included issuing orders to Venezuelan troops. Capitol Hill Cubans identified the Cuban General as Raul Acosta Gregorich.

Considering the promise made above by the late North Korean Ambassador these two bits of information may give Venezuelan democrats cause for alarm.

Providing some context

In March 2016, the same month that President Obama visited Cuba, the Castro regime signed a confidential military cooperation and intelligence-sharing agreement with North Korea reports the Paris based publication Intelligence Online. The Cuban dictatorship, under Raul Castro, has had extensive relations with the Hermit Kingdom that has included violating international sanctions to smuggle tons of weapons.

North Korea reopened an embassy in Venezuela on June 20, 2014 following a high level meeting in October 2013 with North Korea's ambassador to Cuba Jon Yong Jin who was executed in a purge in December of 2013. Venezuela recognized North Korea in 1974 but due to North Korea's economic crisis in the 1990s it shut down its embassy in Venezuela at the time. Venezuelan officials who met with the North Korean diplomat showed an interest in grafting elements of the North Korean governing philosophy onto the Bolivarian Revolution.

The official claim by the Maduro regime is that all this is being done to combat the threat of U.S. imperialism, but the reality appears that this has more to do with maintaining and consolidating control over Venezuela.

Chinese military commandos in Venezuela (2015)

Kim Jung-un comes to Maduro's aid

Intelligence Online, Issue No. 759 dated May 18, 2016

Observers are wondering just how involved the North Korean Praetorian Guard that Pyongyang has sent to assist Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro will become. Hugo Chavez's successor has declared a state of emergency in the country while anti-government protests continue to mount. The man behind the 'loan' of North Korean troops is General Kim Yong-chol, who is close to the country's Supreme Leader Kim Jung-un. The general is both head of the special forces and the United Front Work Department, or Tongil Chonsonbu, the intelligence service in charge of relations with friendly political movements.

North Korean special forces are training with their counterparts of Venezuela's Grupo de Acciones Commando (GAC) and Chinese troops of the 21st Armed Group of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) in Caracas this month.

Back in March, Pyongyang also signed a confidential military cooperation and intelligence-sharing agreement with Cuba, even though the latter is in the midst of a reconciliation process with the U.S.
John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-5173601527260029582016-05-20T19:00:00.001-04:002016-05-21T00:07:34.179-04:00Cuban Independence Day: 1902 vs 2016
A sobering reality

Cuba 1902: On the path to freedom and independence

"Bringing down the American Flag and Raising the Cuban Flag in Havana, May 20, 1902"

Tomas Estrada de Palma becomes the first president of Cuba

One hundred and fourteen years ago today at noon the flag of the United States was brought down and the Cuban flag raised over Havana as Cuba became an independent republic and its first president, Tomas Estrada de Palma, took power and would serve four years and leave office. Prior to the Castro brothers taking over, the Cuban Republic had 12 presidents over its first 58 years which averages out to 4.8 years in office per president. Meanwhile since 1959 two brothers have run Cuba into the ground through an absolutist, totalitarian, communist dictatorship.

Cuba 2016: Over a half century under communist tyranny

#Cuba Otro 20 d mayo sin República, sin libertad y con una dictadura en manos d unos tiranos encaramados en el poder #CubaDecide
— Iván Hdez Carrillo (@ivanlibre) May 20, 2016
 Former prisoner of conscience and independent journalist Iván Hernández Carrillo tweets: "Another May 20th without a Republic, without freedom and with a dictatorship in the hands of some tyrants perched in power."

Why have United States presidents only visited dictators and strongman in Cuba and not their democratic counterparts while in power? President Coolidge visited Dictator Machado in 1928 and President Obama visited Dictator Castro in 2016.

Last month the tyrants presided over another rubber stamp session of the Communist Party Congress with the two brothers now in their 57th year of absolute power.

Tyrants Fidel and Raul Castro now in their 57th year of presiding over Cuba's destruction

 Hopefully one day soon Cubans on the island will regain their popular sovereignty and once again proudly declare their freedom.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-16369245660793268832016-05-20T06:00:00.000-04:002016-05-21T12:58:51.113-04:00Cuba Independence Day 2016: A reflection on the first 467 years
Before the arrival of the totalitarian darkness

Independence Day in Havana, Cuba on May 20, 1902

One hundred and fourteen years ago today at noon the flag of the United States was brought down and the Cuban flag raised over Havana as Cuba became an independent republic. However, when looking at Cuba one should look back over the past 500 years and where it is situated today to gain greater understanding of the unfolding tragedy.

Cuba is just 90 miles south of the United States with a population of approximately 11 million people. It is 780 miles long and has a land area of 40,369 square miles and is the largest island in the Caribbean and 17th-largest island in the world by land area.

Columbus's second stop in the New World was on October 28, 1492 when he landed in Cuba. (The first place he landed on October 12 was the Bahamas). Cuba was a Spanish colony from Columbus's landing in 1492 until 1898 when Spain lost Cuba in the Spanish-American War.

Cubans engaged in two protracted wars of independence. The first was the 10 Years War that took place between 1868 and 1878 and the second took place between 1895 and 1898 ending with U.S. intervention and a 4-year occupation that ended on May 20, 1902. Cuba's first president was a Cuban exile named Tomas Estrada de Palma.

Future first Cuban president Tomas Estrada de Palma on way to Havana

There are many important figures that emerge in the 19th century but for the sake of brevity will mention Father Felix Varela, Jose Marti, Antonio Maceo, Maximo Gomez and the Bacardi family.
Father Varela was a catholic priest who is said to "have taught the Cubans how to think" and entertained ideas of independence that led to his exile to the United States. Antonio Maceo and Maximo Gomez were Cuban generals that played important roles in both wars of independence. Antonio Maceo was of a mixed racial background: part Spanish and part African.

Jose Marti was a journalist, poet and revolutionary who organized and advocated for the 1895 war of independence and spent most of his adult life exiled in the United States in New York City.
Maximo Gomez, was an experienced military man of Dominican origin who oversaw the overall military campaign in the second war of independence and of the three previously mentioned was the only one who survived the war to see the arrival of the Republic.

The Bacardi family, began their world famous Rum business in Santiago de Cuba in 1862. Don Facundo Bacardí Massó founded Bacardi Limited on February 4, 1862. The family would also play an important role in civic life in Cuba, especially Santiago over the next century, and were constant opponents of dictatorship, political corruption and remained ardent Cuban nationalists over several generations. Forced into exile by the Castro regime the Bacardi family has maintained the traditions of the Cuban Republic celebrating independence day, carrying on the family business and continuing the fight for a free Cuba.

Emilio Bacardi: Rebel who fought for independence

The beginning of the Cuban republic on May 20, 1902 had an asterisk – The Platt Amendment: which allowed the United States to intervene in Cuban affairs if U.S. interests were threatened. This Amendment was gotten rid of in 1933 but left a bad taste in the mouth of Cuban nationalists.

Between 1902 and 1952 Cuba progressed socially and economically but faced challenges on the political front. For example in the late 1920s Gerardo Machado, the democratically elected president did not want to leave power becoming a dictator. He was driven from office and into exile in 1933 by a general strike. This was followed by a revolution led by university students and enlisted men in what became known as the sergeants revolt. This put Fulgencio Batista into the national spotlight and by 1934 he was the strong man behind the scenes even though democratic formalities were restored.

In 1940 all the political tendencies in Cuba met to draft what became known as the 1940 Constitution and a presidential election was held and Fulgencio Batista elected. He served out his term as president from 1940 to 1944. Due to a clause in the new Constitution he was unable to run for re-election. In the election of 1944 the opposition candidate, Ramon Grau San Martin, won and served a term as president from 1944-1948 and in the election of 1948, Batista's political party again lost at the general elections and Carlos Prios Socarras was elected president.

Cuba's republic during this democratic period played an important role in the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations.

This democratic renaissance was brought to an end within days of the 1952 presidential elections, when on March 10th Fulgencio Batista organized a coup against the last democratically elected president.

A little over a year later on July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro organized an armed assault on the Moncada Military barracks that was a military disaster but a public relations success. Although most of the men involved with Fidel Castro in the assault were killed, Fidel Castro became a national figure at his trial for the attack. At the trial he portrayed himself as a democrat that wanted to restore the previous democratic order and attacked the Batista dictatorship for its usurpation of the democratic order.

How the totalitarian darkness arrived in Cuba

Upon Batista's departure from Cuba on December 31, 1958, Fidel Castro began his triumphal trek across Cuba to Havana where he began to consolidate power while continuing publicly to claim that he was a democrat but privately began to infiltrate his movement with communists, alienating many who had fought with him, and began to approach the mass media threatening them with violence if they reported anything critical. As the months passed all independent media were taken over. Mass televised executions imposed fear in the populace.

Ramiro Valdez oversaw the installation of the totalitarian communist apparatus in Cuba beginning in 1959. He is now probably doing the same thing in Venezuela. It was on his watch that the East German Stasi trained Cuban State Security.

This is how the darkness of totalitarianism took over Cuba and 57 years later remains entrenched there. Cuba gained its independence on May 20, 1902 after centuries of Spanish colonial rule and four years of U.S. occupation following the Spanish American war.

Half of Cuba's post colonial history, thus far, has been under the boot of a totalitarian caudillo whose father, ironically, fought for the Spanish crown in the war of independence.

José Martí

What would José Martí say?

José Martí was killed in battle against Spanish troops at the Battle of Dos Ríos, near the confluence of the rivers Contramaestre and Cauto, on May 19, 1895. He is buried in the Santa Efigenia Cemetery in Santiago de Cuba. Cubans the world over honor his memory and Cuban independence follows a day later. Seven years and one day after Martí's death Cuba formally obtained its independence on May 20, 1902.

Cubans across the ideological divide claim José Martí as their own. The claims of the dictatorship led by the Castro brothers that Martí is the intellectual author of their political project is ironic considering that the life and writings of this Cuban patriot is the antithesis of the Castro regime.

José Martí believed that "Peace demands of Nature the recognition of human rights." A 57 year old dictatorship that rejects fundamental human rights is the antithesis of what he fought and died for.
Furthermore, he proclaimed the idea that "One just principle from the depths of a cave is more powerful than an army." A principle shared not only by dissidents in Cuba but also echoed by Vaclav Havel, one of the dissidents who had an important role in ending Communism in Eastern Europe in the1989: "I really do inhabit a system in which words are capable of shaking the entire structure of government, where words can prove mightier than ten military divisions."

May 20, 1902 the Cuban flag is raised and the Republic born

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-29401427342696883942016-05-19T20:23:00.000-04:002016-05-20T01:40:26.629-04:00Warned UNHRC in 2014 that Venezuela would spiral out of control and that it required their attention

 "These situations in Cuba and Venezuela require the Human Rights Council´s attention before they spiral out of control." - John Suarez to the UN Human Rights Council 9/15/14

Venezuela under Maduro's regime on May 18, 2016

What is happening now in Venezuela could be foreseen, but the world chose not to act. On September 15, 2014 at the United Nations Human Rights Council under Item 4 on the agenda I read a statement ( 1 hour 33 minutes and 59 seconds) that made the case that the failure to address human rights issues nonviolently in Syria had ended in disaster and that this would be repeated elsewhere where human rights are systematically violated. Two examples offered up as future regional disasters where Venezuela and Cuba. Repressive regimes attempted to disrupt the presentation with points of order, but the full statement was eventually read out and is reproduced below.

Text taken from Directorio Archives

Item 4
United Nations Human Rights Council
September 15, 2014

We welcome the conclusions of the Report of the independent international commission of inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic and particularly the observation that what was a "conflict in the Syrian Arab Republic, once between the Government and a limited number of anti-Government armed groups, has morphed into multiple shifting conflicts involving countless actors and frontlines," and we are in complete agreement with the report that "the regional conflagration, of which the commission has long warned, illustrates the fallacy of a military solution."

The disaster in Syria did not arise yesterday but is the long term result of the failure to have human rights respected there.

Unfortunately other areas exist that can also unexpectedly erupt into regional disasters. Years of freedom of expression and association being systematically outlawed, arbitrary detentions constant, along with politically motivated beatings, torture and extrajudicial killings lead to destabilizing responses.

The 2012 deaths of Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero have not been cleared up. Sonia Garro, a lady in white, remains jailed without trial since 2012 and Angel Yunier Remon Arzuaga, a musician, has been jailed for his dissenting views since March 2013.
Bassil Dacosta, Robert Redman, Génesis Carmona and Geraldine Moreno were the first shot and killed by government agents in their country in 2014.

Since February 12, 2014 forty three youths have been killed while protesting rising insecurity and vanishing rights in their country. Over 5000 have been injured and 3,000 arbitrarily detained. Investigations are needed into the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 43 Venezuelan students and Cuba's Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero.
Ms. Garro and Mr. Arzuaga should be freed.

These situations in Cuba and Venezuela require the Human Rights Council´s attention before they spiral out of control.

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-62878060636322072652016-05-19T02:32:00.002-04:002016-05-19T12:59:00.158-04:00Last Chance for Freedom? Venezuela's dictatorship is cracking down on Venezuelan democrats

"Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship." - George Orwell, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=BfeuNrOWTd8C&pg=PA276&dq=Power+is+not+a+means,+it+is+an+end.+One+does+not+establish+a+dictatorship+in+order+to+safeguard+a+revolution;+one+makes+the+revolution+in+order+to+establish+the+dictatorship.&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwictuSQlOXMAhXM4yYKHcKXA38Q6AEIHTAA#v=onepage&q=Power%20is%20not%20a%20means%2C%20it%20is%20an%20end.%20One%20does%20not%20establish%20a%20dictatorship%20in%20order%20to%20safeguard%20a%20revolution%3B%20one%20makes%20the%20revolution%20in%20order%20to%20establish%20the%20dictatorship.&f=false">1984

MariaCorina in <s>#</s>Aragua, Venezuela with demonstrators tonight

The democratic opposition is using constitutional means and nonviolence to seek an outcome from the current political crisis, but unfortunately according to Secretary of State John Kerry "the United States and Cuba are talking about ways to solve the Venezuelan crisis." This implies that the U.S. is on board with Maduro continuing in power in Venezuela while trying to find ways to stabilize the country by improving the government's behavior. At the same time, despite the Venezuelan regime's rhetoric, remains a major U.S. oil supplier.

Protesters gassed today in Venezuela by the Maduro regime

The Maduro regime has declared a state of emergency as a pretext to crackdown on nonviolent demonstrators exercising their constitutional rights. Today the military and national guard beat up, and tear gassed opposition demonstrators. Maduro has threatened to disappear the National Assembly.

Students repressed and hurt in Merida, Venezuela by regime

 At least 30 were arbitrarily detained today according to Alfredo Romero of the Penal Forum. At the same time armed collectives backed by the police set out to terrorize Venezuelan democrats. Some of these colectivos shot at demonstrators and burned installations at a medical school in Merida to terrorize university students. Meanwhile the regime brought in their own supporters to give the appearance of still have some measure of popular support.

Venezuelan opposition blocked by Bolivarian National Guard

Naturally the Maduro regime resorts to these same old tactics perfected by their Cuban handlers. Meanwhile the same old worn out attacks are made to any who criticize its dictatorial turn. This ignores an unpleasant fact that many would prefer to leave unmentioned. What is taking place today not only in Venezuela, but also in Nicaragua, Ecuador, Bolivia and elsewhere in Latin America is the cost of tolerating injustice in Cuba when a concerted hemispheric response in the early 1990s supporting the democratic aspirations of the Cuban people would have made all the difference.

The head of the National Assembly of Venezuela is complaining of the leadership role played by Cuban officers over the Venezuelan military over social media.

Indignación fan: Gral cubano Gregorich dentro Fuerte Tiuna emite órdenes militares cubanos y también a oficiales venezolanos clan Cabello.
— Henry Ramos Allup (@hramosallup) May 15, 2016

Núcleo 60 oficiales cubanos vive Fuerte Tiuna área Villa Alba infiltrados unidades operativas clave comanda gral cubano apellido Gregorich.
— Henry Ramos Allup (@hramosallup) May 15, 2016

The two tweets above from Henry Ramos Allup are translated as follows:

Outrage FANB: Cuban General Gregorich in Fuerte Tiuna issues orders to Cuban military and Venezuelan officers clan Cabello. Core of 60 Cuban officials live in Fuerte Tiuna infiltrated key operating units commanded by Cuban Gen last name Gregorich.
Maria Adela Castellanos of the CEA University of the Andes tweeted today that "University students protesting peacefully, and the Bolivarian National Guard and collectives lashing out and kidnapping us in the medical school."

Los universitarios protestando pacíficamente, y la GBN y colectivos arremetiendo y secuestrandonos en medicina pic.twitter.com/bKxPapXTze
— Ma Adela Castellanos (@Ade_castellanos) May 18, 2016
 The Obama administration's detente policy with Cuba means that Venezuelan democrats on their own. If they are to succeed then understanding this is key to the grand strategy being plotted out and they should also understand that the military has been deeply infiltrated by and controlled by Castro regime agents and officials. The likelihood of a military coup are minimal. The best, and perhaps, only option is nonviolent civil resistance that recognizing these realities can plot out a path to a democratic transition and the end of the Maduro regime.

 Otherwise the Venezuelan government will complete its metamorphosis into a fully totalitarian communist regime and client state of the Castro regime. The difficulty in ridding oneself of that regime will be exponentially more difficult as the ongoing tragedy in Cuba demonstrates.
John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-35871739082754469392016-05-18T23:59:00.000-04:002016-05-18T23:59:20.358-04:00OAS Secretary General to President of Venezuela: To deny the people that vote ... would make you just another petty dictator
<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=BfeuNrOWTd8C&pg=PA276&dq=Power+is+not+a+means,+it+is+an+end.+One+does+not+establish+a+dictatorship+in+order+to+safeguard+a+revolution;+one+makes+the+revolution+in+order+to+establish+the+dictatorship.&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwictuSQlOXMAhXM4yYKHcKXA38Q6AEIHTAA#v=onepage&q=Power%20is%20not%20a%20means%2C%20it%20is%20an%20end.%20One%20does%20not%20establish%20a%20dictatorship%20in%20order%20to%20safeguard%20a%20revolution%3B%20one%20makes%20the%20revolution%20in%20order%20to%20establish%20the%20dictatorship.&f=false">Over social media today Luis Almagro, the OAS Secretary General, responded to attacks by Nicolas Maduro and issued a press release challenging the latest dictatorial move by the government of Venezuela.

Almagro challenges Maduro not to be just another petty dictator

Message from the OAS Secretary General to the President of Venezuela
 May 18, 2016 President Nicolás Maduro,

I am not a CIA agent. And your lie, even if it is repeated a thousand times, will never be true. Nevertheless it should be clarified, although this is to deny the absurd. My conscience is clear, President, and my behavior more so. There is no threat that you can make that will even remotely affect either.

I am not a traitor. I am not a traitor to ideas, nor to principles, and this means that I am not a traitor to my people, those who feel themselves represented by the principles of freedom, honesty, decency, public integrity (yes, those who assume power as poor people and leave the same way), democracy and human rights. But you are, President. You betray your people and your supposed ideology with your rambling tirades, you are a traitor to ethics in politics with your lies and you betray the most sacred principle in politics, which is to subject yourself to the scrutiny of your people.

You should return the riches of those who have governed with you to your country, because they belong to the people, you should return justice to your people in all the senses of the word (including finding the true killers of the 43 and not the people you hold prisoner for their ideas, although they may not be yours nor mine). You should return the political prisoners to their families.

You should give the National Assembly back its legitimate power, because this comes from the people, you should return to the people the decision about their future. You will never be able to give back the lives of the children who have died in hospitals because they did not have medicine, you will never be able to free your people from so much suffering, so much intimidation, so much misery, so much distress and anxiety.

I hope that no one commits the folly of carrying out a coup d'état against you, but also that you yourself do not do so. It is your duty. You have an obligation to public decency to hold the recall referendum in 2016, because when politics are polarized the decision must go back to the people. That is what the Constitution says. To deny the people that vote, to deny them the possibility of deciding, would make you just another petty dictator, like so many this Hemisphere has had.

I know that the OAS and my work bothers you because, as the song goes, "entre los Ceibos estorba un Quebracho." I am sorry to inform you that I neither bow down, nor am I intimidated.

Reference: E-062/16

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-66193412913055350952016-05-18T02:17:00.001-04:002016-05-18T02:17:45.780-04:00All eyes on Venezuela today: Opposition takes to the street in support of Maduro recall
Opposition calls for massive and nonviolent protests in the streets

"LET US ALL GO TO THE STREET TO TOGETHER DEFEND CHANGE"

Despite President Maduro's state of emergency in order to silence and intimidate dissent the opposition is taking to the street at 10:00am today Caracas time and one main gathering point is the Plaza Venezuela.

This at a moment when Maduro is calling the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff in Brazil a coup, despite the process there being constitutional, and one that Rousseff's party had backed in removing a previous Brazilian president from power. He has also recalled the Venezuelan ambassador to Brazil in protest.

At the same time Nicolas Maduro is claiming that there is a global media "hate" campaign against Venezuela. Let us review the real crisis in Venezuela which is caused by the Maduro regime and its Cuban advisers:

Maduro is threatening to dissolve the democratically elected National Assembly because members are rejecting the state of emergency, which would limit political freedoms.

Opposition leaders, including students, continue to be shot in the head in Venezuela, with the most recent documented incident being on May 5, 2016.

Nonviolent opposition leaders, such as Leopoldo Lopez, have been subjected to show trials and arbitrarily detained for years.

There is no independent judiciary in Venezuela. Judges are expected to do the executive branch's bidding and if they follow the rule of law can be imprisoned and raped.

Venezuela is imploding and the Maduro regime and its Cuban handlers are responsible. Shockingly the Secretary of State of the United States now views Cuba as a partner in stabilizing Venezuela despite the fact that it is the Castro regime that is responsible, in large part for the mess there.
All eyes on Venezuela today when the opposition is taking to the streets and the Maduro regime is threatening civil and political liberties there.
John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-42699515995770453482016-05-17T23:30:00.000-04:002016-05-18T01:27:31.013-04:00Call to action: Sign on the Petition to Seek Truth About the Two Tiananmen Tank Men

The power of two individuals to make a difference

What became of the two Tiananmen tank men?

Following the June 4, 1989 crackdown and massacre on June 5th one man stood up to a line of tanks involved in the Tiananmen Square slaughter to express his moral outrage and blocked them. At the same time it is important to remember that the driver in that lead tank refused to run over the protester. Both individuals are heroes and both their fates remain unknown.

The 2004 Frontline Documentary Tankman explores the significance of this act, and attempted to discover what happened. Now Initiatives for China has a campaign underway to petition the Chinese government to reveal the truth of what happened to the two Tiananmen tank men. Below is the text that Chinese human rights defenders and former prisoner of conscience Jianli Yang sent and asked to have reproduced to spread the word.

Please Sign on the Petition to Seek Truth About the Two Tiananmen Tank Men

The iconic image on Beijing's Tiananmen Square bravely confronting PLA tanks is one of the most important photographs of the twentieth century. It represents ordinary citizens confronting the State violence, and it is not forgotten by history. Over more than two decades, the whole world has been asking: Where is the tank man? As of today, the background of the tank man "Wang Weilin," and his subsequent fate are still unknown to the world. At the same time, we should not forget that, despite the CCP's massacre order, the soldier in the tank chose not to shoot or run over his compatriot. The most logical explanation is that his conscience made him disobey the order. This soldier is equally a hero. As Time magazine pointed out: "[T]he heroes of the tank picture are two: the unknown figure who risked his life by standing in front of the juggernaut and the driver who rose to the moral challenge by refusing to mow down his compatriot. "

Nobody knows the fate of the two heroes, but it is our responsibility to know and to find them. For together, they symbolize that timeless truth that moral courage will triumph over cowardly cruelty.

We hereby launch the initiative of collecting signatures across the world to petition Xi Jinping for the identities, background, and the whereabouts of the two tank men. Please sign your signature and encourage others to sign. There is no deadline for this project, and we will continue to collect signatures until the truth is obtained.

Ways to sign

(1). Go to http://tinyurl.com/<wbr></wbr>finding2tankmen

(2). Enter First Name, Last Name, Email, Country, City or Zip code.

(3). If a street address is asked, and privacy is a concern, please enter N/A.

(4). Click sign

Note: When more than one people want to use one same device to sign, the previous signer must click the small arrow beside the signer's name and then click Log Out before the following one to enter through the link.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-61893950242465244282016-05-16T21:22:00.002-04:002016-05-16T21:22:53.751-04:00IACHR Condemns Murder of Opposition Leader in Venezuela
Venezuela is imploding and violence is escalating. Opposition leaders continue to die under suspicious circumstances with links to the Maduro regime. Efforts by the opposition to constitutionally remove Maduro from power in a referendum have been rejected and the Venezuelan president has declared a state of emergency to suspend the few remaining civil liberties in the country.

Venezuelan opposition leader Germán Mavare

IACHR Condemns Murder of Opposition Leader in Venezuela

May 16, 2016

Washington, D.C. - The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) condemns the killing of Germán Mavare, a political leader and secretary of popular participation of the opposition party Un Nuevo Tiempo, in Venezuela. The IACHR also expresses its deep concern regarding the attacks and acts of harassment directed against individuals who participate in marches and other protest activities.

According to publicly available information, Germán Mavare received a gunshot to the head on May 5, 2016, in the state of Lara. He had been handing out invitations to attend a political event in Barquisimeto, where the president of Un Nuevo Tiempo and first vice president of the Venezuelan National Assembly, Enrique Márquez, would be speaking. Germán Mavare reportedly died after being taken to a health center, according to remarks made to the press by Guillermo Palacios, a member of the Latin American Parliament, who stated that Germán Mavare had previously received death threats.

The IACHR notes that according to press reports, Venezuela's Attorney General's Office has opened an investigation. In this regard, the IACHR calls on the State to conduct this investigation in accordance with due process until it has cleared up what happened and prosecuted and punished the perpetrators and, should they exist, the masterminds of this crime.

On another matter, the IACHR expresses deep concern over the attacks and acts of violence against demonstrators in the context of protests taking place in the country. Since the end of April, marches have been taking place in Venezuela to protest the deterioration of access to rights such as access to water, food, and health. In this context, on April 29, 2016, the executive secretary of the Mesa de Unidad Democrática (MUD), Jesús Torrealba, reported that he had been attacked with punches and struck with rocks when he was leading a march in Caracas to protest electricity cutoffs. The MUD published a video of the attack and indicated that members of the Bolivarian National Police who were present had not acted to put an end to it. According to media reports, the Secretary of Security and Public Order of the state government of Zulia warned, "As soon as we see that the protests are turning into something political, we will use force against the demonstration."

The IACHR firmly calls on the State to adopt urgent measures to ensure that the right to association and freedom of expression can be exercised in Venezuela, free of violence and harassment. States have positive obligations to guarantee the right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. In this regard, actions taken by security forces in situations of protest must aim primarily to facilitate protest. It follows that police operations in the context of protests should, as a general rule, be geared toward ensuring the exercise of this right and the protection of demonstrators and third parties who are present.

In addition, the IACHR has received consistent information indicating that in recent weeks there have been a number of attacks on journalists who were covering demonstrations and activities of social and political leaders at the National Electoral Council. According to the information available, the assailants have been identified as government sympathizers and members of State security forces. On at least two of these occasions, the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB) and the police reportedly took away devices containing material that had been recorded or photographed by the media workers, according to reports by civil society organizations and digital media outlets. The IACHR calls to mind that the State has a duty to guarantee that journalists and members of the media who are doing their work in the context of public demonstrations and situations of public interest are not detained or attacked and that their material is not destroyed or confiscated.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights calls on the State of Venezuela to ensure an atmosphere of freedom and security for all people who live in the country, as part of their right to live in a democracy that respects the rule of law and where human rights are fully guaranteed.

A principal, autonomous body of the Organization of American States (OAS), the IACHR derives its mandate from the OAS Charter and the American Convention on Human Rights. The Inter-American Commission has a mandate to promote respect for human rights in the region and acts as a consultative body to the OAS in this area. The Commission is composed of seven independent members who are elected in an individual capacity by the OAS General Assembly and who do not represent their countries of origin or residence.

http://www.oas.org/en/iachr/media_center/PReleases/2016/066.asp
John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-72186279669389437252016-05-16T01:31:00.001-04:002016-05-16T01:31:41.382-04:00Reflections on the Chinese Cultural Revolution at 50

 Old communist leaders don't fade away but go on one last genocidal slaughter for ideological purity before departing this mortal coil

Ernesto "Che" Guevara and Mao Zedong

 Old Communists are not like old soldiers. They do not fade away. Elderly communist leaders before they depart this mortal coil usually engage in mass killing toward the end of their lives. Josef Stalin in the Soviet Union towards the end of his tenure in power arrested over a million people, appeared to have been preparing one last massacre before his sudden death in 1953 but Mao Zedong in the twilight of his power in 1966 was able to carry out one last sustained campaign of mass killing.

Chinese red guards waving their copies of Mao's little red book

 Today marks the 50th anniversary of the Cultural Revolution in China that began ten years of bloodshed that would claim millions of lives. First generation dictator Mao Zedong was 72 years old at the time and the communist regime had been in power 17 years and fears began to arise of reformist bourgeois elements that would change the nature of the regime. On May 16, 1966 the communist party May 16 Notification warning that the party had been infiltrated by counter-revolutionary "revisionists" who were plotting to create a "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie."

This led to Mao calling for the creation of a "new man" Deutshe Welle reported in a Q&A on the Cultural Revolution that:

According to the Sinologist Oskar Weggel, this "new person" was supposed to be a "selfless communal being in a society free of domination, which had always wandered like a ghost through human utopias." To attain the goal, Mao called for the destruction of the "Four Olds" - old ideas, culture, customs and habits. Mao Zedong's ideas were supposed to replace them.
In reality it appears that there was an internal power struggle within the Chinese Communist Party that drove Mao to launch the cultural revolution because of elements that sought minor revisions to maintain the regime in power. The Globe and Mail provided more details on the terror that unfolded:

Students tortured teachers and beat them to death. Workers attacked one another with screwdrivers devised into spears. Temples and libraries were razed. Millions of people were banished to the countryside for "re-education."

Red Guards targeting unlucky old man

The students organized into Red Guards that were to "sweep away all monsters and demons!" as a People's Editorial demanded. The communist party journal, The Red Flag, celebrated the slaughter:

"The Red Guards have ruthlessly castigated, exposed, criticized and repudiated the decadent, reactionary culture of the bourgeoisie … landing them in the position of rats running across the street and being chased by all"
Although the circumstances in Cuba are different the escalating violence and call for continued ideological purity has a familiar ring. Back in 2011, Raul Castro issued a call to "popular" violence against counter-revolutionary elements at the VI Communist Party Congress Raul Castro:

"It is necessary to make clear that we will never deny our people the right to defend their Revolution. The defense of the independence, of the conquests of Socialism and of our streets and plazas will still be the first duty of every Cuban patriot."
Some policy makers and commentators believe that change in Cuba would best be carried out by those in power. One hopes that a review of other communist dictatorships and first generation leadership will disabuse them of that notion. Fidel Castro at the VII Communist Party Congress earlier this year was calling for another Russian revolution to occur.

To put it more succinctly Fidel Castro is no Gorbachev.

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-38619960754265723212016-05-15T22:17:00.001-04:002016-05-15T22:54:59.062-04:00Orlando Zapata Tamayo was born 49 years ago today and martyred six years ago
Remembering Orlando Zapata Tamayo

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

Orlando Zapata Tamayo was born on May 15, 1967 in Santiago de Cuba and died following a prolonged hunger strike on February 23, 2010 in Havana, Cuba under suspicious circumstances. Amnesty International had recognized the pro-democracy activist and human rights defender as a prisoner of conscience.

A bricklayer and carpenter with a heightened sense of dignity he became a human rights defender. He gathered signatures for Project Varela, a citizen initiative to reform the Cuban system and bring it into line with international human rights standards. Orlando was arrested with Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet and other activists in December of 2002 for gathering to discuss how to empower Cubans with knowledge about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and nonviolent resistance. Released in March of 2003, he would be rearrested for engaging in a fast demanding the release of Dr. Biscet and his other imprisoned colleagues that same month.

Orlando Zapata would spend the last seven years of his life in Cuban prisons suffering beatings tortures, and constant assaults on his human dignity. Orlando Zapata was defiant until the end demanding his right to be treated like a human being.

This was the first high profile opposition death following the start of the Obama administration's outreach to the Castro regime. Prior to that in December of 2009 an American citizen was taken hostage and the U.S. government was uncharacteristically silent.

On March 8, 2010 at the 2nd Geneva Summit for Human Rights, Tolerance and Democracy the plight of Orlando Zapata Tamayo was placed into the Cuban context:

On International Human Rights Day [2009] government organized mobs assaulted the Ladies in White as they marched for the release of Cuba's prisoners of conscience. At least 24 Cuban patients died of exposure at Mazorra, a government hospital in January [2010] of this year and when Amnesty International prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo initiated a water only hunger strike to demand that prisoners be treated decently in December of 2009 prison officials responded by taking away his water for more than two weeks when he was already extremely weak trying to break his spirit and failed but contributed to his death on February 23rd.
Following the international outcry Orlando's death generated, agents of the Castro regime engaged in a campaign of slander against the dead human rights defender in a crude attempt to deny his record of activism.

They failed.

Proof of this can be found as far away as Canada, where  a punk rock band composed and played a song titled Orlando Zapata that protested the death of the human rights activist.

Unfortunately, since 2010 the body count of activists killed under suspicious circumstances has continued to rise. The suspicious deaths of human rights defenders since Orlando Zapata Tamayo's 2010 death is long: Juan Wilfredo Soto Garcia (2011), Laura Inés Pollán Toledo (2011), Wilman Villar Mendoza (2012), Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas (2012), and Harold Cepero Escalante (2012).

This has coincided with escalating levels of violence against nonviolent activists. At the 2011 VI Communist Party Congress Raul Castro issued a call to violence:

"It is necessary to make clear that we will never deny our people the right to defend their Revolution. The defense of the independence, of the conquests of Socialism and of our streets and plazas will still be the first duty of every Cuban patriot."
Despite these trends the United States has pursued a policy of engagement with the Castro regime that has coincided with a deteriorating human rights situation in Cuba. However today the question to be asked is where were you the day Orlando Zapata Tamayo died?

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-63526613702355602202016-05-15T12:44:00.001-04:002016-05-15T12:46:17.433-04:00A Revolution With Promises to Keep: The Case of Sirley Avila Leon
The attempted murder of a human rights defender and former government delegate.

Sirley Avila Leon with Gabriele Stein and Barbara Joe in Miami on 4/2/16

Published in The World Post on May 11, 2016

A Revolution With Promises to Keep

 By Barbara E. Joeauthor, human rights advocate, Spanish interpreter

"Fidel promised that the Revolution was for us, for campesinos, rural farmers like me," sighed Sirley Avila, a slender 56-year-old former Cuban community activist, who has lived under Castro leadership her whole life. "Then, look," she said, "this is what happened." From her wheelchair, she extended the stump of her left arm, where her wrist and hand had been amputated. Lifting her trouser-legs, she revealed scars on her knees. Then, defiantly, she raised her remaining hand in the Cuban dissident "L" sign for Libertad, Liberty.

I met Avila on April 2 at Miami's convention center, where I was participating in Amnesty International (AI) USA's annual conference. She was accompanied by John Suarez of the Cuban Democratic Directorate. Avila had come to Miami for rehabilitation arranged by the Directorate. My own past professional experience with rehab services has made me hopeful that she can regain the ability to walk and also learn to use a left-hand prosthesis.

Back in June 2015, at a book talk at a New York City public library, an audience member had asked me about Sirley Avila, the first time I'd ever heard her name. She had been attacked on May 24. I'd tried to find out more, but reliable information from Cuba is not easy to obtain. Now, less than one year later, here she was, sitting with me and Gabriele Stein, a fellow human rights volunteer from Germany, telling us her story in Spanish, which I translated for Gabriele.

Avila told us she lives alone on a little farm with fruit trees located outside Las Tunas, a small city in central-eastern Cuba. From 2005 to 2013, she was elected three times by her community as an unpaid delegate to Poder Popular, an official legislative body, half of whose members are elected locally. In 2010, the region's rural school was closed because it had only a few pupils. Avila protested that meant children had to walk too far, up to 12 km., but the school remained closed, although she was still reelected to her position. After continually being thwarted on the school issue, two years after its closing, on Sept. 8, 2012, Avila took a fateful step, speaking openly about her frustrations on Radio Martí. She was immediately labeled a mercenary, but no charges were brought against her and the community continued its support. She then joined UNPACU, Unión Patriótica de Cuba, an opposition group, and participated in hunger strikes in solidarity with two political prisoners, Luis Enrique Lozada and Angel Yunier, hunger strikes each lasting more than three weeks.

In December 2013, after a few days' absence to tend to her elderly mother with Parkinson's, Avila returned home to find her dogs and other animals all dead, apparently poisoned. The interior of her home had also been vandalized, with her bed set on fire and the cords cut to her refrigerator and television set with their motors short-circuited and burned out. (In Cuba, appliances are very expensive and hard to replace.) Then, she found her well had been poisoned after hundreds of pounds of yucca had been dumped inside and had decomposed. It took her a full two months with the help of sympathetic neighbors to remove it and restore the water quality. All that proved an ominous warning; the worst was yet to come.

Avila had dared to report the damage to her home and property to the police, accusing state security of being behind the attacks against her. Meanwhile, her neighbors remained steadfastly loyal, asking her to continue to represent them, but, instead, her district was eliminated and apportioned among other districts. In February 2014, when the long-closed school was finally reopened, community members clamored to have her reinstated and the law allowed for a protest by 25% of voters. She went to Havana and met with activist Elizardo Sánchez's brother, Gerardo, to discuss this possibility.

One evening, after Avila had returned home, a young woman friend, Yunisledy López, called to warn her about plans to kill her, but, soon after, López herself was found murdered.

Yunisledy López, murdered on September 26, 2014 after warning Sirley

On May 24, 2015, a couple Avila had hired to help her out on the farm, Osmany Carrión and Mariela Hidalgo, suddenly turned on her and viciously assaulted her. Wielding a machete, Carrión slashed her shoulder, collarbone, and knees and, as she raised her arm to shield her head from his blows, he sliced off her left wrist and hand. His wife then threw the severed hand into the pigsty, contaminating it so it could not be reattached. After that, a judicial hearing was held on the attack, but Avila was not allowed to attend or to submit testimony. She doesn't know what, if anything, happened to Carrión, but she was told that in court, he had accused her of trying to recruit him for dissidence. In September, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights supported Avila's complaint that she was in a "serious and urgent situation."

Surely if the Cuban government did not condone or facilitate the attacks on Avila, it had a duty to protect her — the universal duty of any government toward citizens acting non-violently and within the law. Yet, it is no secret that brutal actos de repudio, acts of repudiation, are officially encouraged. Some Cubans seem to genuinely relish such invitations to beat up fellow citizens, while others claim only to be reluctantly following orders. At the 2011 party congress (another has just concluded), President Raúl Castro issued a call for the expression of righteous wrath against traitors and mercenaries: "It is necessary to make clear that we will never deny our people the right to defend their Revolution. The defense of the independence, of the conquests of socialism, and of our streets and plazas will still be the first duty of every Cuban patriot."

Avila recovering from injuries

 Avila arranged her own trip to Miami, tricking authorities who had blocked her efforts by getting two round-trip flights for herself and her son from Las Tunas to Havana, but having her son return home alone while she boarded a flight to Miami instead. She had already obtained a U.S. visa. She plans to stay in Miami for three months undergoing treatment, fully intending to return home again to her farm, her aging mother, and her two sons, also to rejoin Cuba's peaceful struggle for free expression and association. "We Cubans deserve personal liberty, just like all other human beings," she says. "Yes, I'm still afraid, but unless we are willing to put heart and body on the line, nothing will change for us or for our children. My problem has been that I still enjoyed community support despite all the government's efforts against me and they just couldn't tolerate that."

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-77518716217419381542016-05-14T18:06:00.000-04:002016-05-14T18:06:28.588-04:00The State Department Cuba advisory that the media is not highlighting

Placing Cuba in its proper international context

This blog has raised questions about the U.S. Embassy in Havana and the language in its advisories with regards to Cuban Americans. Incidentally, these advisories have garnered much press attention. The language has been changed and the State Department has explained the reason why.

At the same time a new issue arises over the hype of American travel to Cuba. Why has the media not focused on the State Department's advisory for U.S. citizens that now warns that anyone can be detained at any time for any purpose and that the security services and "judicial" system falls far short of international standards. Here is the exact language:

U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba should be aware that the Cuban government may detain anyone at any time for any purpose, and should not expect that Cuba's state security or judicial systems will carry out their responsibilities according to international norms.
In fact, when a former U.S. intelligence officer Mike Himsworth posts a copy of the advisory on twitter he is ridiculed by the pro-Cuba travel crowd and his warning dismissed.

@_akshun_ It's the State Dept.'s travel advisory. Missing/Ignoring it is their prerogative. https://t.co/Xqx7Z44stR pic.twitter.com/uPPqBr2AMF
— Mike Himsworth (@MikeHimsworth) May 1, 2016

Cuba and North Korea do have a lot in common and the refusal to recognize the repressive nature of both totalitarian regimes places at risk those who travel there believing these two countries are just like anywhere else.

The State Department recognizes this as do U.S. intelligence officers but the news media and others are presenting a sunny image of a despotic regime that may endanger American lives. Meanwhile there is a public discussion of placing a travel ban on North Korea due to American tourists being arbitrarily detained there and sentenced to long prison terms.

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-20767062668019667742016-05-13T23:30:00.000-04:002016-05-14T04:34:00.650-04:00Dissident Family Brutalized in Attack by Castro Paramilitaries
Husband hangs between life and death; son suffers skull fracture.

The past seven years in Cuba has been marked by escalations in the number of arbitrary detentions, severity of violent assaults against the democratic opposition, and the extrajudicial killings of high profile pro-democracy leaders. The Cuban Democratic Directorate's press release reproduced below is another example of the worsening human rights situation on the island. Above photos taken from the twitter feed of Cuban opposition leader and former prisoner of conscience Angel Moya.

Miami, Florida- May 9th, 2016 - Cuban Democratic Directorate. Days after the Chanel fashion show in Havana, Rosa Escalona, member of "The Ladies in White", a human rights group in Cuba, along with her husband and three sons were subjected to a savage beating by Castro thugs. All four family members suffered great bodily injury, with her husband Alberto Pedro Freire Leiva being the most critically injured. This unprovoked attack took place Sunday, May 8th in the city of Holguín, Cuba. The attack is part of a rising wave of violence by the regime against members of the opposition.

Rosa made the following statement by way of telephone to the Cuban Democratic Directorate:

"Yesterday I was detained as I was heading to church. I was once again threatened by members of the State Security who stated that they would "finish with me and my family". Two men came out of Lenin Hospital with iron bars and proceeded to attack us. My 25 year old son's head was broken in two places and he received a skull fracture, my two small sons received blows throughout their bodies and I sustained direct blows to my ribs and a broken head. My husband, Alberto Pedro Freire Leiva is currently in grave condition and it is not known if he will survive. His spleen was broken in two places and as a result, he has had massive internal bleeding with more than 1,000 millimeters of blood throughout his abdomen. My son Yunior Alberto Freire Escalona is under observation in neurosurgery where he might need to be operated. During the attack, one of the men disclosed knowing that I was a member of the "Ladies in White" and a counter revolutionary, he warned me to be very careful of him because when he catches me on the street again he will run me and my sons over with a truck."
The Cuban Democratic Directorate "Directorio" denounces this vile attack and makes the Regime of the Castro brothers, State Security, and all the Castro henchman that perpetuated this violent act responsible for anything happening to Lady in White Rosa Escalona and the members of her family.

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-74991614058377894272016-05-12T02:12:00.000-04:002016-05-15T11:58:40.976-04:00How rejecting Obama's Cuba policy is good for America and GOP prospects in Florida
Anti-communism is still a key factor in the Cuban-American Republican vote

Young Cuban Americans picketed Clinton & protested Cuban embassy opening (2015)

Cuban-Americans have been a reliable Republican voting block since at least 1980 with Ronald Reagan. This has been due to the GOP's consistent anti-communist stand on the Castro regime in Cuba. Nevertheless, there has been an attempt over the decades to claim that younger Cubans are shifting and voting Democrat while at the same time softening their "hard-line" (read pro-democracy) stand on Cuba.

This is a dangerous lie for aspiring politicians whose policy positions are driven by dodgy polls. The political graveyard is littered with those who bought into that lie. Even pollsters that try to shape questions to favor the Obama Cuba policy in rigged polls cannot engineer majority support from Cuban American voters.

The latest victim was Charlie Crist in 2014 who lost a narrowly to unpopular Florida governor Rick Scott. This was because the forces advocating for the end of economic sanctions on the Castro dictatorship produced push polls that convinced candidate Charlie Crist in his run for governor of Florida to support ending the embargo and announce that he planned to go to Cuba. As reality hit and his numbers dropped the trip was put off but in the end Crist lost despite running against the unpopular incumbent Rick Scott in a tight race because of the Cuban vote.

In the Republican primary in Florida the two candidates loudly rejecting the Obama administration's Cuba policy got 75% of the Cuban-American vote to Donald Trump's 18%. Cuban American voters have rejected the Obama administration's failed Cuba policy.

Donald Trump's candidacy poses a threat to continued Cuban-American support for the Republican Party, and despite conventional wisdom, it is not due to his anti-immigration stand. Both Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz tried to out trump Trump on being tough on immigration and together got 75% of the Cuban vote to Trump's 18%. Current polls in Miami-Dade place Trump ahead of Clinton among Cuban Americans by 37% to 31% which is extremely low compared to previous elections. This is also part of the reason that Clinton is ahead in South Florida by 27 points. If Trump's Cuba policy contrasted with Clinton's support of Obama's Cuba policy he would likely expand that lead among Cuban Americans to 56% to 31%. This is based on data from Scott vs Crist in 2014 where the pro-engagement issue got 5% who would vote on it versus 24% who would not vote for a candidate who supported engagement with the Castro regime. This could make a different in narrowing Clinton's lead in Miami-Dade and could tip the balance for the GOP candidate.

This is because Donald Trump has publicly declared that he supports Obama's disastrous Cuba policy which is extremely unpopular with Cuban-Americans, and especially the vast majority of those who are Republicans. Unfortunately, a small cohort of wealthy Cuban-American businessmen who do not represent the majority are peddling a different message that will hurt Mr. Trump's prospects in Florida.

Young Cubans protesting U.S. Embassy opening in Cuba

This ignores that over the past year young 20 something Cuban-Americans picketed Hillary Clinton at Florida International University protesting her support for Obama's Cuba policy, and took to the streets to protest the opening of the United States Embassy in Cuba. This also ignores that in mid-April 2016 hundreds of Cuban Americans poured into the Miami Beach City Hall to reject efforts to bring a Cuban Consulate there.

However, there are more important considerations than electoral ones, such as is this new Cuba policy good for America?

How is it good for Americans to have trade with Cuba drop from $711.5 million in 2008 under the Bush administration with sanctions that protected U.S. taxpayers from picking up the tab to 2015 under the Obama administration when trade dropped to $180.3 million in 2015 and in January 2016 opened up financing for the notorious deadbeat nation?

Under the old policy, which Donald Trump and President Obama both agreed it was time to abandon, American companies made over $5.2 billion while other countries had to forgive billions in debts owed to them by the regime in Cuba. This means that taxpayers in those countries end up picking the tab. If Obama/Hillary/Trump succeed in ending the embargo then the trade in goods with Cuba will descend into negative territory with businesses not getting paid by the Castro regime and manufacturing jobs shipped to Cuba. (Businesses will get their money back through taxpayer bailouts.)

At the same time the Castro regime got a hold of a U.S. Hellfire missile in 2014 and refused to return it to the United States for almost two years turning the U.S. into a laughing stock internationally and raising ominous questions about U.S. national security.

How is this good for America?
John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-14208582571458311002016-05-11T23:30:00.000-04:002016-05-12T05:00:37.798-04:00Venezuela is imploding

The crisis in Venezuela

Wounded protester surrounded by riot police (Univision/ Getty Images)

 In an earlier post on this blog the case was made that Latin America is now imploding. No where is this more evident than in Venezuela. There are food riots and grocery stores being ransacked and looted by desperately hungry Venezuelans. Dumpster diving is an all too common occurrence to survive in what was once a wealthy oil producing country. Is this the Socialism of the 21st century promised by Hugo Chavez? Well, it looks a lot like the communist misery of the 20th century complete with political show trials.

Searching for food in the garbage to combat hunger in Venezuela

The democratic opposition following constitutional safeguards is organizing a recall drive to remove President Nicolas Maduro from public office in Venezuela. The opposition has gathered millions of signatures and today called for mass peaceful protests.

Maduro's security forces block path of nonviolent demonstration in Venezuela

 Today, the Maduro regime's response demonstrated its dictatorial sensibilities in blocking peaceful marches, carrying out brutal physical beatings amounting to physical torture and death threats against prominent opposition activists and their families. University students have been arbitrarily detained for calling for Maduro's recall.

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-39879409222202157152016-05-10T22:00:00.003-04:002016-05-10T22:12:13.073-04:00Questions for the US embassy in Havana, Cuba on U.S. Citizens Services section addressing Cuban Americans
 Some questions about the US embassy in Havana and its warnings to Cuban Americans

Cuba is a lawless autocracy with exhibit A being its response to the Varela Project, a citizen initiative that should be legal within existing Cuban law, but instead led to a massive crackdown and long prison sentences in 2003. This is further concrete proof that the regime in Cuba is a tyranny.

Within this context the statement from the United States embassy in Havana regarding the rights of Cuban-Americans and natural born Americans of Cuban descent is of great concern. The Obama administration has engaged in a policy of unilateral concessions in an effort to normalize relations with the Castro dictatorship. This has emboldened the regime in Cuba. Repression and violence are spiking in numbers not seen in decades.

The US embassy issued some serious warnings to Cuban borns and their children last year and after bad press over the past week quickly changed the language. Initially it gave a number of ominous warnings:

Dual Nationality
The Government of Cuba does not recognize the U.S. nationality of U.S. citizens who are Cuban-born or are the children of Cuban parents. These individuals will be treated solely as Cuban citizens and may be subject to a range of restrictions and obligations, including military service. The Cuban government may require U.S. citizens, whom the Government of Cuba considers to be Cuban, to enter and depart Cuba using a Cuban passport. Using a Cuban passport for this purpose does not jeopardize one's U.S. citizenship; however, such persons must use their U.S. passports to enter and depart the United States. There have been cases of Cuban-American dual nationals being forced by the Cuban government to surrender their U.S. passports. Despite these restrictions, Cuban-American dual nationals who fall ill may only be treated at hospitals for foreigners (except in emergencies). See the paragraph below on Consular Access for information on Cuba's denial of consular services to dual American-Cuban nationals who have been arrested, as well as the paragraph below on Children's Issues for information on how dual-nationality may affect welfare inquiries and custody disputes.

Cuban-American dual nationals should be especially wary of any attempt by Cuban authorities to compel them to sign "repatriation" documents. The Government of Cuba views a declaration of repatriation as a legal statement on the part of the dual national that she/he intends to resettle permanently in Cuba. In several instances, the Government of Cuba has seized the U.S. passport of dual nationals signing declarations of repatriation and has denied these individuals permission to return to the United States.
The crowd that is backing engagement and has the ear of the White House came out to discount the above statement as false. Now the U.S. embassy page reads as follows:

Dual Nationality
The Government of Cuba does not recognize the U.S. nationality of U.S. citizens who are Cuban-born. These individuals will be treated solely as Cuban citizens and may be subject to a range of restrictions and obligations. The Cuban government may require these individuals to enter and depart Cuba using a Cuban passport. Using a Cuban passport for this purpose does not jeopardize one's U.S. citizenship; however, such persons must use their U.S. passports to enter and depart the United States.

Now there is an attempt to back track and say that the matter has been cleared up. Pedro A. Freyre, the Chairman of International Practice at Akerman LLP, says in a CBS4 interview with Hank Tester that one can rest easy that what the U.S. embassy posted was false. He also tried to downplay it stating: "What I look at is what has been happening, what is happening on the ground. Never mind there is an obscure statement in a sub file of a U.S. Embassy in obscure location."

Attorney Freyre should speak with whoever was informing him on the location of the statement on the U.S. embassy page because he misspoke. The statement was displayed on the main page of U.S. Citizens Services ( http://havana.usembassy.gov/service.html ). This was not an obscure and hidden statement as Mr. Freyre implies. Quite the opposite and for that reason this controversy raised alarm, is far from cleared up, and raises a number of important questions.

1. Was this a trial balloon to intimidate Cuban American travelers now that with the number of U.S. travelers increasing they are no longer needed?

2. Who at the U.S. embassy in Havana placed the controversial text on the website in 2015?

3. Did they receive instructions to do so from the State Department?

4. Is this unique to Cuba or does the State Department give erroneous information to prospective American travelers heading to other countries?

5. The Castro regime enforces its rules and regulations arbitrarily to suit the dictatorship's agenda. Is it now tightening up now on Cuban American travel because non-Cuban Americans are visiting the island in large numbers?

Things are getting worse on the human rights front for Cubans living in the island. Why wouldn't also worsen now for Cuban Americans visiting the island while American corporations are willing, with U.S. approval, to discriminate against them to appease the Castro regime?

John Suarezhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1419558703918975245.post-30047796146032053422016-05-10T01:12:00.000-04:002016-05-14T04:42:19.725-04:00Project Varela: Fourteen Years Later
Remembering a historic day 14 years ago

May 10, 2016 is the 14th anniversary of 11,020 Project Varela petitions turned in, in 2003 an additional14,384 petitions & in 2016, 10,009 more petitions

Fourteen years ago on May 10, 2002 in the article "In Time for Carter's Visit, Cubans Petition Government" the New York Times documented a historic moment in the space of six paragraphs:

 "Two days before a historic visit to Cuba by the former President Jimmy Carter, human rights activists today delivered an extraordinary challenge to the Communist government of President Fidel Castro in the form of petitions signed by more than 11,000 people seeking greater freedom.

 The petition drive, known as the Varela Project, calls for a referendum under the terms of the Cuban Constitution on whether there should be more freedom of expression, an amnesty for political prisoners and a chance for ordinary citizens to own small businesses.

 The signed petitions were delivered this morning to the National Assembly, after supporters painstakingly verified each signature, in the most significant peaceful effort to bring reform to Cuba in four decades.

 ''All of these Cubans, who with great courage and sacrifice have signed Project Varela, are the social vanguard for peaceful change in Cuba,'' said Oswaldo Paya, who led the drive. He said changes in the rights of Cubans could only be achieved peacefully.

 The delivery of the petitions seemed timed to coincide with the visit by Mr. Carter, who made human rights a leading issue of his presidency. Not everyone in the dissident community supported the move. Some had rejected the petitions because the proposed referendum would be carried out by a political system they consider illegitimate.

 President Castro made no mention of the drive during a speech tonight addressing another issue that arose in advance of Mr. Carter's visit."

The Varela Project did not end that day but 14,384 additional petition signatures were turned in 2003 and an additional 10,009 in 2016. This citizen initiative remains active as does the legitimacy of its demands for human rights reforms and nonviolent change in Cuba.

Regis Iglesias, Oswaldo Payá and Tony Díaz on May 10, 2002

John Suarezhttp://email@example.com