» Press Releases

Statement by Cuban Exile Organizations on European Union Sanctions Decision
By M.A.R por Cuba, DDC, Plantados, ULC

European Union removes sanction against the Raúl Castro Regime, with strong conditions on human rights issues

Miami. June 20, 2008. The undersigned organizations of the exiled Cuban opposition consider that the European Union’s decision to remove the diplomatic sanctions it had imposed on the Castro regime in 2003 does not correspond to the reality of the repression under which Cubans live. Rather, it is basically a result of the influence and diplomatic work of the government of Spain in favor of the oldest totalitarian dictatorship on the American continent.

 

We consider it shameful that Rodríguez Zapatero’s government lends services of that nature to the Castro brothers’ dictatorial regime while, on the Island, hundreds of people are attacked, arbitrarily arrested, and imprisoned in subhuman conditions for expressing their ideas and demanding respect for universally recognized rights.

 

What would the Spanish socialists who are in power today have thought of a democratic country that would have dedicated its diplomacy in the 1970s, shortly before Franco’s death when repression increased in intensity in Spain, to diminishing the international diplomatic and political pressure on that dictatorship?

 

We agree with the main forces of the internal opposition movement in stating that there have not been real changes in Cuba under Raúl Castro’s regime that would entail the urgent transformation in political, economic, and social spheres that the Cuban nation needs and for which it hopes.

 

We are grateful for the solidarity of countries like the Czech Republic, Sweden, and others who heroically defended the right of the Cuban people to be free and to live under democracy during the meetings, achieving the inclusion of a series of conditions directed at Raúl Castro’s regime that demand the unconditional liberation of Cuba’s political prisoners and respect for human rights on the Island, as well as a call to the regime to fulfill its obligations under two international treaties it recently signed on civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. We also consider positive the European Union’s recognition of the democratic opposition movement that struggles legitimately in order to achieve the true change the country needs and deserves.

 

We take this opportunity to remind international public opinion of the statement signed on June 10 of this year between the European Union and the United States, which calls on the Havana regime to prove its commitment to international human rights treaties with actions by unconditionally freeing all Cuba’s political prisoners. We exhort both parties- the largest democratic grouping in the world- to join their efforts with those of the Cuban people, and we ask them to further the goals of these accords in practice.

 

The Cuban people, on the Island and in exile, appeal for international solidarity, but even without it, will continue to advance in the civic struggle for the country’s democratization and for the recovery of the people’s sovereignty.

 

Signed by:

 

Cuban Democratic Directorate- Orlando Gutiérrez-Boronat

Mothers and Women Against Repression (MAR por Cuba)- Sylvia Iriondo

Plantados until Freedom and Democracy in Cuba- Ángel De Fana

Cuban Liberal Union- Carlos Alberto Montaner

Send by E-mail | Printable Version

Directorio Democrático Cubano
P.O. Box 110235
Hialeah, Florida 33011
Tel. 305-220-2713
info@directorio.org

© Copyright 2006 Directorio Democrático Cubano. All rights reserved.