Eight U.S. Congressmen call on Castro to free union organizers
By - -
June 29, 2006
President Fidel Castro
c/o Alfonso Fraga Perez
Principal Officer
Cuban Interest Section
2630 16th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20009
Dear President Castro,
As Members of the United States Congress, we write to you today to implore you to recognize the rights of workers within Cuba. In 2003, the Cuban government imprisoned countless journalists, pro-democracy reformers and human rights activists and sentenced them to jail for terms of nearly 30 years. Some of those who were rounded up were also workers attempting to form free trade unions. Their only crime was to speak with their fellow workers about the possibility of organizing.
As a member of the International Labor Organization, the oldest UN organization, Cuba is obligated to follow conventions No. 87 and 98, which guarantee individuals freedom of association and the right to organize. While your government in Cuba has long thumbed its nose at upholding these workers rights, the decision to jail innocent people for exercising their freedom violates all principles of human dignity. Recently, your government has release some of those rounded up in 2003, but to our knowledge the union organizers remain locked behind bars in what has been described as unsanitary conditions. We have also heard that some of these individuals are in failing health and are being denied access to medical care. Furthermore, an ILO report prepared by its Committee on Freedom of Association revealed that the Cuban government had committed a violation by imposing a trade union monopoly controlled by the government.
Cuba currently stands at a crossroads and the welfare of its people depends solely on your implementation of their rights as human beings. The Cuban revolution, which forcibly brought you to power, was supposed to be based on empowering the disenfranchised and giving power back to the workers who formed the backbone of any economy. Sadly, your actions, specifically the jailing of labor leaders, stand in stark contrast to these principles you claim to support. The unionization of workers is a tool by which disenfranchised workers can gain their rights and lift the conditions by which they live.
Cuba remains isolated from the free world because of its repressive policies and opposition to basic human rights such as right of workers to organize. If you hold any hopes of having a more open and constructive relationship with the United States, you must start by undoing this clear violation of international law and restore the right of workers to organize. As members of the United States Congress, we urge your government to take all steps necessary to free those citizens who have been wrongfully and illegally imprisoned and move toward a more open, free and independent society based on the true empowerment of workers.
Sincerely,
Congressmen
Vito J. Fossella
James P. McGovern
GK Butterfield
Steven C. la Tourette
Bill Pascrell
Dan Burton
Thaddeus G. McCotter
Frank LoBiondo
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