Cubans are losing their fear of Castro regime

Cubans are losing their fear of Castro regime
By Editorial Board, Published: March 21

WHEN YOANI Sánchez talks about "alternative means of communication" in
Cuba, she speaks with authority. Her blog Generación Y has become a
beacon of democracy and freedom on the island, where the news media are
still held in the tight grip of the Castro regime. Producing a blog
hasn't been easy; Internet access is spotty. But she reports that
alternate networks are throbbing with information that the government
wants to suppress.

When the dissident Oswaldo Payá and activist Harold Cepero were killed
in a car wreck in Cuba's eastern province of Granma on July 22, Cubans
learned of it through these alternative channels. Ms. Sánchez, visiting
Washington this week, told us that Cubans sense that "the government
seems to be hiding something" about the Payá and Cepero deaths and there
has been a "manipulation of facts."

The suspicions are well founded. On these pages recently, Ángel
Carromero, a Spanish politician, said that the car he was driving and in
which Mr. Payá and Mr. Cepero were riding was hit from behind by a
vehicle with Cuban government plates and that he was threatened and
intimidated by the authorities in an attempted coverup. Ms. Sánchez said
that an independent, international investigation should be carried out
as soon as possible, before the government manages to erase every last
bit of evidence. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) has just written to U.N.
Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, asking him to appoint a panel for such a
probe, saying that Mr. Payá's family, the Cuban people and the
international community "all deserve to have the truth."

Truth is not a currency well respected by Fidel and Raul Castro. Ten
years ago this month, they launched a crackdown known as the "Black
Spring," in which 75 dissidents, independent journalists and human
rights activists were imprisoned. The authorities also crushed the
Varela Project, Mr. Payá's 2002 petition drive for guarantees of
freedom; many of his colleagues were jailed. But Mr. Payá was not
imprisoned.

Ms. Sánchez reminded us that such arbitrariness is characteristic of
authoritarianism. "It is hard to think like a repressor, if you have
never been one," she said. "They have their own logic. One of the most
paralyzing elements of the Cuban repression is its illogical nature."
While not in jail, Mr. Payá had no peace. According to family members,
he was threatened repeatedly with death. The threats were often quite
direct: You will die before the Cuban revolution does.

Cuba has lately seen some economic reforms and liberalizations; one of
them allowed Ms. Sánchez to travel freely abroad for the first time. But
she told us the real change in Cuba today is not from the top but rather
from below. "People are losing their fear, moving from silent to open,
from wearing a mask to showing their real face in public," she said. Ms.
Sánchez stands at the cutting edge of this change yet sees a long road
still to be traveled. Cuba has not yet relinquished a stranglehold on
individual liberties.

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