Posted on Saturday, 03.30.13
With wit as her weapon, Yoani Sánchez cuts Castro regime to ribbons
By Juan O. Tamayo
jtamayo@MiamiHerald.com
When a hostile questioner pushed Yoani Sánchez in New York earlier this
month to explain how she dared criticize a Castro government that
provides free health, education and welfare services, Sánchez compared
Cubans to birds in a cage.
"Yes, the food and water are free," the Cuban blogger and journalist
replied calmly. "But those things are not worth more than our freedom."
It's that kind of lacerating yet cool language, and the simple yet
powerful ideas it delivers, that have made Sánchez the spearhead of a
burgeoning digital dissident "blogostroika" in Cuba and won her
international fame and prizes.
The 37-year old , who jokingly describes herself as merely an
"impertinent little girl," has in fact become a powerful player in the
binary guerrilla struggle against Cuba's communist rule.
Her Generación Y blog gets well over 15 million hits a month and is
translated into 20 languages. Her Twitter account has nearly 500,000
followers, and Fidel Castro as well as Raúl Castro's daughter, Mariela,
took the time to criticize her.
Sánchez will be in Miami this week for a string of public appearances
and a family reunion during a stop in her whirlwind tour of a dozen
countries in South and North America and Europe that started Feb. 17 and
is expected to last about three months.
It's the first time Cuban authorities have allowed her to leave the
island since 2004, when she returned from a two-year stay in Switzerland
and began launching a string of digital publications.
Sánchez's digital sword regularly skewers Fidel and Raúl as well as
their policies and acolytes. And her tweets — at times fierce, funny or
mocking — are like 140-character thumbs-in-the-eye to the government.
Her power lies in "language that cuts through the hypocrisy and myths
that have clouded the truth about Cuba for so many years," said Ted
Henken, a Baruch College professor who studies social media in Cuba and
has written several articles about her.
She describes herself as a political "free electron" that gravitates
toward conservatives or liberals depending on the issue and does not
insult the other side.
Her husband, journalist Reinaldo Escobar, 65, says that's part of the
secret of her success.
"Yoani writes from a point of moderation, a middle point that many
people can agree with," said Escobar, who was fired from the newspaper
Juventud Rebelde in 1988 for criticizing the government and now works as
an elevator repairman.
She opposes the U.S. embargo, Escobar said, because the Castro brothers
use it as an excuse for all their failures. And since she favors
unlimited travel abroad for Cubans, he said, she also favors
unrestricted U.S. travel to the island.
Havana calls her a "mercenary" paid by Washington, and Castro supporters
threw fake dollars at her in Brazil last month. She denies accepting
improper money and Escobar says they live off their work for foreign
newspapers. Sánchez is the Cuba correspondent for Spain's El País newspaper.
Ironically, a number of moderate exiles and U.S. journalists say they
wonder whether she's too good to be true — perhaps allowed a long leash
by the Castros and spared the police repression that other dissidents
suffer in return for her criticisms of U.S. policies.
Sánchez argues that her fame is her shield from repression. And while
she steadfastly attacks the government, she has not joined any dissident
organization and calls herself an "independent" or "alternative" journalist.
And while Cuban officials argue that Sánchez is virtually unknown on the
island, her supporters point out that the government blocked access to
her blog until recently, and that the state's news media monopoly treats
her as a Soviet-era non-person.
"A baseball player here can be well known, but the question is how
important are his home runs to the future of Cuba," Escobar said in a
phone interview from Havana.
Sánchez can look a bit like a hippie at times, favoring loose cotton
blouses, long skirts and dark hair down to her hips. She speaks softly
and mostly slowly. But even relatives paint her as fiercely headstrong
since the age of 5, said Henken.
Mary Jo Porter, the Seattle engineer who founded the volunteer network
that translates Generación Y and other Cuba blogs, said part of
Sánchez's appeal is the "juxtaposition of her fragility, her small and
slight physical form, with the iron strength so apparent in her voice,
her life and her work."
But, Porter said, "put food in front of her and she eats like a
lumberjack," and in private she's even more cheerful and funny.
"There's no 'behind-the-scenes-Yoani'… what you see is the real her,"
the translator said.
Born in 1975, Yoani Maria Sánchez Cordero is part of what she dubbed
Generation Y — Cubans whose names are often spelled with odd Ys because
of Moscow's influence over the island at the time. But she came of age
as the Soviet Union collapsed, cut off its huge subsidies to Cuba and
plunged it into its worst economic crisis of the 20th century.
The daughter of a modest family — her father, William, is a retired
train engineer who now fixes flat car and bicycle tires, and her mother,
Maria Eumelia, works as a taxi dispatcher — she studied IberoAmerican
literature at the University of Havana.
Her graduation thesis was titled "Words under Pressure: A study on the
literature of dictatorship in Latin America" and was partly based on a
novel by Peru's Mario Vargas Llosa about the assassination of Dominican
Republic dictator Rafael Trujillo in 1961.
Escobar said that they met in 1993 when she borrowed his copy of another
Vargas Llosa novel, and their son Teo is 17 years old.
The couple later taught Spanish, mostly to German visitors, and guided
them around Havana, while at the same time learning German.
Sánchez moved to Switzerland to work in a bookstore in 2002 in what was
planned as the first step of the family's departure, Escobar said. Teo
followed a year later, but a string of factors, including her father's
illness, led them to return in 2004.
Having lost their Cuba residency by staying abroad for more than 11
months, they bought round-trip tickets to Havana for a "family visit"
and tore up their passports after landing to avoid being returned to
Europe. They lived in legal limbo until the government agreed to
recognize their residency again.
Sánchez, who had put together her first computer in 1994 from used bits
and pieces — Escobar said she also fixes the fridge in their Havana
apartment — and experienced the Internet while in Zurich, returned with
a new career: digital journalist.
In 2004 she began launching a string of Internet publications such as
Consenso, Contodos and Convivencia, and later became the webmaster for
Desde Cuba, a Web portal that today hosts 45 blogs, almost all critical
of the Castro governments.
Three years later she launched Generación Y — the first anti-government
blog from inside the island and not anonymous — declaring that she had
tried yoga but still needed to somehow exorcize the demonic frustrations
of life in Cuba.
With the government blocking access to her blog, Sánchez passed herself
off as a German to use Internet cafes in tourist-only hotels and email
her columns to supporters abroad who translated and posted them.
She once donned a blonde wig to slip into an academic seminar on
blogging limited to government supporters.
But prestigious awards poured in for her posts. She won Colombia
University's Maria Moors Cabot prize and Spain's Ortega y Gassett award.
The Prince Claus award from the Netherlands brought her $40,000. Time
magazine put her on its list of 100 most influential people in 2008. And
President Barack Obama answered her written questions in 2009.
The government unblocked access to Generación Y and about 40 other blogs
in 2011, implicitly admitting that it could not really control what
Communications Minister Ramiro Valdes called the "wild pony" of the
Internet.
Millions of Web pages now circulate in the island on CDs, DVDs, flash
drives and Bluetooth-capable cellphones. In a scene she compared to a
Wild West gunfight, Sánchez wrote that people were meeting in a park,
pointing their phones at each other and exchanging data without nearby
police knowing what was happening.
In more recent years she has founded a bloggers' academy, tweeted alerts
on police arrests or harassment of other dissidents and grown more
political.
Raúl Castro's meek reforms are not enough to rescue the economy from its
quagmire, Sánchez has declared, and once he leaves power — he has
promised to retire in 2018 — it will be difficult for his successors to
maintain control.
Cuba's ruling system is like the old Havana buildings that are
dilapidated yet survive even hurricanes, she told McClatchy
correspondent Tim Johnson during an interview in Mexico last month.
"But one day, they want to fix the door," Sánchez said. "They take out
screws, and the house collapses."
Read more here:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/v-fullstory/3315676/with-wit-as-her-weapon-yoani.html#storylink=cpy
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Yoani Sánchez faces as many questions as explanations from exiles
Posted on Saturday, 03.30.13
In My Opinion
Myriam Marquez: Yoani Sánchez faces as many questions as explanations
from exiles
By Myriam Marquez
mmarquez@MiamiHerald.com
Forty questions in 80 days.
From Brazil to New York, internationally renown Cuban blogger Yoani
Sánchez has encountered Castro sympathizers agitating, calling her a
"mercenary of the CIA," a gusana, a worm (so old school for the
commies), an instrument of the U.S. government. They have thrown at her
fake dollar bills and a list of 40 loaded questions the Cuban regime
wants answered.
Forty questions in the 80 days of her whirlwind tour to Latin America,
Europe and the United States. Forty questions that aren't questions at
all but, rather, malevolent intentions to trap a 37-year-old Cuban (for
daring to question her government) in a crumbling ideological box.
Now she's in Miami, the soul of the exile community, and faces more
questions, some heartfelt and truly curious about this wife, mother and
writer who turned to the Internet just a few years ago to report about
her homeland, an island of daily paradoxes and humiliations. And with
each posting on her Generation Y blog and each tweet on Twitter she has
become an internationally recognized figure in journalism, politics and
human rights causes that extend beyond Cuba.
From Miami, many more than 40 questions are headed her way as she meets
with me and the Herald's Editorial Board and newsroom editors and
reporters on Monday before heading to the Freedom Tower at Miami Dade
College to answer more questions, then to Florida International
University for more questions. So many questions for the unfazed Yoani,
who seems to take it all with poise, her words as biting about the
regime as they are illuminating and hopeful about Cubans' march toward
democracy.
More than the questions, there are the explanations from Miami's walking
wounded — the old soldiers of Brigade 2506, the now middle-aged children
of Pedro Pan, the exiled political prisoners, the historicos. They want
Yoani to know, for her to let fellow Cubans know upon her return, that
exiles love their homeland, love their compatriots — but more than that,
that their history has been distorted by a dictatorship that gets to
write it.
The brigadistas' fight at the Bay of Pigs 50-plus years ago, like
Yoani's words running through the iCloud in nanoseconds today, was an
attempt to save the country they still love from the ruin it has become
under the Castro brothers. The 14,000 Cuban children sent to the states
by desperate parents through the Catholic Church in the early 1960s
wanted the best for them, they were exercising the universal and
fundamental right of each parent to save her children, and they needed
no CIA-inspired plot to come to that conclusion.
And so the questions and the explanations will come at Yoani rapid fire
in the hope that she will speak truth to a world of apologists for the
regime. As if this slip of a girl with the hip-length hippie hair were a
21st century prophet descending the Sierra Maestra. On Saturday, she
once again descended the mountain of lies to expose the historical scabs
to freedom's fresh air. In a Saturday post titled "Flan de Coco" on her
Generación Y blog, she writes:
"I've found a Cuba outside of Cuba, I told a friend a few days ago. He
laughed at my play on words, thinking I was trying to create literature.
But no. In Brazil a septuagenarian excitedly gave me a medal of the
Virgin of Charity of Cobre. 'I have not been back since I left in 1964,'
she confirmed as she handed me this little gem that had belonged to her
mother. During my stay in Prague, a group of compatriots living there
seemed to be more aware of what was happening in our country than many
who vegetate, inside it, in apathy. Amid the tall buildings of New York,
a family invited me to their house and their grandmother made a 'coconut
flan' in the style of our traditional cuisine, so damaged on the island
by the shortages and scarcities.
"Our diaspora, our exile, is conserving Cuba outside of Cuba. Along with
their suitcases and the pain of distance, they have preserved pieces of
our national history that were deleted from the textbooks with which
several generations have been educated or rather, raised to be mediocre.
I'm rediscovering my own country in each of these Cubans dispersed
around the world. When I confirm what they have really accomplished, the
contrast with what official propaganda tells me about them leaves me
with an enormous sadness for my country.
"For all this human wealth that we have lost, for all this talent that
has had to wash up outside our borders and for all the seeds that have
germinated in other lands. How did we allow one ideology, one party, one
man, to have felt the 'divine' power to decide who could or could not
carry the adjective 'Cuban?'
"Now I have proof that they lied to me, they lied to us. Nobody has had
to tell me, I can grasp it for myself on seeing all this Cuba that is
outside of Cuba, an immense country that they have been safeguarding for
us."
And, still, so many questions — from the spiritual to the ordinary to
the conspiratorial. Is she religious? How did she lose a tooth, really?
Who's paying her way?
She will answer them all, I suspect, with the grace she exhibited while
being attacked by pro-Castro mobs in Brazil on her first stop. Here, she
will be tested by a dwindling rightwing fringe that wants her to fall
lock step with their pro embargo position. They will not speak for the
majority of exiles who see beyond one U.S. policy to judge a woman who
succinctly and poetically exposes her people's suffering every day from
inside the dictatorship and, now, once again with four simple words
tells the world:
They lied to us.
Read more here:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/v-fullstory/3315698/myriam-marquez-yoani-sanchez-faces.html#storylink=cpy
In My Opinion
Myriam Marquez: Yoani Sánchez faces as many questions as explanations
from exiles
By Myriam Marquez
mmarquez@MiamiHerald.com
Forty questions in 80 days.
From Brazil to New York, internationally renown Cuban blogger Yoani
Sánchez has encountered Castro sympathizers agitating, calling her a
"mercenary of the CIA," a gusana, a worm (so old school for the
commies), an instrument of the U.S. government. They have thrown at her
fake dollar bills and a list of 40 loaded questions the Cuban regime
wants answered.
Forty questions in the 80 days of her whirlwind tour to Latin America,
Europe and the United States. Forty questions that aren't questions at
all but, rather, malevolent intentions to trap a 37-year-old Cuban (for
daring to question her government) in a crumbling ideological box.
Now she's in Miami, the soul of the exile community, and faces more
questions, some heartfelt and truly curious about this wife, mother and
writer who turned to the Internet just a few years ago to report about
her homeland, an island of daily paradoxes and humiliations. And with
each posting on her Generation Y blog and each tweet on Twitter she has
become an internationally recognized figure in journalism, politics and
human rights causes that extend beyond Cuba.
From Miami, many more than 40 questions are headed her way as she meets
with me and the Herald's Editorial Board and newsroom editors and
reporters on Monday before heading to the Freedom Tower at Miami Dade
College to answer more questions, then to Florida International
University for more questions. So many questions for the unfazed Yoani,
who seems to take it all with poise, her words as biting about the
regime as they are illuminating and hopeful about Cubans' march toward
democracy.
More than the questions, there are the explanations from Miami's walking
wounded — the old soldiers of Brigade 2506, the now middle-aged children
of Pedro Pan, the exiled political prisoners, the historicos. They want
Yoani to know, for her to let fellow Cubans know upon her return, that
exiles love their homeland, love their compatriots — but more than that,
that their history has been distorted by a dictatorship that gets to
write it.
The brigadistas' fight at the Bay of Pigs 50-plus years ago, like
Yoani's words running through the iCloud in nanoseconds today, was an
attempt to save the country they still love from the ruin it has become
under the Castro brothers. The 14,000 Cuban children sent to the states
by desperate parents through the Catholic Church in the early 1960s
wanted the best for them, they were exercising the universal and
fundamental right of each parent to save her children, and they needed
no CIA-inspired plot to come to that conclusion.
And so the questions and the explanations will come at Yoani rapid fire
in the hope that she will speak truth to a world of apologists for the
regime. As if this slip of a girl with the hip-length hippie hair were a
21st century prophet descending the Sierra Maestra. On Saturday, she
once again descended the mountain of lies to expose the historical scabs
to freedom's fresh air. In a Saturday post titled "Flan de Coco" on her
Generación Y blog, she writes:
"I've found a Cuba outside of Cuba, I told a friend a few days ago. He
laughed at my play on words, thinking I was trying to create literature.
But no. In Brazil a septuagenarian excitedly gave me a medal of the
Virgin of Charity of Cobre. 'I have not been back since I left in 1964,'
she confirmed as she handed me this little gem that had belonged to her
mother. During my stay in Prague, a group of compatriots living there
seemed to be more aware of what was happening in our country than many
who vegetate, inside it, in apathy. Amid the tall buildings of New York,
a family invited me to their house and their grandmother made a 'coconut
flan' in the style of our traditional cuisine, so damaged on the island
by the shortages and scarcities.
"Our diaspora, our exile, is conserving Cuba outside of Cuba. Along with
their suitcases and the pain of distance, they have preserved pieces of
our national history that were deleted from the textbooks with which
several generations have been educated or rather, raised to be mediocre.
I'm rediscovering my own country in each of these Cubans dispersed
around the world. When I confirm what they have really accomplished, the
contrast with what official propaganda tells me about them leaves me
with an enormous sadness for my country.
"For all this human wealth that we have lost, for all this talent that
has had to wash up outside our borders and for all the seeds that have
germinated in other lands. How did we allow one ideology, one party, one
man, to have felt the 'divine' power to decide who could or could not
carry the adjective 'Cuban?'
"Now I have proof that they lied to me, they lied to us. Nobody has had
to tell me, I can grasp it for myself on seeing all this Cuba that is
outside of Cuba, an immense country that they have been safeguarding for
us."
And, still, so many questions — from the spiritual to the ordinary to
the conspiratorial. Is she religious? How did she lose a tooth, really?
Who's paying her way?
She will answer them all, I suspect, with the grace she exhibited while
being attacked by pro-Castro mobs in Brazil on her first stop. Here, she
will be tested by a dwindling rightwing fringe that wants her to fall
lock step with their pro embargo position. They will not speak for the
majority of exiles who see beyond one U.S. policy to judge a woman who
succinctly and poetically exposes her people's suffering every day from
inside the dictatorship and, now, once again with four simple words
tells the world:
They lied to us.
Read more here:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/v-fullstory/3315698/myriam-marquez-yoani-sanchez-faces.html#storylink=cpy
In solidarity with Cuba's voices of opposition to Castro's tyranny
Posted on Saturday, 03.30.13
YOANI SANCHEZ
In solidarity with Cuba's voices of opposition to Castro's tyranny
BY MARIO DIAZ-BALART AND ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN
As we celebrate Passover and Easter, we cherish the freedom to practice
our beliefs and express our views, but are also reminded of those 90
miles away who suffer under an evil communist dictatorship. As the
beacon of democracy, we stand with pro-freedom activists in Cuba who are
struggling to achieve those same essential liberties.
On Monday, South Florida will have the opportunity to hear, once again,
the tragic story of an oppressed people under the thumb of a despotic
regime. Yoani Sánchez uses social media to shine a light on the dark
rule of the Castro brothers. Through her blog and writings, Yoani
reveals the plight of the Cuban people to the international community,
raises awareness on the extent of the regime's brutality, and gives
voice to those silenced by oppression.
During her recent visit to Washington, we, along with our congressional
colleagues, discussed with Yoani the ongoing dire situation in Cuba.
This event illustrated the bipartisan and bicameral support for the
cause of democracy in Cuba. We discussed the gross human-rights
violations on the island as Yoani conveyed the atrocities committed
against the Cuban people and the denial of their rights of free speech,
press, and assembly. We expressed to Yoani that, even if we do not agree
on every point, we stand in solidarity with the opposition voices in
Cuba and reaffirmed that they are not alone in their struggle.
This month, we remember the 2003 Black Spring crackdown in Cuba where 75
dissidents were unjustly imprisoned. Unfortunately, little has changed
since that time. The Ladies in White continue to be harassed, kicked and
beaten by Castro's state security agents just for marching in peace to
church. The Castro regime has the blood of pro-democracy advocates on
its hands, and we remain deeply concerned for the health and lives of
those brave activists who continue to speak out.
During the years of the Obama administration alone, pro-democracy
leaders Orlando Zapata Tamayo (d. Feb. 23, 2010), Juan Wilfredo Soto
García (d. May 8, 2011), Laura Pollán (d. Oct. 14, 2011), Wilman Villar
Mendoza (d. Jan. 19, 2012), Harold Cepero (d. July 22, 2012) and Oswaldo
Payá Sardiñas (d. July 22, 2012) have lost their lives at the hands of
the Castro dictatorship. These deaths underscore the grave risks assumed
by pro-democracy activists such as Antonio Rodiles, Sara Marta Fonseca,
Yoani Sánchez, Jorge Luis García Pérez ("Antunez"), José Daniel Ferrer
García, Marta Beatriz Roque, Berta Soler, Dr. Oscar Elías Biscet and
many others when they simply express their views.
We also cannot forget the appalling case of Alan Gross, a U.S.
humanitarian aid worker who was arrested in December 2009 and remains in
prison for the "crime" of helping Cuba's small Jewish community access
the Internet. He is reportedly in poor health after having lost 100
pounds in prison while his daughter and mother are both battling cancer
in the U.S.
According to the Human Rights Watch 2013 World Report, "Cuba remains the
only country in Latin America that represses virtually all forms of
political dissent. In 2012, the regime . . . continued to enforce
political conformity using short-term detentions, beatings, public acts
of repudiation, travel restrictions, and forced exile." Numerous NGOs
have documented the sharp rise in detentions, arrests and other acts of
repudiation in Cuba, but the numbers could actually be higher due to
many who are imprisoned on trumped-up charges that are difficult to
document. For example, the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and
National Reconciliation reported that there were 6,602 documented
political arrests in 2012, which was markedly up from 4,123 in 2011 and
2,074 in 2010.
Unfortunately, many in the international community fail to acknowledge
the Castro regime's egregious human rights record and brutal suppression
of fundamental liberties. However, with the help of Yoani and other
pro-democracy advocates, the Castro brothers have failed to silence the
Cuban people who are increasingly demanding real change.
Cuba's growing opposition movement is more united than ever. Due to its
heroic efforts, democracy will prevail on the island. May it be soon.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart are Republican members of
Congress representing South Florida.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/3313987/in-solidarity-with-cubas-voices.html#storylink=misearch
YOANI SANCHEZ
In solidarity with Cuba's voices of opposition to Castro's tyranny
BY MARIO DIAZ-BALART AND ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN
As we celebrate Passover and Easter, we cherish the freedom to practice
our beliefs and express our views, but are also reminded of those 90
miles away who suffer under an evil communist dictatorship. As the
beacon of democracy, we stand with pro-freedom activists in Cuba who are
struggling to achieve those same essential liberties.
On Monday, South Florida will have the opportunity to hear, once again,
the tragic story of an oppressed people under the thumb of a despotic
regime. Yoani Sánchez uses social media to shine a light on the dark
rule of the Castro brothers. Through her blog and writings, Yoani
reveals the plight of the Cuban people to the international community,
raises awareness on the extent of the regime's brutality, and gives
voice to those silenced by oppression.
During her recent visit to Washington, we, along with our congressional
colleagues, discussed with Yoani the ongoing dire situation in Cuba.
This event illustrated the bipartisan and bicameral support for the
cause of democracy in Cuba. We discussed the gross human-rights
violations on the island as Yoani conveyed the atrocities committed
against the Cuban people and the denial of their rights of free speech,
press, and assembly. We expressed to Yoani that, even if we do not agree
on every point, we stand in solidarity with the opposition voices in
Cuba and reaffirmed that they are not alone in their struggle.
This month, we remember the 2003 Black Spring crackdown in Cuba where 75
dissidents were unjustly imprisoned. Unfortunately, little has changed
since that time. The Ladies in White continue to be harassed, kicked and
beaten by Castro's state security agents just for marching in peace to
church. The Castro regime has the blood of pro-democracy advocates on
its hands, and we remain deeply concerned for the health and lives of
those brave activists who continue to speak out.
During the years of the Obama administration alone, pro-democracy
leaders Orlando Zapata Tamayo (d. Feb. 23, 2010), Juan Wilfredo Soto
García (d. May 8, 2011), Laura Pollán (d. Oct. 14, 2011), Wilman Villar
Mendoza (d. Jan. 19, 2012), Harold Cepero (d. July 22, 2012) and Oswaldo
Payá Sardiñas (d. July 22, 2012) have lost their lives at the hands of
the Castro dictatorship. These deaths underscore the grave risks assumed
by pro-democracy activists such as Antonio Rodiles, Sara Marta Fonseca,
Yoani Sánchez, Jorge Luis García Pérez ("Antunez"), José Daniel Ferrer
García, Marta Beatriz Roque, Berta Soler, Dr. Oscar Elías Biscet and
many others when they simply express their views.
We also cannot forget the appalling case of Alan Gross, a U.S.
humanitarian aid worker who was arrested in December 2009 and remains in
prison for the "crime" of helping Cuba's small Jewish community access
the Internet. He is reportedly in poor health after having lost 100
pounds in prison while his daughter and mother are both battling cancer
in the U.S.
According to the Human Rights Watch 2013 World Report, "Cuba remains the
only country in Latin America that represses virtually all forms of
political dissent. In 2012, the regime . . . continued to enforce
political conformity using short-term detentions, beatings, public acts
of repudiation, travel restrictions, and forced exile." Numerous NGOs
have documented the sharp rise in detentions, arrests and other acts of
repudiation in Cuba, but the numbers could actually be higher due to
many who are imprisoned on trumped-up charges that are difficult to
document. For example, the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and
National Reconciliation reported that there were 6,602 documented
political arrests in 2012, which was markedly up from 4,123 in 2011 and
2,074 in 2010.
Unfortunately, many in the international community fail to acknowledge
the Castro regime's egregious human rights record and brutal suppression
of fundamental liberties. However, with the help of Yoani and other
pro-democracy advocates, the Castro brothers have failed to silence the
Cuban people who are increasingly demanding real change.
Cuba's growing opposition movement is more united than ever. Due to its
heroic efforts, democracy will prevail on the island. May it be soon.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart are Republican members of
Congress representing South Florida.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/3313987/in-solidarity-with-cubas-voices.html#storylink=misearch
Let freedom tweet
Posted on Saturday, 03.30.13
The Miami Herald | EDITORIAL
Editorial: Let freedom tweet
OUR OPINION: Now in Miami, Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez has become a
symbol of hope for her Generation Y
By The Miami Herald Editorial
HeraldEd@MiamiHerald.com
If symbols matter, then surely Yoani Sánchez won the hearts of Cuban
exiles everywhere when she rushed from Miami International Airport
straight to the Virgin of Charity Shrine so dear to so many on both
sides of the Straits of Florida.
There she sat on the sea wall on Thursday afternoon outside the Coconut
Grove shrine to Cuba's patron saint, while visiting with Catholic
Archbishop Thomas Wenski. "Miami's Malecon," she called the wall —
capturing exactly the yearning that Cuba's first exiles experienced in
the 1960s when they decided to pool their pennies to build the shrine
overlooking Biscayne Bay, a view that many likened to Havana Bay and its
famous sea wall.
Still, 54 years separate the 37-year-old wife and mother from those who
first stepped on freedom's soil in Miami after the 1959 revolution. Her
beliefs and experiences, for a woman born a generation after the
revolution, are in many ways unique to her so-called generation Y (those
who grew up in Cuba under the influence of the former Soviet Union) and
yet universal for those who believe that freedom comes from the people
and not from a dictatorship's decree.
Ms. Sánchez has faced many more fans throughout the world than
pro-Castro mobs during her 80-day tour through three continents. In
Miami, she's likely to face some protests from another faction — the
dwindling number of hard-right exiles who view her with suspicion. (Or
those pro-Castro operatives who are known to infiltrate such groups to
agitate.)
It would not be the first time that such a small, and increasingly on
the fringe, group would get disproportionately more attention from the
media than their numbers warrant. But as Ms. Sánchez stated in Brazil
and Mexico when she was staring down leftist radicals with their 40
questions supplied courtesy of Cuba's communist regime, "I dream that
one day people in my country will be able to express themselves . . .
publicly like this, without reprisals."
There will be many questions for Yoani, whose first name has become a
household word here if not in Cuba, where her blog and her tweets are
blocked by Raúl Castro's government so that they do not penetrate the
limited access that Cubans have to the Internet. Certainly she has
answered anything thrown her way with aplomb
She surely will speak out again against a regime that quashes most every
basic human right and note, as she did in a small room at the United
Nations when Cuban officials threw a tantrum after learning that the
blogger was meeting with international correspondents: "If this meeting
had been held in an elevator, it would have been freer" than what the
Cuban people face on the island.
Castro sympathizers claim the same old line they've employed on other
dissidents: that she is working for the CIA. Some exiles, having been
burned before by Cuban agents in Miami pretending to be anti-Castro
activists, wonder if this young woman is beholden to government
officials in Havana.
What's clear is that Ms. Sánchez does not shy away from telling us how
she sees it. She is in Miami visiting her older sister, who arrived two
years ago. On Monday she will meet with The Herald's Editorial Board and
receive freedom awards at Miami Dade College's Freedom Tower and Florida
International University.
"I am truly happy," Ms. Sánchez said upon her arrival to Miami. "I feel
in the air and in the people a lot of respect, a lot of freedom. I feel
like I'm in Cuba but free."
Bienvenida a Miami, Yoani. Welcome to the Magic City.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/3313946/let-freedom-tweet.html#storylink=misearch
The Miami Herald | EDITORIAL
Editorial: Let freedom tweet
OUR OPINION: Now in Miami, Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez has become a
symbol of hope for her Generation Y
By The Miami Herald Editorial
HeraldEd@MiamiHerald.com
If symbols matter, then surely Yoani Sánchez won the hearts of Cuban
exiles everywhere when she rushed from Miami International Airport
straight to the Virgin of Charity Shrine so dear to so many on both
sides of the Straits of Florida.
There she sat on the sea wall on Thursday afternoon outside the Coconut
Grove shrine to Cuba's patron saint, while visiting with Catholic
Archbishop Thomas Wenski. "Miami's Malecon," she called the wall —
capturing exactly the yearning that Cuba's first exiles experienced in
the 1960s when they decided to pool their pennies to build the shrine
overlooking Biscayne Bay, a view that many likened to Havana Bay and its
famous sea wall.
Still, 54 years separate the 37-year-old wife and mother from those who
first stepped on freedom's soil in Miami after the 1959 revolution. Her
beliefs and experiences, for a woman born a generation after the
revolution, are in many ways unique to her so-called generation Y (those
who grew up in Cuba under the influence of the former Soviet Union) and
yet universal for those who believe that freedom comes from the people
and not from a dictatorship's decree.
Ms. Sánchez has faced many more fans throughout the world than
pro-Castro mobs during her 80-day tour through three continents. In
Miami, she's likely to face some protests from another faction — the
dwindling number of hard-right exiles who view her with suspicion. (Or
those pro-Castro operatives who are known to infiltrate such groups to
agitate.)
It would not be the first time that such a small, and increasingly on
the fringe, group would get disproportionately more attention from the
media than their numbers warrant. But as Ms. Sánchez stated in Brazil
and Mexico when she was staring down leftist radicals with their 40
questions supplied courtesy of Cuba's communist regime, "I dream that
one day people in my country will be able to express themselves . . .
publicly like this, without reprisals."
There will be many questions for Yoani, whose first name has become a
household word here if not in Cuba, where her blog and her tweets are
blocked by Raúl Castro's government so that they do not penetrate the
limited access that Cubans have to the Internet. Certainly she has
answered anything thrown her way with aplomb
She surely will speak out again against a regime that quashes most every
basic human right and note, as she did in a small room at the United
Nations when Cuban officials threw a tantrum after learning that the
blogger was meeting with international correspondents: "If this meeting
had been held in an elevator, it would have been freer" than what the
Cuban people face on the island.
Castro sympathizers claim the same old line they've employed on other
dissidents: that she is working for the CIA. Some exiles, having been
burned before by Cuban agents in Miami pretending to be anti-Castro
activists, wonder if this young woman is beholden to government
officials in Havana.
What's clear is that Ms. Sánchez does not shy away from telling us how
she sees it. She is in Miami visiting her older sister, who arrived two
years ago. On Monday she will meet with The Herald's Editorial Board and
receive freedom awards at Miami Dade College's Freedom Tower and Florida
International University.
"I am truly happy," Ms. Sánchez said upon her arrival to Miami. "I feel
in the air and in the people a lot of respect, a lot of freedom. I feel
like I'm in Cuba but free."
Bienvenida a Miami, Yoani. Welcome to the Magic City.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/30/3313946/let-freedom-tweet.html#storylink=misearch
Yoani y la libertad
Yoani y la libertad
Carlos Alberto Montaner | Miami | 31 Mar 2013 - 12:16 am.
Si la primera vez que Yoani Sánchez recibió una invitación y una visa
para viajar al extranjero, la dictadura le hubiera permitido ejercer su
derecho a entrar y salir libremente del país, no habría alcanzado la
enorme celebridad y peso que hoy tiene.
Yoani Sánchez visita Miami. Es la escala más difícil de su largo
periplo. En todas partes, como los toreros consagrados tras una buena
faena, ha salido en hombros de la multitud. En Florida también
triunfará, pero le costará un poco más de trabajo.
Me da la impresión de que la inmensa mayoría de los cubanos la quiere y
respeta —estoy entre esos admiradores—, pero no faltan los que la
adversan por distintas razones, con frecuencia totalmente irracionales.
Yoani ha dado docenas de charlas, concedido cientos de entrevistas, y se
ha enfrentado muy exitosamente a las turbas de simpatizantes de la
dictadura castrista enviadas por la embajada cubana en cada sitio donde
ha sido invitada a hablar. En más de medio siglo de tiranía, nadie ha
sido más eficaz en la tarea de desmontar los mitos del régimen y mostrar
la miserable forma de vivir de los cubanos.
Paradojas de la vida: de alguna manera, la actitud grosera y vociferante
contra Yoani de estos agresivos matones, aunque desagradable mientras se
producen los incidentes, ha servido para mantener el interés de los
medios de comunicación y para suscitar el respaldo de notables sectores
políticos y sociales.
Estos energúmenos, acostumbrados al medio cubano, donde no hay vestigios
de libertad, no acaban de entender que tratar de silenciar a Yoani,
insultando y calumniando a una periodista independiente, una muchacha
frágil que sólo cuenta con su palabra y su valentía, es un
comportamiento contraproducente en cualquier país libre en que se produzca.
Las armas de Yoani han sido la sinceridad, una lógica aplastante, la
innata capacidad para la comunicación y su propia y atrayente
personalidad. Es decir, los mismos rasgos que, paulatinamente, fueron
despertando, primero, la curiosidad de los grandes medios e
instituciones —Time, El País, The Miami Herald, Foreign Policy, Columbia
University—, y luego la admiración de millones de lectores en todo el
mundo que encontraban en sus crónicas una equilibrada descripción del
empobrecido manicomio cubano.
El régimen de los Castro, convencido (o al menos decidido a convencer a
los demás) de que detrás de cada crítica está la mano de Estados Unidos,
del capitalismo o de oscuros intereses económicos, se empeñó, sin el
menor éxito, en tratar de demostrar que Yoani era una marioneta de la
CIA, del Grupo Prisa o de cualquier fabricante artificial de prestigios.
No había nada de eso. Como suele ocurrir, el talento de Yoani, la
impredecible suerte y el ataque de la dictadura, la colocaron en el
punto de mira de los grandes centros de difusión de información, a lo
que contribuyó que el mismísimo presidente Obama, cuando ya la
periodista era extremadamente famosa, le respondiera un cuestionario
destinado a su blog.
Pudo haberle sucedido a otros notables blogueros dentro de Cuba —Claudia
Cadelo, Iván García, Luis Cino, entre los buenos escritores—, pero
resultó Yoani la que concentró el interés de la opinión pública
internacional, a lo que no fueron ajenos el acoso y los maltratos del
régimen.
Es increíble que la dictadura no aprenda la lección: quienes más daño le
han hecho a la imagen del Gobierno han sido las víctimas de sus abusos.
A lo largo de esa infinita tiranía, Huber Matos, Armando Valladares,
Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo, Gustavo Arcos, Ricardo Bofill, María Elena Cruz
Varela, Reinaldo Arenas, Laura Pollán, Raúl Rivero, Oswaldo Payá, ahora
su hija Rosa María, entre tantos otros cubanos valiosos, han encontrado
tribuna y eco para sus denuncias como consecuencia de los atropellos de
que fueron objeto.
Si la primera vez que Yoani Sánchez recibió una invitación y una visa
para viajar al extranjero, la dictadura le hubiera permitido ejercer su
derecho a entrar y salir libremente del país, no habría alcanzado la
enorme celebridad y peso que hoy tiene.
¿Por qué no lo hizo? Por una mezcla de arrogancia y estupidez. Por creer
que pueden aplastar sin consecuencias a las personas. Afortunadamente,
eso no es cierto. La suya es la voz potente de los débiles. "Un
principio justo desde el fondo de una cueva puede más que un ejército",
decía Martí. ¡Bienvenida Yoani, a la libertad!
http://www.diariodecuba.com/cuba/1364685368_2552.html
Carlos Alberto Montaner | Miami | 31 Mar 2013 - 12:16 am.
Si la primera vez que Yoani Sánchez recibió una invitación y una visa
para viajar al extranjero, la dictadura le hubiera permitido ejercer su
derecho a entrar y salir libremente del país, no habría alcanzado la
enorme celebridad y peso que hoy tiene.
Yoani Sánchez visita Miami. Es la escala más difícil de su largo
periplo. En todas partes, como los toreros consagrados tras una buena
faena, ha salido en hombros de la multitud. En Florida también
triunfará, pero le costará un poco más de trabajo.
Me da la impresión de que la inmensa mayoría de los cubanos la quiere y
respeta —estoy entre esos admiradores—, pero no faltan los que la
adversan por distintas razones, con frecuencia totalmente irracionales.
Yoani ha dado docenas de charlas, concedido cientos de entrevistas, y se
ha enfrentado muy exitosamente a las turbas de simpatizantes de la
dictadura castrista enviadas por la embajada cubana en cada sitio donde
ha sido invitada a hablar. En más de medio siglo de tiranía, nadie ha
sido más eficaz en la tarea de desmontar los mitos del régimen y mostrar
la miserable forma de vivir de los cubanos.
Paradojas de la vida: de alguna manera, la actitud grosera y vociferante
contra Yoani de estos agresivos matones, aunque desagradable mientras se
producen los incidentes, ha servido para mantener el interés de los
medios de comunicación y para suscitar el respaldo de notables sectores
políticos y sociales.
Estos energúmenos, acostumbrados al medio cubano, donde no hay vestigios
de libertad, no acaban de entender que tratar de silenciar a Yoani,
insultando y calumniando a una periodista independiente, una muchacha
frágil que sólo cuenta con su palabra y su valentía, es un
comportamiento contraproducente en cualquier país libre en que se produzca.
Las armas de Yoani han sido la sinceridad, una lógica aplastante, la
innata capacidad para la comunicación y su propia y atrayente
personalidad. Es decir, los mismos rasgos que, paulatinamente, fueron
despertando, primero, la curiosidad de los grandes medios e
instituciones —Time, El País, The Miami Herald, Foreign Policy, Columbia
University—, y luego la admiración de millones de lectores en todo el
mundo que encontraban en sus crónicas una equilibrada descripción del
empobrecido manicomio cubano.
El régimen de los Castro, convencido (o al menos decidido a convencer a
los demás) de que detrás de cada crítica está la mano de Estados Unidos,
del capitalismo o de oscuros intereses económicos, se empeñó, sin el
menor éxito, en tratar de demostrar que Yoani era una marioneta de la
CIA, del Grupo Prisa o de cualquier fabricante artificial de prestigios.
No había nada de eso. Como suele ocurrir, el talento de Yoani, la
impredecible suerte y el ataque de la dictadura, la colocaron en el
punto de mira de los grandes centros de difusión de información, a lo
que contribuyó que el mismísimo presidente Obama, cuando ya la
periodista era extremadamente famosa, le respondiera un cuestionario
destinado a su blog.
Pudo haberle sucedido a otros notables blogueros dentro de Cuba —Claudia
Cadelo, Iván García, Luis Cino, entre los buenos escritores—, pero
resultó Yoani la que concentró el interés de la opinión pública
internacional, a lo que no fueron ajenos el acoso y los maltratos del
régimen.
Es increíble que la dictadura no aprenda la lección: quienes más daño le
han hecho a la imagen del Gobierno han sido las víctimas de sus abusos.
A lo largo de esa infinita tiranía, Huber Matos, Armando Valladares,
Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo, Gustavo Arcos, Ricardo Bofill, María Elena Cruz
Varela, Reinaldo Arenas, Laura Pollán, Raúl Rivero, Oswaldo Payá, ahora
su hija Rosa María, entre tantos otros cubanos valiosos, han encontrado
tribuna y eco para sus denuncias como consecuencia de los atropellos de
que fueron objeto.
Si la primera vez que Yoani Sánchez recibió una invitación y una visa
para viajar al extranjero, la dictadura le hubiera permitido ejercer su
derecho a entrar y salir libremente del país, no habría alcanzado la
enorme celebridad y peso que hoy tiene.
¿Por qué no lo hizo? Por una mezcla de arrogancia y estupidez. Por creer
que pueden aplastar sin consecuencias a las personas. Afortunadamente,
eso no es cierto. La suya es la voz potente de los débiles. "Un
principio justo desde el fondo de una cueva puede más que un ejército",
decía Martí. ¡Bienvenida Yoani, a la libertad!
http://www.diariodecuba.com/cuba/1364685368_2552.html
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Questions about a dissident's death in Cuba won't go away
Opinion
AN EDITORIAL: Questions about a dissident's death in Cuba won't go away
The Washington Post
The car crash that killed dissident Oswaldo Paya and the youth activist
Harold Cepero in eastern Cuba last July was on a rural road. As with any
wreck in which passengers die or are knocked unconscious, there was some
confusion. In the front of the rental car, on the passenger side, sat
Jens Aron Modig of Sweden, president of the youth league of Sweden's
Christian Democratic Party. He has said he was asleep at the moment of
impact. The driver, Angel Carromero, a leader of the youth wing of
Spain's ruling party, has told us the car was hit from behind by a
vehicle bearing Cuban government license plates. They both survived; Mr.
Paya and Mr. Cepero, in the back seat, did not. Mr. Carromero said that
after the crash he was imprisoned and subjected to intimidation and
threats by Cuban authorities, who attempted to cover up their role in
the deaths. Cuba convicted Mr. Carromero of vehicular homicide,
transferred him to Spain and declared the case closed.
But it must not be closed. Mr. Carromero and Mr. Modig carried cell
phones. Text messages were sent to friends and relatives abroad
immediately after the wreck. These messages cannot be manipulated or
suppressed. Although not the whole story, they must be taken seriously
as important contemporaneous evidence. The text messages are one reason
why the questions about Mr. Paya's death will not go away.
It is not known precisely what happened on the road, but the messages
offer clues. One was sent from Mr. Modig's phone to a recipient in
Sweden, according to screenshots provided to us. It says: "We've
crashed. Traveling in an ambulance now. I do not have my passport. Not
in grave danger." A subsequent message reports that Mr. Modig and Mr.
Carromero are in a hospital in the town of Bayamo "and OK."
Then Mr. Modig adds: "Angel said that someone had tried to run us off
the highway."
Who? And why? If the wreck was — as Cuba has claimed — an accident
caused by reckless driving, why would one of the survivors have said
they were run off the road? These and other suspicions about the death
of Mr. Paya need to be addressed. Mr. Paya's family, including his
daughter Rosa Maria, have demanded an international and independent probe.
On Monday, eight U.S. senators from both parties asked for such an
investigation from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, part
of the Organization of American States. The signers are Sens. Richard J.
Durbin, D-Ill., Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Benjamin L. Cardin, D-Md., Mark
Kirk, R-Ill., John McCain, R-Ariz., Bill Nelson, D-Fla., Robert
Menendez, D-N.J., and Mark R. Warner, D-Va. They say Mr. Carromero's
account has raised "deeply troubling questions that Paya's car was
deliberately targeted by Cuban government officials well known for their
harassment of Paya." Only a serious investigation will put this matter
to rest. It seems like the very minimum necessary for a man who
championed the cause of freedom in Cuba.
http://morningjournal.com/articles/2013/03/28/opinion/doc5153b0d6adad8834049811.txt
AN EDITORIAL: Questions about a dissident's death in Cuba won't go away
The Washington Post
The car crash that killed dissident Oswaldo Paya and the youth activist
Harold Cepero in eastern Cuba last July was on a rural road. As with any
wreck in which passengers die or are knocked unconscious, there was some
confusion. In the front of the rental car, on the passenger side, sat
Jens Aron Modig of Sweden, president of the youth league of Sweden's
Christian Democratic Party. He has said he was asleep at the moment of
impact. The driver, Angel Carromero, a leader of the youth wing of
Spain's ruling party, has told us the car was hit from behind by a
vehicle bearing Cuban government license plates. They both survived; Mr.
Paya and Mr. Cepero, in the back seat, did not. Mr. Carromero said that
after the crash he was imprisoned and subjected to intimidation and
threats by Cuban authorities, who attempted to cover up their role in
the deaths. Cuba convicted Mr. Carromero of vehicular homicide,
transferred him to Spain and declared the case closed.
But it must not be closed. Mr. Carromero and Mr. Modig carried cell
phones. Text messages were sent to friends and relatives abroad
immediately after the wreck. These messages cannot be manipulated or
suppressed. Although not the whole story, they must be taken seriously
as important contemporaneous evidence. The text messages are one reason
why the questions about Mr. Paya's death will not go away.
It is not known precisely what happened on the road, but the messages
offer clues. One was sent from Mr. Modig's phone to a recipient in
Sweden, according to screenshots provided to us. It says: "We've
crashed. Traveling in an ambulance now. I do not have my passport. Not
in grave danger." A subsequent message reports that Mr. Modig and Mr.
Carromero are in a hospital in the town of Bayamo "and OK."
Then Mr. Modig adds: "Angel said that someone had tried to run us off
the highway."
Who? And why? If the wreck was — as Cuba has claimed — an accident
caused by reckless driving, why would one of the survivors have said
they were run off the road? These and other suspicions about the death
of Mr. Paya need to be addressed. Mr. Paya's family, including his
daughter Rosa Maria, have demanded an international and independent probe.
On Monday, eight U.S. senators from both parties asked for such an
investigation from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, part
of the Organization of American States. The signers are Sens. Richard J.
Durbin, D-Ill., Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Benjamin L. Cardin, D-Md., Mark
Kirk, R-Ill., John McCain, R-Ariz., Bill Nelson, D-Fla., Robert
Menendez, D-N.J., and Mark R. Warner, D-Va. They say Mr. Carromero's
account has raised "deeply troubling questions that Paya's car was
deliberately targeted by Cuban government officials well known for their
harassment of Paya." Only a serious investigation will put this matter
to rest. It seems like the very minimum necessary for a man who
championed the cause of freedom in Cuba.
http://morningjournal.com/articles/2013/03/28/opinion/doc5153b0d6adad8834049811.txt
Morning Journal: preguntas sobre la muerte de Payá y Cepero
Morning Journal: preguntas sobre la muerte de Payá y Cepero
Los mensajes de texto son una de las razones por las que no van a
desaparecer las preguntas sobre la muerte del Sr. Payá, apunta la editorial.
marzo 29, 2013
El accidente de coche donde murieron los disidentes Oswaldo Payá y el
joven activista Harold Cepero ocurrió en un camino rural al Este de Cuba
el pasado mes de julio. Una vez ocurrido el siniestro en el que hubo
muertes y otros pasajeros quedaron inconscientes se produjo cierta
confusión, destaca una editorial del periódico The Journal Morning.
Jens Aron Mogig presidente de la liga juvenil del Partido Demócrata
Cristiano de Suecia viajaba en la parte delantera del coche de alquiler,
en el lado del pasajero y ha dicho que estaba durmiendo en el momento
del impacto.
El conductor Ángel Carromero, un dirigente del a la juvenil del partido
gobernante de España, ha dicho que el coche fue golpeado por detrás por
un vehículo con placas del gobierno cubano.
Carromero y Modig sobrevivieron el accidente, sin embargo el el Sr. Payá
y el Sr. Cepero, que viajaban en el asiento de atrás, no.
Cuba condenó al señor Carromero de homicidio vehicular, lo trasladaron a
España y declaró cerrado el caso pero en las declaraciones que ofreciera
el joven político español al llegar a su país destacó que después del
accidente fue encarcelado y sometido a intimidación y amenazas por parte
de las autoridades cubanas, que trataron de encubrir su papel en las
muertes.
Según señala The Morning Journal el caso no debe estar cerrado porque
Carromero y Modig realizaron llamadas desde sus teléfonos celulares a
amigos y familiares en el extranjero inmediatamente después del
incidente y estos mensajes no pueden ser manipulados o suprimidos.
Aunque no es la historia completa, estos textos deben ser tomados en
serio como pruebas contemporáneas importantes. Los mensajes de texto son
una de las razones por las que no van a desaparecer las preguntas sobre
la muerte del Sr. Payá, apunta el editorial.
No se sabe exactamente lo que pasó en el camino, pero los mensajes
ofrecen pistas. Uno de ellos fue enviado desde el teléfono del Sr. Modig
a un destinatario en Suecia, el texto dice: "Hemos caído. Viajando en
una ambulancia ahora. Yo no tengo mi pasaporte. No se encuentra en grave
peligro.
Otro mensaje informa que Modig y Carromero están en un hospital de la
ciudad de Bayamo y bien". Entonces el señor Modig añade: "Angel dijo
que alguien había tratado de salirse de la carretera".
The Morning Journal pregunta ¿Quién? ¿Y por qué? Y destaca "Si el
accidente fue, como Cuba ha planteado, un accidente causado por
conducción temeraria, ¿por qué uno de los sobrevivientes ha dicho que
ocurrió fuera de la carretera?
Estas y otras sospechas sobre la muerte del Sr. Paya son necesarias
aclararlas. La familia del Sr. Payá, incluyendo a su hija Rosa María,
han exigido una investigación internacional e independiente.
El lunes, ocho senadores de ambos partidos pidieron una investigación de
la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos, que forma parte de la
Organización de los Estados Americanos.
Los firmantes son los senadores Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., Marco Rubio,
republicano por Florida., Benjamin L. Cardin, demócrata de Maryland.,
Mark Kirk, republicano por Illinois., John McCain, R-Ariz., Bill Nelson,
demócrata por la Florida., Robert Menéndez, demócrata por Nueva Jersey,
y Mark R. Warner, D-Va.
Los senadores plantean en la petición que en los mensajes telefónicos
el Sr. Carromero hay preguntas muy inquietantes acerca de que el coche
fue atacado deliberadamente por funcionarios del gobierno cubano
conocidos por su acoso a Payá."
Sólo una investigación seria aclararía el asunto dice Morning Journal
que recuerda "es lo minino que podría hacerse por un hombre que
defendió la causa de la libertad en Cuba.
http://www.martinoticias.com/content/peticion-investigacion-muerte-paya-cepero/20958.html
Los mensajes de texto son una de las razones por las que no van a
desaparecer las preguntas sobre la muerte del Sr. Payá, apunta la editorial.
marzo 29, 2013
El accidente de coche donde murieron los disidentes Oswaldo Payá y el
joven activista Harold Cepero ocurrió en un camino rural al Este de Cuba
el pasado mes de julio. Una vez ocurrido el siniestro en el que hubo
muertes y otros pasajeros quedaron inconscientes se produjo cierta
confusión, destaca una editorial del periódico The Journal Morning.
Jens Aron Mogig presidente de la liga juvenil del Partido Demócrata
Cristiano de Suecia viajaba en la parte delantera del coche de alquiler,
en el lado del pasajero y ha dicho que estaba durmiendo en el momento
del impacto.
El conductor Ángel Carromero, un dirigente del a la juvenil del partido
gobernante de España, ha dicho que el coche fue golpeado por detrás por
un vehículo con placas del gobierno cubano.
Carromero y Modig sobrevivieron el accidente, sin embargo el el Sr. Payá
y el Sr. Cepero, que viajaban en el asiento de atrás, no.
Cuba condenó al señor Carromero de homicidio vehicular, lo trasladaron a
España y declaró cerrado el caso pero en las declaraciones que ofreciera
el joven político español al llegar a su país destacó que después del
accidente fue encarcelado y sometido a intimidación y amenazas por parte
de las autoridades cubanas, que trataron de encubrir su papel en las
muertes.
Según señala The Morning Journal el caso no debe estar cerrado porque
Carromero y Modig realizaron llamadas desde sus teléfonos celulares a
amigos y familiares en el extranjero inmediatamente después del
incidente y estos mensajes no pueden ser manipulados o suprimidos.
Aunque no es la historia completa, estos textos deben ser tomados en
serio como pruebas contemporáneas importantes. Los mensajes de texto son
una de las razones por las que no van a desaparecer las preguntas sobre
la muerte del Sr. Payá, apunta el editorial.
No se sabe exactamente lo que pasó en el camino, pero los mensajes
ofrecen pistas. Uno de ellos fue enviado desde el teléfono del Sr. Modig
a un destinatario en Suecia, el texto dice: "Hemos caído. Viajando en
una ambulancia ahora. Yo no tengo mi pasaporte. No se encuentra en grave
peligro.
Otro mensaje informa que Modig y Carromero están en un hospital de la
ciudad de Bayamo y bien". Entonces el señor Modig añade: "Angel dijo
que alguien había tratado de salirse de la carretera".
The Morning Journal pregunta ¿Quién? ¿Y por qué? Y destaca "Si el
accidente fue, como Cuba ha planteado, un accidente causado por
conducción temeraria, ¿por qué uno de los sobrevivientes ha dicho que
ocurrió fuera de la carretera?
Estas y otras sospechas sobre la muerte del Sr. Paya son necesarias
aclararlas. La familia del Sr. Payá, incluyendo a su hija Rosa María,
han exigido una investigación internacional e independiente.
El lunes, ocho senadores de ambos partidos pidieron una investigación de
la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos, que forma parte de la
Organización de los Estados Americanos.
Los firmantes son los senadores Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., Marco Rubio,
republicano por Florida., Benjamin L. Cardin, demócrata de Maryland.,
Mark Kirk, republicano por Illinois., John McCain, R-Ariz., Bill Nelson,
demócrata por la Florida., Robert Menéndez, demócrata por Nueva Jersey,
y Mark R. Warner, D-Va.
Los senadores plantean en la petición que en los mensajes telefónicos
el Sr. Carromero hay preguntas muy inquietantes acerca de que el coche
fue atacado deliberadamente por funcionarios del gobierno cubano
conocidos por su acoso a Payá."
Sólo una investigación seria aclararía el asunto dice Morning Journal
que recuerda "es lo minino que podría hacerse por un hombre que
defendió la causa de la libertad en Cuba.
http://www.martinoticias.com/content/peticion-investigacion-muerte-paya-cepero/20958.html
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