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The Bush administration rejects normal relations with communist Cuba because of its sorry human rights record and political prisoners. Cuba holds about 350 political prisoners. The U.S.'s new best friend, communist Uzbekistan, an infinitely more brutal, despotic tyranny than Cuba, holds over 7,000.

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Fidel on May Day 2003

[ 05 April 2004: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

[ 05 April 2004: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

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Originally posted by CMOT Dibbler:
...So which is it, is El Commondante a kind and gentle man, a benevolent revolutionary who just wants to do the right thing for his people, or is he a corrupt despot who only cares about power?
[ 05 April 2004: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

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There's only one way to answer a question like that. Do your own homework and form your own opinion. Here's some help:

Granma

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I find Fidel confusing. I used to think the man was a saint, I still have his picture beside my bed.

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At the same time, even a democratic state in Cuba's situation would be pretty likely to have some political prisoners (aka people they thought were spies or in the pay of same). Some of the people in jail and called "political prisoners" seem in fact to be people in the pay of the US seeking to destabilize the country. Others seem genuinely to be political prisoners, there for trivial "offenses".

Meanwhile, I think both Castro and the upper Communist Party people are very much afraid that democratization would let the US pry the place open and kill off the very real advances they've made. They could probably get away with more openness than they've got, but the worry is a very real one. I do wonder what Cuba would be like today if there had never been any pressure from the United States in the first place. More room to evolve, I would think, the results less rigid.

I wonder if Castro is hoping to outlast the US. There are a lot of people predicting that the American "imperial moment" doesn't have too many years to run, that they're going to hit an overstretch crisis military, economic or both. After which Cuba might be in a position to loosen up if it had alliances going with countries in a possibly resurgent Latin America. But on the other hand, that's a lot of ifs, and Castro can't have that many years left in him either. Maybe he's just stalling in hopes the horse will learn to talk.

[ 06 April 2004: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

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What is the human rights situation in Cuba. Castro insists that no man has been executed in his country for 43 years. Is this the case? Are the elections in Cuba as free as they are in Sweden?

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Unlike previous years, when Cuban authorities were mostly content to merely harass and threaten independent journalists and their families, in 2003, authorities launched an all-out assault against the opposition and the independent press. Officials jailed 29 journalists—about one-third of the island’s independent press—and sentenced them to lengthy prison terms. Those who continue to work face systematic police harassment and threats.
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The imprisoned journalists, who are being held in maximum-security facilities and are handcuffed any time they leave their cells, have denounced their unsanitary prison conditions, inadequate medical care, solitary confinement, and lack of access to the press and television. They have also complained of receiving foul-smelling and rotten food.

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For another journalistic approach, try the International Federation of Journalists (The IFJ is also critical of the arrest of journalists in Cuba.)

[ 06 April 2004: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

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Castro insists that no man has been executed in his country for 43 years. Is this the case?

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One interesting part of the interview was when Fidel said something to the effect of "maybe I am a dictator but what's wrong with that". I thought he was being extremely candid.

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We fully respect the opinions of those who oppose capital punishment for religious, philosophical and humanitarian reasons. We Cuban revolutionaries also abhor capital punishment, for much more profound reasons than those addressed by the social sciences with regard to crime, currently under study in our country. The day will come when we can accede to the wishes for the abolition of such penalty so nobly expressed here by Reverend Lucius Walker in his brilliant speech. The special concern over this issue is easily understood when you know that the majority of the people executed in the United States are African American and Hispanic, and not infrequently they are innocent, especially in Texas, the champion of death sentences, where President Bush was formerly the governor, and not a single life has ever been pardoned.

The Cuban Revolution was placed in the dilemma of either protecting the lives of millions of Cubans by using the legally established death penalty to punish the three main hijackers of a passenger ferry or sitting back and doing nothing. The U.S. government, which incites common criminals to assault boats or airplanes with passengers on board, encourages these people gravely endangering the lives of innocents and creating the ideal conditions for an attack on Cuba. A wave of hijackings had been unleashed and was already in full development; it had to be stopped.

We cannot ever hesitate when it is a question of protecting the lives of the sons and daughters of a people determined to fight until the end, arresting the mercenaries who serve the aggressors and applying the most severe sanctions against terrorists who hijack passenger boats or planes or commit similarly serious acts, who will be punished by the courts in accordance with the laws in force.

Not even Jesus Christ, who drove the traders out of the temple with a whip, would fail to opt for the defense of the people.

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The fact that a head of state, on a national holiday, makes it his business to defend such executions while acknowledging that he would rather not carry them out seems to deserve our consideration. Even the most consistent opponent of capital punishment could imagine circumstances where they could not avoid it: civil war, invasion, and so on.

I was referring to capital punishment - on that subject at least, the US cannot be accused of hypocrisy. They do it, and they don't pretend that they'd rather not do it.

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What is the human rights situation in Cuba. Castro insists that no man has been executed in his country for 43 years. Is this the case?

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Fidel wasn't referring to capital punishment, he was referring to torture.

The Cuban government has indeed executed prisoners (something I personally oppose) but I think that international human rights organizations would agree that Cuba has not engaged in the torture of prisoners...political and otherwise.

There have been reports of poor prison conditions and neglect, but certainly not torture.

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Are the elections in Cuba as free as they are in Sweden?

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The Cuban parliament (its called the Assembly of People's Power) is an elected body, but its not elected in a way that those in western countries would be familiar with.

As I understand, candidates are nominated by workplace committees, neighbourhood committees and various social organizations. On the ballot, people vote on whether or not they approve the candidates or not. The Cubans would argue that its at this "grass roots" level where democracy takes place.

Apparently there is a "recall" provision in the Cuban constitution but how often it is in fact used is a question I can't honestly answer. It would be interesting to find out.

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Stone showed happy crowds waiting to meet Castro. How authoritarian is the old man? Is he as tyrannical as Saddam Hussein or the Shah?

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One of the "crowd" scenes took place at the Latin American School of Medicine in Havana. Students at the school are drawn from throughout Latin America and receive their medical education for free courtesy of the Cuban government. The school also accepts students from depressed communities in the U.S. who could otherwise not afford a medical education.

Needless to say, those students all feel very grateful towards Fidel and that's why you saw him being treated like a rock star.

Oliver Stone did the documentary prior to the arrests of the so-called "independent journalists" and apparently plans to go back to Cuba to do another film dealing with this issue. All of these "independent journalists" were in some way shape or form receiving payments from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana through a programme initiated by the Bush-appointed head of the section James Casson. So its debatable in my view as to how "independent" they were.

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He hasn't expressed a deep hatred for ethnic minorities in his country and even his zero-tolerance policy for homosexuality seems to have disappeared.

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Actually I thought Castro was quite honest about this issue in the film where he talked about the history of machismo throughout Cuban history and how they've evolved out of it.

Actually, some months ago the "Telelatino" cable channel carried a Cuban film which dealt with this very issue, however within a Cuban context.

This would have been a film that was shown in Cuban cinemas and on Cuban television...sorry can't remember the name of it. It was in Spanish with subtitles and my Spanish isn't very good.

Basically the film deals with a young male art student who's also a candidate member for the Cuban Young Communist League. The student strikes up a friendship with a gay man.

The film was straight-up honest about the homophobia in Cuban society, how the student was hassled because of his friendship with the gay man. Towards the end of the film the gay man gives a "speach" questioning why gay people can't be considered communists and revolutionaries.

I've seen other Cuban films on the weekend on Telelatino from time to time. Interesting what you can catch "flicking the remote".

The black population in Cuba were treated as subhumans in pre-revolutionary Cuba. One thing that the revolution did accomplish was the elimination of racism. In the film, Castro states that blacks in Cuba are in fact the most revolutionary and therefore the most pro-government. I can only say that from my own travels to Cuba over the years that I would tend to agree.

Threads on Cuba come up quite frequently on babble. With very limited resources its made tremendous achievements in health and education despite 40 years of harassment and sabotage by the U.S.

Most of us would like to see Cuba become more open and democratic, but its between the perverbial rock and a hard place.

[ 06 April 2004: Message edited by: radiorahim ]

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Threads on Cuba come up quite frequently on babble. With very limited resources its made tremendous achievements in health and education despite 40 years of harassment and sabotage by the U.S.

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A bit of quick Googling indicates that these EPZ's haven't exactly taken off, though. It seems that foreign companies are forbidden from hiring & firing labourers directly, instead having to hire them through an "employment agency" which is part of the Cuban government. Plus, the companies are forced to pay such things as social security benefits, paid vacations & holidays, and free lunches for their workers.

What kind of "free trade zone" is that?

Obviously those Cubans haven't quite grasped what the "maquiladora" philosophy is all about. It's a good start, though: maybe, given time, they'll learn, and Cuba will join the "race to the bottom" like everybody else.

[ 08 April 2004: Message edited by: beluga2 ]