Welcome to the Carnival of Latin America and the Caribbean. I dedicate this week’s Carnival to the courageous men and women who have resisted the oppressive Communist regime in Cuba. Here is Mary O’Grady’s column in today’s Wall Street Journal:
Zapata Lives
Castro forces dissidents to accept exile as the price of release from his dungeons.
Zapata’s passing sparked international outrage, and on July 7 the regime yielded to the pressure. It agreed to release the independent journalists, writers and democracy advocates who had been jailed during the 2003 crackdown on dissent, known as the Black Spring.
Yet only the naïve could read Castro’s forced acquiescence as a break with tyranny. It is instead a cynical ploy to clean the face of a dictatorship. It is also an effort to reclaim respectability for the world’s pro-Castro politicians, including Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos. No one understands this better than the former prisoners.
Those sent to Spain have not hidden their joy about getting out of Cuban jails. “There are no words to fairly describe how amazed and excited I was when I saw myself free and next to my wife and daughter again,” Normando Hernández González told the Committee to Protect Journalists in a telephone interview. But Mr. Hernández, an independent journalist, hasn’t minced words about Cuban repression either.
In a telephone interview with Miami’s Radio Republica, he talked about his “indescribable” time in jail. “It’s crime upon crime, the deep hatred of the Castro regime toward everyone who peacefully dissents. It is a unique life experience that I do not wish upon my worst enemy.”
The regime tried to spruce up the former prisoners by dressing them in neatly pressed trousers, white shirts and ties. But they brought tales of horror to Spain. Ariel Sigler, a labor organizer who went into prison seven years ago a healthy man but is now confined to a wheel chair, arrived in Miami on Wednesday.
These graphic reminders of Castro’s twisted mind have been bad for Mr. Moratinos’s wider agenda, which is to use the release of the prisoners to convince the European Union to abandon its “common position” on Cuba. Adopted in 1996, it says that the EU seeks “in its relations with Cuba” to “encourage a process of transition to pluralist democracy and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, as well as a sustainable recovery and improvement in the living standards of the Cuban people.” Mr. Moratinos’s desire to help Fidel end the common position is a source of anger among Cuban dissidents.
The former prisoners also resent their exile, after, as Mr. Hernández puts it, “being kidnapped for seven years.” He explained to Radio Republica: “The more logical outcome would be, ‘Yes, you are freeing me. Free me to my home. Free me so I won’t be apart from my sister, from my family, from my people, from my neighbors.’” Instead he says he was “practically forced” to go to Spain in exchange for getting out of jail, and to get health care for his daughter and himself.
Cuba’s horrendous prison conditions are no secret. In his chilling memoir “Against All Hope” (1986, 2001), Armando Valladares cataloged the brutality he experienced first hand as a prisoner of conscience for 22 years. A steady stream of exiles have echoed his claims. But another bit of cruelty is less well understood: For a half century the regime has let political prisoners out of jail only if they sign a paper saying they have been “rehabilitated” or, when the regime is under pressure, if they agree to leave the island. Getting rid of the strong-willed, while being patted on the back for their “release,” has been Castro’s win-win.
Now some prisoners are refusing to deal. Ten of the 52, including Óscar Elías Biscet, famous for his pacifism, say they will not accept exile as a condition of release. These brave souls remain locked up.
Read a few reports from the Miami Herald:
Safe in Spain, Cuban dissidents vow to continue struggle
Seven dissidents freed by the Cuban government arrived in Spain, promising to continue their struggle against the Castro regime. Ten others still in jail say they will not leave Cuba.
11 Cuban prisoners, expatriated to Spain, are weary, ailing, defiant and free
After years in windowless cells, they find themselves reunited with family but deprived of their homeland.
At Marc Masferrer’s blog, Guido Sigler Amaya, Cuban Political Prisoner of the Week, 8/1/10
Babalú interviews Ariel Sigler Amaya (translated into English at Babalu):
ARGENTINA
Argentine football
The Diego show
Why fans forgave their team’s early exit
BOLIVIA
Morales priest arrested on cocaine charge
BRAZIL
Brazil’s Lula is Ignoring Rebel Threat in Venezuela, Colombia’s Uribe Says
Brazil’s presidential campaign
Vice squad
The stakes are high for the hapless running-mates
CHILE
Proyecto de Reforma para Transantiago
COLOMBIA
Colombia-Venezuela dispute unresolved in meeting of South American leaders
Marcela Sanchez: Farewell to Alvaro Uribe
CUBA
Is Cuba Inching Away From Socialism? Very Doubtful
HONDURAS
Wonderfultastic: 42% of Honduran Loans are for Consumption
MEXICO
Mexico: Where Is Your Shame?
Mexico: The Death of a Cartel Leader (by subscription)
PANAMA
Hola Corregiduria
Playing Panama Canal’s Expansion via Bladex
PERU
Peru denies espionage accusations
Four presumed members of FARC guerrilla arrested in Peru
PUERTO RICO
Puerto Rico to Host Biggest Solar Park in Latin America, h/t Dick.
VENEZUELA
What to do with Hugo Chávez?
Oliver Stone, Tariq Ali, Marc Weisbrot and Larry Rohter
Venezuela takes opposition TV owner’s farm
Lealtad chavista hacia las FARC
The week’s posts and podcasts:
In today’s podcast at 11AM Eastern: Monica Showalter
Chavez sends troops to Colombia border
Colombia proves again that Venezuela is harboring FARC terrorists UPDATED
The Chavez bailout
The cartels kidnap 4 who reported on the jail hitmen
Venezuela: Haven For Terrorists?
Mexican cartels expand into Central America