Freedom to the 870 political prisoners of the Uprising in Cuba!

Together with artists like Silvio Rodríguez, Pablo Milanés, the writer Leonardo Padura and journalists like Eralidis Frometa we demand the immediate release of the political prisoners!

Statement of La Marx International 4/9/21

Some 870 young people, workers, artists, activists, women and men are detained in Cuban prisons after the days of mobilizations on July 11, 12, and 13. Among them, a significant number of girls and boys, adolescents between the ages of 13 and 16, who participated, led and coordinated the massive mobilizations. They are political prisoners detained for demonstrating, who are being victims of summary trials, without lawyers, or full rights of defense, imprisoned and held incommunicado from their families, who are desperate to know their whereabouts and situation. 

The capitalist dictatorship of Díaz Canel and the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) responded to the historic mobilization with brutal repression and arrests. In a television message, Díaz Canel stated that the mobilizations were organized by a "small group of counterrevolutionaries" who carried out "acts of vandalism" and provoked the police, attributing the uprising to the United States. 

But all these proposals of Díaz Canel, and the dictatorship are totally false. The uprising of the Cuban people was spontaneous, massive, and organized by activists, mostly young people. A gigantic and historic mobilization that covered 20 cities of the country and 20 neighborhoods of Havana, in the capital of the country. 

A Cuban and world arc demands the freedom of political prisoners 

The uprising of the Cuban people lasted 3 days. It began on July 11 in San Antonio de los Baños, the town where the musician Silvio Rodríguez was born, who described in his blog "Segunda Cita" how it all happened: "Regarding the police action, in the first demonstration, which was in San Antonio de los Baños, there was no response. The protesters went through the main streets, passing through the municipal government headquarters, in front of the Party and even by the police. There was no repression there, although later, in other cities, there was " (Silvio Rodríguez," Segunda Cita ") 

This national uprising on July 11 was a spontaneous, massive convocation, led and coordinated by the youth through social networks, as an expression of a people fed up with enduring the brutal and humiliating situation of poverty, misery, repression, and the disastrous policy towards the pandemic of the dictatorship. No political party, or social or popular organization called for the mobilization. 

On the left, the massive arrests of the regime against the protesters. On the right, the prisoners are crowded into the jails of the dictatorship 

The uprising was born from below, as a result of the self-organization of the people themselves, repeating the same characteristics of the revolutionary mobilizations that have been roaming the world, such as those in Colombia, the United States, Chile, Lebanon, Iraq, Myanmmar, France, etc. to name a few

And although it is known that US imperialism wants to intervene and take advantage of the situation to control the process, the uprising of the Cuban people is legitimate, representative of the most oppressed layers of the workers and the people. The historic days that began on June 11 have opened a revolutionary process of struggle against the dictatorship that has no turning back. 

On Monday, July 12, the mobilizations were repeated, but they found a Cuba that woke up militarized. On every corner there were police and paramilitary bodies watching over the people, at the same time that there was an "internet blackout" throughout the island. The dictatorship, out of fear of the people, and of self-organization through social networks, removed the repressive bodies to stop the mobilization of the masses. 

There were arrests in all the cities and neighborhoods of the country, and this caused the demonstrations to be less massive on the 13th. The arrests and repression that took place on the 11th, 12th, and 13th, left 870 prisoners detained, and 2 disappeared. Immediately the musician Pablo Milanés called for freedom for the protesters, from his personal account on Facebook with these words: "It is irresponsible and absurd to blame and repress a people who have sacrificed and given everything for decades to support a regime that in the end what he does is imprison him" , he wrote in a message that went viral. 

On July 11, actor and playwright Yunior García, director of Trébol Teatro, was arrested when he led a group of fellow artists who protested in front of the state Institute of Radio and Television. He was released the following day and requested a meeting with Silvio Rodríguez, who responded positively to the request and held a meeting with Yunior García and his wife, the film producer Dayana Prieto. 

Silvio Rodríguez acceded to Yunior and Dayana's requests, and demanded the freedom of the political prisoners. This is how Silvio Rodríguez explained it: "They asked me to call someone and ask for amnesty for all the prisoners. I remember the last time I asked for an amnesty. It was at the Anti-imperialist Tribune. A second before raising an authority told me not to say it. If I don't say that, I won't say anything, I replied. And I was able to reach the microphone. And among many other things I asked for the freedom of those people with whom I did not agree. And a couple of weeks later (not because of me) 70 lives they were free. I don't know how many prisoners there will be now, they say hundreds. I ask the same for those who were not violent and I keep my word " (Silvio Rodríguez," Segunda cita ")

The important and renowned Cuban writer Leonardo Padura also spoke out for the Freedom of Political Prisoners, as well as a huge range of activists, personalities, and political and social organizations from around the world. We must unite in the demand for the freedom of all political prisoners, the same as we demand in countries like Chile and Colombia, supporting without any doubt the struggle of the Cuban people. 

The dictatorship wants to stop the revolution with more repression 

The independent journalist Eralidis Frometa demands the freedom of her husband Lázaro Yuri Valle Roca, detained on June 15, 2021. Lázaro Yuri was accused of "contempt and "enemy propaganda " by the authorities of the regime, simply by raising his political thoughts and opposing the dictatorship. The same claim that Eralidis and Lázaro Yuri raise is now a massive claim throughout Cuba. 

Cuban journalist Eralidis Frometa and her husband Lazaro Yuri Valle Roca being detained in Havana 

The massive arrests and imprisonment of activists put on the table the question of the repression that the dictatorship launches to prevent the mobilization of the people from deepening. After the demonstrations, the Government made some concessions such as facilitating the entry of food and medicine to the island, it has repaired houses, it has made asphalt in the communities that were thrown into the streets, measures that carry out these measures as an escape valve for relieve the pressure of the mass movement, seeking demobilization. 

However, the measures are not only insufficient to alleviate the serious situation of the Cuban people, but also in parallel to the concessions, the dictatorship of the Communist Party has launched a repressive escalation. He has carried out raids on activists' homes, seizures of phones, and laptops. On the other hand, the situation of political prisoners is desperate, overcrowded, in the midst of a pandemic, without having the resources to have the necessary medical assistance, and isolated from their families. 

On August 17, 2021, the government published Decree-Law 35 and other regulations that regulate the use of telecommunications, including the internet and radio, as well as the so-called "cybersecurity incidents". The decree, which claims to have the objective of "defending" the Cuban revolution, requires that telecommunications providers interrupt, suspend or cancel their services when a user publishes "false" information or that affects "public morality" and "respect for the public order". 

In Cuba, the internet is very expensive, which still makes it difficult for the people to access it. Many telecommunications services are offered exclusively by Empresa de Telecomunicaciones de Cuba S.A. (ETECSA), state-owned, and under the control of the Cuban government. The dictatorship uses this control to limit internet connectivity, impose arbitrary restrictions against critics and dissidents, artists, journalists, intellectuals or activists.

Through Decree-Law 35, internet providers can be fined or lose their license if they do not comply with the obligations established in the decree, and it requires telecommunications providers to grant a wide range of information and services to government authorities. According to this decree, providers must provide security agencies with the "technical facilities and services they require" to the Ministry of Communications. 

Likewise, together with Decree-Law 35, the Díaz Canel dictatorship published the resolution on "cybersecurity" that describes content protected by freedom of expression as "cybersecurity incidents". Qualified as "cybersecurity crimes", any expression of criticism or call for activists. This allows activists to be criminalized by defining these messages as "inciting mobilizations" or "promoting social indiscipline" or "undermining" the "fame" of a person or "their own esteem". 

According to the resolution of the Cuban dictatorship, the authorities of the Ministries of Communications, Interior and Revolutionary Armed Forces must take measures for the "prevention", "detection", "investigation" and "mitigation" of "cybersecurity incidents" even to seek its "eradication." 

Officials must prioritize the reaction to incidents considered "high" or "very high" dangerous, such as the "spreading of false news" or messages that "promote social indiscipline." Decree-Law 35 sanctioned by Díaz-Canel and the Communist Party of Cuba, does not differ in any way from the reactionary and anti-democratic anti-terrorist decrees established in the United States through the enactment of the Patriot Law between 2002 and 2006. 

The Administration Bush launched a battery of measures that qualify "enemies" and criminalize activists, which facilitates repression, persecution and imprisonment in prisons such as Guantánamo, or other detention centers that the United States has established around the world. The Cuban dictatorship takes measures similar to those taken by US imperialism, which carries out massive cyber espionage in the name of "defense of the homeland." 

The measures that the Pentagon and the CIA have taken were denounced by Julian Assange, the Wikileaks site, Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning, and so many other fighters for the defense of human rights that the US systematically violates. Now, these same measures are taken by the dictatorship of the Communist Party of Cuba, with practically the same arguments that Pentagon and CIA officials use. 

And also copying the model of other capitalist dictatorships such as that of the Putin government in Russia, which approved in 2020 article 207.1 of the Criminal Code, which punishes with up to three years of deprivation of liberty whoever "publicly disseminates information that is he knows that it is false in circumstances that threaten the life and safety of citizens" 

The arrest warrant for Yuri Valle Roca in which the dictatorship declares him a prisoner for "contempt and enemy activities"

Or the "cybercrime law" of October 2020 of the Nicaraguan National Assembly that criminalizes whoever "publishes or disseminates false and / or misrepresented information that causes alarm, fear or anxiety" in the population. Or the anti-cybercrime law of Saudi Arabia passed in 2007, criminalizes the action of "producing something that damages public order, religious values, public morals, the sanctity of private life."

The Cuban people face a capitalist dictatorship 

The coincidences between governments and regimes that are apparently opposing such as the United States, Russia, Nicaragua, Cuba, or Saudi Arabia issuing similar laws calling political opinions "cybercrime", persecuting opponents, and criminalizing activists, do not end there. 

All these governments and capitalist regimes also have another great point of agreement: They all qualify Cuba, its regime and government as "communist" or "socialist." And at this point everyone also lies to the Cuban people, and to the peoples of the world. The media affirm that the Cuban people rose up "against communism." And the dictatorship of Diaz Canel calls itself "socialist."  However, none of this is true, the uprising of the Cuban people is confronting capitalism. Many honest Cuban activists believe that they are facing a socialist government. And that the monstrous dictatorship in which they live is the "dictatorship of the proletariat." 

Nothing could be more false. Since the 90's the Castros have turned Cuba into a capitalist country, and precisely the outbreak of the masses also a rejection of the enormous inequality, typical of every capitalist country. While the majority of the population sinks into hunger and poverty, the ruling classes of the leaders of the Communist Party, government officials, and heads of the Armed Forces control capitalist companies, run the tourism business, associate with imperialist capital. , and live a life of luxury in yachts and mansions, without hunger or ration books. 

Another false argument is that misery, poverty, rationing and scarcity is the product of the US blockade. It is also false. Although the criminal US blockade exists, Cuba has trade with the entire capitalist world via European imperialism. Products enter Cuba, but only the ruling classes have access to them. The goods are in the special stores, but only those who handle euros or dollars can access them. The Cuban people who have Cuban pesos in their pockets cannot access any goods. He lives a horrible political and economic apartheid, but capitalist. 

In 2019 the dictatorship imposed with a fraudulent plebiscite, a new Constitution for the country that establishes in article 22 the recognition of private property of the means of production, by means of the following text: "They are recognized as forms of property, following: private: that which is exercised over certain means of production by Cuban or foreign natural or legal persons ... " 

The new Constitution established in Article 28: "...The State promotes and provides guarantees to foreign investment, as an important element for development economic of the country... ". And in article 29: "Private property over land is regulated by a special regime." The abolition of the travel Constitution of Cuba that defended the collective property of the means of production, is the expression of the growing relationship between the Cuban bourgeoisie of the CP, and European imperialism. 

The Stalinists, the reformists and social democrats who speak of a socialist Cuba lie. The outbreak of the people took place against the horrible political and economic apartheid of Cuban capitalism, which reached its most critical point when in November 2020 the dictatorship approved a brutal plan of adjustment and hunger called "Task of Economic Ordering." 

The "Economic Ordering Task" devalued the Cuban peso, established a miserable wage of 80 dollars (U $ S) for workers, a salary for retirees of just 67 dollars (U $ S), a brutal attack that put million Cubans in situations of extreme vulnerability and poverty, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This adjustment plan eliminated subsidies that allowed the town to access basic food and household items such as rice, beans, eggs, chicken, children's milk, soap, etc., and subsidies for 191 medicines, one criminal political attitude in the midst of a global pandemic. State prices increased 1.5 times, while prices for non-state self-employed workers increased 3 times. 

Many honest Cuban activists who believe that they are facing a socialist government, and that the United States can help them, are having a bitter experience. The US government does not defend human rights either, no capitalist government does. The government of Biden and the United States has no interest in overthrowing the monstrous dictatorship, it does not want a second Cuban revolution at the doorstep of the United States. Down with the capitalist dictatorship! Freedom to political prisoners! 

The example is Venezuela: US imperialism is secretly negotiating and negotiating in Mexico with the dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro. Those Venezuelans who believed that the United States was going to help them overthrow the dictatorship, come face to face with reality. The Cuban people cannot place trust in any government, or capitalist leader, in the fight against the dictatorship. You must only rely on your own strength, to impose your own destiny! 

We have to fight for Freedom for the 870 young people, workers, artists, activists, women and men who are detained in the prisons of Cuba! Anmisty or pardon for all! Freedom to all political prisoners! Out with Decree-Law 35, Down with the dictatorship. From Marx International we support and accompany the struggle of the Cuban people, an example for all the peoples of Latin America and the world! 

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