Father Geoffrey Bottoms is a British Catholic priest. He is an executive member of the British Cuba Solidarity Campaign and has visited Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, and Fernando González in their various US prisons and met regularly with their families. He also leads Group Study Tours of Cuba each year on behalf of the British campaign. Father Bottoms is a follower of liberation theology and is actively involved in the labour and trade movement. He is a member of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union in the UK.

July 5, 2014

Dear President Obama,

As a Catholic priest in Britain I have followed the case of five Cuban prisoners in the United States known as the Cuban Five since 2002. They were convicted in Miami of charges ranging from failure to disclose themselves as foreign agents to conspiracy to commit espionage and even murder and were given sentences stretching from fifteen years to double life. In reality they were defending their people against acts of terrorism by certain Cuban-American groups in Miami hostile to Havana that have killed almost three thousand five hundred people and injured over two thousand others.

The United Nations Commission on Human Rights on the recommendation of its Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions and Amnesty International have both raised concerns as to the fairness and impartiality of a trial that took place in such a hostile environment as Miami where there were irregularities in the due process of law. An International Commission of Inquiry held in London in March of 2014 led by three internationally renowned judges reached a similar conclusion.

I have attended three appeals on behalf of the Five in Miami and Atlanta and heard the arguments for myself. I have also visited three of the prisoners and met with their families and am convinced that there has been a gross miscarriage of justice.

Fernando Gonzalez and Rene Gonzalez have both returned to Cuba having served their sentences but I am appealing for the release of Gerardo Hernandez serving double life in USP Victorville, California, Antonio Guerrero serving 22 years in FCI Marianna, and Ramon Labanino (known as Luis Medina) serving thirty years in FCI Ashland. The appeal process has now reached the stage of Habeas Corpus with fresh evidence having come to light of journalists in the pay of the US government writing biased reports both before and during the trial itself.

Mr. President, I know that you are a man of peace having won the Nobel Peace Prize and that you are also a man of faith who attempts to put his Christian principles into practice in public life. I therefore appeal for the release of the remaining three Cuban prisoners in the interests of furthering relations between the US and Cuba and world peace. Surely a humanitarian resolution to this case can be found?

The world has moved on since 1959 and it is obvious that US policy towards Cuba since then has failed to achieve its objectives. Meanwhile much suffering has been caused not least to these men and their families and especially Adriana, the wife of Gerardo Hernandez, who has been consistently denied a visa to visit her husband since 1998. I believe that they are victims of this failed strategy.

Both your country and Cuba stand to benefit from a relationship of mutual respect and co-operation and your presidency could be defined by ending decades of this sterile policy towards a noble and heroic developing country on your doorstep that only wishes to pursue its humanitarian future free from outside interference.

Can you do it? Yes you can!

With the greatest respect,

Fr. Geoffrey Bottoms
Sheffield UK.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/27/destabiliziation-in-latin-america/

Destabiliziation in Latin America
June 27, 2014

ZunZuneo and the U.S. Policy
Destabiliziation in Latin America
by Matt Peppe

News from the AP about the U.S. government’s secret project to create a Cuban Twitter or “ZunZuneo,” to be used for disseminating propaganda and fomenting unrest in Cuba, spurring young people in that country to overthrow their government, comes as no surprise to anyone with even the most cursory understanding of U.S. policy in Cuba and Latin America in general. It is but a tiny part of a 55-year-old, completely unprovoked, genocidal policy against a nation whose only offense is failing to subordinate itself to the will of the U.S. government.

ZunZuneo was initiated and run by the ostensibly “humanitarian” U.S. Agency for International Development through a series of shell corporations which were not supposed to be traced back to the government. The project is typical of the type of subversion and interference with another nation that the U.S. government has always felt entitled to undertake, regardless of the principles of sovereignty and self-determination fundamental to international law.

Due to Cuba’s successful revolution in 1959 and their ongoing ability to resist U.S. subversion of their socioeconomic system, U.S. actions against the tiny nation in the Carribean have been harsher than any other victim who fails to recognize the U.S. as its rightful master. Early destabilization efforts included a vicious campaign of terrorism against Cuba, part of a massive CIA effort that later evolved into a policy of providing safe haven to terrorist exile groups and looking the other way as they violate the U.S. Neutrality Act and international law.

The largest act of subversion is, of course, the blockade, euphemistically known in the U.S. as an “embargo.” The U.S. blockade against Cuba has now lasted more than a half century as a punishment for Cuba achieving self-determination. The blockade is an act of warfare, as it is based on the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917 (TWEA), which is only applicable during times of war. The blockade has been expanded and strengthened over the years with various violations of international law such as the Helms-Burton Act and the Torricelli Act. The policy of the U.S. blockade has been found to be an illegal violation of international law for 22 straight years by 99% of the world’s nations, who have demanded its end.

The attempted subversion of a country’s political system is not unique to U.S. actions against Cuba, nor is it unique to USAID. Other U.S. government agencies, such as the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), have long carried out similar actions. Such organizations purport to be apolitical groups for “democratic” promotion but are in reality nothing more than fronts, essentially political action committees (PACs). Due to the concealment of their purpose, they are more like political slush funds used to advanced the perceived interest of the United States.

Of course, they are not used to promote American “values” or “humanitarian principles” with abstract names like “freedom” and “democracy”, but the interests of the corporate sector eager to seek new investment opportunities outside their own country and control over the resources that they refuse to recognize as the property of local populations.

For example, over the last 15 years in Venezuela the U.S. spent $90 million funding opposition groups, including $5 million in the current federal budget. During this time, since Hugo Chavez first assumed office, his revolutionary party has won 18 elections and lost only 1. The margins of victory during Chavez’s tenure reached higher than 20%. After his death, his hand-picked successor Nicolás Maduro won by a margin of 1.6% in 2012. This is a very narrow margin, to be sure, but as Dan Kovalik points out it is a margin of victory larger than JFK’s victory over Richard Nixon and certainly larger than George Bush’s victory over Al Gore. Bush actually lost the popular vote but was declared the winner by the Supreme Court in an instance of political mettling that would be hard to imagine in any other democracy in the world.

Despite the success of the Chavista party, the opposition, aided and abetted by the U.S. government, has tried to portray the elections as “questionable” or “illegitimate”. Secretary of State John Kerry led the way by calling for a recount, encouraging the opposition to challenge the results of the election and refuse to concede.

“Washington’s efforts to de-legitimise the election mark a significant escalation of US efforts at regime change in Venezuela,” wrote Mark Weisbrot. “Not since its involvement in the 2002 military coup has the US government done this much to promote open conflict in Venezuela… It amounted to telling the government of Venezuela what was necessary to make their elections legitimate.”

In fact, international organizations monitoring the Venezuelan Presidential vote attested to the “fair and transparent” election process and former President Jimmy Carter called the country’s electoral system “the best in the world.”

The U.S. government has also refused to recognize the vast advances social progress made under the current government. Under Chavez, the country drastically reduced poverty, especially extreme poverty, with the latter falling from 23.4% in 1999 to 8.5% in 2011. As the government has put its massive revenues from oil sales to use to provide universal education and health care for all Venezuela’s citizens, people traditionally shut out of the country’s economic gains have benefited tremendously. Venezuela has gone from one of the highest rates of income inequality in Latin America to the lowest, a truly Herculean accomplishment.

Yet this does not even factor into the U.S.’s policy toward Venezuela. As a cable published by Wikileaks from 2006 demonstrates, the U.S. policy of destabilization and regime change against Hugo Chavez was pursued until his death. Now, with the perceived weakness of Maduro and the propaganda value of violent street protests portrayed in the international media as a “student movement”, it seems that Kerry is like a shark who smells blood in the water when he slanderously proclaims a “terror campaign” and foments further unrest.

U.S. government officials must feel frustrated at their inability to project their will for Venezuela to be subservient to the United States. After all, it has proved much easier in countries such as Honduras to oust a democratically elected President as happened with Manuel Zelaya.

“Zelaya was initiating such dangerous measures as a rise in minimum wage in a country where 60 percent live in poverty. He had to go,” wrote Noam Chomsky, who goes on to note that the U.S. virtually alone in the world in recognizing the “elections” later held under military rule of Pepe Lobo. “The endorsement also preserved the use of Honduras’ Palmerola air base, increasingly valuable as the U.S. military is being driven out of most of Latin America.”

Unsurprisingly, four years after the coup a Center for Economic and Policy Research report finds that “much of the economic and social progress experienced from 2006 – 2009 has been reversed in the years since,” with “economic inequality in Honduras” rising “dramatically.”

The next success of Obama’s administration in Latin America was the coup in Paraguay, in which the right-wing, elite opposition was able to drive democratically-elected Fernando Lugo from the Presidency and thus stop his program of promoting land rights for a long-oppressed peasant population.

“The United States promotes the interests of the wealthy of these mostly-poor countries, and in turn, these elite-run countries are obedient to the pro-corporate foreign policy of the United States,” writes Shamus Cooke.

There was also the coup last year against the progressive former mayor of Bogotá, Colombia, Gustavo Petro. His supposed abuse of power was de-privatizing garbage collection in the capital city, which allegedly harmed the “freedom of free enterprise.” The anti-democratic actions in Colombia, a beneficiary of an enormous amount of U.S. aid, have not affected the U.S. policy toward the nation. Kovalik notes that the actions taken against Petro are part of a much larger pattern.

“While the press, as well as the U.S. government, will not acknowledge it, the elimination of progressive political leaders by coup d’ état is taking place in Latin America with increasing frequency,” Kovalik writes.
Of course this is part of long-standing U.S. policy that has destroyed democracies in countries such as Guatemala, Chile, Brazil, Argentina and many other nations since the end of WWII alone. The anti-democratic measures enabled and supported by the U.S. have taken decades to recover from, if the nations victimized have been able to recover at all.

Media reporting of the story has tended to downplay or apologize for the Cuban Twitter program by stressing the U.S. government denials that it was meant to overthrow the government, or it was beneficial in allowing Cubans to communicate with each other.

Not surprisingly, Cubans themselves do not see it this way. They understandably do not appreciate an underhanded attempt to collect their personal data or to use them as pawns in a political game.

This should be a reasonable position for any American to understand. Would you support China or Russia setting up a social network meant to overthrow your government to impose one more to their liking?

Certainly not. The plot in the fictitious House of Cards of infiltration of the U.S. political process by foreign money probably seems shocking to the average American. In this country, it is a crime for foreign countries or nationals to influence democracy and domestic affairs through political contributions.In reality, this is exactly what the U.S. government has carried out in foreign countries for decades. ZunZuneo is demonstrable proof they continue to do so to this day. ZunZuneo is not just a case of USAID and the U.S. government getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar. It is part of an ongoing assault against sovereignty and self-determination of any country who opposes U.S. foreign policy. People of these countries are just as smart, capable, and deserving of a government independent of outside interference as U.S. citizens are.By simply recognizing that their government has no business in determining another country’s political affairs, and demanding that their government stop spending their tax dollars to do so, U.S. citizens could do more to advance democracy and the ideals their country claims to stand for than the U.S. government has ever done.

Matt Peppe holds a master’s degree in Public Administration from the Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy at SUNY Albany and a bachelor’s degree in English and American Literature from NYU. His writing about U.S. foreign policy and Latin America has appeared in Countercurrents, La Respuesta Magazine and other outlets. You can read his blog or follow him on twitter.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/27/destabiliziation-in-latin-america/

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Sunday, June 22, 2014

ARGENTINA WANTS TO CONTINUE PAYING

ITS DEBTS BUT THEY WON’T LET IT

Argentina wants to continue paying its debts, just as it has been doing since 2005, but this is now hindered by Judge Thomas Griesa’s ruling and by the US Supreme Court’s refusal to take on the case

The default of the Argentine Republic in 2001 was the biggest one in the world’s financial history, largely exceeding 100 billion US dollars. Decades of overindebtedness and low growth left the country with a debt amounting to over 160% of its GDP, an unemployment rate close to 25% and over 50% of its population in poverty. Since 2003, several measures were implemented that were aimed at normalizing the country’s international financial relations. The fundamental principle of all negotiations conducted with creditors was always the same: in order to be able to pay, Argentina must first grow, so as to generate the resources that will enable it to honour its commitments. Growth to enable payments has been the hallmark of all debt negotiations conducted by Argentina since 2003. Under this approach, for over a decade, Argentina’s economy has been growing, bringing down unemployment and continuing to reduce its debt, to such an extent that foreign currency-denominated public debt owed to the private sector currently does not exceed 8% of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.

The process to restructure the debt that was defaulted on in 2001 still continues. Along this difficult road, the debt owed to the International Monetary Fund was repaid in full, an agreement was reached with creditors in connection with the final awards of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), obligations to international organizations like the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank and the Andean Development Corporation were also honoured in full and, recently, payment over a period of up to 7 years was agreed with the Paris Club, in addition to the compensation given to the company REPSOL, within the context of the retaking of control over 51% of the shares in oil company YPF.

Without doubt, the most complex problem was to reach a deal with the thousands of holders of debt in default since 2001, amounting to 81 billion US dollars. But Argentina was successful in this regard … it reached an agreement for a voluntary exchange of defaulted instruments for new bonds involving a haircut, longer term and lower rate, which ensured that the commitment undertaken by the country would be sustainable. The exchange offer was made in 2005 and again in 2010, finding acceptance among 92.4% of creditors. One of the keys to success was, as is customary in such transactions, the fact that both Argentinean legislation as well as the prospectus of the instruments issued prevent the offering of better conditions to creditors who failed to accept the offer (holdouts). Since 2003, through the efforts of all of the Argentine people, debt service payments related to the whole restructured debt have been made punctually, in an amount of over 190 billion dollars and with no access to international financial markets.

7% of bondholders did not accept the restructuring. The vulture funds that secured a ruling in their favour are not original lenders to Argentina. They purchased bonds in default at obscenely low prices for the sole purposes of engaging in litigation against Argentina and making an enormous profit. Paul Singer’s NML fund, for example, in 2008 paid only 48.7 million US dollars for bonds in default. Judge Griesa’s ruling now orders that it be paid an amount of 832 million U.S. dollars, i.e., a gain of 1,608% in only six years.

Argentina has appealed against New York District Court Thomas Griesa’s ruling, which orders payment of 1.5 billion dollars to be made on June 30, which is the due date of the next payment related to the restructured debt. However, it is estimated that the total bonds in default that did not enter the restructuring processes amount to 15 billion US dollars, i.e. over 50% of Argentina’s foreign currency reserves. Judge Griesa’s ruling would push the country to a new default. This is so because if Argentina does pay the 1.5 billion, it will have to pay 15 billion in the immediate future. To make matters worse, under the laws of Argentina and the clauses governing the restructured instruments (RUFO), if the vulture funds were to be paid, all other bondholders would demand equal treatment, involving an estimated cost of over 120 billion US dollars. If, on the other hand, Argentina does not pay the vulture funds, Judge Griesa’s ruling forbids Argentina to make payments to 92.4% of the bondholders who did accept the restructuring, as the judge has issued orders to the Bank of New York and to the settlement agencies for them not to pay.

In other words: paying the vulture funds is a path leading to default, and if they are not paid, Judge Griesa’s order entails jeopardizing the right of the bondholders to collect their debt restructured in 2005 and 2010.

Meanwhile, the vulture funds have invested millions of dollars in lobbying and propaganda, trying to make the whole world believe that Argentina does not pay its debts and refuses to negotiate. However, precisely since 2003, the way out of default while reducing debt was by negotiating and paying. Even today, Argentina still keeps the possibility of an exchange open for all those who respect the principle of equality. A decision of the U.S. Judiciary favourable to 1.6% of the bondholders, who are specialized in litigation, jeopardizes a debt restructuring voluntarily accepted by 92.4% of the creditors. The legal interpretations relied upon in Judge Griesa’s rulings have been called into question by the most varied parties: the governments of France, Mexico, Brazil and Uruguay; settlement agency Euroclear and the Fintech fund. Joseph Stiglitz, Anne Kruger, Nouriel Roubini have also made statements along the same lines, as well as CELAC, the G24, G77, and 106 British parliamentarians. Even the US government and the IMF have shown concern at the global implications of the ruling.

This ruling seeks to put Argentina in a delicate position, but also any other country that may have to undertake a restructuring of its debts in the future. Under the domestic legislation of any country, when there is a suspension of payments and 66% of creditors agree to a deal, the rest are also obliged to accept. As there is no legal framework governing the default of a sovereign country, this precedent means that even if 99.9% voluntary acceptance were to be achieved, 0.1% of creditors could invalidate the whole restructuring.

The will of Argentina is clear: we expect a judicial decision that promotes fair and balanced negotiating conditions to resolve this protracted and difficult dispute that has affected, affects and will continue to affect the Argentina people due to the voracity of a minute group of speculators.

– Presidency of the Nation –

– Argentine Republic –

Contact: Analia Rach Tel. +54 (11) 4114-9595

Email: privada@jefatura.gob.ar

The default of the Argentine Republic in 2001 was the biggest one in the world’s financial history, largely exceeding 100 billion US dollars. Decades of overindebtedness and low growth left the country with a debt amounting to over 160% of its GDP, an unemployment rate close to 25% and over 50% of its population in poverty. Since 2003, several measures were implemented that were aimed at normalizing the country’s international financial relations. The fundamental principle of all negotiations conducted with creditors was always the same: in order to be able to pay, Argentina must first grow, so as to generate the resources that will enable it to honour its commitments. Growth to enable payments has been the hallmark of all debt negotiations conducted by Argentina since 2003. Under this approach, for over a decade, Argentina’s economy has been growing, bringing down unemployment and continuing to reduce its debt, to such an extent that foreign currency-denominated public debt owed to the private sector currently does not exceed 8% of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.

The process to restructure the debt that was defaulted on in 2001 still continues. Along this difficult road, the debt owed to the International Monetary Fund was repaid in full, an agreement was reached with creditors in connection with the final awards of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), obligations to international organizations like the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank and the Andean Development Corporation were also honoured in full and, recently, payment over a period of up to 7 years was agreed with the Paris Club, in addition to the compensation given to the company REPSOL, within the context of the retaking of control over 51% of the shares in oil company YPF.

Without doubt, the most complex problem was to reach a deal with the thousands of holders of debt in default since 2001, amounting to 81 billion US dollars. But Argentina was successful in this regard … it reached an agreement for a voluntary exchange of defaulted instruments for new bonds involving a haircut, longer term and lower rate, which ensured that the commitment undertaken by the country would be sustainable. The exchange offer was made in 2005 and again in 2010, finding acceptance among 92.4% of creditors. One of the keys to success was, as is customary in such transactions, the fact that both Argentinean legislation as well as the prospectus of the instruments issued prevent the offering of better conditions to creditors who failed to accept the offer (holdouts). Since 2003, through the efforts of all of the Argentine people, debt service payments related to the whole restructured debt have been made punctually, in an amount of over 190 billion dollars and with no access to international financial markets.

7% of bondholders did not accept the restructuring. The vulture funds that secured a ruling in their favour are not original lenders to Argentina. They purchased bonds in default at obscenely low prices for the sole purposes of engaging in litigation against Argentina and making an enormous profit. Paul Singer’s NML fund, for example, in 2008 paid only 48.7 million US dollars for bonds in default. Judge Griesa’s ruling now orders that it be paid an amount of 832 million U.S. dollars, i.e., a gain of 1,608% in only six years.

Argentina has appealed against New York District Court Thomas Griesa’s ruling, which orders payment of 1.5 billion dollars to be made on June 30, which is the due date of the next payment related to the restructured debt. However, it is estimated that the total bonds in default that did not enter the restructuring processes amount to 15 billion US dollars, i.e. over 50% of Argentina’s foreign currency reserves. Judge Griesa’s ruling would push the country to a new default. This is so because if Argentina does pay the 1.5 billion, it will have to pay 15 billion in the immediate future. To make matters worse, under the laws of Argentina and the clauses governing the restructured instruments (RUFO), if the vulture funds were to be paid, all other bondholders would demand equal treatment, involving an estimated cost of over 120 billion US dollars. If, on the other hand, Argentina does not pay the vulture funds, Judge Griesa’s ruling forbids Argentina to make payments to 92.4% of the bondholders who did accept the restructuring, as the judge has issued orders to the Bank of New York and to the settlement agencies for them not to pay.

In other words: paying the vulture funds is a path leading to default, and if they are not paid, Judge Griesa’s order entails jeopardizing the right of the bondholders to collect their debt restructured in 2005 and 2010.

Meanwhile, the vulture funds have invested millions of dollars in lobbying and propaganda, trying to make the whole world believe that Argentina does not pay its debts and refuses to negotiate. However, precisely since 2003, the way out of default while reducing debt was by negotiating and paying. Even today, Argentina still keeps the possibility of an exchange open for all those who respect the principle of equality. A decision of the U.S. Judiciary favourable to 1.6% of the bondholders, who are specialized in litigation, jeopardizes a debt restructuring voluntarily accepted by 92.4% of the creditors. The legal interpretations relied upon in Judge Griesa’s rulings have been called into question by the most varied parties: the governments of France, Mexico, Brazil and Uruguay; settlement agency Euroclear and the Fintech fund. Joseph Stiglitz, Anne Kruger, Nouriel Roubini have also made statements along the same lines, as well as CELAC, the G24, G77, and 106 British parliamentarians. Even the US government and the IMF have shown concern at the global implications of the ruling.

This ruling seeks to put Argentina in a delicate position, but also any other country that may have to undertake a restructuring of its debts in the future. Under the domestic legislation of any country, when there is a suspension of payments and 66% of creditors agree to a deal, the rest are also obliged to accept. As there is no legal framework governing the default of a sovereign country, this precedent means that even if 99.9% voluntary acceptance were to be achieved, 0.1% of creditors could invalidate the whole restructuring.

The will of Argentina is clear: we expect a judicial decision that promotes fair and balanced negotiating conditions to resolve this protracted and difficult dispute that has affected, affects and will continue to affect the Argentina people due to the voracity of a minute group of speculators.

– Presidency of the Nation –

– Argentine Republic –

Contact: Analia Rach Tel. +54 (11) 4114-9595

Email: privada@jefatura.gob.ar

Minstry of Foreign Affairs. Esmeralda 1212, C.A.B. A C1007ABR, Argentine Republic.

Tel. +54(11)4819-7000 – info@cancilleria.gob.ar  – http://mrecic.gov.ar/

On June 2, 23 Parliamentarians from Costa Rica sent a letter to President Obama asking him to free Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino and Antonio Guerrero, 3 of the Five Cuban antiterrorists imprisoned in the United States for more than 15 years. In the letter they mentioned the request made by Uruguayan President José Mujica and advocate for a humanitarian solution to the case of the Cuban 5. They also urge the U.S. Government to “seriously consider a humanitarian exchange of Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero and Ramón Labañino, by the American contractor Allan Gross”.

June 2, 2014

San José Costa Rica, Central América

President Barack Obama

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20500 USA.

Your Excellency Mr. President Obama,

This year, September 12 will mark 16 years since Five Cuban citizens were imprisoned in the United States and sentenced without any proof to long terms in prison ranging from 15 years to two life sentences. The trial in Miami lacked all guarantees to due process.

Since, September 12, 1998, these men have become recognized internationally as the “Cuban Five”. They are considered Cuban anti-terrorist patriots by the Cuban people and the peoples of our America, since their actions were to prevent terrorist acts against the people of Cuba and the United States.

The Presidential administrations of former Presidents Bill Clinton, George Bush and your own time in office, have witnessed that since that time of their incarceration people from all over the world have rallied on their behalf. There has been a nonstop chorus of voices demanding that your government release immediately Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino and Antonio Guerrero, three of the five Cubans who still remain in prison.

Mr. President, it is time that you put an end to this terrible injustice that during three administrations has shadowed the ideal of democracy and justice of your country. It reveals that double-speak and double standards prevails in this case and that concerns us.

You have in your hands the power to grant the executive pardon that they deserve so that they can return to their Cuban homeland to be with their families and their people.

Mr. President Obama, we members of the Legislative Assembly of Costa Rica, today join the cry of the solidarity and social movements from all over the world, to support the proposal submitted to you by one of the most worthy Presidents of Latin America, his Excellency Mr. President of Uruguay José Mujica. He has expressed to you his deep concern in the case of the Five and the Guantánamo prisoners, cases which constitute two major embarrassments to humanity. On the other hand, we urge you to seriously consider the humanitarian exchange of Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero and Ramón Labañino, for the American agent Alan Gross.

Mr. President, we hope that you pay attention to our request and put an end to this shameful injustice committed against the Cuban Five anti-terrorist patriots.

Sincerely yours,

Costa Rican Deputies to the Legislative Assembly of Costa Rica

Ligia Elena Fallas Rodríguez

Jorge Arguedas Mora

José Corrales L

José Antonio Ramírez Aguilar

Ronald Vargas Araya

Carlos Hernández Alvarez

Gerardo Vargas Varela

Edgardo Vinicio Araya Sibaja

Humberto Varas Corrales

Patricia Mora Castellanos

Javier Francisco Cambronero Arguedas

Marvin Antonio Delgado

Nidia M Jiménez Vásquez

Laura Garro S.

Marlene Madrigal Flores

Marta Arauz Mora

Jorge Rodríguez

Franklin Corella U

Rosibel Ramos Madrigal

Rafael Ortiz

Emilia Molina Cruz

Víctor Hugo Morales

Natalio Guerrero Campos

International Committee for the Freedom of the Cuban 5

info@thecuban5.org
http://www.thecuban5.org

By W. T. Whitney Jr.

General John Kelly heads the U.S. Southern Command. As such he directs military operations throughout Latin America and the Caribbean and wages war against drug trafficking and associated crime in Honduras. Kelly’s visit to Tegucigalpa on June 2 meant so much to Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández that Kelly got to attend a session of Honduras’ Council of Defense and National Security .

Kelly announced that, “the work that this government has undertaken [against drug trafficking] in these last months is incredible.” He lauded Honduras’ new policy of extraditing accused drug offenders to the United States. Hernández characterized Kelly is a “great friend of Honduras” and observed that his police and soldiers take encouragement from Kelly’s kind words.

Honduras’ role as a transfer point for drugs heading north and a murder epidemic there blamed on drug-related crime serve as rationale for U.S. military intervention. Honduras’ murder rate is the world’s highest. A congressional report indicated that as of February 3013, the United States had provided $163 million in military and police assistance over three years; $58.2 million more were anticipated during the then current year. The U.S. military operates three naval bases in Honduras. Its large Palmerola Air Base supports long distance flights.

But U.S. crime fighting in Honduras is not all that it seems. Police, soldiers, and paramilitaries, for example, are killing children, many of whom are engaged in criminal activities instigated by adults. The Casa Alianza children’s rights group reported that between January 1 and March 30, 2014, 270 persons less than 23 years of age were murdered. That group’s director José Guadalupe Ruelas declared on television on May 5 that, “one million Honduran children are not in school, 330,000 child laborers are being exploited, and every year 8000 children leave the country without an adult, fleeing violence.” Yet on May 9, “military police … savagely beat” and detained Ruelas.

Killings may have little to do with drug transactions. On May 4, for example, murderers hit a human rights activist and community leader in San Pedro Sula . On May 12 gunfire wounded a Tegucigalpa councilman who was an opposition activist. The next day armed men killed an agrarian rights activist in Baja Aguan. On May 16, someone shot and killed the popular mayor of Iriona. On May 22 in La Ceiba shots from a passing vehicle killed a taxi driver and two passengers, one a prison guard. Assailants there that day killed a forestry engineer who reported illegal logging. On May 28 in Copán department, a radio journalist and human rights defender was killed. On May 10, heavily armed men broke into the house in Yoro Department where eight Cuban doctors on a solidarity mission were living. The intruders handcuffed, beat and threatened to kill the physicians.

And in May Congressperson Jan Schakowsky’s (D-IL) widened the U. S. discussion on violence in Honduras. Her letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, signed by 108 colleagues, urged the “State Department to use its leverage to urge the Honduran government to protect the fundamental human rights of its citizens, end the use of military forces for law enforcement, investigate and prosecute abuses.”

A military coup removed populist President Jose Manuel Zelaya on June 28, 2009. Violence and social turmoil wracking Honduras since then suggest politics are at work. Conditions worsened after January 27, 2014 when right wing President Hernández took office.

Poverty in Honduras is 60 percent, and productive land is concentrated in very few hands. Defending establishment interests, the Liberal and National Parties have controlled Honduran politics for decades. Oligarchs arranged for Zelaya’s ouster, something U.S. Ambassador Hugo Lorens knew about beforehand. U.S. military and intelligence operatives had allegedly communicated with perpetrators . The plane taking Zelaya to exile in Costa Rica stopped en route at the U.S. Palmerola Air Base.

Formed after the coup, the National Front for Popular Resistance (FNRP) resisted, first in the streets and then though its new LIBRE political party. Campaigning for a constituent assembly and social justice, the mildly socialist Libre Party backed Xiomara Castro as its presidential candidate. She had led in polls prior to the November, 2013 election, widely regarded as fraudulent. National Party candidate Hernández won by eight percentage points.

The pre-election killing of 18 LIBRE activists followed murders of opposition activists, unionists, teachers, and students ongoing since 2009. Now, according to a police whistleblower, “Summary executions have increased [while] public security is being totally militarized and the military now controls several institutions civilians should direct … A] blank check [exists] for repression of the political and social opposition, criminalization and prosecution of protest, and violation of human rights.”

The atmosphere is toxic. On May 14 the National Party president of Honduras’ Congress used police to expel all 37 LIBRE Party congressional deputies. Security forces used tear gas, pepper spray, and batons. The deputies had wanted to debate agrarian reform, corruption, and model cities – the previous government’s plan for privately-governed havens for corporations. Television showed police carrying away ex-President Zelaya, now a congressman and head of LIBRE Party’s parliamentary bench.

Agrarian rights activists face danger, especially in Baja Aguan where African palm plantations and palm oil processing facilities are centered. On May 21, 315 soldiers, police, and 40 private security operatives expelled small farmers occupying two plantations; they wounded two and arrested 14. That scenario has recurred often throughout the region for several years. Although legislation in the 1980’s and Zelaya-era regulations later on made land available to peasants, agribusiness impresarios, notably Dinant Corporation owner Miguel Facussé, usurped large tracts. Between 2010 and 2013, public and private security forces killed 102 small farmers who resisted.

The Committee for Free Expression indicated recently that 173 journalists, teachers, judicial personnel, and human rights advocates were assaulted in 2013, with state security forces carrying out half the attacks; there were 11 murders. Between January 2010 and July 2013, 36 journalists or “social communicators” were killed.

U.S. mainstream media pay little attention to violence in Honduras. Nevertheless, Rep. Schakowsky and her colleagues took a stand: they urged Secretary of State Kerry to “fully enforce the Leahy Law, which prohibits assistance to individuals or units of any foreign military or police body that commit gross human rights abuses with impunity.”

Yet General John Kelly takes that legal requirement, and presumably his civilian overseers, with a grain of salt. Testifying before a congressional committee on April 29, he complained that the Leahy Law sometimes interferes with the Southern Command mission. Because of that, Kelly uses Colombian soldiers rather than his own.

“When we ask them to go somewhere else and train the Mexicans, the Hondurans, the Guatemalans, the Panamanians, they will do it almost without asking … It’s important for them to go,” he explained, “because I’m – at least on the military side – restricted from working with some of these countries because of limitations … based on past sins. And I’ll let it go at that.”

General Kelly may have been thinking of the new “TIGRES” militarized police formation established by President Hernández for “direct combat with transnational organized crime.” U.S. military advisors worked with Colombia’s “Jungle School” (Escuela de Selva) to train TIGRES recruits.

“I did what’s right and have never endangered anyone.”

That’s the assertion of Hero of the Cuban Republic Ramón Labañino Salazar who was unjustly
sentenced to 30 years in prison that he is serving in a federal prison in Kentucky, in the United
States. Now 51 years of age, he was 35 years old when they arrested them that early morning on
September 12, 1998.

Author: Deisy Francis Mexidor, June 9, 2014.
http://www.granma.cu/cuba/2014-06-09/hice-lo-justo-y-jamas-he-danado-a-nadie !

That day in September, 2009 when they proceeded to resentence him in Miami, in the United
States, Ramón Labañino Salazar, who was still carrying a life sentence plus 18 years in prison,
entered the judicial chamber with his hands held high, as a victory symbol.

Glancing around, he looked at all those present in the audience until he found his beloved
Elizabeth. He smiled at her as if he were the happiest of mortals and with his look covered her
with kisses. It was a fleeting moment but at the same time almost eternal.

There were so many things being said at that moment! It was just like the one that happened
later when he learned that his new sentence, no less unjust, would remove 30 years of physical
liberty from his life. Then too his captors couldn’t lock up his soul and spirit.

“I am by nature an optimistic man,” confessed Labañino, one of five Cuban anti-terrorists
sentenced to long terms in U. S. prisons.

In response to a questionnaire, the Hero of the Republic of Cuba pointed out that, “I have
always found reasons for taking a positive point of view of everything happening around me,
including the fights, the injustices, and the hard things one lives with and sees in prison. He
shares that title with his comrades Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González,
and René González. (The last two are now in Cuba but not before they satisfied all sanctions
against them.)

The Five are brothers in the same struggle, although they are confined in prisons far apart from
each other. They took to using “us” instead of “I” and what was important for one took on a
collective nature.

They did this from the beginning and every time a message arrives from them, the farewell
invariably finishes with “five hugs.” That’s how Ramón ended these replies sent from the
penitentiary in Ashland, Kentucky.

The son of Nereyda Salazar Verduy (deceased) and Holmes Labañino Cantillo, Ramón was born
June 9, 1963, in the Havana district of Marianao. He graduated with top academic recognition,
qualifying in economics at the University of Havana.

His greatest treasures are the daughters he adores, Aili (from his first marriage) Laura, and
Lizbeth, as he tirelessly repeats.

When he left home to work abroad, precisely in February, 1992, Elizabeth Palmeiro, his wife,
was barely eight weeks pregnant with Laura. He could not enjoy that period or the arrival into
the world of Lizbeth whom he only came to know in February, 1997, just after she was born.

His comings and goings in and out of the country and then prison made it so that despite being
married for 23 years, Ramón and Elizabeth have only lived together, without being apart, for
barely two years. They’ve been separated the rest of the time.

Nevertheless, they built a family together, and she, behind the lines, waits for him dealing with
the family project that came about despite obstacles. There they are, “his beautiful women,”
as he proudly says.

Question – How does a man succeed in overcoming great adversities? Where does one find
such strength?
Answer – Above all, when one is convinced that what he is doing is always correct, just, and
legal, that one defends a humane cause, that one has never put anybody or any thing in
danger, and that, on the contrary, he has sacrificed everything for the common good, for
people’s lives – innocent people – then those ideas themselves lend enormous force of will and
persistence against all adversities and “adversaries.” The fight is just. Victory will indeed have
to be sweet.

Q. – What do you recall about Ramón as a boy and young university student?
A. – I think I am an eternal child. That’s what my wife Elizabeth, my daughters, and whoever
knows me say. I don’t know if that will always be true, or if they say it through the love they
show me, but I do believe I’ve never lost (nor ever will) that youthful, smiling, cheerful, and
optimistic spirit that helps one so much to live and struggle. I was that way as a child: smiley
and very timid, very much so, I would say. And I always was enthralled by studying and doing
sports.

I remember from childhood that my little sister Laide began calling me “Papi.” I think that was
because I took care of her a lot, and my mother instilled in us the idea that the family’s oldest
brother is like a second father. And I think I accepted that role quite seriously, so much so that
even today, many call me “Papi.” And that’s something my daughters resent, because they
want to be the only ones saying that to me, but they know very well that I am the unique, the
one and only “Papi,” from the soul to infinity, and that’s important.

I really enjoyed my university years. As I said, studying and doing sports captivated me, and I
could do both there fully. Also I was a student assistant in statistical mathematics beginning
with the second year of the course. Sometimes I gave review courses and classes to comrades
in the lower years or in our own year. It’s something I always liked a lot, teaching. I could
practice judo and karate in the university, which was my dream in sports. It was a period of
learning, but above all of growth. It helped me a lot in my formation and in my convictions in
every sense, something for which I am infinitely grateful to Cuba, to our Revolution, to our
socialist system.

Q. – Do they see you as the big one of the group?
A. – That’s one point of view of those who see me. I don’t see myself as strong, rather I work to
be “considered” thin. Of course, that continually costs me much effort to believe it myself. I
do sports for pleasure, also because I need to get rid of so much stress, and because I feel
much better and useful after each workout. I try to keep myself healthy in spite of the
heartaches, since it’s our way of fighting and overcoming, of not letting ourselves fall apart or
be destroyed. Now I myself am doing weights and long walks inside the prison, some handball,
a lot of chess. That makes me feel healthy, vital, and ready for everyday struggles and ones in
the future that surely will come.

Q. – Who did you want to resemble?
A. – I myself sought guidance through example from the great ones, not to be them, since it’s
impossible to attain icon status. But I have greatly admired and would try to be like Che, like
our immortal Antonio Maceo, like José Martí, like Fidel, like Raúl, like Bolívar, like Sucre, and
now a lot like our Hugo Chávez. They are in essence my everyday examples. I would be very
pleased, simply, to be like every man who has decency and honor, but that would make this list
too extensive.

A. – Could you let us know what you like by way of reading – historical personalities, fiction,
[even television] series…?
A. – I am going to reduce the list to five for each category. I don’t want to bore you or be too
exhaustive, but, look, among my favorite readings are: “One Hundred Years of Solitude” and
“Love in the Time of Cholera,” by Gabriel García Márquez; “The Kingdom of this World,” by
Alejo Carpentier: “Simple Verses,” by José Martí; and “The House of the Spirits, by Isabel
Allende.

From television series I can name “In Silence It Had to Be” and “Julito the Fisherman,” two
excellent Cuban productions; and from another area – adventures – where I saw “The
Commandos of Silence.” And I take the occasion to ask why they don’t make new versions of all
these series on Cuban television. As to films, I point to “Strawberry and Chocolate” and
‘Undercover” (“Clandestinos”), where our much-admired Isabel Santos took the lead role.
In regard to fictitious characters, there are these: Don Quijote and Sancho Panza, David in “In
Silence It Had to Be,” interpreted by the late actor Sergio Corrieri; “Julito the Fisherman,”
immortalized by René de la Cruz; and Bruce Lee in some of his films on martial arts, to mention
a few.

Historical figures that I feel are examples for imitation are: Simón Bolívar, Ernesto Che
Guevara, Antonio Maceo, José Martí, and Fidel Castro.

P. – They arrested you when you were 35 years old. What is your concept of time?
A. – Time is a relative concept. If I think about myself, I think time does not pass. When I think
of my daughters becoming women, when I look into the eyes of my beloved Eli, time becomes
infinite for me, cruel, implacable. On that score, I go back to another time, one of laughter
and joys, of return and happiness, to the precious time of our future, free in Cuba – and with
that (my optimism), I stop. You already know I am a huge optimist, that I am going to remain
that way, and so I am happy.

P. – Imagine you are a poet improviser and they give you a “forced foot” that says, “…I am
this kind of guy.” (1)

A. – I am this kind of guy
exactly how you see him
not right not wrong
simple, no frenzy.
With Cuba free I learned
That the way is to love struggle
And this threatening fight today
Is for the truth I knew
And I will continue being like this,
A simple guy with decency
That is worth much more than gold,
One who is honored to die as I lived.

Q. – If you close your eyes now, what do you see?
A. – I see Cuba, a beach blue, clean, and dazzling. I see Eli, my daughters, all my family, my
people. I see laughter, joy, eternity. That way I make my freedom tangible and real. And I know
it’s certain.

(1) A “forced foot” (pie forzada) is a usually ten-line bit of improvised poetry that must end
with a proposed verse, or as with Ramon, begin with it.

Translated by W. T. Whitney Jr. for www.letcubalive.org

Counterpunch

June 17, 2014

Terrorism As A Weapon Of Hegemony

The Cuban Five

by CHANDRA MUZAFFAR

Once again, the International Movement for a Just World (JUST) joins hands with the people of Cuba and justice-loving people in every nook and cranny of the planet, in demanding the immediate release of the three remaining prisoners from the Cuban Five who are still languishing in US jails, after 13 years.

Two were released after completing their prison terms — Rene Gonzales on the 7th of October 2011, and Fernando Gonzales on the 27th of February 2014. It is important to emphasize that they walked to freedom with their dignity intact. The three who are still in jail — Gerardo Hernandez, Antonio Guerrero and Ramon Labanino — deserve our fullest support and solidarity. We should continue to campaign for them with all our heart and soul.

To reiterate, the imprisonment of all five is a travesty of justice. The Cuban Five were monitoring Cuban exile groups in the US in the nineties who had a proven record of committing terrorist acts against the Cuban people. They were gathering information about the terrorist missions that these groups were planning and had informed the US authorities about what they (the Cuban Five) were doing. And yet they were arrested and jailed after an unfair and unjust trial.

If the Cuban Five working under the direction of the Cuban government was determined to expose terrorist activities being carried out against their motherland from US soil, it was mainly because Cuba and its leadership had been victims of US sponsored terror and violence for decades. In 1976, a Cuban commercial plane with 73 passengers on board, a number of them school children, was bombed, killing everyone. The alleged mastermind of this terrorist act, Luis Posada Carriles, is still alive, protected by the US government. There was also an unsuccessful invasion of Cuba by groups in the US in 1961, the infamous ‘Bay of Pigs’ fiasco. A series of terrorist attacks targeting hotels and tourists in the nineties sought to cripple the Cuban economy. And there have been innumerable attempts to assassinate the Leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, right through the 47 years that he was in power. Add to all this the crippling economic sanctions imposed upon Cuba by every US Administration since 1961 and we will get a complete picture of how a small nation of 11 million people has had to endure the terror unleashed against it by its superpower neighbor.

Why has Cuba been the target of terrorism in all its manifestations for so long? The reason is simple. The US elite will not accept in its neighborhood, a nation which is determined to choose its own path to the future without being dictated to, or dominated by, the US. It will not tolerate a people who are committed to defending their independence and sovereignty. To put it in another way, the US drive for hegemony does not permit another nation— especially a nation with a different worldview — to preserve and enhance its dignity.

This hegemonic attitude is borne out by the US’s treatment of other countries in Latin America. Whenever a nation steps out of line, the US line, it is clobbered. Sometimes through terror and violence. Look at Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama, Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, at different times and in different circumstances. Even in West Asia, terror has been employed to both undermine governments which want to maintain a degree of independence from the US and the West and to create instability and chaos in society. This is the story of Somalia and Sudan, of Libya and Lebanon, of Iraq and Syria. In Southeast Asia too, the Vietnamese, the Cambodians and Laotians have all experienced US terror, just as the people of the Philippines had in the past. Weren’t the citizens of Hiroshima and Nagasaki also exposed to a US “rain of terror” in 1945?

Let’s be clear about this. Terrorism is a tool for dominance and control. Terrorism is a weapon of hegemony. The US — like some other states too—uses this weapon in both ways. It employs terror when it suits its interests. It also fights against terrorism when it serves its agenda. This is why for the US there are “good terrorists” and “bad terrorists.” It is quite happy to collude with the former and crush the latter.

This was obvious in Iraq following the Anglo-American occupation of the land in 2003. In the initial phase the occupier encouraged the Shia militias to fight the Sunni remnants of the Saddam Hussein regime. Once the Shias got into power through the democratic process and moved closer to Iran, the US became worried and backed Sunni militias fighting the Shia dominated government. Now of course, Sunni-Shia clashes, compounded by various other forces, have assumed a life of their own.

In Syria, it is an open secret that the US and other Western and regional actors have been actively involved in supporting the armed rebels against the Bashar al-Assad government in Damascus. Some of the rebels are favored more than others by the US just as other rebels are linked to some of the other external players. The good terrorists from the US perspective receive a lot of assistance including weapons and funds through channels connected to US allies in the region. Are there bad terrorists in the Syrian conflict? While the US may not approve of the tactics used by some of the rebels, it has refrained from strong denunciation of them since it shares their overriding objective of eliminating Assad. So it is Assad who is the bad terrorist in the eyes of the US. Assad is bad because he has been consistent in his opposition to US-Israeli hegemony over West Asia.

There is parallel of sorts to the Cuban situation. All those individuals and groups opposed to the Cuban government, however violent they may be, are good terrorists and have been bestowed with all kinds of aid by US agencies through various conduits. Fidel Castro, and his successor, Raul Castro, are the bad ones. Fidel in particular was demonized in the mainstream Western media as few other leaders had been. Needless to say, it was because of his principled position against US helmed hegemony, articulated with such depth and clarity, that a grossly negative image of the man was disseminated through the media.

But Fidel Castro and the Cuban Five have demonstrated that in the ultimate analysis truth will triumph. Today, Fidel commands a lot of respect and affection among ordinary men and women everywhere for what he has accomplished for his people and indeed for the people of Latin America and the Global South. Similarly, the cause of the Cuban Five has become one of the major rallying-points in the worldwide struggle for human freedom and human dignity because it symbolizes the struggle of the powerless against the powerful.

Dr. Chandra Muzaffar is President of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST), an NGO based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/17/the-cuban-five-2/