From our Bureau of Quixotic Gestures And Lists that Seem Incomplete
Santa mierda de los camellos de los Reyes Magos!
Here you go. Something like this has never happened before. The gesture reveals a lot about the U.S. State Department’s efforts. The question remains: why issue this press release now, with no major players involved? Why couldn’t the State Department get the other G7 nations on board, or any Western European state other than Austria? Were they asked to sign? And if not, why not? And if so, why have they not joined the other 20 nations and the U.S. in condemning Castro, Inc. and its repression?
It’s nice to know that the leaders of these nations — two of which (Brazil and Ecuador) were formerly in the Castro camp — support the efforts of freedom-loving Cubans. This is a victory, small though it is. Maybe the State Department is working on getting bigger fish to add their names to the list. That would be wonderful. Now, let’s hope this is an indication of bigger and better things to come that offset the inertia and leftist tilt of Jar-Jar Biden & Company.
From the U.S. Department of State:
We, the Foreign Ministers of Austria, Brazil, Colombia, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, Guatemala, Greece, Honduras, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Republic of Korea, and Ukraine, and the United States Secretary of State, condemn the mass arrests and detentions of protestors in Cuba and call on the government to respect the universal rights and freedoms of the Cuban people, including the free flow of information to all Cubans.
On July 11, tens of thousands of Cuban citizens participated in peaceful demonstrations across the country to protest deteriorating living conditions and to demand change. They exercised universal freedoms of expression and assembly, rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the American Convention on Human Rights, the Inter-American Democratic Charter, and the European Convention on Human Rights.
We call on the Cuban government to respect the legally guaranteed rights and freedoms of the Cuban people without fear of arrest and detention. We urge the Cuban government to release those detained for exercising their rights to peaceful protest. We call for press freedom and for the full restoration of Internet access, which allows economies and societies to thrive. We urge the Cuban government to heed the voices and demands of the Cuban people.
The international community will not waver in its support of the Cuban people and all those who stand up for the basic freedoms all people deserve.