| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"pedro martori" |
| Date: |
16 Jul 2003 07:54:12 AM |
| Object: |
NAACP urged to rebuke Cuba |
NAACP urged to rebuke Cuba
by Justin Willett (jwillett@herald.com)
The Miami Herald
July 15, 2003
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/6303640.htm
As the NAACP holds its national convention in Miami Beach this week, a
group of Cuban Americans wants the civil rights organization to know
about--and acknowledge--what they say is the suffering of black residents in
Cuba.
Activists gathered Monday at the west Miami headquarteres of
Municipalities of Cuba in Exile to highlight what they portrayed as the
persecution of black people under the regime of Fidel Castro.
Several Cuban exiles described their imprisonment on the island and said
black people continue to languish in Cuban prisons because of their
political views.
Ernesto Díaz Rodríguez, who was arrested in 1968 for taking part in an
anti-Castro operation and served 22 years in prison, said the 1959 Cuban
revolution did not, as Castro's government and its supporters have said,
help black Cubans.
''It is all a lie,'' Díaz Rodríguez said through an interpreter. ``The
Cuban black population is not different from the black population in South
Africa or the black population of the United States.''
Eusebio Peñalver, who along with Díaz Rodríguez was one of the so-called
plantados, or ''immovable'' prisoners who rejected the regime's
''reeducation'' program, served 28 years in prison after being arrested for
opposing Castro.
Myles Kantor, a columnist for FrontPageMagazine.com and director of the
Center for Free Emigration, said the NAACP should attack Castro's
persecution of black citizens as it did apartheid in South Africa.
''We simply seek moral consistency by the NAACP,'' Kantor said. ``We hope
the NAACP will choose the path of solidarity instead of silence.''
In addition to sending a letter to NAACP leaders urging their support, the
Cuban exile group plans to hold a vigil tonight at the southwest corner of
19th Street and Convention Center Drive, across from the Miami Beach
Convention Center, where the NAACP is holding its convention.
lavozdecubalibre.com
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