As
the Miami Herald editorial board lays out this morning, the Obama
administration failed to make a deal with the Castro regime that would actually
improve human rights for the Cuban people.
LISTEN TO Speech
Miami Herald: “…the United States has made most of the concessions, while Cuban president Raúl Castro given very little, especially in the realm of human rights, in return.” In the two and a half years since the Obama administration announced the thaw, which we applauded — and still do — the United States has made most of the concessions, while Cuban president Raúl Castro given very little, especially in the realm of human rights, in return. … As reported by El Nuevo Herald’s Nora Gámez Torres this week, “Cuban dissidents of various political stripes agree that the United States must make changes to apply pressure to the Raúl Castro regime.” They are the ones on the front lines, being censored, imprisoned, harassed, beaten. It’s only right that their words resound the loudest in formulating our country’s revised policy. (The Miami Herald, 6/16/17)
According to the
executive director of Human Rights Watch, President Obama’s eagerness to tout
his accomplishments resulted in two major mistakes on human rights.
· President Obama
was so “eager to celebrate his accomplishments” that he “did little to press
Raúl Castro’s government to show concrete results.” While in Cuba, Obama
addressed the need for progress on human rights but, eager to celebrate his
accomplishments, did little to press Raúl Castro’s government to show concrete
results. (Human Rights Watch, 1/9/17)
· President Obama
failed to generate international pressure on Cuba to make real progress on
human rights. Nor did the administration work with other governments to
generate multilateral pressure for reform. (Human Rights Watch, 1/9/17)
Human Rights
Watch’s World Report 2017 details how human rights abuses have grown worse
since President Obama’s policies took effect.
In recent years,
the Cuban government has been making more and more “arbitrary arrests of human
rights defenders, independent journalists, and others.” The Cuban government
continues to repress dissent and punish public criticism. It now relies less
than in past years on long-term prison sentences to punish its critics, but
short-term arbitrary arrests of human rights defenders, independent
journalists, and others have increased dramatically in recent years. Other
repressive tactics employed by the government include beatings, public shaming,
and termination of employment. (Human Rights Watch, World Report 2017)
From January
through August 2016, the government made more arbitrary detentions than it had
in the past six years. The government continues to rely on arbitrary detention
to harass and intimidate critics, independent activists, political opponents,
and others. The Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation,
an independent human rights group that lacks official authorization and is
therefore considered illegal by the government, received more than 7,900
reports of arbitrary detentions from January through August 2016. This
represents the highest monthly average of detentions in the past six years.
(Human Rights Watch, World Report 2017)
· Dozens of
political prisoners remain behind bars, and human rights groups believe the
Castro regime is hiding even more. Despite the release of the 53 political
prisoners in conjunction with the agreement to normalize relations with the US,
dozens more remain in Cuban prisons, according to local human rights groups.
The government denies access to its prisons by independent human rights groups,
which believe that additional political prisoners, whose cases they cannot
document, remain locked up. (Human Rights Watch, World Report 2017)
Despite the Castro
regime’s changes to travel restrictions in 2013, authorities still prevent
people who express dissent from leaving the country. Nonetheless, the reforms
gave the government broad discretionary powers to restrict the right to travel
on the grounds of “defense and national security” or “other reasons of public
interest.” Such measures have allowed authorities to deny exit to people who
express dissent. (Human Rights Watch, World Report 2017)
“The Cuban government
still refuses to recognize human rights monitoring as a legitimate activity and
denies legal status to local human rights groups.” Government authorities
harass, assault, and imprison human rights defenders who attempt to document
abuses. In September, police raided Cubalex, a six-year-old organization that
investigates human rights violations and provides free legal services to
free-expression activists, migrants, and human-rights defenders. Officers
confiscated files, strip-searched four men and a woman, and arrested two
attorneys, one of whom was still in detention at time of writing. (Human Rights
Watch, World Report 2017)
The Cuban
government still opposes UN resolutions aimed at scrutinizing human rights
abuses in places like North Korea, Syria, Iran, and Ukraine. As a member of the
UN Human Rights Council from 2006 to 2012 and from 2014 to the present, Cuba
has regularly voted to prevent scrutiny of serious human rights abuses around
the world—opposing resolutions spotlighting abuses in North Korea, Syria, Iran,
and Ukraine. (Human Rights Watch, World Report 2017)