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Jailed
in Cuba
International pressure can help journalists
Union-Tribune
Editorial, December
2, 2003.
The repression of Cuba's independent journalists
is an issue that transcends the current
U.S. debate over how best to promote a democratic
transition in post-Castro Cuba. Advocates
and opponents of continuing the four-decade
U.S. trade embargo against the Castro dictatorship
can agree that imprisoning journalists and
crushing their movement for a free press
are gross violations of human rights.
Supporters of keeping at least a modified
version of the trade embargo argue that
it weakens Castro and provides the only
leverage for easing his regime's repression
of human rights. The Bush administration,
noting Castro's stubborn refusal to loosen
the Cuban Communist Party's grip on power
or bargain on human rights matters, recently
formally reaffirmed retaining the trade
embargo and the ban on American tourism.
Opponents of the trade embargo, now including
much of the U.S. Congress and some among
the Cuban exile community, argue with equal
fervor that the embargo has long since failed.
Indeed, embargo opponents assert that refusing
most U.S. trade with Cuba strengthens Castro
by giving him both a nationalist rallying
cry and an excuse for Cuba's threadbare
economy. Better, they say, to remove trade
restrictions and flood Cuba with an American
influence and economic presence that would
inevitably work to promote a market economy
and political liberalization.
This debate - in which both sides present
compelling points - will drag on at least
until 2005, when the Bush presidency will
either begin its second term or be replaced
by that of a Democratic challenger, perhaps
with a different Cuba policy.
Meanwhile, a third or more of Cuba's brave
corps of independent journalists languishes
in prison. Their movement to break the Cuban
state's stranglehold on all information
and publications disseminated within Cuba
remains harshly beleaguered if not thoroughly
repressed.
What's needed, then, are policy options
that can work now to help Cuba's imprisoned
journalists and, one must hope, promote
their vision of a freer press and a freer
flow of information within Cuba.
While Fidel Castro remains a stubborn tyrant
irrevocably committed to holding power and
maintaining a Communist Cuba, he is not
impervious to pressure on human rights issues.
Past protests, especially from those less
hostile than the United States to the Cuban
revolution, have occasionally produced grudging
concessions from Havana. A sustained chorus
of international protests on behalf of Cuba's
jailed journalists stands some chance of
alleviating their present plight.
A coalition comprising the European Union,
Latin American governments, international
press freedom organizations, human rights
groups and the United States could prove
surprisingly effective. That effort, loosely
begun earlier this year, should be pressed
and escalated.
The time to try rescuing Cuba's persecuted
advocates of a freer press, and all that
portends for Cuba's future, is now.
© Copyright 2003 Union-Tribune
Publishing Co.
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