Cuba:
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
2006
Released by
the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor. February 28, 2005. (FULL
REPORT)
Cuba remains a Latin American
anomaly: an undemocratic government that
represses nearly all forms of political
dissent. President Fidel Castro, now in
his forty-seventh year in power, shows no
willingness to consider even minor reforms.
Instead, his government continues to enforce
political conformity using criminal prosecutions,
long- and short-term detentions, mob harassment,
police warnings, surveillance, house arrests,
travel restrictions, and politically-motivated
dismissals from employment. The end result
is that Cubans are systematically denied
basic rights to free expression, association,
assembly, privacy, movement, and due process
of law.
Legal and Institutional Failings
Cuba's legal and institutional structures
are at the root of rights violations. Although
in theory the different branches of government
have separate and defined areas of authority,
in practice the executive retains clear
control over all levers of power. The courts,
which lack independence, undermine the right
to fair trial by severely restricting the
right to a defense.
Cuba's Criminal Code provides the legal
basis for repression of dissent. Laws criminalizing
enemy propaganda, the spreading of "unauthorized
news," and insult to patriotic symbols
are used to restrict freedom of speech under
the guise of protecting state security.
The government also imprisons or orders
the surveillance of individuals who have
committed no illegal act, relying upon provisions
that penalize "dangerousness"
(estado peligroso) and allow for "official
warning" (advertencia oficial).
Political Imprisonment
In early July 2005 the Cuban Commission
for Human Rights and National Reconciliation,
a respected local human rights group, issued
a list of 306 prisoners who it said were
incarcerated for political reasons. The
list included the names of thirteen peaceful
dissidents who had been arrested and detained
in the first half of 2005, of whom eleven
were being held on charges of "dangerousness."
Of seventy-five political dissidents,
independent journalists, and human rights
advocates who were summarily tried in April
2003, sixty-one remain imprisoned. Serving
sentences that average nearly twenty years,
the incarcerated dissidents endure poor
conditions and punitive treatment in prison.
Although several of them suffer from serious
health problems, the Cuban government had
not, as of November 2005, granted any of
them humanitarian release from prison.
On July 13, 2005, protestors commemorated
the deadly 1994 sinking of a tugboat that
was packed with people seeking to flee Cuba.
The protestors marched to the Malecón,
along Havana's coastline, and threw flowers
into the sea. More than two dozen people
were arrested. Less that two weeks later,
on July 22, another thirty people were arrested
during a rally in front of the French Embassy
in Havana. While the majority of those arrested
during the two demonstrations have since
been released, at least ten of them remain
incarcerated at this writing.
Travel Restrictions and Family Separations
The Cuban government forbids the country's
citizens from leaving or returning to Cuba
without first obtaining official permission,
which is often denied. Unauthorized travel
can result in criminal prosecution. The
government also frequently bars citizens
engaged in authorized travel from taking
their children with them overseas, essentially
holding the children hostage to guarantee
the parents' return. Given the widespread
fear of forced family separation, these
travel restrictions provide the Cuban government
with a powerful tool for punishing defectors
and silencing critics.
Freedom of Assembly
Freedom of assembly is severely restricted
in Cuba, and political dissidents are generally
prohibited from meeting in large groups.
In late May 2005, however, nearly two hundred
dissidents attended a rare mass meeting
in Havana. Its organizers deemed the meeting
a success, even though some prominent dissidents
refused to take part in it because of disagreements
over strategy and positions. While barring
some foreign observers from attending, police
allowed the two-day event to take place
without major hindrance. The participants
passed a resolution calling for the immediate
and unconditional release of all political
prisoners.
Prison Conditions
Prisoners are generally kept in poor and
abusive conditions, often in overcrowded
cells. They typically lose weight during
incarceration, and some receive inadequate
medical care. Some also endure physical
and sexual abuse, typically by other inmates
with the acquiescence of guards.
Political prisoners who denounce poor
conditions of imprisonment or who otherwise
fail to observe prison rules are frequently
punished by long periods in punitive isolation
cells, restrictions on visits, or denial
of medical treatment. Some political prisoners
carried out long hunger strikes to protest
abusive conditions and mistreatment by guards.
Death Penalty
Under Cuban law the death penalty exists
for a broad range of crimes. Because Cuba
does not release information regarding its
use of the penalty, it is difficult to ascertain
the frequency with which it is employed.
As far as is known, however, no executions
have been carried out since April 2003.
Human Rights Defenders
Refusing to recognize human rights monitoring
as a legitimate activity, the government
denies legal status to local human rights
groups. Individuals who belong to these
groups face systematic harassment, with
the government putting up obstacles to impede
them from documenting human rights conditions.
In addition, international human rights
groups such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty
International are barred from sending fact-finding
missions to Cuba. It remains one of the
few countries in the world to deny the International
Committee of the Red Cross access to its
prisons.
Key International Actors
At its sixty-first session in April, the
U.N. Commission on Human Rights voted twenty-one
to seventeen (with fifteen abstentions)
to adopt a blandly-worded resolution on
the situation of human rights in Cuba. The
resolution, put forward by the United States
and co-sponsored by the European Union,
simply extended for another year the mandate
of the U.N. expert on Cuba. The Cuban government
continues to bar the U.N. expert from visiting
the country, even though her 2005 report
on Cuba's human rights conditions was inexplicably
and unjustifiably mild.
The U.S. economic embargo on Cuba, in
effect for more than four decades, continues
to impose indiscriminate hardship on the
Cuban people and to block travel to the
island. An exception to the embargo that
allows food sales to Cuba on a cash-only
basis, however, has led to substantial trade
between the two countries. Indeed, in November
2005, the head of Cuba's food importing
agency confirmed that the U.S. was Cuba's
biggest food supplier. That same month the
U.N. General Assembly voted to urge the
U.S. to end the embargo.
In an effort to deprive the Cuban government
of funding, the U.S. government enacted
new restrictions on family-related travel
to Cuba in June 2004. Under these rules,
individuals are allowed to visit relatives
in Cuba only once every three years, and
only if the relatives fit the government's
narrow definition of family-a definition
that excludes aunts, uncles, cousins, and
other next-of-kin who are often integral
members of Cuban families. Justified as
a means of promoting freedom in Cuba, the
new travel policies undermine the freedom
of movement of hundreds of thousands of
Cubans and Cuban Americans, and inflict
profound harm on Cuban families.
Countries within the E.U. continue to disagree
regarding the best approach toward Cuba.
In January 2005, the E.U. decided temporarily
to suspend the diplomatic sanctions that
it had adopted in the wake of the Cuban
government's 2003 crackdown against dissidents,
and in June it extended the sanctions' suspension
for another year. Dissidents criticized
the E.U.'s revised position, which Spain
had advocated, and which the Czech Republic,
most notably, had resisted.
Ladies in White (Damas de Blanco), a group
of wives and mothers of imprisoned dissidents,
were among three winners of the prestigious
Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought for
2005. The prize is granted annually by the
European Parliament in recognition of a
recipient's work in protecting human rights,
promoting democracy and international cooperation,
and upholding the rule of law. As of this
writing, it was not clear whether the Cuban
government would allow representatives of
Ladies in White to travel to France in December
2005 to receive the prize.
Relations between Cuba and the Czech Republic
continue to be strained. In May 2005, Cuba
summarily expelled Czech senator Karel Schwarzenberg,
who was visiting Havana to attend the dissidents'
two-day meeting. On October 28, on the eighty-seventh
anniversary of the establishment of independent
Czechoslovakia, the Cuban authorities banned
a reception that the Czech Embassy was planning
to hold in Havana, calling it a "counter-revolutionary
action." The Cubans were reportedly
angered by the embassy's decision to invite
representatives of Ladies in White to attend
the function.
Venezuela remains Cuba's closest ally in
Latin America. President Castro and Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez enjoy warm relations,
and Venezuela provides Cuba with oil subsidies
and other forms of assistance.
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