Monday, May 22, 2006
Pan African Newswire
Also on this
page:
Message from Ricardo Alarcon, President of the National
Assembly of People’s Power of the Republic of Cuba
DC Hands Off Cuba & Venezuela speech by Jose Pertierra
on May 20,06
Solidarity Demonstration Held to Support Cuba & Venezuela;
Statements
Demonstration
Held to Defend Cuba and Venezuela
March
from Malcolm X Park to White House draws hundreds
By Abayomi
Azikiwe, Editor
Pan-African News
Wire
WASHINGTON,
D.C., May 20, 2006 (PANW)--Growing support for the governments and
peoples of Venezuela and Cuba was evident today when various
organizations and individuals gathered in the nation's capital to
express their concern about the increasingly aggressive foreign policy
directed at these two Caribbean and Latin American nations by the Bush
administration.
Beginning at
10:00 a.m. activists rallied at
Malcolm X Park located on Euclid and 15th Street, NW, to circulate
leaflets, posters, Venezuelan flags as well as listen to speeches from
over 25 different people calling for the full recognition of both Cuba
and Venezuela as sovereign nations. After the extensive rally,
activists lined up in the Park and marched on to 16th Street, NW where
they paraded through the city chanting pro-Cuban and Venezuelan
slogans.
The first stop
of the march was the Cuban Interests
Section where a delegation from the demonstration greeted the diplomats
with messages of support for the foreign policy aims and objectives of
the Caribbean state. Members of the delegation to stop by the Cuban
Interests Section included Pam Africa of the MOVE organization, Ignacio
Meneses of the US/Cuba Labor Exchange and Nellie Hester Bailey, the
leader of the Harlem Tenants Council.
The
demonstration
continued through the streets of the nation's capital arriving
eventually at Lafayette Park right across the street from the White
House. After the arrival of the marchers at Lafayette Park another
group of speakers continued to protest the role of the United States
against Cuba and Venezuela.
This
demonstration was hosted and
sponsored by dozens of different organizations. For more information on
the endorsing groups, just log on to the following web site at
May 20 Coalition
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Message from
Ricardo Alarcon,
President of the National Assembly of
People’s Power of the Republic of Cuba
Dear sisters and
brothers:
On
behalf of the revolutionary Government of Cuba and the Cuban people I
salute the organizers and all participants at the May 20 Hands off
Venezuela and Cuba rally.
We appreciate
your solidarity in our
struggle for independence and justice in the face of the imperialist
aggression that our people have been resisting, heroically and
successfully for over 47 years. In spite of the economic blockade our
people have advanced dramatically in building a new and better society
and are cooperating closely with our brothers and sisters in Venezuela.
We are helping many others as well in Latin America, the Caribbean,
Africa and Asia to improve their lives. We strongly believe that free
and universal health care and education, a decent job and housing are
inalienable rights that belong to everybody including the millions
deprived of those rights in the United States.
We urge all of
you to join us in demanding an end to the criminal and hypocritical
policy of the Bush administration that continues to promote terrorism
against the Cuban people as illustrated by their protection of such
cold blood killers like Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles. In
addition, join us also in opposition to the maintaining unjustly of the
incarcerated Five Cuban heroes that were detained almost 8 years ago
precisely for their efforts against those very same terrorist groups
that operate with impunity and with the official protection of the US
authorities.
We call upon all
of you to join in the
international campaign against US sponsored terrorism from September
12, when the Cuban Five will have been deprived of their freedom for 8
years, to October the 6th, which will mark the 30th anniversary of the
destruction of a Cubana civilian airplane resulting in the
assassination of all 73 persons on board. We should also commemorate
next September 21, the 30th anniversary of the killing in Washington
D.C. of Orlando Letelier and Ronnie Moffit.
Orlando Bosch
was
involved in the plot to murder Letelier and Moffit which is clearly
reflected in recently declassified U.S. official documents. However,
Bosch has never been questioned by the FBI and is living in Miami still
actively pursuing his criminal endeavors.
Luis Posada
Carriles
is a fugitive of the Venezuelan justice from which he escaped with the
help of the Reagan-Bush White House twenty years ago. The U.S.
Government knows very well that he and Bosch masterminded the
destruction of our airplane in 1976. The U.S. has an obligation to
extradite Posada to Venezuela to continue his trial related to that
heinous crime or it has the responsibility to prosecute him in the U.S.
for the same crime. There is no legal alternative according to
international conventions against terrorism that have been signed and
ratified by the U.S. But Mr. Posada has been for more than a year under
U.S. official protection and so far he has not been extradited or
accused.
The detention of
Gerardo, Ramon, Antonio, Fernando
and Rene was determined to be arbitrary and illegal by a unanimous
decision of a five member panel of U.N. human rights experts. Their
convictions were reversed also by a unanimous decision of three judges
of the Atlanta Court of Appeals. Those decisions were announced in May
2005 and August 2005, but the Five Cubans are still in prison subjected
to cruel and unusual treatment with severe violations of their human
rights including the denial of visas to the wives of Gerardo and Rene
that have not been permitted to enter the U.S. to visit them.
The
Five Cubans must be liberated immediately. Posada Carriles and Bosch
must be prosecuted and punished as admitted and very well documented
terrorists.
The cynical “war
on terrorism” carried out by Bush has to be unmasked, denounced and
defeated.
The
aggression against the Iraqi people has to be stopped forthwith. The
exploitation and discrimination against immigrant workers, the war on
poor people, must end.
The threats
against Venezuela and the
interventionist attempts against other peoples in Latin America have to
be condemned and rejected.
Let’s fight
together to build
bridges of friendship, peace and cooperation between the peoples of the
United States and Latin America and the Caribbean. Let’s struggle
united, shoulder to shoulder, towards a new and better world, a world
of justice and freedom for all.
Long live the
American people.
Long live the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean. In solidarity
let’s fight together until victory forever.
Ricardo Alarcon
La Habana
May 20, 2006
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DC Hands Off
Cuba & Venezuela speech by Jose Pertierra on May 20,06
PUNISH, DON´T PROTECT,
POSADA CARRILES
Text of speech
given by José Pertierra at the Hands off Cuba and Venezuela
Rally in Washington, D.C. on May 20, 2006
The
first year anniversary of Luis Posada Carriles’ detention by the Bush
Administration was the 17th of May. Some might view this as a cause for
celebration: that a notorious international terrorist, a man known as
the Osama Bin Laden of Latin America, accused of downing a passenger
plane with 73 passengers on board has been caught and is in jail,
presumably to await prosecution for his crimes. Yet the Bush
Administration did not charge Posada Carriles with terrorism, nor has
it prosecuted Venezuela’s request for his extradition—a request that
has been pending since June of last year.
The only charge
brought against Posada Carriles by the Bush Administration is a mere
immigration infraction: i.e., entry into the United States without
inspection. The Bush Administration used the immigration case against
Posada to spin a tall-tale: to try and fool people into believing that
the U.S. takes the Posada case seriously and to give the appearance
that the wheels of justice are grinding along, when in fact the White
House is simply using the immigration case as the prop with which to
stonewall the prosecution of this international terrorist.
The
United States is legally obligated to abide by its international treaty
obligations and extradite or prosecute this criminal.
Posada
Carriles stands indicted in Venezuela for 73 counts of first degree
murder in relation to the downing of a passenger plane on October 6,
1976. At the time, it was worst act of terrorism perpetrated on a
civilian
airliner.
Aboard the plane
were 73 persons. 57 of
the passengers were Cubans. 11 of them were Guyanese, most of them had
just won scholarships to study medicine in Cuba. The remaining five
passengers were Koreans. Those on board averaged only 30 years of age.
Traveling
with the group were 24 members of the Cuban fencing team, many of them
teen-agers, fresh from gold medal victories at the Youth Fencing
Championship in Caracas.
Most of the
bodies recovered from the
wreckage were too grotesquely disfigured to be identified by their
loved ones. The forensic report performed by the coroner describes the
condition of the nine year old Guyanese girl whose remains were
recovered from the downed aircraft: “Body of a girl around 9 years of
age . . . . Brain missing, only facial bones, scalp and hair remaining.
Lungs and heart destroyed. Liver and intestines shattered. Buttocks
missing on right lower limb. Compound fracture of tibia and fibula . .
. ” None of the 73 passengers aboard the plane survived.
In
support of its extradition request, Venezuela submitted documents to
the United States showing that Posada is under indictment in Venezuela
for first degree murder in relation to the downing of the plane, that
there is an arrest warrant outstanding against him in Caracas and that
there is probable cause to hold him for trial as the mastermind of the
downing of the passenger plane.
This is an
airtight case. Only
the Bush Administration’s desire to shelter this international
terrorist impedes his extradition, but the law is clear. It obligates
the United States to either extradite or prosecute.
The
international treaties and conventions to which the United States is a
party, obligate the Bush Administration to either extradite Posada
Carriles or to prosecute him in the United States for 73 counts of
first degree murder.
There is no
discretion. It cannot pretend
he is simply an undocumented immigrant and place him in a safe and
comfortable holding facility in Texas until the extradition case goes
away.
Venezuela’s
extradition case is not going to go away. The
government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is firmly committed
in the fight against international terrorism. Venezuela’s commitment is
not to an a la carte war on terror, such as the Bush Administration
wages: a war that distinguishes between terrorists that the U.S.
prefers to protect and terrorists that the U.S. prefers to torture. All
terrorists should be prosecuted. None should be tortured.
What
would the Founding Fathers think of a White House that protects
terrorists but persecutes those who combat terrorism? Would Jefferson
and Madison recognize this country today? A country that shelters
Posada, yet persecutes and punishes five brave Cubans (Gerardo, Rene,
Tony, Fernando and Ramón) who came to this country to combat
terrorism?
A
high ranking United States government official told us last week that
Venezuela should be content with the fact that Luis Posada Carriles has
not been released and continues detained in an immigration holding
facility. Well, President Bush, we don’t want Posada detained for mere
immigration infractions. We want him tried for 73 counts of first
degree murder. The families of the victims want to be sure that his
crimes do not go unpunished.
At home, I have
a woodcut done by
my late friend, the Uruguayan artist Naúl Ojeda. Living in the
woodcut
in bright red ink is a Pablo Neruda poem. Part of the poem says,
Por estos
muertos nuestros pido castigo
Para los que de
sangre
salpicaron la
Patria
pido castigo
For the sake of
our dead, I ask for punishment.
For those who
spilled blood in our country,
I ask for
punishment
Para el verdugo
que mandó esta muerte
pido castigo
Para el que dio
la orden de agonía
pido castigo.
For the
executioner who sent us murder
I ask for
punishment
For the one who
gave the order that caused our agony
I ask for
punishment
Para los que
defendieron este crimen
pido castigo
No quiero que me
den
la mano empapada
por nuestra
sangre: Pido castigo.
For those that
defended this crime
I ask for
punishment
I don’t want
them to extend us
hands soaked
with our
blood: I want
them punished.
No los quiero de
embajadores
tampoco en su
casa tranquilos
Los quiero ver
aquí juzgados
en esta plaza,
en este sitio.
Quiero castigo
I don’t want to
see them as ambassadors
or living
comfortably in their homes.
I want to see
them tried here
In this plaza,
right here in this place
I want them
punished.
Mr.
President: we don’t want to see Luis Posada Carriles living comfortably
in Miami again, while his crimes go unpunished. We don’t want to see
him exhibit his fourth-grade quality paintings in a Miami gallery
again. We don’t want to see him again on Miami television as an honored
guest, pontificating about his warped version of freedom and democracy.
We
want to see him punished. For the sake of the little nine year old girl
whose body was blown to pieces by his bombs, we want him punished. For
the sake of Nancy Uranga, a pregnant 22 year old fencer from Cuba, we
want him punished. For the sake of the families of the 73 passengers
aboard Cubana de Aviación 455, we want him punished.
For Carlos
Alberto Cremata and his brothers who were mere teen-agers when they
lost their father, their inspiration and their friend, Carlos Cremata
Trujillo. For Margarita Morales who lost her father, Julio—the fencing
team’s trainer. For Odalys Pérez, whose father Wilfredo bravely
piloted
the doomed plane away from Paradise Beach to avoid crashing it into the
beachgoers on shore. For Camilo Rojo, whose memories of his father,
Jesús, are the incomplete memories of a toddler.
For their sake,
and for the sake of the pain they have endured for the past thirty
years. For the pain of growing up without a father or a mother or a
brother or a sister or a spouse, we want him punished. In Caracas, in
Washington, or right here in front of the White House, in Lafayette
Park, if you prefer.
We want this
terrorist punished for his crimes, and Venezuela will not rest unless
and until justice is served.
José
Pertierra is an attorney, practicing in Washington, D.C. He represents
the Venezuelan government in the case of Luis Posada Carriles.
From: Daniel del
Solar
e-mail
solarmedia@hotmail.com
cell 510 290 3022
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