(EFE).- Several dozen Cuban expatriates and some Americans gathered this Monday before the Cuban Embassy in Washington to protest and hold a vigil on the occasion of the first anniversary of the anti-government protests of July 11, 2021 in that country.
Those gathered carried posters and banners bearing slogans such as “Long live Cuba Libre” – painted on modest cardboard – or “Freedom for Cuba. The Government is killing”, the latter in English.
On the ground and in front of the fence of the Cuban embassy, the demonstrators spread out a series of black and white photographs of people who suffered reprisals in the government of Miguel Díaz-Canel and previously of the brothers Fidel and Raúl Castro, as well as of their relatives, with a prominent presence of mothers.
Among them were names such as Christian Díaz, Diubis Laurencio Tejeda, Esmeralda Rodríguez and Yudinela Castro.
Among them were names such as Christian Díaz, Diubis Laurencio Tejeda, Esmeralda Rodríguez and Yudinela Castro.
“The tyranny of the Castros and Diaz-Canel must be overthrown. It has been too long, too many prisoners and too many dead. This cannot continue like this, it cannot. It must be denounced, here in Washington and throughout the world,” Marlene Suárez, one of the protesters who came wearing a t-shirt with the Cuban flag printed on it, told Efe.
The concentration was enlivened at almost all times by the rhythm of island music that sounded from the loudspeakers of a truck in which there were also slogans and denunciations against the Cuban regime such as “We were so hungry that we even ate our fear.”
The concentrates chanted on several occasions shouts in unison of “God, homeland and freedom”, as well as “Down with the Castros” and “Díaz-Canel assassin”.
Meanwhile, in Miami, exile organizations, congressmen and mayors of the Miami Cuban community reaffirmed on Monday their support for their “brothers” on the island, asked the US government to help bring about change in Cuba and reproached Canada and the European Union to “finance the repression”.
“Shamefully, the struggle of the Cuban people has not been a priority for the (Joseph) Biden Administration. Worse still, at this critical time for the Cuban people, they have chosen to support the regime with weakened sanctions, increased revenues and cuts to the Office of Transmissions to Cuba,” Cuban-born Republican congressman Mario Díaz-Balart said at a press conference.
As in other US cities, such as Washington, New York, Tampa, Las Vegas or Los Angeles, the commemoration in Miami culminated at night with a march through the streets
Carlos Giménez, also a congressman, Republican and Cuban by origin, demanded that the US president “condemn the communist regime for its decades of oppression” and support the release of political prisoners and the holding of free elections.
As in other US cities, such as Washington, New York, Tampa, Las Vegas or Los Angeles, the commemoration in Miami culminated at night with a march through the streets, preceded by various cultural, religious and patriotic events.
“The battle for Cuba’s freedom is not over,” said Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo, one of those attending an event held at the headquarters of Brigade 2506, which brings together veterans of the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.
The mayors of Miami, Francis Suárez, and Doral, Juan Carlos Bermúdez, commissioners, exile figures and members of the Cuban community participated in the commemorative act in which a video with scenes of the 11J protests and the repression exerted by the security forces.
Orlando Gutiérrez, of the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance, stressed that “the civic uprising has not stopped” and mentioned that they have documented graffiti, pot-banging and other acts of protest recorded today in different parts of Cuba.
Gutiérrez asked the Democratic Biden government to help Cubans who want “freedom and democracy” and urged it to convince the “Western democracies” that provide “hard money that the Cuban government uses to operate and repress” of the need to to cut off the flow to a “63-year dictatorship”.
“How are they going to be financing the main ally of Vladimir Putin (Russia’s president) in the West?” Asked the exile leader, who accused the Paris Club, the European Union and the governments of Canada, France, Italy and Spain of “financing the repression of the Cubans”.
The latter is the case of Felipe Alonso, 84, who was sentenced to 30 years and arrived in the US on an “unforgettable” February 27, 1980 after serving 15 years in prison.
The event was attended by brigade members from the Bay of Pigs dressed in uniform and about twenty members of the Historical Political Prison of Cuba, which brings together political prisoners who settled in the United States after serving their sentences or being released due to pressure from other governments or institutions.
The latter is the case of Felipe Alonso, 84, who was sentenced to 30 years and arrived in the US on an “unforgettable” February 27, 1980 after serving 15 years in prison.
Alonso, who was part of the group of plant yourselves, those who did not collaborate at all with the Cuban prison system, stressed to Efe that he considers the prisoners and those sentenced on the island for 11-J equal to them. “They are our replacement, we thought there would not be. That means that we planted a very fruitful seed,” he stressed.
According to a report published last week by the US-based organizations Cubalex and Justicia 11J, a total of 1,484 people were arrested after the protests a year ago, of which 701, aged between 12 and 68, are still behind bars.
In the famous Versailles restaurant in Miami, groups of people with Cuban flags and T-shirts with legends such as “Patria y vida” and photographs of 11-J prisoners gathered after noon.
The artist of the San Isidro Movement (MSI) Luis Eligio D Omni, blindfolded, chained, handcuffed, wrapped in a Cuban flag
The artist of the San Isidro Movement (MSI) Luis Eligio D Omni, blindfolded, chained, handcuffed, wrapped in a Cuban flag and dragging a wooden shield loaded with posters with the legend “Political Prisoner”, made a performance in the parking lot of the restaurant titled “Unconditional Freedom”.
In addition to asking the demonstrators to “make way for the condemned”, the poet also shouted that the people of Cuba have been “condemned for 63 years” to a “communist dictatorship” and “we are all political prisoners.”
“55 fewer detainees,” shouted the “condemned” among the cars surrounded by people with posters that read “political prisoner.”
The slogan “Patria y vida”, the title of the song that became the anthem of the 11-J protests, and the traditional cry “Long live free Cuba!” They resounded in the events held yesterday, which culminated in a walk for freedom in Cuba that ran through Little Havana’s Eighth Street until it reached a monument dedicated to Cuban heroes.
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