MIAMI, United States. – The Greek left-wing economist and politician Yanis Varoufakis, who visited Cuba last week, said that the island’s government should undertake economic reforms to “energize” small businesses, as well as respect human rights, for the sake of greatest “fortress” of the Revolution, according to an EFE report.
The former Minister of Finance of Greece and founder of the Movement for Democracy in Europe (DiEM25) told that news agency that he had discussed these issues with the Minister of Finance and Prices of Cuba, Meisi Bolaños, and with members of the Political Bureau of the Party Communist who did not identify.
Varoufakis specified that he had been “very explicit” when discussing with the Cuban authorities the issue of respect for human rights.
“I approach Cuba in the same way that I do with my friends, with my family… with everyone with whom I have to cooperate and work together. In a way that is both respectful and critical,” she said.
“If someone close to you and with whom you have to cooperate does something wrong, you have to look them in the eye and tell them. And that includes human rights,” she added later.
According to Varoufakis, the left must “recover the concept of freedom”, something that -he pointed out- had lost in favor of the right in the 20th century “because of the gulag and the tendency [de la izquierda] to create concentration camps for their own people.”
The Greek politician also expressed his conviction that “the strength of the Cuban Revolution will increase when it treats those who demonstrate against the Cuban government and the PCC as its own people, as potential allies despite disagreements and demonstrations.”
At another point in his interview with EFE, the economist acknowledged that his interlocutors had been “quite self-critical with respect to his monetary policy” (Sorting Task), although he did not mention whether any opinion had been issued on the subject of human rights.
In Cuba, Varoufakis He participated at the V Conference for the Balance of the World, an international forum on foreign relations with more than 1000 participants from 86 countries.
