Activists defy Castro government, but few follow.
Nick MiroffSeptember 14, 2011 06:00
HAVANA, Cuba — The uprisings that have rocked the Middle East this year
appear to be inspiring a new wave of protests on this island.
But while the Arab Spring is still in full effect in many countries,
opponents of the Castro government have gained little momentum for a
"Cuban Autumn."
In recent weeks, anti-government activists have staged several public
demonstrations in Havana and eastern Cuba. News and video clips of the
events were posted on social-networking sites and broadcast on Miami
television channels.
They show small groups of activists banging cookware, chanting
anti-Castro slogans and "Freedom!" until police and state-security
agents arrive to whisk them away.
In some of the videos, larger crowds of Cubans stand around watching the
protesters, but they do not join in.
The incidents come after a period of relative calm that followed the
Castro government's move last year to release scores of imprisoned
political prisoners, with the Catholic Church playing a mediating role.
The amnesty briefly ameliorated criticisms by Western governments and
human-rights groups of Cuba's one-party socialist system and its
treatment of non-violent dissenters.
Now activists are once more testing Raul Castro's tolerance for public
protest — and whether the tactics used by tweeting insurgents in the
Middle East could spread anti-government sentiment here.
One disadvantage often cited by Cuban activists is that they operate at
a significant technology deficit. The island is one of the
least-connected countries in the world, and though many young people
have mobile phones, most lack access to Facebook, Twitter and
video-sharing sites because of internet restrictions and scarce bandwidth.
Anti-Castro activists on the island are also viewed suspiciously or with
outright hostility by many Cubans, even those who have lost faith in
Cuba's socialist model. State media broadcasts frequently show them
meeting with U.S. diplomatic officials, depicting them as
"counterrevolutionaries," "mercenaries" and "opportunists" who are out
to make a buck or get political asylum abroad.
Many others here remain committed to Cuba's system and its revolutionary
ideals, even as the free health care, education and other benefits the
government provides continue to diminish.
But dissidents also say Cuban authorities are escalating their attacks
to intimidate others from joining their pro-democracy efforts. In
August, police violence against peaceful protesters reached its highest
level in recent years, according to the Havana-based Cuban Commission on
Human Rights and Reconciliation, an anti-Castro group that the tracks
political arrests and detentions. Nearly twice as many activists have
been detained so far this year compared to the same period in 2010, the
group said, including 130 short-term detentions over the weekend.
The Cuban government has challenged those charges, accusing the group of
padding its lists with fake names.
Castro opponents do not claim the Cuban government stoops to the type of
methods that have been used by regimes in the Arab world, where
activists are raped, tortured and murdered, and where protests are
commonly met by volleys of police gunfire.
But state-security officials can plainly be seen coordinating
counter-protests by government loyalists, who often surround dissidents
and shout epithets at them for hours on end, sometimes accosting them
physically. Security agents typically stand between the two sides to
keep things from getting too rough.
When Cubans protest in public spontaneously, as some of the recent
videos show, police quickly swoop in to arrest the demonstrators and
haul them away, though the activists are often released several hours later.
Cuba's Catholic church, which played a central role in securing the
release of more than 100 jailed activists over the past year, issued a
carefully worded statement last week that condemned violence against
"defenseless" people.
But Church spokesman Orlando Marquez also said in the statement that the
Cuban government told the church "no one at the national level" had
ordered attacks on protesters.
Cuban state television has aired footage of the protests, claiming the
incidents were part of a "media campaign" against the island. It called
the demonstrations acts of "public disorder" that were organized by
U.S.-supported "mercenaries" and planned in coordination with American
officials.
"The goal is to create a climate of tension that will justify
aggressions against Cuba," the report said.
While Cuba's economy continues to struggle, there has not been the kind
of broader unrest on the island that sparked street protests during the
post-Soviet crisis of the 1990s.
Raul Castro has eased state control over the economy since taking over
for his older brother in 2006, allowing for new private businesses and
pending reforms that would permit Cubans to buy and sell homes and cars
for the first time in half a century.
Castro has also encouraged Cubans to vent their frustrations — within
limits — through established channels like workplace forums and
neighborhood meetings. Criticizing state institutions and government
bureaucracy is no longer taboo, but organized opposition and public
protests — like the recent demonstrations — remain out of bounds.
Since most of the dissidents freed over the past year opted to leave
Cuba for Spain as part of an arrangement with the Madrid government, the
latest rounds of protests may also be an effort by activists to remain
visible, particularly to supporters abroad.
Cuba's most famous online anti-government activist, Yoani Sanchez, sends
out cascades of tweets from her mobile phone, including information
about protests. Her blog, Generation Y, is no longer blocked on the
island by the government, but many young Cubans who manage to get online
aren't necessarily inclined to use their precious bytes on political sites.
A high-speed undersea data link to Venezuela completed this summer with
much fanfare is supposed to come online in the next few months,
increasing Cuba's bandwidth by a factor of 3,000. Its debut has been
repeatedly delayed, adding to perceptions that Cuban authorities are
wary of its power, even though they have already announced it will not
be used to deliver private internet access to Cuban homes.
U.S. officials appear to view communication technology as the key to
sparking political change on the island. In a leaked 2009 U.S.
diplomatic cable that recently surfaced, the top American official in
Havana, Jonathan Farrar, urged the lifting of restrictions on software
downloads in Cuba, where Microsoft and other American companies have
blocked access to comply with anti-terrorism statutes. Such
restrictions, Farrar argued, work "directly against U.S. goals to
advance people-to-people interaction."
Bringing more technology, wrote Farrar at the time, could "help
facilitate Iran-style democratic ferment in Cuba."
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