To promote a peaceful transition to a Cuba that respects human rights
and political and economic freedoms
Freedom in the World 2021 Report rates Cuba among the 25 most "Not Free" in the world. Officials risk health of dissidents in midst of pandemic
The human rights situation in Cuba remains dire in 2021. Freedom House in their Freedom in the World 2021 rated Cuba Not Free and scored the country 13 out of a possible 100 for political rights and civil liberties. Cuba is among the 25 most unfree countries on the planet, and shares this dubious distinction with, among others, the People's Republic of China, Belarus, Laos, North Korea, and the occupied country of Tibet.
However I will quibble with the claim in the Freedom House report that the "the government achieved some success in controlling the COVID-19 pandemic, reporting just 145 deaths to the World Health Organization by year’s end, but the global crisis took a heavy toll on the economy." The Cuban government has a decades long record of under-reporting deaths in other health crises, and locking up whistleblowers that disclose the real numbers.
Respected economist Carmelo Mesa-Lago in a Harvard webinar on May 1, 2020 noted that in Cuba, “there is no independent entity that can report its own [coronavirus] figures or criticize the government’s data.”
Data reviewed by the Miami Herald and reported by Nora Gamez on May 5, 2020 indicated that "in the week ending on March 21, 2020 there were 144,095 newly reported 'acute respiratory illnesses.' By March 28, the number of new weekly cases of people with acute respiratory diseases rose to 188,816, more than double the weekly average this year. 'Not only could the increase be explained by a COVID-19 outbreak, it most likely does reflect the COVID-19 outbreak based on when it started and what has been going on in the world,' said Dr. Aileen Marty, an expert on infectious tropical diseases and director of the Florida International University Health Travel Medicine Program."
Footage emerged in April 2020 of a dead body in a street in Pinar del Río, and police afraid of being infected refusing to take the body.
Diario de Cuba reported on November 12, 2020 that " examples abound showing that the information disclosed distorts case statistics and hides the severity of outbreaks."
Political repression is prioritized over public health concerns. Christian Solidarity Worldwide reported on March 2, 2021 that Maria Antonieta Colunga Olivera, wife of Cuban journalist Yoel “Yoe” Suarez " was abruptly summoned by Cuban State Security on [March 1, 2021] to the Immigration Police Station in Nuevo Vedado, where she was interrogated about the work of her husband," and threatened. Yoel has been targeted "because of his work covering human rights issues, including freedom of religion or belief." They disregarded the danger to her and others in having her travel and meeting in an enclosed space in the middle of the pandemic.
Maria Antonieta Colunga Olivera
Freedom House's overall assessment in its 2021 report is spot on: "Cuba’s one-party communist state outlaws political pluralism, bans independent media, suppresses dissent, and severely restricts basic civil liberties. The government continues to dominate the economy despite recent reforms that permit some private-sector activity. The regime’s undemocratic character has not changed despite a generational transition in political leadership between 2018 and 2019 that included the introduction of a new constitution."
On March 8, 2021 at 10:30am Freedom House, the Steven J. Green School of International & Public Affairs, and the Vaclav Havel Program for Human Rights and Diplomacy will host a free webinar on "Freedom in the World 2021: Political Rights and Civil Liberties in Latin America" and registration is now open. There should be an opportunity to probe further and ask questions.
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