Human rights in Cuba

This year at the United Nations Human Rights Commission, it was Britain's turn to sponsor the annual resolution condemning Cuba for its alleged human rights abuses. It was passed by the narrow majority of two, 22 to 20. This was two less than last year's majority. BARNABY MITCHELL reports.

Behind this result lies the hand of US imperialism, determined to destroy Cuban socialism and its international example. Yet each year, it becomes more difficult for the US to muster the required majority. Last year, the Czech Republic had been only too keen to demonstrate its neo-colonial status by authoring the resolution. This time things went awry when the Czech government slipped in a phrase attacking the US blockade. Britain had to adopt a much higher profile in ensuring that things were brought back in line. Thus when Kenya pledged to vote in favour of Cuba, in stepped Clare Short's International Development Department which dangled a $37 million offer of aid to support treatment of 1.6 million Kenyans who suffer from HIV/AIDS. The Kenyans changed their minds and abstained.

The human rights issue has always been used by the likes of the US and Britain to pressurise or attack countries in the developing world. It is a fact that the Geneva Commission has never passed a resolution against a developed (ie imperialist) country. Cuba is condemned for alleged infringements of liberal democratic freedoms; ignored are the basic rights it provides to its people that are denied to billions throughout the world, including tens of millions in the US and Britain: the right to adequate food, decent healthcare and a full education.

Cuba itself sits as a full member of the UNHRC, and has used its position as part of its counter-offensive against imperialism. Recently a resolution it proposed to consider access to adequate food to be a human right was approved, with the US the only dissenter. The US also vetoed another resolution co-sponsored by Cuba supporting the right to essential medicines; other countries with large pharmaceutical industries supported the US. A similar line-up of imperialist countries opposed a further resolution for the establishment of a more just economic order, criticising the detrimental impact of IMF structural adjustment packages and the crippling nature of foreign debt.

Cuba has responded to the UNHRC condemnation in the way it deals with all major political issues, by holding mass meetings and debates throughout the country to discuss the issue. Special televised 'Roundtable' discussions have been held. Last year Cuba responded by exposing human rights abuses in the Czech Republic and other Latin American countries which had supported the US resolution. This year Cuba has revealed the dirty tricks played by the US and Britain to blackmail governments into supporting the resolution. In a neat twist, the US has recently been voted off the UNHRC which has caused it much embarrassment. This was possible because this vote, unlike others, involves a secret ballot. Hence many countries, particularly in Africa, which the US has continually threatened with economic and political pressure to secure their support for US imperialism's interests, were able to get their own back. The US is now refusing to pay its dues to the UN as a consequence.

Labour's 'ethical' foreign policy of course requires it to be in the forefront of the anti-Cuban alliance. FRFI readers should need no reminders about Labour's record on human rights: its bombing campaigns against Iraq and Yugoslavia in defiance of international law, or its draconian Terrorism Act which Amnesty International says would 'either directly contravene international human rights treaties... or may result in human rights violations.' Cuba's exposure of Britain's role this year deserves our support; its use of every available forum to fight back against imperialism shows its renewed confidence after overcoming the economic problems of the past few years.

From Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! 161 June/July 2001

On the trail of Bacardi
Interview with Hernando Calvo Ospina

Hernando Calvo Ospina is the author of Ron Bacardi: la guerra occulta (Bacardi's Secret War), reviewed in the last issue of FRFI. FRFI interviewed him on a recent visit to London.

FRFI: In your book you mention that it is its secretiveness that makes Bacardi attractive to the CIA.

Calvo Ospina: Bacardi's relationship with the CIA goes back a long way - it started with the preparations for the Bay of Pigs invasion (1961). You might say that Bacardi is not directly engaged in politics, but pays for others to advance its political interests, and although Bacardi is not a US company it has been extremely useful to the US.

Have you got any comments about Otto Reich's appointment as head of Latin American policy for the Bush administration?

It is frightening. But it is Bush's way of paying back the people of Florida - he won the election thanks to them. Bush's brother Jeb (Governor of Florida) has always been a right hand of the Cuban-American Mafia. Reich is a personal friend of Jeb's, and he has also been a CANF (Cuban-American National Foundation) treasurer. His appointment is a reward for the extreme right and the Cuban-American Mafia. Reich is a danger not only to Cuba, but also to the people of Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador.

In Spain a similar thing happened, the 'Socialist Party' sold part of the telephone company to the Mas Canosa family who after a while said to the government 'sorry, we cannot manage this any longer' and gave it back to the government. But all they handed back were some papers, because they had sold off the computers, equipment and buildings beforehand. They gave back nothing! And they left 2,000 Spanish workers unemployed.

Bacardi has become part of this globalisation madness with its attempt to pirate the name and trade mark of Havana Club from Cuba and the multinational which is marketing Cuban Havana Club (Pernod-Ricard). So we have a situation where the European Union is expected to capitulate to the US which is defending the interests of a private company which isn't even US-owned!

What do you think of the call to boycott Bacardi?

I would like to say that for me it is a political and humanitarian crime that Bacardi is trying to starve the Cuban nation into submission. Now I am not going to say don't drink Bacardi, drink Havana Club. If people decide to drink Bacardi - fine, although it is the worst rum I have had! It's a matter of conscience. It won't be easy to organise a boycott, as Bacardi is one of the 10 most powerful companies in the world. But if we manage to get people to say: I don't see a bat but a Dracula figure, it will be a step forward.

It is extremely important to have campaigns that get to young people. The new Bacardi drink is aimed at young people with its 'innocent' 5.4% alcohol. But bit by bit young people will drink more and more. It is more alcoholic than a beer and it is the first step into increased alcohol consumption. As adults you move on to their rum which is 40%, and that is definitely bad for your health. The work needs to raise the consciousness of youth about the politics that plays with the health of the people and which also manipulates information and laws, and which tramples over other nations. So if the campaign is able to persuade people that Bacardi is doing wrong, that it has a dark and secret history, it will be important.

From Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! 161 June/July 2001

World Bank praises Cuba's social welfare

Praise for Cuba came from an unlikely source in April, when World Bank President James Wolfensohn announced that the Cuban government was doing 'a great job' in providing for the social welfare of its people.

Cuba's achievements are indeed spectacular. For instance:

• By 1999, infant mortality in Cuba had dropped to 7 per 1,000 live births (with officials who have visited the island in the last year accepting the figure is now closer to 6), from 11 per 1,000 in 1990. The 1999 figure for Argentina is 18, for Chile 10 and for Costa Rica 12; in Latin America and the Caribbean as a whole, it is 30 per 1,000 live births.
• The mortality rate for children under five fell in Cuba from 13 to eight per 1,000 over the last decade. In Chile, the country closest to Cuba's achievement, the figure is twice that and the average for the region was 38 per 1,000 in 1999.
• Net primary enrolment for Cuban girls and boys reached 100% in 1997 (up from 92% in 1990) as high as most developed nations and higher than the US rate. The figure for Latin America as a whole was 80-90%. There were 12 primary school pupils for every Cuban teacher in 1997 - the Latin American average was twice as high.
• The Cuban youth illiteracy rate is zero, unmatched by any other Latin American country, where the average is 7%.

Besides North Korea, Cuba is the only developing country which, since 1960, has never received the slightest assistance, either in advice or in aid, from the Bank. It is not even a member. Rather, through its socialist, centrally planned economy and its commitment to the needs of the people - an anathema to everything the World Bank stands for - it has been able to prioritise social development, with public spending on education amounting to 6.7% of GNP, twice the proportion of other Latin American countries. Spending on health care throughout the economic hardship of the 1990s was 9.1% of GDP. Yet, while praising Cuba's social achievements, the World Bank laments that the system 'does not give people opportunities for prosperity' [my italics]: in other words, the kind of rank inequality so beloved of the World Bank, where a tiny minority are enriched at the expense of the majority.

Cat Wiener

From Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! 161 June/July 2001