Volume 36, Number 10 · June 15, 1989
Cuba: The Human Rights Show
By Aryeh Neier
On March 29, four days before Mikhail Gorbachev's visit to Havana, Cuban police arrested eight members of the Cuban Human Rights party, which has perhaps a few dozen members. They were tried the next day, without having legal counsel, on charges of clandestinely printing the party's newsletter Franqueza. The evidence produced against them consisted of the fourth issue of Franqueza, which discussed human rights abuses by the regime. Five men were fined varying sums equivalent to an average Cuban worker's salary for one to two months, and all were released from custody. The group was undeterred and announced plans to hold a demonstration on April 4 in front of the Soviet embassy—where Gorbachev would be staying—to appeal for glasnost and perestroika in Cuba. This was thwarted by the arrest of some twenty-one human activists on the night before the demonstration was to be held.
Feature, 4130 words
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