HAVANA (Reuters) – Cuban dissidents welcomed on Thursday U.S. President Barack Obama, for exposing mistreatment of the Government of Cuba and said his remarks helped their cause.
Opponents praised the appears to be a new, tougher attitude on the part of U.S. President who has said he intends to improve relations between the two countries soured since Fidel Castro came to power in 1959 and installed a communist system.
The Cuban government, which considers the dissidents as subversives employed by the United States has not commented on Obama”s statement, released Wednesday in Washington.
Cuban state media a column published on Thursday by former President Fidel Castro praising Obama for getting approval of its controversial health reform, and it recalled that the island has had a universal health system for over 50 years.
Castro”s article appears to have been written before the publication of the declaration of Obama.
dissident Guillermo Farinas, who has 29 days on hunger strike, said by telephone from a hospital in the city of Santa Clara in central Cuba, the statement that although Obama would not have immediate effect would help to isolate the communist government of the island.
” It is very important because a dictatorial government, totalitarian as the one offered here should not be negotiated. A dictatorship is the condemnation and isolation, “he said.
Farinas, a psychologist 48, is on hunger strike in protest demanding the release of 26 political prisoners sick. It expresses its readiness to die for that cause if necessary.
Obama said the human rights situation in Cuba was “deeply disturbing,” citing the recent death of political prisoner Orlando Zapata after a long hunger strike and the “repression” Last week the dissident group Ladies in White during marches to commemorate the 2003 arrest of 75 opponents.
“These events stress that in Instead of seizing an opportunity to enter a new era, the Cuban authorities continue to meet the aspirations of the Cuban people with a closed fist, “Obama said.
U.S. President also requested the Government of the island for the immediate release of 200 political prisoners.
Ladies in White
“On behalf of the Ladies in White I thank Obama The statement criticizing the government, “said Berta Soler, the wife of dissident Angel Moya, sentenced in 2003 to 20 years in prison.
” It is very important to have solidarity and international personalities Obama in particular, raising his voice, calling for respect for human rights and freedom for political prisoners, “he added.
economist Oscar Espinosa Chepe, a former political prisoner, also thanked the President for showing “strong support” and said that Cuba rejected the opening of Obama because “totalitarianism needs the confrontation to justify repression.”
Obama softened the embargo Washington applies to Havana since 1962, removing restrictions for Cuban Americans to travel to the island and resuming the migration dialogue, and to restore direct mail.
Bush pledged more progress provided that Cuba released its political prisoners and give signs of progress in human rights.
Cuba, which holds that a victim 50 years of U.S. aggression, has complained that Obama has done very little to achieve a rapprochement.
After a brief approach when he took power, relations between the old enemies again became rough after Cuba arrested in December to an American contractor and accused him of working for “intelligence services” of his country.
The contractor, Alan Gross, remains behind bars without charges. United States has said it was in Cuba only to provide internet access to the Jewish community, although he admitted he came to the island with a tourist visa that could not accommodate that kind of work.
His job was funded U.S. programs to promote democracy in Cuba, the island”s leaders see as part of Washington”s campaign to undermine its socialist system.Gross Obama did not mention in his statements.
(Additional reporting by Nelson Acosta and Esteban Israel in Spanish Published by Rosa Tania Valdes and Silene Ramirez)
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