CUBA CARAVAN AND
UPDATE ON THE
‘FREE THE FIVE’ CAMPAIGN
Comox Valley Friends of Cuba is hosting two participants in this year’s Caravan To Cuba on June 28 at The Avalanche meeting room, 275 8th Street, Courtenay (behind Go Mango restaurant).
Alicia Jrapko is the main speaker for the event. Originally from Argentina, she was forced to leave in 1976 for the San Francisco Bay area. She first traveled to Cuba in 1994 with IFCO/Pastors For Peace and has been active in the San Francisco Bay Area Friendshipment Committee, a nonprofit organization which supports IFCO/Pastors for Peace projects in Cuba, Chiapas, Mexico and Central America.
She is also involved with the National Committee to Free the Five Cubans imprisoned in the United States. The Cuban Five, Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González, and René González, have been incarcerated in the US for almost 13 years. Their crime: infiltrating terrorist groups in Miami and handing over the information that they gathered to the Cuban government and to the US government in order that it could take action to prevent the attacks that were being planned in the United States against Cuba.
In the words of one of their lawyers, Leonard Weinglass: “The Five should have been returned to Cuba shortly after their arrest, as is the custom when foreigners are arrested in the United States on missions for their home countries and their activities here caused no harm. There are numerous examples, most recently the Russian agents who were sent home this year after being held in custody for less than thirty days. In this particular case, where the Five not only did no harm, but were in the US to thwart terrorist activities directed against Cuba, they clearly should have been returned.”
Weinglass, who died in March 24 of this year, was a tireless advocate for the Cuban Five. He made it very clear that international support (which includes hundreds of organizations and ten Nobel prize winners, the bar associations of many countries, the entire Mexican Senate, and two former presidents of the European Union) is extremely important to put pressure on the Obama administration to Free the Five. He said “history has shown in a number of cases, like those of the Puerto Rican patriots, that freedom can be attained for political prisoners in the US through the sustained efforts of those who believe in justice.”
Goods for the Caravan and cash donations will be accepted at the meeting. FMI 250-338-4067.
