LETTER FROM LAS DAMAS DE BLANCO - February, 2006

A CALL FROM THE LADIES IN WHITE (LAS DAMAS DE BLANCO) TO WOMEN, TO ALL THE CUBAN PEOPLE, AND TO INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC OPINION

Since March 20, 2005, supposedly spontaneous “Meetings” or “Acts of Repudiation” have been carried out against the Women in White (Damas de Blanco) in Havana and other cities and towns in Cuba. We know that citizens, among them Cuban women, are being instigated by the authorities so that the attack us verbally and harass us. Usually the participants do not know us personally nor do they know about our activities.

These aggressions have become ones of physical danger against peaceful women, and they have placed our health and lives in danger, as well as that of our children and other family members. It was possibly not the initial intention of the participants, both men and women, to cause the damage they have caused. Nevertheless, verbal abuse in the midst of so much tension that exists in our country due to the shortage of daily necessities and the different forms of repression can have nasty consequences, especially coming from the hands of the State Police that directs them. These lamentable actions bring the “Porras” (beatings) of the dictatorship of Gerardo Machado and the fascist hordes to mind.

We call upon all people and especially Cubans who carry out such embarrassing acts to get to know us and to think seriously about the fact that they could also be exposed to similar situations. We are all Cubans, and as such we are all brothers and sisters. We require solidarity, especially when reason and a just and peaceful cause are on our side.

WHO ARE THE LADIES IN WHITE?

We are the peaceable wives, mothers, daughter, sisters, and aunts of the 75 prisoners of conscience, incarcerated on March 18th, 19th, and 20th of 2003 only for the crime of attempting to exercise their right to free expression and desiring good things for our people and our country. WE ARE ALL VOICES. Pain and injustice unite us.

We come together without affiliation to any party, political criteria, or religious beliefs. The majority of us – workers, university and technical professionals, or housewives – never imagined ourselves in the situations that life has imposed on us. We have survived without noticing we overcome repression and fear every day. We have no other choice.

During those days of March, 2003, immediately when the ostentatious searches behind closed doors with cars and uniformed and civil police everywhere concluded, we wives began to denounce the terrible conditions of confinement and impoverishment and the permanent interrogations to which our loved ones were submitted at the General Headquarters of State Security (State Police). Later the summary trials without due process followed with sentences of up to 28 years in prison.

Our numbers grew. The majority of the wives, mothers, daughters, sisters and aunts of the 75 met in the ill-starred headquarters or at the prisons. The prisoners, residents throughout the country, were sent to prisons far away from their homes. As such, our families were also condemned and submitted to psychological tortures that cruelly affect our children and the older folks in particular. Nevertheless, being so displaced contributed to our getting to know each other and to the entire population learning about the injustices committed against the 75.

A few of us were involved in projects as journalists and independent librarians or human rights activists. EACH ONE PARTICIPATES IN ACTIVITIES OF SOME POLITICAL OR OTHER TYPE OF ORGANIZATION. SHE DOES SO ON HER OWN ACCORD, NOT AS A REPRESENTATIVE OF THE LADIES IN WHITE.

We demand justice of the competent authorities in our country, according to laws in force. We attend mass on Sundays at the Church of Santa Rita de Acacia, the Patron Saint of Impossible Causes. We walk down 5th Avenue in Miramar, Havana. We fast, and we get together for Literary Teas to exchange ideas, read and our and the prisoners’ letters and poetry, find out about any new arbitrary actions, and support one another. We ask for and we receive support and solidarity from the Cuban people and the international community.


The authorities have repressed us in many different ways. They have practically surrounded the church we attend; they place operatives of State Security in public places where we meet; they threaten us in our homes or in State Security Offices; they compel our neighbors to keep their distance; they intimidate people who offer their homes for us to stay overnight when we visit our husbands in other provinces. On March 20, 2005, Palm Sunday, when we were walking down 5th Avenue in Havana in honor of the second anniversary of the arrests, a huge number of women organized and directed by State Security flung themselves at us. Carrying pink gladiolas y blessed palm branches, we responded level-headedly; we continued walking, singing and praying. It was the first “Meeting” or “Act of Repudiation” in a renewed wave of repression. Afterwards, basically in the interior of the country, the intimidations, offenses, and aggressions against women and their families have continued.

The prisoners of conscience receive frequent visits from State Police, who demand that their wives stop their efforts. The authorities tell the prisoners that their terrible prison conditions depend on us. The prisoners know that the authorities are lying to them. In addition, these people want the men to think that they are forgotten and that they will stay in prison until the end of their sentence of until their death. The prisoners do not receive adequate medical attention. Presently, sixty of the 75 are languishing in prison. Fifteen have been released because of illness; three of them have been able to leave the country, but the twelve who are at their homes could be returned to prison at any time. Some, like Julio Valdés Guevara who urgently needs a kidney transplant, are in danger.

Other Cuban women have joined the Ladies in White as a show of SUPPORT. They are welcome and undoubtedly are very courageous because they face repression in spite of NOT BEING LADIES IN WHITE because they are not connected to the 75 prisoners of conscience. However, we also support the other political prisoners in Cuba.

On December 14, 2005, we received the Andrei Sakharov Freedom of Conscience Prize from the European Parliament. The Cuban government did not grant the five delegates to attend the award ceremony in Strasbourg, France, in spite of the efforts of Mr. Josep Borrel, president of the European Parliament, the English and Spanish governments, among others, and prominent people. The Cuban authorities prevented five peaceable women to travel, but in reality the Cuban government has demonstrated its true nature, one which violates the most basic human rights.

Upon conferring the Sakharov Prize to the Ladies in White, the European Parliament has inspired new hope in our innocent prisoners of conscience who are unshakeable in their convictions. The efforts of governments, parliaments, NGO’s, prominent personalities, and the information in the international press have saved lives and must continue to work for the immediate and unconditional freedom of all these prisoners.

SOLIDARITY AMONG WOMEN AND THE CUBAN PEOPLE CAN ACHIEVE EVEN MORE.

MAY THE HARASSMENT, REPRESSION, AND ABUSE END!
IMMEDIATE AND UNCONDITIONAL FREEDOM FOR THE 75 PRISONERS OF CONSCIENCE! THEY ARE INNOCENT!

Havana, February 6, 2006


Translation: Tanya S. Wilder / Human Rights Committee / Coalition of Cuban-American Women / tswilder@charter.net