|
|
|
|
Publications >> Democracy Newsletter
|
|
National Endowment for Democracy News and Information Spring 2003 Newsletter
|
|
Cuba’s Democrats and Human Rights Activists Targeted in Mass Crackdown
By the time Oswaldo Payá spoke at Georgetown University last autumn about the Varela Project—a petition-campaign he founded to effect a national referendum on political and economic freedoms in Cuba—more than 30,000 Cuban citizens had signed on. The appearance and strength of such initiatives indicate to some a significant new dynamic: the growth inside Castro’s Cuba of a peaceful yet powerful movement for political freedom. Reminding the world about the importance of that movement, Castro’s government spent March and April rounding up Cuban human rights and pro-democracy activists to be prosecuted in secret “trials.” The proceedings were conducted at a breakneck speed—about 80 in a single weekend—with most sentences ranging between 15 and 25 years. Among the prosecuted are numerous grantees of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), including writers for the journal Encuentro, journalists from CubaNet, and some 40 Varela Project activists, such as Hector Palacios, the project’s leading organizer. The Cuban government cited as proof of the defendants’ treachery their possession of such innocuous items as a typewriter, articles from the foreign press, laptops, fax machines, and human rights materials. In a recent presentation at NED, Cristina Rivero, the daughter of Cuban poet and journalist Raúl Rivero said that even chairs from her father’s home in which American diplomats had sat were used as criminal evidence. The official line of the Cuban government is that the dissidents, some of Cuba’s most vocal critics, were being bankrolled by the United States and aiding subversion by a foreign power. Cases against many of them were built with the help of government spies who had infiltrated opposition groups by feigning solidarity. Some of the spies carried on their ruse with diabolical stamina, passionately criticizing Castro for more than a decade. The crackdown has been deemed a double-edged sword intended to stir both fear and internal distrust among members of the opposition. But dissidents who escaped the crackdown, such as Payá, have vowed in its wake to continue their efforts to bring greater freedoms to Cuba. Meanwhile, concerned that the international community is distracted by the war in Iraq and its aftermath, many international organizations have stepped up efforts to pressure Cuba for the release of these individuals or at least for fair trials. The United States, Germany, Spain, Canada, human rights groups such as Amnesty International, and labor organizations such as the AFL-CIO have issued statements condemning this latest wave of repression. “The activists arrested in this crackdown seek only to exercise fundamental political and civil liberties, such as the right to self-expression,” wrote former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in a letter issued to numerous recipients—including all members of the U.S. Congress—on behalf of the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI), which she chairs. “Such liberties are universally recognized in international human rights conventions and must be respected by any government.” At NED, the World Movement for Democracy issued alerts on April 4 regarding several of its members who were jailed in the crackdown: Oscar Elilas Biscet, a well known physician who was arrested during a December protest and later sentenced to 25 years; Librado Linares García of the Movimiento Cubano Reflexión, who received a 20-year sentence; and Marta Beatriz Roque, an economist and political activist who also received a 20-year sentence after originally being threatened with life imprisonment. The World Movement for Democracy is calling for letters to be written to Castro and/or to Cuban embassies around the world, voicing concern for the detainees, as well as for submission of these letters to newspapers for publication. The International Movement of Parliamentarians for Democracy, an affiliate of the World Movement, also issued a statement condemning the crackdown. The statement calls on the Cuban government to abide by its obligation under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to immediately release all political prisoners in Cuba. Contact information and further details about suggested actions can be found on the World Movement for Democracy’s Web site at www.wmd.org. “This is a rare opportunity for collective action that should be nurtured,” testified Christopher Sabatini, NED’s Senior Program Officer for Latin America and the Caribbean, in a recent hearing before the House Committee on International Relations. “The Castro government and those within his regime who may be waiting for change need to realize that, despite Iraq, the world is watching and it stands united in its solidarity with the democratic movement and desire for peaceful democratic change in Cuba.” [Top]
|
|
NED Honors Payne, Bolaños with Democracy Service Medal
On March 12, NED hosted a two-part tribute to Congressman Donald M. Payne (D-NJ), who recently completed nine years of service on the NED Board of Directors and has long championed human rights and democracy on the African continent and worldwide through his congressional service.
Following the discussion, the Democracy Service Medal was presented to Congressman Payne at a Capitol Hill reception. Thomas J. Donahue, NED’s vice-chairman, paid tribute to Payne, noting, “From the successful struggle to achieve democracy in South Africa, to the protracted efforts to remove the dictators from Nigeria, to the ongoing attempts to heal the ravages of war in Congo, Liberia, and Sudan, Don has played a significant role both on the Hill and at NED.” The reception also featured remarks from many of Payne’s fellow members of Congress, including Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN), and Representatives Chris Cox (R-CA), Charlie Rangel (D-NY), Elijah Cummings (D-MD), Steve Rothman (D-NJ), and Gregory Meeks (D-NY). The chairman of the event’s host committee, Noah Samara, who is chairman and CEO of WorldSpace Corporation, also spoke at the event, which raised funds for the work of the Africa Democracy Forum. Other major contributors to the event included Black Entertainment Television and Discovery Communications.
NED Chairman Vin Weber presented the medal to Bolaños and said, “President Bolaños has kept his promise to the Nicaraguan people and has taken the most far-reaching steps in the history of the country to end the corruption and abuse of power that have prevented Nicaragua from fulfilling its potential as an independent and democratic country…He has displayed both personal courage and firm democratic conviction, offering a model of presidential leadership that is truly admirable.” In his acceptance remarks, Bolaños proclaimed, “There is only one right time for the president of a democratic nation to fight corruption, and that is: always!” The NED Board of Directors created its Democracy Service Medal in 1999 to recognize individuals who have demonstrated through personal commitment their dedication to the advancement of freedom, human rights, and democracy. Previous recipients are Lane Kirkland and Lech Walesa (1999), Martin Bútora and Alexandr Vondra (1999), John B. Hurford (2000), John Brademas, Fred Iklé, Richard Lugar, and Stephen Solarz (2001), Paula Dobriansky (2002), Jan Nowak (2002), and Chen Wu, Sue-jen (2002). [Top]
|
|
Chairman's Message
To those who believe that democracy and Islam are incompatible, I would like to recommend two essays in the April 2003 issue of the Journal of Democracy. One is entitled “The Sources of Enlightened Muslim Thought” by Dr. Abdou Filali-Ansary. The other, “The Silenced Majority,” is the work of Radwan Masmoudi.* Both articles are versions of papers that the two authors presented at a conference in Washington last September on “Liberal Islam,” co-sponsored by NED’s International Forum for Democratic Studies and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
Filali-Ansary notes that, while affirming the sacred character and universal validity of the views expressed by the Prophet of Islam, the enlightened tendency within Islam rejects the idea that Islam is a system of social and political regulation. This view provides an opening for both an acceptance of convergence with other religious traditions and a full respect for the co-existence of Muslims as equal citizens with non-Muslims. According to Masmoudi, two minority groups in the Muslim world, secular and religious extremists, today vie for political control. In the center we find a majority, a “silenced” one to be sure, but one composed of individuals who want to both practice their religion and live in the modern age. That majority adheres to an Islam that believes that human beings are created free and must remain free, and that it is wrong, counterproductive, and against the will of God to impose religion on people. Additionally, liberal Islam emphasizes the importance of treating every human being fairly and equally, of entrusting the affairs of the community to a process of mutual consultation and consent, of holding rulers accountable to those who elect them, and of leaving to Muslims themselves the responsibility of achieving divinely prescribed objectives using reason, knowledge, and faith. These articles demonstrate the wisdom of engaging with individuals who both work within the Islamic tradition and favor liberal democracy, an approach, I hasten to add, that is articulated in the strategic plan adopted by the NED Board last year and made even more relevant by recent events in the Middle East.
Vin Weber [Top]
|
|
NED Joins Fellow Democracy Support Foundations at Paris Meeting
NED was among thirty-six foundations to attend the sixth World Conference of Democracy-Support Foundations, held March 20–21 in Paris, France. Eighteen countries were represented at the conference, during which NED President Carl Gershman addressed one of several roundtable audiences about the role of NED and its international counterparts in promoting democracy in the Muslim world.
Other roundtables examined the potential new role of democracy-promotion foundations in a reunified Europe, perspectives on democracy in Africa, and the work of the foundations in South America. The World Conference of Democracy-Support Foundations brings together democracy-support foundations from around the globe to discuss and pursue common interests and projects, as well as to allow exchange on potential new objectives. The first conference was launched by NED in February of 1993. The full text of Carl Gershman’s remarks is available on the NED Web site. [Top]
|
|
March Marks Arrival of Five New Reagan-Fascell Fellows
Olga Gyárfásová wants to examine how political polls in the U.S. shape public policy and use her findings to explore how political polling in her home nation of Slovakia, where she is a program director at an independent public-policy think tank, could strengthen democracy. With a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Gyárfásová is doing just that. [Top]
|
|
Africa Democracy Forum Builds Momentum at Durban Meeting Group Meets Following Postponement of the Third Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy
In light of the impending war in Iraq, the Steering Committee of the World Movement for Democracy announced in March the postponement of its Third Assembly, which had been scheduled to take place April 23–27 in Durban, South Africa. Concerns over the potential for travel restrictions, threats to safety, a reduced turnout, and distraction of participants from the agenda of workshops led to the committee’s difficult decision to postpone. A new date will be announced following consultation among Steering Committee members.
“The voices of African leadership in this organization are truly impressive,” said NED President Carl Gershman, who is on the World Movement for Democracy’s Steering Committee and attended the Durban meeting. “Their level of resolve, enthusiasm, and wisdom signals real promise for the future of democracy throughout Africa. The ADF is poised to become a model network to other regions.” In addition to attending both regional and topical workshops, more than 120 participants discussed the role of African civil society organizations in regional initiatives and organizations, such as the Africa Union and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). Dr. Christopher Landsberg, director of the Centre for Policy Research in South Africa, was a keynote speaker. A number of exciting projects were identified during plenary sessions, including the possibility of the ADF acquiring observer status in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Africa Union. The ADF is also exploring ways in which it can serve as a link between the Africa Union and civil society and is considering the creation of task forces to better familiarize ADF members with the Southern African Development Community (SADC), ECOWAS and its parliament, and the policies and peer-review mechanism of NEPAD. For more information, contact Mr. Ryota Jonen, ADF coordinator, at ryota@ned.org.
|
|
| |
