BY ARGIRIS MALAPANIS
LOS ANGELES - At a broadly attended meeting here, the National Network on Cuba set a six-month schedule of educational and protest activities in the United States, as well as trips to the Caribbean country, to widen opposition to Washington's unremitting economic war against the Cuban revolution.
Representatives of local coalitions and national organizations that belong to the network decided to keep up a campaign to defeat legislation pending in U.S. Congress that would tighten Washington's economic embargo on Cuba; call protests to condemn attacks by border patrol agents against a recent humanitarian aid caravan to Cuba organized by Pastors for Peace; urge member groups to build a delegation of U.S. trade unionists to the 17th congress of the Central Organization of Cuban Workers (CTC) in April; and organize a contingent of hundreds of students, young workers, and other youth from the United States to go to Cuba in July as part of a U.S.-Cuba Youth Exchange.
The National Network on Cuba (NNOC) is a coalition of local and national groups that organize activities in opposition to U.S. policy toward Cuba. Some 60 people attended the February 10-11 gathering here, representing 40 organizations from 23 cities. Three new groups were voted into membership, bringing the total number of affiliates to 75.
The newly admitted organizations are the New Mexico Committee to Normalize Relations with Cuba, the Miami-based Jewish Cultural Center, and the Milwaukee Coalition to Normalize Relations with Cuba.
José Luis Ponce and Sergio Martínez, first and third secretaries of the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C., completed speaking tours during the NNOC meeting. They capped off their California visit with a public forum on the evening of February 10 titled "Survival in the Time of the Blockade - Changes in Cuba Today" (see articles on page 9).
California tour sets example
During the NNOC meeting, many delegates pointed to the
success of these tours, which won new layers of youth and
others to oppose Washington's aggression against Cuba, as an
example to be emulated by network affiliates across the
country. The week before the visits by Ponce and Martínez,
Armando Amieva, also an official of the Cuban Interests
Section, completed a similarly productive speaking tour of
four cities in Iowa.
Ponce and Martínez urged Cuba solidarity activists to continue their efforts to defeat legislation, introduced in Congress by Sen. Jesse Helms and Rep. James Burton, that would significantly tighten Washington's embargo of Cuba. Different versions of this bill were approved by the House of Representatives on September 21 and by the Senate on October 19. A joint congressional conference committee could convene in March to come up with a compromise version.
The NNOC meeting agreed to keep up its campaign to oppose the Helms-Burton bill. In the course of this discussion, however, many participants said that it is unlikely that either the White House or Congress will take steps to loosen the U.S. economic squeeze on Cuba in the near future.
Leslie Cagan of the Cuba Information Project, and one of the NNOC national cochairs, said that recent tighter government enforcement of U.S. travel restrictions to Cuba point in the direction of a harsher stance by Washington. Cagan provided anecdotal evidence of increased harassment by immigration agents of people returning from Cuba to the United States.
Attack on aid caravan
Another such example is the attack by border police and
federal agents on a humanitarian aid caravan to Cuba. On
January 31 dozens of cops with tow trucks and other vehicles
cordoned off the U.S.-Mexico border near San Diego when 70
drivers in 30 vehicles organized by Pastors for Peace
attempted to cross into Tijuana, Mexico, carrying 325
computers destined for Cuban hospitals. The cops seized the
material aid by force, injuring two dozen caravan
participants in the process and arresting 11 of them who were
later released on bond.
Pastors for Peace had organized five previous caravans to Cuba since 1992 with humanitarian aid, including computers. This was the first time the government decided to enforce its travel restrictions, which prohibit such trips without a U.S. treasury department license, by halting participants physically and confiscating all aid.
Three days before the network gathering the government wound up its antidemocratic campaign another notch.
On February 7, the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) and Pastors for Peace were served with a subpoena to testify before a grand jury in Buffalo, New York, on February 22. The subpoena demands complete records from IFCO-Pastors for Peace with the names of participants and other information on the fourth and fifth "Friendshipment" caravans to Cuba, which took place in November 1994 and July 1995 respectively.
Tom Hansen of Pastors for Peace, an NNOC affiliate, gave a brief presentation on these developments during the first day of the Los Angeles meeting. He said that in response IFCO is organizing two other border crossings with newly donated computers for Cuba in San Diego and Vermont on February 17.
The activists gathered here decided to publicize and urge participation at these crossings. The meeting also called on Network affiliates to organize demonstrations on February 16 and 17 at U.S. federal buildings in cities across the country to demand that the government drop all charges against the 11 caravan members, rescind its subpoena to Pastors for Peace, and release the humanitarian aid destined for Cuba.
"If the government can get away with this assault without paying a very high political price, the entire Cuba solidarity movement and basic democratic rights of all will be dealt a serious blow," Andrés Gómez, executive director of the Antonio Maceo Brigade and one of the national cochairs of the NNOC, told the media at a news conference the next day. "As a Cuban I feel this is an act of barbarism against Cuba in which it is people who suffer." The Antonio Maceo Brigade is a Miami-based organization of Cubans who support the Cuban revolution.
The February 11 press conference - called by the network to protest the attacks on the caravan - was covered by Channel 34, the main Spanish-language television station here; the local affiliate of Pacifica Radio; and the Spanish- language daily La Opinión.
The participants also assessed the outcome of three regional demonstrations in October demanding an end to the U.S. economic blockade of Cuba. Some 400 people took part in the San Francisco ac tion and 300 in Chicago on October 14. In New York, 3,000 people turned out for a similar march on October 21, which coincided with the 50th anniversary commemoration of the founding of the United Nations and the New York visit of Cuban president Fidel Castro. The three demonstrations, as well as a number of other local activities, were initiated by the NNOC.
Most participants described the protests as a modest success. "There was no objective basis for big actions in the streets," said Holly Fincke of the Venceremos Brigade. "Cuba was not a main issue in the press before the October actions. Given this, the size and the youthfulness of those who turned out, as was the case in San Francisco, can be pointed to as positive."
Carol Thomas of the Boston-based July 26 Coalition said the success of the October actions should be viewed in light of numerous other activities in defense of Cuba, which took place around the world in September and October, "including solidarity conferences in India and South Africa, and marches of thousands in Italy, Britain, and other countries."
The considerable number of college students and other young people who came to the action in New York, Thomas noted, points to the need for the network to do more work in solidarity with Cuba among youth.
Thomas, along with Maceo Dixon and Tanya Teller, also from Boston, reported that a faculty-student committee based at Roxbury Community College in that city has invited two Cuban youth leaders to do a speaking tour of college campuses across the United States. Dixon said that more than 100 professors and student leaders have sent invitations to Iroel Sánchez and Maika Guerrero, two researchers at the Center for Studies of Youth in Havana, to speak at U.S. schools in April.
The NNOC agreed to encourage its affiliates to support and build this effort.
U.S.-Cuba Youth Exchange
Ten youth were among the delegates at the Los Angeles
meeting, including Ty Moore and Scott Winn, who were
representing the Seattle-Cuba Friendshipment. Moore said that
his group had just organized a fund-raiser with 70 people to
build a youth brigade to Cuba this summer, which the network
had decided to organize at its last meeting in Miami. "Over
20 young people have already signed up for this brigade," he
said. Other participants reported similar responses to this
project in their cities.
The Network decided to organize up to 500 young people to go on this trip, which is now called the "U.S.-Cuba Youth Exchange." The dates for the trip are July 24-August 5. Participants will be hosted by the Union of Young Communists (UJC) in Cuba and will take part in the July 26 celebration commemorating the 1953 attack on the Moncada barracks by fighters of the July 26 Movement.
Young people on this brigade will stay with families in Santiago de Cuba and Guantánamo. They will join Cuban volunteers doing work in agriculture in those areas, participate in a summit of U.S. and Cuban youth, and spend several final days in Havana.
The New York-based Cuba Information Project will organize the travel. The NNOC has set up a task force with more than a dozen representatives of political organizations and local coalitions that belong to the network, which is charged with organizing outreach for the youth exchange.
The NNOC also set guidelines to ensure the broadest possible participation of youth from across the United States on this trip. National organizations can have up to 30 members on the brigade and delegations from each city may not exceed 10 percent of the total number of participants.
"The U.S. government has lied to us about Cuba and about Fidel Castro," Adrianna Sánchez of the Twin Cities Network on Cuba told Channel 34 at the February 11 press conference. "We demand an end to the travel ban and the right to see Cuba for ourselves." Sánchez and Lorena Gaibor of the New Jersey Network on Cuba told the press the network plans to reach out to the NAACP, South Christian Leadership Conference, National Organization for Women, and numerous student and other groups not affiliated to the NNOC in order to build the U.S.-Cuba Youth Exchange.
Several youth activists noted that they became involved with the network last year as a result of the work of local Cuba coalitions building a U.S. delegation of more than 200 to the Cuba Lives International Youth Festival, which took place in Havana in August. Festival participants had agreed on the idea of this youth exchange.
The NNOC task force ordered a pamphlet produced by Avríl, the editorial house affiliated with the UJC, with speeches by Fidel Castro and other Cuban leaders at the Cuba Lives festival. The booklet will be used as a tool to build the upcoming youth exchange.
CTC congress
The NNOC meeting also decided to urge affiliated groups to
build a delegation of trade unionists, including union
officials and rank-and-file workers, to go to Cuba to attend
the April 25-30 congress of the Central Organization of Cuban
Workers.
"The 17th Congress of the CTC will probably be one of the most important political meetings in Cuba this year," said Ignacio Meneses in his report to the meeting. Meneses is the coordinator of the Detroit-based U.S.-Cuba Labor Exchange, which is organizing the U.S. delegation to the CTC congress.
A few participants said that this trip offers the opportunity to reach out to factory workers and unionists involved in recent battles in the labor movement - like the Detroit news strikers, United Auto Workers members at Caterpillar fighting for a contract, and the building maintenance workers in New York City who won a contract after a one-month strike in January.
Representatives of several member groups reported on plans for additional trips and material aid campaigns to Cuba. The Venceremos Brigade, for example, is organizing its 27th contingent to the Caribbean island in April.
Meneses reported that CTC general secretary Pedro Ross and other Cuban trade union leaders will address a Cuba solidarity conference in Montreal March 15-16. The network agreed to help organize delegations from several U.S. cities to this meeting as well.
The meeting also decided to support efforts by the Atlanta Network on Cuba to build a welcoming event in Atlanta this summer, when the Cuban athletes arrive to participate in the Olympic games in that city. The group will also organize social and other activities during the Olympics for the Cuban athletes who attend.
An election for national coordinators of the network was held. Leslie Cagan of the Cuba Information Project, Andrés Gómez of the Antonio Maceo Brigade, Marilyn McKenna of the Chicago Cuba Coalition, and Ignacio Meneses of the U.S-Cuba Labor Exchange were elected unanimously. Holly Fincke, a former coordinator, declined nomination.
The NNOC set its next meeting for September 28-29 in Pittsburgh.