On 29 and 30 April, brigadistas from Rock around the Blockade and the RCG attended the International Solidarity Conference to Free the Cuban Five in Havana. The event was organised by the Union of Young Communists and attended by over 500 delegates from more than 70 countries.
Gerardo Hernandez, Rene Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez and Ramon Labanino have been held in US prisons since 1998. Between them they have been sentenced to four life sentences and 75 years imprisonment on trumped-up espionage and conspiracy charges. The five men were indeed collecting intelligence, but not about the US government or its activities; instead they were infiltrating and investigating counter-revolutionary groups in Miami that were plotting terrorist activity against Cuba.
The political level of the conference was inspirational. Major contributions included a detailed history of the concerted terrorist campaign waged by the CIA and others against Cuba ever since the Revolution, a rousing speech from veteran communist Armando Hart about the need for a revolutionary dialogue between generations and a determined message that the struggle will go forward until the Five are free from Roberto Gonzalez, brother of Rene.
In addition to the Cuban comrades, in every session there were international speakers, representing the solidarity movement in their countries. Understandable prominence was given to the representatives from the belly of the beast – the US, where it was made clear the campaign to free the five must be concentrated. Other speakers were from Mexico, Venezuela, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, the Ukraine and elsewhere. The RCG was proud to be invited onto the platform as a representative of solidarity in Britain with the Cuban Five. Our contribution affirmed the responsibility of progressive people in imperialist nations to build solidarity with Cuban socialism and not to restrict the campaign to free the Cuban Five to the legal battle in the US courts.
Plenty of time was allocated to contributions from the floor. A comrade from Western Sahara spoke about how the education he was being given free in Cuba represented true internationalism, while a representative from Barbados spoke movingly about the suffering caused in his own country by the 1976 downing of the Cuban passenger plane by Posada Carriles and his terrorist cronies.
The hypocrisy of the US keeping the Five in prison while releasing Posada was a recurrent theme and was stressed in the closing session by Ricardo Alarcon, president of the Cuban National Assembly, who also reaffirmed the need for a campaign to increase international pressure in the build-up to the next court hearing in Atlanta on 20 August.
Roberto Gonzalez told FRFI: ‘Politics establish the limits of the judicial process…politics has entered the courtroom and is part of a governing system which puts limits on the legal process. The arrest of the five was based on politics; it is ideology which limits the fight for legal justice and that’s what allows five men to be in prison for saving lives. That’s why international solidarity is important.’
Paul Mallon
RCG speech at the conference: www.ratb.org.uk/brigade07/rcgspeech5conference0407.mp3
Interview with Roberto Gonzalez www.rcgfrfi.plus.com/downloads/cuba5interview.mp3
FRFI 197 June / July 2007
