Thursday, July 26, 2012

Oswaldo Paya: A Life

Commentary at Oswaldo Paya's Funeral

El hermano del fallecido Payá asegura que sufrió un accidente parecido hace un mes

«Recibía constantes amenazas de muerte. Era seguido las 24 horas del día», asegura. La disidencia cubana exige que se investigue el suceso y sospecha que se trata de un «atentado» del régimen
 
ABC.es Día 24/07/2012 - 03.25h
 
El disidente cubano Oswaldo Payá había sufrido en junio pasado un accidente de tráfico en La Habana similar al que este domingo le causó la muerte, por lo que los dos siniestros podrían estar relacionados con las amenazas que «habitualmente» recibía el conocido líder opositor, ha denunciado su hermano, Carlos Payá. Payá ha explicado que el primer accidente ocurrió el 2 de junio en La Habana cuando la furgoneta en la que viajaba su hermano volcó después de que un coche le diera un fuerte golpe en la parte trasera. Oswaldo salió ileso y sólo sufrió algunas contusiones que no eran de gravedad. El promotor del Proyecto Varela «no quiso informar de nada de lo ocurrido por prudencia», pero su hermano recuerda que Oswaldo «recibía constantes amenazas de muerte, además era acosado, perseguido y hasta vigilado con cámaras frente a su casa, estaba como en una prisión en vida». «Oswaldo era seguido y vigilado las 24 horas del día», asegura Carlos.
Carlos Payá, representante en España del Movimiento Cristiano de Liberación que fundó su hermano, ha dejado claro que no maneja «los elementos suficientes» para afirmar categóricamente que la muerte de Oswaldo fue un asesinato, como denuncian algunos disidentes, pero señala que lo ocurrido «nos hace pensar que existía el caldo de cultivo para que todo esto sucediera».
Oswaldo falleció el domingo en un accidente de tráfico en la provincia cubana de Granma (sureste), en el que otro opositor ha muerto y dos extranjeros -un sueco y un español, miembro de Nuevas Generaciones del PP en Madrid- han resultado heridos.

«Fue un atentado»

La disidencia dentro y fuera de la isla, así como varios gobiernos extranjeros, han pedido al Gobierno de Raúl Castro esclarecer las causas de este hecho. «Todo esto tiene que ser investigado, debemos saber lo que realmente sucedió», defiende Payá, que añadió que «esto sucede en una carretera y tiene que haber una investigación para saber lo que sucedió».
«Estoy casi convencido de que fue un atentado por parte del Gobierno cubano, porque ellos habían informado por teléfono a la hija de Payá, Rosa María, de que estaban siendo asediados por un vehículo que intentaba sacarlos de la carretera», denunció también el presidente del Movimiento Democracia, Ramón Saúl Sánchez.
La viuda del opositor, Ofelia Acevedo, ha dicho que el Movimiento Cristiano Liberación, que lideraba su marido, «continuará la lucha pacífica» en la isla en favor de los derechos de los cubanos. «A ese ideal mi esposo dedicó su vida hasta entregarla», dijo Acevedo.

Reacciones en España

En España, el vicesecretario de Organización y Electoral del PP, Carlos Floriano, ha expresado el pesar de su partido por el fallecimiento de Payá, a quien ha definido como «un luchador demócrata y pacífico por la libertad y los derechos humanos». El diputado de UPyD Toni Cantó ha subrayado también lo «extraño» del accidente, aunque se ha mostrado «prudente» a la espera de tener más detalles. El PSOE ha lamentado la muerte de Payá y ha dicho que espera «conocer pronto» las circunstancias en las que se produjo el siniestro. El líder de IU, Cayo Lara, ha lamentado esta tarde la muerte del disidente, horas después de haberse referido a él como «un fallecido más de los muchos que se matan en las carreteras» y de haber dicho «lamentar todas las muertes que se producen en accidentes de tráfico». «Para nosotros no merece más comentario», había dicho Lara en el Congreso.

Cuba mantiene retenido al español que conducía el coche en el que viajaba Payá

Exteriores aclara que el miembro de las Nuevas Generaciones del PP Ángel Carromero no tiene permiso para abandonar la localidad de Bayamo porque la investigación sobre el accidente sigue en marcha

Cuba mantiene retenido al español que conducía el coche en el que viajaba Payá
Estado en el que quedó el coché del disidente cubano, Oswaldo Payá, tras el accidente
El militante de Nuevas Generaciones del PP herido en el accidente de tráfico en el que murió el disidente cubano Oswaldo Payá ha pasado la noche «bajo custodia» de las autoridades policiales cubanas en la localidad de Bayamo (en el sureste del país), según ha indicado una portavoz del Ministerio español de Exteriores citada por Ep. Las autoridades cubanas «no han presentado cargos contra él», añadió la portavoz, en línea con la información aportada por el portavoz parlamentario del PP, Alfonso Alonso.
Carromero, ha precisado la portavoz, no ha pasado la noche en una «celda común compartida» sino que las autoridades policiales cubanas le han habilitado una «dependencia aparte» para él solo, en la que permanecía a primera hora de esta mañana. El cónsul adjunto de España en La Habana, Álvaro Kirpatrick, que llegó ayer a Bayamo, permanecerá en esta localidad «todo el tiempo que sea necesario» para seguir asistiendo al vicesecretario general de Nuevas Generaciones en Madrid.
Carromero permanece retenido en Bayamo porque las autoridades cubanas aún no han concluido las «diligencias propias» que se abren tras un accidente de tráfico como el que sufrió el joven español el domingo, cuando conducía un vehículo de alquiler donde viajaban el destacado opositor Oswaldo Payá y su colega Harold Cepera, ambos fallecidos en el siniestro. El cuarto ocupante del vehículo, el presidente de la Liga de la Juventud Demócrata Cristiana de Suecia (KDU), Aron Modig, herido leve en el accidente, fue autorizado ayer a regresar a La Habana, en compañía de diplomáticos de su país de origen.
Como Carromero era quien conducía el coche, es posible que las autoridades cubanas todavía consideren necesaria su presencia en Bayamo para seguir interrogándole acerca de las circunstancias en que se produjo el accidente o pedirle, por ejemplo, que visite con ellos la zona del siniestro. El vicesecretario general de Nuevas Generaciones en Madrid prestó declaración este lunes durante varias horas en dependencias policiales tras ser dado de alta en el hospital Clínico Quirúrgico Docente Carlos Manuel de Céspedes en Bayamo, donde le atendieron por una herida en la frente.

Como turista

El cónsul de España en La Habana esperó en una habitación contigua a lo largo de toda la declaración y permanecerá acompañando a Carromero hasta que la situación se aclare y se autorice al español a regresar a La Habana, desde donde podrá tomar un avión de vuelta a España.
Carromero viajó a Cuba en compañía de Modig, con quien ingresó en el país como turista, sin avisar de su intención de aprovechar su estancia en la isla para entablar contactos con la disidencia. Según la versión oficial difundida por el diario «Granma», el accidente se produjo cuando Carromero, que conducía un choque de alquiler, «perdió el control» del vehículo e «impactó contra un árbol». La hija de Oswaldo, María Payá, ha denunciado que según los primeros testimonios de los dos heridos extranjeros un segundo vehículo intentó sacarlos de la carretera, embistiéndolos varias veces. El hermano del líder del Movimiento Cristiano de Liberación, Carlos Payá, residente en España, informó de que su hermano sufrió un accidente similar en junio, cuando una furgoneta le dio un golpe por detrás cuando conducía su coche, que volcó. En esa ocasión, Payá no resultó herido de gravedad y no dio importancia al incidente, a pesar de que solía recibir amenazas de muerte.

El coche en el que viajaba Payá sufrió «un impacto brutal», según varios disidentes

Los opositores no encuentran pruebas de que hubiera otro vehículo implicado en el accidente. Los vecinos niegan haber visto a otro conductor en la carretera en el momento del choque
ABC.es Día 25/07/2012 - 16.31h
El coche en el que viajaba Payá sufrió «un impacto brutal», según varios disidentes
abc

Dos colaboradores de la Comisión Cubana de Derechos Humanos y Reconciliación Nacional (CCDHRN) que han visitado el lugar del accidente donde el lunes los disidentes cubanos Oswaldo Payá y Harold Cepero fallecieron han asegurado que el vehículo sufrió «un impacto brutal» y han descartado que hubiese otro coche implicado en el siniestro, según ha informado el portavoz de la CCDHRN, Elizardo Sánchez. Indicó que los dos colaboradores de la Comisión Cubana de Derechos Humanos y Reconciliación Nacional se han trasladado a la provincia de Granma (sureste) para comprobar las condiciones de la zona. Ambos activistas confirmaron que el vehículo sufrió «un impacto brutal» y no encontraron ninguna prueba de la implicación de otro coche en el accidente.
Al ser preguntados por los activistas, los vecinos de la zona aseguraron que no había otro vehículo en la carretera cuando se produjo el choque. En el accidente, resultaron heridos el miembro de las Nuevas Generaciones (NNGG) del Partido Popular (PP) en Madrid, Ángel Carromero, y al presidente de la Liga de la Juventud Demócrata Cristiana de Suecia (KDU), Jens Aron Modig. Carromero se encuentra por segundo día en unas dependencias policiales en Bayamo —la localidad cerca de la cual se produjo el accidente—, donde está siendo interrogado por las autoridades cubanas sobre las circunstancias del accidente.

Cuba impide salir de la isla al superviviente sueco del accidente de Payá

Igual que el español Carromero, Modig tendrá que continuar en La Habana
a la espera de que las autoridades autoricen su salida del país
ABC.es
 27/07/2012 - 02.50h
El joven político sueco Jens Aron Modig, segundo superviviente en el accidente de tráfico en el que murió el destacado disidente Oswaldo Payá, permanece en La Habana a la espera de que las autoridades cubanas autoricen su salida de la isla, según ha informado una portavoz del Ministerio sueco de Asuntos Exteriores. Aron Modig, que resultó herido leve en el accidente, fue dado de alta el lunes y, tras prestar una primera declaración ante la Policía, abandonó Bayamo (al sureste de la isla) hacia La Habana, acompañado por la embajadora sueca en Cuba. Su plan inicial era regresar cuanto antes a Estocolmo, pero las autoridades cubanas han requerido que permanezca en La Habana para hacerle nuevas preguntas en calidad de «testigo» del accidente, ha explicado la misma portavoz. El departamento sueco de Exteriores no ha podido precisar la ubicación exacta del sueco en La Habana, pero sigue confiando en que el presidente de la Liga de la Juventud Demócrata Cristiana de Suecia (KDU) pueda regresar a su país cuanto antes. Modig viajó a Cuba a mediados de este mes junto con el vicesecretario general de Nuevas Generaciones del PP en Madrid, Angel Carromerro. Aunque entraron en la isla como turistas, aprovecharon para mantener contactos con la oposición cubana, entre ellos el destacado disidente Oswaldo Payá. El domingo, Carromero viajaba por carretera cerca de la localidad de Bayamo (sureste de la isla) junto a Modig, Payá y el opositor Harold Cepera cuando el coche que conducía el español se salió de la carretera y chocó contra un árbol, según la versión oficial. Junto a Payá falleció el también Cepera. La familia de Payá informó de que uno de los supervivientes había denunciado que un segundo coche embistió varias veces, intentando sacarlos de la carretera. Tanto el PP como el Gobierno español han evitado pronunciarse sobre esta hipótesis. Carromero permanece retenido en dependencias policiales en Bayamo y el Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores y de Cooperación no prevé una resolución de su situación en «muy corto plazo», entre otras cosas porque los festejos en torno al Día de la Rebelión Nacional, que se celebran hoy, están afectando al ritmo de las diligencias.

Dozens reported arrested on way to Cuban dissident's funeral

By Patrick Oppmann, CNN updated 7:16 AM EDT, Wed July 25, 2012

Ofelia Acevedo (left), widow of Oswaldo Paya, and their daughter, Rosa Maria, attend his funeral on Tuesday in Havana.

Ofelia Acevedo (left), widow of Oswaldo Paya, and their daughter, Rosa Maria,
attend his funeral on Tuesday in Havana.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas died in Sunday car crash Dozens of anti-government activists arrested on their way to Payá's funeral Cuban police said they are investigating the circumstances of Paya's death Havana, Cuba (CNN) -- Friends, family members and fellow dissidents on Tuesday buried Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, a prominent critic of Cuba's socialist government. Dissident organizations reported that dozens of anti-government activists were arrested as they made their way to Paya's funeral. Video showed police pushing several dissidents into buses. The Cuban government Tuesday did not immediately respond to CNN's inquiries regarding the arrests. Payá, 60, and another dissident Harold Cepero Escalante died Sunday after the car they were traveling in crashed near La Gavina, Cuba. Two other men in the car, Spanish politician Angel Carromero and Swedish politician Aron Modig, survived and were released from the hospital on Monday. Carromero was behind the wheel when the rental car crashed said Francisco de Borja Morate Martín, a counselor in the Spanish Embassy in Havana. "He is very shaken psychologically," he said. The diplomat said that on Tuesday Carromero was, for a second day, speaking to Cuban police and was being assisted by Spain's consul to Cuba. Carromero's testimony could be key to determining how Payá, one of Cuba's best known dissidents, died. On Sunday, family members told CNN that the car he was had been run off the road by another, apparently on purpose. Details of deadly crash disputed But a statement released by the Cuban government on Sunday said witnesses to the crash reported the car had lost control on its own and crashed into a tree. Oswaldo Payá was a long standing thorn in the side of Cuba's government, which considers dissidents to be paid mercenaries who have betrayed their own country. In 2003, Payá received the European Parliament's Sakharov prize for freedom of expression. The award is named for Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov and is awarded to those who work to promote human rights and democracy. The Varela Project, a signature drive led by Payá, delivered thousands of signed petitions asking for changes to Cuba's political system. The initiative was largely ignored by Cuba's leaders, but former President Jimmy Carter highlighted Payá's work during his trip to Cuba, the first made by a former U.S. president to Cuba since the 1959 revolution. Amid the questions that swirl around Payá's death, some of his fellow dissidents called for an end to the conspiracy theories and for a transparent investigation into how he died. "He tried to carry out reform in a nonviolent way," said fellow dissident Elizardo Sanchez. "It turns out that he died in a violent way; an absurd and strange accident." According to a government statement, Cuban police are investigating the circumstances of Paya's death.

Cuba Dissidents Mourn Oswaldo Paya, One of Their Own, Killed in Car Crash

Havana, Cuba – They streamed into Havana to mourn one of their own -- Oswaldo Paya, one of Cuba's leading dissidents, who was killed over the weekend in a car crash. And the dissidents promised to continue the fight for human rights in their homeland. Several hundred relatives, friends and fellow dissidents converged on a chapel in the Cerro neighborhood Havana for Paya's wake after his body arrived from the eastern province of Granma. As the coffin carrying his remains entered, many applauded. "He was a person sincerely committed to achieving the best for the Cuban people," said Miriam Leyva, one of the founding members of the activist group Ladies in White. Meanwhile, questions persisted about the circumstances surrounding the crash, with presumptive GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney and other politicians -- including members of the Cuban-American congressional bloc -- alluding to unconfirmed reports suggesting that another car may have been involved. Cuban exile groups in the United States demanded a thorough investigation. Paya's relatives have said they believe another car may have tried to run the one carrying Paya off the road. Some dissidents have spread those theories on Twitter and blogs, while others said there was no reason to suspect foul play. "We rule out any conspiracy theory," said Elizardo Sanchez, a de facto spokesperson for Cuba's small opposition. Earlier at Paya's home, a close associate gave thanks for what he called an outpouring of support. "I can promise you and assure you we will continue our struggle, our demands for the civil rights of all Cubans," Ernesto Martini told the mourners. Paya, 60, gained international fame as the lead organizer of the Varela Project, a signature-gathering drive asking authorities for a referendum on guaranteeing rights such as freedom of speech and assembly. The initiative launched a decade ago was seen as the biggest nonviolent campaign to change the system Fidel Castro established after the 1959 Cuban revolution. Paya died Sunday afternoon along with another dissident, Harold Cepero Escalante, in the crash in La Gavina, 500 miles (800 kilometers) east of the capital. Authorities said the driver of the rental car carrying Paya and Cepero lost control and struck a tree. Fellow passengers Jens Aron Modig, a Swedish citizen, and Angel Carromero, a Spaniard, were hospitalized with minor injuries and later released. It was not immediately clear who was behind the wheel. U.S. President Barack Obama's administration lamented Paya's passing. Paya was "a tireless champion for greater civic and human rights in Cuba ... (who) gave decades of his life to the nonviolent struggle for freedom and democratic reform in Cuba," the White House said in a statement. Romney said "the cause of freedom in Cuba has lost one of its strongest voices and respected leaders," and called Paya's death "profoundly heartbreaking and infuriating." Cuban state media reported the deaths without mentioning that Paya and Cepero were government opponents. Official media rarely refer to dissidents except to excoriate them as "counterrevolutionaries" financed by Washington. Spanish Embassy spokesman Francisco de Borja said Carromero has been giving statements to investigators and it was unclear when he would return to Spain. Kalle Back, secretary-general of the Swedish Christian Democratic Youth, said Modig was in Cuba together with Carromero, who's deputy chairman of the Spanish ruling conservative Popular Party's youth wing. The Popular Party said Carromero was in Cuba for vacation and could not say how he came to be traveling in the vehicle with Paya. Modig is chairman of the youth wing of the Christian Democrats, a small political party that's part of Sweden's center-right coalition government. "He is doing well under the circumstances," Back said of Modig. "He has been released from the hospital and is under the care of the Swedish Embassy. ... He was there to show his moral support for the democracy movement." The Spanish government and the European Union, which awarded Paya its Sakharov human rights and democracy prize in 2002, both sent condolences. "Oswaldo Paya had dedicated his life to the cause of democracy and human rights in Cuba," EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said in a statement. This story is based on reporting by The Associated Press. Read more: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2012/07/24/cuba-dissidents-mourn-oswaldo-paya-one-their-own-killed-in-car-crash/#ixzz21mvqr3Wj

After the Funeral of Oswaldo Paya

http://www.france24.com/en/20120725-scores-activists-arrested-funeral-dissident-paya-farinas-cuba-escalante-car-accident

Cubans Begin to Rebuild Their Residential Real Estate Market

July 26, 2012 12:54 pm
By LAURA LATHAM / The New York Times
HAVANA -- A university administrator knows she is privileged to have a small apartment in a prime quarter of Old Havana, given to her by the government for a peppercorn rent. But as she shows a visitor the tiny two-room property, she asks: "Quieres permuta?" That is, in English, "Want to trade?" Since the revolution in the late 1950s, swapping or bartering homes, a process known in Cuba as permuta, was the only way residents could change their accommodations. Property was government owned and private sales were prohibited. In November 2011 the law was amended, giving residents the right to buy property freehold, though they can own only one home in the city and a second one in a rural or coastal location for vacations. Since the change, the trickle of property sales has increased. Granma, the Communist Party newspaper, reported in March that there were 2,730 sales in the first quarter of 2012, and an additional 10,660 transactions were recorded to legalize previous exchanges. Prices in Cuba tend to be far lower than elsewhere in the Caribbean, though sellers sometimes expect additional, unregistered payments to avoid taxation. Asking prices for basic apartments generally are as low as 15,000 Cuban convertible pesos, or $15,000, though such apartments are likely to be of poor quality and in undesirable locations. One-bedroom properties in need of renovation generally start at around 30,000 convertible pesos. Something more habitable with one or two bedrooms costs about 50,000 convertible pesos, and houses with three to four bedrooms begin at 80,000 convertible pesos, depending on the location. City districts in Havana like Vedado and Old Havana and the suburbs of Miramar and Playa offer better standards of accommodation than poorer areas like Centro Havana and Cerro. Buyers, however, complain that there are no price benchmarks. "We haven't had a real estate market in Cuba before, so no one knows how much a house is really worth. You might visit two identical places and get two different price requests," said the owner of a popular local restaurant, who, like many of those interviewed for this story, asked not to be identified because he was afraid of government reprisals. He said some owners would take payment only in euros or dollars, and had unrealistic expectations about the value of their properties, something he and friends are encountering as they try to find a building in Vedado suitable for renovation into apartments. Private enterprise is still heavily restricted in Cuba, and many workers earn an average salary of 20 convertible pesos a month, set by the government, so even low-end property is out of reach. Those who do buy often use money they have received legally from family members or friends outside the country. Foreigners who are permanent residents can buy in the same locations as citizens, though they usually are asked to pay a higher price, while foreigners who do not live on the island are limited to specific condominiums. They also must use registered companies for their purchases, though such purchases are not subject to the standard 4 percent tax on residential sales. All foreign purchasers are allowed to own one car per property, and can import duty-free one shipping container's worth of goods and furnishings for personal use. The introduction of resort-style vacation homes for foreigners has been expected since the government legalized leasehold land ownership by foreign companies at the end of last year. International developers have been working on several such projects, backed by Canadian and European investors, though none has yet been approved for construction. At least for now, Havana's wealth of crumbling historic properties, which date to the 17th century and include an eclectic mix of Spanish Colonial, Art Deco and 1950s Modernist architecture, is out of bounds to the overseas buyer, though leases to renovate them for business purposes can be obtained with government permission. There is general agreement in Cuba that finding properties is hard for everyone and has to be done by word of mouth. It is illegal to act as a real estate agent and not entirely legal to advertise properties for sale, though many residents list their properties anonymously on Web sites like Revolico or put a "se vende" sign outside their houses. The restaurateur said the signs began appearing only five or six months ago. "Now you see them appearing everywhere," he said. "It's a big change for people who were brought up to believe all property must be shared and private ownership was wrong." One property search agent in Havana represents Cuban and international investors but, because of the illegal nature of his job, works only via personal recommendations. He said that international buyers who were not residents should expect to pay a minimum of around 125,00 convertible pesos for a one-bedroom apartment of around 65 square meters, or 700 square feet, in a good building, with access to a communal pool and gym. The European owner of a four-bedroom penthouse in the Atlantic building, on the famous Malecón seafront strip, has said the apartment is for sale though it is not formally on the market, the agent said. It has a private rooftop terrace with a pool, and the agent said he was looking for offers of about 3.7 million convertible pesos. Expatriates are the main market for Cuban property. A design consultant, who is Cuban by birth and has family in Havana, has spent the past 20 years working in Britain and Antigua by permission of the government. Now she has decided to buy her first home in Cuba. "I'm buying a property in Havana as an investment and as a vacation residence," she explained. Though unwilling to be identified by name or to say how much she could spend, she said she could see the potential in owning her own property: "I would consider renting it long-term to the right tenant, for example, an expat working for a foreign firm in Cuba." She also said she appreciated what a big step private ownership was for Cuban residents, noting that they used to risk the loss of their houses if the government found out they were exchanging residences or making illegal payments to lawyers or agents. The market is still too new and in too much flux to predict future prices. But Johnny Considine, marketing manager for Esencia Experiences, a Cuban tourism agency that rents out private villas, said he believed that leasing potential was the key to investing well in Cuban real estate. "There is a lack of very high-end hotels in Cuba, and rentals were previously restricted by the government to a maximum of two bedrooms in a private house lived in by the owner, known as casas particulares," he said. "Now there's the opportunity to rent higher-grade property, including entire villas." Tourism to Cuba is rising, with a record 1.24 million visitors recorded in the first quarter of 2012. Returns on one-bedroom apartments range from 50 to 100 convertible pesos a night, depending on location and condition of the property. Mr. Considine said that for a luxury property with pool, waterfront location and two or more bedrooms, that figure can reach 400 to 1,400 convertible pesos a night. Even though the Cuban market appears to be opening up, few residents voice any confidence about the changes. "Today we can buy and sell property, but many people still feel there may be no security in ownership," the restaurateur said. "The laws in Cuba can change from one day to the next."

After the Funeral of Oswaldo Paya

Amnesty International Criticizes Cuba’s Detention of Dissidents at Funeral

AP Wire, Thursday, July 26th, 2012
Human rights organization Amnesty International and the U.S. government criticized Cuba Wednesday for briefly detaining dozens of dissidents after they attended the funeral of prominent opposition leader Oswaldo Payá.
A few hundred people had gathered at a Havana church the previous day to pay respects to Payá, who died Sunday in a car crash, when a scrum broke out outside between dissidents yelling “freedom!” and state security agents.
Police herded more than 40 people onto buses, according to noted dissident hunger-striker Guillermo Fariñas. They were taken to police stations and released within hours.
Cuba, which considers members of the island’s small dissident community to be “counterrevolutionaries” bent on undermining the government, has cleared its prisons of internationally recognized prisoners of conscience in recent years. Dissidents say authorities have since turned to brief detentions such as those seen Tuesday.
The short-term arrests “aim to produce physical and psychological wear and tear among the opposition,” said Fariñas, who like Payá is a past winner of the European Union’s Sakharov human rights prize.
Dissidents accused police of rough treatment, but there were no reports of any serious injuries.
The White House said in a Wednesday statement that the detentions “provide a stark demonstration of the climate of repression in Cuba.”
“We look forward to the day when the Cuban people can live in the free society Oswaldo Payá worked so hard to bring about throughout his lifetime,” it read.
Human rights group Amnesty International also criticized the arrests.
“Tuesday’s events follow the pattern of short-term detentions and imprisonments we’ve seen the Cuban authorities carry out time and again as a form of intimidation against dissidents and human rights activists,” said Gerardo Ducos, Amnesty’s Cuba researcher.
There was no word of the detentions in Cuban state media, which rarely mention dissidents except to accuse them of being paid stooges of the U.S. government. Island newspapers have reported Payá’s death, but without mentioning his opposition activities.
A rental car carrying Payá, another Cuban dissident, and two Europeans crashed Sunday in the eastern province of Granma, killing Paya and the other Cuban.
State media said the accident happened when the driver of the vehicle lost control and hit a tree.
A member of the Spanish conservative ruling party’s youth wing was apparently behind the wheel. Both he and a Swede belonging to a political youth organization suffered minor injuries. They made statements to police and were being assisted by officials from their respective embassies, but have not spoken to the news media.
There have been some conflicting accounts of the crash including speculation it could have been intentional, and dissidents demanded a transparent investigation.
“We will clear up and seek justice for the violent death of my father,” daughter Rosa María Payá said Tuesday at the church.
Payá, 60, was a leading government opponent who in the late 1990s and early 2000s headed up the Varela Project, which gathered thousands of signatures calling for political and economic change.

Requiem for a Cuban Dissident: Why Oswaldo Payá Spooked Castro

The untimely death of Oswaldo Payá leaves Cuba bereft of a charismatic dissident who sought a middle path between the hardline dogmas of both his country's communist rulers and right-wing exiles abroad

Franklin Reyes / AP
Franklin Reyes / AP
Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya speaks with journalists after meeting with former President Jimmy Carter in Havana, Cuba on March 30, 2011.
Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá’s Havana home was as modest as most of the communist island’s houses. But politically it was an oasis, a refuge from the polarized thinking about Cuba that dominates both sides of the Florida Straits. I last visited Payá’s casa in 2003, shortly after Fidel Castro had thrown 75 of his fellow dissidents behind bars – a crackdown prompted largely by Payá’s successful effort to gather petition signatures for a constitutional referendum on democratic reform. Payá reiterated his opposition to the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba because, he said, it gave Castro a convenient excuse for his economic failures. But he also flashed a wry smile and told me, “I’m all for Americans traveling here, but please don’t think Cuba will be democratized by people coming to dance salsa and smoke cigars.”
That preference for common sense over blind ideology – the independent-minded refusal to bow to the bullying of either the Castro dictatorship or the Cuban exile lobby – is what made the 60-year-old Payá arguably Cuba’s most important dissident. It’s also what makes his death in a car crash in eastern Cuba on Sunday, July 22, all the more tragic. Payá, who was laid to rest in Havana yesterday, was a peaceful rebel, and his Gandhi-esque penchant for lawful resistance is precisely what spooked Castro so profoundly. “We’re the first non-violent force for change this island has ever known,” he told me in 2003 when so many of his dissident colleagues were imprisoned – though Castro didn’t jail Payá because he presumably feared the global outcry. “Castro can’t crush that, no matter how hard he tries.”
Payá as a result would have been a particularly important figure to have around when Castro, 85, and his younger brother Raúl, 81, who took over as Cuban President after Fidel fell ill in 2006, are gone. Few Cubans could have been more helpful to the inevitable transition to democracy: unlike the communist bureaucrats who are nervously propping up Cuba’s jaded Marxism, or the hardline Cuban exiles who are delusionally obsessed with toppling the Castro regime from Miami, Payá had actually been planting the seeds of democratic practice in the island’s civic soil.
More: Who’s Bugging Castro in Cuba?
It’s ironic that Payá died in a car, since he was best known as the engineer who bicycled to work every day as a hospital equipment technician – often shadowed by police. Payá’s family has sparked speculation about whether Sunday’s crash – which also killed a fellow member of Payá’s Christian Liberation Movement (MCL) and injured two visiting Europeans – was an accident or the result of foul play. One of the Europeans, a Spaniard who was driving the car, has told the media the crash was an accident, but Cuban exile leaders and U.S. politicians are calling for an investigation.
Whatever the circumstances of his death, Payá in life was one of the most dogged adversaries the Cuban revolution has ever faced. And much of that determination sprang from his Catholic faith, which he held as strongly as the Castros have clung to their brand of socialism. When Fidel took power in 1959, Payá was the only kid in his Havana primary school who refused to become a Communist Youth member. In high school, after openly criticizing the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, he was sent to a labor camp for three years. Even so, rather than escape to Miami in the 1980 Mariel boatlift, he stayed in Cuba to work for its democratization – “This is what I am supposed to be, this is what I have to do,” he once told TIME – and he even made quixotic runs for Cuba’s National Assembly as an opposition candidate.
In 1996, Payá created his most effective instrument: the Varela Project. By 2002, after years of distributing leaflets and petitions from old mimeograph machines, it had collected far more than the requisite 10,000 signatures – which under Fidel’s 1976 Constitution legalizes a national referendum. Payá’s plebiscite would have asked for five basic human rights: free speech, free assembly, multiparty elections, broader free enterprise and the freeing of political prisoners.
Fidel of course refused to recognize the petitions. But the Varela campaign — named after 19th-century Cuban Catholic priest and independence champion Félix Varela — had established something unprecedented in communist Cuba: a broad, grassroots dissident network that could push for change on the island itself instead of from the diaspora in Florida. The Castros weren’t the only ones unsettled by that development; it also bothered many in the Cuban-American leadership. The Cuban-American community was largely supportive of Payá. But hardliners had long insisted on non-engagement with Havana, and they disparaged the idea of democratic players inside Cuba, believing that only exile heroics could challenge the Castros. Equally irksome to them was the way Payá’s movement distanced itself from the exiles and U.S. assistance, especially its rejection of the embargo, as a means of keeping Havana from labeling it as a tool of los yanquis.
Payá warned that lifting the embargo won’t produce overnight change in Cuba, but he also realized that maintaining it hasn’t worked, either – and that politically it probably helps more than hurts the Castros. As he gained international acclaim – in 2002 he won the European Union’s Sakharov Prize for human rights, and during a visit to Cuba that year, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter hailed Payá in a speech broadcast to every Cuban household – Payá’s belief that Washington should engage Cuba helped embolden more moderate Cuban-Americans. A decade later, in fact, polls show a majority of Cuban-Americans think the embargo should end. Back on the island, however, to make sure Payá didn’t embolden more Cubans, a humiliated Fidel struck back in 2003 with the mass arrests.
Still, Paya’s example has inspired more legalistic reform efforts in Cuba – including an unprecedented suit, filed against the government in 2010 by attorney Wilfredo Vallín, seeking the right to register an association of dissident lawyers. Last year a judge actually ruled that the case could proceed, and this summer an appeals court has heard oral arguments. Just as important, however, may be Payá’s example as a person of faith. In recent years Cuba’s Catholic Church has rebuilt itself after the 1959 revolution had all but dismantled it. Today the church is nothing less than the island’s first and only alternative institution to that revolution, helping Raúl carry out the capitalist reforms Cuba’s threadbare economy needs to survive – and which the Varela Project petitions had called for. The church also recently brokered the release of 115 political prisoners, including the dissidents rounded up in 2003.
More: Rendering Unto Castro
Most recently Payá had been directing a new campaign, the Heredia Project, which pushes for civil rights such as freer travel inside and outside Cuba. “We are asking for normal things that most people everywhere take for granted,” he told TIME last fall. “Nothing more or nothing less.” Even with Payá gone, the Castros will have to deal with his legacy – as was evident yesterday when Cuban police arrested, and reportedly roughed up, dozens of dissidents after Payá’s funeral mass. As Payá once insisted to me: “This is a duel between power and spirit.”


Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/07/25/requiem-for-a-cuban-dissident-why-oswaldo-paya-spooked-castro/#ixzz21mnswLn6

Cuban dissidents call for ‘transparent’ investigation of Oswaldo Payá’s death

Tuesday, July 24th, 2012
BY MIMI WHITEFIELD (Miami Herald
The Christian Liberation Movement called on the Cuban military junta Monday to carry out a “transparent’’ investigation of the deaths of its founder Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, a champion of civil society, and dissident Harold Cepero Escalante, who died in a controversial car crash.
It’s still not clear what happened Sunday afternoon on a pot-holed road in eastern Cuba as Payá, 60, who fought for the rights of the Cuban people for more than two decades, and Cepero, 31, the Movement’s youth leader, traveled in a rental car with two European companions.
Payá, who lived in Havana, was best known for his role in organizing the Varela Project, a signature-gathering drive in support of a referendum on laws to guarantee freedom of speech and other civil rights.
The two international supporters were identified as Ángel Carromero Barrios and Jens Aron Modig. Both sustained minor injuries. Spanish media reported that Carromero is a leader of the Spanish Popular Party’s youth organization, Nuevas Generaciónes, and that Modig is president of the Swedish Christian Democrat Youth League, wing of Sweden’s ruling alliance.
Spanish news agency EFE, citing sources, said Carromero was driving.
The Cuban government said the driver of the rental car lost control and hit a tree at 1:50 p.m. local time Sunday in La Gavina, a town about 14 miles outside Bayamo, the capital city of Granma province.
But Rosa María Payá, the dissident leader’s daughter, said their car was struck by another vehicle. In a recording on Payá’s official website, she said, “The information we received from the boys in the car with him is that a car was trying to push them off the road, ramming them at every moment. So we think — we are convinced — that they wanted to harm them and ended up killing my father.”
In a statement Monday, the Christian Liberation Movement said “the circumstances of these deaths have not been cleared up and are open to hypothesis’’ and it demanded a “transparent’’ investigation.
Some members of the Movement remained suspicious. Julio Hernandez, the group’s Miami representative, said Payá told him three weeks ago that his car had been wrecked and flipped when another vehicle hit him in Havana. “He said he was alive by a miracle,” Hernandez told El Nuevo Herald.
However, Yoandris Montoya and Felix Rivero, two dissidents from Bayamo who were sent to the crash site by the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, said two people who claimed to have witnessed the crash told them the vehicle ran off the road on its own to avoid a pothole, tumbled and hit a tree. The stretch of road was under repair.
In an unusual step, Granma, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, reported the deaths Monday on page six and said the crash was under investigation.
The story called the incident “a regrettable traffic accident.” Although it mentioned the victims by name, it described them simply as “Cuban citizens.’’
Ofelia Acevedo, Payá’s widow, said the Christian Liberation Movement “will continue its peaceful fight until all Cubans win the rights we have by law. My husband dedicated his life to this ideal until the end.
“From eternity,’’ she said, he will “encourage and accompany us until truth and justice make our dear island an authentic home for all Cubans.’’
Payá, who worked tirelessly to open more space for civil society, won the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize in 2002 and was nominated multiple times for the Nobel Peace Prize.
He embarked on the Varela Project in 1998 and delivered the first group of more than 11,000 signatures to the National Assembly, Cuba’s parliament, in 2002. Before the petition drive was over, there were more than 25,000 names on the petition. The project took its name from Félix Varela, a priest revered for his role in Cuba’s independence fight against Spain.
Cuban authorities ignored the Varela Project petitions, but the government did launch its own petition drive, which led to enshrining the socialist system as “irrevocable’’ in the Cuban constitution.
Still, Payá, a Catholic layman, continued his efforts to mobilize Cubans to demand their civil rights although in recent years the spotlight shone more brightly on younger dissidents.
“The unexpected and tragic death of this human rights activist is certainly a blow and a setback for Cuba’s small civil society; yet, his example and his courage will continue to inspire those both inside and outside of Cuba who work and struggle for a peaceful but real transition in Cuba to a democratic form of government in which both human rights and the rule of law are protected,’’ said Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski in a statement Monday.
A Mass in Payá’s honor is scheduled for 8 p.m. Tuesday at Ermita de la Caridad, known as the Shrine of Our Lady of Charity, in Coconut Grove. Numerous dissidents gathered Monday at Payá’s home and at El Salvador del Mundo church in the Havana neighborhood of El Cerro to pay tribute. There was a 10-minute ovation when Payá’s body arrived at the church where he launched his civic movement in 1991. He is expected to be buried Tuesday.
Miriam Leiva, a founding member of the Ladies in White dissident group, and Oscar Espinosa Chepe, a dissident economist, issued a joint statement praising Payá’s work and also demanded exhaustive and timely information from authorities on the circumstances of the dissidents’ deaths.
As word of Payá’s death spread, condolences from fellow dissidents, the Catholic Church and people around the world were extended to his wife and family.
Payá, the White House said, was a “tireless champion” in “the nonviolent struggle for freedom and democratic reform in Cuba.”
“Cuba has lost one of its most important voices of political dissent and strongest proponents of fundamental freedoms for the people of his homeland. We extend our most heartfelt condolences,’’ said Victoria Nuland, a spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department. “Mr. Payá will be remembered for his vision and dedication to a better future for Cuba. His legacy will endure in the inspiration he provided to the Cuban people and his admirers the world over.”
Republican Florida Sen. Marco Rubio called Payá “one of many heroes on the island who has exposed the myths and failures of the Cuban Revolution and challenged its habitual violation of human rights. As we try to learn more about the circumstances of Payá’s death, it is critically important that the international community join those inside Cuba in pressuring the regime to be forthcoming with the truth,’’ he said in a statement. “It’s important that anyone with knowledge about this car crash be protected and allowed to share what they know.”

Cuba broadens economic reforms

* Some state companies to be granted greater autonomy
* All Cubans to pay income and property taxes
* New cooperatives to divide profits as members see fit

By Marc Frank

HAVANA, July 26 (Reuters) - Cuba adopted a new tax code this week and said it would loosen regulations on some state companies while turning others into cooperatives, as one of the world's last Soviet-style economies moves in a more market-friendly direction.

The plans were announced at a session of the National Assembly, which passed the country's first comprehensive tax code since the 1959 revolution on the communist-ruled island.

Foreign journalists were barred from Monday's meeting, only portions of which were later broadcast by the official media.

President Raul Castro, 81, has liberalized regulations for small businesses and farming, and begun leasing small state retail outlets to employees since taking over for his ailing older brother Fidel in 2008. But he now appears ready, says Cuba expert Phil Peters, “"to put some meat on the bone."

Marino Murillo, head of the Communist Party commission responsible for implementing reforms approved at a party Congress last year, characterized the tax law as providing the basis for "“bringing up to date the economic model," while releasing few details of the code.

The new law takes effect next year and is scheduled for publication next month.

Castro's point man for reform said it would gradually replace an old Soviet-style system and eventually require everyone to pay income and property taxes for the first time since the 1960s.

Murillo, in a two-hour presentation to the National Assembly, announced that an unspecified number of state companies would be partially deregulated by the end of the year.

He said the companies, previously part of various ministries, would be able to make day-to-day business decisions without waiting for government approval, manage their labor relations and set prices. After meeting state contracts, they will also be able to sell excess production on the open market.

The companies will be self-financed, including through bank credits, and expected to cover their losses, versus handing over all profit to the state and receiving financing and subsidies from the treasury.

Instead of being micro-managed by the ministries, Murillo said the companies would be evaluated by "“four or five indicators" such as earnings, the relation of productivity to salaries and their ability to meet the terms of state contracts.

Murillo also announced that 222 small to medium-sized state businesses were preparing to become cooperatives, ranging from restaurants and produce markets to shrimp breeding and transportation.

The cooperatives will lease state property and equipment at 10-year renewable intervals, operate on a market basis, pay taxes like other companies and divide profits among members as they see fit, Murillo said.



"SLOW BUT STEADY"

“"They have been rolling things out one by one on a slow but steady timetable and my guess is they will continue to do so. It's a timeline that goes to 2015," Peters, a vice president of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute, said.

"Now they are getting to the things that really have the ability to increase the size of the private sector and create the savings in the state sector that they say are their targets," he said.

Cuba, with a foreign debt of more than $22 billion according to Reuters' estimates and still mired in a post-Soviet crisis after 20 years, has no choice but to change its inefficient ways, government insiders say.

Marino said as much during the National Assembly meeting.

"“We are not calling for turmoil ... but the reality of life shows we can not maintain (a command economy)," he said.

The five-year reform plan calls for moving from government administration of just about the entire economy to managing it through “"indirect" means such as taxes and bank credits.

Most retail services and minor production and farming are scheduled to go over to a “"non-state" sector that will account for more than 40 percent of the labor force, compared with the current 15 percent.

At the same time, the Communist Party plans to move away from a paternalistic state system of collective work and consumption to one where individual effort is better rewarded. Across the board subsidized goods and services are to be replaced by targeted welfare.

Castro, who closed the National Assembly meeting, said the new measures would “"permit the state to forget about the administration of a set of secondary services and productions and concentrate on improving the management of the basic means of production which will remain as socialist state companies."

Murillo also announced that the government would lease to its employees more than 1,000 small cafeterias, following in the footsteps of barbershops, hairdressers and a host of other minor services let go over the last few years.

The former state establishments now must compete head to head with a burgeoning small business sector of more than 300,000 mom-and-pop operations, including restaurants and other small companies.

Murillo said the new tax code would cut small business taxes on average by between 3 and 7 percent and provide other benefits for start-ups, such as eliminating the labor tax for those with five employees or less.

The new law will also benefit small farmers, he said.