perdonate la pessima traduzione


Il sito web WikiLeaks ha inferto un brutto colpo ai mal chiamati oppositori, in Cuba, rivelando un cablo diplomatico inviato a Washington, nel 2009, dal capo della Sezione d'Interessi degli USA a L'Avana (SINA), Jonathan Farrar, che ha caratterizzato questi controrivoluzionari come estremisti e scollegati dalla realtà del loro paese.

Nello stesso cablo, filtrato da Wikileaks e pubblicato dal quotidiano spagnolo El Pais, il diplomatico USA ha inoltre sottolineato che i cosiddetti dissidenti "sono più interessati ai soldi che a portare le loro proposte a settori più ampi della società" ciò che conferma le ripetute affermazioni di Cuba che sono mercenari al servizio di una potenza straniera.

Il rapporto segnala anche che un "gruppo di opposizione" aveva apertamente presentato al consigliere politico della SINA un bilancio per la loro presunta organizzazione, ossia una sorta di libro paga con l'obiettivo che questa missione diplomatica assumesse il pagamento degli stipendi.

Farrar riconosce che gli "oppositori" che gli Stati Uniti mantiene e a cui destina finanziamenti milionari per destabilizzare l'isola non rappresentano i cubani ed hanno molte poche possibilità di sostituire le attuali autorità nella nazione caraibica.

Il Capo della SINA, nello stesso testo, osserva anche come i "dissidenti sono vecchi e non collegati con i giovani".Nonostante questo, Farrar ha raccomandato che l'attuale amministrazione USA, del presidente Barack Obama, continui a sostenere gli smascherati mercenari ciò che mette in risalto la nota intenzione della Casa Bianca di proseguire a finanziare la malridotta controrivoluzione cubana con il vecchio e fallito obiettivo di cercare di destabilizzare l'isola.

Media giornalistici stranieri, in Avana, aspettano con attenzione possibili nuove pubblicazioni di WikiLeaks relazionate con gli "oppositori" in Cuba ed il maneggio di denaro ricevuto dalla SINA che ha fatto sì, poco tempo fa, che questa missione diplomatica fosse oggetto di un audit (valutazione) su cui i commenti son sono stati per nulla favorevoli.


Wiki:

ID: 202438

Date: 2009-04-15 133:00

Origin: 09HAVANA221

Source: US Interests Section Havana

Classification: CONFIDENTIAL

Dunno:

Destination: VZCZCXYZ0001

PP RUEHWEB



DE RUEHUB #0221/01 1051333

ZNY CCCCC ZZH

P 151333Z APR 09

FM USINT HAVANA

TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 4310

INFO RHMFISS/CDR USSOUTHCOM MIAMI FL

RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC

RHMFISS/COGARD INTELCOORDCEN WASHINGTON DC

RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC

RHMFISS/NAVINTELOFC GUANTANAMO BAY CU



C O N F I D E N T I A L HAVANA 000221



SIPDIS



E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/08/2019

TAGS: PGOV, PINR, PREL, PHUM, CU

SUBJECT: THE U.S. AND THE ROLE OF THE OPPOSITION IN CUBA



Classified By: COM Jonathan Farrar for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)



1. (C) SUMMARY: As the Raul Castro government of Cuba

(GOC) appears to have settled into a position of undisputed

authority internally, it is worth asking what the Cuban

political opposition is doing and the role it may play in the

future. Two recent op-ed pieces in the international press

that have infuriated dissident leaders argue that the answers

are: not much and none. Though the op-ed pieces do not

mention it, this assessment should carry the caveat that part

of the reason for the relative inaction of the opposition is

that the GOC is taking active steps to undermine it. Many

opposition groups are prone to dominance by individuals with

strong egos who do not work well together and are therefore

easy targets for manipulation by the Cuban security services.

The Agenda para la Transicion, which was launched with much

promise one year ago, is on the verge of breaking apart.

Oswaldo Paya's Dialogo Nacional has picked up some stray

dissidents, but has not taken any significant action in

months. Though dissidents have reacted very negatively to

the articles in the international press, the fact is that

they contain more than a grain of truth and it would have

been better if the criticism had been taken as a wake-up call.



2. (C) Without some true epiphany among the opposition

leadership and a lessening in official repression of its

activities, the traditional dissident movement is not likely

to supplant the Cuban government. The dissidents have, and

will continue to perform, a key role in acting as the

conscience of Cuba and deserve our support in that role. But

we will need to look elsewhere, including within the

government itself, to spot the most likely successors to the

Castro regime. End Summary.



Public Criticism Touches a Nerve in the Dissident Community

--------------------------------------------- --------------



3. (C) Two recent op-ed pieces that ran in the Miami press,

one by Ivette Lea Martinez entitled "the Wall of

Dissidence," and the other by Fernando Ravsberg entitled

"Cuba, the Dissidents and the World," argued that the

dissident movement in Cuba has become as old and as out of

touch with the lives of ordinary Cubans as the regime itself.

The articles represented comprehensive and fairly balanced

critiques of the dissident movement, and appeared at a time

when the dissidents are under more pressure than ever from

the Cuban government. As such, they might have generated a

reform debate among the dissident leaders, but instead they

simply focused dissident frustration with the Cuban exile

community.



4. (C) In general, we would make the same criticisms of most

of the official dissident movement that we have contact with

in Havana. In fairness to the dissidents we would add--as

the op-ed pieces did not--that being an anti-GOC activist in

Cuba is enormously difficult, and that any effort to move

beyond small meetings in private homes would almost certainly

be quickly and firmly repressed by the security services.

That said, we see very little evidence that the mainline

dissident organizations have much resonance among ordinary

Cubans. Informal polls we have carried out among visa and

refugee applicants have shown virtually no awareness of

dissident personalities or agendas. Judging from the

reactions we have heard from our dissident contacts, the most

painful accusation made by the commentators was that the

dissidents are old and out of touch. Many of the leaders of

the dissident movement are indeed comparatively old.

Long-time dissidents XXXXXXXXXXXX are in their 60s.

Others such as Francisco Chaviano and wife Ana Aguililla,

Rene Gomez Manzano and Oswaldo Paya are well into their 50s.

They have little contact with younger Cubans and, to the

extent they have a message that is getting out, it does not

appeal to that segment of society. Their very valid focus on

the plight of friends and relatives being held as prisoners

of conscience, and on the government's failure to uphold

basic human rights, does not address the interests of Cubans

who are more concerned about having greater opportunities to

travel freely and live comfortably.



Dissident Movement Not a Coherent Whole

---------------------------------------



5. (C) Whether or not the opposition organizations have

agendas that can be made to appeal to a broad range of

interests on the island, they must first begin to achieve

some level of unity of purpose as an opposition, or at least

stop spending so much energy trying to undercut one another.

Despite claims that they represent "thousands of Cubans," we

see little evidence of such support, at least from the

admittedly limited vantage point we have in Havana. When we

question opposition leaders about their programs, we do not

see platforms designed to appeal to a broad cross section of

Cuban society. Rather, the greatest effort is directed at

obtaining enough resources to keep the principal organizers

and their key supporters living from day to day. One

political party organization told the COM quite openly and

frankly that it needed resources to pay salaries and

presented him with a budget in the hope that USINT would be

able to cover it. With seeking resources as a primary

concern, the next most important pursuit seems to be to limit

or marginalize the activities of erstwhile allies, thus

preserving power and access to scarce resources.



6. (C) Younger individuals, including bloggers, musicians,

and performing and plastic artists do not belong to

identifiable organizations, though they are much better at

taking "rebellious" stands with greater popular appeal.

However, these individuals are still tightly controlled by

the GOC, eschew the label of "dissident," and do not seem to

aspire to any leadership role. The international fame gained

by a few, such has blogger Yoanny Sanchez, fuels further

jealousy among the traditional dissident organizations and

prevents them from working with the incipient networks that

the younger generations are beginning to form.



Internal Divisions and Limited View Hamper Activity

--------------------------------------------- ------



7. (C) The current feud among the leadership of the Agenda

para la Transicion is a case in point. When the organization

was founded one year ago, it was ground breaking in that it

brought together an unusually broad array of dissidents. The

only significant groups missing were those of Oswaldo Paya,

who was invited to join but refused, and XXXXXXXXXXXX,

a group that is considered by

other dissidents to be a "tame" opposition organization that

is controlled by the GOC. However, after only a year in

which its signal accomplishment was presenting a prize to a

young graphic artist for designing a logo for the

organization, the Agenda para la Transicion seems close to

flying apart. The crux of the dispute appears to be a power

struggle XXXXXXXXXXXX and several followers on



one side and XXXXXXXXXXXX and XXXXXXXXXXXX and some of

their followers on the other. But the main problem lies in

the fact that, while the concept of unifying the opposition

under one umbrella organization has a great deal of merit,

the members have not been able to overcome the challenge of

keeping several very strong and uncompromising personalities

working together. The splits that would be natural among the

members of such a group are aggravated by active measures

being taken by Cuban state security, which works to coopt

certain members and infiltrate the organization with its own

agents whose job it is to stoke any discord that exists.



8. (C) Oswaldo Paya and his supporters, who now include

XXXXXXXXXXXX Manzano and

dissident economist Oscar Espinosa Chepe, continue to be a

very sober and serious force. Paya has outlined great plans

to organize his "National Dialogue" in the same way he did

the Varela Project in the late 1990s with grassroots support

throughout the island, but there is little activity apparent.

The fact that 41 of the 54 prisoners of conscience arrested

in the Black Spring of 2003 and still being held are Varela

Project volunteers clearly weighs heavily on Paya.

Therefore, much of his focus has been on defense of human

rights and demands for the release of political prisoners.

While these are laudable goals that must be pressed forward,

as noted above, they have little resonance within Cuban

society and do not offer a political alternative to the

government of Cuba.



Incipient Political Parties in Cuba

-----------------------------------



9. (C) The COM met on March 31 with the leaders of several

self-professed political parties, most of them in some way

claiming to be a successor to the old Cuban Liberal Party.

These individuals at least claim to have political

objectives. Each of the groups presented a platform, all of

which were very similar. But they were also quite

impressive, attacking tough issues like constitutional

reform, the status of the armed forces and security forces,

and domestic and international economic policy. However,

when the COM asked representatives of each group to explain

how they would appeal to the Cuban public at large if there

were open national elections tomorrow, none had a good

answer, and it was apparent that they had not given a great

deal of thought to that possibility. The groups expressed

their thanks to USINT for bringing them together in such a

forum, and seemed prepared to contemplate the function of

grassroots politics in their planning. There is as yet no

indication that there is any general movement in that

direction, however.



Relations with the Exile Community

----------------------------------



10. (C) A consistent problem, and one that is becoming more

acute as the eventual end of the Castro brothers' regime

comes into sight, is the relationship between the on-island

opposition and the exile community. Even though much of

their resources continues to come from exile groups,

opposition members of all stripes complain that the intention

of the exiles is to undercut local opposition groups so that

they can move into power when the Castros leave. The

islanders accuse Miami and Madrid-based exiles of trying to

orchestrate their activities from afar, and of

misrepresenting their views to policy makers in Washington.

Ironically, the "exile community" in many cases includes

former dissidents who only just recently were able to get off

the island. Their closeness to the remaining dissidents on

the island does not appear to keep them in the latter's good

graces. Instead, they are almost immediately lumped into the

"them" that defines the exile community for the on-island

opposition.



COMMENT

-------



11. (C) COMMENT: Various dissident leaders have maintained

their focus on specific issues like treatment of political

prisoners, and such work is valuable and worthwhile. This is

especially true of groups like the Damas de Blanco, whose

very narrow focus on the plight of their imprisoned family

members has made it one of the most effective organizations

on the island. It is the dissident movement that holds the

GOC accountable for its violations of basic human and civil

rights. From our standpoint, however, there are few if any

dissidents who have a political vision that could be applied

to future governance. Though the dissidents will not

acknowledge it, they are not widely known in Cuba outside the

foreign diplomatic and press corps. A key factor that

contributes to this is the GOC's focused effort to keep

dissidents divided and unable to reach out to ordinary

Cubans. We have no doubt that, as alleged, the dissident

movement is heavily penetrated by state security. This

penetration allows the government to play on the egos and

personal feuds that are normal in any society, and exacerbate

the divisions that would exist naturally among the

dissidents. Unless the GOC relaxes its suppression of

opposition organizations, and the dissidents themselves

become more capable of cooperative behavior, it is unlikely

that they will play any significant role in whatever

government succeeds the Castro brothers. Nevertheless, we

should continue to support the good work being done by the

dissident movement in promoting observation of

internationally recognized human rights and making public the

plight of political prisoners.



12. (C) COMMENT CONTINUED: We believe it is the younger

generation of "non-traditional dissidents," such as Yoanny

Sanchez, that is likely to have a greater long term impact on

post-Castro Cuba. However, the most likely immediate

successors to the Castro regime will probably come from

within the middle ranks of the government itself. We do not

know yet who might eventually rise to leadership positions in

place of the old guard from within the government. The recent

purge of younger officials like former Vice President Lage

and former Foreign Minister Perez Roque must have given pause

to any in that cadre who had considered thinking out loud

about the future. Still, we believe we must try to expand

ou contacts within Cuban society on leadership and democracy

initiatives as broadly as possible. We also must continue to

open up Cuba to th


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