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THE CASTRO REGIME’S ONGOING VIOLATIONS

OF CIVIL AND POLITICAL RIGHTS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, 

GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND 

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JULY 13, 2016

Serial No. 114–219

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

MATT SALMON, Arizona 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin 

DAVID A. TROTT, Michigan 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

DANIEL DONOVAN, New York 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

AMI BERA, California 

ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

DANIEL DONOVAN, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

AMI BERA, California 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

Oscar Elias Biscet, M.D., president, Lawton Foundation for Human Rights 

(former Cuban political prisoner) ........................................................................ 5

Ms. Sirley Avila Leon, democracy advocate .......................................................... 8

Ms. Maria Werlau, president, Free Society Project .............................................. 12

Mr. Geoff Thale, program director, Washington Office on Latin America .......... 21

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Oscar Elias Biscet, M.D.: Prepared statement ...................................................... 7

Ms. Sirley Avila Leon: Prepared statement .......................................................... 10

Ms. Maria Werlau: Prepared statement ................................................................ 15

Mr. Geoff Thale: Prepared statement .................................................................... 24

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 42

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 43

The Honorable Christopher H. Smith, a Representative in Congress from 

the State of New Jersey, and chairman, Subcommittee on Africa, Global 

Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations: List of 

political prisoners in Cuba .................................................................................. 44

Written responses from Mr. Geoff Thale to questions submitted for the record 

by the Honorable Christopher H. Smith ............................................................ 46

(1)

THE CASTRO REGIME’S ONGOING 

VIOLATIONS OF CIVIL AND POLITICAL 

RIGHTS 

TUESDAY, JULY 13, 2016

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH,

GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 o’clock p.m., in 

room 2172 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. 

Smith (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. SMITH. The subcommittee will come to order. And first let 

me begin by apologizing for the delay. There were a large series of 

votes in the House which precluded our meeting at the appointed 

time, so I do thank you for your forbearance. 

Good afternoon. It has been 1 year and 8 months since President 

Obama announced a major change in our country’s policy toward 

Cuba. It has been 11 months since Secretary Kerry visited Havana 

and reopened our Embassy, and it has been nearly 4 months since 

our President visited Cuba. Clearly, a lot has changed in just over 

11⁄2 years but for the people of Cuba, particularly those espousing 

fundamental human rights, what has changed? 

Today we will examine the sorry state of the civil and political 

rights in the Castro brothers’ Cuba, and how despite all the promises by the administration and that an opening to Cuba would lead 

to greater opening domestically for the Cuban people, we still see 

political repression, including it must be noted repression directed 

at the Afro-Cuban population. And in the past, this subcommittee 

has had a previous hearing where we focused in great part on that 

terrible repression. 

This is not the first time this subcommittee has expressed concern about the lack of openness to democracy and the mistreatment 

of dissenters in Cuba. In fact, one of our witnesses, the courageous 

Dr. Oscar Biscet, offered dramatic testimony before this subcommittee in February 2012 when he testified via telephone from 

the U.S. Interests Section in Havana after evading the Cuban police to get there. 

Likewise, on February 5, 2015, we held a hearing entitled 

‘‘Human Rights in Cuba: An Opportunity Squandered,’’ wherein we 

asked whether the Obama administration had used the considerVerDate 0ct 09 2002 15:37 Oct 04, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\071316\20745 SHIRL
2

able leverage that it wields to better the condition of the Cuban 

people, or whether it was squandering the opportunity. 

Since then our fear that the administration has not been pushing 

sufficiently for the release of political prisoners and other human 

rights concerns has only grown with the focus on President 

Obama’s legacy instead of on the Cuban people. 

For example, when President Obama made his visit to Cuba, he 

and Raul Castro appeared in a photo opportunity press conference. 

CNN’s Jim Acosta, much to his credit, asked the hard question 

about Cuba’s political prisoners. Raul Castro, much to his discredit, 

denied that there were any political prisoners in Cuba. ‘‘Give me 

the list of the political prisoners and I will release them immediately,’’ Castro taunted. ‘‘Just mention the list,’’ he said. President 

Obama did not present him with a list. 

Well, Mr. President, I have the list right here of 50 political prisoners compiled by our good friend and colleague, Ileana RosLehtinen, and without objection we’ll insert that list into the record 

and we will send it to the Embassy here in Washington for Cuba. 

And, hopefully, it will be then sent down to Raul Castro. This is 

the list that President Obama should have had in his breast pocket 

ready to pull out when Raul Castro dared him to call his bluff. 

When I came to Congress in 1981 with Ronald Reagan, in the 

days of the old Soviet Union, one of the first issues I worked on 

was the plight of Soviet Jews and refuseniks who were imprisoned 

or not allowed to leave the Soviet Union. I recall Secretary of State 

George Schultz when he said that whenever he met with his Soviet 

counterpart, and from him down to the lowest level State Department officer, he would bring with him a list of imprisoned dissidents and human rights advocates. Front and center of any discussion whether at nuclear arms or tension in the Middle East, 

Secretary Schultz would bring up dissidents, naming them by 

name. It was this constant focus on human rights that helped move 

the Soviet Government to allow Jews and others to leave the Soviet 

Union, great people such as the great Natan Sharansky. 

And I have another list of names I would like to read, that of 

six members of the Cuban National Front of Civic Resistance who 

have applied for visas to come to the United States, but for some 

reason, inexplicably, our State Department has refused to allow to 

visit the U.S. They are Orlando Gomez Echavarria, Jose Alberto 

Alvarez Bravo, Yaite Diasnell Cruz Sosa, Yoel Bravo Lopez, Lazaro 

Ricardo Fiallo Lopez, and Ciro Aleixis Casanova Perez. I call upon 

Secretary Kerry to allow these brave people to enter the United 

States so they can meet with all of us who want to hear their stories about what is truly happening on the ground in Cuba. 

Finally, I note that the administration has failed to secure the 

release of fugitives from justice, such as JoAnne Chesimard, who 

is on the FBI’s Most Wanted Terror List, convicted of killing a New 

Jersey State Trooper, Werner Foerster. The administration must 

insist upon the unconditional return of Chesimard and all other fugitives from justice, as well as demand that the Castro regime respect the civil and political rights of the Cuban people before making any further concessions. And to underscore the point, unconditional means unconditional. There should be no swap where we exchange convicted Cuban spies like Ana Montes, or Kendall Myers 

3

for these fugitives as a concession to the Castro regime. The effect 

of that would be to trade Americans who have committed crimes 

in the United States for other Americans who have committed 

crimes in the United States demoralizing our intelligence community further in the process. 

With that, I want to turn to our witnesses. And before that, we 

turn to my good friend and colleague, Ms. Bass, for any opening 

comments she might have. 

Ms. BASS. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

For me, I think I will probably sit here today and say minority 

in terms of what my opinions and viewpoints are. And with all due 

respect, especially to my colleague Albio Sires, who I know is a 

Cuban-American and had a terrible experience with his family and 

all in Cuba, but I do stand here as somebody who is happy that 

we have finally changed our policy in Cuba. For over 50 years having a policy that I think many people in the world viewed as a 

failed policy, and then our history on the island prior to 1959 was 

not positive, and I think in the last 50 years was not positive. The 

numerous attempts that have been—there are the numerous incidents that have been documented of the U.S. trying to overthrow 

the Government of Cuba, versus the Cuban people standing up, attempts by the CIA to assassinate Cuban leaders. There was the 

suspect plane that was shot down in the mid-1970s in which an entire athletic team was lost, a Cuban plane. And now we have President Obama who on December 17 finally changed our policy. Many 

countries around the world disagreed with our policy for many 

years. The embargo that we had really limited a lot of trade with 

Cuba, but over the years, especially the last 20 years, a lot of countries began ignoring that embargo, and I think we looked rather 

strange, especially in the Americas. So the President reestablishing 

diplomatic relations while removing Cuba as a designation as a 

State Sponsor of Terrorism, increasing travel and commerce; I, 

frankly, have always felt that as a U.S. citizen I should have the 

right to travel anywhere in the world I choose to travel. The increase in remittances and trade and communications, the idea of 

U.S. companies beginning to have a physical presence on the island. We do know that the embargo still remains, and I’m hoping 

over time we lift that embargo. 

One concern I have in terms of Afro-Cubans that you mentioned 

is, I know that because of the remittances, not everybody has family here that can give remittances to their family members on the 

island. And maybe it’s time we reconsider some of our other policies. For example, we provide a lot of U.S. support to media that 

is supposed to go into Cuba, but as I understand it, the Cuban Government blocks, and so I wonder what is happening with all of 

those resources. And maybe those resources could be redirected to 

help address some of the inequities in Cuba, especially with the 

Afro-Cuban population and the population that does not have the 

access to remittances. 

Again, I welcome my colleague here, Mr. Sires from New Jersey, 

and more than willing to share with the approval of the chair my 

time with him, so I would yield to my colleague. 

Mr. SMITH. I would yield such time as it may consume to Albio 

Sires, a good friend and colleague from New Jersey. 

4

Mr. SIRES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Bass. 

Thank you very much, and thank you for allowing me to participate with you today, both chairman and ranking member. And for 

holding this important hearing, and for allowing me to attend. 

It has been 18 months since our relationship with Cuba has 

changed, and what continues to trouble me is that for all the talk 

of additional actions to be taken by the United States, little has 

been said of the steps the Cuban regime must take. Far too much 

has been given already. We need to see more concrete measures in 

terms of human rights, political freedoms, and the release of all political prisoners. 

People are routinely jailed and innocent women are beaten, while 

Castro continues to harbor dangerous fugitives, including JoAnne 

Chesimard, one of the FBI’s Most Wanted individuals for killing a 

New Jersey State Trooper, and then fleeing her prison sentence to 

live out her days on the island. 

What also upsets me is that while the Castro regime continues 

to oppress innocent people, he will be able to strengthen his grip 

on power by pocketing all the tourism dollars that the U.S. engagement will bring into the state-owned businesses further depriving 

the Cuban people an opportunity at a better life. 

We need to do more to bring attention to the plight of the Cuban 

people and implore our neighbors to stand up to the Castro regime 

and speak out against the continued human rights violation. 

I thank my colleagues once again for holding this important 

hearing, and I urge the administration to finally make human 

rights in Cuba a top priority. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Sires, thank you very much, and I thank you for 

your leadership on human rights in general, but especially as it relates to Cuba. You have been tenacious, and I want to note that 

Mario Diaz-Balart was here earlier and when he served here and 

now out of office in like manner does the same great work. And 

Kristina Arriaga, I want to thank her. As some of you saw, she was 

sworn in earlier right before the hearing. She from being one of the 

leaders of the Becket Fund to the United States Commission for 

International Religious Freedom as one of the commissioners. And 

I look forward to her work on the Commission, and then the entire 

commission as we go forward. 

Is Lincoln still here? I guess Lincoln has left, but he was a great 

leader like his brother, Mario. 

Let me just introduce our very distinguished group of witnesses, 

people for whom, and I believe this subcommittee has just such 

great respect for beginning with Dr. Oscar Biscet, who was born in 

Havana. In 1987, he began practicing the medical profession and 

teaching at the hospital in Havana. Dr. Biscet openly opposed 

Cuba’s communist regime and in 1994, Cuban authorities opened 

an official case where he was accused of carrying out ‘‘dangerous 

activities.’’

Dr. Biscet was arrested in 1999, and officially accused of crimes 

such as dishonoring national symbols, disorderly contact and inciting delinquent conduct. These are obviously catchall phrases so 

often employed against dissidents. As a result of these accusations 

he was sentenced to 3 years in prison. After his release in 2002 he 

5

was rearrested but later released thanks to pressure from religious 

and human rights organizations. 

He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President 

George Bush. While this is Dr. Biscet’s first time appearing before 

the subcommittee in person, he offered dramatic testimony, as I 

mentioned earlier before to the subcommittee in February 2012 

when he testified via telephone from the U.S. Interests Section in 

Havana. 

We’ll then hear from Ms. Sirley Avila Leon who is an ex-delegate 

of the People’s Assembly. She joined the democratic opposition after 

she was driven out of her position for trying to keep a school open 

in her community. Official channels ignored her and after she went 

to the international media, she was removed from office. 

Following escalating acts of repression by state security, she was 

gravely wounded in a machete attack in May 2015, in what was 

believed to have been an officially sanctioned attempt on her life. 

In September 2015, the Inter-American Commission on Human 

Rights concurred that she was in a ‘‘serious and urgent situation 

since her life and physical integrity are at risk.’’ In March 2016, 

she arrived in the U.S. to tell her compelling story and to obtain 

medical care. 

We’ll then hear from Ms. Maria Werlau who co-founded in 2012 

and still heads the Free Society Project, a nonprofit organization to 

advance human rights through research and scholarship. Its leading initiative, the Cuba Archive Truth and Memory Project focuses 

on transitional justice issues and human exploitation. 

Ms. Werlau is a former Second Vice President of Chase Manhattan Bank and a longtime independent consultant specializing in 

Cuban affairs and other international issues. Her extensive publications on Cuba cover a wide range of topics, including policy, 

international law, foreign investment, and other economic issues. 

She has served task forces on U.S.-Cuban relations for the Council 

on Foreign Relations and the American Enterprise Institute. 

And then we’ll hear from Mr. Geoff Thale. Mr. Thale oversees the 

entire range of the Washington Office on Latin America’s research 

and advocacy, on Latin American policy, and human rights issues, 

along with a focus on specific countries and themes. Mr. Thale led 

the team that authored ‘‘Forging New Ties,’’ as well as recommendations for new directions in U.S. policy toward Latin America. 

Mr. Thale has studied Cuba issues since the mid-1990s, and has 

traveled to Cuba more than a dozen times, including organizing 

delegations of academics and Members of Congress. He coordinates 

WOLA’s advocacy on this issue with a coalition of business, agricultural, and human rights groups who favor lifting the travel ban 

and rebuilding contacts between the United States and Cuban society. 

Dr. Biscet, the floor is yours. 

STATEMENT OF OSCAR ELIAS BISCET, M.D., PRESIDENT, 

LAWTON FOUNDATION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS (FORMER 

CUBAN POLITICAL PRISONER) 

[The following testimony was delivered through an interpreter.] 

6

Dr. BISCET. Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to address you on behalf of the suffering people of Cuba. This subcommittee of the House directed by Congressman Christopher 

Smith has been an unshakeable bastion of the promotion and defense of the freedom values of the American nation. These values 

that ennoble human dignity for those whose rights are violated flagrantly and systematically in my nation. 

In my country, Cuba, a small group of individuals using criminal 

conduct have taken over the administrative power and through 

state terror have kidnaped the sovereignty and freedom of the people and set up a society of fear. For more than 57 years the basic 

human rights, the freedom to talk, freedom of the press, to gather, 

association, and religious freedom have been undermined against 

the dignity of my people. 

The socialist regime that rules my country run first by Fidel Castro, now by his brother, Raul, was imposed by force with the use 

of weapons of war and overrode the 1940 Constitution. This Constitution was suspended de facto, never abolished de jure; that is 

why even in theory it is still in force and it declares the Castro 

communist regime as illegitimate. 

The 1940 Constitution guarantees the freedom and the human 

rights of the Cuban people through its Letter of Rights in Chapter 

IV. This letter was inspired in the American Bill of Rights of the 

United States Constitution of 1788, that strengthens modern democracy in the world starting with its cry of independence in 1776. 

Actually, the Obama administration has established diplomatic 

relations with the dictatorship in Communist Cuba violating the 

Act for Freedom and Cuban Solidarity, or known also as the 

Helms-Burton Law. But worst of all was the undermining of the 

American values of freedom enshrined in the Bill of Rights of its 

Constitution. 

Admirable Mr. Smith, Congresspersons, excellencies, I’m here 

today to highlight the honorable example of George Mason and Patrick Henry in the Congress of the State of Virginia where they 

firmly opposed to countersign the Constitution of the United States 

until the Bill of Rights was introduced. Congresspersons, don’t 

allow that the creed of a nation, the Bill of Rights, continue to be 

violated flagrantly. Don’t be tolerant maintaining the American 

and Cuban people separated in two nations, yours free, and mine, 

Cuba, slave. With your solidarity you not only enhance human dignity, but you accelerate the process through which democracy and 

freedom comes to the Cuban people. 

Thank you very much. God bless America and Cuba. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Biscet follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Dr. Biscet, thank you so very, very much. I’d like to 

now turn to Ms. Avila, and please present your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF MS. SIRLEY AVILA LEON, DEMOCRACY 

ADVOCATE 

[The following testimony was delivered through an interpreter.] 

Ms. AVILA LEON. My name is Sirley Avila Leon. I am Cuban, and 

I live in Cuba. Because of my work as a delegate to the Municipal 

Assembly of People’s Power for the Majibacoa municipality since 

2005 I have perceived, have seen the double standards of our leaders who in reality are not interested in the people. The biggest 

problems were bureaucratic. There was so much corruption that 

the system did not work. 

From the beginning, I started to take interest in the lives of the 

citizens and, in particular, the children of my region who walked 

more than 9 kilometers through difficult roads in order to attend 

the nearest school. The parents needing to accompany their children had no time to cultivate their land despite the abject poverty 

in which they lived. Some emmigrated to other villages in order to 

spare their children. I set myself to the task of demanding the 

school that the neighborhood needed so much. I reached the highest echelons of power in Cuba passing through all the intermediate 

levels, and although I managed to get a school built, it was soon 

closed leaving the village and rural children in the same situation 

of helplessness. 

Because of my work and my demands in favor of reopening the 

school, I began to be accused of being a leader, and the families of 

the farmers in my area began to receive threats that their schoolage children would be taken away from them. I was threatened and 

repeatedly repressed by government officials, and in Havana I was 

even expelled from the Council of State and threatened with being 

accused of threatening state security. 

All this is what led me on September 8, 2012 to denounce the 

regime’s human rights violations against the farmers and the people in general from the island itself by means of the broadcast 

Radio Marti. From that moment onwards I was a victim of several 

attempts on my life, attempts to eliminate me physically and other 

acts of vandalism against my farm, my animals, and my property 

all organized by the regime and its political police as part of its attempt to get rid of me. 

A young woman, Yudisleidy Lopez Rodriguez, alerted me to the 

fact that the political police had offered highly dangerous common 

criminals rewards for murdering me. She was killed on September 

26, 2014 for publicly decrying an attack on me in which my bed 

was set on fire during the early morning. Her murder was covered 

up as a crime of passion. 

On May 24, 2015, I was attacked in my home by Osmani Carrion, who was sent by state security to kill me. I am sure he was 

sent by the political police because I later discovered that he was 

a highly dangerous common prisoner who had been granted parole 

only days before attacking me. He attacked me with a machete severing my left hand and mutilating my right arm and both knees. 

He did not cut off my head thanks to the presence of a child at the 

scene of the events, and thanks to God who protected my life so 

9

that I could be here today and offer my testimony. In the days before the attack the regime had started a rumor that I had sold the 

farm and had left the area so that the neighbors would not be concerned about my physical disappearance. And I am sure of this because today marks the 22nd anniversary of the sinking of the 13 

de Marzo tugboat that claimed the lives of 37 men, women, and 

children. 

Today before this subcommittee of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the United States Congress I want to ask two questions. 

Taking into account the U.S. Government’s new relations with the 

dictatorship of Cuba, I wonder why has the situation of systematic 

human rights violations in Cuba not been a fundamental point in 

negotiations with the regime that has been in power for 57 years? 

How is it possible that the U.S. Government has made so many 

concessions to the regime of Cuba without demanding respect for 

human rights on the island, and justice for the many attacks on 

the civil and political rights of the Cuban people? I am a direct witness of the workings of the legal system in which citizens are not 

guaranteed any procedural safeguards. 

I am very grateful that over the years other victims of repression 

in Cuba have had the chance to come forward in this very space 

in order to denounce and publicize the realities of life in Cuba, and 

I thank you for giving me the opportunity to participate here today. 

I ask only that the Government of the United States, international 

human rights organizations, and the governments of the free world 

not abandon the people of Cuba in their struggle for freedom. Do 

not allow yourselves to be confused by the regime’s propaganda 

campaign presenting Cuba as a country in transition. Cuba remains a military dictatorship. In Cuba, human rights continue to 

be violated, and the people of Cuba are now more alone than ever 

behind the curtain of foreign investors and North American tourists. I ask you not to abandon Cuba and to denounce the harsh reality we live. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Avila Leon follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Ms. Avila, thank you so very much for your testimony 

and for suffering personal injury for your beliefs, and your testimony was outstanding. 

I’d like to now ask Ms. Werlau if you could present your testimony, as well. 

STATEMENT OF MS. MARIA WERLAU, PRESIDENT, FREE 

SOCIETY PROJECT 

Ms. WERLAU. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee for the opportunity to offer you this testimony. Please 

consider for the record my more extensive written statement. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection it will be made part of the record. 

Ms. WERLAU. Thank you. 

Today I will focus on the Cuban Government’s continuing violations of the right to life. To illustrate the extreme contempt for 

human life the Castro regime has displayed from its inception, we 

need just recall three of its flagrant atrocities that occurred on the 

month of July of different years. 

In 1994, on a day like today, July 13, a group of 68, including 

many women and children, boarded a tugboat to escape to the 

United States. Three boats were waiting for them, alerted by infiltrators. With high-pressure water jets, they began ripping children 

from their parents arms and sweeping terrified passengers off to 

sea. Finally, they rammed and sunk the fleeing tugboat, drowning 

all those who had taken refuge in the cargo hold. With survivors 

clinging to pieces of wreckage, the pursuing boats then circled 

around them seeking to drown them with wave turbulence. Thirtyseven perished including 11 children. 

Fourteen years earlier, on July 6, 1980, Cuban Navy boats and 

an air force plane had attacked an excursion boat that toured the 

Canimar River of Matanzas loaded with passengers who tried to 

flee to the United States. The exact number of victims from that 

massacre is unknown, but numbers in the dozens and included 

children. 

Among hundreds of July victims of the Castros, two stand out. 

On July 22nd, 2012, Oswaldo Paya, arguably Cuba’s leading opposition figure, and Harold Cepero, a young activist from his organization, were killed in a car accident believed to have been caused 

by state agents. These are just examples of the large-scale and 

growing tragedy the Cuba Archive Project, which I head, is documenting and for which the Cuban regime has not been held accountable. 

To date, we’ve recorded over 6,100 deaths and disappearances 

caused by the Castro regime—or so attributed to the Castro regime 

by our Project—not from combat situations. Each has a detailed 

record. The victims include infants, pregnant women, the elderly, 

human rights defenders, Protestant pastors, Jehovah’s Witnesses, 

political prisoners, young men objecting to military service, and 

anyone who gets in the way of the Castros. Also on the list are 21 

U.S. citizens executed, assassinated, or disappeared, and six killed 

in terrorist attacks sponsored or supported by Cuba. 

We know, sadly, that this count is woefully lacking. What’s more, 

for it to be comprehensive it would have to include many more Cubans who have perished and extended to many countries where 

13

Cuba has created, supported, and promoted wars, subversion, and 

terrorism as today in nearby Venezuela and Colombia. The human 

toll of the Castro dynasty is easily, in my view, several hundred 

thousand and counting. 

Things are not much better since Raul Castro, until 10 years ago 

the number two man, assumed supreme command in Cuba, replacing his brother, Fidel. Since then and until last December 31st, 

Cuba Archive has documented 264 cases of death and disappearance, a count we know is very incomplete. 

A particularly troubling aspect of the ongoing crimes of the Cuba 

regime relates to the grave abuses committed by Cuban authorities 

against persons attempting to escape the country. The attacks appear to have declined, in part because Cuba has perfected a highly 

lucrative business from exporting people that welcomes most departures; yet killings, beatings, torture, and other abuses perpetrated on those fleeing have not stopped. 

To take just one example, on December 16, 2014, the day before 

President Obama made his surprise announcement of normalizing 

relations with Cuba, 32-year-old Liosbel Diaz disappeared after 

Cuban border guards sunk, reportedly in international waters, the 

boat in which he was escaping with 31 passengers, including 

women and children. 

What’s perhaps more egregious is the aberration of a tropical 

Berlin Wall at Guantanamo, altogether overlooked by the free 

world. Twenty-six years after the fall of the infamous Berlin Wall, 

a deadlier replica now lasting twice longer stands in Communist 

Cuba. Barbed wire, mine fields, watch towers, ferocious dogs, 

sharpshooters, all to prevent escapes to the U.S. base in Guantanamo. It has a sordid extension, a sea wall in the Bay added in the 

mid-1990s to prevent swimmers from reaching the U.S. base. 

Cuba Archive has documented several dozen individuals killed or 

disappeared while attempting to flee to our base in Guantanamo, 

but we believe that hundreds, perhaps thousands have paid with 

their lives, limbs, eyes, or years of prison for attempting the crossing in the last 51⁄2 decades. Our Government is well aware of the 

land mines on the Cuban side and that the Cuban guards stationed 

around our base have orders to shoot to kill the fence jumpers. 

Let me finish with an important clarification. Our work is not 

primarily about lists or statistics. Each number or name on these 

lists, or the victims missing from them, is a story, a stolen life, a 

circle of loved ones left behind in grief, and to date without foreseeable justice. We try to honor each person by gathering as much information as possible and dedicating an individual record of our 

database to each one, but it is impossible to have a full tally of the 

magnitude of this tragedy, and much less to convey the loss and 

suffering connected to each story, or to this overall calamity. At 

times, it overwhelms. 

I urge you to visit our Web site, CubaArchive.org, and familiarize 

yourself with these stories, at least see some of the faces, as we 

have pictures of many victims. The Cuban regime is guilty of egregious, extensive, and ongoing crimes against humanity. This is an 

amply documented fact that reputable governments and institutions, as well as principled individuals can only ignore at will. I 

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punity and engaging it on its terms only produces more victims and 

provides resources for its tyrannical ways. That is not just bad for 

the Cuban people, the imprint of this regime is exported globally 

with the help of rogue allies, and that is to the detriment of our 

security and of global freedom and peace. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Werlau follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Ms. Werlau. 

And I’d like to now go to Mr. Thale. 

STATEMENT OF MR. GEOFF THALE, PROGRAM DIRECTOR, 

WASHINGTON OFFICE ON LATIN AMERICA 

Mr. THALE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you, Mr. Sires and 

Ms. Bass, as well, for the opportunity to speak here. I will probably 

present, as Ms. Bass said, something of a minority view on the 

panel. 

I’m the Program Director of the Washington Office on Latin 

America. We look at human rights and social justice issues in the 

hemisphere. I have followed Cuba issues since the mid-1990s, and 

I’ve traveled there about three dozen times. We have a pretty broad 

set of contacts from Cuban Government officials through academics, the religious community, and to people in the dissident 

community. 

I think we heard on this panel a set of very serious and real concerns about the human rights situation in Cuba. There are serious 

and real human rights problems on the island; although, I probably 

wouldn’t paint them in as uniformly grim a way as some of the 

other panelists here would. But I think the question is less about 

the specifics of the situation than about how the U.S. responds to 

that situation. And the argument I would make is that after we 

have spent 56 years on an embargo and a policy regime change, 

this had little impact on the human rights situation on the island. 

Since December 17, we’ve made what I think is a healthy shift to 

a policy of engagement that over time is far more likely to make 

a real difference in the human rights situation in Cuba. It will give 

us an opportunity to project our values and our interests, and will 

strengthen broadly our contacts in human society. 

So overall, I want to make three points, one very quickly about 

Cuba today, one about changes that are going on in Cuba itself, 

and then finally come back to the U.S. role in addressing the 

human rights situation and U.S. policy toward the island. 

We’ve heard about the human rights situation in Cuba today. 

There are violations of freedom of speech and freedom of association. There’s only one legal political party on the island. Those are 

real and very serious concerns. And as we’ve heard, there’s harassment of dissidents, and though we didn’t talk about it much here, 

pretty clearly a policy of torture and detention of dissidents. 

As important for most Cubans along with the human rights situation, probably for most Cubans more important, the economy is 

stagnant and people, especially young people, are looking for opportunity. I don’t think we should paint everything as grim in Cuba. 

Life expectancy is long, the medical system is reasonably good, literacy is high. There have been some efforts to address racial inequity, LGBT issues, and women’s participation in the workforce. 

All that said, no question there are real and serious human rights 

in Cuba. 

I think what’s important, my second point here, is that there is 

a process of change going on on the island itself. I think we know 

about some of the economic changes. They are halting, there’s a lot 

of back and forth in this process, but there’s clearly movement toward the emergence of a private sector, toward greater foreign inVerDate 0ct 09 2002 15:37 Oct 04, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\071316\20745 SHIRL
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vestment, and toward what eventually will be a more mixed economy in Cuba. 

Along with that, and I think this has been less talked about, but 

I think it is evident that within Cuba itself we have seen greater 

political openness, and greater political debate, and greater access 

to and sharing of information in the last several years than we 

have seen in previous decades. And I think that’s important. 

I think we’ve seen the spread of cell phone technology. I think 

we’ve seen limited but real increases in Internet access. I think 

we’ve seen far more blogs and bloggers in Cuba itself expressing a 

much wider range of political opinions. I think we’ve seen the sharing through thumb drives of regular sets of information, including 

a lot of information from the United States, and everything from 

newspaper columns to the latest television shows. I think we’ve 

seen greater official tolerance of all of that behavior, and I think 

we’ve seen more debate among the nascent civil society, in the academic community, and even at official Cuban media than we have 

in the past. So I think there’s a limited, we shouldn’t exaggerate, 

but there’s a real process of internal change going on driven in part 

by the economic change, driven in part by increased access to information and the internet. 

In that context, the change in our relationship with Cuba is important. Before December 17th, our policy, a policy of embargo and 

regime change, did very little. I think if you look back, it did very 

little to actually encourage change on the island. In fact, more 

often than not, it offered the most hardlined sector in the Cuban 

Communist party an excuse to crack down further on dissent. I 

think since December 17th and under the new approach we have 

seen that U.S. policy interacting with changes going on on the island encourages greater openness and greater tolerance. 

We heard a comment earlier about President Obama’s visit, and 

I’d say I think President Obama’s visit is actually an example of 

ways in which U.S. engagement helps open space. The President 

came, he gave a press conference. Raul Castro may or may not 

have responded to the question about human rights and political 

prisoners, but he was forced for the first time in public and on 

Cuban television to answer a set of uncensored questions from an 

international press audience. The President, our President, followed that with a nationally televised live speech in which he 

warmly greeted the Cuban people and made some of the strongest 

criticisms of the Cuban Government that they’ve heard on public 

television in many years. And then that whole visit was both preceded and followed by real debate in Cuban society, in its 

blogosphere, and even in the official media about what the President’s visit was and meant, and what its impact has been. 

So I think the argument is, in fact, our engagement rather than 

allowing the Cuban Government to tighten its grip, has actually 

helped loosen the grip, and increased flexibility, access to information, and openness. I think it’s clear the President’s policy and our 

approach to Cuba is broadly supported on the island itself. Polls 

show that Cubans overwhelmingly support normal relations with 

the United States and, in fact, that many Cuban dissidents and 

whatever their view of the government support normalization of 

U.S.-Cuban relations. It’s clearly popular in the Cuban-American 

23

community here, and among U.S. population in general. And I 

think over time it is going to contribute to greater political openness in Cuba, and that is in our national interest and the interest 

of the Cuban people. 

We shouldn’t be naive about that process. It will be slow, it will 

be complicated, there will be difficulties along the way, but I think 

in the end the evidence is very strongly that a policy of engagement 

is more likely to contribute to change in the human rights situation 

in Cuba than the policies we’ve had in the past. Thanks. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Thale follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Thale, thank you very much. 

I’d like to begin the questioning first asking Dr. Biscet. Years ago 

I met Armando Valladares, who had spent numerous years in Cuba 

prisons. He was tortured horribly. He wrote a book called ‘‘Against 

All Hope,’’ I’ve read it twice. I actually went with him to the U.N. 

Human Rights Commission. Frank Calzon has been there many 

times bearing witness to human rights abuses, including sex trafficking, and I’ll never forget reading the book when he described 

the tortures that were systematic, the Ho Chi Minh poles, the terrible degrading perversions that were imposed upon political prisoners by the guards with the full assent of the Castro brothers for 

years. And I wonder if you could tell this subcommittee what it was 

like for you when you were in prison, how were you treated? How 

much time did you spend in solitary confinement? And if you could 

just provide us that insight. 

It was books like Richard Wumbrand’s ‘‘Tortured for Christ,’’ 

which got me into the religious freedom issue back in 1981 when 

he talked about what Nicholae Ceausescu’s secret police, called the 

Securitate, had done, that it woke up many of us in Congress about 

what, in that case, Ceausescu was all about. 

In the Communist regime of the Soviet Union, Solzhenitsyn laid 

bare what was going on in the gulags in Siberia. It is important 

that we know truly what’s going on behind those closed doors. If 

you could provide us with some insight? 

[The following was delivered through an interpreter.] 

Dr. BISCET. When one wants to know the nature of a society, 

first visit their prisons. And perhaps that’s why the Castro Communist regime doesn’t allow anyone to visit; the International Committee of the Red Cross is not allowed in, Amnesty International 

is not allowed in, Human Rights Watch is not allowed in, because 

then they would see the perverse nature of that regime. And first 

you need to remember that what you have in Cuba is a totalitarian 

Communist regime. You need to remember Stalin, remember Hitler; that’s what you have in Cuba. 

When many were making a profound critique of torture taking 

place in the Naval Station Guantanamo Bay prison camp with the 

terrorists, Fidel Castro at the same time was torturing in Cuba. 

One of the tortures that they used to commit was to hang people 

from the roof, from the ceiling with handcuffs with their legs dangling in the air for 10 to 24 hours. Another one was where they 

handcuffed individuals with their hands behind their back, and 

also handcuffing their feet in a reverse fetal position and leaving 

them several hours in their cell in that prone position. Another one 

is that they used the electric shock gun as a tool of persuasion for 

those who protest or complain. Another punishment that I saw was 

to be closed off in a punishment cell sometimes completely closed 

off, sometimes not, but with people sick with active tuberculosis. 

Another thing that I saw and suffered were being placed in small 

cells with people with HIV, but also with people who are mentally 

ill, and in that process people becoming infected with the virus. In 

another case they placed me in a very small cell with people who 

were mentally ill, taking away their psychotropic medication so 

they would be in a state of delirium so they would attack me. Also, 

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senters to cease and desist from their thinking by inciting to beat 

them. On three occasions, three inmates tried to murder me sent 

by officials of the prison. And this is how they with these inhuman 

practices seek to drive mad those who are there innocently. On one 

occasion, I was kept 5 months in a dark punishment cell. I only received water once a day, and it was at the same spot where one 

would defecate. In this cell, on one occasion I was without the ability to speak to another human being for 1 month. In broad strokes, 

those are the tortures applied or carried out in the prisons. 

We know that the Castros use the prisons and the common prisoners to try to break the freedom spirit of the Cuban people. In my 

last years in prison, my last 10 to 12 days, I was just eating bread 

and water because I feared that the political police would have me 

murdered. And they not only torture the person who dissents, but 

also their families. Families, when they go to make their visits, are 

searched and harassed as if they were criminals. And food and nutrients or vitamins that are taken there are also searched and often 

damaged in ways that negatively affect the health of the prisoner. 

And they also use the suspension of family visits as a way to impact not only the family, but also the prisoner. And the most barbaric thing I’ve seen, also, is the use of medicine as an instrument 

of torture where patients who are sick are denied medical assistance, and then have died. 

Mr. SMITH. As we said, I do have a lot of questions. I’ll ask one, 

yield to my good friend, Albio, and then come back to some of those 

questions. But let me just thank you for giving us that terrible insight as to what you have endured. 

I have tried to get to Cuba for 20 years and have been denied 

a visa each and every time. Most recently, I met with Jose Cabanas, the Ambassador of Cuba to the United States. He made it 

clear that if I were to go, I’d have to agree to certain parameters 

in terms of who I could meet with. And I’m wondering, Mr. Thale, 

last time you were here in February 2015 testifying, I asked you 

if you had in your many visits, and I think you said 36 so far, or 

approximately, whether or not you visited any dissidents in prison, 

and I’m wondering have you done that, one. And, secondly, did you 

raise the case with your Cuban interlocutors the case of Dr. Oscar 

Biscet while you were in Cuba? 

Mr. THALE. I have not visited a prison on my trips. I have visited——

Mr. SMITH. Have you requested to do so? 

Mr. THALE. No, and I’d be happy to do that, as a matter of fact. 

In Cuba and in many countries prison systems are terrible places 

and need to be reformed, and I’d be happy to make that request. 

And I know there’s been discussion about the ICRC visit, so think 

that’s perfectly legitimate. 

I have not raised Dr. Biscet’s case. I have raised a number of 

cases, of individual cases as well as general human rights cases 

with Cuba authorities——

Mr. SMITH. But no specific dissidents, or no dissidents by name? 

Mr. THALE. I have named—no, I’ve named a number of individual cases over the years, including the 75 who were arrested in 

2003. I raised that personally with the Cuban Foreign Minister, so 

33

I’ve raised a range of those cases. I obviously raised the Alan Gross 

case, as well. 

Mr. SMITH. Just so I know, was there any reason why you didn’t 

raise Dr. Biscet? There was a campaign that Albio Sires, Ileana 

Ros-Lehtinen, Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Mario Diaz-Balart, and I, and 

many others to have Dr. Biscet named as a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. I know he was under review for that. It was a global effort. 

We certainly in Congress had a bipartisan effort to do so. His 

prominence and his gravitas, his courage, I don’t know how he survived all of the cruelty that was imposed upon him. I have no idea. 

Faith, I’m not sure how he could have survived it, and to be here 

speaking so eloquently and in such calm tones when he has been 

so maltreated by a dictatorship. I would have hoped you would 

have raised his case. 

Maybe you could help me get that visa, because I want to go to 

the prisons. I have been asking—just let me say parenthetically 

and I, again, will yield to Dr. Biscet. I’ve been in Chinese gulags, 

Beijing Prison Number One, when Xanana Gusmao of East Timor 

was in a Jakarta prison. Jakarta, the Indonesians allowed me into 

that prison. Along with Frank Wolf, we got in during the worst 

days of the Soviet Union into Perm Camp 35 which is where 

Sharansky was held and many other political prisoners. All of 

those dictatorships allowed us in into the prisons, and we can’t get 

into the prisons of Castro’s Cuba. It is very telling. Albio. 

Mr. SIRES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Biscet, thank you very 

much. 

You know, Mr. Thale, I came here when I was 11 years old, 1962, 

and I have been dealing with the Cuban community where I live 

ever since. I represent the second largest concentration of CubanAmericans outside of Miami. And I get that 55 years or 57 years 

without any kind of talking. It’s a long time, but my biggest complaint is that we have given away pressure points where we could 

have drawn concessions from the Cuban Government. At a time 

when Venezuela can no longer provide the kind of assistance that 

it provided before, at a time when Russia can’t actually do anything for Cuba, Cuba seems to be on its own, and we seem to be 

throwing them a lifesaver, in terms of getting concessions from 

them. This government is not going to give any concessions until 

some pressure is put on them. And the President can go to Cuba, 

the Pope can go to Cuba, two Popes can go to Cuba and nothing 

changes. So to me, you know, this picture that you paint of all 

these changes, I disagree with you. I don’t think it’s that great of 

a change. 

People go to Cuba, they tell you who you can meet with. Have 

you met with dissidents? Do you get a chance to meet with any dissidents you want? Because I know that Members come, you know, 

first thing they tell the Members when they go to Cuba is this is 

the group of people you can’t meet with. 

I’m not finished yet. In terms of the economy, 85 percent of the 

economy in Cuba is controlled by the government. When they talk 

about economic growth for the people of Cuba, we’re not talking 

about the people of Cuba. Maybe they own an ice cream parlor, 

maybe they sell hot dogs, maybe they sell hamburgers, but still you 

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ment for the workers. And the government tells you what to pay, 

and then they in turn pay peanuts to the workers of Cuba. So how 

are the Cuban people going to benefit? 

My complaint is we just don’t insist on concessions from this government. And, you know, I don’t know, I’ve made it clear to the 

President. I’m not telling you anything that I haven’t told the 

White House, or I have said at the committee. But, you know, negotiations are a two-way street. Now they want Bank of Cuba, they 

want Cuba to buy—they don’t—they can’t buy anything. They’re 

one of the biggest debtor nations in the world, so how are they 

going to buy anything? They’re going to run billions of dollars of 

debt and then they’re going to expect people to forgive the money. 

So I know we have to start someplace, but my biggest problem is 

we started and we didn’t get any real concessions. 

And in terms of JoAnne Chesimard, I’m constantly meeting with 

the State Troopers in New Jersey. I was the Speaker of the House 

in New Jersey for 4 years. We went down Florida when they put 

the $1 million bounty on JoAnne Chesimard, and we had a press 

conference. Now it’s $2 million. And now they’re talking about exchanging prisoners, Montes for JoAnne Chesimard. There’s no reason we should give up a spy because you have a person who shot 

somebody point blank on the New Jersey Turnpike and ran to 

Cuba, and has been living there as if she was a hero. 

So, I get your position, I understand your job. You get your orders, but what I have said to you I have told the people at the 

White House. I’ve been here 10 years and I’ve been firm on my position. You want something for Cuba, give me something in return. 

Stop the abuses. Just listen to some of the abuses. Why must we 

always give in? 

And as far as all the—I get this—people tell me all the time oh, 

we now have a better relation with everybody else because now—

there’s not one country that has spoken up about the abuses of 

human rights in Cuba for 18 months. I hear Argentina talking 

about the abuses in Venezuela, but I don’t hear anybody talking 

about the abuses in Cuba. So that argument to me is bogus because they don’t speak, they’re afraid of the Cuban Government. 

They’re afraid that they may foment the college studies and the 

universities in their country against the government if they speak 

up. So there you have it; tell me what you think. 

Mr. THALE. Well, thank you, Congressman Sires. Respectfully, 

obviously, we do see the situation differently. I’ve had family that 

lived in Cuba at one time or another, but I’m not Cuban-American, 

and my family members were passing through. My family is Irish, 

and they feel—through three generations feel personal and incredibly powerful stories about the British and their attitude toward 

the Irish. And I understand those kind of strong personal feelings. 

So I understand, and I think we’ve heard stories here that are very 

real, and very powerful. I understand the importance of that. 

My view is that the decision to normalize relations was made because it was—I think because it was in the U.S. national interest 

to do so. I think it did help with our relationship with other partners in the hemisphere, particularly with Colombia. I think it does 

help with some of our business interests, and I think it’s fundamentally clear that what we have done over the last 57 years, 

35

which is to say no concessions, no nothing until you change or collapse hasn’t worked, so I think we need a new approach. I don’t 

think that the Obama administration came in, and I know we’ll 

dispute about this, but came in saying we’re going to make concessions. I think the Obama administration came in saying we are 

going to take a new approach that’s in our interest, and that we 

believe over time will lead to change in your society. I don’t think 

it came in saying the changes will be A, B, C, and D in exactly this 

order, and we’re going to tell you what to do, but I think it came 

in believing that engagement and ending hostility is more likely to 

generate greater flexibility and more people inside Cuba and inside 

Cuban society who want to push for change internally and on their 

own terms. And I think we’re beginning to see that. I don’t think 

it’s easy. I don’t think any of this process is magical, but I don’t—

but I do think that over time it’s far more likely to make a difference. 

Mr. SIRES. I want the best for Cuba. I just think we have different ways from my experience, my life experience of how to approach and deal with the Cuban Government. I’ll just give you an 

example that just happened to me. My aunt came from Cuba not 

too long ago. She went back to see her daughter. I asked her to get 

me a copy of my birth certificate. She went to the Municipal Building, they denied my birth certificate because they said I was a terrorist. So like anything in Cuba, they gave $20 to somebody, I have 

four copies in my house today. I can tell you other things that has 

happened to families of mine because they’re related to me, how 

they lost their job, how they pressure the family. And people that 

were educated on the island, and educated in Russia, once they 

found out they were my cousins, they became persona non grata. 

So, you know, I do have emotional ties to Cuba, but my biggest 

problem is look, let’s negotiate, let’s negotiate. 

And this business that the Cuban people are improving the economy when 85 percent of the economy is run by the government, 

and if you don’t work for the government you can’t get a job, which 

is what happened to my cousin. He was an engineer; he lost his 

job. And where do you go; you’re an engineer in Cuba and you don’t 

work for the government? You become a taxi driver. 

Mr. THALE. The emerging private sector in Cuba does probably 

include between 25 and 30 percent of the workforce. Within that, 

there’s a small set of people who are making real money. I think 

there’s very little question about that. And then there actually is—

we’re beginning to see for the first time in 55 years people working 

in the private sector for others. Right now, those people are probably making more than they’d make in the state sector; although, 

down the road we’ll have to see what happens there. But there is 

an emerging private sector. It is not the——

Mr. SIRES. It’s a small group of people that are benefitting from 

the tourists, but it’s not the island or the workforce of the island. 

That’s still controlled by the government. 

Mr. THALE. So the government workforce is probably 70 percent, 

75 percent. It’s smaller than it was, but it’s clearly an overwhelmingly majority; that’s true. All I’m saying is that we are seeing the 

beginnings of a small private sector emerging, and within that 

we’re seeing some workers and some owners. 

36

Mr. SIRES. Mr. Thale, quite frankly, a lot of that force, a lot of 

those people were there before the engagement. Okay? A lot of 

these people that were selling and trading, and everything else, it 

was there before we did this engagement with them, so there was 

already a small amount of people trading back and forth within the 

country. You can only repress an economy so much. The Cuban 

people tend to be pretty good at making a buck, whether it’s here 

or there. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Sires. 

I’ll ask a question or two, then yield to my friend. And then I 

have some final questions after that. 

The Washington Post has been probably the most outspoken in 

its editorial pages; one of the editorials was ‘‘Failure in Cuba.’’ 

They’ve had a series of important statements to be made. They’ve 

pointed out that the economic lifeline to Cuba when the Soviet 

Union diminished, then Russia in terms of their ability to provide 

economic assistance to Cuba; Venezuela, with the decline of oil 

prices they lost their capability. Now they’re really in dire straits 

and cannot funnel money to Havana. And then the U.S. stepped in 

right at the precise time to keep the dictatorship afloat. 

The Washington Post, one of their editorials, on January 31 said, 

‘‘Mr. Obama continues to offer the Castro regime unilateral concessions requiring nothing in return. Since the United States has 

placed no human rights conditions on the opening, the Castro regime continues to systematically engage in arbitrary detention of 

dissidents and others who speak up for democracy. In fact, detentions have spiked in recent months. The state continues to monopolize radio, television, and newspapers.’’

In another just published editorial, this by Jackson Diehl, deputy 

editorial page editor, he writes and he does profile Dr. Biscet. He 

says that, ‘‘Obama’s policy has had the effect of stranding the most 

American pro-democracy people in Cuba, the activists who have 

spent their lives fighting the system at enormous personal cost. 

While the regime collects U.S. cooperation in dollars, repression of 

the opposition has sharply increased. According to the Cuban Commission for Human Rights, there were 6,075 political arrests during the first 5 months of this year, 2016, the highest number in 

decades.’’ If that isn’t a clear suggestion of a failed policy, wait, and 

wait for what, as things go from bad to worse, as more people are 

being rounded up, as catch and release becomes the modus operandi for the Castro brothers. So I think we need to put this in perspective. 

I was for the Apartheid sanctions against South Africa, the sanctions against Russia most recently, the sanctions against China 

when they were in place. Unfortunately, they’ve been lifted, and we 

have seen a diminution of human rights respect under Xi Jinping’s 

regime in the People’s Republic of China. We put sanctions on in 

order to say we’re not kidding, conditions are about human rights, 

and about the great people like Dr. Biscet and others who are suffering unspeakable cruelty because they want freedom and democracy. 

I would ask a question, how many people—and maybe, Ms. 

Werlau, you might have this answer, one of you might. How many 

people has the Castro regime tortured over these many decades? 

37

How many people have they killed because of their political positions? It seems to me the number is so high, and I’ve seen estimates, but I would appreciate your thoughts, that the Castro brothers ought to be referred from the Security Council to the International Criminal Court, the ICC, the tribunal for crimes against 

humanity. We are talking about large numbers of people over the 

course of many decades, systematic repression and, of course, a systematic murdering of people who don’t agree with the regime. Your 

thoughts? And, again, if anyone has any insights as to how many 

people. Ms. Werlau? 

Ms. WERLAU. I don’t think anybody can answer how many people 

because we simply don’t know. But I just want to point out that 

the Stasi files that were recovered point to around 60,000 political 

prisoners, I forgot, I think in the early 1970s or late 1960s. There 

are just no statistics. 

But I do want to say something that comes to mind. We do know 

how many the Pinochet dictatorship killed in its 15-year life, and 

that’s 3,187 is the total of disappeared and killed by the Pinochet 

regime. And I never heard any human rights organization argue 

that we must engage the Pinochet regime on its own terms, that 

we must somehow convince them, by giving people cell phones or 

whatever, that they need to change. The fact of the matter is, the 

Chilean society was never totalitarian, and yet the whole community, the whole worldwide community, condemned dictatorship in 

Chile. And that’s what’s been missing, a multilateral approach to 

say we’re not going to engage an illegitimate criminal regime on its 

terms. We’re going to demand conditions. 

What has failed is that government. Engagement has been tried 

by European countries, by Canada, by Latin America for decades; 

we traded, invested, supported, given credibility, given assistance 

to Cuba, you name it, and nothing has worked. What we need to 

do is to try to get a multilateral approach to understand that that 

is the nature of that regime, that we must set conditions to engage 

it. 

[The following was delivered through an interpreter.] 

Ms. AVILA LEON. I was surprised to hear the defense of the regime by the gentleman on my left. The rental houses provided by 

the regime have been used as a reward for torture, for assaults. 

This is similar to what happened with the opening of agricultural 

and other properties, that it was done for a show externally, but 

it was being provided to those with privileges in the regime, with 

those that are well connected. It’s not something that helps the 

Cuban people. 

And if you want a more clearer demonstration of the failure of 

this policy, is what happened within hours of President Obama’s 

arrival in Havana, which was the repression and violence visited 

upon the Ladies in White in Todos Marchamos. 

Sole proprietors are getting most of the money. They’re there to 

control tourists, they are getting their remittances, but I can provide firsthand evidence. My son, who was 181⁄2 years a member of 

the Cuban Armed Forces for not tying me down and declaring me 

insane was fired from the Armed Forces, and is unable to get work 

now. 

38

I believe that the gentleman who was testifying to my left, what 

he’s reporting on is the regime’s propaganda campaign. It’s what 

he’s observing. The investors and the tourists are a smokescreen 

that do not demonstrate the profound poverty that the Cuban people are submerged in, the cruel poverty, which really does descend 

to the level of slavery in terms of the little payment that is provided for those who work in the government sector. And I invite 

those who have this view, if they come to Cuba to walk with me, 

and I can show them the real Cuba. 

[The following was delivered through an interpreter.] 

Dr. BISCET. I think we need to remember people, we who are 

present here, that when I said that this regime is Hitler and Stalin-like, it is Hitler and Stalin-like. The number of dead may not 

be the same, but there is a machinery of death that operates as 

that of Hitler and Stalin. They arrived in power January 1, 1959. 

Raul Castro engaged in the first mass execution with a mass grave 

in the first month of the revolution; 900 people in the first month 

were executed, 500 of them for thinking differently. They did not 

pertain to the previous regime. The death penalty exists to terrorize the population and to control it. 

Prior to the revolution between 1902 and 1950, there was no 

practical death penalty in practice in Cuba. There was a regulation 

that if someone in the military was a traitor to their country with 

a foreign power, they could be executed, but beyond that it didn’t 

exist on paper, and it wasn’t applied in practice. 

This dictatorship has engaged in mass executions, mass jailings, 

mass confiscations of properties to impose state terror, and to use 

the state terror to control the Cuban people through fear. So it 

really is state terrorism, and there is a Cold War continuing in our 

country, but it is against our own people. And these days because 

that terror has been so effective, it doesn’t have to be a mass terror, it’s a selective terror against all who raise their voice, all who 

associate freely or assemble freely. They can be targeted. 

The last three young men to be executed in Cuba in 2003, young 

Afro-Cuban men, were executed with the purpose of terrorizing the 

Cuban population, especially the Afro-Cuban population. Since 

then there have been no more executions, but the death penalty remains on the books. Raul Castro has said that if they need to do 

what they did in 2003, they will do it again. And please have that 

present. 

Ms. BASS. Okay, we’re going to be called for votes in just a second. Okay, I just wanted to say a couple of things. Number one, 

I do hope that I see the day in the United States that we get rid 

of the death penalty, as well. 

I just wanted to correct a couple of things, or at least give my 

viewpoint, anyway, of President Obama’s visit. I was there with the 

President, and I thought it was frankly extremely remarkable that 

the President of the United States spoke to the Cuban people and 

was quite openly critical of Cuba. He had a meeting with dissidents, and the people that he met with were chosen by the U.S. 

Embassy, they were not chosen by the Cuban Government. I think, 

frankly, that that was a very remarkable thing, and I could only 

imagine a head of state coming to the United States and meeting 

with a group of Black Lives Matter or other people here who have 

39

issues, or raise issues in the United States and say that Raul Castro wants to come and visit San Quentin, or wants to raise questions about what it happening in this country, raising questions 

about the African-American population in the United States, why 

so many people have been killed by police officers, why the unemployment rate is so high, why the education rate is low, why we 

have systemic discrimination in the United States. 

So I think that, to me, 50 years of one policy that didn’t work, 

I understand the definition of insanity is to keep going the same 

thing and then expect different results. To me, it makes sense that 

we have a new policy and it is certainly my understanding when 

the Obama administration has been in negotiations with the Cuban 

Government, that they have consistently raised human rights, 

human rights violations. And it’s my understanding that when we 

engage in negotiations with many other countries, that that is also 

what we do. We don’t leave that off the table. 

With that, I’m going to go vote. Thank you. I’ll yield back to the 

chair. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much. Dr. Biscet, you wanted to finish your comment? 

[The following was delivered through an interpreter.] 

Dr. BISCET. I think it’s important because we just brought up the 

issue of race, and I think it’s important that we talk about the 

issue of race in Cuba. 

In the U.S., these difficulties can be resolved in the court of law 

where the judiciary is independent, but in Cuba the courts are subject to the arbitrary whims of the executive. 

The Afro-Cuban population in Cuba is one that’s most discriminated against, but that’s not the greatest issue confronting Cuba. 

The greatest issue is the political and ideological apartheid that exists in the country where all persons who think or speak differently 

are discriminated and looked down upon by the Cuban regime. 

In Cuba there’s no right to vote, there’s no right to free elections. 

The elemental human rights that are defended so much here in the 

United States are what is lacking, or what are lacking in Cuba. 

The history of the United States and the people of the United 

States is a beautiful story of integration. When you fought for your 

independence from Great Britain, there were Cubans on the island 

who sent assistance to help you in your struggle. There were poor 

families in Cuba that although they had very few resources gave 

what little they had to assist in the independence of the United 

States. And we’re also very proud that the American people took 

a part in the independence of Cuba. And when the Joint Resolution 

of 1898 was done, it guaranteed the independence and freedom of 

the Cuban nation. Four years in 1902, thanks to this Joint Resolution to this document, the Cubans had their freedom and their 

independence. And it was signed here in this place by this Congress, and signed by President McKinley. 

And we also have to be proud of another law that exists today, 

which is the law of freedom and solidarity, otherwise known as the 

Helms-Burton Law which guarantees a democratic Cuba. And that 

document has within it that law, that to have diplomatic relations 

that the regime or the government that you’re dealing with has to 

be undergoing a transition to democracy, or that it be a democratic 

40

government. Nevertheless, this law has been violated by the administration that’s actually in power. Our people are still living 

under this modern slavery which is communism and socialism. 

Many years ago, your country had a Civil War because part of 

the country wanted to maintain part of the population in slavery, 

and that violated the U.S. Constitution; principally, those basic 

human rights found in the Bill of Rights. We have our own Rights 

Charter like that of the Bill of Rights in our Constitution of 1940. 

And for that reason I ask Representative Starling to reflect on this, 

that all those rights found in the 1940 Constitution have been abrogated in a de facto manner. And that’s what we want, we want 

to have the same rights you have. And please take a look at the 

conditions on the ground before you start giving additional concessions. 

I want to show you something beautiful. The first thing that free 

Cuban people did when they got their independence was to have 

a referendum of what statue they would place in Havana. The Cubans voted for our Apostle Jose Marti, and while they waited for 

the building of the statue of Jose Marti, they inaugurated another 

statue remembering America; and that is the Statue of Liberty in 

the Central Park of Cuba, which is the most famous park in Cuba. 

That’s what the United States represents to Cuba, freedom. 

Mr. SMITH. Dr. Biscet, we’re out of time for 14 votes that have 

just occurred on the House floor. I want to thank you, and thank 

all of you for your testimony. I wish this could go longer, but it is 

on zero, and I will miss an important vote on Iran. So I want to 

thank you. 

I have some additional questions on trafficking. Yesterday, the 

administration gave an upgrade again for the second year in a row 

to Cuba. I wrote that law on trafficking. I think it was a horrific 

decision politically motivated, and my hope is that they will revisit 

it even before next year because it was a mistake to give a passing 

grade to a country where sex and labor trafficking flourishes. 

The hearing is adjourned, and again I thank you. I do have to 

run. 

[Whereupon, at 5:24 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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A P P E N D I X 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

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MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD BY THE HONORABLE CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, 

A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY, AND CHAIRMAN, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS


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