Cuba Sí

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cuba solidarity festival "20 years of Cuba Sí" in July 2011 in Berlin's Parkaue . Speaker: Hans Modrow

The AG Cuba Sí at the party executive of the party Die Linke is an independent working group of the party Die Linke with the aim of political and material solidarity with socialist Cuba . The Federal Ministry of the Interior rated Cuba Sí in the reports for the protection of the constitution from 2007 to 2015 as “openly extremist”.

structure

The organization was founded on July 23, 1991 and is based in Berlin. According to its own statements, the AG has 400 members in over 40 politically independent and independent regional groups in Germany, which, however, operate nationwide. Three full-time employees coordinate the work. Cuba Sí is financed through donations.

Political work

Cuba Sí publishes the magazine Cuba Sí-revista , which appears twice a year. In addition, Cuba Sí is co-organizer of the annual Rosa Luxemburg Conference and appears at various events with stands. Both at events and via the Internet, Cuba Sí distributes a wide range of texts in which the policy of the Cuban government is presented positively and the position of the Cuban government is represented on controversial political issues (e.g. human rights, freedom of the press, free elections) .

In addition, Cuba Sí organizes “political trips” to Cuba, including every year to the international book fair in Havana, as well as trips called “work camps” which, in addition to visits to various institutions supervised by state organizations, also include voluntary work and for “the acceptance of the Cuban system basic requirement "is.

Aid projects

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.
No sources of information (individual records) are given for the entire relief campaigns (sections “Milk for Cuba's Children”, “Cuba Must Survive” and “Almendares Vivo”).

"Milk for Cuba's Children"

This project supports milk production in Cuba. The project partner is the Cuban Association for Animal Production (ACPA). Confirmed project proposals, half-yearly project reports and regular evaluations and workshops are part of the project work. In 2011 the projects will be carried out in four provinces of the country: Havana , Sancti Spiritus , Pinar del Río and Guantánamo . Cooperatives and state-run companies are funded. In addition, the living conditions of the people who work and live there are to be improved through the expansion and construction of new houses or the promotion of a sustainable energy supply based on biogas or solar energy.

"Cuba must survive"

The aim of the project is the material support of the social infrastructure in the project regions, the realization of short-term projects in the fields of education, health, culture and others as well as the guarantee of political work and solidarity campaigns of the AG Cuba Sí with the party executive of the left.

"Almendares Vivo"

Almendares Vivo is a cultural project that Cuba Sí supports together with the musician Gerardo Alfonso and several international non-governmental organizations . The project is named after the Almendares Park in Havana and its amphitheater. The aim is to offer artists a stage and to enrich the cultural life in Havana. Since the entrance fees for the events are only a few cents, the project cannot be carried out without outside help. Cuba Sí supports the project, among other things, with the delivery of musical instruments and accessories. The work is often carried out against the bureaucratism that is also pronounced in Cuba and the mistrust of some cultural officials about the aims and forms of the project.

effect

According to the Cuban partners of the Association for Animal Production, ACPA, Cuba Sí contributed to the production of more than 20 million liters of milk in the 20 years of its existence up to 2011. This could have saved over $ 10 million on the import of milk powder. Almost 10,000 hectares of arable and pasture land have been made usable again. 374 houses for the cattle breeders and 400 stables have been built or repaired. The project regions also benefit from the support. So could z. B. irrigation systems and water supply systems are repaired or newly installed, 61 biogas plants are built and 250,000 trees are planted. A complete blacksmith's workshop has been set up in the province of Guantánamo.

Cooperation with other organizations

Organizations with which Cuba Sí maintains partnership contacts are the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), the Cuban Institute for Friendship of Peoples (ICAP), the headquarters of the Cuban trade unions (CTC), the pioneering organization "José Martí" (OPJM) the magazine Bohemia , the Cuban Chamber of the Book (CCL), the cultural project Almendares Vivo and others. Cuba Sí is still a member of the nationwide network Cuba - informationsbüro e. V. and maintains partnerships with national and international Cuba solidarity organizations.

Support from Venezuela

In August 2017, Cuba Si published a statement by the "Network Cuba", of which the group is a member, in connection with the political development in Venezuela : "We stand firmly on the side of the Bolivarian government and the civilized people".

Observation by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution

Like other groups that are close to the party Die Linke or are directly associated with it, the Federal Ministry of the Interior describes Cuba Sí as "openly extremist" in the reports for the protection of the constitution from 2007 to 2013. The Office for the Protection of the Constitution 2008 notes that in March 2008 Cuba Sí published a joint call for support for socialist Cuba with the DKP and the “Kommunistische Arbeiterzeitung” (KAZ). The appeal said:

“Solidarity with Cuba! (...) What these henchmen of US state terrorism mean is clear: overthrow the Cuban government and the socialist order! We call on the friends of the Cuban people and their socialist government: Let's defend Cuba's independence and sovereignty! "

The Federal Government's report on the protection of the constitution justifies the list of the group with the lack of critical discussion of human rights violations in Cuba . Instead, according to the homepage of the AG Cuba Sí, Kuba would be presented as "exemplary in the realization of human rights". The Bavarian State Ministry of the Interior expresses concern in its own constitution protection report 2008 that Die Linke does not fully share the basic democratic understanding of human rights and that working groups such as Cuba Sí are deliberately relativizing human rights violations in socialist states. For example, Cuba Sí expressly advocates Cuban-style socialism despite its obviously authoritarian nature from the point of view of the Bavarian official reporter .

criticism

The sociologist Klaus Meschkat criticizes that Cuba solidarity organizations like Cuba Sí! "To consider it their revolutionary duty to refrain from any open criticism of the Cuban leadership or even to justify repressive measures - at best with dutiful regret of the death penalty and its execution." In doing so, they renounced "to their own judgment in the face of the wisdom of one." brilliant leader " Fidel Castro , who, including his leadership, seems to be " above all criticism " . The Cuban revolution is religiously inflated.

In 1996, the news magazine Der Spiegel criticized a “glorification of the Castro regime” by Cuba Sí. The magazine also reported on PDS member Frank-Reginald Evertz, who originally wanted to found a kibbutz based on the Israeli model together with Cuba Sí on the island . However, Evertz immediately abandoned the plans after taking part in a two-month educational trip to Cuba. There he had met local opponents of the regime who were subjected to severe reprisals by the communist regime. As a result, Evertz made contact with the dissident group "Movement for Truth" and came to the conclusion: "There is tropical Stalinism in Cuba ."

According to the television magazine Kontraste, it is difficult to identify any specific confrontation by Cuba Sí with state human rights violations and political repression in Cuba , nor is a critical discussion about the one-party system and authoritarian governance in Cuba with regard to the inner-Cuban opposition . The Bundestag member of the Left Party Ulla Jelpke claimed that her answers in the Kontraste interview had been put in a wrong context.

The signing of the Cuba resolution of the European Parliament of February 2, 2006, in which the human rights violations by the Castro regime were criticized, by three German members of the Confederal Group of the European United Left ( André Brie , Helmuth Markov , Gabi Zimmer ) was in of the 2/2006 edition of the Cuba Sí Revista and described the resolution as a whole as an "unworthy scenario", which is in the tradition of " colonial manner" and "interference" in the "internal affairs of a state". The “peaceful change” sought by the European Parliament in Cuba is condemned as a policy in the style of “US foreign policy guided by hegemonic interests”. A discussion about human rights in Cuba should be conducted with the “Cubans” from a “solidary perspective” instead of with “opposition groups” as was previously the case.

literature

  • Heinz-W. Hammer, Frank Schwitalla: Solidarity - the tenderness of the peoples . Small reference work on the 20-year history of the Netzwerk Cuba eV, Papyrossa, 2013, ISBN 978-3-89438-523-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Constitutional Protection Report for 2007: Constitutional Protection Report 2007 ( Memento of September 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (p. 152), Constitutional Protection Report for 2015, Constitutional Protection Report 2015 (PDF, p. 142)
  2. ↑ 20 years of Cuba Si
  3. ↑ Stern Online , July 22, 2010 What do KPF, Geraer Dialog or "Cuba Si" want?
  4. ↑ Round trip ( Memento from January 12, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), information on a round trip on the Cuba Sí homepage
  5. ↑ Workcamps , information on traveling with work on the homepage of Cuba Sí
  6. ↑ http://cuba-si.org/files/cuba/revista/revista_1-2010_web.pdf
  7. ↑ A thank you from Cuba
  8. ^ Members of the Cuba network ( Memento from March 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ↑ Putin, Maduro and Co. Left convulsion with autocrats , Spiegel Online , August 10, 2017
  10. ^ Constitutional Protection Report for 2007: Constitutional Protection Report 2007 ( Memento from September 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (p. 154)
  11. ↑ Constitutional Protection Report for 2013: Constitutional Protection Report 2013 (p. 182; PDF; 4.94 MB)
  12. ↑ Constitutional Protection Report for 2008: Constitutional Protection Report 2008 ( Memento from October 7, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) (p. 152; PDF; 4.9 MB)
  13. ↑ Junge Welt No. 62 of March 13, 2008, supplement "literature", p. 7.
  14. ↑ Homepage of AG Cuba Sí, November 8, 2010. Quoted in Verfassungsschutz Report 2010
  15. ↑ Bavarian Constitutional Protection Report for 2008: Bavarian Constitutional Protection Report 2008 ( Memento from June 10, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) (p. 162 (bottom), p. 163 (top); PDF; 3.4 MB)
  16. ↑ Klaus Meschkat : Renunciation of one's own judgment - Cuba controversy ( Memento of August 21, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) , Socialist positions, first published in: z3w - sheets of the information center 3rd world. No. 270 July / August 2003
  17. ↑ Der Spiegel April 15, 1996 Socialists - Last Reservations
  18. ↑ Contrasts: The Cuban Crisis in the Left Party - How Much Criticism Can Socialism Under Palm Trees Endure? https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/kuba-krise-die-pds-hat-kein-verhaeltnis-zu-menschenrechte-a-403755.html
  19. ↑ Incorrect representation in the program "kontraste" (press release from MdB Ulla Jelpke of March 24, 2006)
  20. ↑ Solidarity and human rights (PDF; 454 kB) in: Cuba Sí Revista 2/2006 (p. 3)
  21. ↑ The party executive dismisses critics of Cuba in: Der Spiegel from February 28, 2006