Gustavo Arcos

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Gustavo Arcos Bergnes (born December 19, 1926 in Caibarién , Las Villas , † August 8, 2006 in Havana ) was a participant in the Cuban Revolution , diplomat , political prisoner, human rights activist and oppositionist against Fidel Castro .

Life

Gustavo Arcos studied in 1947 at the University of Havana Law . He gave up his studies to fight against dictator Fulgencio Batista . On the side of Castro, he took part in the failed assault on the Moncada barracks on July 26, 1953 , which is considered to be the starting signal for the Cuban revolution , and was sentenced to his first prison sentence for this. A gunshot wound sustained in the attack left him with painful walking difficulties for the rest of his life, which also prevented his active participation in the guerrilla war after he, like the brothers Fidel and Raúl Castro and numerous other "Moncadistas", went into exile after the amnesty in 1955. His brother Luis, who was six years his junior, was a participant in the expedition of the yacht Granma from Mexico in November 1956 and was killed a few days after the landing by troops of the Batista government. Gustavo Arcos only returned to Cuba from exile in early 1959.

After taking power in 1959, Arcos was Cuba's ambassador to Belgium until 1964 . However, he was increasingly critical of the leadership and resigned in 1964. After returning to Cuba, he was imprisoned from 1967 to 1970 and 1981 to 1988 for publicly criticizing the government. In later years he remained exposed to various repression measures by the government, including temporary arrests, public defamation and Actos de Repudio - one of these acts of intimidation in front of Arcos' house, officially described as "spontaneous" demonstrations by the indignant people, was presented on March 8, 1990 by a prominent official of the Communist Party of Cuba : Roberto Robaina , then General Secretary of the Communist Youth Association . The President of the National Student Union , Felipe Pérez Roque , also took part in the campaign. Both later served as Cuban foreign ministers (1993–1999 and 1999–2009).

The 1981 arrest took place at sea when Arcos tried to flee Cuba. From 1969 until his death, the Cuban government denied him the right to leave his country - according to Arcos in response to Fidel Castro's personal reaction to a hunger strike with which Arcos protested that he was sentenced to ten years in prison for "improper behavior towards the revolution".

In 1983, Arcos and his brother Sebastián Arcos joined the Cuban human rights committee, Comité Cubano Pro Derechos Humanos CCPDH, founded by Ricardo Bofill . Gustavo Arcos was considered a symbol of the opposition.

On Tuesday, August 8, 2006, Gustavo Arcos succumbed to a myocardial infarction .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Luis Arcos Begnes in the official Cuban web encyclopedia EcuRed , accessed on November 27, 2011 (Spanish)
  2. ↑ a b Gustavo Arcos: Notas de una vida ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF, 473 kB), in: Revista Hispano Cubana HC No. 6 from January 2000, pp. 7–9, accessed on October 14, 2012 (Spanish) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hispanocubana.org
  3. ↑ Oscar Peña: Una apertura nacional in: El Nuevo Herald of February 26, 2011, accessed on September 12, 2012 via Libertad Sindical (Spanish)
  4. ↑ Adolfo Rivero Caro: El fecundo magisterio de Gustavo Arcos (PDF; 42 kB) in: Siglo XXI undated , accessed on November 27, 2011 (Spanish)
personal data
SURNAME Arcos, Gustavo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Arcos Bergnes, Gustavo (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Cuban dissident
DATE OF BIRTH December 19, 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH Caibarién , Las Villas
DATE OF DEATH August 8, 2006
Place of death Havana