Havana/The Cuban Government confirmed this Monday direct contacts with the United States, responding to “recent publications in the foreign press,” and assured that “the meeting was respectful and professional, without deadlines or conditions.” With this brief statement, the ruling party tries to refute the 15-day ultimatum that Washington would have given in the conversations that occurred on April 10.
In a very brief interview published in Granmathe deputy director general in charge of the United States in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Cuba, Alejandro García del Toro, declared that “within the framework of the meeting, none of the parties established deadlines or made compelling statements, as has been mentioned by the American media.”
According to information revealed by Axiosthe talks included a two-week ultimatum for the Cuban regime to release “high-profile” political prisoners – among them Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel Castillo Osorbo– as a “gesture of good will.” The request was confirmed by a White House spokesperson to USA Today, who also urged Havana to “stop playing games while direct talks are held.”
The Cuban Government had reacted this Monday to the revelation of the US ultimatum, through a text published by the media official Reasons for Cuba –casually titled Lies with footnotes–where the meeting was not completely denied, but rather the existence of a “secret trip of high-level officials with demands.”
The article fervently denies the existence of political prisoners, but what it reveals is the State’s refusal to release them.
Later, Reasons for Cuba he was juggling to justify the possible existence of the meeting: “If that meeting with ‘high-level officials’ really occurred and demands were raised there such as the release of prisoners, political freedom, compensation and conditioning of aid, Cuba’s response was and will be the same as always: a resounding rejection.”
The article fervently denies the existence of political prisoners, but what it reveals is the State’s refusal to release them: “The ‘freedom of political prisoners’ is a euphemism for demanding the release of people convicted of common crimes or for violating Cuban laws. The Cuban judicial system is independent and does not negotiate hostages.”
The note in Reasons for Cuba emphasizes the rejection of Starlink, the satellite tool of SpaceX, Elon Musk’s company, whose use to offer internet services to the Island was also included in Washington’s ultimatum.
For the regime, this option is a direct threat to information control. The possibility that free internet access will no longer pass through state filters terrifies the Cuban Government. Thus, in the official statement, “technological sovereignty” is invoked with the same firmness with which “releasing prisoners” is rejected.
The possibility that free internet access will no longer pass through state filters terrifies the Cuban Government
The rest of the text repeats the usual narrative of describing the Island as a victim of imperialism and the blockade; and concludes with what is the regime’s stubborn response to dialogue with the United States: “No conditions. No exchange of ‘prisoners’. Without handing over sovereignty.”
In that sense, it has been mobilized the signature campaign “voluntary” initiatives initiated by Díaz-Canel in defense of a “vocation for peace”, which completely ignores the political opening that is required of him.
He recent attempt by Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, The Crab –grandson of Raúl Castro, who uses him as a mediator – to send a letter to the White House through an intermediary and bypassing the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, a staunch adversary of the regime, ended in resounding failure. The courier was intercepted at the Miami airport and the document with an official seal was confiscated, according to The Wall Street Journal.
USA Today there was informed too in a previous article that the Pentagon had accelerated plans for a possible intervention – without implying a decision has been made – and, just one day later, a Navy drone flew over the Island for 12 hours in what many interpret as a warning signal.
According to ‘USA Today’, Washington’s ultimatum ends this weekend.
The regime’s “gestures of good will” regarding releases continue to be unsatisfactory. Of the 51 inmates released following the agreement with the Vatican announced on March 12, only 27 were political prisoners. The subsequent pardon of more than 2,000 inmates, presented as a “humanitarian and sovereign” act, has exclusively benefited common prisoners. Today, the independent organization Prisoners Defenders report 1,252 political prisoners.
According to USA TodayWashington’s ultimatum ends this weekend. The US demands included, in addition to the release of political prisoners and the introduction of satellite internet services with Starlink, economic reforms that facilitate foreign investment, a review of the confiscations of the 1960s and the elimination of restrictions on political freedoms.
