HAVANA: Havana’s streets were calm Monday on the one-year anniversary of unprecedented anti-government demonstrations, with Cubans denouncing a pre-emptive security clampdown to avoid a repeat.
Amid fresh accusations of human rights abuses and calls from the United States for the Cuban government to “respect” dissident voices, President Miguel Diaz-Canel said he was convinced the country would emerge from what he described as a “complex situation.”
There had been calls for new protests on the anniversary, but more than a dozen dissidents, artists and independent journalists said on Twitter they had received warnings from the police not to leave their homes, from where some reported patrols outside.
They also included the parents of protesters in jail.
“I am under siege,” tweeted Yurka Rodriguez, the mother of 25-year-old Yunaikis Linares, one of hundreds placed behind bars by the communist regime.
Rodriguez used the hashtag #SOSCuba.
“No one will go out on the street,” student Carlos Rafael Dominguez, 18, told AFP.
“There is no bringing it (the government) down,” he said resignedly.
Added 64-year-old Maria de los Angeles Marquez: “People are resisting going out” because of the heavy sentences — up to 25 years in some cases — meted out for participation in last year’s spontaneous outburst of anti-government ire.
Mass protests broke out across Cuba on July 11 and 12 last year, with demonstrators clamoring for food and freedoms amid the island’s worst economic crisis in 30 years, and shortages of fuel, medicines and food.
A crackdown by the security forces left one dead, dozens injured and 1,300 people detained, according to rights observers.
Hundreds, including minors, have since been given jail sentences for such crimes as “public disorder,” “contempt” or “sedition.”
In a report published on the one-year anniversary of the protests, Human Rights Watch detailed “systematic human rights violations” committed by the government to quash further dissent.
The report listed claims of “arbitrary detention, abuse-ridden prosecutions, beatings and other cases of ill-treatment that in some cases constitute torture.”
“A year ago today, thousands of Cubans protested, demanding rights and freedoms, but the government gave many of them only two options: prison or exile,” said Juan Pappier, senior Americas researcher at HRW.
Diaz-Canel, who has described the protests as “a vandalistic coup,” tweeted Monday that “if anything is to be commemorated this 11th of July, it is the victory of the Cuban people, the Cuban revolution.”
Cuba has for the past six decades been the target of US sanctions that the government blames for the island nation’s economic woes.
Citing a backdrop of “constant economic, political and ideological siege,” the president said he was “convinced that we will also emerge from this complex situation.”
Cuba accuses the United States of fomenting last year’s protests.
In a statement Monday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington recognized the “determination and courage” of the Cuban people “as they continue to fight for respect for human rights.”
The HRW report documented 155 cases of abuse as part of the “repression against July 2021 protesters.”
This included detention of people protesting peacefully or on their way to join marches, and detainees held incommunicado sometimes for months on end without access to relatives or a lawyer.
It also reported unsanitary prison cells, and little or no access to food, medicines, clean water or Covid-19 masks.
“Many (detainees) said they were subject to abusive and repeat interrogations... Some were beaten, forced to squat naked, or subjected to ill-treatment, including sleep deprivation and other abuses that in some cases amount to torture,” said the report.
Orestes Sandoval, an 80-year-old queuing to buy cigarettes in the Cuban capital, told AFP a new round of protests was unlikely.
“With everything that has happened, I don’t believe anyone would dare to do such a thing.”
Cubans decry pre-emptive clampdown on protest anniversary
https://arab.news/w9w5j
Cubans decry pre-emptive clampdown on protest anniversary
- In a report published on the one-year anniversary of the protests, Human Rights Watch detailed “systematic human rights violations” committed by the government to quash further dissent
North Korean leader Kim inspects new warship, claims progress toward nuclear-armed navy
- Kim has hailed the development of Choe Hyon as a significant advancement toward his goal of expanding the operational range and preemptive strike capabilities of his nuclear-armed military
SEOUL, South Korea: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un inspected his new destroyer for two straight days ahead of its commissioning and observed a test of cruise missiles fired from the warship, vowing to accelerate the nuclear-armament of his navy, state media said Thursday.
The North’s official Korean Central News Agency said Kim, during his visits to the western shipyard of Nampo on Tuesday and Wednesday, also inspected the construction of a third destroyer of the same class as his 5,000-ton warship, the Choe Hyon, first unveiled in April 2025.
Kim has hailed the development of Choe Hyon as a significant advancement toward his goal of expanding the operational range and preemptive strike capabilities of his nuclear-armed military. State media says the ship is designed to handle various weapons systems, including antiair and anti-naval weapons, as well as nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles. South Korean military officials and experts say Choe Hyon was likely built with Russian assistance amid deepening military ties, but some have raised doubts about whether it’s ready for active service.
North Korea unveiled a second destroyer of the same class in May last year, but it was damaged during a botched launching ceremony at the northeastern port of Chongjin, triggering a furious reaction from Kim, who called the failure “criminal.” North Korea has said the new destroyer, named Kang Kon, was relaunched in June after repair, but outside experts have questioned whether the ship is fully operational.
After observing Choe Hyon’s sea trials on Tuesday, Kim said the ship met operational requirements and called it a symbol of the country’s expanding naval capabilities. He called for building two warships a year over the next five years of the same or higher class as the Choe Hyon.
Kim came back Wednesday to observe a test launch of cruise missiles from the Choe Hyon. State media published photos of him watching from shore as several projectiles rose from the vessel in plumes of white smoke and described the weapons as “strategic,” a term used for nuclear-capable systems.
After years of spurring ballistic missile development, Kim has shifted his focus more toward naval capabilities, including an ongoing construction of a nuclear-powered submarine. KCNA said the third destroyer under construction at the Nampo shipyard is expected to be completed by the ruling Workers’ Party’s founding anniversary in October.
Naval capabilities were also a key focus when Kim outlined his five-year military goals at last month’s Workers’ Party congress, which included calls for intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of being launched from underwater.
Kim on Tuesday claimed that his efforts to arm his navy with nuclear weapons were “making satisfactory” progress. He said those purported advancements would “constitute a radical change in defending our maritime sovereignty, something that we have not achieved for half a century.”
KCNA did not elaborate on what Kim meant. Some analysts say North Korea may be preparing to formally declare a maritime boundary that could encroach on waters controlled by rival South Korea.
As inter-Korean tensions worsen, Kim has repeatedly said he does not recognize the Northern Limit Line, drawn by the US-led UN Command at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. The poorly drawn western sea boundary has been the site of several deadly naval clashes in past years.
At the party congress, Kim doubled down on plans to expand North Korea’s nuclear arsenal, which already is equipped with various weapons systems threatening the United States and US allies in Asia, and confirmed his hard-line view of rival South Korea.
But he left the door open for dialogue with the Trump administration, reiterating Pyongyang’s demand that Washington drop its insistence on denuclearization as a precondition for resuming long-stalled talks.
