Latin American MPs ask the EU to stop financing the Cuban regime

Members of Parliament from Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic sent a letter on March 16 to Koen Doens, Director General of the European Commission's International Partnerships Department in Brussels, urging him to halt the Cooperation Agreement between the European Union and the Cuban regime.

The deputies claim that Havana is not complying with the human rights requirements of the agreement.

"The persecution and repression against Cuban civil society has continued unabated and the European Union should not be financing it. The communist regime in Cuba has not ceased so far in its interest to crush Cuban civil society," they said.

In the letter, to which ADN Cuba had access to, the legislators pointed out the high sentences imposed on the demonstrators of the July 11, 2021 protests, as well as the repression of the regime, particularly seen in the sentences against the opponents Félix and Sayli Navarro and the arrest of José Díaz Silva, president of the Movement of Oppositionists for a New Republic.

"As staunch allies of the Russian Federation, they have used aggression against Ukraine to imprison other civil society leaders," the deputies said.

"We have toa focus all our efforts on making the communist regime in Cuba understand that its repression has financial consequences with Europe; it is the way to protect the brave Cuban civic fighters," said Dragos Dolanescu, Costa Rican parliament member and president of the Hemispheric Front for Freedom.

The legislators claimed that the European Union Cooperation Agreement with the Cuban regime establishes in Article 1 that "both parties have agreed to respect and promote democratic principles, respect for all human rights and fundamental freedoms as recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights."

The MPs claimed that "the violation of the Cooperation Agreement by the communist regime of Cuba is irrefutable. Moreover, the violent repression they have used constitutes a gross disrespect for the European Union and its member nations, which so honorably negotiated the Agreement."

The Costa Rican parliament members who have signed the document include Dragos Dolanescu, Costa Rica Justa; Patricia Villegas and Walter Muñoz, Partido Integración Nacional; Shirley Díaz, Nueva Generación; Melvin Nuñez and Floria Segreda, Restauración Nacional.

The Dominican Republic is represented by Ramón Ceballo and Félix Hiciano Almanzar of the Partido Revolucionario Moderno; Miguel Bogaert, Bloque Institucional Social Demócrata; Miguel Ángel de los Santos, Partido Cívico Renovador; and Elías Wessin Chávez, Partido Quisqueyano Demócrata Cristiano.