Zitat von US-Außenministerium

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2008 Human Rights Report: Cuba
Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
2008 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
February 25, 2009

Cuba, with a population of approximately 11.2 million, is a totalitarian state formally led by President Raul Castro. In 2006 General Castro was granted provisional control of the government by his brother, Fidel Castro, who officially resigned as president on February 19. On February 24, the National Assembly unanimously elected Raul Castro to succeed his brother as chief of state, president, and commander in chief of the Armed Forces. Fidel Castro remains officially the first secretary of the Communist Party (CP). In the January 20 elections for the National Assembly, which were neither free nor fair, the CP won as much as 98 percent of the vote and 606 of the 614 seats in the National Assembly. The Ministry of the Interior exercises control over police, the internal security forces, and the prison system.

The government continued to deny its citizens their basic human rights and committed numerous, serious abuses. The government denied citizens the right to change their government. At year's end there were at least 205 political prisoners and detainees. As many as 5,000 citizens served sentences for "dangerousness," without being charged with any specific crime. The following human rights problems were reported: beatings and abuse of detainees and prisoners, including human rights activists, carried out with impunity; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions, including denial of medical care; harassment, beatings, and threats against political opponents by government-recruited mobs, police, and State Security officials; arbitrary arrest and detention of human rights advocates and members of independent professional organizations; denial of fair trial; and interference with privacy, including pervasive monitoring of private communications. There were also severe limitations on freedom of speech and press; denial of peaceful assembly and association; restrictions on freedom of movement, including selective denial of exit permits to citizens and the forcible removal of persons from Havana to their hometowns; restrictions on freedom of religion; and refusal to recognize domestic human rights groups or permit them to function legally. Discrimination against persons of African descent, domestic violence, underage prostitution, trafficking in persons, and severe restrictions on worker rights, including the right to form independent unions, were also problems.

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Zitat von Moskito

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Leider erwähnen sie die Konzentrationslager von Guantanamo Bay in ihrem Bericht nicht, ob sie das wohl vergessen haben?

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