Maseda
Díaz
Moyá
Today, in the wake of events in Egypt, many are as hopeful as ever that a smilar day is in Cuba's future — and soon. The details are different and many of the challenges lining the route to Cuban freedom are much more profound.
But the faith of many, in Cuba and in exile, is strong, and that is critical to the struggle, as we have seen today on the streets of Cairo.
Today also reminds again of the character and courage of those on the front lines of the Cuban struggle — men like prisoner of conscience Hector Maseda.
The Catholic archdiocese in Havana, in its role as spokesman for the Castro dictatorship, announced this morning that Maseda and another prisoner of conscience, Eduardo Díaz, would be released. Maseda and Díaz were members of the Group of 10 prisoners still in jail because of their refusal to accept exile as condition of their release, as called for by a July 2010 deal between the church, Spain and the dictatorship.
Later in the day, Díaz had been reunited with his family.
But Maseda remained in his cell, refusing to be released until the dictatorship first releases fellow prisoners suffering from serious illnesses. (He also was insisting that no conditions be placed on his release.)
Those prisoners, according to reports, include Díaz, Pedro Argüelles Morán and Librado Linares García.
In refusing parole, Maseda was emulating fellow prisoner of conscience Angel Moyá Acosta who last week stayed in his cell after making an identical demand on behalf of his brothers-in-struggle.
Men like Maseda and Moya — and many more on the Cuban street and in Cuban jails — on the front lines in the fight against the Castro regime should give other Cubans, on the island and in exile, hope that right will prevail in Cuba.
On a moral and spiritual level, the dictators are no match.
And as we have seen in Egypt, and in Tunisia earlier this year, history is on the side of men like Maseda, Moyá, Oscar Biscet González, and José Ferrer García.
And against dictators like Hosni Mubarak and Raúl Castro.
Cuba is not Egypt, and you only invite peril if you presume an inevitability to events.
But Egyptians have shown Cubans, and all others struggling against oppression, that their faith, when combined with effective action, is not futile.
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