Cuba’s Shameful Friends

Cuba's Shameful Friends / 14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez
05/25/2016 04:49 pm ET | Updated 10 hours ago
Yoani Sanchez
Publisher of 14ymedio, independent newspaper in Cuba

14ymedio, Generation Y, Yoani Sanchez, Havana, 25 May 2016 - People with
whom we share sorrows and joys are a reflection of ourselves, however
different they may appear. As friends we choose them to accompany us,
but also to complete us, with the diversity and continuity that our
human nature needs. The problem is when our choices of coexistence are
not based on affinities and preferences, but on interests and alliances
focused on annoying others.

In the same week, the Cuban executive has embraced two deplorable
authoritarian regimes. A few hours after Cuban Vice President Miguel
Diaz-Canel Bermudez met with government functionaries in Belarus,
Havana's Plaza of the Revolution hosted a meeting between Raul Castro
and a special representative from North Korea's Workers Party.
Disgraceful comrades, shamelessly embraced and praised by the island's
officialdom.

In a world where civil society, calls for the respect for human rights,
and movements that promote the recognition of rights are making
themselves heard ever more loudly, it is difficult for the Cuban
government to explain his good relations with Europe's last dictator and
with the cruelly capricious grandson who inherited power through his
bloodline. What united the island's authorities with similar political
specimens?

The only possible answer is sticking their finger in the eye of Western
democracies and the White House. The problem with this attitude lies in
the demands from these fellow travelers for commitments and silences.
Diplomatic friendship is converted into complicity and the comrades end
up defining the nature of those who have chosen their company.

Source: Cuba's Shameful Friends / 14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez -
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoani-sanchez/cubas-shameful-friends--1_b_10134002.html