President Joe Biden said Monday the anti-communist protests that broke out in Cuba over the weekend represent a “clarion call for freedom.”
“We stand with the Cuban people and their clarion call for freedom and relief from the tragic grip of the pandemic and from the decades of repression and economic suffering to which they have been subjected by Cuba’s authoritarian regime,” Biden wrote in a statement, his first comments on the mass demonstrations. “The Cuban people are bravely asserting fundamental and universal rights. Those rights, including the right of peaceful protest and the right to freely determine their own future, must be respected.”
CUBAN PROTESTERS SPARK MASS DEMONSTRATIONS ACROSS WESTERN DEMOCRACIES
Biden additionally called “on the Cuban regime to hear their people and serve their needs at this vital moment rather than enriching themselves.”
The president did not respond to questions on the protests, the largest mass demonstrations undertaken by Cuba in decades, on his arrival at the White House on Sunday evening after a weekend at his home in Delaware.
The demonstrations in Cuba’s largest cities sparked additional protests in other countries, including the United States and Argentina, in support of the Cuban people.
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, the hand-picked successor of the Castro regime, attempted to shift blame for the protests to the U.S. in a televised address on Sunday, claiming that economic sanctions and punitive action taken during the coronavirus pandemic had undermined the government.
Diaz-Canel urged his supporters to combat protesters in the streets, prompting a backlash from many American government officials.
“We are deeply concerned by ‘calls to combat’ in Cuba,” Assistant Secretary of State Julie Chung tweeted Sunday night. “We stand by the Cuban people’s right for peaceful assembly.”
We are deeply concerned by “calls to combat” in #Cuba. We stand by the Cuban people’s right for peaceful assembly. We call for calm and condemn any violence.
— Julie Chung (@WHAAsstSecty) July 11, 2021
National security adviser Jake Sullivan added that the U.S. “would strongly condemn any violence or targeting of peaceful protesters who are exercising their universal rights.”
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The U.S. supports freedom of expression and assembly across Cuba, and would strongly condemn any violence or targeting of peaceful protesters who are exercising their universal rights. https://t.co/FjI8bUHoQE
— Jake Sullivan (@JakeSullivan46) July 12, 2021
