Citizens Demand Issued to the Cuban Government

HAVANA TIMES — Dozens of intellectuals and opposition activists on Tuesday began circulating a citizens’ initiative on the Internet demanding the Cuban government to respect human rights, reported the Cubaencuentro website.

The document demands legal safeguards and policies expressed in the Declaration of Human Rights be put into place as well as the ratification of accords signed in 2008 concerning civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights.

The demands include “public debate around the issues of the dual currency, immigration restrictions, the rights of workers to a living wage, the right of all Cubans — wherever they live — to promote economic initiatives in their own country, the demographic crisis, free Internet access and new technologies” and discussion “on the exercise of democracy.”

Among the signatories are former political prisoners, the Ladies in White, and other dissidents such as Guillermo Fariñas, Darsi Ferrer, Elizardo Sanchez, Yoani Sanchez, Manuel Cuesta Morua, and Antonio Rodiles, as well as intellectuals such as Rafael Rojas, Raul Rivero and Antonio Jose Ponte.