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the Cuban 5
August 5 for the Cuban 5, Cindy Sheehan Sends a Message to President Obama
This August Cindy Sheehan joins the international campaign of the 5th of each month for the Cuban 5 and is sending the following letter to President Obama.
Photo: Bill Hackwell, Cindy Sheehan in front of the White House, April 2012
Cindy Sheehan is an American anti-war activist whose son, U.S. Army Specialist Casey Sheehan, was killed during the Iraq War in 2004. From that time on Cindy became a leading voice against the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. She attracted national and international media attention in August 2005 for setting up Camp Casey right outside President George W. Bush’s Texas ranch.
After meeting family members of the Cuban 5 in 2006 Cindy started a special relationship with the mothers of the Five based on her sense of justice and her understanding of the suffering that only a mother separated from a son knows.
LETTER OF CINDY SHEEHAN TO OBAMA
August 5, 2012
Dear President Obama,
Though I have little faith you will actually read this letter, my passion for this cause gives me optimism that you might take a moment to hear me.
I am writing to you about the case of the “Cuban 5." The Cuban Five are five Cuban anti-terrorist agents from Cuba, who came to the United States to monitor the activities of real terrorists-Cuban expatriates living here who planned violent counter-revolutionary acts in Cuba and have been responsible for the deaths of thousands of Cubans over the years.
As you probably know, my son, Casey Austin Sheehan, was killed in Iraq on April 04, 2004. He was lied to by his government and military leadership that told him he was occupying another’s land to “fight terrorism." So many injustices have been committed in this so-called Global War on Terror, but these Five Cuban heroes have been in US jails and prisons for fourteen years and their only real crime was not registering as foreign agents-a mild crime that usually carries a mild sentence of expulsion or short prison terms.
However, to obfuscate the USA’s training of and harboring of real terrorists, such as Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles, the injustice system of this country has convicted these five Cubans in a travesty of justice and the penalties were inhumane.
I have read numerous other letters to you from colleagues who have also pled with you to Free the Five based on the fact that they are sons, husbands, and fathers who need to return to their homeland and be with their families. Since you are already well aware of the deaths of sons, fathers, husbands, wives, mothers, and daughters due to the expansion of the Bush wars, and starting a few of your own, I am rather certain that approach will not work.
I know and care about the families of the Five-Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González and René González-they are optimistic and wonderful human beings. I have had the fortune of getting to know them over the years during my travels to Cuba and around the world. I am not appealing to you based on compassion as that would be a useless waste of my time and yours-the US imprisons more people per capita than any other nation in the world. Nor am I appealing to you based on the fact that you were a Constitutional Scholar and lawyer, primarily because what happened to the Five was an obscenity of the law, as was the signing of the NDAA into law, drone bombing in countries without a declaration of war, and assassinating US citizens without the due process guaranteed by the Constitution-all clearly in violation of the Constitution and also obscene.
However, I am appealing to you to “Free the Five" based on the fact that you have said, and shown the world, that the USA can “act pre-emptively" to protect our “safety," and I would like to believe that you would extend the Cuban people and government the same right to protect its citizens from acts of terrorism.
Your regime has vigorously violated the sovereignty of several countries in the purported quest to “keep America safe." The Cuban government and the Five Heroes did far less.
As a United States citizen, I do not make appeals of the people who work for me, however, I demand that my government allow the Four still imprisoned people listed above, as well as René González, who is out but on probation in Miami (which is the worst place for him to be because of the counter-revolutionary Cuban terrorists who live there) to return home. They have been punished enough for a relatively small crime.
President Obama, you have also made a statement that “Cuba needs to change its society" before you will consider normalizing relations. The blockade is an anachronism from the Cold War that can be lifted to the benefit of both nations- then you can go visit and see how wrong you’ve been.
Cindy Sheehan
REMEMBER: THE 5TH OF AUGUST FOR THE CUBAN 5
NEXT SUNDAY AUGUST 5TH, CALL THE WHITE HOUSE AND JOIN THE WORLDWIDE DEMAND FOR THE FREEDOM OF THE FIVE.
DIFFERENT WAYS TO REACH THE WHITE HOUSE
By phone: 202-456-1111 (If nobody answers the phone leave a message)
If calling from outside the United States, dial first the International Area Code
+ 1 (US country code) followed by 202-456-1111
By Fax: 202-456-2461
If fax is sent from outside the United States, dial first the International Area
Code + 1 (US country code) followed by 202-456-2461
To send an e-mail: president@whitehouse.gov
To send a letter
President Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20500
EE.UU.
To send an electronic message write to:
SEND AN ONLINE MESSAGE TO PRESIDENT OBAMA
For more information about the Cuban 5 visit www.thecuban5.org
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