[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 77 (Friday, June 4, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1028]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 FREEDOM FOR PEDRO PABLO ALVAREZ RAMOS

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART

                               of florida

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, June 3, 2004

  Mr. LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to 
speak about Pedro Pablo Alvarez Ramos, a prisoner of conscience in 
totalitarian Cuba.
  Mr. Alvarez Ramos is a true leader for freedom, human rights, and 
worker rights for the Cuban people. He is President of the United Cuban 
Workers Council (CUTC), an organization dedicated to improving the 
condition and treatment of workers in totalitarian Cuba. As the 
President of CUTC, Mr. Alvarez Ramos has been a constant advocate for 
every Cuban worker currently toiling under the nightmare of repression 
called the Castro regime. Mr. Alvarez Ramos has bravely denounced the 
cruel policies of the tyrant and demanded that every Cuban laborer be 
allowed their inalienable human rights and worker rights.
  Because Mr. Alvarez Ramos committed himself to achieving workers 
rights for every Cuban, he has been a constant target for the 
dictator's thugs. According to Amnesty International, Mr. Alvarez Ramos 
has been the subject of harassment and detention for his trade union 
activities since at least 1996. In October 2000, in connection with his 
work in preparing the first CUTC congress, Mr. Alvarez Ramos was thrown 
in the totalitarian gulag. Eventually, in November 2001, he was charged 
with resisting arrest and Mr. Alvarez Ramos was finally released from 
the horrors of the gulag in late January 2001.
  On March 19, 2003, as part of the tyrant's brutal crackdown on 
peaceful pro-democracy; activists, Mr. Alvarez Ramos's home was 
searched and his private library confiscated. He was subsequently 
sentenced by a sham court to 25 years in the totalitarian gulag 
because. of his efforts for worker rights in Cuba.
  Mr. Alvarez Ramos is languishing in the inhuman conditions of the 
totalitarian gulag, because he believes every Cuban worker should have 
rights, not repression. It is unconscionable that, at the dawn of the 
21st century and just 90 miles form our shore, Mr. Alvarez Ramos is 
imprisoned in a gulag because he is attempting to achieve workers 
rights for the citizens of Cuba.
  Mr. Speaker, this Congress convenes in a building that represents 
freedom to those languishing in the darkness of repression. It is 
incumbent on those of us who have the privilege of serving in this 
monument to liberty to demand freedom for all pro-democracy activists 
locked in infernal gulags. My Colleagues, we must demand the immediate 
release of Pedro Pablo Alvarez Ramos, and every prisoner of conscience 
in totalitarian Cuba.

                          ____________________