Cuba-bound aid caravan stops in Providence / Photo
2:54 PM Wed, Jul 08, 2009 | Permalink
Email
 |
 |
Projo 7 to 7 News BlogTaking the news pulse of Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts, by Providence Journal and projo.com staff, from 7 to 7, every business day |
|
Get the 7 to 7 on your mobile at www.projo.com. Twitter: projo | RSS | Email alerts
« URI's Coastal Institute gets new director |
Main
| R.I. chief justice, Superior Court judge to be sworn in »
PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- They wore Che Guevara and "End the Blockade of Cuba -- The Time is Now" T-shirts. And they talked of policy reform. President Obama, they said, has lifted travel restrictions for Cuban-Americans to visit the island nation. But sanctions -- which they call illegal and immoral -- remain nearly 50 years after they were first implemented as a partial embargo. Providence was the third stop of the New York-Cuba-bound Pastors for Peace "Friendshipment" caravan, already in its 20th year. This year, the caravan is expected to deliver building supplies to Cuba. The caravan -- which included driver Bill Hill of Tucson, Ariz., Isabelle Jagninski of New York, and John Thomas of Canada -- left Providence around 1 p.m. for its next stop in Hartford, Conn. It will head to Texas, picking up volunteers and construction supplies along the way. The 15 buses, which by trip's end will have visited more than 130 cities in the United States and Canada, are expected to converge in Texas to cross into Mexico and, ultimately, head to Cuba. Despite U.S. travel restrictions to the island, none of the volunteers have been arrested or had to pay fines in any of the previous trips, said Hill, who's visited Cuba 19 times. They did, however, have several hunger strikes, he said. 
CommentsLeave a commentPlease be civil. Vicious comments, personal attacks and profanity won't be published. Name and email are required; email address will not publish. |
Tags 
New comments
New photos
New posts
Projo blogs
Archives
Note to people helping Cubans: "Wearing Che Guevara" is not a sign of solidarity with Cubans. Che was "notorious as a ruthless disciplinarian who unhesitatingly shot defectors" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Guevara). While your good deeds are much appreciated, I'm sure, you are doing a great disservice and issuing a slap in the face to the many displaced Cubans here in the US by wearing this man's image. Please stop.
Report Abuse
Ah, wikipedia, always a reliable source.
The Cubans in the U.S. are mostly the oligarchs and their descendants who used to grind the rest of the Cuban people into the dirt, helped by that murdering U.S.-government supported dictator Batista.
Report Abuse
http://reformedcovenanter.wordpress.com/2008/07/30/che-guevera-was-a-communist-terrorist-your-t-shirt-is-not-cool/
Report Abuse
Why does the Journal report on this without any background on who Che Guevara was? Why are leftist dictators who murder their people constantly held up as heroes. Give no money to these people, and tell them that instead of money they need to overthrow the communist government.
Report Abuse
"Che's life is an inspiration for every human being who loves freedom. We will always honor his memory." ~ Nelson Mandela
Che has always been one of my personal heroes. A secular saint who died for our capitali$t sins.
"Che is not only an intellectual, he was the most complete human being of our time, our eras most perfect man." ~ Jean Paul Sartre
Report Abuse
Ronald Reagan's right-wing contra death squads led to the deaths of 100,000 in Guatemala, 70,000 in El Salvador, and 30,000 in Nicaragua.
Che Guevara was 'created' through the United Fruit Co & CIA 1954 overthrow of the democratically elected Arbenz in Guatemala (while Che was living there). Any actions of Uncle Sam's induced Frankenstein's, ultimately lead back to U.S. foreign policy - and the brutal tyrants it supports, arms, and chooses to head it's allied financial oligarchies.
Report Abuse
Che reviewed the appeals of those who received a guilty sentence of being a war criminal during the revolutionary tribunals - and was in charge of pardoning them or not ... similar to the same role as a U.S. Governor. Does that make him a "murderer" if he refuses to commute the sentence? Hardly.
Batista's henchmen had terrorized Cuba's poor for 7 years and killed 20,000 + while torturing even more. The fact that Che saw to it that those victims got justice is not only heroic but admirable.
Report Abuse
Joyce, would those oligarchs include the criminals and the insane who Castro freed to the US? Would they also include the political prisoners - whom Sec State Clinton (thus, it's Obama's policy) said just today would have to be released by Cuba before the US could consider any further changes in the situation?
Have you personally ever been there - as I have - and seen the incredible poverty? Viva la revolucion, but there's no f'n toilet paper in this communist paradise.
And did you know that Castro attempted to overthrow the Dominican government in, I think it was 1947. He was no liberator, he just wanted a country to run.
It's real easy to live in a democracy and criticize - try the same thing in a communist country, where the local people were forbidden to even board my boat while I was there.
That's freedom? Most of you people are fools if you think Castro is/was a hero. He's a dictator, period.
Report Abuse