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Letter to Lech Walesa La Habana, Cuba Dear companion in struggle: At this moment I am serving a 25-year prison term simply for being the secretary General of the United Council of Cuban Workers (CUTC for its acronym in Spanish), a Cuban independent labor union. The CUTC is affiliated with the Latin American Workers Union (CLAT) and the World Confederation of Labor, and has received the recognition from the International Labor Organization, and the CNV-ACTIC KOM OVER, (National Federation of Christian Trade Unions from the Netherlands), amongst other international acknowledgments. In 1989, when I founded the General Union of Cuban Workers (UGTC), which was the first independent labor union in my country, my inspiration was your work on behalf of the working class in communist Poland -the establishment of the Solidarity Labor Union. Your fight and your clear vision of the possible future of Polish workers led you to the final victory, a transition to a democracy, after a logical process that pushed the Polish government to recognize your organization, a true bastion of the struggle for democracy. I congratulate you on this 25th anniversary of Solidarity. And I would personally like to thank you, on behalf of myself and my family, for the opportunity offered to my daughter Susana Alvarez Pruneda to represent the unjustly imprisoned independent labor union activists of Cuba at such magnanimous event. I recognize the noble struggle that Polish workers sustained in order to obtain their liberty. From prison I advocate these ideals that you inspired in me, as an emblem and a symbol of liberty, in order to seek our own freedom, always in favor and for the Cuban working class. In this I firmly believe. They may be able to hold my body, but not my mind. I will stay firm in my struggle for my Homeland, my family, my people, the members of the CUTC and the independent labor unions in Cuba, fighting so the Covenants and Recommendations of the ILO, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Declaration for the Fundamental Labor Principles are fulfilled in Cuba. I am convinced, that sooner or later the light of liberty will shine and become a reality for all Cubans. From the Prison Combinado del Este I send you a fervent and affectionate greeting, reiterating my thanks and congratulations. Mr. Pedro Pablo Alvarez Ramos |
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