Payá: Sakharov prize honors all Cuban people

Following are excerpts from remarks by Cuban activist Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas after receiving the Sakharov Award for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament last week. The speech was translated by Renato Pérez of The Herald.

You have awarded the Sakharov prize to the people of Cuba. I say the people of Cuba because they greatly deserve this recognition. I say this without excluding any of my compatriots, whatever their political stance, because [human] rights have no political or racial or cultural color. Dictatorships have no political color, either; they're neither rightist nor leftist, they're just dictatorships. In my country, there are thousands of men and women who struggle, amid persecution, for the rights of all Cubans. Hundreds of them are in prison merely for proclaiming and defending these rights, so I accept this recognition on their behalf.

I say this prize is for all Cubans because I understand that, with this prize, Europe wishes to tell them: ``You, too, have the right to have rights.''

Of this we were always convinced, but there were times when it seemed that that truth was not so evident to many in the world.

I don't come here to ask for support for opposition to the Cuban government or to condemn those who persecute us. It doesn't help Cuba when some in the world take the side of the Cuban government or of those who oppose it, from positions of ideology. We want them to take a position in favor of the Cuban people. And that means to support respect for all their rights, to support an opening, to support our demand to consult our people at the polls about the changes we are demanding.

We ask for solidarity so our people may be given a voice at the ballot box, as the Varela Project proposes. Many have linked this prize to the Varela Project, and they're right, because the thousands of Cubans who, amid repression, have signed that petition for a referendum are making a decisive contribution to the changes Cuba needs.

Those changes would mean participation in economic and cultural life, political and civil rights and national reconciliation. That would be the true exercise of our people's self-determination. The myth that we Cubans must live without rights to uphold our country's independence and sovereignty has got to end.

Father Félix Varela taught us that independence and national sovereignty are inseparable from the exercise of the fundamental rights. We Cubans who live in Cuba and in the diaspora, as a single people, have the will and the ability to build a democratic, just and free society, without hatred or revanchism and, as José Martí dreamed, ``with everyone and for the good of everyone.''

NO MORE VIOLENCE

We have not chosen the peaceful road as a tactic but as something inseparable from the objective of our people. Experience tells us that violence generates more violence, and when political changes are made by those means, we arrive at new forms of oppression and injustice.

It is our desire that violence and force will never again be the means to overcome crises or unjust governments. This time, we shall accomplish change through this civic movement that is already opening a new stage in the history of Cuba in which dialogue, democratic participation and solidarity will prevail. Thus we shall build a true peace.

Cuba's heroic civic fighters, the citizens who sign the Varela Project, hold no weapons in their hands. We do not have an armed wing. We have two arms stretched out, and we extend our hands to all Cubans, as brothers, and to all the peoples of the world.

The first victory we can claim is that there is no hatred in our hearts. That is why we say to those who persecute us and try to dominate us: You are my brother, I do not hate you, but you will no longer dominate me through fear; I don't want to impose my truth on you or allow you to impose yours on me. Let us seek the truth together. That is the liberation we are proclaiming.

There are people who believe in the myth of the dilemma between political and civil rights, on one hand, and in the ability of a society to build social justice and achieve development, on the other. They are not mutually exclusive. The absence of civil and political rights in Cuba has had grave consequences, such as inequality, poverty among the majority, privileges among a minority and the deterioration of some services, even when they are conceived as humane and positive systems.

Although many Cubans have labored for years with love and good faith, today there is a grave situation in the field of civil and political rights, in addition to a growing inequality and deterioration of the quality of life for the majorities. Also, the citizens' hands are bound, neutralizing Cubans' enormous potential for creativity and industriousness. That's the main cause of our poverty.

We cannot justify this reality by stating that the Cuban people chose this system freely. You know that none of the people represented in this Parliament, or any people in the world, would ever renounce the exercise of their fundamental rights.

It is increasingly evident that well-being and progress in economic and social matters are the fruits of the exercise of rights. Likewise, a democracy is neither real nor complete if it's incapable of initiating and sustaining a rise in the quality of life for all people. That's because no peoples exercise their votes freely to opt for the kind of poverty and inequality that reduces the masses to a state of disadvantage and marginalization.

Latin Americans are clamoring for real democracy, the type upon which justice can be built. It is scandalous when -- in the name of efficacy -- methods are applied that claim to overcome crises and eliminate poverty but, in practice, threaten to annihilate the poor.

I don't presume to announce new positions or models, but our people have lived and suffered diverse political and economic systems. Today we know that any method or model that -- in the alleged search for justice, development or efficacy -- places itself above the individual or negates any of the fundamental rights, leads to some form of oppression and exclusion and plunges people into calamity.

We wish to express our solidarity with all those who suffer any form of oppression and injustice, with those who have been silenced and marginalized throughout the world.

The cause of human rights is unique, the way humanity is unique. Now that there's so much talk about globalization, we announce and denounce that if solidarity is not globalized, human rights are in danger -- and so is the right to go on being human. Without human solidarity we cannot preserve a clean world that offers the possibility of life to human beings.

NEEDED: A NEW SPIRIT

Therefore, I humbly believe that, more than new models in societies and international relations, what's needed is a new spirit. This new spirit must be expressed in solidarity, cooperation and justice in the relationship between countries and will not be a brake to development. Because, if policies and models are subordinated to the fulfillment of the individual, to the construction of justice and democracy, if the policies are humanized, then we'll bridge the abysses that separate nations and we shall be a true human family.

May our message of peace and solidarity reach all peoples. All Cubans receive this prize with dignity, proclaiming our hope to rebuild our society with everyone's love, as brothers, as children of God.

We Cubans are simple people and only wish to live in peace and get ahead by the strength of our work. But we cannot -- do not know how to -- live without freedom and do not wish to live without freedom.

Before the Lord of history, born in a humble manger, we place this homage and our hopes. Thank you and Merry Christmas.