President’s poor intervention

Dear Editor, In the regime presided over by Fidel Castro only one political party was tolerated – the Communist Party. Freedom of expression and of speech was, in effect, non-existent. Persons who were not members of the Communist Party found themselves under surveillance by the secret police.  Journalists and writers were subject to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment. 

The situation has not substantially changed under Fidel Castro’s successor. President Michael D. Higgins has on occasion rightly and forcibly condemned the abuse of human rights by autocratic regimes of the right but the abuse of these same rights by regimes of the left are to be equally deplored. Hence the well-nigh universal disappointment at the president’s intervention on the death of the Cuban dictator.

Yours etc.,

J. Anthony Gaughan,

President, Irish PEN, Blackrock, Co. Dublin.