Laura Pollan Toledo 1948-2011...

A few words (though this hardly does her justice) to pay tribute to a brave woman, Laura Pollan Toledo, founder of the Ladies in White in Cuba, which she established after the arrest of her husband, Hector Maseda, a journalist, in 2003 (I had written about Laura and the Cuban human rights movement last year in a post you can find here). Laura died last Friday in a Havana hospital of cardiac arrest, following a pulmonary illness.
The group was composed of the wives of dissidents, who demanded the release of all political prisoners arrested in the spring of 2003, during a wave of arrests referred to as the Black Spring..
We fight for the freedom of our husbands, the union of our families. We love our men, she declared in 2005.
All have now been released, but Laura pursued her campaign for democracy and justice nevertheless.
As long as this government is around there will be prisoners. Because while they’ve let some go, they’ve put others in jail. It is a never-ending story, she said last month.
We continue being defenders of human rights. We are not politicians, we want freedom for the country, democracy, she also declared.
The Ladies would dress in white every Sunday, and, after attending Mass, march down Havana’s main avenue, each holding a gladiolus.
Though regularly harassed by pro-government thugs, the Ladies never failed to demonstrate week after week…
It’s really bad news for the human rights and pro-democracy movement. It’s an irreparable loss. We ‘ll see with time if others step forward to take her place, Elizardo Sanchez, leader of the Cuban Commission of Human Rights, an independent NGO, told Reuters.
Yesterday, the Ladies marched (see the video here), though for the first time, without Laura…
Men were allowed to join them this time (including Hector Maseda), in her honor…
At the end of the gathering, instead of shouting Freedom as they traditionally did, they chanted Laura Pollan lives…
May the spirit of Laura Pollan inspire her Cuban compatriots and encourage them to pursue, as fearlessly as she did, the struggle for justice and democracy…
(the photograph above of Laura Pollan was found here)