"Mission Against Terror" Breaks Silence

[XXPANTHAXX]

By Cheryl LaBash
Workers World

City by city the award winning documentary, Mission Against
Terror, is chipping away at the curtain of silence
surrounding the case of the Cuban Five, five men from Cuba
who are currently unjustly imprisoned in the U.S. for
preventing terrorism against the Cuban people.

Accompanied by Irish co-writer/director, Bernie Dwyer, the
national 22 city tour is distributing a new and powerful
organizing tool to social justice and Cuba solidarity
activists. Initiatated by the National Free the Five
Committee and the National Network on Cuba, the organizers in
large and small cities are bringing the fight for the Cuba
Five to wider audiences as the anniversary of the appeal
hearing on March 10 approaches.

Starting in Miami, the tour reached its mid point February 12
at a Detroit screening co-sponsored by the Justice for Cuba
Coalition and the Swords Into Plowshares Peace Center and
Gallery Saturday Matinee Film Series. University students,
union, legal, academic, religious and Cuba solidarity
organizers raised funds for a local Free the Five ad
campaign.

Just across the Canadian border from Detroit the Canada Cuba
Friendship Association/Windsor, showed the film at the School
of Visual Arts at the University of Windsor earlier in the
day as part of a film festival. The Windsor committee
reported the well attended audience included two people in
the audience who had a youth soccer team with them at the
time, narrowly missed being in the lobby of the Havana hotel
that was bombed in July 1997 because of a last minute change
of plans.

In New York, an overflow crowd caused dozens to be turned
away, buying out all 40 copies of the film. In Philadelphia,
Boston, Washington, D.C., New Paltz, Chicago, Minneapolis
meetings and interviews are introducing people to the Five,
their individual families and the support of their larger
Cuban family. Through interviews with former CIA agent Philip
Agee, attorney Leonard Weinglass, Ricardo Alarcon and others,
woven together with dramatic historic film footage, Mission
Against Terror artfully and compelling tells the story of
these extraordinary men.

How are audiences reacting to the documentary? Dwyer said,
When the film finishes there is usually silence and then
applause because the ending of the film is really quite
poignant. People do take a moment to reflect when it is over.

What has really surprised me is not so much that people
havent heard about the case of the Five, because that is a
particular case and also there has been a wall of silence
around it in the U.S. mainstream media. What really shocks
me, because I was brought up in Ireland, is the lack of
knowledge about the 45 years of U.S. aggression with the
trade blockade, economic blockade and actual physical
violence.

The CIA has backed active anti-Cuban right wing groups in
Miami to carry out assassination attempts on Fidel Castro and
also on the people of Cuba. I'll tell you, Dwyer continued,
the people of the United States are really, really shocked
when they realize this has been carried out in their name.

When asked why she and co-director Roberto Ruiz Rebo took on
this project, Dwyer explained that in addition to her work as
a journalist for Radio Havana assigned to covering the case
of the Cuban Five, she had been involved in campaigns in
Ireland to free Irish political prisoners who were in British
prisons.

I could see similarities here, said Dwyer. I could see that
thing that goes on we have to convict them, we have to charge
them, we have to put them in prison. Also the way family
members are treated. Irish families hated going to England to
see their family members. Games are played we don't have a
prisoner by that name because the prisoner was taken out the
back door. This is happening as well with the case of the
Five.

There was the case of Antonio Guerreros mother who is not a
young woman going to the States to visit her son. Its not
easy for them. They are treated badly. They are not used to
being in a big vast country like this, not knowing anybody.
She was there for a week to visit her son on different days.

On the last day, she went to the prison to say goodbye to
Antonio and he could say goodbye to her. They told her there
was no prisoner by that name. He was transferred to a
hospital. She couldn't go to the prison hospital. It was too
far away and the families can only travel within a certain
perimeter. So she had to go back to Cuba without saying
goodbye.

Although Mission Against Terror is off to the west coast to
finish the tour, copies of the film are available from Cuba
solidarity organizations across the country and will continue
to be shown. Due to U.S. visa restriction Cuban co-director
Roberto Ruiz Rebo could not participate in the U.S. tour.

However both he and Dwyer will continue the international
tour together. In April look for them in England, Scotland,
Wales and Ireland, then Germany in May.