|
|
NEWS
Stars and intellectuals hit out at Castro in Paris event
PARIS (AFP) - Film stars and intellectuals including Catherine Deneuve,
Sophie Marceau, Pedro Almodovar and Jorge Semprun attended a soiree here
supporting the Cuban people and hitting out at repression by leader
Fidel Castro.
Actress Deneuve opened the event organized by the association Reporters
Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders) at a theatre on the
Champs-Elysees by reading from a speech made by Castro in Havana on
January 8, 1959 just after the victory of the Cuban revolution.
"Fooling the people will have the worst consequences ... I shall do
everything in my power to resolve the problems without shedding a drop
of blood," the revolutionary leader promised.
Semprun, the Spanish writer and former culture minister, charged that 40
years later "the people are still on their knees in front of the rifles"
and spoke of "the occultations of truth that have for so long been the
prerogative of part of the European Left."
Special homage was paid to poet and journalist Raul Rivero, sentenced
recently to 20 years in prison at a closed-doors trial for "attacking
the sovereignty of the (Cuban) state."
His daughter Cristina Rivero took to the stage to ask "how could a poet,
one man, like a modern Hercules divide the country?"
Actress Sophie Marceau read a poem by Raul Rivero and Spanish director
Pedro Almodovar, brandishing a fan bearing the words "Cuba si, Castro
no" expressed the hope that Castro would restore Cuba's freedom and get
rid of dictatorship.
Back
|
|
|
