Puerto Rico before the UN in Geneva

The fight for our sovereignty and independence, although increasingly uphill, is carried out every day from different scenarios: in agriculture, where young people try to rescue the land to ensure a future with food sovereignty; in communities fighting against forced displacement by large foreign millionaire interests that receive benefits from local government; in the environmental defenders who fight incessantly against the dispossession and destruction of our coasts and natural reserves; in the fight against privatization that the neoliberal process has intensified, making each public service a source of million-dollar profits for mafia companies, mostly foreign, which, while profiting, deteriorate the services necessary for the population, services such as energy, health, education, public transportation.

In addition, there are the left-wing and pro-independence political parties and organizations that fight from their various ideological platforms against colonialism and the new government imposed by the US Congress, the Fiscal Control Board, which came with the excuse of “fixing the finances”. ”, and it has become a true center that has encouraged foreign money laundering.

On the other hand, there is the fight at the international level, where representatives of our organizations raise the protest, especially in United Nations organizations.

And it is here, in its Geneva office, that this week, the true face of the United States at the UN was shown to the world.

The American Civil Liberties Union in Puerto Rico and the Puerto Rican Institute of International Relations presented two detailed reports on the need for decolonization of Puerto Rico and the incompatibility of colonialism with Human Rights.

Mr. Fermín Arraíza, director of the ACLU-PR, went on to say that “Puerto Rico is not simply a territory; is a nation with the full right to self-determination”, and that the UN has the obligation to address it, and “the United States could face the International Court of Human Rights and the UN general assembly for misinterpreting the colonial status of Puerto Rico” .

In response, the representative of the USA refused to answer. So in the face of this refusal, the Puerto Rican delegation and delegations from other countries stood in silent protest and turned their backs in solidarity with Puerto Rico.

The fight will have to continue at all levels, and if the UN and its courts refuse to consider it, it will be the united peoples who will finally achieve victory.

From Puerto Rico, for Radio Clarín of Colombia, Berta Joubert-Ceci spoke to you.

Translated by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews