MIAMI — A few dozen people met on Monday night at the Our Lady of Charity National Shrine to pray for freedom in Cuba as they marked the first anniversary of the historic July 11 protests.
Some of the parishioners had participated in a march along Eighth Street in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood in solidarity with the Cuban political prisoners.
Aylin Silva and Wilfredo Ramos marched together and used their mobile phone to show their relatives on the communist island the strong showing. Their relative was in tears.
“We have to arm ourselves with courage,” she said in Spanish from Cuba.
The crowd shouted in Spanish: “Long live a free Cuba!”
Andy Gómez, formerly of the University of Miami’s Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies, has been following the officials’ crackdown after the July 11 protests.
“The only way that this regime is going to come down is if a large portion of their military turns on its leaders,” Gómez said.
The Assembly of the Cuban Resistance also commemorated the anniversary at the Bay of Pigs Museum in Miami with veterans of the Assault Brigade 2506.
“It’s a freedom that we believe in, it’s a cause that we believe in, it’s people that we will support forever,” Rafael Montalvo, the president of Brigade 2506, said during the event.
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- South Florida’s Cuban exiles mark one year since antigovernmental protests in Cuba
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- Record number of Cuban migrants attempting to cross into US at southern border with Mexico
- ‘Florida is a destination area’: An exclusive look at immigration border crisis amid rise in rescues
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