The Hill Op-Ed: Cuba, Nicaragua can no longer whitewash their religious freedom violations

Cuban pastor Enrique Fundora (left) and Nicaraguan human rights advocate Felix Maradiaga in front of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva

This Op-Ed was originally published in The Hill on September 27, 2023. You can read the original version here.

 

For authoritarian states around the globe, the United Nations has sadly long served as a place where they can whitewash or deflect the world’s attention from their human rights abuses.

We see this in the cases of Cuba and Nicaragua, whose dictators have worked assiduously to manipulate the UN system to their advantage. This is especially so true of Cuba, which currently sits on the UN Human Rights Council.