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The Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel evoked the historic Protest of Baraguá this Sunday in a social media post that has drawn attention for occurring amid recent acknowledged contacts between Havana and Washington by the regime itself.
“It is called Baraguá and from history, we are struck by Antonio Maceo's inflexibility regarding the Pact without independence: ‘We do not understand each other’ he tells the Spanish counterpart and calls his troops to ‘break the corojo’ soon. We will always owe ourselves to that legacy of dignity,” Díaz-Canel wrote on his Facebook account.
The message, accompanied by the hashtag #CubaLivesInItsHistory, recalled one of the most well-known episodes of Cuban independence history: the Baraguá Protest, which took place on March 15, 1878, when General Antonio Maceo rejected the Pact of Zanjón, signed between Spain and some of the independence leaders to end the Ten Years' War without granting independence to the island.
During the meeting with the Spanish general Arsenio Martínez Campos, Maceo uttered the famous phrase "No, we do not understand each other", which came to symbolize the refusal to accept an agreement deemed insufficient for the independence goals and the "moral salvation of the revolution."
Over the decades, the official propaganda of the Cuban regime has turned the Baraguá Protest into a symbol of political stubbornness and defense of principles, presenting it as a historical precedent for the government's confrontational stance against external pressures.
Díaz-Canel's reference comes at a politically sensitive moment. On March 13, during a special appearance broadcast by state television, the leader himself admitted for the first time that there are discussions with the United States, following weeks of official denials.
As he explained at the time, these are contacts in the initial phases and of an exploratory nature. Díaz-Canel also noted that General Raúl Castro is involved in the process and that there are international mediators participating in the dialogue.
The acknowledgment of these conversations occurs in a complex geopolitical context for Havana following the capture of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela on January 3rd, an event that weakened one of the main allies of the Cuban regime and exacerbated the energy crisis facing the island.
In that context, Díaz-Canel's evocation of Baraguá has been interpreted by some observers as an attempt to reinforce the narrative of political firmness, even as the Cuban regime acknowledges the existence of contacts with Washington.
The Protest of Baraguá has been repeatedly used by the official discourse since 1959 as a symbol of national resistance and rejection of agreements deemed contrary to the country's interests. In the regime's narrative, the figure of Antonio Maceo is often presented as a historical antecedent of the so-called "revolutionary intransigence."
However, the phrase quoted by Díaz-Canel —"We do not understand each other"— takes on a particular nuance amidst a moment where the government itself acknowledges that it is exploring channels of dialogue with the United States.
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