Puebla Group Calls U.S. President to close Guantanamo Naval Base

The Puebla Group urged U.S. President Joe Biden to close the Guantanamo base, located in that illegally occupied territory, in Eastern Cuba, with its attached prison.

In a press release, prominent political personalities from 16 countries that make up the alliance stated that the termination of this territorial enclave, with the end of the economic, commercial, and financial blockade, would represent an important gesture of progress in inter-American relations, respect for human rights and integration.

This decision would also be interpreted as a positive sign on the road to reestablish the initiative of normalization of relations advanced during Barack Obama’s administration. The current President Biden was his vice-president’, the text specifies.

The statement was signed by several members of the Group, among them former presidents Dilma Rousseff (Brazil), Ernesto Samper (Colombia), and Fernando Lugo (Paraguay), as well as several former presidential candidates and senators from nations such as Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico, Ecuador, and Chile.

Since 2002, the United States has had a prison center for terrorist suspects at the Base, located on Cuban territory against the will of the Cuban government and people.

With some 780 convicts at the beginning, the prison generated worldwide outrage for the torture and mutilations that took place there and represented a symbol of Washington’s excess in response to terrorism.