Our Mission

In 1959, Fidel Castro - who led the armed wing of a broad-based opposition movement against the Batista dictatorship - seized power in Cuba on behalf of a popular effort premised on the restoration of Cuba's constitutional democracy. Instead of holding promised free elections, Castro and a small circle of collaborators proceeded to discard the progressive Cuban Constitution of 1940 , abolished all political parties, and destroyed the autonomous institutions of Cuban civil society.

Gone were the free press (including over 300 newspapers across the island) and freedom of expression, the autonomous universities and the academic freedom that thrived therein, many of the churches and all religious schooling (and the religious freedom that they fostered), and the vast web of voluntary civic and professional organizations that had abounded in Cuba since before independence. Gone too were the independent labor unions and the hard-won labor rights codified by the Constitution of 1940, all political parties and all forms of democratic politics.

In the process of snuffing out every last spark of independence that remained in Cuban society, the new regime systematically did away with the customary rights Cubans had enjoyed since the dawn of the Republic, carrying out a ruthless campaign to silence all dissent. Challengers within the revolutionary armed forces and the leadership of the opposition were subjected to mock trials and summarily executed, relegated to Castro's gulag, or forced into exile.

Forging an alliance with the then-Soviet Union, Castro declared a communist-totalitarian state and placed himself at the helm of a reign of terror that has caused more than 100,000 Cubans to lose their lives and separated a nation by forcing almost two million Cubans into exile.

CANF embodies the struggle of so many Cubans -and friends of freedom alike - who seek to end more than forty years of totalitarian rule that has silenced, impoverished and brutalized the Cuban people. CANF unites thousands who, willing to share the benefits and blessings of living in free societies, act on their sense of duty to help bring freedom and a dream of a better future to the people of Cuba.