Some 20 European human rights groups have answered a call to establish a common platform on Cuba, another step in a burgeoning U.S.-European campaign to forge a many-voiced ``choir for democracy'' on the island.
The European Platform for Human Rights and Democracy in Cuba said it hopes to coordinate programs and exchange information among groups from the continent that wish to help Cubans obtain basic civil rights.
The Netherlands' branch of the Roman Catholic group Pax Christi and Dutch government agencies are expected to provide funds for an initial organizational meeting, probably next month in The Hague.
Pax Christi launched the Platform last month with an appeal adopted by six groups and welcomed by another 15 groups expected to attend the meeting next month as observers, said Pax Christi's Erick Laan.
``This is meant to be a sign of encouragement from Europe for all Cubans and Cuban organizations who are silenced in their struggle for basic rights,'' the appeal said.
Creation of the Platform was hailed by Clinton administration officials as progress in a campaign to create multilateral pressures on Cuba to shift toward Western-style democracy.
The 15-member European Community adopted a binding policy last month linking relations with Cuba to progress on human rights, and several European business groups are considering adopting guidelines for investments in Cuba.
Europe's position appears to be a shift from decades of policy that seemed to play down Cuba's human-rights picture, portraying it as a direct result of aggression from its U.S. neighbors.
President Clinton, in a clear sign of gratitude for the shift, then postponed for another six months a section of the Helms-Burton Act that had angered Europe by threatening legal action against foreigners doing business in Cuba.
The Platform's creation underlined a recent shift in the focus of some of the European nongovernmental groups that once saw Cuba as an egalitarian society striving to feed and educate its people.
``Europe has been slow in recognizing the importance of human rights and democracy in Cuba,'' said the Pax Christi proposal for the Platform.
Three of the seven founding groups have solid liberal credentials: Pax Christi, the Italian branch of the League for Human Rights and the Liberation of People, and the Dutch-based International Artists Organizations.
The others are the British Index on Censorship; the Italian Committee for Human Rights in Cuba; Glasnost in Cuba, a Dutch group linked to labor unions; and the Italy-based Russian Ecumenical Center, which focuses on human rights in communist-ruled countries.
Several of the 15 other groups that have endorsed the Platform will take part only as observers out of concern that Cuban government officials will try to interfere with some of their activities in Cuba.
Platform members in the past have sent private cash donations to human rights activists inside Cuba, as well as fax machines and books to groups of independent lawyers and dissidents.
Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald