Human Rights and
International Democratic Solidarity

MEMBERS

Gabriel C. Salvia
Gabriel C. Salvia
General Director of CADAL
Human rights activist dedicated to international democratic solidarity. In 2024 he received the Gratias Agit Award from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic. He is the author of the books “Memory, human rights and international democratic solidarity” (2024) and “Bailando por un espejismo: apuntes sobre política, economía y diplomacia en los gobiernos de Cristina Fernández de Kirchner” (2017). In addition, he compiled several books, including “75 años de la Declaración Universal de Derechos Humanos: Miradas desde Cuba” (2023), “Human rights in international relations and foreign policy” (2021), “Desafíos para el fortalecimiento democrático en la Argentina” (2015), “Un balance político a 30 años del retorno a la democracia en Argentina” (2013) and “Diplomacy and Human Rights in Cuba” (2011), His opinion columns have been published in several Spanish-language media. He currently publishes in Clarín, Perfil, Infobae and La Nación, in Argentina. He has participated in international conferences in Latin America, Africa, Asia, Europe, the Balkans and the United States. Since 1992 he has served as director of Civil Society Organizations and is a founding member of CADAL. As a journalist, he worked between 1992 and 1997 in print, radio and TV specialized in parliamentary, political and economic issues, and later contributed with interviews in La Nación and Perfil.
Gabriel C. Salvia's publications
Apertura Latinoamericana | Archivo | Articles | Artículos | Books | Diálogo Latino Cubano | Documents | Informes | Interviews | Latino-Cuban Dialogue | Libros | Rankings | Research Reports

See Gabriel C. Salvia's publications in collaboration with other authors

12-08-2024 | Articles
It is time that democracies adopt a coordinated and active foreign human rights policy. Such a policy must be based on its general application and on maintaining high domestic standards of civil and political liberties.

11-03-2024 | Articles
No Latin American country made a recommendation to China on Tibet in its recent human rights review in Geneva, which reflects how far the Latin American region is from inserting itself internationally in the claim for noble causes, including countries such as Argentina, Chile and Uruguay that lived through terrible military dictatorships.

31-01-2024 | Articles
CADAL launched the initiative »Point out and shame dictatorships» which consists in comparing the intervention of our country with another one that deserves to be highlighted. For example, last January 23 took place the 4th UPR of China, considered »autocracy», »not free country» and with »closed civic space», where CADAL highlights the intervention of the United Kingdom and invites to qualify Argentina’s intervention to monitor its commitment to human rights and international democratic solidarity.

12-12-2023 | Articles
She leaves a tremendous legacy of civic courage, solidarity and genuine commitment to the defense of human rights. Never will be forgotten the time she confronted Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet at the assembly of the Inter-American Press Association in Santiago, Chile, and, looking him straight to the face, called him «murderer».

21-11-2023 | Articles
Javier Milei’s refusal to invite autocratic countries to his presidential inauguration implies, on the one hand, not granting them »equal treatment», since their representatives lack the democratic legitimacy that he has and, on the other hand, sending a message of international democratic solidarity to the victims of repression and state terrorism in autocracies.

29-09-2023 | Articles
That China is a dictatorship and its victims are counted in millions is more than documented, and with its anti-democracy narrative and its global economic influence the Chinese Communist Party regime is the greatest threat to the universal ideal of human rights. The more countries denounce its human rights situation the more the Asian giant’s reprisals will be cushioned, the more changes of political openness it will favor and the more moral authority it will grant to point the finger at other dictatorships.

18-08-2023 | Articles
Milei represents a dogmatic ideology, which combines economic libertarianism with political conservatism, which, besides not being applied in any country in the world, denies dissent and the possibility of peacefully confronting opinions, that is to say, of practicing political tolerance, which is the basis of democratic coexistence.

30-05-2023 | Articles
For Milei, accomplishing his political promises is not feasible unless he weakens democratic institutions. The probable negative effect of Milei’s government on civil and political liberties is compounded by the fact that libertarians do not recognize economic, social, and cultural rights. Therefore, their ideology conflicts with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

27-02-2023 | Articles
Double standards must not be applied when judging foreign authoritarian regimes, whether the regime implements left-wing or right-wing ideology. This is a fundamental principle of human rights activism. Given that human rights are universal rights, human rights organizations should vigilantly protect human rights in all cases.

13-12-2022 | Articles
(Clarin) Argentina’s international insensibility represents, in a way, a failure of the ideals of Memory, Truth, and Justice and a general ignorance of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: «All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.»

11-03-2022 | Articles
If the path to world peace depends on the globalization of democracy, then countries with governments based on the standards of article 12 of the Universal Declaration on Democracy must adopt international democratic solidarity as a fundamental axis of its foreign policy on human rights and do so without double standards.

24-08-2020 | Articles
Horáková was a pioneer of human rights activism and an emblematic figure in the defense of democracy in the then Czechoslovakia. The book «Milada Horáková: Defender of Human Rights and Victim of Totalitarianisms» by historian Ricardo López Göttig is an invitation to remember this brave woman and to embrace the noble ideals she defended, for which she first suffered imprisonment in the Nazi concentration camp in Terezin and eventually was executed by the communists.

05-03-2020 | Articles
From the perspective of the commitment to human rights, the decision of the new Uruguayan authorities -that will assume office next March 1- to not include the region’s autocrats in the swearing in ceremony is consistent with their values. It speaks badly of an exemplary democracy to give “equal treatment and respect” to leaders in other countries that were not elected through free, fair and competitive elections.

19-07-2019 | Articles
The list of complacent would be long, for example, those of democratic countries whose officials never received any nomination for the Award for Committed Diplomacy in Cuba, so it is as if they were not there. And most worrying, after the delivery of the last edition of the Prize for the period 2016-2018, is the setback that some embassies recorded.

30-04-2019 | Articles
(The Global Americans) A month after promoting the establishment of PROSUR, Chilean President Sebastián Piñera contradicted the central principles of the new regional bloc during a trip to China.

27-02-2019 | Articles
(The Global Americans) Given the significant numbers of votes against the reform, the results of the referendum call into question the unanimity on which Castro and the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) have always attempted to stake the legitimacy of the revolution.

16-08-2018 | Articles
One year from primary elections, the future of Argentina is torn between economic stagnation, the debate over the decriminalization of abortion, and the corruption of the Kirchner years.

09-01-2018 | Articles
(The Global Americans) It would be relevant to know the expectations of the High Representative of the European Union in the dialogue on human rights with Cuba.

09-12-2017 | Articles
(Perfil) Legislators can submit draft declarations condemning humanrights violations in dictatorial countries and ask for declarations from theirrespective governments in intergovernmental organizations; denouncecorrupt electoral processes that are neither fair nor transparent inautocratic regimes; and recognize the work and initiatives of democraticactivists whose lives are at risk.

23-08-2017 | Articles
From this year forward, the Argentine capital will be a pioneer city in Latin America as it commemorates the victims of totalitarianism every 23rd of August. Someone who will always be in our thoughts on this day will be Cecilia de la Torre, who passed last December.

14-12-2016 | Articles
Without a Cuban gesture towards a more open political system, it does not make sense to discuss an agreement since the one party regime of Raúl Castro would not approve any improvement in the area of human rights. Thus, the negotiations between the EU and Cuba started rather poorly if we believe there was ever any genuine interest by the EU in achieving any progress regarding a more open political system in the island.

30-11-2016 | Articles
(Infobae) A human rights figure cannot be indifferent towards human rights violations that take place in the remaining dictatorships nor they can ignore such evident facts to defend the indefensible.

29-11-2016 | Articles
(Latin America Goes Global) Recently, a third of the members of the UN Human Rights Council were renewed with China, the biggest dictatorship in the world, accumulating no less than 180 votes which gives proof to the assumption that several developed democracies voted in China's favour.

10-06-2015 | Articles
(El País/Spain) If Raúl Castro truly wants Obama to have a bigger support in Congress to lift the embargo, he has to provide a gesture on his part which could include repealing Law 88. Since this wouldn’t involve the political risk of making a reform which stems from the recognition of the exercise of fundamental rights. If Raúl Castro doesn’t even repeal Law 88, this might be because he feels very confident that the dictatorship he installed with his brother Fidel is entirely safe from international pressure and questionings.

14-05-2015 | Articles
When the last Universal Periodic Review of Cuba was held in Geneva, France recommended to the government of Raul Castro to ensure freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, and the free activity of human rights defenders, independent journalists and political opponents. Now,what value does this recommendation have when France validates the repression of those rights that is has asked Cuba to guarantee?

22-12-2014 | Articles
The Cuban regime uses a similar argument as China to justify its rhetorical model of "socialist, local, original, democratic and participatory development" and keep the dictatorship unchanged. In fact, during its Universal Periodic Review at the UN Human Rights Council, held on May 1st, 2013, the Cuban dictatorship affirmed that it does not accept any universal model of democracy.

11-12-2014 | Articles
Despite of not having the communications of the developed democracies during the Universal Periodic Review of North Korea at least the majority of the Latin American countries voted on November 18th in favor of the critical resolution about the situation of human rights in this country and like that the political division of the region was shown again.

04-02-2014 | Articles

27-11-2013 | Articles
The Council has 47 member states, regionally elected by a majority of the UN countries. For the election of the members of the UN Human Rights Council, the contribution to the protection and promotion of human rights in the country should be taken into account. Now, regarding some of the countries that have just been elected to serve on this body, like Saudi Arabia, Cuba, China, Vietnam, and Russia, it remains clear that the fulfillment of its goal is unfeasible. Can there be a greater contradiction than a Human Rights Council that incorporates dictatorships?

28-06-2012 | Articles

15-06-2012 | Articles

08-05-2012 | Articles
The recent support of the self-defined “progressive” sectors of the Argentine legislature for the nationalization of the majority share of YPF shows they are no longer an alternative to the Kirchner government, in political or economic terms.

18-07-2010 | Articles
Immediately one can listen to the optimistic readings on political changes in Cuba, as if ignoring the repressive regime's skill to hold in power for more than half a century. However, so long as first generation human rights are considered a crime, nothing will change in that country and those who are being released can be sent back to prison anytime.

27-01-2009 | Articles
Kirchnerism has exploited the issue of human rights politically, and lacks the most minimal concern for the subject. Cristina's trip to Cuba leaves no doubt about it, especially when, to top it off, she was received by the elderly dictator Fidel Castro, and had the delicateness of considering that event “a distinction for the entire Argentinean people”.

22-12-2008 | Articles
The Rio Group is a Latin American mechanism of political articulation and diplomatic negotiation which was created in 1986 and currently consists of 23 member countries. The Rio Group decided to incorporate the Cuban dictatorship as a full-fledged member during the presidential summit of Mercosur.

22-10-2008 | Articles
Furthermore, on the eve of legislative elections in one year, those affected by the kirchnerist proposal could vote massively for opposition candidates in October 2009 and then the governing party would be lethally hurt if it looses its own majority.


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