Ms. Judith Krug, Director
Office for Intellectual Freedom
American Library Association 50 East Huron Stree Chicago, Illinois60611
Dear Ms. Krug,
With great admiration for your long record in the
service and defense of intellectual freedom, I provide the enclosed
documentation of a year-long effort to encourage your Office to
recognize and condemn yet one more assault on
intellectual freedom, in
the form of book burning.
It is my hope that the enclosed documentation
will lead to the listing, on your Office's "Book Burning in the 21st
Century" web
page, of the book burning that occurred in Cuba
in the year 2003, following the arrests and convictions of some 75
dissidents.
As a trained historian, I
find it odd that Don Wood of your Office requests secondary newspaper
sources as documentation, in
preference to the actual primary source court documents.It is also ironic that Mr. Wood prefers journalism - and
independent
journalism, of all things - over government records,
especially in light of the fact that Cuba
is one of the world's greatest prisons
for independent journalists, and
the government records which Walter Skold and I are using as our chief
proofs are documents
of the Cuban government itself!
Regarding Mr. Wood's preference for a story in a
major newspaper, it should be possible to interest a major newspaper in
running this story at the time of Banned Books Week.However, although it would make lively reading as a news
account,
not to mention an editorial piece, please know that I do not
wish to embarrass my professional association in this manner.
Therefore I implore you to accept the
documentation offered here in good faith, or to contact the FloridaStateUniversity
Center for Human Rights for verification from the people who have
posted the Rule of Law and Cuba
web site, and to contact
Dr. Holly Ackerman, the Amnesty International
country specialist for Cuba,
who is also a librarian, for her verification
of the authenticity of
this documentation.
Please advise me, by August 25 (one month prior
to Banned Books Week) about the ALA OIF course of action in this regard,
and whether an approach to a major newspaper will be required.
Sincerely,
Steve Marquardt, Ph.D.
Copy (cover letter only) to: Holly Ackerman, Ph.D.
<>Librarian for Latin America and Iberia
(as of July 1, 2006) DukeUniversity,
Perkins Library Box 90195
<>Durham, North
Carolina27708-0195