Fidel himself admits to having 20.000 political prisoners. In addition to those executed and those incarcerated. there is right here in our Nation a dramatic indication of the severity of political repression in Cuba. As I pointed out in a floor statement October 10. that indicator is thegreat mass of refugees who have fled the brutal Castro dictatorship: some threequarters of a million refugees at last count. The flow increased to a human flood as Castro clamped down on free enterprise. free press. free speech. freedom of religion. and freedom of action. It accelerated even further with the airlift. and it continued even after the airlift was ended. For 15 years now. the flow of refugees to the United States and elsewhere has continued. So offensive has this regime been to Cubans that many refugees risked life and limb to leave Cuba. to say nothing of giving up all their worldly possessions. One estimate has it that over 11.000 Cubans have fled to this country by boat or raftoften traversing the 90 miles in imminent danger of drowning. or capture by Castros vessels. or both. Those who have been fortunate enough to flee have told us that those early excesses of autocratic rule. the executions. were only the harbinger of a brutal dictatorship dedicated to stamping out. wherever possible. personal freedom and human dignity.
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