Members of the Organization of American States (OAS) appointed Cuban activist Rosa María Payá on June 27 as commissioner-elect of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
With 20 votes from 34 OAS member states, Payá was elected on June 27. The IACHR is a principal and autonomous organ of the OAS responsible for promoting and advocating for human rights.
“Deeply honored by the trust that the States of the Americas have placed in me today to defend the human rights of all,” Payá wrote on social media platform X. “Thank you to the United States for the boldness of such an extraordinary candidacy as mine. It will be an honor to serve the peoples of the Americas.”
“We live on a continent where democracy is weakening, repression is growing, and millions of people are suffering the effects of the collapse of the rule of law. Violence, organized crime, forced displacement, and persecution hit the most vulnerable hardest: girls, boys, women, and those persecuted for their political beliefs,” she added.
Payá, 36, considers the mission of the IACHR essential and listed her priorities at the helm of the commission: Protecting those most in need, defending democracy, ensuring an effective and transparent commission, and bringing the system closer to the most vulnerable.
In her post, she recalled her life under Cuban tyranny, which she described as “the longest and bloodiest our continent has ever suffered,” adding that its permanence “has cost the end of democracy in Nicaragua and Venezuela and has caused the greatest migration crisis in our history.”
Payá is the daughter of Cuban activist Oswaldo Payá, who died in a car accident in Granma, Cuba, along with fellow Cuban activist Harold Cepero, on June 22, 2012.
After an investigation that took 10 years to complete, a 2023 report by the IACHR concluded that the Cuban regime was involved in the accident that led to their deaths.
On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and deputy secretary of state Christopher Landau urged OAS members to support Payá’s candidacy to head the IACHR.
Rubio said, “The United States is proud to have nominated Rosa María Payá for this role,” in a statement on June 26.
