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In mid-October in Miami, Florida, the Southeast Asian Democracy League and the Cuban Liberty Council (CLC) along with three other Cuban expatriate organizations came together to support a common cause: the removal of all militarily imposed totalitarian dictatorships.

The Southeast Asian Democracy League consists of the Bangladesh Democracy League, the Sam Rainsy Party of Cambodia, the Force of Vietnamese People for Freedom and Democracy, and the Government of Laos Abroad. All of these groups represent nations that have been conquered by totalitarian regimes.

Founded by Cuban expatriates who escaped from Castro’s Cuba, the CLC was established in 2001 to promote and support the Cuban exile community in the United States and opposition parties inside Cuba. They were joined by Municipios de Cuba en el Exilio, the Cuban Political Prisoners Council, and the Junta Patriotica Cubana. Together they represent the majority of Cubans who are against Castro’s Communist regime.

Featured speakers at the conference related stories of persecution and suffering in Cuba and in Asia. Dr. Charles Chang, prime minister of the Government of Laos Abroad, explained the atrocities committed against the Hmong people, especially children, by the communist Pathet Lao party. Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, according to Dr. Muhammed Chowdhurry, a military dictatorship operates behind the scenes and the people are arrested and terrorized. Free elections are impossible and popular political leaders have been jailed.

The Chinese communist party has long been particularly repressive. Among many other victim groups in China is the Falun Gong, whose practitioners are routinely hunted down and persecuted. A spokesperson from the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong described the imprisonment and torture of millions of Falun Gong practitioners. And in Vietnam, the Montagnards, a small ethnic minority that helped the United States during the Vietnam War, is now physically persecuted by the Vietnam Communist Party (VCP). The VCP specializes in slavery and human trafficking, and the country still has no freedom of religion or the press, or, for that matter, any measurable degree of political freedom.

Delegates at the forum pledged to work together to break the stranglehold totalitarian regimes have on the people of their various homelands. The meeting of these dissident groups serves as a reminder that, throughout much of the world, many people remain under the yoke of oppressive and tyrannical regimes. That they met in Florida, in the USA, should remind Americans of the freedoms they yet enjoy and should be committed to protecting.