Monday, June 9, 2008

En honor del Dr. Armando Lago

Con profunda tristeza notificamos la muerte del Dr. Armando Lago anoche, 8 de junio, en Miami. A pesar de que deja un vacío muy profundo con su partida, su obra y dedicación continuarán siendo fuente de gran inspiración para nosotros y nuestro proyecto.

Armando M. Lago, Ph.D., obtuvo su Maestría y Doctorado en Economía de la Universidad de Harvard. Tuvo una distinguida carrera como profesor universitario, especialista internacional en transporte y dueño de una firma dedicada a la econometría. A la vez, desarrolló múltiples actividades cívicas en el área de Washington, D.C., donde residió por muchos años. Entre otras cosas, fue coautor de obra La política de la psiquiatría en la Cuba revolucionaria (1991). Al jubilarse por razones de salud a mediados de los años noventa, se dedicó a documentar el costo en vidas de la revolución cubana y escribió el manuscrito Cuba: El costo humano de la revolución social. Fue co-fundador y vicepresidente de la organización Free Society Project, quien desarrolla el proyecto de memoria y verdad, Archivo Cuba. Su minuciosa y dedicada investigación constituye el principal pilar de este trabajo.


Maria C. Werlau
Directora Ejecutiva
Archivo Cuba
www.ArchivoCuba.org


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Dr. Armando Lago, economist and respected Cuban researcher, died Sunday at age 69 in Miami. He passed away at the South Miami Hospital after suffering a heart attack and enduring a long string of illnesses.

Dr. Lago was born in Cuba, which he left in 1960 at age 19, persecuted by the Castro regime. As a student of Colegio La Salle, in Havana, he swam competitively and was known for his brilliant intellect, graduating at the top of his class. He settled with his family in Puerto Rico, where he completed his undergraduate university studies and went on to obtain his Ph.D. and Masters in Economics from Harvard University.

Shortly thereafter, Lago moved to Washington, D.C., where he raised his family and was a professor of economics at Catholic University of America. Prior to establishing his consulting business, Econometrics, in the Washington, DC area, Lago held executive positions at D.C. based economic consulting firms and think tanks as well as the Stanford Research Institute of California. He achieved international renown as a specialist in transportation economics.

Lago was also an active participant of civic and human rights' undertakings. Among other things, he was Chairman of the Board of the Greater Washington (D.C.) Ibero-American Chamber of Commerce and founding member and co-founder and former President of the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy. In the late 1970s he had discovered his passion for human rights in Cuba as a volunteer for the nonprofit organization "Of Human Rights" in Washington, D.C., led by Elena Mederos, where he interceded for the freedom of Cuban political prisoners. Among his human rights undertakings, he co-authored The Politics of Psychiatry in Revolutionary Cuba, (Transaction Publishers, 1991), which documented the Castro regime use of psychiatric torture against its people.

After his retirement for health reasons in the mid 1990s, Lago devoted his time to compiling a record of Cubans who perished under the Castro regime and authoring the manuscript Cuba: The Human Cost of Social Revolution. His dedicated and rigorous work of many years laid the foundation for its truth and memory initiative, Cuba Archive, that is documenting the cost in lives of the Cuban Revolution under the auspices of Free Society Project, a non-profit organization he co-founded for this purpose. Its work has been featured in numerous articles and television programs in the United States and all over the world over the past five years. The 1961 execution by the Castro regime of his close friend Virgilio Campaneri­a at age 23, particularly inspired him.

A viewing will be held Friday, June 13th from 5-10PM at the Caballero Funeral Woodlawn-Miami chapel, 3344 S.W. 8th street, Miami. The funeral service will be held on Saturday, June 14th, at 9:30AM at St Raymond Church, 3475 S.W.17th Street, Miami.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made in his memory to the non-profit project Cuba Archive, which can be found online at www.CubaArchive.org.


Maria C. Werlau
Directora Ejecutiva
Archivo Cuba
www.ArchivoCuba.org

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