A Cuba Brigade organized by the Berlin-based association Interbrigadas has been named after the Argentine doctor Alina Sánchez (Lêgerîn Çiya). The association is engaged with internationalist aspirations in the field of political and cultural exchange between Europe and Latin America. Last summer, a brigade was already in Cuba to put internationalist solidarity into practice. Specifically, it is about the "Ventana al Valle", a socio-cultural center in Viñales in western Cuba, which provides space for Cuban culture and discussion. Together with local comrades, a "Ranchón" (Cuban palm roof) was built, trees were planted and flowerbeds created, and a workshop was built and equipped with tools. In addition, since last year the project has a piece of land on which a permaculture fruit forest is to be planted. Initial designs have been developed for this and some have already been implemented. The current brigade wants to help on site with the second construction phase.

Alina Sánchez was born in Argentina in 1986, completed her medical degree in Cuba and came into contact with the Kurdish liberation movement in 2011. In Kurdistan, she called herself Lêgerîn Çiya. An internationalist, she most recently lived in Rojava and was instrumental in reorganizing the health care system in the self-administered areas in northern Syria. She was killed in a traffic accident near Hesekê on March 17, 2018. She is unforgettable in Kurdistan and for internationalists worldwide.

The PKK message of condolence after her death included the following:

“We have learned of the martyrdom of our international comrade Lêgerîn Çîya (Alina Sanchez) with great sorrow. We offer our condolences to the whole of democratic humanity and her family. We share the pride and honor of having such a comrade, like our comrades and all socialists. As we commemorate Comrade Lêgerîn Çîya with gratitude and respect, we promise to crown her fight all throughout Kurdistan, the Middle East and the world.

Leader Apo’s line of women’s emancipatory democratic socialism had pulled her from Argentina the homelands of Che Guevara to Kurdistan’s mountains of freedom. She came thousands of miles to the Medya Defense Zones in 2011 to meet her socialist comrades with a great passion for freedom and democracy that she longed for. Coming together with the mountains of freedom was like awakening to a new life for her. Under intense attacks by the Iranian and the Turkish state, she remained in the Qandil Xinêre and Garê regions. She witnessed first-hand the war aspect of the struggle for freedom and democracy in Kurdistan under the bombs. In her first month, she came face to face with almost becoming a martyr. The hardships of the Kurdistan revolution and her experiences made her ties to the PKK and the Freedom Movement stronger.

Lêgerîn Çîya was a comrade who studied medicine in Cuba. As she only had one year left, the Freedom Movement decided she should have gone back to Cuba to finish her studies, and return to the country afterwards. And she was tasked with promoting Leader Apo’s line of thought throughout Latin America and handle PKK organization there. Comrade Lêgerîn went to Cuba with this responsibility and this duty and graduated from medical school there, then participated in the promotion and organization of Leader Apo, PKK and the PAJK in Latin America along with other comrades and allies. She completed important work on this front, and became one of the first comrades who laid the foundations of our movement in South America.

With the development of the Kobanê resistance, and the founding of democratic confederalism based on an organized society in Rojava and Northern Syria, Comrade Lêgerîn turned back towards Kurdistan. She ran to Rojava with the sentiment shared by the great revolutionary Che Guevara, to take part in the foundation of the democratic confederal system and the building of the democratic social life. She strived to build the health system in Rojava and to play her part in the actualization of the revolution. She participated in all efforts with the passion and enthusiasm for freedom that South American peoples and revolutionaries have, and became a valued comrade of the Rojava Revolutionaries.

Comrade Lêgerîn Çîya both facilitated the arrival of many internationalists to Kurdistan and Rojava, and left her mark on the Rojava Revolution with her women’s liberation revolutionary democratic socialist line and character. Rojava revolutionaries and our people will never forget her. The struggle and martyrdom of Lêgerîns will be Rojava’s democratic revolutionary line, and the guarantee for that line.

We remember Lêgerîn Çîya with gratitude and respect, and promise to hold her flag of struggle up high. We say her international spirit and socialist path will live on in the line of the PKK.”