Uncommon Sense

Amnesty International: Cuba stifles freedom of expression, association, assembly

Amnesty International this week released its annual report for 2011.

This is how it summed up the situation in Cuba:

The last 11 prisoners of conscience detained during the March 2003 crackdown were released in March, along with 62 other political prisoners. However, government repression continued, resulting in hundreds of short-term arrests and detentions. Journalists and political dissidents faced harassment and intimidation by security officials and government supporters acting with government acquiescence.

The Cuban authorities continued to stifle freedom of expression, association and assembly, in spite of the much publicized releases of prominent dissidents. Hundreds of pro-democracy activists and dissidents suffered harassment, intimidation and arbitrary arrest.

In April, the Cuban Communist Party held its first congress since 1997 and adopted a package of more than 300 economic reforms that were due to be introduced gradually. However, no resolutions were adopted granting Cubans greater enjoyment of civil and political rights or proposing legislative reforms to allow greater political freedom on the island. During the year, the Cuban government introduced minor economic reforms authorizing the sale of cars and houses, and permitting some income-generating activities outside its direct control.

Alan Gross, a US citizen arrested in December 2009 for distributing telecommunications material in Cuba, was sentenced by a Cuban tribunal to 15 years in prison for crimes against the security of the state. US officials and personalities attempted to secure his release on humanitarian grounds but were unsuccessful.

Read the whole thing here.

Mariela Castro's Anti-Americanism

The U.S. State Department was wrong to grant Cuba First Daughter Mariela Castro a visa to visit the United States. She is more than the spawn of a dictator but rather a valiant defender of the indefensible, one of the world's most repressive regimes that among other abuses, denies Cubans the right to travel that she requested from the United States.

In her own words, here are some more reasons why, courtesy of the Cuba Transition Project at the University of Miami:

Mariela Castro’s Anti-Americanism   “[Cuba] won independence from Spain, but this was curtailed by the intervention of the United States.” "[Cuba gano] la independencia ante España, pero se frustró debido a la intervención norteamericana.” (1) “The United States remains hegemonic. It is the world’s police, it controls us all. Case in point, Europe has followed in its footsteps by establishing its Common Position against Cuba. That is cynicism! This demonstrates that Europe is subordinate to the politics of the United States.” “Los Estados Unidos siguen siendo hegemónicos. Son los policías del mundo, nos controlan a todos. Constato que Europa le ha seguido los pasos al establecer una posición común contra Cuba. ¡Eso es cinismo! Eso demuestra que está subordinada a la política de los Estados Unidos.” (2)  “[A] very sad event that is causing great sorrow to my family…is the situation of our five heroes illegally and arbitrarily jailed in the United States for protecting the Cuban people from the terrorist acts organized in the United States with US government financing….Because they’re really so crude that they are not even willing to trade our prisoners for the North American prisoner here [Alan Gross] who was legally tried and sentenced with every respect for the rights of a prisoner.” “[Un] acontecimiento muy triste que se está viviendo con mucho sufrimiento por mi familia…es la situación de nuestros cinco héroes, prisioneros ilegalmente, arbitrariamente, en los Estados Unidos por proteger al pueblo cubano de los atentados terroristas que se organizan desde los Estados Unidos con financiamiento el gobierno norteamericano…. Porque realmente son tan burdos que ni siquiera quieren cambiar a nuestros prisioneros por el prisionero norteamericano que está aquí [Alan Gross], que ya fue condenado en un juicio legal y con todos los recursos de respeto a los derechos del prisionero”. (3)  “I hope that the economic, financial and trade blockade against Cuba will be lifted, so that the economy can grow and wages can rise. But I also hope that we will not compromise our independence and become weak, and that we will never betray our ideals of equality and social justice.”  “Espero que el bloqueo económico, financiero y comercial contra Cuba serán levantadas, de modo que la economía puede crecer y los salaries pueden aumentar. Pero también espero que no vamos a comprometer nuestra independencia y se vuelven débiles, y que nunca vamos a traicionar nuestros ideales de igualdad y justicia social”. (4)  “I still have the energy, hope and strength to continue fighting for this socialism. I know that the Revolution has developed many defense mechanisms in the face of the constant hostility from the US imperialism and all its vast resources. And that’s not just some trite phrase; it’s an expansive, intensive, very cruel imperial system, and it’s necessary to continue fighting, to not back down in the face of violence, in the face of the pressures that we will continue to confront.”  “Todavía tengo la energía, esperanza y fuerza para seguir luchando por este socialismo. Yo sé que la Revolución ha desarrollado muchos mecanismos de defensa frente a la constante hostilidad del imperialismo de EE.UU. y todos sus vastos recursos. Y eso no es sólo una frase trillada; es un sistema imperial expansivo, intensivo y muy cruel, y es necesario seguir luchando, que no se retire frente de la violencia, frente a las presiones que vamos a seguir confrontando”. (5) Notes  (1) Interview with French newspaper L’Humanite, “Mariela Castro: Cuba siempre sorprende.” December 9, 2011.http://www.ahora.cu/es/secciones/especiales/657-mariela-castro-cuba-siempre-sorprende (2) Op Cit (3) Interview with Russian media Actualidad RT. http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs3162.html.  (4) Ertel, Manfred. “Interview with Mariela Castro: We Need Changes in Cuba.” Spiegel Online. 7/21/2010.http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,707267,00.html.  (5) Acosta, Dalia. “Mariela Castro’s Hopes for Cuba.” Havana Times. 6/24/2009. http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=10543

Cuban human rights activist Ivonne Mallezo nominated for Front Line Defenders Human Rights Award

Ivonne Mallezo

Out of 107 nominees, Cuban human rights activist and former political prisoner Ivonne Mallezo is one of five finalists for the prestigious Front Line Defenders Human Rights Award.

Front Line Defenders sums up the case in support:

In Cuba, Ivonne Mallezo Galano has been repeatedly detained by the authorities for promoting human rights and democracy. On 30th November 2011 following a peaceful protest in the Fraternidad Park in Havana where she was part of a group that displayed a white sheet that read: “Down with Hunger, Misery, and Poverty”. She was subjected to 51 days of cruel and degrading treatment in prison before her release on January 20, 2012. Two days after her release in January she was back together with the Ladies in White (Damas de Blanca) participating in their regular Sunday march on 22nd January in the streets of Havana. During the recent visit of the Pope to Cuba, Ivonne was one of the human rights defenders rounded up and detained throughout the pontiff’s visit.

Mallezo and others unfurl protest banner.

Read more about Mallezo here.

United Nations anti-torture panel zeroes in on Cuban repression

The United Nations has far from a pristine history when it comes to holding the Castro dictatorship accountable for its 50-plus years of repression.

But the UN's Committee Against Torture deserves applause by inspiring a ridiculous comment from one of the dictatorship's mouthpieces in response to the panel's request Tuesday for information about the deaths of political prisoners Orlando Zapata and Wilman Villar and other human rights abuses in Cuba.

"(N)o one in our country has been persecuted or sanctioned for exercising their rights, including those of free expression and association," said Cuban deputy attorney general Rafael Pino.

No one, except the thousands of political prisoners, past and present, who have languished in the Castro gulag because they exercised the rights given to them by God.

No one, except the activists who every day risk what little liberty they enjoy to ensure that one day they and their successors enjoy those rights freely.

No one, except those Cubans, like Zapata and Villar, who were permanently silenced, who were murdered by the Castro regime because of the threat that they, and their commitment to those rights, posed to the dictatorship's survival.

That one of the dictatorship's flunkies would stand before the world and deny the undeniable, is evidence enough that whatever action the UN takes against Cuba as result of the latest inquiry, the Castros live in fear that their time is up.

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McClatchy Newspapers has more on the Committee Against Torture's inquiry:

 

A U.N. panel on torture Tuesday demanded that Cuba provide information on the deaths of several political prisoners, the repression of dissident groups such as the Ladies in White and the 2,400 arrests of government critics reported last year.

The demand came on the same day that Cuba's Granma newspaper and Prensa Latina news agency published reports defending the island's prison system, which faces allegations of "slave labor" in the 1980s and other current abuses.

Members of the U.N. Committee Against Torture, which is based in Geneva, requested the Cuban government explain the recent deaths of dissidents Orlando Zapata Tamayo and Wilman Villar after lengthy prison hunger strikes, and that of Juan Wilfredo Soto after an alleged beating by security officials.

Complaints that Cuban prisons are plagued by overcrowding, malnutrition, bad hygiene, and beatings for those who protest and forced exile for others have been received in Geneva, said panel member George Tugushi.

Cuba also has been asked to explain the "aggressions and harassments" against the Ladies in White, bloggers Yoani Sanchez and Orlando Luis Pardo and Zapata's mother, Reina Luisa Tamayo, the panel noted during the first day of its two-day hearing on Cuba.

The U.N. committee also asked for explanations of the more than 2,400 short-term detentions of dissidents reported in 2011 by Havana human rights activists, including Elizardo Sanchez Santa Cruz of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation.

"We want Cuba to clarify all these cases," said Nora Sveaass, one of the 10 panel members and a Norwegian human rights attorney, according to media reports from Geneva.

The panel, which monitors enforcement of the U.N. Convention on Torture and Other Physical Abuses and Transgressions, reviews the records of several U.N. member nations each year. This year it was Cuba's turn.

Read more here: http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2012/05/22/2532738/un-panel-queries-havana-on-human.html#storylink=cpy

 

 

Cuban independent journalist awaits deportation back to his hometown

Calixto Martinez

Reporters Without Borders has the latest on Cuban independent journalist Calixto Martinez, who was arrested May 10 and was being detained in Havana pending his deportation from the capital:

Calixto Ramón Martínez Arias, a reporter for the independent news agency Hablemos Press, was arrested on 10 May and is being held in a police detention centre in Havana awaiting deportation in three days’ time to his home town of Camagüey for the 10th time in two years.

His sister-in-law, Niurka Caridad Ortega, visited the journalist yesterday and told Hablemos Pressshe had “seen him and taken him some clean laundry, although he said he had stopped eating since Thursday and was spitting blood. It appears that the stomach ulcer from which he suffers has worsened.”

Reporters Without Borders said: “Calixto Ramón Martínez lives and works in Havana, where he also has relatives. On this basis, his expulsion to Camagüey contravenes the relaxation, passed at the end of last year, of the law on internal migration, which restricted the movement of people to the capital.

“The free movement of individuals is a basic right which the Cuban government must acknowledge, particularly if it decides to ratify the two United Nations pacts on civil and political rights that it signed in 2008.

“Why do the authorities insist in uprooting this man from his everyday surroundings? Is it because he recently reported, via Hablemos Press, that Havana was experiencing problems with its water supply? The subject deserves more than senseless reprisals against the journalist who raised it.

“This deportation – his 10th — would be laughable were it not for the fact that it exposes the refusal of the government, which claims to be aware of the need to change the way it governs, to establish an open and sustained dialogue with civil society.”

The press freedom organization also called for the journalist to be given all appropriate care.

Hablemos Press has recorded just over 1,900 detentions or hostile acts by the authorities towards dissidents since the start of the year, including 340 during April. The agency has itself been affected by the crackdown. Besides Martinez, two more of its journalists, Gerardo Younel Avilaand Magali Norvis Otero, were each detained briefly, on 6 and 9 May respectively.

 

Cuba activist Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia arrested again (UPDATED)

Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia was released from jail on Thursday, 24 hours after his latest arrest.

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Cuban dissident Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia was arrested in Havana on Wednesday.

Ferrer, who had been released April 29 after almost a month in jail, was on his way to the Czech embassy to access the Internet, when the Castro police swept in and arrested him.

Details of his whereabouts were not known, but human rights activist Elizardo Sanchez, with whom Ferrer was staying while visiting the capital said he thought Ferrer would be returned to his hometown of Santiago de Cuba.

Ferrer was part of the Group of 75 dissidents arrested and imprisoned during "the black spring" of 2003. He was released last year and quickly resumed his anti-Castro activism. He currently is the leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba.

Diario de Cuba has more.

Cuba Lady In White faces trial Tuesday on charge of 'disobedience'

Yaquelin Garcia Jaens

Cuban Lady In White Yaquelin Garcia Jaens needs your help.

This brave woman, the wife of a political prisoner and an activist in her own right, needs your help because without it, the Castro regime on Tuesday will get away with yet another injustice against one of its opponents.

Garcia on Tuesday is scheduled to stand trial on a supposed charge of "disobedience," an Orwellian catch-all provision in Cuban law used by the Castro dictatorship to provide a veneer of legitimacy to its repression.

Garcia, who was twice arrested and detained for several days on two separate occasions in April, said she is unsure why she was charged.

"Perhaps this is because I have been arrested on several occasions and warned that I cannot continue marching with the ladies (Ladies in White) at El Cobre," in Santiago de Cuba, she said.

Garcia is the wife of political prisoner Ariel Eugenio Arzuaga Peña, who last year was sentenced to 6 years in prison on a charge of "violence."

Presumably, the outcome of Garcia's "trial" has already been determined. So what exactly can you do to help?

You can stand with Garcia by paying attention to her plight and sharing it with others. Email or Tweet or Facebook this post to demonstrate to her, and to the dictatorship, that she will not be forgotten. Let her, and her tormentors, know that this injustice will not go unchallenged.

It is a small gesture but one with real power.

Read more about Garcia, in English, here.

Bismark Mustelier Galan, Cuban Political Prisoner of the Week, 5/6/12

Pedazos de la Isla has the story of Cuban political prisoner Bismark Mustelier Galan, who is laying his life on the line in his battle against the Castro dictatorship. (Read a previous profile of Mustelier here.)

Bismark Mustelier Galan. Political Prisoner. Held in Aguadores prison since April 1st 2012

Alina Fonseca Guevara, the wife of political prisoner Bismark Mustelier Galan, who has been jailed since April 1st in the Aguadores Prison after he complained in a hospital about lack of medical attention for a minor, informed this Friday, May 4th, about the danger which her husband faces in prison after he declared himself on hunger strike this past Thursday May 3rd.

According to Fonseca Guevara, Bismark began his hunger strike the moment in which the penal authorities, specifically the chief of the unit Luis Enrique Lopez, denied her right, and the right of other activists, to visit him in prison.  “I went to visit Bismark on Thursday along with a group of his childhood and neighborhood friends- Miguel Rafael Cabrera Montoya, Rolando Humberto Rodriguez, Hector Felix Labrada, and Jose Batista Flacon, and they denied our visit“, said Guevara, “so then, I went to speak to the chief of the unit (Luis Enrique Lopez) and he told me that he was the one who had made such decision and that the prison was like his house, that he would decide who could enter“.

Fonseca said that with the hunger strike, Bismark is demanding that the penal authorities  allow his friends and family to visit him, as well as that his prison conditions are immediately improved.  “In his penal ward, the bathrooms are horrible.  There has not been water for 15 days, they give them just a bit of water sometimes to shower and to drink.  Many prisoners chose to drink it and then they cannot shower“, said Alina, adding that she was able to communicate with her husband on Friday morning.  “Bismark told me not to worry, that he was strong.  He told me that he would not depose his hunger strike until his demands are fulfilled“.

Meanwhile, Yuniesky Domínguez González, an activist from the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), reiterated the severity of Bismark’s case, pointing out and warning that the Aguadores Prison is the same penitentiary in which the dissident Wilman Villar Mendoza died just 4 months ago after he was kept in horrid conditions and he initiated a hunger strike.

“In other words, we fear for the security and life of Bismark Mustelier Galan,” said Gonzalez, “we know that the Aguadores Prison is a horrid place and we fear very much for his life”.

Gonzalez added that during the morning of Friday, May 4th, in the town of Palma Soriano their appeared 4 signs with anti-government messages written on them, as well as messages demanding the release of the political prisoners Bismark Galan andDany Lopez de Moya.  The latter was recently sentenced to 1 year and 6 months of prison under false charges of “public disorder” after publcily wearing a T-shirt which read “Boitel-Zapata-Wilman Live“- a tribute to three Cuban freedom fighters who have died while demanding justice for the Cuban people.

According to Yuniesky Gonzalez, in addition to those 4 signs, throughout this past week “various signs have appeared on numerous occassions“, and “they have been put there by dissidents and by people who do not even belong to opposition groups“.

“It has gotten to the point that the government, and State Security, have put put up heir own signs with their own messages against the opposition, but people who pass by draw an ‘X’ on it and write ‘NO’, which goes to show the disapproval felt by the opposition and by everyday citizens in regards to these government signs“.

Cuban human rights group reports 402 arrests in April

Quantifying the repression in Cuba is an impossible task, if only because of the information blockade imposed by the Castro dictatorship and because the regime feels absolutely no need to account for the arrests and other actions it takes against its opponents.

Which is why two human rights groups that monitor conditions on the island can arrive at different statistics.

The CIHPRESS news agency on Wednesday reported 340 politically motivated arrests in April.

And on Thursday, the Cuban National Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation put the count at 402. That brings the total for the first four months of the year to 2,795, compared to 1,166 in the first four months of 2011.

The numbers were different, but CIHPRESS identified a similar trend.

So no matter how you count it, and no matter the protestations of the Castro dictatorship's apologists, nothing has changed in Cuba.

Freedom for Cuban political prisoners Sonia Garro and Niurka Luque NOW!

Cuban activists Sonia Garro and Niurka Luque are being held in the Castro gulag after their arrests in March in the days leading up to Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the island. They are two of the newest prisoners of conscience in Cuba.

Read more about Garro here.

Read more about Luque here.

Cuban human rights group reports 340 political arrests in April

The CIHPRESS news agency and human rights group reports that there were 340 politically motivated arrests in Cuba in April.

That's the lowest monthly total this year and less than half of the 760 reported in March.

But it's still 340 too many.

For the year, CIHPRESS has recorded 1,915 arrests through April 30 -- already more than the 1,499 recorded in all of 2010 and just about half of the 3,835 arrests counted in all of 2011.

For details of each of the arrests counted in April, go here.

Barack Obama may be a bad president, but he's no Che Guevara

Che Guevara was a murderer, and no amount of iconography will ever change that.

And no amount of iconography will ever change that for reasons of ideology and temperament, Barack Obama as president of the United States leaves plenty to be desired.

But that is where the comparison, such as it is, must end.

Che Guevara was a mass murderer, responsible, directly and indirectly, for the deaths of thousands of people in Cuba and around the world. The system he helped implement in Cuba continues its reign of oppression, a legacy more powerful than a famous photograph.

Barack Obama is the elected leader of the United States, legitimately elected by the American people. Maybe that was a mistake, maybe he fooled the American electorate like no president before him. But all that can be remedied in November.

Che Guevara's victims have no such right.

Which is why images like this one are wrong.

Images like this one, which is circulating through social media, are an insult to the presidency and to American democracy. Because for all his faults, Barack Obama is not a socialist or communist nor is he a mass murderer. Rhetoric that suggests he's another Che Guevara is shrill and dangerous.

And it insults and betrays those who have suffered and continue to suffer because of what Che Guevara did. They do not deserve to have what they endured -- the loss of their homes and businesses, the firing squads, the economic deprivation, the forced exile, etc. -- to be belittled like this.

They deserve better.

Cuba pastor refused exit visa as family faces indefinite separation

Christian Solidarity Worldwide has the latest on Cuban pastor and former political prisoner Omar Gude, whose experience with the Castro regime belies the fantasy held by some that the dictatorship is about to announce a major emigration/immigration reform:

The Cuban government continues to refuse to issue an exit visa to protestant Pastor Omar Gude Perez, nine months after his family was first offered asylum by the United States (US). The rest of the family, who have already been issued visas and are waiting on Pastor Gude Perez to be granted his, have been advised that the offer of asylum will expire if they do not leave the country in the next few weeks.

After the family of four was granted asylum in July 2011, they were informed by Cuban emigration officials that they would not be allowed to leave the country. Over the next few months, and following an international campaign, Pastor Gude Perez’s wife Kenia was granted an exit visa along with their adolescent daughter. Further campaigning resulted in an exit visa being granted to their teenage son in late 2011, but the government remains adamant that they will not allow Pastor Gude Perez to leave the island.

Pastor Gude Perez, the leader of an unregistered and fast-growing network of protestant churches, was imprisoned on trumped up charges in 2008. He was released on “conditional liberty” after serving almost three years of six and a half year sentence. He and his wife have consistently and publicly denounced violations of religious freedom committed against their churches. They believe that their outspokenness on religious freedom issues is why the government is reluctant to allow Pastor Gude Perez to go to the US, where the couple would be able to speak more freely about the persecution they have suffered.

The family has expressed deep unhappiness regarding the decision they are facing. While his wife and two children are free to leave the country, they are reluctant to enter into an indefinite separation from Pastor Gude Perez. There is additional concern that the government may threaten or punish him if his wife speaks out publicly about the human rights violations the family has suffered. At the same time, while in Cuba, the couple are barred from religious work and the educational opportunities for their children have been severely limited. They continue to call on the Cuban government to issue Pastor Gude Perez an exit visa so that the family can leave Cuba together.

CSW Advocacy Director Andrew Johnston said, “CSW is deeply concerned at the way the Cuban government is treating the Gude Perez family. It is unconscionable to push this family into an enforced and indefinite separation, while at the same time severely restricting their ability to work and practice their faith, and, even worse, limiting their children’s educational opportunities, while they are inside Cuba. We strongly urge the Cuban government to issue Pastor Gude Perez an exit visa as rapidly as possible to allow the family to remain together.”

Jose D. Ferrer: 'Whatever we need to do for the freedom of Cuba, we will continue doing'

Pedazos de la Isla has an interview with former prisoner of conscience Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia, a day after he was released after 27 days in jail:

After being confined to a dungeon of the Versalles Police Unit in Santiago de Cuba for 27 days, the leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba, Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia, narrates how his recent arrest occurred, of which “crimes” he is being accused of, and sends out a message to the international and national (Cuba) community in the following interview:

Pedazos de la Isla: We have heard the testimonies of your wife, Belkis Cantillo, and of your daughter Martha Beatriz about what happened in your home on April 2nd.  Tell us about that moment from your own experience.

José Daniel Ferrer García:  I was detained on April 2nd, 2012 after consecutively participating in two programs on Radio Marti.  Upon finishing the final program, the 3 main chiefs from the repressive organisms of the Castro tyranny of Santiago de Cuba showed up to my house along with other members of the political police and the national police.  They raided my home, tearing down the door and taking my wife amid physical blows.  They even used forced against my mother-in-law.

I only had enough time to send out a message on Hablalo sin Miedo, detailing that  my home was being invaded.  They forcibly took my wife and I, another relative, and 7 other activists from UNPACU who were carrying out their activities in favor of freedom.

After they detained us, the police officials stayed in my house, sacking it.  They took laptops, 2 printers, lots of information on CDs, USB drives, lots of books, print outs from UNPACU, our cell phones, photo cameras, microphones, TV cards (during those days we had just finished recording images from the papal visit to Cuba), blank sheets of paper, pens, everything.  They robbed us as they regularly rob the home of any peaceful dissident.

PDLI: Have they returned any of these materials which they stole from you?

JDFG:  None of the things they robbed from me have been returned.  It is all in their possession (the regime), including my wife’s cell phone and my cell phone.  They even robbed flashlights and photographs.

PDLI: What happened after they arrested you?

JDFG:  They took us to different police units- some to Micro 9, other to “La Tercera”.  My wife, our other relative, and I were taken to the Versalles Unit, to the department of Criminal Operations and Instruction.  After 72 to 96 hours, they started to release the rest of the activists, including my wife.

PDLI: You spent 27 days detained.  During this time, you declared yourself on hunger strike, you received threats, etc.  Now that they released you, what do you know of what is happening with other activists from UNPACU who are still being held?

JDFG : In these very moments, there are still two of our members in prison.  One of them- Dany Lopez de Moya- was sentenced under a false judicial process which the regime routinely puts in practice in the Castro tribunals.  Moya was sentenced to 1 year and 6 months of prison for the supposed crime of resistance and disobedience to the authorities.  There is also the case of Bismark Mustelier Galan who is in preventative prison in the Aguadores Jail, waiting for a trial for the supposed crime of “attempt” when he did not do such a thing.  He was actually the victim of an arbitrary and violent arrest on behalf of one of the delegates from the Ministry of the Interior in Palma Soriano and another police agent.

PDLI: Their were many civic demonstrations throughout the island in demand of your liberation, as their also were in the Cuban exile community and in other parts of the world.  How does all this solidarity make you feel?

JDFG : It has made my spirit stronger, especially upon seeing all of the brothers and sisters who have displayed valor, intelligence and sacrifice not only in this Eastern region but in other parts of the country, as well as my brothers in exile and many other people around the world.  There has been much solidarity.  Now, we must continue in the fight and put our grain of sand for the freedom and democracy of Cuba.

PDLI:  In your case, you still have pending accusations… 

JDFG : They released me on the afternoon of April 29th under the warning that there is still an open process against me.  They gave me a file number- 66- in which they accuse me of “instigating, organizing, and financing” acts of public disorder in the Eastern region of Cuba.  According to them, our peaceful actions in favor of the democratization of Cuba are acts of provocation which contribute to public disorder.  They have told me that if i continue “organizing, inciting, and financing” these kinds of actions, then they would accelerate the process against me and taken me to prison under supposed crimes of disorder and I would have to serve the rest of my sentence of the Black Spring of 2003.  In other words, I would have to serve the remaining 17 years of my 25 year sentence, in addition to more time which they would add for the crime of public disorder.

They told me that, if on the contrary, I understand this and chose the “best” way out and avoid this situation, turning ourselves into a “closed door” opposition, an opposition of only denouncements, of moderate and timid actions, then they would possibly analyze my case and decide a new verdict.  This is their threat.

PDLI: And what is your response to this threat?

JDFG : My response is that whatever we need to do, in a peaceful manner, for the freedom of Cuba, we will continue doing.  And if we have to return to prison, then we will go back to prison.  As the saying goes, in a nation where the elemental rights of men are violated, the best place for an honest man is a jail cell.

Castro regime releases jailed Cuban dissident Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia

Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia (Reuters photo)

Cuban opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia was released from jail on Sunday, almost a month after his most recent arrest.

But Ferrer, one of Cuba's most active opposition leaders still faces charges of "instigating, directing and financing public disorder" in eastern Cuba. No trial date has been set.

Ferrer, leader of the Cuba Patriotic Union, was one of the Group of 75 dissidents arrested and sentenced to lengthy prison terms during the "black spring" of 2003. He was one of the final Group of 75 prisoners to be released last year after he refused overseas exile as a condition of his release.

Martinoticas.com has more on Ferrer's release.