Almost a month after his most recent arrest, Cuban activist Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia remains imprisoned in the Castro gulag because of his opposition to the Havana dictatorship.
Earlier this week, Ferrer, one of the Group of 75 dissidents jailed during the "black spring" of 2003 and paroled last year, started a hunger strike. He suspended the protest on Thursday.
For more on this very brave man and what drives him, read this essay from Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter:
The Castro regime wanted to execute José Daniel Ferrer García in 2003 requesting the death penalty in a show trial but the international outcry caused them to back down and sentence him to a 25 year prison sentence instead. After the untimely and sinister death of Cuban Lady in White founder, Laura Inés Pollán Toledo on October 14, 2011 the threat to José Daniel's life cannot be underestimated. Like Laura Pollán, José Daniel has a nonviolent strategic vision and an ability to mobilize and organize people combined with great courage. He has founded the opposition movement the Patriotic Union of Cuba. In the midst of a violent crackdown in August of 2011 Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia made the following call to action for a free Cuba over twitter:
- To democratize Cuba we should obtain the massive growth of the resistance. For the resistance to become massive we need rapid and effective communication with the populace.
- To achieve change in Cuba, we have to reach the people. For rapid communication with the populace, we need the technical means.
- We cannot advance more in the democratization of our homeland for lack of technical means and the resources for them.
- There is no struggle for the good without loses and without risks. Who fears the risks never will achieve any advance in the struggle. Being careful is one thing, not risking is something very different. Great achievements are not obtained without great sacrifice.
Read the whole thing here.
For more on Ferrer Garcia's decision to end his hunger strike, read this.
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