Spotlight on Cuba: Crackdown on Dissidents

Chronology of Events

April 30, 2004: Spain will favor democratic development in Cuba through dialogue, the first vice president of the socialist government in Spain, María Teresa Fernández de la Vega, said. "Our policy will be that of favoring, supporting and trying to help the modernization of those countries which are still under non democratic situations from an economic, social and political perspective." "And Cuba is one of them," Fernández de la Vega said. (AFP, 30/4/04)

April 30, 2004: Blanca Reyes, wife of dissident imprisoned Raúl Rivero, denounced that Cuban authorities have not yet responded a petition she made to travel. Reyes asked an exit permit to travel to Belgrade where she will receive Rivero's award granted by UNESCO. The World Award for Freedom of the Press was granted to the dissident intellectual. Although some UNESCO sources feel optimistic about the possibility of Cuban authorities granting Reyes the permit, she showed her skepticism about it. (El Nuevo Herald, 30/4/04)

April 29, 2004: In a letter to a Senator from Strassburg (North), the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Michel Barnier says that the French government closely follows the situation of political prisoners in Cuba, and will continue to request from Cuban authorities their total liberation. The French Minister also says that he has "attentively followed the situation of Mr. Manuel Vázquez Portal, and that of the whole group of political prisoners in Cuba". He also added that France has "regularly" requested from Cuban authorities "to review their position on this matter". (AFP, 29/4/04)

April 27, 2004: A Cuban court granted a blind human rights lawyer and another opposition activist conditional liberty, while eight other dissidents received prison sentences of three to seven years, a prominent member of the opposition told the press. Elizardo Sánchez, the president of the illegal but relatively tolerated Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, said the blind activist, Juan Carlos González, was given a four-year sentence that was commuted to conditional liberty or parole. (IPS, 27/4/04)

April 26, 2004: During the trial followed to blind dissident Juan Carlos González Leiva and other activists, it was known that the group included Lester Tellez Castro, an independent journalist who revealed in court he had been working as a state security infiltrator called agent "Ignacio." During the trial, he publicly renounced his work for the Cuban police. After his statement in court, Trelles was immediately sent back to jail, where he expressed his repentant for having defended what he called "an unfair and worthless cause". The court sentenced him to 3-1/2 years in prison. (Cubanet, Reuters, 27/4/04)

April 26, 2004: Blind Cuban dissident Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leiva was found guilty of disrespecting Fidel Castro and other offenses and sentenced to four years in prison, dissident sources said. Eight other dissidents received shorter prison sentences in the one-day trial in the central Cuban town of Ciego de Avila where only relatives were allowed in the courtroom. A tenth man facing trial revealed himself to be a government agent who had infiltrated the dissident group in Ciego de Avila, commission president and veteran human rights activist Elizardo Sanchez said. (Reuters. BBC, EFE, 26/4/04)

April 26, 2004: A blind lawyer and nine other opposition activists were put on trial in Cuba in the first prosecution of government opponents since last year's jailing of 75 dissidents. Blind human rights lawyer Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leyva and the other nine opponents of Fidel Castro were charged with disrespect for authority and public disorder, according to the Cuban Human Rights Commission. Only relatives were allowed into the courtroom for the trial, which took place in the central town of Ciego de Avila. "They face sentences of up to six years," said veteran rights activist, Elizardo Sanchez, head of the commission. All ten were arrested March 4, 2002, when they tried to visit an independent journalist, who had allegedly been beaten by police at a Ciego de Avila hospital. They have been jailed without charges since then. (CNN, 26/4/04)

April 22, 2004: With the adoption of a resolution on the situation in Cuba after its emergency debate, the European Parliament again calls on the Cuban authorities to immediately release all political detainees. It is pleased to note the release of Julio Antonio Valdes for health reasons. It is waiting for the Cuban authorities to decree a new de facto moratorium on the death penalty. Parliament calls for utter compliance with the constitutional process, which consists in collecting signatures in the context of the Varela project on the basis of Article 88 of the Constitution, which authorises citizens to present a legislative initiative as soon as 10,000 signatures, or more, have been collected. It unreservedly restates the EU's commitment and willingness concerning aid for the Cuban population. The Parliament invites all Community institutions to send an open invitation to Oswaldo Paya Sardinas, Sakharov Prizewinner 2002, and calls on the Cuban authorities to no longer prevent him travelling to Europe. (Agence Europe, 22/4/04)

April 22, 2004: Cuba 's planned trial of a blind human rights lawyer, along with nine other dissidents and independent journalists, on charges of "disrespect for authority" demonstrates a continuing pattern of political repression, Human Rights Watch said. Human Rights Watch has learned that the trial of the 10 defendants is scheduled to be held on April 27. Juan Carlos González Leiva, a blind lawyer, is the president of the Cuban Foundation for Human Rights (Fundación Cubana de Derechos Humanos). He and most of the other defendants have been held in pretrial detention in eastern Holguín province for more than two years. "The upcoming trial is a travesty," said Joanne Mariner, deputy director of Human Rights Watch's Americas Division. "The defendants face criminal charges that clearly violate their basic rights to freedom of expression." (Human Rights Watch, 22/4/04)

April 21, 2004: A group of Cuban government opponents gathered at a home in Havana to pray for the release of imprisoned dissidents on the island. The prayer chain, which brought together nearly 30 people, was organized by Yolanda Triana Estopiñan, whose husband Orlando Fundora Alvarez is one of the 75 non-violent democracy activists and independent journalists sentenced last year to prison terms averaging 20 years. Relatives of other jailed dissidents, members of outlawed opposition groups and a Greek Catholic priest co-sponsored the chain and shouted slogans in favor of human rights and the release of the prisoners. (EFE, 21/4/04)

April 20, 2004: Cuban opposition leaders expressed concern over the health of Marta Beatriz Roque, the only woman among the 75 dissidents sentenced a year ago to prison terms of up to 28 years. Roque, sentenced to 20 years in jail, has for months been confined to a prisoners' ward of the Carlos J. Finlay Military Hospital in Havana because of her health. A communique issued in Havana and signed by Vladimiro Roca of the outlawed Todos Unidos movement, among others, complained that relatives have been banned from visiting Roque at the hospital for the past two weeks. (EFE, 20/4/04)

April 20, 2004: Cuban mass organizations are telling their members to beat any person who might be talking about human rights and the Varela Project. According to a member of the dissident organization 24 de Febrero, these instructions began to be transmitted in meetings in Santiago de las Vegas, City of Havana, and have been extended to the municipalities of Centro Habana, Habana Vieja and Playa. (Lux Info Press, 20/4/04)

April 19, 2004: At the 43rd anniversary of the triumph of Cuba's army and militia at Bay of Pigs, Fidel Castro said that the internal opposition in the island is "a 0.03 percent" of the Cuban population. (World Data Service, Notimex, 20/4/04)

April 18, 2004: Reina Luisa Tamayo requested from Cuban authorities that her son be released from prison. Orlando Zapata Tamayo has being held without due process since his arrest in March 2003. Cuban State Security has accused him of the alleged crime of public disorder. During this time, the State Attorney has set his case for trial in 4 occasions, but prison authorities have refused to take him to the Tribunal, she added. "If they refuse to take him to trial then they should set him free", she said. (Puente Informativo, 18/4/04)

April 16, 2004: Ten members of the Cuban Foundation for Human Rights (Fundación Cubana de Derechos Humanos), FCDH, imprisoned since 2002, will go to trial. The information was provided to Maritza Calderín, wife of Juan Carlos González president of FCDH, imprisoned without trial since 2002, by a police investigator from the Pedernales Prison, Holguín. The FCDH members waiting for trial are Juan Carlos González Leiva, Lázaro Iglesias Estrada, Léxter Téllez Castro, Carlos Brizuela Yera, Enrique García Morejón, Antonio Marcelino García Morejón, Delio Laureano Requejo Rodríguez, Virgilio Mantilla Arango, Odalmis Hernández Márquez y Ana Peláez García, these last two released on bail. (Cubanet, 16/4/04)

April 15, 2004: Cuban dissident Julio Antonio Valdes Guevara, one of 75 dissidents jailed a year ago, has been temporarily released to receive a kidney transplant, he said. "I'm happy to be free, despite the fact that my health is very bad," Valdes told a group of foreign journalists before being admitted to the Nephrology Institute of Havana. Valdes, 52, was sentenced to 20 years behind bars during a series of summary trials which sent 75 dissidents to prison in the spring of 2003, but due to the gravity of his condition, he was granted a temporary release to attend to his health problems. (EFE, 15/4/04)

April 15, 2004: Within minutes of the vote being passed in Geneva, Cuba rejected it. Describing the resolution as "ridiculous", Cuba's Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said that his government would not adhere to the commission's key request that a human rights investigator be allowed into the country. "Cuba rejects the spurious resolution approved in Geneva and would not abide by any of its stipulations", he said. Cuba co-operates with the international community but not when it is discriminated against, Pérez Roque added. Censured countries face no penalties, but rights campaigners say the resolutions do serve to shine a light on abuses. (BBC, Radio Habana Cuba, 15/4/04)

April 15, 2004: Cuban dissidents welcomed the UN vote condemning the human rights situation on the communist-ruled island, though they expressed skepticism about the possibility of it bringing about changes. Elizardo Sanchez, who heads the Cuban Human Rights Commission, said the resolution "is appropriate and perfectly justified" given "the terrible situation of civil, political and economic rights that continues to prevail in Cuba." "Its impact will be minimal, because the Cuban government continues to ignore the calls of the international community on this matter," Sanchez told the press. Nonetheless, he said, the narrowly approved resolution "is important for the human rights and pro-democracy movement, like a practical form of moral support." Vladimiro Roca, head of the All United Movement, said the passing of the resolution constitutes "moral support for our struggle." "It's nothing more than moral support. Despite all the times they've singled out the Cuban government, the human rights situation worsens for days instead of improving," he said. "I don't think there are going to be changes. There's no will on the part of the government to carry out these changes," said Roca. (EFE, 15/4/04)

April 15, 2004: The UN Human Rights Commission condemned Cuba for its spring 2003 crackdown that sent 75 peaceful dissidents, mostly democracy advocates and independent journalists, to prison for terms averaging 20 years. The resolution presented by Honduras passed narrowly, by a vote of 22-to-21, with 10 abstentions. Most Latin American countries represented on the panel agreed to censure the Cuban government, with Chile, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru and sponsor Honduras voting for the resolution. Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay abstained. With the exception of the Dominican Republic, Paraguay and Honduras, which were not on the commission last year, Latin American countries stuck to the positions they took in 2003. Non-governmental organizations considered the resolution, with its moderate language, too soft on the wave of arrests in Cuba last year.Besides asking the Castro regime to avoid "measures that could threaten the fundamental rights (…) of its citizens," the resolution once again urged Havana to cooperate with the UN's special rapporteur for Cuba, French jurist Christine Chanet. (EFE, AP, Reuters, 15/4/04)

April 13, 2004: The World Medical Association is pressing the Cuban Government for information on four physicians and two dentists who have been in prison in Cuba for the past two years for human rights activities. The WMA is urging its 80 national medical association members to write to their governments and to the European Commission requesting them to put pressure on the Cuban government to disclose information about what, if any, trials the six are facing, the exact nature of their sentences and to ask for their fair and humane treatment in prison. Dr Delon Human, secretary general of the WMA, said: We are particularly concerned about one of the six, Dr Oscar Elias Biscet, who has been in poor health, and this has been exacerbated by his imprisonment in an underground dungeon. The other five are Dr. Marcelo Cano Rodriguez, Dr. José Luis Garcia Paneque, Dr. Luis Milàn Fernàndez and the two dentists, Alfredo Manuel Pulido Lopez and Ricardo Enrique Silva Gual. (WMA Press Release, 13/4/04)

April 11, 2004: A demonstration of 10,000 Cubans in Havana condemned the role of the Honduran government when it presented a resolution against Cuba at the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC). On behalf of the rest of the Cuban people, many representatives from the municipality of San Miguel del Padron pointed at US as the real author of the resolution in Geneva in an Open Tribune, a becoming habitual massive activity in Cuba. (Prensa Latina, 13/4/04)

April 11, 2004: Honduras President Ricardo Maduro said that he himself wrote the resolution asking Cuba to authorize a visit of the UN's High Commission for Human Rights - and not someone from the United States government as has been charged. Maduro was answering critics from across the political spectrum who claimed that the United States had handed him the text - in English - to be presented to the UN High Commission for Human Rights in Geneva. "I wrote the resolution myself," the chief executive told jounalists. He added that this would be the third time that the (Honduran) government backed "exactly the same position". "This resolution is almost identical to the one I voted for last year and the year before. It was written here, it is proudly Honduran, because with it we defend human rights," Maduro said. "If defending human rights is servile, then I'll go on defending them and anyone can call me what he wants to," he said. (EFE, 11/4/04)

April 11, 2004: Dissident Leonardo Bruzón Avila was transferred from Salvador Allende Hospital to the military hospital "Carlos J. Finlay", in Havana, after having been lapsed into coma. After two years in jail, Bruzón initiated a hunger strike claiming for the celebration of his trial. (El Nuevo Herald, 11/4/04)

April 9, 2004: Journalists participating in the official Roundtable TV Program presented aspects of the Cuban "battle of ideas" to unveil the untruth of the anti-Cuban resolution presented by Honduras in Geneva and sponsored by US. The Cuban journalists recalled the pressures, threats and blackmail in UN Human Rights Commission by the Bush administration to accomplish their goals recruiting governments to vote against Cuba. (Prensa Latina, 9/4/04)

April 7, 2004: In a session marred by shouting matches between lawmakers and the forcible clearing of the galleries, Chile's lower house voted to urge the government to support a condemnation of Cuba in the UN Human Rights Commission. The motion passed by a vote of 67-8, with 14 abstentions. The resolution was introduced by the Christian Democrats, putting them at odds with the Socialists, their partners in the ruling coalition. Lawmakers from the two parties exchanged fierce barbs in the debate, accusing each other of inconsistency concerning human rights. (EFE, 7/4/04)

April 7, 2004: Cuban Foreign Affairs Minister, Felipe Pérez Roque, refused versions about the possibility of an arrangement between Cuba and the EU in the near future. "There are no conditions to talk about that possibility", Pérez Roque said. "Relations have deteriorated because there are European countries that prefer to maintain relations with factions paid by Washington than with the Cuban government", he added. (EFE, 7/4/04)

April 7, 2004: A Cuban human rights activist, jailed for hatching plans to honor the late Brothers to the Rescue fliers, has lapsed into a coma after a prolonged hunger strike, according to sources monitoring his health. Sources described as ''delicate'' the condition of Leonardo Miguel Bruzón Avila, imprisoned without trial since February 23, 2002. (El Nuevo Herald, 9/4/04)

April 7, 2004: Cuban dissident Vladimiro Roca, rejected statements by Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban National Assembly. Alarcón stated that the 75 dissidents, imprisoned since last year, were sent to jail for "national security reasons". "That is a way to justify a major political mistake that they do not want to rectify", Roca said. (El Nuevo Herald, 8/4/04)

April 6, 2004: Honduras tabled a motion urging Cuba to guarantee freedom of expression and religion at the main United Nations human rights forum, with the apparent blessing of the United States. The text of the motion to the UN Commission on Human Rights also called on Havana's communist authorities to hold a "fruitful dialogue" with Cuban political groups and thinkers to develop democratic institutions and civil liberties. It backed citizens' rights to due process and deplored the heavy sentences handed down against some 75 dissidents rounded up a year ago, but stopped short of demanding their release. Peru, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Australia and the Czech Republic have so far joined Honduras as official sponsors of the motion. Diplomats said that although the United States had not yet signed up as a co-sponsor, it had made clear it backed the motion and would support it, along with European Union countries on the body. (Reuters, 6/4/04)

April 6, 2004: Over 78 French senators and lawmakers have joined a campaign to sponsor Cuban political prisoners. The senators and lawmakers have sent letters to the French Foreign Affairs Minister, Dominique de Villepin, and to the Cuban Ambassador to Paris, Eumelio Caballero, expressing concern for the health of the prisoners and their conditions in jail. They also claim for their urgent liberation. (Encuentro en la Red, 6/4/04)

April 6, 2004: About 30 opponents of Fidel Castro launched a 24-hour fast seeking the release of more than 300 Cuban political prisoners, including 75 who were rounded up and jailed in a crackdown a year ago. In a cramped flat in the El Vedado neighborhood, seated under a huge red, white and blue Cuban flag bearing the names of 75 dissidents sentenced to lengthy jail terms last year family and friends demanded freedom for loved ones they say are held in dismal conditions. (AFP, 6/4/04)

April 5, 2004: Nicaragua, El Salvador and Peru intend to support a US-prompted Honduran draft resolution condemning Cuba's human rights policy before the UN Human Rights Commission. High-ranking State Department officials called a press conference to announce the development and explain Washington's position toward the Commission's session this month in Geneva. Kim Holmes, assistant secretary of the State Department's Bureau of International Organization Affairs, said the wording of the resolution to be presented April 15-16 "is stronger than last year's." The United States and some other countries want stronger language this year in light of last year's sentencing and imprisonment of more than 70 Cuban dissidents. Holmes said he was optimistic the text drawn up by Honduras will receive wide endorsement and predicted that the majority of Latin American nations will vote to upbraid Havana. (EFE, 5/4/04)

April 5, 2004: Cuban parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon defended last year's crackdown on 75 activists, telling a group of American newspaper editors that internal security outweighs international image. "I think you should take into account the problem of image," Alarcon told the board of directors for The Associated Press Managing Editors. But, he added, "No nation can base its conduct relating to fundamental national security based on how the media might reflect what you do." Alarcon's comments came during a two-hour meeting with the APME board of directors, which represents 1,700 newspapers in the United States and Canada. The board arrived in Havana for a two-day stay after visiting Mexico, where they met with President Vicente Fox. (AP, 5/4/04)

April 4, 2004: José Enrique Santana Carreira, National Coordinator of the Democratic Party November 30 "Frank País" began an indefinite hunger strike at the Prison 1580. "Our brother is in a hunger strike demanding that his condition of political prisoner be respected and also, because on March 15, prison authorities endorsed common prisoners to force José Enrique to comply with the so called "prison regulations", according to Yamile Casas Sánchez, member of the National Executive Board of the illegal political party. (Puente Informativo, 4/4/04)

April 3, 2004: Cuban dissident Pedro Pablo Alvarez, jailed for 25 years, was allowed to assist at the Havana burial of his mother. State authorities let the president of the illegal Unitarian Council of Cuban Workers leave prison and remain for two and a half hours at the funeral home where friends and family kept vigil over the remains of his mother, Raquel Ramos Soto. Later he attended the burial ceremony in Havana's Cristobal Colon Cemetery, watched by plainclothes agents. (EFE, 3/4/04)

April 2, 2004: Reporters Without Borders - which champions freedom of the press - has invited several people to Montreal to discuss the issue of journalistic freedom in Cuba. The guests include Castro's daughter, Alina Fernández Castro. "At least we can try to keep those people alive by keeping them in the news," Fernandez said in a brief telephone interview from Miami, Florida., where she now lives in exile. "We have to take every opportunity to let people know about the situation (in Cuba)." Reporters Without Borders gave Cuba the dubious distinction of being the world's biggest prison for journalists, with 30 reporters behind bars to date. ( Montreal Post, 2/4/04)

April 1, 2004: Dutch Ambassador to Cuba Wieck Wildeboer has been "frozen" for eight months. Except for that one hour when he presented his credentials. "It is rather frustrating," Wildeboer says. "All my requests to speak to officials are rejected or there is no reply." Persistent European protests over the treatment of Cuban dissidents have gone down completely the wrong way with the Fidel Castro regime. On the order of the commander who has been in charge for 45 years on the largest Caribbean island, no European diplomat is being spoken to. "The Cubans have dug a pit for themselves, and they can no longer come out of it because the leader has forbidden that," says EU ambassador in Havana Sven Kuehn von Burgsdorff. "They [dissidents in jail] are people who wish to have a chance to make known a different opinion quite peacefully. It is unacceptable to shut up dissidents and treat them as criminals," Von Burgsdorff says. ( Rotterdam NRC Handelsblad, 1/4/04)

April 1, 2004: The Cuban Catholic Church urged the communist government of Fidel Castro to pardon or reduce the sentences of the 75 dissidents sentenced to up to 28 years in prison in April 2003. "Such a move would be very positive for Cuba," Catholic Church spokesman Orlando Márquez wrote in a local magazine. "Pardoning the prisoners of conscience or reducing their sentences would be a sign not of weakness but of moral strength." The latest edition of the same magazine called on the government to perform a meaningful act of clemency as urged also by Pope John Paul II. (ANSA, 1/4/04)

April 1, 2004: Maritza Calderín Columbié, wife of Juan Carlos González Leiva, blind Cuban lawyer imprisoned for more than two years by Cuban State Security without a trial, denounced the unfortunate case of her husband. In a letter addressed to the Sixtieth Session of the United Nations' Commission for Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland, Calderín Columbié says that her husband remains in prison since March 4, 2002 in the State Security Department of Pedernales in Holguin, Cuba, many kilometers away from his home. She reiterates that "he is kept behind bars, deprived of sunlight and fresh air for months in a cell as filthy as a pigpen; denied a trial, and the opportunity to seek release under bail". "In addition, he is physically, mentally, and emotionally tortured systematically by intentionally exposing him to toxic substance with penetrating odors, which are also thrown on his body and inside his cell", she adds. (Cubanet, 1/4/04)

April 1, 2004: Gisela Delgado, wife of Héctor Palacios, a dissident in jail since last year's crackdown, urged the Cuban government to broadcast in full the interview she gave to Cuban TV official journalists. Delgado sent a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister, Felipe Pérez Roque, signed on March 31st that was distributed to foreign press based in Havana. (Notimex, 1/4/04)

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