March 31, 2005: Cuban dissident Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leiva has declared himself on a hunger strike, along with several other activists. Gonzalez Leiva is protesting the arrest of members of his family by the Cuban political police. Gonzalez Leiva’s cousin, Santiago Santoyo Gonzalez, member of the Cuban Foundation for Human Rights, was arrested for possessing a DVD donated to the Foundation by the US Interest Section in Havana. State Security refused to acknowledge the papers presented by Gonzalez Leiva, which proved the DVD’s lawful origin. Andres Gonzalez Leiva, brother of Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leiva, was removed from his home and arrested because he had a radio provided by the US Interest Section in Havana. The arrests took place after a meeting of the Human Rights Foundation at Gonzalez Leiva’s home. Gonzalez Leiva has refused to accept the unlawful arrest of his family members and declared himself on a hunger strike in front of the Central Police Station in Ciego de Avila. (Netfor Cuba, 31/3/05)
March 30, 2005: The European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee passed a resolution criticizing the "sudden change of direction" of the EU’s policy toward Cuba and the provisional lifting of diplomatic sanctions agreed on by the European Council at the request of Spain. The resolution had been passed by a vast majority at the Commission and is expected to be ratified by the European Parliament. (Europa Press, 30/3/05)
March 27, 2005: European Union Development Commissioner Louis Michel has urged Cuban Fidel Castro to release imprisoned dissidents during a visit to Cuba to reopen talks between Brussels and Havana, an EU spokesman said. The Cuban leader expressed interest in mending relations with Europe during the four-hour meeting, Michel's spokesman Amadeu Altafaj Tardio said. "Michel repeated to Castro the unvarying position of the EU in favour of the release of all political prisoners on the island," the
spokesman said. "The meeting was cordial and very constructive," he said. (Reuters, 27/3/05)
March 27, 2005: One week after being confronted by a group of pro-government counter protesters, the wives of jailed dissidents marched peacefully after Easter services to demand the release of their husbands. Some 30 wives of jailed dissidents dressed in white and carrying flowers, attended Mass at Santa Rita Church, in the Miramar neighborhood, and marched peacefully down 5th Avenue, as they have been doing every week since the spring of 2003, when 75 peaceful dissidents were given long prison sentences by the government following a crackdown on the opposition. The scene, however, was much different from last weekend, when some 200 members of the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) blocked the weekly march by the so-called "Damas de Blanco" (Women in White), chanting pro-government slogans and screaming insults. Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque defended the federation's actions last week, saying that "in Cuba, the streets belong to the revolutionaries." We are revolutionaries, because revolution means change," Marcela Sanchez, wife of dissident Marcelo Lopez, said. Marcelo Lopez was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2003 and released last November for health reasons. The women responded to Lopez's statement with shouts of "change, change." The lack of problems "could be an attempt by the government to present this as an act of tolerance as the time for debate in Geneva nears," Gisela Delgado said, referring to the upcoming 61st annual session of the UN Human Rights Commission in the Swiss city. (The New York Times, EFE, 27/3/05)
March 26, 2005: Fidel Castro met with European Union Development and Humanitarian Aid Commissioner Louis Michel, the first high-ranking EU official to visit since relations with the island were normalized. Castro shares the European Union 's interest in strengthening ties and tackling sensitive issues such as human rights and the island's political prisoners, EU commissioner Louis Michel said after four-hour talks with the Cuban leader. Castro, Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, Michel and non-resident EU Ambassador Dino Sinigallia spoke of issues of bilateral interest, the officials said. "We spoke together about all the issues, even about the difficult issues, and sensitive issues, and there is of course a common interest to relaunch a political dialogue," Michel said as he entered a meeting with Cardinal Jaime Ortega, the Roman Catholic Church's top prelate on the island. The meeting with Castro was not on Michel's agenda, though it had been mentioned as a possibility. (EFE, AP, 26/3/05)
March 25, 2005: Wives of imprisoned dissidents urged Fidel Castro to respect their right to peaceful protest, calling a government-sponsored interruption of their weekly march "an act of provocation.'' The Ladies in White delivered at government offices of the Ministry of the Interior and the National Assembly a letter addressed to Castro complaining of the lack of “tolerance” for the exercise of their demands, because "we are exercising and claiming a constitutional right." They were not allowed to deliver the letter at the Council of State office in charge of claims by the population (Oficina de Atención a la Población). In the letter, the "Ladies in White'' said they will hold top members of the government responsible for any harm done to them in future standoffs. "We do not discard the possibility that our blood will shed on the streets as we peacefully fight for the freedom of our men,'' said the letter, signed by Laura Pollan, wife of Hector Maseda, who is serving a 20-year sentence, Dolia Leal, wife of Nelson Aguilar, sentenced to 13, and three other wives of jailed dissidents. (The New York Times, EFE, La Jornada, 26/3/05)
March 25, 2005: The European Union commissioner Louis Michel urged Cuba to turn the page on past tensions and start a new dialogue with the European Union. "In my opinion, I don’t think it is necessary to spend more time on past difficulties. I think that the important thing is that today there already are several specific elements, and there is an expression of a very strong will to see our relations consolidate, relaunched," Michel said with Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque looking on. Michel and six other members of an EU delegation began the round of meetings with Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque. The EU commissioner said he addressed the political prisoner issue in meetings with some of Cuba's top officials but reached no agreements on their fate. "I think there is an acceptance on the Cuban side to discuss these very sensitive issues," Michel said after meeting with parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon. "I really have the impression there is space to make progress and that my visit is a milestone." The EU has asked that Cuba release all political prisoners, and in particular 61 dissidents who remain behind bars after a roundup of 75 government opponents two years ago. The other 14 activists were later released on medical parole. "These past few years have been difficult ones in our relationship, for many reasons," Michel told Perez Roque in initial remarks open to the news media. "The important thing today is for there to be various concrete elements and an expression of very strong determination for us to be able to strengthen our relationship." Perez Roque told Michel, "We receive you as a friend," and said he hoped the visit would represent "a new opportunity to give continuity to our discussion." Michel was expected to meet with Cardinal Jaime Ortega, academics and dissidents, dissident sources said. (The News International, Seattle Post, The New York Times, 26/3/05)
March 23, 2005: A top UN investigator clashed with Cuban officials over her report criticizing human rights conditions on the communist-ruled island. Cuban Ambassador Jorge Mora Godoy told the UN Human Rights Commission that Christine Chanet was playing into the hands of the US campaign against Havana. "This document, based on lies and slander, only serves as a platform to justify the anti-Cuban campaign of the United States (...) which has submitted my country to aggression for 45 years,'' said Mora Godoy. But Chanet, a French legal expert, slammed Cuban authorities from banning her from the country, making it "almost impossible" to prepare a balanced report. The clash occurred when Chanet presented her report on human rights in Cuba to the 53-nation commission, which is part-way through its annual six-week session. (AP, Reuters, 24/3/05)
March 21, 2005: Cuban Foreign Affairs Minister justified two incidents of public harassment of Cuba’s opponents, saying they were "mercenaries" on the US payroll who deserved to be repudiated. During a press conference held in Havana, Felipe Pérez Roque said that those who demonstrate in the island, even peacefully, on behalf of dissidents should not be surprised at being hounded in the streets. "In Cuba, the streets belong to the revolutionaries (... and) it's legitimate for our people to defend their streets and to oppose those who work for the U.S. government," Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque said. "It's legitimate for the people to impede, within norms that include neither excesses nor violations of physical or moral integrity (...the) provocations (of) mercenaries," as the Cuban government calls the dissidents, he added. "Anyone who commits a provocation should know that these things happen," the foreign minister said, adding that the Saturday attack on another dissident in his own home was also justified. "If some whiner provokes his neighbors, he should know that at some point they will lose patience and respond to the provocations," Pérez Roque declared in his first press conference after returning from a trip to Europe. The central theme of the news conference was the human rights situation on the communist island. Acts of "popular repudiation" were regular and normal at the beginning of the 1980s, when demonstrations were organized against citizens who wanted to leave the country via the port of Mariel. (The Globe and Mail, EFE, 21/3/05)
March 21, 2005: S everal Cuban dissidents met with the ambassadors of EU nations in Havana and asked them to include demanding the release of the regime's opposition prisoners on its negotiating agenda with the Fidel Castro government. Attending the two-hour meeting held at EU representative Sven Kuhn von Burgsdorff's residence were Christian democratic leader Oswaldo Paya, former political prisoner Martha Beatriz Roque, Todos Unidos leader Vladimiro Roca and progressive dissident figure Manuel Cuesta Morua. The EU was represented by the ambassadors or chiefs of mission of Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Great Britain, Sweden, The Netherlands, Slovakia, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland and Belgium. After the meeting, Paya said that he asked the ambassadors to include lobbying for the release of imprisoned dissidents on its list of matters to discuss with Havana. "If the EU is going to have a dialogue with the Cuban government, it must include on its agenda (...) the freedom of the political prisoners, because that is something that cannot be postponed," he said. Roque, of the dissident Assembly to Promote Civil Society, said that the meeting "was very friendly and cordial," but she added that there had been "no kind of commitment (made) by the EU." (EFE, 21/3/05)
March 20, 2005: Some 200 women supporters of Fidel Castro laid siege to a march by 30 female relatives of imprisoned dissidents in an attempt to intimidate them. The women, waving Cuban flags and chanting "Fidel, Fidel" and "down with the worms" intercepted the wives and other relatives as they quietly marched, dressed in white with flowers in hand, down 5th Ave., the main thoroughfare in Havana's Miramar district. Some 50 men, who appeared to be from the Communist party and security forces, stood by across the street and later were seen telling the women what to do. The dissidents' female relatives have gathered every Sunday for two years at the Santa Rita Church for Mass, then walked a few blocks outside along the avenue without incident, staging brief rallies in a nearby park. After 30 minutes of harassment from the FMC crowd, the opposition members sat on the steps of the Santa Rita church and began praying and singing. The Palm Sunday march marked exactly two years since the government ended a round up of 75 pro-democracy activists, independent journalists and others. (Reuters, EFE, 20/3/05)
March 19, 2005: A mob attacked the home of dissident doctor, Darci Ferrer, after he placed photos and posters of the imprisoned Castro opponents in front of his house. Ferrer was slightly injured and his protest trashed. "This could be the start of a new wave of political repression by the government using all means at its disposal, including these brigades, which typically are connected to security forces. I know, they attacked me four or five times," said veteran human rights activist, Elizardo Sanchez, head of the illegal but tolerated Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation. (Reuters, 19/3/05)
March 18, 2005: The limitation of freedom of expression, association and assembly are serious human rights violations. They must stop immediately, said Amnesty International as it published a report on prisoners of conscience in Cuba on the 2nd anniversary of the 2003 crackdown. Amnesty International currently recognizes 71 prisoners of conscience imprisoned across the island for peacefully expressing their beliefs and opinions and calls on the Cuban government to immediately and unconditionally release all of them. (AI Press Release, 18/3/05)
March 18, 2005: Nearly 30 wives of political prisoners marched to the headquarters of the government's journalists' union to demand their plight be publicized in Cuba's state-run media, marking the second anniversary of the crackdown that put their spouses behind bars. Wearing all-white clothing and sashes that said "amnesty," the women dropped off a letter to the union president that harshly criticized those working for Cuban newspapers, magazines and television stations. "Journalists for the state media keep silent. They don't see," the Cuban wives said. "They don't know what's happening in their times. They wear ear muffs, and march on the only road that the state lets them." "We are here to demand our page, our space," continued the letter from the prisoners' wives, "because although they don't like it, they can't deny our existence." The women also passed out copies of the letter to passers-by. (AP, 18/3/05)
March 18, 2005 : Amnesty International urged a high-ranking EU official about to visit Cuba to pressure the Castro regime to release all political prisoners jailed in the Caribbean nation. Louis Michel, European Union commissioner for development and aid, is set to visit the Communist-ruled island as a step in a tentative rapprochement between the 25-nation bloc and the 46-year-old regime. "As dialogue with Cuba is renewed, the EU must reiterate its petition to authorities of that country for the immediate and unconditional release of all prisoners of conscience," said the international human rights organization. Cuba's outlawed Commission on Human Rights says the government has imprisoned some 300 people for political offenses. "The EU must pressure Cuba to put an immediate end to such violations," he said. "In Cuba, exercise of the freedom of expression is considered a crime, as is working with a human rights organization or publishing articles and giving interviews to media considered critical of the Cuban government," said the communique. (EFE, 18/3/05)
March 16, 2005: More than 100 prominent writers, editors, and reporters throughout Latin America joined the Committee to Protect Journalists in calling on Fidel Castro to immediately release 23 jailed journalists, saying the two-year-long imprisonments violate "the most basic norms of international law" and represent "an affront to human dignity." The demand, made in a letter sent to Castro and signed by 108 writers from 18 countries, comes nearly two years to the day that Cuban authorities swept up dozens of independent journalists and dissidents in a massive effort to silence political criticism. Signatories of today's letter include Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes, Argentine author Tomás Eloy Martínez, Brazilian journalist Geraldinho Vieira, and Venezuelan editor Teodoro Petkoff. (CPJ News, 16/3/05)
March 15, 2005: Human rights activists Antonio and Enrique García Morejón were released from prison after serving their sentences. The García Morejón brothers had been sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison under alleged charges of contempt of Fidel Castro, resisting arrest, disobedience and public disturbances. (Cubanet, 17/3/05)
March 15, 2005: Cuba defended its rights record in a document prepared for an upcoming United Nations meeting, saying that giving medical parole to 14 of the 75 dissidents rounded up in a crackdown two years ago demonstrated its penal system's "profound humanism." The reference, contained in a text written for the UN Human Rights Commission meeting that opened in Geneva, was the government's first public reference to the early releases last year of 13 men and one woman for health reasons. Two new chapters of the book Cuba and Human Rights are “the latest contribution to the effort against lies and deceits”, President of the Cuban Parliament Ricardo Alarcon stated at the launching of the book. The volumes were launched in the former nursery school Le Van Than, target of a sabotage that jeopardized the life of 570 children and 156 workers on May 8, 1980. "Very few places are better than this, the target of one of the most abominable terrorist actions against our people, to present these books citing evidence of the US's long history of violence against Cuba and its desire to overthrow the Cuban Revolution," said Alarcon. (AP, 15/3/05)
March 14, 2005: Cuban's foreign minister called on the European Union for a renewed dialogue on the issue of human rights, but declined to say if there would be more releases of imprisoned government dissidents in his country. "Cuba's disposition is to advance with the European Union in a political dialogue on human rights" Felipe Perez Roque told a joint news conference with his Spanish counterpart Miguel Angel Moratinos. He noted that the annual nation-by-nation vote at the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva routinely led to political tensions, and said Cuba asks the 25-nation European bloc to abandon its common stance to condemn the island's human rights record. "We ask the EU to leave the actual road of common position and replace it with a reciprocal and frank dialogue," he said. "The decision to release a prisoner (in Cuba) is for the courts to take. It's not a government decision," he said. "The prisoners that were released some months ago were released because of health problems."
March 14, 2005: The Committee to Protect Journalists issued its annual report, Attacks on the Press 2004. Most of the journalists jailed were locked up on vague ``anti-state'' charges, such as sedition, subversion and working against the interests of the state, the CPJ says. According to the report, Cuba accounts for 23 of the 122 journalists imprisoned around the world. (The New York Times, 14/3/05)
March 12 , 2005 : The wives of jailed dissidents known as the "Women in White" because of their dress, are preparing vigils and meetings March 18-20, to mark the second anniversary of the first summary trials. Gisela Delgado, wife of Hector Palacios, sentenced to 20 years, has not lost hope after two years of "total anguish, immense sorrow." Laura Polla, wife of Hector Maseda, also serving a 20-year sentence, is convinced the government will not engage in a "mass release." "I am not political, but I have always thought you cannot keep innocent men in prison for more than two years," Polla said, urging other dissidents' wives "not to give in to despondency." (EFE, 12/3/05)
March 11, 2005: The OAS's Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (CIDH) announced that rights violations continue in the Americas despite "important progress." In one of its most notable resolutions at the close of its first session of 2005, the Organization of American States' CIDH said that the US economic embargo "on the Cuban regime has a serious impact on the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights" on the communist island. Although it acknowledged that Cuba had freed some persons "who had been unjustly imprisoned," the commission said that no significant changes had occurred in that country's "systematic repression of dissidents, human rights defenders and independent journalists." (EFE, 11/3/05)
March 10, 2005: Cuban Foreign Minister, Felipe Pérez Roque, told European Union Development Commissioner Louis Michel, that to truly make progress in relations with Cuba European countries “should move away from the futile affairs [that take place] in Geneva”, where a new resolution against Cuba at the UN Human Rights Commission will be voted in April. During their meeting, Michel told Pérez Roque “clearly” that the EU expects Cuba to make progress toward political openness and to release political prisoners. Pérez Roque said that the release of jailed oppositionists “is not the subject of political negotiations”. (ABC, 11/3/05)
March 9, 2005 : More than 30 dissidents in Cuba have been sent to jail in the last year, according to the illegal Cuban Foundation for Human Rights. The Foundation released a “Report of Human Rights Violations in Cuba in 2004” in which it criticizes the “worrying” prison conditions and the “political repression, terror and misinformation” on the island. (EFE, 9/3/05)
March 8, 2005: A group of Cuban dissidents asked British Secretary of State for Latin America, Bill Rammell, that the European Union continue to lobby for the freedom of Cuban political prisoners and the defence of human rights on the island. Hours prior to his departure from the island, Rammell met with several dissidents. He first met with Marta Beatriz Roque and Vladimiro Roca and minutes later met with Oswaldo Payá, leader of the Christian Liberation Movement (MCL) and Oscar Espinosa Chepe, a member of the “group of 75” recently released from prison on health grounds. (EFE, 8/3/05)
March 8, 2005: The highest ranking European official to visit Cuba since a diplomatic dispute over human rights erupted in 2003 said he urged the government to free all political prisoners and stop harassing dissidents. British Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell, responsible for Latin America and human rights, said he had frank talks with members of Fidel Castro's government on the need to improve its rights record as part of a new policy of engagement with Cuba. "I have raised my concerns directly about the need to release all political prisoners within Cuba, especially the 75 that were imprisoned following the crackdown on the peaceful opposition in March 2003,'' Rammell said at a news conference shortly before his departure. Cuba last year released 14 of the jailed dissidents, leading to the temporary lifting of European Union diplomatic sanctions and a thaw in relations. But Rammell said: "We want to see all of them released.'' "I have urged Cuban ministers to accept international access to their prisons, to end the harassment of individuals by the state and take steps toward the abolition of the death penalty,'' he added. Rammell met with Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque for two hours without reaching an agreement. (The New York Times, 8/3/05)
March 8, 2005: Cuba has praised Spain, Britain, and Belgium as the main movers behind a recent thaw in relations with the European Union, but made clear the bloc's demands for the release of jailed dissidents were in vain. "We do not interfere in the internal affairs of members of the European Union, so why should we allow those countries to interfere in our internal affairs?" Cuban deputy foreign minister Abelardo Moreno told the press in an interview. Moreno, on a visit to London, singled out three nations for helping bring about what he termed the EU-Cuban "detente". "Several European countries have been much more realistic and objective than others," he said. "The UK, Spain, Belgium and a few other countries have been very constructive (...) The UK sensed what was happening was really a non-issue, that Europeans in general had made a mistake." (Reuters, 8/3/05)
March 8, 2005: The administration of Pharmacy #674 of the Boyeros municipality, in Havana, fired from his job the human rights activist Dalgi Salgado Gomes, a member of the Pro Human Rights Party of Cuba. "They fired me after 12 years of working at the pharmacy, alleging I did not fulfill the requisites for the job”, Salgado said. “A few days later, an employee revealed that the firing took place due to express orders of the State Security," she added. (Puente Informativo, 8/3/05)
March 3, 2005: Reporters Without Borders applauded the release of independent journalist Carlos Brizuela from a Cuban prison after serving a three-year sentence. Brizuela Yera, who was released the day before, according to the group, worked at an independent news agency in the eastern city of Camagüey before his arrest. He was sentenced to three years in prison in April of 2002 for disobedience and irreverence toward Fidel Castro. (AP, 3/3/05)
March 2, 2005: A special UN rights envoy has urged Cuba to free all political dissidents, grant freedom of expression and lift restrictions on travel. In her annual report to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, French magistrate Christine Chanet said Cuba had continued to arrest dissidents, while journalists had been "threatened and intimidated." She also accused Cuba of giving "disproportionate" sentences to those jailed for the mere expression of views, and repeated her alarm at the jail conditions some prisoners faced. Chanet, who was appointed by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in early 2003 to probe allegations of abuse in Cuba, has been repeatedly refused permission to visit the Communist Caribbean state. "The personal representative of the High Commissioner is alarmed at the allegations of ill-treatment in detention submitted by families of prisoners," she said, repeating a concern she raised in her first report in February 2004. Chanet said that Cuba could point to many positive developments in the economic, social and cultural areas, particularly in health and education. It was also "impossible to ignore the disastrous and lasting economic and social effects" of the economic embargo enforced by the United States, and which had worsened in 2004. Far from encouraging the granting of more freedom, the tensions created by the embargo, which she noted had been condemned by the UN General Assembly, such acts "provide the Cuban authorities with an opportunity to tighten repression”. (Reuters, La Jornada, Notimex, 2/3/05)
