HAVANA — Cuba's Roman Catholic Church on Friday revealed the names of four more political prisoners to be released into exile in Spain, bringing to 36 the number freed and sent off the island under an agreement with President Raul Castro's government.

The men are among 75 dissidents who were arrested in a March 2003 crackdown on organized political opposition and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. The charges included treason and conspiring with U.S. authorities to undermine Cuba's communist system.

Under a once-unthinkable government deal with the church, which Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos helped facilitate, Cuba agreed on July 7 to release the remaining 52 prisoners still imprisoned from the crackdown.

Nelson Molinet Espino, Hector Raul Valle Hernandez, Miguel Galvan Gutierrez and Jose Miguel Martinez Hernandez will be freed as soon and flown to Spain, Cuban church official Orlando Marquez said in a statement.

That means all 36 former prisoners released so far will have elected to head to Spain with their families. One then continued on to Chile and settled there.

That leaves just 16 awaiting release some nine weeks after the agreement — though some political prisoners have been offered freedom but declined to leave their country.

It is not clear if those released subsequently will be exiled or if some will be allowed to stay in Cuba — and how long their releases will take is also unknown.

The Miami Herald reproduces this The New York Times article by former Mexican Minister of Foreign Affairs Jorge Castañeda regarding the latest political developments in Cuba:

The Castros blink

BY JORGE G. CASTANEDA
jorgecastaneda.org

Finally, someone in Cuba went eyeball to eyeball with the Castro brothers, and they blinked.

On July 7, Guillermo Fariñas, a dissident on a hunger strike for more than four months, achieved what no one has done before. Through a combination of careful confrontation, personal fortitude and international support, Fariñas forced Raúl Castro to negotiate with Cuba's Roman Catholic Church -- which led to the immediate release of five political prisoners, with 47 more to follow over the next four months.

Of course, this is not the first time that the Cuban regime has freed political prisoners. The many other instances were almost always in exchange for political and economic concessions.

In 1978, Fidel Castro allowed more than 3,000 jailed dissidents to leave for the United States after a group of exiled Cubans from Miami visited Havana. Many in the Miami group subsequently advocated for ending the U.S. embargo against Cuba.

In 1984, Castro freed 26 prisoners; in 1996, three; and in 1998, more than 80, after visits from, respectively, Jesse Jackson, Bill Richardson and Pope John Paul II, according to The Miami Herald's Andres Oppenheimer.

Spain's Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos desperately tried to play a role in the Fariñas case. But this time, the circumstances were different. Fariñas was willing to die for his demands; he saw how they were, in a sense, reinforced by the death of another hunger striker, Orlando Zapata, last February.

The Castros knew that Fariñas would die, too, if they didn't accept his demands, and that his death would make any improvement in relations with the European Union or President Obama even more difficult to acheive.

The island's economic situation has gone from dire to worse in recent times. Raúl Castro recognized that, without a rapprochement, he couldn't achieve whatever changes he might hope to make -- hence the dialogue with the church and the release of the prisoners.

Despite Fariñas' courage and political skill, the significance of the agreement between Cuba's Cardinal Jaime Ortega and Raúl Castro is modest.


• First, circumstances may change during the four months that will pass before all the prisoners on the list are freed. Meanwhile, the remaining prisoners are still hostage to the Castros' dealings with the church and possibly the European Union.


• Second, an additional 100 political prisoners in Cuba, and perhaps many more, are not included in the agreement. [The government has since indicated it may free all political prisoners, but that has not been confirmed.]


• Third, articles 72 and 73 of the Cuban criminal code, which establish the notion of ``dangerousness'' -- an outrageously inexplicit word that has been denounced by Human Rights Watch -- are still on the books.

According to Cuban law, anybody can be jailed at any time, even before committing a crime, if they are perceived to have a penchant for doing so. And political opposition to the regime is a crime.


• Finally, it is unclear whether the 52 dissidents will be freed in Cuba or deported to Spain and elsewhere. Fidel Castro has used expulsion from his homeland as a political instrument for more than half a century, with great success.

Whether the church and Spain should lend themselves to this ploy is debatable. Even ``voluntary'' exile is a non sequitur: Asking political prisoners in poor health to sign a statement that they will willingly accept exile is hardly magnanimous or ethical.

Most important, however, is whether small gestures like the new agreement alter the human-rights situation in Cuba and represent the beginning of a transition in Cuban politics.

Jose Miguel Vivanco, the Americas director of Human Rights Watch, hit the mark when he said that he could not congratulate a government for freeing people who should never have been jailed.

The real issue is whether there is any justification for the survival of a regime that acknowledges the existence of political prisoners, uses them as bargaining chips and needs to be forced by dead or dying hunger strikers to liberate any of them. Little can be done to change this situation until the Cuban people decide they have had enough. Meanwhile, voters should question their leaders' having any dealings with the Cuban regime.

By Michael C. Moynihan

The sinister dictators of Cuba, Fidel and Raul Castro, are getting a fair amount of good press for releasing a handful of political prisoners that committed no crime. A few things to keep in mind, for those celebrating the great “humanitarian gesture”—the one designed to head off Western criticism following the death of hunger strikers. The prisoners, all jailed for "political offenses," were allowed to leave prison provided they left Cuba—the cause for which they have risked their lives—and relocated to Spain. 11 prisoners were released to Spanish authorities, though many others refused to surrender their citizenship in exchange for their freedom. At a press conference in Spain, a small group of recently arrived dissidents urged the European Union to keep pressure on Cuba, noting that “their release was not a gesture of good faith but ‘a desperate action’ by the Cuban government.”

So how were conditions in Cuban prisons? According to this [expletive] at Harvard Law School's Criminal Justice Institute, the Cuban prison system is "far more humane than Western propaganda would have the uninformed public believe," nor do those lucky enough to be incarcerated "have to pay for their education, medical, dental or hospital care, or any other activities they experience." Imagine not having to fork over your $18 monthly salary for "activities" like beatings and the bi-weekly rotten food buffet!

In an interview with Bloomberg, recently-released prisoner Normando Hernandez Gonzalez explained what was wrong with all of this "Western propaganda" about prison conditions:

“The first month I spent in jail, I only ate eight times because the food they gave us was subhuman and so rotten that if you offered it to a dog, he’d turn away. For refusing to wear prison overalls, I was sent to a dark cell for 101 days without seeing the light of day. There wasn’t a single inch of my skin that wasn’t covered in septic mosquito bites. I was forced to sleep on the concrete floor with rats and cockroaches crawling over me.”

Incidentally, Gonzalez was sentenced to 25 years in prison for his association with the Camagüey College of Independent Journalists.

Miami Herald columnist Andreas Oppenheimer pooh-poohs talk of a “new era” from Cubans held hostage by the Castro brothers:

…[M]ost important, the Cuban regime is not even talking about modifying articles 72 and 73 of its criminal code, an Orwellian legislation that allows it to put people behind bars before they committed a crime on the mere suspicion that they may commit one in the future.

Nor is the regime ready to consider changing its law 88, which allows it to imprison people for writing anything that can be interpreted as critical of the government, or its various laws banning freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom to travel within the country or abroad, independent unions, and political parties.

When I asked José Miguel Vivanco, head of the Human Rights Watch advocacy group's Americas department, whether Cuba's latest announcement amounts to a "new phase" in Cuba, he said: "We are obviously very happy for the prisoners and their families, but I am not going to congratulate a government for imprisoning people that shouldn't have been imprisoned in the first place."

AP informs from La Habana:

HAVANA — U.S. diplomats in Havana have told relatives of jailed Cuban dissidents that it will be more difficult for them to apply for asylum in America if they first accept a Church-brokered deal to trade jail for exile in Spain.

The meetings, confirmed by the family members of six imprisoned dissidents, come at a delicate time and could complicate releases of some 52 activists, journalists and opposition leaders arrested in a 2003 crackdown.

Under a deal brokered by Havana Cardinal Jaime Ortega earlier this month, Cuba has already freed 11 political prisoners and flown them to Madrid. Nine others have accepted the offer and are expected to arrive in coming days.

The rest of the jailed dissidents have either refused to go, or have not yet been contacted by Roman Catholic church officials. The church has said exile in Spain is an "option," but has not specified what will happen to those who refuse to leave the country.

The family members of several dissidents who have not yet accepted Spanish asylum met Tuesday with officials at the U.S. Interests Section, which Washington maintains in Havana instead of an embassy. Other family members are expected to visit the Interests Section in coming days.

After the meetings, the relatives told The Associated Press they were informed they would not be allowed to apply for asylum in the United States from Spain, but could petition for residence like any other would-be immigrant.

"We came here thinking they would give us some option (of applying for asylum from Spain), but they won't," said Sofia Garcia, whose husband, Jose Miguel Martinez, has been serving a 13-year sentence for treason.

She said she was told that if the family goes to Spain they would have to apply for residence in the United States through regular channels, a process that can take years and usually requires a sponsor.

Teresita Galvan, whose brother Miguel Galvan is serving a 26-year term, said she left the meeting under the impression that by accepting the deal to go to Spain, her family would give up its right to later claim asylum in the United States.

It means a stark choice for some of the dissidents, many of whom have family in the United States: Stay in Cuba and try to win U.S. asylum, or leave immediately for Spain and take themselves out of consideration.

Gloria Berbena, a spokeswoman at the Interests Section, confirmed that individual meetings were taking place to answer questions the family members might have about seeking asylum.

Berbena said the Cubans were being informed that any asylum applications from Spain would be handled differently from those made inside Cuba.

"The process is different depending on where you apply from," she said.

Cubans applying for asylum in the United States can claim that they face persecution or danger if they remain in the country, something that would be harder to do if they have already fled to a friendly country.

When asked if American diplomats were advising the prisoners not to accept Spanish asylum, Berbena said only: "We believe that Cubans should be free to make their own decisions."

By RICARDO GONZÁLEZ ALFONSO
Madrid

I NEVER imagined I would be born at the age of 60, at an altitude of several thousand feet above the Atlantic. That isn’t gibberish; it’s what I felt when I was released from jail in Cuba and exiled to Spain last Monday.

My debut as a prisoner of conscience came early in 2003, a period subsequently characterized by the world’s press as the Black Spring. I was just one of 75 Cubans imprisoned for our belief that freedom is an achievable miracle and not a crime against the state.

They say prison is a school, and it’s true. I did my best to be a good student and kept back my tears. I succeeded so well that my prison companions still think me a brave man.

Within a few months I could find my way pretty well around the labyrinths of shipwrecked souls. I learned the secrets and legends of killers for hire, crimes of passion, traffickers in illicit powdery substances, would-be emigrants whose clandestine departures had been no secret to the state — even thieves who’d share their teaspoon of sugar on days of hunger.

Zoology was one class we had every day. I learned to live with rats, and even came, on certain nights of our tropical winter (which is winter, nevertheless) to stare at them with an urgency not unlike what people call appetite. I was a solitary friend to the deft spiders that sometimes freed me from the torturous buzzings and blood-shedding bites that accompanied my insomnia.

I became well versed in cosmic solitude and silence. I remember being in a cell no wider than a man with outstretched arms. I also grew familiar with fetid overcrowding and unceasing clamor. Months of unending darkness, months of eternal light.

I was only an auditor in certain courses, in which I learned that some prisoners were specializing in self-injury as a crude solution to their despair. I was witness to mutilated hands and other wounds as mortal or venial as sins. A man cut off his own penis and testicles in a desperate attempt to become a woman. Others, more radical and exhausted by perpetual existential tumult, turned to various methods of suicide, all of them extremely effective.

A large part of the program of study consisted in the defense of one’s rights. There was no theoretical option, only the very Cuban practice of the hunger strike. I carried one out for 16 days, until part of my will felt satisfied with my victory. That long and voluntary fast vindicated the enforced daily fast of imprisonment.

As in any school, there were periods of leisure. Packs of cigarettes were wagered on the outcome of chess matches, card games or soccer contests. I knew sellers and buyers of recreational drugs who were very good at evading or bribing both prison guards and informer inmates.

There was no lack of expertise in armed aggression. Pitiful, decaying knives that were nevertheless sharp-edged and skillfully wielded left trails of blood and rage behind them. (But I never signed up for that class.)

I’ve always had an aptitude for subjects that have to do with dreams, and I dreamed of my wife and children with such fervor that I know they felt my caresses as they lay asleep.

I was almost an exemplary student, and received only one failing grade: in hatred. Despite certain zones of memory, I bear no rancor against my jailers.

And now, after this senescent birth of mine, I’m contemplating the future with all the hope of the newly unveiled. Ever the optimist, I even dream of returning to a Cuba where freedom is not an impossible illusion. I know that, in the next 60 years, I won’t have to be reborn again.


Ricardo González Alfonso is a journalist. This article was translated by Esther Allen from the Spanish.

By María Elena Salinas

For those of us who live in a free society, it’s difficult to imagine what it’s like to survive in a place where expressing your views and asking that your rights as a human being be respected could land you in jail. But that’s what life is like in Cuba. Throughout the years, the communist regime of the Castro brothers has put hundreds of dissidents behind bars.

In a twist of fate, or political maneuvering, 52 prisoners of conscience are being set free, allowed to leave the country with their family members if they so choose. Many of them accepted the offer to begin their exile in Spain.

Among the first nine to arrive in Madrid was Normando Hernandez. He traveled there with his wife and young daughter and was greeted by his mother, Blanca Gonzalez, who traveled to Spain from her own exile in Miami to greet him. I spoke to Normando by phone shortly after. “I feel a lot of sadness and nostalgia,” he told me. “It broke my heart to see my mother crying when she saw the frail condition I am in.”

It was for him a bittersweet moment. Although happy to be a free man and once again reunited with his mother after eight years, it pains him to think of what he left behind. “I left not only family members behind, but also my people, my brothers in the cause who are living their life in slow motion in Cuban jails in deplorable conditions and with the uncertainty of what will become of them.”

When they arrived in Spain, the freed prisoners were taken to a modest hotel in an industrial area in the outskirts of Madrid, where conditions were not quite what one might expect to find in a First World country. No TV sets, the rooms have metal lockers to store clothes, and guests have to share a bathroom. Yet, they could not complain. This was heaven compared with the conditions in a Cuban jail.

Hernandez worked as a writer and independent journalist in Cuba. He was sentenced to 25 years behind bars for reporting on the conditions of state-run services and criticizing the government. According to PEN American Center, a literary and human-rights organization, during his time behind bars he was transferred several times from one prison to another, held in solitary confinement with only four hours of sunlight a week. He was forced to share a tiny cell with insects, rodents and mentally unstable prisoners. He was given polluted water and inadequate food, and was offered only basic medical services. While in captivity, he contracted several illnesses.

The release of the 52 prisoners from Cuban jails is officially the result of the Catholic Church on the island and the government of Spain negotiating with Cuban authorities, but almost certainly was influenced by the bravery of ordinary Cubans who decided to go from oppressed observers to silent protesters, a silence so strong it reverberated in the highest levels of the Cuban hierarchy.

The pressure was on when international public opinion began to shift against the Castro regime as images of the “Ladies in White,” mothers and wives of political prisoners, being harassed by pro-government mobs during their Sunday vigils were broadcast around the world. The death of Cuban dissident Orlando Zapata in February, following an 85-day hunger strike, motivated independent journalist Guillermo Farinas to start his own hunger strike until prisoners who were gravely ill were allowed back home with their families and given proper medical attention. Shortly after the announcement of the release of the political prisoners in Cuba, Farinas, virtually on his deathbed, ended his 130-day hunger strike.

The release of these men is one of the most significant signs coming from the communist island of what could be the appearance of loosening up its tight reign. Critics of the Cuban regime think it’s just a public-relations stunt. The Cuban government has never admitted that there are political prisoners in Cuba, but according to human-rights groups, there are still dozens of prisoners of conscience behind bars.

For his part, Normando Hernandez will begin a new life in Spain, hoping eventually to live his exile in Miami. But his struggle to free Cuba will remain the same: “Whatever it takes to free my people, I will do, as a journalist, as a defender of human rights, in any capacity, but I will do it in a peaceful way.”

From AP:

GENEVA — The U.N. secretary-general says Cuba should build on its release of at least 20 dissidents by doing more to improve human rights.

Ban Ki-moon welcomed last week's transfer of 11 Cuban prisoners to Spain. Nine more are expected to arrive Tuesday, along with around 50 of their relatives.

Speaking in Geneva, Ban said Monday that he has closely followed the developments. He called them "encouraging."

But he said the U.N. still expects "more reconciliatory measures taken by Cuban authorities, establishing the rule of law and respecting human rights."

Cuba is committed to releasing 52 imprisoned dissidents under a deal with the Spanish government and Catholic Church.

MADRID — Spain's Foreign Minister says nine more Cuban political prisoners will fly to freedom in Madrid this week along with around 50 of their relatives.
Miguel Angel Moratinos says the freed dissidents would arrive Tuesday to join 11 others recently released and now in Spain.

The liberation of 20 Cuban dissidents to Spain is part of a commitment made by the Castro regime to release 52 opponents imprisoned since 2003 under an agreement reached with the Spanish government and Catholic Church. Moratinos did not identify the prisoners but said all were traveling of their own free will. He asked that Spaniards and Cubans show understanding.

Moratinos was speaking during a visit to Kazakhstan in an interview broadcast on Cadena Ser's website Sunday.

The Miami Herald publishes today an extensive report by Fabiola Santiago on the Cuban political prisoners exiled to Spain:

11 Cuban prisoners, expatriated to Spain, are weary, ailing, defiant and free
After years in windowless cells, they find themselves reunited with family but deprived of their homeland.

BY FABIOLA SANTIAGO
FSANTIAGO@MIAMIHERALD.COM

MADRID -- Packed into a hostel named Welcome that advertises lodging for about $18 a night -- the same as a cab ride to this industrial hub 10 miles away from the city center -- the 11 freed Cuban prisoners who arrived this week with their families face an uncertain future in a country reeling from economic woes.

The ex-prisoners are not euphoric, as one might expect newly freed men to be, and despite the crisp white shirt, dress slacks, leather shoes and striped tie with which the Cuban government put them on a plane to the Spanish capital, the men look weathered by their whirlwind transatlantic flight and seven years of incarceration in windowless cells alongside common prisoners.

"I can't enjoy anything. I can't feel free as long as there is a political prisoner in Cuba. How can I be happy with all I left behind?'' asks Mijail Barzaga Lugo, 43, who served time in four different prisons for filing news reports about life in Cuba to CubaNet and Radio Martí.

Barzaga and the others are part of a group of 75 independent journalists and peaceful dissidents jailed in the massive crackdown of 2003 known as the Black Spring. These 11 freed prisoners are the first of 52 scheduled to be released and expatriated to Spain in the next four months under an agreement negotiated by the Spanish government and the island's highest-ranking Catholic, Cardinal Jaime Ortega. Two others from the group of 75 -- the poet and columnist Raul Rivero, released in 2005, and Alejandro Gonzalez Raga, released in 2008 -- also were resettled here.

Besides Barzaga, those who arrived between Tuesday and Thursday were Ricardo Gonzalez Alfonso, Lester Gonzalez, Omar Ruiz, Antonio Villareal, Julio Cesar Galvez, Jose Luis Garcia Paneque, Pablo Pacheco, Omar Rodriguez Saludes, Normando Hernandez Gonzalez, and Luis Milan. All were accompanied by family members, some of them members of the support group Ladies in White, who marched every Sunday in Havana to demand the prisoners' freedom.

The State Department confirmed reports that Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega was in the U.S. just days before he announced a deal with Raúl Castro to release political prisoners.

BY JUAN O. TAMAYO
JTAMAYO@ELNUEVOHERALD.COM

Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega visited the United States in June, just days before he announced that the Raúl Castro government had agreed to free 52 political prisoners, the U.S. State Department confirmed Friday.

"Cardinal Ortega visited the United States in June,'' said Virginia Staab, a Western Hemisphere Affairs spokesperson. But she declined comment on reports that Ortega met with two senior U.S. officials in Washington during the visit and informed them -- with Cuba's approval -- of his talks with Castro on the prisoner release.

"What we find important here is not who knew what when but that several individuals who were imprisoned simply due to their personal beliefs have been released and that many more (more than 100) have not yet been identified for release,'' she said.

"We continue to urge the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners, not just those arrested during the Black Spring crackdown in 2003.''

TOP OFFICIALS

The Wall Street Journal reported on June 28 that Ortega had met with Arturo Valenzuela, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs, and Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs committee. Neither have confirmed the report.
Berman has endorsed a bill before Congress that would lift all U.S. restrictions on travel to Cuba -and unleash a gusher of U.S. tourism dollars for the economically strapped island.

Officials in Washington told El Nuevo Herald that Ortega was in Washington on June 22 as part of a low-profile U.S. visit. He also spent time in New York City, apparently meeting with U.S. Catholic church officials.

Ortega's director of communications, Orlando Marquez, confirmed to the website Progreso Weekly on June 30 that the cardinal had visited Washington for meetings arranged by the U.S. Conference of Bishops.

MONTHS OF TALKS

Ortega's talks with Castro began in March, after pro-government mobs harassed the Ladies in White during their marches, following a mass in a Havana church to demand the release of relatives jailed since the 2003 crackdown.

It was only last week that Castro agreed that over the next three to four months he would free the last 52 dissidents still in jail from the 2003 roundup, which sentenced 75 opposition figures to lengthy prison terms.

Two dozen others were previously released.

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Chile says it will take in Cuban dissidents released by the communist government.

A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Alfredo Moreno says he is trying to help liberate Cuba's dissidents.

The Cuban government has agreed to gradually free 52 prisoners last week after meeting with Cuba's Roman Catholic Cardinal Jaime Ortega, and 17 have accepted asylum in Spain.

Moreno made the offer to Spain's foreign minister, who brokered the meeting. His spokeswoman spoke Sunday on condition of anonymity because she cannot be named under ministry policy.

Moreno did not talk to Cuban officials directly. Cuba has not commented on its promised release of political prisoners.

By MARC LACEY

MEXICO CITY — The Cuban government’s announcement last week that it will release 52 political prisoners has done little to quell the island’s fiercest critics, who are asking President Raúl Castro, “What about the rest?”

But exactly how many people are said to remain jailed on the island because of their political beliefs varies widely, depending on who is doing the counting. On the low side, Amnesty International says that only one confirmed prisoner of conscience will remain in Cuba should the Castro government follow through on its plans to release all 52 in the coming months. That one prisoner is the lawyer Rolando Jiménez Posada, and the human rights group — which coined the term prisoner of conscience in the 1960s — called on Cuba to immediately release him as well.

Before the announcement of the latest planned release, the Cuban Commission on Human Rights, an independent group that is tolerated on the island but not recognized by the government, put the number of political prisoners at 167, which it said was the lowest since the 1959 revolution in which Fidel Castro came to power. Its new figure, should all 52 get out, will be 115.

Other groups, however, say the real figure is much higher. Human Rights Watch does not specify an exact number, but includes in its tally scores of people who have been arrested in recent years for the vague Cuban crime of “dangerousness."

Some former prisoners contend that there is a political element to so many detentions in Cuba — and that the government does not allow adequate legal representation to those it wants isolated. They say the real number probably reaches into the thousands.

“If the Castro tyranny really would like to make a good faith gesture, it ought to liberate all those prisoners in its dungeons,” said Miguel Sigler Amaya, an activist now based in Miami who spent two years in a Cuban prison for “disobedience” and “resistance,” and contends that thousands of fellow Cubans are detained on similarly nebulous charges. One of his brothers, Ariel, a political prisoner, was released last month after suffering health problems in prison, and another, Guido, is among those expected to be released.

The brothers were among the activists and journalists rounded up by the government in March 2003 in a mass crackdown on dissent known as Black Spring. Those detainees were arrested on various charges and convicted after brief, closed trials. Their sentences ranged from six years to 28 years.

For its part, the Cuban government puts the number of political prisoners that it is holding at zero. Fidel Castro, the ailing former president, acknowledged holding thousands of prisoners of conscience decades ago, but in recent years he has said that Cuban jails hold only common criminals and those who illegally acted as paid agents of the United States.

One reason for the varying figures is the definition of who, exactly, is a political prisoner. Another is that the Cuban government has not allowed the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit its prisons.

Agreement on a precise figure is unlikely, as is determining why President Castro chose to make his drastic announcement now. Another looming question is how the United States, which has long called for the release of Cuba’s political prisoners and has welcomed those released in the past, will respond to President Castro’s overture.

“It’s something that is overdue but nevertheless very welcome.” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told reporters last week.

Acknowledging that its figure is on the low side, Amnesty International defines prisoners of conscience as those inmates jailed for their beliefs who have been found not to have used or advocated violence.

“Some other ones may not be on our radar,” said a spokeswoman for the group, Guadalupe Marengo, who noted that Amnesty had not been permitted to visit Cuba to conduct research in more than two decades.

Amnesty International said Mr. Posada, the one remaining Cuban inmate it considers a prisoner of conscience and thus entitled to immediate release, was given a 12-year sentence in 2003 for “disrespecting authority and revealing secrets about state security police,” after he participated in a peaceful demonstration calling attention to the plight of political prisoners.

Human Rights Watch, which conducted a surreptitious study inside Cuba last year, documented more than 40 cases of people imprisoned for “dangerousness” since Raúl Castro replaced his brother in 2006, as well as scores of other people sentenced for violating laws that criminalize free expression and association.

Noting that Cuba has conducted prisoner releases in the past and then gone on to fill its jails with even more political dissidents, Human Rights Watch said that the country’s judicial system clearly needed an overhaul.

“The international community needs to pressure Cuba to go beyond the periodic release of jailed dissidents and instead dismantle the repressive laws, courts and security forces that put them in prison in the first place,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch, who secured the release of six prisoners from Cuba in 1995.

One aspect of the planned release that has critics of the Cuban government upset are reports that once the prisoners are liberated, they are to be flown out of the country, and thus will be far less able to continue their activism and hold the government accountable.


But Cardinal Jaime Ortega, Havana’s Roman Catholic archbishop, who played a critical role in negotiating the releases, suggested that leaving Cuba would be an option, not a requirement, for the former prisoners. The first 17 are expected to travel to Spain as early as Monday, church officials said. Others may choose other countries or decide to stay in Cuba, they said.

The decision, which was first reported by the Roman Catholic Church but later appeared in the Communist Party newspaper Granma, although with no mention that the inmates to be released were political prisoners, prompted the activist Guillermo Fariñas to end the hunger strike he had begun in February to press the government to release ailing prisoners.

But Mr. Fariñas would not take credit for the planned release. A statement that his supporters pressed up to a window in the hospital where he remained Sunday said, “Only Cuba, our nation, has won.”

Antonio Betancourt contributed reporting.

Cuba has pledged to let 52 of its prisoners of conscience go. We hope their release happens, and soon. But there should be no illusions that this gesture augurs fundamental political change on the island that the Castro brothers, Fidel and Raúl, have ruled with an iron fist since 1959. The Castro regime has a long history of tactical human rights concessions -- with the goal of buying time for the regime rather than reforming it. This release would appear to fit the pattern.

Always impoverished and unfree, revolutionary Cuba is in extra-bad shape now. Cardinal Jaime Ortega, the usually discreet archbishop of Havana, recently warned of "a difficult situation" that calls for "quick" changes by the government lest "impatience and ill will" spread. The state-run economy is reeling: Tourism and mineral exports are down, foreign debt is up, and Venezuela is decreasingly able to help because of its own colossal mismanagement. Meanwhile, Cuba's dissidents are gaining in daring and prestige -domestically and internationally. The death of prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo after a 75-day hunger strike, as well as the attacks of government-backed mobs on peaceful demonstrations by wives and mothers of political prisoners, earned global condemnation and set back Spain's efforts to relax the European Union's policy linking economic aid with human rights progress. Dissident Guillermo Farinas is near death on a hunger strike of his own, demanding freedom for 25 political prisoners who are sick.

The regime could ill afford that embarrassment. So the promised release is a victory for Mr. Farinas. And it's no accident that it was coordinated with the Spanish government -or that it came a week after the House Agriculture Committee had approved lifting the ban on U.S. tourism to the island and easing U.S. food sales. Raúl Castro, who took over day-to-day control from his ailing brother four years ago, undoubtedly hopes to encourage these developments, which promise to relieve his cash crunch.

How should the United States respond? As suggested by the fact that cash-only food exports from the United States make this country Cuba's fifth-largest trading partner, "embargo" is already a misnomer to describe the main U.S. policy approach. In fact, along with Venezuelan petroleum and tourism, cash remittances from Cuban Americans, which President Obama already has eased, constitute one of Cuba's economic pillars. We don't generally approve of restrictions on where Americans may travel. But the Cuba "ban" already includes large exceptions for Cuban Americans, trade delegations and educational missions. Neither those visits nor the influx of Canadians and Europeans have had the effect of liberalizing the regime -though they have brought in hard currency.

The 52 inmates represent fewer than one-third of Cuba's 167 political prisoners, according to democracy advocate Freedom House. Among prisoners notably not mentioned for release on Wednesday was Alan Gross of Potomac, an Agency for International Development contractor imprisoned in Cuba since December for the crime of distributing cellphones and laptops in Cuba's tiny Jewish community. And the first five prisoners to be freed reportedly are going to be forced into exile as a condition of their release. Mr. Obama has wisely linked major changes in U.S. sanctions to significant movement toward democracy and freedom by Havana. That condition is still far from met.

"We want true freedom. Let the prisoner and his family decide. If there are forcible deportations, there can be no talk about an advancement of human rights."

We could not agree more.

By WILL WEISSERT (AP) 

The Roman Catholic Church said Wednesday that Cuba has agreed to free 52 political prisoners and let them leave the country in what would be the island's largest mass liberation of dissidents since Pope John Paul II visited in 1998.

Five are to be released into exile in Spain as soon as possible, while the remaining 47 will be let go in "a process that will take three or four months starting now," said Havana's archbishop, Cardinal Jaime Ortega.

The deal was announced following a meeting between President Raul Castro and Ortega. Also participating was visiting Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos and his Cuban counterpart, Bruno Rodriguez.

"We feel enormous satisfaction," Moratinos said in a statement released by the Spanish Embassy. "This opens a new era in Cuba with hope of putting aside differences once and for all on matters of prisoners."

Moratinos then wrapped up his two-plus days here, but did not take any freed prisoners back to Spain with him. He and Ortega said they weren't sure how long it would take for the first five prisoners to be released.

The scope of the agreement "is a surprise," said Elizardo Sanchez, head of the independent Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation. "We were hoping for a significant release of prisoners, but not this."

Ortega said that those to be released were all members of a group of 75 leading political opposition activists, community organizers and journalists who report on Cuba in defiance of state controls on media. They were rounded up in a crackdown on dissent in March 2003.

"I'm so excited," said Laura Pollan, whose husband, Hector Maceda, was one of the 75, and had been serving 20 years in prison for treason — but now could be headed home soon.

But Pollan was also hesitant, saying Cuba may not free as many political prisoners as it says it will.
"I don't think they will let everyone go; I think only some will be," she said in her shabby living room in central Havana. "It won't be the first time that they lie."

She later added, however, "I hope to God I'm wrong and can tell you in September that I was wrong and that the government kept its promise."

Some of the 75 original prisoners had previously been freed for health reasons or after completing their terms, or were allowed into exile in Spain. But at least 52 have remained behind bars — most serving lengthy prison terms on charges of conspiring with Washington to destabilize Cuba's political system.

Church official Orlando Marquez said that by the cardinal's count, only 52 prisoners were left imprisoned from that group.
Sanchez originally said there were actually 53 of the 75 still behind bars and that one, a former police official named Rolando Jimenez, had been left off Wednesday's list. But he later clarified that his group considers Jimenez a "prisoner of conscience" but not among the 75 arrested in 2003 — meaning all of the group captured seven years ago now stand to be freed in coming weeks.

Sanchez also said the "forced exile in Spain" that awaits the first five to be released is not the same as unconditional freedom.

"These liberations will not mean a significant improvement in the terrible situation of human rights that exists in Cuba," said Sanchez, whose Havana-based commission is not recognized — but largely tolerated — by Cuba's government, which officially brooks no organized opposition.
"It's opening the prisons a little, and not to everyone," he said.

Ortega refused to divulge which five prisoners would be released first, or how they were chosen — saying he couldn't yet do so because some of their relatives had yet to be notified.

The cardinal also wouldn't say whether those released after the initial five will be deported to Spain or allowed to stay on the island. Asked if subsequent groups of the prisoners would be forced into exile, he said only that leaving Cuba "is a proposal" they will be offered.

Still, if the agreement holds, it would be the largest group of political prisoners freed since the government released 299 inmates in a general amnesty following the pope's visit 12 years ago. Of those, about 100 were considered held for political reasons.

Others cheered the news, including Sarah Stephens, head of the Washington-based Center for Democracy in the Americas, which supports lifting the United States' 48-year-old trade embargo against the island.

"This is joyful news for the prisoners and their families, a credit to the Cuban Catholic Church," Stephens said in a statement, "and a lesson for U.S. policymakers that engagement — talking to the Cubans with respect — is accomplishing more, right now, than the embargo has accomplished in 50 years."

In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Virginia Staab said "we would view prisoner releases as a positive development, but we are seeking further details to confirm the facts."
Cuba's Catholic Church has recently become a major political voice on the island, though only with the consent of the Castro government.

In May, Ortega negotiated an end to a ban on marches by a small group of wives and mothers of political prisoners known as the Ladies in White.

The cardinal and another church leader subsequently met with Castro for four hours. Church officials then announced the government would transfer political prisoners to jails closer to their families and give better access to medical care for inmates who need it. That led to 12 transfers last month, and freedom for paraplegic Ariel Sigler.

Those discussions apparently laid the groundwork for Wednesday's large-scale agreement.

The church's increasing role helped to defuse a human rights situation that has been tense since the Feb. 23 death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, an activist who died in prison after a lengthy hunger strike. He became the first Cuban opposition figure to die after refusing food in nearly 40 years.

His death sparked international condemnation, and Pollan said Wednesday she thought Cuba had been forced into this latest move because "no country was going to change its position toward Cuba if there weren't improvement in the area of human rights."

The announced agreement also appeared to cast some doubt on the future of Guilermo Farinas, an opposition activist and freelance journalist who has refused food and water since February to protest Zapata Tamayo's death and demand freedom for dozens of political prisoners, all among the 75 jailed in 2003.

He said by phone Wednesday from a hospital in the central city of Santa Clara, where he has received nutrients intravenously, that he would continue his hunger strike and was prepared to go until he dies. Cuba's state-controlled media has reported that Farinas recently suffered a potentially fatal blood clot in his neck.

Fidel Castro said Cuba held 15,000 political prisoners in 1964, but officials in recent years say none of their prisoners are held for political reasons — all for common crimes or for being paid "mercenaries" of U.S.-funded groups trying to overthrow Cuba's government.

According to a report released this week by Sanchez's commission, the number of Cuban political prisoners has fallen to 167, the lowest total since Fidel Castro took power on New Year's Day 1959 — but that tally included those now set to be released as part of the agreement between the church and the government.

"There are more than 100 remaining prisoners and we don't see any in this agreement," Sanchez said. "The government of Cuba should free all political prisoners in Cuba."

Reina Luisa Tamayo at the Huffington Post:

Much has been said in the Cuban regime's official media about my son Orlando Zapata Tamayo, a young black man. Many lies have been told, and it has been said that my son was a criminal, and that he was not simply allowed to die. The truth is that my son was murdered. The truth is that my son was allowed to die on a hunger strike he held to demand respect for his rights, and to demand freedom for his people. Today, I would like to tell you just who Orlando Zapata Tamayo was: a defender of human rights, and my beloved son.

Orlando Zapata Tamayo was born on May 15, 1967, a native of Santiago de Cuba. He spent his childhood in Santiago and Antilla in Holguin province, where he went to school through the ninth grade. He never spoke much, but he had a big heart for his family and all those who knew him, always giving the best of himself to his fellow man.

He competed in boxing at the provincial level in the 14-16 year olds division, winning first place and prizes for best match. Later, he began his working life. He earned a degree as a bricklayer with an elementary understanding of carpentry and plumbing, which allowed him to work in those areas. On several occasions working with crews in Havana, he earned the distinction of being named best worker.

Even though he would be offered a certain sum for his work before he started, when he finished the job he would be paid a lesser amount of money. Due to this kind of deceit, he dissociated himself from the only official employer, the government, and started working on his own account in order to survive. He was fined on repeated occasions for registering home addresses other than where he lived. It was through his work that he managed to he came into contact with the opposition. He founded a dissident discussion group in Havana's Central Park with activist Henry Saumell and others. He also worked on the Varela Project, which collected more than 10,000 signatures, as required by the Cuban constitution, on a citizen's initiative calling for democratic reform in Cuba. He was a member of the Republican Alternative Movement [Movimiento Alternativa Republicana] and the 30th of November Party [Partido 30 de Noviembre] which were actively engaged in a peaceful struggle against the Castro brothers' regime. As a result of this work, he was detained on several occasions.

Zapata was arrested on December 6, 2002 in Havana's Lawton neighborhood while on his way to attend a meeting with Dr. Oscar Elias Bicet at the Lawton Foundation for Human Rights, and he was then imprisoned. He was released three months later, without ever being tried. When he launched a protest fast with Marta Beatriz Roque and other activists against the continued jailing of activists, among them Dr. Biscet, he was arrested in the crackdown known as the Black Spring of 2003. Regime officials tried him based on his first arrest and sentenced him to three years imprisonment for resistance, disobedience and disorderly conduct for his position of opposition to the regime.

While in prison, his resistance led to additional charges with each one adding years to his sentence. Ultimately, the three year sentence was extended to 57 years and six months in prison. He remained a resistor, eating only what his family brought him. He only accepted water in prison, sleeping on the floor with bedding from home. His path through various prisons was one of physical and emotional abuse, which left their marks on his body. He underwent surgery for an intracrinal hematoma produced by a blow delivered by convicted criminals thrown into his sealed, maximum security solitary confinement cell. The prisons he went through were: Cien y Aldaboz, Villa Marista, Quivicán, Guanajay, Taco Taco, Holguín Provincial Prison, Cuba Sí, Kilo 8, and Combinado del Este in Holguin.

In Holguin, he suffered his last beatings, which were intended to end his life, on August 29, September 24, and October 26, of 2009. To demand respect for his rights, he carried out a water-only protest fast in intervals for 18 months. He would be shaved and have his hair cut only by force. He never wore a common prisoner's uniform, the uniform of a convicted criminal. While he was in Holguin Provincial Prison, State Security video taped him often.

He was sent to Kilo 8, the maximum security prison in Camagüey, where they stole his food upon arrival in order to force him to eat the prison food. They also forced him to dress as a common prisoner, while he had previously worn white at every prison he had gone through.

Zapata began his final hunger strike in order to demand respect for his rights as a political prisoner. He spent one month and three days on the floor. He was denied water for 18 days in an attempt to break his defiance, which provoked two heart attacks while still being held at Kilo 8. Afterwards he was transferred to the Prisoners Ward at Amalia Simoni Hospital. This is when his family was able to see him briefly. They only allowed him one bottle of water, but not the one from which he wanted to drink.

He was transferred to a so-called "Intensive Care Unit" that was cobbled together on the spot exclusively for him, and where he was kept under guard by armed soldiers. This all created a delay that caused his health to worsen. He had to be transferred to the Prisoners' Hospital at Combinado del Este Prison, where his health worsened to a critical point. The authorities knew that the goal was to murder him, to eliminate him. He was then transferred to Hermanos Ameijeiras Hospital where he died on February 23, 2010 at approximately 3:30 p.m.

We, Zapata's family and friends, have suffered a great deal of repression since his death. My son died for the sake of his belief in freedom. We have been attacked by groups of people organized by State Security, who want to prevent us from marching to the cemetery after leaving Mass on Sundays. My son's tomb was desecrated by them, the police.

The Castro brothers try to intimidate us, but what they don't know is that this family has never been afraid. This family has never knelt to anyone. Now, with even greater courage, dignity, and principles, we will follow the ideas and words of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, who was murdered, who was tortured, and who was denied water for 18 days in order to do away with him. But nobody was ever able to subjugate my son. He never knelt before the dictatorship. He never gave in, and he preferred to die rather than to live on his knees.

This is why we say: Zapata Lives! We shout it in the streets. We shout it wherever we may be. Zapata lives on in our hearts. His example guides the Cuban people in their struggle for freedom.

Some 75 Cuban journalists, librarians, human rights activists and other dissidents were arrested and imprisoned during the "black spring," which started March 18, 2003.

Fifty-two of them remain in Raul Castro's gulag, as of June 24, 2010.

There are hundreds, if not thousands more political prisoners jailed in Cuba because of their opposition to tyranny and dedication to freedom. Their suffering is no less that that experienced by those arrested during the "black spring," and they are no less deserving of your prayers and solidarity. (You can read about many of them by clicking on the names on the right side of this page.)

But the Group of 75 — which now stands at 52, after a series of paroles for medical and other reasons, Reinaldo Labrada Peña completing his sentence and Orlando Zapata Tamayo dying as the result of a hunger strike — is deserving of special consideration because they were at the front lines of the struggle to bring real change to Cuba, to bring nothing less than real democracy, freedom and human rights, whether they were activists gathering signatures for the Varela Project or journalists telling the story of Cuba, the real Cuba, for the world to know.

The dictatorship could not stand it so, as the world focused on the imminent U.S. invasion of Iraq in the spring of 2003, Fidel Castro struck back, and struck back hard, arresting 75 dissidents and sentencing them to prison terms of up to 28 years for daring to oppose his dictatorship.

And the world barely raised a whisper of protest. The United Nations subsequently elected Cuba to its Human Rights Council and the European Union repealed diplomatic sanctions implemented in response to the crackdown, even though most of those arrested remained in jail.

But in the past four months, since Zapata's death, many who previously chose to ignore the Cuban human rights situation or worse, to appease the Castro dictatorship, have turned on Havana, demanding the release of the Group of 75 and other political prisoners. The Castros have been unmoved, but the pressure has been real.

As horrific as Zapata's suffering was — simply put, he was murdered by the regime — his death has not been in vain. More people now know about the reality of the Castro gulag, and more importantly are now speaking out against it.

We are that much closer to his fellow prisoners being free.

Fidel Castro's action in 2003 was not just an attack on Cuban liberty, it was an assault of freedom everywhere. As long as a single Cuban is jailed because of something he wrote or because he believed every Cuban should have a real vote, we are all less free.

To appease the tyranny in Havana and expect a change in behavior by the dictatorship is as deplorable as the crimes committed by the Castros.

So that's why it is incumbent we all do something on behalf of the Group of 52.

Tell someone why the embargo should remain in place.

Tell someone that Raul Castro is no different than his big brother.

Tell someone Oscar Biscet's story.

Tell someone about Ariel Sigler Amaya, who has been left a shell of his former self after seven years in the gulag. He has been released from prison, and his spirit is strong, but his physical recovery has only begun.

Tell someone about Orlando Zapata Tamayo

If you are Catholic, tell your church leaders to work for the release of all Cuban political prisoners.

Say a prayer.