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RIGHTS-CUBA: Hunger Striker Refuses to
Go into Exile
By Patricia Grogg
HAVANA (IPS) - The state news media in
Cuba reported Monday on the case of
dissident Guillermo Fariñas, who has
been on a hunger strike for 13 days and
refuses to go into exile in Spain.
An article titled "Cuba will not accept
pressure or blackmail", published by
Granma, the mouthpiece of the governing
Communist Party, says that "as a result
of successive hunger strikes, Fariñas'
body is in a process of significant
deterioration" and he is only alive
"thanks to the skilled medical care he
has received".
Monday's was the first reference in the
state media to Fariñas' hunger strike,
who is demanding the release of 26
political prisoners who reportedly have
health problems.
Cuban authorities asked Spain to take
Fariñas in, diplomatic sources from that
European nation told reporters.
But the activist said he would not call
off his hunger strike and said he would
only travel to Madrid if he were denied
medical care in Cuba, in order to
continue his fast there.
The dissident was visited late last week
at his home in Santa Clara, a city
nearly 300 km east of the capital, by
Spanish diplomats.
They reportedly asked him, without
success, to call off his fast and engage
in talks.
Spain, which currently holds the
rotating presidency of the European
Union, is trying to change the bloc's
so-called "common position" on Cuba by
eliminating a clause calling for
democracy and improved human rights, in
order to remove hurdles to improved
relations with this Caribbean island
nation.
The government of Raúl Castro sees the
EU's demands as meddling in the
country's internal affairs.
Fariñas began his fast on Feb. 24, the
day after imprisoned dissident Orlando
Zapata died on the 85th day of a hunger
strike.
The two cases have made headlines around
the world, standing in sharp contrast to
the government's habitual silence on
issues involving dissidents.
Granma accused unnamed "major Western
media outlets" of drawing attention to
the case by spreading "a prefabricated
lie," while ignoring news like Cuba's
abundant medical aid to earthquake-torn
Haiti or the start of a massive vaccine
campaign in Cuba that will protect more
than half a million children from polio.
"The manipulation goes to such an extent
that journalistic reports even claim the
Cuban government has indicated that this
paid employee of the United States
Interests Section (SINA) in Havana
should be allowed to die, while they do
not write a single word on the multiple
efforts by our health professionals to
provide assistance to this individual,"
Granma wrote.
The Cuban government considers all
dissidents, regardless of how radical or
moderate they are or whether or not they
have ties with groups or individuals
abroad, as "mercenaries" or paid
employees at the service of Washington's
hostile policy towards Cuba. By the same
logic, it denies that there are any
political prisoners in Cuba's jails.
Granma described Fariñas as a
"counter-revolutionary" who in 1995
physically assaulted a female employee
at a health facility where he worked as
a psychologist, "causing multiple wounds
to her face and arms."
The incident, after which he was put on
parole for three years, "revealed his
clearly unhinged personality, and showed
that there was no political aspect
involved," reported the newspaper,
according to which Fariñas revealed his
"violent nature" once again in 2002,
when he beat an elderly man with a cane
in Santa Clara and was sentenced to
nearly six years in prison.
Fariñas, who describes himself as an
independent journalist, has gone on
several hunger strikes in the past. One
of his demands has been Internet access
in his home.
"His service sheet is long, including
attendance at activities of all kinds in
SINA and several European diplomatic
offices that direct the subversion in
Cuba, from which they receive
instructions, money and supplies," the
newspaper wrote.
According to Granma, "in this case, it
is not medicine that is needed to
resolve this problem that has been
intentionally created with the purpose
of discrediting our political system,
but the patient himself and the
unpatriotic Cubans, foreign diplomats
and media outlets manipulating him. The
consequences will be solely and entirely
their responsibility."
The government has never given in to
pressure of this kind, and is even less
likely to do so in a case that has drawn
heavy media coverage.
Most Cubans are basically unaware of the
activity of dissidents in this country.
In a statement to the foreign press
Monday, Elizardo Sánchez, spokesman for
the Cuban Commission for Human Rights
and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN),
clarified that his organisation is
"vigorously and publicly opposed to
hunger strikes."
But Sánchez also said the Cuban
government has the obligation to provide
Fariñas with the necessary medical
attention.
The activist told IPS that Fariñas is
accompanied by a friend who is a doctor
and that he has also been visited by the
local doctor. Last week the hunger
striker was briefly admitted to
hospital, after passing out because of
low blood sugar. |
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