Distributed by CubaNet
by Lucas Garve, Independent Press Agency of Cuba (APIC)
HAVANA, September 18 (APIC). Jose Marti [Cuba's leader in the struggle for independence from Spain] went into exile at the height of his youth. Exile was the chalice of his youth; a bitter drink he endured in the separation from everything he held dear. In numerous cases, prisoners of conscience have been forced to leave their beloved land and go into exile.
However, a new variation of this form of punishment has become customary in Cuba: banishment--the exclusion from visiting other cities or provinces and confinement in cities or town in the interior of the country. An example of this aggression against individual freedom is the case of Aida Rosa Jimenez, president of the Cuban Mothers Solidarity Movement and the Civic Democratic Association. She has known banishment from Cienfuegos, Santa Clara and Camaguey, places to which the Department of State Security (DSE), through its agents Omar de la Torre, Boris Luis and Odelin, has forbidden her from returning.
Aida Rosa sufferingly endures being prohibited from travelling to the provinces in the interior of the country. She is accused of establishing "illicit associations," proselytizing, seeking support, and creating footholds in the interior for her Cuban Mothers Solidarity Movement. In addition, within the city of Havana itself, she is forbidden from visiting certain neighborhoods.
What actual crime has been committed by this woman activist? That of helping political prisoners and prisoners of conscience; of visiting the prisoners' relatives and giving them spiritual, moral and material support to the extent possible; of gathering information about the state of Cuban prisons and the feeding, treatment and condition of political prisoners and prisoners of conscience. This is her crime!
Nor is her case unique. Another example? Nestor Rodriguez Lobaina and Radames Garcia, who are serving sentences of banishment and confinement in Baracoa and Palma Soriano, respectively, where they are forced to report daily to the police station so that their presence may be confirmed. Neither has been given copies of the sentence he is serving.
These two young men; what have they done?, why did they unleash the ire and punishment of the authorities? In the eyes of the strongmen of the regime they committed a horrendous act: they organized an association of young students--University Students Without Borders-- whose principal objective was to make universities autonomous once again. An egregiously base crime, in the judgement of the Cuban government!
Merely for describing the realities of the country, various independent journalists were threatened with forced exile: Rafael Solano, Roxana Valdivia, in 96; previously, Fernando Velazquez Medina and Xiomara Gonzalez Figueroa (former journalist of "Juventud Rebelde" [official newspaper of the Cuban Communist Youth] and Rebelde Radio [official radio station of the Cuban Communist Youth]), who resisted the pressures from the authorities. There is also the case of Velazquez Medina, who was jailed for belonging to the group Alternative Criterion.
We are thus faced with a repressive measure whose origin in these parts dates to the time of the Spanish colonial regime. An involuntary mental association forces one to mention the fact. Apparently, genealogical factors inspire, after so many years, the undertaking of similar actions.