Another Opposition Activist Being Taken to Trial

HAVANA ­ 19 June, InfoBuro An officer of a clandestine opposition political party, a political prisoner, and an Interior Ministry official have been jointly charged with a crime for which they will be tried in the next few weeks.

Thirty-four-year-old Maritza Lugo Fernández, an officer in the 30 de Noviembre Party who also worked to defend political prisoners in Cuba, has been charged with bribery. Authorities claim she paid a prison official 100 pesos in order to smuggle a tape recorder in to a political prisoner, Raúl Ayarde Herrera, in a Havana prison. When convicted, she will be sentenced to up to eight years.

The political prisoner, convicted of alleged espionage, was then transferred to Kilo 5 penitentiary in Pinar del Rio Province.

According to a source in the underground Press, authorities have obtained a confession from prison officer Yannier Macias Pérez of having accepted her bribe, though Ms. Lugo insists she has never even met him.

Ms. Lugo is the temporary head of the 30 de Noviembre Party, since the arrest last December of its President, Osmel Lugo, who has since been sentenced to two and a half years imprisonment.

Distributed by Cubanet