Held in Cuba, American Alan Gross launches hunger strike

Posted on Tuesday, 04.08.14

Held in Cuba, American Alan Gross launches hunger strike
BY JUAN O. TAMAYO
JTAMAYO@ELNUEVOHERALD.COM

U.S. government subcontractor Alan P. Gross, serving a 15-year prison
sentence in Havana, went on a hunger strike after learning that
Washington had financed a semi-clandestine Twitter-like system for
Cubans, his U.S. lawyer said Tuesday.

Attorney Scott Gilbert said Gross told him in a phone conversation
Tuesday afternoon that he had not eaten since Thursday but is drinking
water and has lost about 10 pounds, on top of the 100 pounds he lost
since his arrest in late 2009.

"When I asked him how long he planned to continue the hunger strike,"
said Gilbert, "he said, 'as long as it takes.' "

Gross said the "final straw" that prompted his hunger strike came when
he learned on Thursday that the U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID) had launched the controversial Twitter-like platform
after his arrest, Gilbert said.

Gilbert had criticized USAID earlier Tuesday for launching the
semi-secret Zunzuneo platform in 2010, saying that it represented an
additional risk for the 64-year-old USAID subcontractor from Potomac,
Md. The program was first disclosed by The Associated Press.

The Gross family was told "that there were no further covert missions in
Cuba. We've been assured that nothing like this was going on. Either we
were lied to or the people who were speaking to us were being deceived,"
he told El Nuevo Herald.

USAID and the White House have said that the Zunzuneo program was not
"covert," but required discretion because Cuba has outlawed cooperation
with all USAID programs as "subversive." USAID says the programs only
promote democracy and civil society.

Gross' continued detention in Havana has become one of the key
roadblocks to the Obama administration's efforts to improve relations
with the communist-ruled island.

A statement issued early Tuesday by Gross family spokesperson Jill
Zuckman quoted Gross as announcing the hunger strike but making no
mention of the Zunzuneo program.

"I began a fast on April 3 in protest of the treatment to which I am
subjected by the governments of Cuba and the United States," he was
quoted as saying. "I am fasting to object to mistruths, deceptions, and
inaction by both governments, not only regarding their shared
responsibility for my arbitrary detention, but also because of the lack
of any reasonable or valid effort to resolve this shameful ordeal."

That statement also quoted Gross' wife, Judy Gross, as saying that she
is "worried sick about Alan's health, and I don't think he can survive
much more of this."

Zuckman told El Nuevo Herald that Gross had declared his hunger strike
because "he has lost hope" that Washington and Havana will be able to
negotiate his freedom anytime soon.

"On the fourth anniversary of his arrest in December, Alan felt
gratified by the support he was receiving and felt there was some hope
that the United States and Cuba would find a path forward so that he
could go home," Zuckman said.

"Four months later he has lost hope and feels he has no other way of
getting people to listen to him and to resolve his situation," she
added. Zunzuneo "had something to do with it [the hunger strike], but
the bigger issue is Alan is losing hope."

Gross was arrested Dec. 3, 2009, and accused of delivering sophisticated
communications equipment financed by USAID to Cuban Jews so they could
bypass Cuban government controls on access to the Internet.

Havana has offered to free Gross in exchange for three Cuban spies
serving long sentences in U.S. prisons for conspiracy to spy on U.S.
military and exile targets. Two others completed their sentences and
returned to Havana.

Obama administration officials have repeatedly and flatly said there
will be no swap, especially because Gross is not a spy and one of the
jailed Cubans is serving a life sentence for his role in Cuba's killing
of four Brothers to the Rescue pilots in 1996.

Jose Miguel Insulza, secretary general of the Organization of American
States, told the Miami Herald on Tuesday that he believes the hunger
strike is a bad idea for a man in ill health like Gross, but hopes that
it will help to get him out of Cuba.

"If it's possible to open some kind of negotiations, it would not only
be good for the people involved. It would also be good for a better
climate in U.S.-Cuba relations, which are so important," Insulza said
after speaking at the Palm Beach Strategic Forum.

USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah, meanwhile, testified at a Senate hearing
Tuesday that the agency was aware that Gross ran the risk of getting
arrested in Cuba because the island's communist government had outlawed
the pro-democracy programs

But "the detention of Gross is wrong, and the responsibility rests with
the Cuban authorities," Shah told the hearing, which also touched on the
controversy surrounding the Zunzuneo program.

Source: Held in Cuba, American Alan Gross launches hunger strike - Cuba
- MiamiHerald.com -
http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/04/08/4047328/held-in-cuba-american-alan-gross.html