Posted on Mon, Mar. 24, 2008
HAVANA --
(AP) -- Ailing former leader Fidel Castro Monday made a rare mention of
his government's crackdown on political opponents five years ago,
defending the action and exhorting the United States to treat its
prisoners with the same humanity he said Cuba uses with its inmates.
''What an enormous difference between the methods of the United States
and of Cuba!'' Castro wrote in an essay published Monday in state media,
apparently referring to how the U.S. government treats terror suspects.
''None of the mercenaries were tortured or deprived of attorney or
trial,'' Castro said of the 75 dissidents rounded up beginning on March
18, 2003. Cuba accused them of being mercenaries working with the United
States to undermine the communist government, a charge the dissidents
and U.S. officials denied.
Twenty of the original 75 have seen been released, 16 on medical parole
and four into forced exile in Spain.
''They have the right to visits, access to [conjugal visits] and all the
other legal prerogatives of all inmates,'' Castro wrote.
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