Cuba denies role in dissident death, detains more dissidents

Cuba denies role in dissident death, detains more dissidents
Feb 24, 2010, 21:40 GMT

Havana - The death of a hunger-striking Cuban dissident provoked
international outcry Wednesday as well as conflicting reactions from
Cuban authorities, who arrested and detained dozens in what dissidents
called 'a wave of political repression.'

Cuban President Raul Castro denied charges of any official wrongdoing in
the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo, according to comments quoted on the
Cuban state website Cubadebate.cu.

'There are no tortured prisoners, there have been no tortured prisoners,
there was no execution. That happens at the (US Naval) base of
Guantanamo,' Castro was quoted as saying.

Zapata Tamayo, 42, a bricklayer, had been serving a 36-year jail
sentence for wrongdoings such as 'disrespect,' 'public disorder,'
'resistance' and 'disobedience.' In prison since 2003, Zapata Tamayo was
a member of the dissident group Republican Alternative.

He died Tuesday after an 83-day hunger strike.

The Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation
(CCDHRN), an umbrella organization of dissidents, said that some 30
dissidents were arrested or detained in their homes Wednesday. The
measures appeared aimed at preventing dissidents from attending Zapata
Tamayo's funeral, the grouip said.

'A wave of political repression has been unleashed,' Elizardo
Sanchez, spokesman for CCDHRN, told the German Press Agency dpa.

Cuba's official website, Cubadebate.cu, initially said in its headline
that Castro 'laments' the death of the dissident, then removed the word,
and still later revived the 'laments' version.

The world 'lament' was only used in the headline, there was no use of
the word or a similar expression in the text of the story.

Zapata Tamayo was one of 55 prisoners of conscience who have been
adopted by the rights organization Amnesty International (AI). AI called
for a probe on whether mis-treatment 'may have played a part' in Zapata
Tamayo's death.

Fellow-dissident Oswaldo Paya said the man suffered 'many insults,
racist contempt, beatings and abuse on the part of his jailers and of
state security.'

'Zapata was murdered, slowly, for many days and many months in all the
prisons where he was held,' Paya said in a statement.

The deceased dissident's mother told famous Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez
that her son had been the victim of 'premeditated murder.'

'My son has been tortured all the time he was in prison,' Reina
Luisa Tamayo was quoted as saying.

'With my profound pain I ask the world to demand the freedom of the
remaining prisoners, of the remaining brothers who are unfairly in jail,
so that what has happened with my son does not happen again,' she said.

On Wednesday, Castro was visiting the Cuban port of Mariel with
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Lula, who arrived in Cuba
late Tuesday, did not comment on Zapata Tamayo's death.

Sanchez, of the CCDHRN, spoke of a 'wave of arbitrary arrests and
house detentions on the part of the state's security forces across the
country, with a special emphasis on eastern provinces.'

Arrests took place in Holguin, where Zapata Tamayo lived and where
he was set to be buried Wednesday, and also in Santiago de Cuba,
Guantanamo, Las Tunas and Camaguey, Sanchez said.

The dissident, who died at a hospital in Havana, was to be buried in
Banes, about 800 kilometres east of Havana. His body arrived there
Wednesday.

Sanchez said other remembrance ceremonies were to be held across the
country. Photographs of the dissident were being distributed for the
ceremonies.

According to the CCDHRN, Zapata Tamayo is the first dissident to die
in Cuban prisons since 1972.

Human rights organizations denounced that there are around 200
political prisoners in the communist island. The Cuban government denies
that there are any political prisoners in Cuba, and says all prisoners
have been arrested and condemned based on the law.

The US State Department said Wednesday that the death of Zapata Tamayo
'highlights the injustice of Cuba's holding more than 200 political
prisoners who should now be released without delay.'

State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said the United States had
raised the case of Orlando Zapata Tamayo with Cuban officials and called
on Havana to release all political prisoners. He said Washington had
grown increasingly concerned about Zapata's incarceration and poor health.

Spain, which holds the rotating presidency of the European Union (EU),
also deplored the death.

'Both Spain and the EU are going to keep working so that there is a
transition, a full democratic transition in Cuba, in which the Cuban
people plays the leading role, as soon as possible,' Spain's Deputy
Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega told the European
Parliament in Brussels.

The Spanish European Union presidency has encouraged the 27-nation
bloc to upgrade its relations with Cuba, arguing that the union's
current policy of strictly linking dialogue with human rights has
yielded few results.

Spain had also expressed concern for Zapata's health at a recent
bilateral Spanish-Cuban meeting in Madrid, government sources said.

Cuba denies role in dissident death, detains more dissidents - Monsters
and Critics (25 February 2010)
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/americas/news/article_1536389.php/Cuba-denies-role-in-dissident-death-detains-more-dissidents