Cuban Biscet calls for public defiance of illegitimate Cuban government

Cuban Biscet calls for public defiance of ‘illegitimate’ Cuban government - Cuba - MiamiHerald.com: "“But the fundamental work is here in Cuba, to try to create a grand civic mass movement” that will push for democracy and human rights “in public places, in a non-violent political defiance of the government,” he told El Nuevo Herald by telephone from Havana. Eventually, the movement may become a political party, added Biscet, 51, a physician and founder of the Lawton Foundation for human rights and viewed as one of the most respected and conservative critics of the Fidel and Raúl Castro governments. Dissidents have launched several similar campaigns in recent decades. Some were crushed by the government and others simply faded away for lack of popular support. Biscet and his wife, Elsa Morejón, a nurse, were fired from their jobs in the public health system for their activism and he has served 11 years in prison — the first three for dishonoring a national symbol by flying the Cuban flag upside down, among other charges. He was freed in late 2002, was arrested again one month later and was tried as part of a 2003 crackdown on dissent, known as Cuba’s Black Spring, that sentenced 75 peaceful opposition activists to up to 28 years in prison for “counterrevolutionary activities.” Amnesty International declared him a “prisoner of conscience” in 1999 and President George W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007. Biscet was freed in March of 2011 as part of talks between Raúl Castro and the Catholic Church that led to the release of the last of the 2003 prisoners still in jail. Most went directly into exile in Spain, but Biscet and about a dozen others stayed in Cuba. . . . " Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/01/10/3175081/cuban-biscet-calls-for-public.html#emlnl=Business#storylink=cp


Follow @VelcroFeline

Seguir a @VelcroFeline