This article appeared in the Guardian on Tuesday March 18 2008 on p41 of
the Leaders & reply section. It was last updated at 00:01 on March 18 2008.
Today marks the fifth anniversary of Cuba's Black Spring, when
approximately 90 critics of Castro's regime were arrested as "agents of
the American enemy". One-day hearings were held behind closed doors,
with the accused denied time to put together cogent defences. They
received prison sentences ranging from 14 to 27 years.
Of those arrested, 35 were writers, journalists and librarians.
Observers believed their convictions amounted to a concerted attempt to
suppress Cuba's independent media, which was flourishing at the time.
The crackdown prompted many other Cuban journalists to give up their
professions or opt for exile.
Some of these prisoners have been conditionally released, on
humanitarian grounds, since April 2004. Immediately before Castro's
resignation last month, three were freed and allowed to leave for Spain,
for unknown reasons. Yet 28 others remain imprisoned under appalling
conditions. Six journalists whose situation is of particular concern are
Normando Hernández González, Adolfo Fernández Saínz, Julio César Gálvez
Rodríguez, Fabio Prieto Llorente, Pedro Argüelles Morán and José Luis
García Paneque. All six have been in dangerously poor health for years.
The only humane and just solution for all those unlawfully arrested in
March 2003 is to release them unconditionally.
We, the undersigned members of the worldwide writers' association, call
for the freedom of our Cuban colleagues to be returned to them, and for
freedom of expression to return to Cuba.
Lisa Appignanes President, English PEN
Sir Alan Ayckbourn,
Rosie Boycott
Jonathan Heawood
Hanif Kureishi
Philip Pullman,
Carole Seymour-Jones
Tom Stoppard
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