Alan Gross, U.S. contractor held in Cuba, ends hunger strike

Saturday, April 12, 2014

Alan Gross, U.S. contractor held in Cuba, ends hunger strike

Alan Gross, U.S. contractor held in Cuba, ends hunger strike
Published April 12, 2014 - EFE

Alan Gross, the U.S. government contractor serving a 15-year sentence in
Cuba on subversion charges, has abandoned a hunger strike after eight
days at the urging of family members, his attorney said Friday.

The 64-year-old Maryland man began the fast on April 3 to protest
"inhumane" treatment behind bars and to pressure Havana and Washington
into making a serious effort "to resolve this shameful ordeal," in the
words of a letter he sent his lawyer in Washington.

Gross abandoned the hunger strike at the behest of his 91-year-old
mother, according to a statement.

"There will be no cause for further intense protest when both
governments show more concern for human beings and less malice and
derision toward each other," he told attorney Scott Gilbert.

Gross traveled to Cuba on behalf of a Maryland company that won a
contract from the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID,
to expand Internet access and the flow of information on the
Communist-ruled island.

Cuban authorities arrested him in December 2009 in possession of
communications equipment.

Havana said he was illegally aiding dissidents and inciting subversion
and in an August 2012 ruling, Cuba's highest court upheld the 15-year
jail sentence imposed on the American.

Gross began his fast a day after Washington acknowledged the existence
of a USAID project to create a "Cuban Twitter."

USAID's 2010-2012 ZunZuneo initiative was conducted via a Spanish front
company using banks in the Cayman Islands.

"Once Alan was arrested, it is shocking that USAID would imperil his
safety even further by running a covert operation in Cuba," attorney
Gilbert said earlier this week.

"USAID has made one absurdly bad decision after another. Running this
program is contrary to everything we have been told by high-level
representatives of the Obama administration about USAID's activities in
Cuba," Gilbert said.

Gross has lost more than 49 kilos (110 pounds) since his arrest and is
confined to a small cell with two other prisoners for 23 hours a day,
his lawyer said.

Cuba has hinted that it would release Gross in exchange for the return
of the three of the "Cuban Five" intelligence agents who remain jailed
in the United States.

Washington has dismissed talk of a possible swap, demanding that Cuba
release Gross unconditionally.

EFE

Source: Alan Gross, U.S. contractor held in Cuba, ends hunger strike |
Fox News Latino -
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/politics/2014/04/11/alan-gross-us-contractor-held-in-cuba-ends-hunger-strike/

Alan Gross begins a hunger strike to protest his kidnapping by the Castro brothers

Alan Gross begins a hunger strike to protest his kidnapping by the Castro brothers

April 8 - Alan Gross, the U.S. government contractor who has been imprisoned in Cuba for more than four years, began a hunger strike last week to protest his treatment by both the Cuban and U.S. governments, his lawyer said Tuesday.
“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,” Gross said in a telephoned statement to his legal team.

As he has many times before, Gross called on President Obama to become personally involved in efforts to free him from “inhumane treatment” in a Cuban prison.
Gross was arrested in 2009 for distributing Internet and other communications materials in Cuba under a program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development. He was sentenced to 15 years for crimes against the Cuban state and is said to be in poor health.
His case moved back into the limelight last week following revelations about a separate USAID program to undermine Cuba’s communist government with a Twitter-like network designed to build an audience among Cuban youth and push them toward anti-government dissent. While unclassified, administration officials have described the program as “discreet.” Continue Reading The Washington Post
 

Apretaste! A Craigslist for the Island of the Disconnected / Yoani Sanchez

Posted in Reinaldo Escobar

Tatania wants to sell a stroller, Humberto is interested in some sneakers, and the retired woman on the corner is offering a mahogany desk. Individual barter and buying-selling alleviates the shortages in state markets. So it’s become common to see walls plastered with ads offering houses for sale or the services of someone who repairs furniture. The classified sites on the Internet also trade in anything you can imagine, from an illegal satellite dish to birdseed.

Despite the poor connectivity, Craigslist-style sites are very popular on the Island. Some of them have developed strategies to reach Cuban readers, such as the distribution of classifieds via email. This is the case withApretaste! which offers the service of sending and receiving information via email for users on our “Island of the Disconnected.” Winner of a hackathonheld in Miami this February, the site has great potential and boasts a simple design that loads quickly.

Visiting Apretaste!, I remember a phrase I always repeat when I encounter something hard. “Creativity is the capacity to open a window when the door is closed,” I tell myself, like a mantra in complex situations. And this classified portal is a diminutive and promising window that has opened in the iron wall of disconnection. A breath of air flows through it.

I hope that one day Tatiana, Humberto, and the retired lady on the corner can not only use the powers of Apretaste! through email, but also enter it on the web, click, enter a phrase into its simple search engine and find, in this way, whatever they need.

7 April 2014

April 1 - Venezuelan troops dispersed opposition demonstrators with tear gas on Tuesday and blocked anti-government activist Maria Corina Machado, recently stripped of her seat in the National Assembly, from reaching the legislature.
National Guard soldiers surrounded a rally of opposition sympathizers who had planned to march into downtown Caracas to protest at Machado's expulsion from Congress, preventing them from leaving and clearing the square with tear gas.
Parliament stripped Machado of her post last week on charges she violated the constitution by accepting an invitation from Panama to speak against the government of President Nicolas Maduro at a meeting of the Organization of American States.
The opposition leader dismissed that process as an illegal maneuver by a dictatorial government and vowed to attend a session of the legislature on Tuesday. She was stopped from doing so by a line of troops several blocks from the parliament.
"I want to thank every citizen for their support and strength!" she said on Twitter as her supporters gathered.
"Today I am more a deputy than ever, and I will continue to be one until the people decide otherwise."
Anti-government protests began in the South American OPEC nation of 29 million in mid February over shortages of basic items and high crime levels. The protests have decreased in intensity in the last few weeks as opposition demonstrators grow weary.
The director of local pollster Datanalisis said this month that Maduro's approval rating dropped to 41.5 percent in March from around 47 percent in February, according to local media.  Continue reading  http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/01/us-venezuela-protests-idUSBREA301XZ20140401

Cuba: More than 800 political arrests in March, more than 2,900 in the first quarter- UNPACU 4/1 press release

Cuba: More than 800 political arrests in March, more than 2,900 in the first quarter

Link to press release in HTML: http://www.unpacu.org/cuba-mas-de-800-detenciones-politicas-en-marzo-mas-de-2900-en-el-primer-trimestre/

Cuba: more than 800 political arrests in March, more than 2,900 in the first quarter

CUBAN COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND NATIONAL RECONCILIATION

CUBA: SOME ACTS OF POLITICAL REPRESSION IN MARCH 2014

(SD: Arrests) (AR: Acts of repudiation) (AV: Vandalism) (AF: Assault) (H: Harassment)

• During the recently concluded March we have been able to verify at least 813 arbitrary arrests for political reasons , unable to wait for new reports that will surely come after the close of the information.
• Confirmed so far number means a decrease compared with the previous three months, in which more than a thousand arrests monthly average was recorded.
• The CCHRNC attributes this to possible government interest in Cuba show a better image of the face of the newly initiated talks with the European Union, which we expect to occupy a prominent place everything related to civil, political, economic, social, cultural, labor and employment, currently violated, the vast majority of Cuban citizens.
• The CCHRNC wishes every possible success for European diplomacy, but we can not hide our deep skepticism because of the almost total lack of political will of the ruling regime in Cuba (which has now entered its year 56 exercising power despotically) who insists on presenting as "reforms" certain administrative changes, no structural impact and legal legitimacy and therefore perfectly reversible.
• The ultra-repressive minority rule in Cuba is only interested in producing false signals to keep buying time changes and enforce the authoritarian principle of "last to issue and deliver to last".

Havana, April 1, 2014

Documented cases of persons temporarily detained or prosecuted for political reasons, since January 2010:

	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014
January	117	268	631	364	1,052
February	235	390	604	504	1,051
March	83	264	1,158	354	806
April	162	244	402	366
May	120	349	423	375
June	104	212	427	180
July	125	251	406	233
August	184	243	521	547
September	90	563	533	708
October	310	286	520	909
November	244	257	410	761
December	300	796	567	1,123
Total annual	2,074	4,123	6,602	6,424	2,909 (3 months)
Monthly average	173	344	550	536	970
Highest quarterly average	285 (Q4)	446 (Q4)	798 (Q1)	931 (Q4)	970 (Q1)

Table 1 Reported cases documented by the CCHRNC (FIDH) for the last 4 years.

Original official document CCHRNC of April 1, 2014, Member Organization of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) Cuba only attached:

http://www.unpacu.org/wp-content/uploads/OVERVIEW-CUBA-MARCH-2014.pdf

------------- PAGE 2 -------------

Application submitted to all international bodies about the agreements signed by the vast majority of peaceful internal dissent Cuba, whose official wording took place on 26 February this year is attached to this statement.

Madrid, February 26, 2014

By recognizing the legitimacy of Cuba's independent civil society

Since the ratification of our commitment to peaceful methods to achieve the rule of law, we demand from the government of Cuba and to the international community:

1. Unconditional release of all political prisoners, including those under extra-penal license.
2. End of political repression, often violent, peaceful movement against human rights and pro-democracy.
3. Respect for the international commitments already entered into by the government of Cuba, reserves-without ratification of the International Covenants on Human Rights and compliance with ILO conventions on labor and trade union rights.
4. Recognition of the legitimacy of the independent Cuban civil society.

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Yoani Sánchez - Blogger

Berta Soler - Spokesperson of the Ladies in White

Elizardo Sanchez - President of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation

Juan Felipe Diaz Medina - Christian Liberation Movement (MCL)

Guillermo Fariñas - UNPACU

Manuel Cuesta Morua - Progressive Arc

Reinaldo Escobar - Journalist

Antonio Guedes - President of the Association of Ibero-American Freedom by AIL

Guillermo Gortázar - President of the Fundación Hispano Cubana

Javier Larrondo - UNPACU Representative in Spain and EU

Virgilio Toledo - President Coexistence Spain

Frisia Batista - President of Roots of Hope Spain

Elena Larrinaga - FECU

Alejandro González Raga - Cuban Observatory for Human Rights

Blanca Reyes - Women in White

Eduardo Perez Bengochea - Coordinator of the International Human Rights Platform of Cuba

Tomás Muñoz and Oribe - Union Liberal Cubana

For more information, please contact:

CUBAN COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND NATIONAL RECONCILIATION (CCDHRN):

Elizardo Sanchez Santa Cruz-Pacheco, President:

Phone until 04/17/2014: +420776524228
Mobile phone in Havana (after April 20): (+53) 52 45 8060
Email: 

Central Office CCHRNC in Havana:

Phone (+53) 7203 85 84