Relatives of jailed dissident ask Cuba to allow Red Cross visit

Tuesday, March 30, 2004

HAVANA, Cuba (AFP): Relatives of jailed dissident Oscar Espinosa Chepe who is serving a 20 year sentence urged Cuban authorities Monday to allow the International Red Cross to visit him to verify his health.

Miriam Leiva, the 63-year-old economist's wife, refuted last week's statements to the contrary by Cuban foreign minister Felipe Perez Roque, calling for her husband's release on poor health grounds.

"We demand Oscar's immediate release, since his only crime was to express his ideas," Leiva said.

The dissident's wife has maintained Espinosa Chepe suffers from cirrhosis of the liver, prostate adenoma, as well as hypertension, and is too sick to stay in jail.

Leiva called for Amnesty International, which considers Espinosa Chepe a "prisoner of conscience", and Human Rights Watch as well as the Red Cross to personally verify her husband's state of health and his prison conditions.

On Thursday, Perez Roque introduced to reporters the military doctor in charge of Espinosa Chepe, Felix Baez who said he was in a "good general state of health".

"There is a campaign against Cuba," Perez Roque said at a news conference. He described charges of mistreatment by prisoners' relatives as "manipulated, tendentious information ... lies."

Cuba is "fulfilling minimum United Nations requirements on treatment of prisoners," he said.

The prisoners are treated with "respect for their physical and moral well-being," and "receive adequate medical attention, good food ..."

The foreign minister also showed a 19-minute film of relatives of seven prisoners reportedly in poor health, who told Cuban television reporters their loved ones were receiving good medical care and were in satisfactory health.

  Back...

  Most popular articles: viewed, printed and e-mailed

  Printable version