VZCZCXRO4722
RR RUEHAG
DE RUEHUB #6439/01 2301730
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 181730Z AUG 06
FM USINT HAVANA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 3709
INFO RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES
RUEHWH/WESTERN HEMISPHERIC AFFAIRS DIPL POSTS
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HAVANA 016439 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE DEPT FOR WHA/CCA 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/18/2016 
TAGS: PHUM KDEM SOCI CU
SUBJECT: NO RELIEF FOR CUBAN POLITICAL PRISONERS, OR THEIR 
FAMILIES 
 
REF: HAVANA 15749 
 
HAVANA 00016439  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
Classified By: COM Michael Parmly for Reason 1.4(d). 
 
¶1. (C) Summary: Cuba's political prisoners continue to suffer 
from appalling and unhealthy prison conditions, while many of 
their family members face vindictive and even terrifying acts 
organized by the Cuban Government.  On August 16 and 17, 
USINT spoke on the phone with the spouses or parents of ten 
of the 75 peaceful activists jailed in the March 2003 
crackdown.  Most were convicted of violating Law 88: 
Protection of National Independence and the Economy of Cuba. 
Nine are still in prison and one is out on conditional 
parole.  The relatives paint a distressing picture, not only 
of the prisoners' treatment behind bars but of their own 
struggle to get by as family members of "mercenaries" and 
"counter-revolutionaries."  Some of these relatives are 
subjected to "acts of repudiation."  Of the 10 families we 
contacted in Bayamo, Camaguey, Ciego de Avila, Havana, Las 
Tunas, Manicaragua, Manzanillo, Santa Clara and Santiago, six 
reported harassment of family members.  All of the prisoners 
are dealing with health problems, some severe.  End Summary. 
 
HEALTH WOES 
----------- 
 
¶2. (C) The list of ailments of the ten prisoners is 
disconcertingly long: dengue fever, kidney failure, 
intestinal disorder, bleeding colon, malnutrition, ulcer, 
inflamed prostate, pulmonary distress, hemorrhoids, 
hypertension, knee issues, renal problems, osteoporosis, 
kidney cyst, emphysema, chronic gastritis, anemia, glaucoma, 
digestive problems.  On average, the incarcerated members of 
the families we spoke with each had two or three serious 
medical conditions, and in many cases prison staffs are 
failing to provide treatment or medicine.  In some cases, 
this failure is deliberate.  Adolfo Fernandez Sainz, an 
independent journalist and opposition party member serving 15 
years at Canaleta prison in Ciego de Avila, requires regular 
access to sunshine for a medical condition.  But according to 
his wife Julia Nunez, a guard routinely denies Fernandez this 
right, without explanation.  None of the common criminals is 
denied their time outside, she says.  At the notorious 
Boniato prison in Santiago, Luis Milan Fernandez, a doctor 
who is serving a 13-year sentence, is recovering from dengue 
fever contracted on or about August 9, along with several 
other prisoners.  (Note: At least 20 Cubans have died from 
the latest dengue outbreak.  End Note.) 
 
ARSON THREAT 
------------ 
 
¶3. (C) Since December 8, political prisoner Jose Garcia 
Paneque of the outlawed Democratic Solidarity party has lived 
at the infirmary of Bayamo's Los Mangos prison.  Paneque, 
serving a 24-year sentence, is battling an intestinal 
disorder and other health problems, but his relatives may be 
having a tougher time.  As reported reftel, his wife Yamile 
Llanes was home with 11 youngsters between the ages of 7 and 
25 on August 3 when around 100 people staged a particularly 
intense "act of repudiation" in front of their house in Las 
Tunas.  Llanes told us that a number of the children started 
crying when a member of the mob shouted, "Let's set the house 
on fire and burn the worms!"  Others yelled, "We'll defend 
the Revolution with all means necessary!"  Paneque's 
seven-year-old daughter remains traumatized and asks to move 
away from the neighborhood, her mother says.  In Manzanillo, 
an act of repudiation was held August 13 against Lady in 
White Cruz Delia Mora, wife of Julio Antonio Valdez Guevara. 
Valdez, an independent librarian, is out on conditional 
parole and was at a hospital during the act, receiving 
dialysis.  Thirty to 40 participants, none of them neighbors, 
gathered to snarl "worm!" and "counter-revolutionary!" at 
Mora. 
 
HOUNDED OUT OF WORKPLACE 
------------------------ 
 
¶4. (C) For Rebecca Rodriguez, the wife of dissident dentist 
Alfredo Pulido Lopez, a 2003 act of repudiation marked the 
beginning of the end of her work as a physical therapist. 
Around 100 workers at her clinic staged the event to denounce 
Pulido and, by extension, Rodriguez.  Despite the harassment, 
Rodriguez held on for two more years, continuing to work 
until she could no longer stand the abuse meted out to "the 
wife of a mercenary."  She quit, and swears she'll never go 
back "even if I have to starve."  Thanks to support from a 
foreign NGO and her father, she is not in danger of starving. 
 
HAVANA 00016439  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
 But Rodriguez, a Lady in White, is feeling the heat from 
State Security - and the cold shoulder from neighbors. 
"State Security knows everything I do," including a May 2005 
visit to USINT.  Neighbors keep her at arm's length, she 
added.  "I am practically alone here."  Pulido, for his part, 
is serving 14 years at Kilo 7 prison in Camaguey.  An 
independent journalist, Varela Project organizer and member 
of Oswaldo Paya's Christian Liberation Movement, Pulido has 
respiratory problems and avoids the prison yard out of fear 
of being attacked by violent inmates. 
 
HOLDING HIS TONGUE 
------------------ 
 
¶5. (C) Political prisoner Nelson Moline Espino isn't having 
trouble with other inmates, but he's choosing his words to 
the guards carefully these days.  His father told us that in 
May, Moline, 41, complained to guards vociferously over the 
beating of a thin, elderly inmate, and consequently spent the 
next three weeks in a punishment cell, "without any 
communication."  Moline, serving 20 years at Kilo 5 prison in 
Pinar del Rio, launched a hunger strike, but it didn't help 
him leave the punishment cell any sooner.  Says his father: 
"At other prisons, he was allowed to make a weekly phone call 
home, but not at Kilo 5."  The father says the family has not 
faced any harassment, but that his son is "in bad shape," and 
living "in bad conditions." 
 
MANICARAGUA: DISSIDENT HELL 
--------------------------- 
 
¶6. (C) Moraima Leon, wife of political prisoner Arturo Perez 
de Alejo, has the rotten luck to live in the Villa Clara city 
of Manicaragua, infamous for denying dissidents access to 
cafeterias, bars, bus stations and sports facilities.  "I 
don't get out much," she says, her world reduced to 
occasional trips to church or one of the few shops that will 
serve her.  She avoids possible run-ins with critics, usually 
senior citizens with comments like, "Your worm husband got 
what he deserved."  A Lady in White, she is one of only two 
women on the city's 21-dissident blacklist.  She tries to 
leave the city a few times each year, to meet up with other 
Ladies in Havana, but usually is blocked by Communist 
militants.  Her husband, doing 20 years at Guamajar prison in 
Santa Clara, isn't faring any better.  His 12 cellmates are 
all common criminals.  The water is undrinkable.  Often there 
is no water for flushing.  Perez, of the Escambray 
Independent Human Rights Organization, suffers from an ulcer, 
pulmonary issues, an inflamed prostate and hemorrhoids. 
 
LAYING LOW 
---------- 
 
¶7. (C) Osleivy Garcia, the wife of political prisoner Pablo 
Pacheco Avila in Ciego de Avila, is a rarity: a doctor who is 
married to a dissident but has been allowed to keep her job. 
She states, in a tone lacking conviction, that she is not 
being harassed, and makes clear she's trying to avoid the 
wrath of Communist militants.  She concedes that Pacheco, 
whom she visited August 15 at Moron prison, is in bad shape. 
"He's sick," with hypertension, renal problems and a bad 
knee.  "His spirits are down."  Pacheco, an independent 
journalist, bunks with ten common criminals.  Fellow inmates 
were taking his belongings, "but he's worked that out."  Now 
he's just trying to avoid upsetting the guards, she says. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶8. (C) Relatives of Cuban political prisoners can be forgiven 
for occasionally exaggerating the medical woes of their loved 
ones.  For most inmates serving time for political crimes, 
the only early ticket out is conditional parole on health 
grounds.  For this reason, family members might refer to a 
bad cough as a "respiratory ailment" and a paper cut as a 
"gash."  That said, Castro's prisons - let alone the more 
frightening "detention centers" such as Villa Marista and 100 
y Aldabo -- are enough to make a healthy man sick in a matter 
of weeks.  The food is largely inedible, hygiene is 
inadequate and medical services sorely lacking.  Since the 
official, temporary handover of power to Raul Castro, the 
armed forces chief and thus the country's top jailer, we have 
seen no change in the horrendous and inhumane treatment of 
political prisoners, and no let-up in the collective 
victimization of their family members. 
PARMLY