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For Immediate Release
Contact:
Julio Hernandez, Francisco De Armas
International Representatives, Christian Liberation Movement
(787) 549-1805
www.oswaldopaya.org
FOR ANTONIO DÍAZ SÁNCHEZ’S RIGHT TO LIFE AND LIBERTY
Havana, January 18, 2008-Prisoner of conscience, Antonio Ramón Díaz
Sánchez, is imprisoned in Canaletas prison in the Cuban province of Ciego de
Ávila. He is a member of the Coordinating Council of the Christian
Liberation Movement and is one of the principal organizers of the Varela
Project.
He is one of the Cuban Spring political prisoners, is 45 years old and was
sentenced to twenty-seven years in prison in April 2003.
In December 2004 he was diagnosed with Ischemic Cardiopathy and an enlarged
prostate (BPH) in the National Hospital for Prisoners that is located inside
the Eastern Compound Prison in Havana.
During 2007, a specialist in Proctology that has conducted various
diagnostic tests on him declared that Antonio Díaz is suffering from an
illness known as Immunologic or Idiopathic Colitis, after observing
significant deterioration and numerous ulcers in his intestines after
various colon rectoscopy. One cause in the worsening of this illness has
been constant stress.
Antonio Díaz Sánchez’s wife has presented, by means of an attorney that was
contracted from a law practice, a request before the court that sentenced
Antonio, so that the necessary process could take place to be considered for
an extrapenal license for health reasons. According to the attorney in
charge of the case, the court accepted the proceeding a week later. This
request was made in June 2007, but to date, almost seven months later, the
court has not responded and has not sent Antonio the corresponding medical
report to the National Hospital for Prisoners, thereby not abiding to what
was legally established. Rule 132 establishes the proceedings to be followed
in the case of a request for an Extrapenal License.
Antonio has been prescribed a specific nutritional diet by the doctors,
which he only partially receives from the prison authorities. For instance,
in the last twenty days Antonio was not able to eat breakfast for eleven
days because he was not given the food that his rigorous diet requires for
his illness. More information can be found on www.oswaldopaya.org.
Antonio Díaz Sánchez declared that the only civic and peaceful recourse that
he can take to defend his right to life is his own life and that is why he
has decided to not accept any more of the medication that the doctors have
prescribed and that many times he receives incompletely and irregularly and
he will also refuse any more consultations with a specialist, in protest
against the arbitrariness of the court that should have already sent him a
medical report many months ago to decide whether the alleviation or cure of
his illness is incompatible with his remaining in prison. It is evident that
unjust imprisonment and the conditions in which he is under confinement are
the most direct cause for his illness worsening.
Antonio has announced that he will begin to take increasingly more drastic
peaceful acts of protest against the inactivity of the court that is
condemning him in this way to an early death.
Antonio Díaz is imprisoned in a cell, which is 5.5 meters wide and equally
long, with twenty six common prisoners. In this limited area there are nine
three-level bunks. Antonio’s health is irreversibly deteriorating every day
that he spends in prison. He is being subjected to short-term annihilation.
Our call is for everyone inside and outside of Cuba to raise their voices to
save the life of Antonio Díaz Sánchez, for his release, and for all those
who are imprisoned in Cuba for peacefully defending Human Rights.
Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas
Coordinator of the Christian Liberation Movement
For more information or to obtain a copy of the press release, please
contact: Julio Hernández or Francisco De Armas, International
Representatives, Christian Liberation Movement, (787) 549-1805, mcl2004jhs@yahoo.com,
fdamcl@cs.com
Given to the Information Bridge Cuba Miami by the Christian Liberation
Movement in the Exterior on the 22nd day of January of 2008. Translation:
Christian Liberation Movement.
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