Cuban Leader Antúnez Announces Move Beyond Fasting Protest to New Phase of Action for Freedom

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Cuban Leader Antúnez Announces Move Beyond Fasting Protest to New Phase of Action for Freedom
By Jorge Luis García Pérez "Antúnez"

Statement from Antúnez and the Placetas Fasters

Iris Pérez Aguilera, Antúnez, and Diosiris Santana during the hunger strike in Placetas in March 2009.

Placetas. Jorge Luis García Pérez “Antúnez”. May 12, 2009. The seven human rights defenders who took part in the protest begun on February 17^th in the city of Placetas, Villa Clara announced they are moving beyond their weeks-long liquid fast in order to launch a new phase of civic action during the traditional “Pedro Luis Boitel Activism Memorial,” to take place from May 13^th to May 25^th. The activists addressed their announcement to public opinion in Cuba and abroad, to the prestigious organizations and well-known individuals who supported them all over the world, and to all those fellow Cubans who expressed their solidarity and constant concern.

The factors that played an important role in reaching this decision were the expressions of concern and suggestions from fellow Cubans and friends of the cause of freedom in Cuba, the achievements made during this struggle, the impressive mobilization of solidarity the protest generated among the internal opposition and the citizenry- who poured out their sympathy and sense of identification with its demands- as well as the apparent political cost exacted from the oppressors- who were forced to expose some of their most important and influential collaborators out of desperation.

We wish to alert public opinion concerning the possibility that some of the fasters may fall victim to arrests, beatings, and repression when they attempt to move to another location, as happened recently to opposition activist Ernesto Mederos Arrozarena, as is happening to activist Loreto Hernández García- who has again been prevented from reaching the home serving as the protest’s headquarters, and as has happened with so many of our brothers who have attempted to reach the site of the protest.

The protest will continue in new settings, demanding an end to the torture of imprisoned opposition activist Mario Alberto Pérez Aguilera and all political prisoners, decent and decorous housing for every Cuban, and the publication of the international human rights agreements to which Cuba is signatory. As the slogan of the important, second phase of the Noncooperation with the Dictatorship Campaign says: We All Are the Resistance.

I invite all Cubans to take part in this campaign.

Thank you for so much support, and human solidarity in the struggle.

Signed:

Diosiris Santana Pérez

Ernesto Mederos Arrozarena

Carlos Michael Morales Rodríguez

Iris Tamara Pérez Aguilera

Carlos Miguel López Santos

Yoandri Naoski Ricardo Mir

Jorge Luis García Pérez “Antúnez”

From Placetas, this has been Jorge Luis “Antúnez” García Pérez.

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