Friday, May 31, 2013

Prison Diary XXII Maximum Security and Minimum Decency

Prison Diary XXII: Maximum Security and Minimum Decency / Angel Santiesteban
Posted on May 31, 2013

Some days ago I was told that I had been "revoked" to a maximum security
prison for six months for the hunger strike I undertook. They are so
predictable I could not help smiling. But it has been nothing more than
a justification to punish me and keep me away from the phone in a
further attempt to reduce the regularity of the posts I write for my
blog, The Children Nobody Wanted.

Since I've been here I haven't gone to the dining room, for the benefit
it represents for me to spend time in my cell, allowing me to write,
read, and also avoid losing this in search of food you can not eat.

One prisoner told me that perhaps the conversation I had with the Prison
Director had been a provocation for me to declare a hunger strike again,
to land me in solitary confinement and to put an end to my public
demands. They want to silence me to prevent me from giving my opinions
about May 1st and their report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva,
Switzerland.

Once again, the government of the Castro brothers, violates the rights
of a Cuban with their usual cynicism, using another lie to commit a new
injustice, as I had been informed that he was not revoked because the
transfer from La Lima Prison to 1580 Prison was not because of a
discipline infraction, and this is what they also told my family on
Saturday April 13.

Now I am, for those who still defend the dictatorship, in a maximum
security prison, instead of the promised hospital where they would give
me a "check up." Lie after lie.

Worst of all is that they have emerged, again, unharmed before the Human
Rights Council, precisely on the issue of prisons in Cuba, where they
commit so many abuses and violate the rights of prisoners with impunity.

The Council and the world must prevent the Cuban government from
continuing to mock the United Nations.

We Cuban Prisoners ask each fair and decent citizen take a minute of
your life and protest the abuses that occur in Cuban jails.

Ángel Santiesteban-Prats
1580 Prison, May 2013
Havana, Cuba

30 May 2013

http://translatingcuba.com/prison-diary-xxii-maximum-security-and-minimum-decency-angel-santiesteban/

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