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US Government Places New Obstacles Against Cuban Five |
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Saturday, 14 July 2012 09:45
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 The federal prosecutor''s office in the state of Florida, in the United States, has rejected a defense motion submitted on behalf of the five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters arrested in 1998 and still imprisoned in the US.
The men are known in Cuba and the rest of the world as the Cuban Five.
Activists view the motion by the US government prosecution as a new obstacle in the legal process to free the Five.
On June 6, lawyer Martin Garbus, defense attorney for Gerardo Hernandez, one of the Cuban Five, asked Washington to release documents related to its payment to journalists for the purpose of creating negative media against the Cuban Five, before and during the trial against them.
One month later, the prosecution sent the Miami Court its arguments against the motion, hoping to halt the legal process whose numerous irregularities have been internationally denounced.
Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González, Antonio Guerrero and René González, were in US national territory to prevent actions against Cuba by violent groups based in Florida.
Now the Cuban patriots are in prison while Rene Gonzalez is doing three years of supervised parole in US national territory, after spending 13 years in prison.
After denouncing the US government's funding of journalists to create an adverse campaign against the Cuban patriots, Garbus said Washington was not authorized to do so, since it turned the journalists into paid government agents.
The procedure to enable the access to materials not revealed during the legal process, called "Discovery", includes 84 persons linked to the press covering on the case, 7 television stations and 13 radio stations.
The Cuban Foreign Affairs Ministry also denounced a new arbitrary action by US authorities against Gerardo Hernandez, since both Garbus and the Cuban consuls who are legally authorized to visit him, were recently prevented from doing so. (PL)
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