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NEWS
Brutally
beaten and detained independent journalist and husband while traveling
back to their province.
(HAVANA/CUBA/November 15
/Puenteinofcubamiami.org) -
The Independent Journalist María Josefa (Marilin) Díaz Fernández and her
husband Lázaro González Ávila, a member of the Christian Liberation
Movement in Camaguey, were brutally beaten, then arrested by forces of
the political police in Santi Espíritu for simply telling a traveler at
the Bus terminal not allow the National Revolutionary Police to
confiscate without a search warrant, the bag of potatoes she was
carrying, for vendors were allowed to sell potatoes freely along the
province and she had the right to carry them. Immidiately thereafter, an
official turned to them telling them to shut up and then proceeded to
brutally attack them both.
In the middle of the night of today, Friday the 14th, María Josefa Díaz
(Marilin) Fernández, denounced to correspondents of Lux Info Press from
a public telephone at the Police Station in Sancti Spiritu, the
atrocities that the political police committed against her and her
husband at the Bus Terminal of the above mention province.
Lázaro and Marilin were brutally beaten by several police
officers,therefore interrupting their trip back home to which they
opposed, arguing that they had committed no crime, that they were
returning home from an illness trip. Marilin had just been released from
the Hospital La Dependiente in Havana, where she received critical
intensive treatment for Lectopirosis, as stated in the medical papers in
her possession which were issued at the medical facility to guarantee a
priority bus ticket to Camaguey, for her condition required a quick trip
home for total bed rest in order to finish recuperating from her
illness.
"I have black and blues all over my arms from the intravenous
medications given to me at the hospital, notwithstanding, they proceeded
to beat me and slap me in the face, one of the officials held both of
his hands against my mouth so that no one would hear me scream, there
was an incalculable number of officers beating my husband at the same
time, then they dragged him to a cell…I kept calling his name, but he
did not answer. He probably fainted from all the blows he received, he
just won't answer me. I managed to call you from a public phone in the
lobby of the police station, for I looked so bad after they finished
abusing me, that they called a doctor, I don't know how long I will go
unnoticed. I feel so weak I cannot even lift my arms. They are checking
our luggage at the present time, I don't know how this is going to end.
Please, it is necessary that you denounce to world what is happening to
us because our relatives don't know were we are and you know perfectly
well that they do not notify relatives of these matters".
"In her luggage, Maria Josefa had books for the independent
library she runs in Camaguey and copies of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights to distribute in her province. Also, due to her grave
illness, her husband, who is an active member of the Christian
Liberation Movement and is actively working with the Varela Project,
traveled to the Capital at the urging of hospital officials, leaving
their small son at the care of neighbors in their hometown"-finished
saying Ada Kaly Márquez, correspondent for Lux Info Press in Havana.
Reported the correspondents of LUX INFO-PRESS in Havana, Gilberto
Figueredo and Ada Márquez, also, National Coordinator of the Democratic
Party November 30 "Frank País". For the Information Bridge Cuba Miami,
given on November 15, 2003.
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