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NEWS
Cuban dissident
tries to rally support for release of political prisoners
By VANESSA ARRINGTON
9 November 2006
HAVANA (AP) - Cuba's best-known dissident on Thursday urged member
nations of the U.N. Human Rights Council to demand the release of all
Cuba's political prisoners, a day after the world body's General
Assembly voted against a similar measure.
Oswaldo Paya, whose signature drive for democracy in 2002 gained him
international attention and prompted the government to declare socialism
in Cuba "irrevocable," said he was lodging letters urging the motion at
several Havana embassies for countries on the 47-nation Human Rights
Council.
"It's scandalous that this is not a scandal," he said of Cuba's
imprisonment of political activists.
Rights groups say more than 300 political activists are imprisoned in
Cuba. The Cuban government denies holding prisoners of conscience,
calling them common criminals or U.S.-backed "mercenaries" seekign to
topple Fidel Castro's system.
On Wednesday, the U.N. General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to urge the
United States to end its 45-year-old trade embargo against the communist
government. But it voted down an Australian amendment calling on Cuba to
free political prisoners and respect human rights.
Paya said his Christian Liberation Movement is against the trade
embargo, and glad the world is pressuring the United States to lift it.
But just as important for Cubans, he said, are freedom of expression and
the right to choose their political and economic systems.
"They are denying Cubans the right to have rights," he said of countries
who fail to recognize this need. "We need international solidarity, and
moral support."
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