7-13-05, 8:58 am
In an opinion released in late May, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions, a group created by the UN Commission on Human Rights, criticized the treatment of five Cuban men arrested in Miami in 1998 as 'arbitrary.'
It described the treatment of the five Cuban prisoners as 'incompatible with the standards contained in Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.'
The opinion presented as a request to the US government also requested the US 'to adopt the necessary steps to remedy the situation.'
According to the investigation of the working group, the five men, Antonio Guerrero Rodríguez, Fernando González Llort, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, Ramón Labañino Salazar, and René González Sehwerert were kept in solitary confinement for 17 months during which time their basic civil liberties as detained persons were violated. The US government restricted access to their lawyers and to evidence laid against them, inhibiting their ability to mount an adequate legal defense.
The US government used the cloak of 'national security' to keep 'evidence' against the Five secret.
Further, before and during the 2001 trials of the five men, the working group concluded, 'the climate of bias and prejudice against the accused in Miami persisted and helped to present the accused as guilty from the beginning.' Because of this situation, it was 'almost impossible' to find an impartial jury, especially for a case related to Cuba.
The human rights working group concluded that the conditions surrounding the arrest, detention and trial of these five men constitute a case of 'the deprivation of liberty of these five persons an arbitrary character.'
The five men were accused of espionage and conspiracy to commit espionage and were sentenced from 15 years to life in prison.
Many of the groups have actively engaged in activities or have members who have engaged in activities that the US government in other contexts would only describe as terrorist. Members of these organizations have carried out bombings of civilian targets in Cuba and in other countries with Cuban-associated targets, such as a library in Mexico.
The infamous Luis Posada Carriles, who is now being coddled by the Bush administration in Texas, is an admitted terrorist who planned and carried out the bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed dozens of civilians. Posada Carriles has close ties with numerous organizations in Miami that the Cuban Five were trying to expose. Alpha 66, Brigada 2506, Brothers to the Rescue, Comandos F4, Cuban-American National Foundation and Omega 7 are the names of just some of these organizations that operate openly on US soil with impunity.
The Five had accomplished quite a bit of work up to their arrest in 1998. In fact, their success ultimately led to their arrest. Through their dangerous work, they compiled an enormous file, which was then transmitted to the Cuban government. In turn, Cuba provided copies of the materials to the FBI and asked for assistance in bringing terrorists to justice.
As a result, the FBI learned the identity of the Cuban Five and, instead of following up with investigations of terrorist organizations, promptly arrested the Five.
For more information on the international struggle to free the Five, visit .
--Joel Wendland may be reached at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net.
