Posted by
Silvio Canto, Jr. on Thursday, July 27, 2006 10:36:56 AM
On July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro and his followers attacked the Moncada Barracks in east Cuba:
"The attack proved disastrous and more than sixty of the one-hundred and thirty-five militants involved were killed. Castro and other surviving members of his group managed to escape to a part of the rugged Sierra Maestra mountains east of Santiago where they were eventually discovered and captured.
Castro was tried in the fall of 1953 and sentenced up to fifteen years in prison. While he was being held at the prison for political activists on Isla de Pinos, he continued to plot Batista's overthrow, planning upon release to reorganize and train in Mexico.
After having served less than two years, he was released in May 1955 due to a general amnesty from Batista who was under political pressure, and went as planned to Mexico." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidel_Castro)
In Mexico, Castro met Che Guevara and the rest is history.
Today, Cuba is under a dictatorship. Thousands have been executed. Others have died leaving the country. Many others are sitting in political prisons. Castro has never allowed anyone a fair trial or had a general amnesty. Castro devatasted a beautiful country and a prosperous island.
In fact, political prisons are the worst legacy of Castro’s dictatorship:
“The conditions in Cuba's prisons are inhuman, and political prisoners suffer additional degrading treatment and torture.” (http://hrwpubs.stores.yahoo.net/cuba0799.html)
What are Cuba’s political prisons like? Read Armando Valladares “Against all Hope”:
“This is a book about my 22 years in Fidel Castro's political prisons for expressing ideas different from those of the Castro regime.”
(http://www.encounterbooks.com/books/aghop/aghop_prologue.html)
What about journalists in Cuba:
“Jorge Olivera Castillo spent most of two years in the hellish conditions of Cuba's prisons. The director of a small independent news agency, the Havana Press, Olivera Castillo was one of 29 journalists arrested in a massive government crackdown on dissidents and the independent media in March 2003. He was convicted in a one-day, closed-door proceeding under a law prohibiting acts "aimed at subverting the internal order of the nation and destroying its political, economic, and social system."
(http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2005/DA_spring05/Olivera/Olivera.html)
In retrospect, July 26 turned out to be a bad day for Cuba.