Spain's "Silent Mariel" is Officially Over

at 10:12 AM Saturday, April 9, 2011


According to The Miami Herald:


Cuba's release of political prisoners has ended at 115, the Spanish government said Friday, drawing strong objections from human rights activists in Havana that at least 50 remain in the island's prisons.

Spain's "silent Mariel" of political prisoners and opposition activists (as pro-democracy leader Guillermo Farinas labeled it) is officially over.

The result: 103 political prisoners banished to Spain, while only 12 were conditionally released (under "extra-penal" licenses) on the island.

So what happens to the remaining 50+ well-known (and identified) political prisoners?

How about those unknown? After all, the Castro regime prohibits the International Committee of the Red Cross and the U.N.'s Special Rapporteur on Torture from entering the island.

How about the countless others imprisoned for "common crimes" (with a political context), such as "illegal exit," "social dangerousness" and "illegal association"

How about about those arrested last year, this year and in the future?

Let's not forget that the Castro regime has a long history of releasing (and banishing) political prisoners in times of crisis -- only to (once again) fill up its jails soon thereafter.

At the end of the day, nothing has changed in Cuba that would legally or institutionally protect pro-democracy advocates, civil society activists or any other Cuban from peacefully opposing (or even criticizing) the dictatorship of Fidel and Raul Castro.

That's the tragic bottom line.