SPECIAL BRIGADE ASSAULTS GUILLERMO FARINAS

Habana, may 9, 2009

Special Brigade assaults Guillermo Fariñas

In early hours of the morning of this day, Jorge Luís García Pérez (Antúnez) denounced via telephone that members of a special brigade of the national police known as the "Black Berrets", intercepted Guillermo Fariñas Hernández (Coco), member of the Pro Temporary Secretary of the Agenda for the Cuban Transition; in the corner of Paseo Martí and 7th of South Placetas, Villa Clara, a few meters of distance from his house.

Antúnez claimed, he could observe from his house when the police arrived asking Coco for his members card and later on commenced beating him with force by his ribs. He saw that his brother, Loreto Hernández García, was also attacked with force when he came out in his brothers defense: they cuffed him, threw him on the floor and kicked him. Minutes later a Captain of the police presented himself at the area to stop the beatings and take both from the place in a patrol car.

When they where liberated, at around 3p.m. approximately, Guillermo Fariñas narrated that they had taken him to a police station where he was attended by Captain Héctor De La Fé Freires. He informed of the confiscation of the two letters which he had, send by the Liberal Unity Party of the Republic of Cuba and Agenda for the Cuban Transition, for Antúnez and his companions.

Ana Aguililla Saladrigas

Director of the Bureau of Information

Translator: Eduardo E. Rodríguez Candelario, boricua member of the PULC and collaborator of the OCPI in Puerto Rico.