at 12:26 AM Tuesday, July 19, 2011
More details of the brutal repression against the Ladies in White this past Sunday.
From the Coalition of Cuban-American Women:
Ladies in White Beaten, Dragged and Stoned After Mass
In Santiago de Cuba, a city in the eastern province of Cuba, female pro-democracy activists were savagely beaten and verbally attacked in the streets by Cuban State Security agents after they attended mass in the Basilica of "El Cobre," a Catholic shrine dedicated to "Our Lady of Charity," where they prayed for the freedom of all Cuban political prisoners and for the freedom of Cuba.
Tania Montoya Vazquez, one of the 16 Ladies in White who were attacked, describes the violence:
"...it wasn't enough for them to snatch the gladiolus from our hands, they began to beat us, they ripped all our clothes, I have scratches all over my body... so does Aimee and all the other women in the group. We all did a 'sit-in' and they almost killed us... they did not stop slapping us, we are all scratched, they pulled our hair, they dragged us, and they threw rocks at us as we remained united, in silence on the ground, firm in our conviction that what we want is the freedom of our political prisoners and the freedom of Cuba.
...this was all organized and ordered by State Security whom we make responsible for what could have happened to each one of us and the physical condition we are all presently in... they didn't care that they beat up Nersa Fernandez Fonseca, an older woman in her fifties. Several of us had to go to the hospital due to our ailing physical conditions. I was hit on the head with a stone and have a bump, I'm all bruised. When they attacked us, they never took into consideration the fact that we were women walking in silence. Freedom for Cuba! Long live human rights! Freedom for our political prisoners!"
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