Cuban Parliament President Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada speaks on the case of five men railroaded by the US justice system for crimes they never committed

by Deisy Francis Mexidor

There is no national or international podium that Ricardo Alarcón doesn't use to bring up the case of the Cuban Five, five Cubans held as prisoners in US jails since September 12, 1998.

For more than nine years he has dedicated considerable effort to explain the details of the case and build support for the struggle to free Fernando Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero, Ramon Labañino, Rene Gonzalez and Gerardo Hernandez, unjustly condemned by a Miami court.

Alarcón spoke with Granma on the sixth anniversary of their sentencing.

Recently you have contrasted the case of the Cuban Five with those of other individuals accused of espionage.

Perhaps more cases will come to light; I will refer to one that eloquently illustrates what we've been talking about. It took place in June of this year. It's the case of a Mr. Aragoncillo, a Philippine born man. He was an FBI officer assigned to the offices of Vice President Richard Cheney. He worked in the White House. He was also tied to the executive mansion back when Al Gore was the vice president. The court record states that from that office he obtained 733 secret documents. I'm not talking about a conspiracy to commit espionage [what the Cuban Five were accused of] but of straight out espionage.

When he left the White House, he went to work with the FBI in New Jersey. It was then that they discovered the fact and they brought Aragoncillo to trial. He was found guilty and sentenced to ten years in prison.

Ten years in prison for real, substantive espionage. Meanwhile, the Cuban Five, who never obtained even one piece of paper, were accused of conspiracy to commit espionage without being accused of espionage itself. A long list of high level US authorities paraded before the court testifying that "there was absolutely nothing pointing to espionage." However, the prosecution managed to convince a Miami jury and they were harshly sentenced to terms including four life sentences and 75 years in prison.

This can be explained because the fact that the jury in this Floridian city was terrified and the farce was played out amid a completely hostile atmosphere towards our compatriots.

Now, in June 2007, with all the repressive laws in the Untied States, and such a climate against foreigners… a man who was really spying during a long period of time, and not in just any place but from the White House, received a 10-year sentence, which could be reduced for good conduct.

Therefore, the first thing that comes to mind is the arbitrariness, the lack of fairness in the Cuban Five case. They were given sentences that were not only out of proportion, but absurd. The entire legal process against the Cuban Five was a political and propagandistic operation against Cuba and to please the Miami Mafia. That's the only explanation.

For the eighth time, the US authorities have denied a visa to Olga Salanueva and Adriana Perez, the wives of Rene Gonzalez and Gerardo Hernandez, to visit their imprisoned husbands.

The denial of visas for family members to visit the Cuban Five is totally arbitrary. And not only arbitrary, but also in violation of international and United States norms. It is part of what the United States government has done to punish the Cuban Five while at the same time trying to break their will.

All people in prison have the right to receive visits from family and even other persons. In our case, we are talking about a special situation, because the prisoners are in a country and their relatives in another. When the United States has dealt with this type of situation a resolution has been found, even in more problematic cases.

For example, remember Zacarias Mozawi, born of Moroccan parents in France. He was arrested, charged and sentenced in the United States for supposedly being one of the participants in the 9/11 attacks. According to the charges, he was going to pilot one of the 9/11 planes.

His Moroccan mother, a resident in France, requested a visa to go to the US and visit her son. She was granted an unlimited visa for humanitarian reasons in a situation involving someone that they presented as the only survivor of the commando that attacked the Twin Towers in New York.

Another case involves Johnny Walker, captured in Afghanistan when the US war against that country began. This young man was wearing a Taliban uniform, was armed and fighting against the US forces. They captured him. Since he was a US citizen, they didn't take him to the Guantanamo Naval Base —located on Cuban territory and illegally occupied by the US. They took him to his country of birth, tried him there and he is serving a sentence somewhere in California.

At the sentencing hearing there appears to have been an agreement between the government and this man, including one that allowed him to serve his sentence close to where his family lives in San Francisco, to facilitate them visiting him, to make it easier for the family. That was correct. I don't criticize it.

Compare this treatment with the situation of the Cuban Five. The process to request a visa lasts months: The US Interests Section gives you an appointment, you go there, they give you forms to fill out, and these are submitted to the US consul. Then you wait… A wait that can be several months, until they call you and say yes or no. In practice this has meant that for those who have been able to travel it has been at most once a year. In the case of Adriana and Olga, the situation is worse; they have never been able to visit their husbands.

On one occasion Adriana was given a visa, but the treatment was even crueler because when she arrived in Houston they wouldn't let her stay in the US and she was returned to Cuba. Olga was also given a visa once that was later revoked. Since then it has been all negative replies. They have said "No" to eight consecutive requests.

In this entire context, what role does solidarity play?

It is very important that people make statements around the world as the case becomes more known, so in some way we can jump the wall of silence surrounding it in the United States. To accomplish that, solidarity is very important.

If US citizens knew half the truth, just a piece of the truth, they would see that they are governed by a terrorist mafia that supports, harbors and protects active terrorist groups, while incarcerating people who fought against terrorism.

Granma12-12-2007