International solidarity is more necessary than ever
Urgent message from the International Committee for Justice and Freedom of the Five

The Atlanta Court of Appeals recently issued the procedure for rehearing the case of the Five Cuban compatriots by the 12 active judges of that court.[1]

The calendar has been set as follows:

• December 15 th : The defense will present its arguments to the court
• January 27 th 2006: The prosecution will present its arguments to the court
• February 13 th 2006: The hearing will take place during the course of this week. Arguments from both sides will be heard by the 12 judges in a plenary session. The trial will take place in Atlanta, Georgia.
• The defense and prosecution will have 20 minutes each to express their arguments
• The case will be reconsidered by the Court based on three questions: the Florida District Court's discretion to deny the defendents' motions to change venue and for new trial and the process to select an impartial jury.[2]

We believe it essential to develop an extensive solidarity campaign and to circulate as much information as possible regarding the severe violations suffered by the Five and their families. An extreme example is Olga Salanueva and Adriana Pérez – the US government has recently denied, again, visas for them to visit their husbands in prison.

It is absolutely necessary that the case is reported by the press and all media within our reach, whether commercial or ‘alternative'. We must make use of advertising space and other means which will keep the topic in the press and denounce the double standards of the US Government in its war against terrorism: while it protects and supports criminal groups in Miami, sinister characters such as Luis Posada Carriles, Orlando Bosh or Hector Pesquera, ex-chief of the Florida FBI who incarcerated, tortured and developed a media campaign to condemn the Five Cuban Compatriots even before the trial. Now it has become known that Pesquera participated in meetings where the plot to murder the Public Prosecutor of Venezuela, Danilo Anderson, on November 18 th , 2004 was formed. In that meeting, which took place in Panama, an attack against Bolivarian President Hugo Chávez was planned with the presence of CIA agent Morrison and the Cuban-American and Venezuelan mafias.[3]

The mafia paid 1, 200, 000 dollars for the horrific crime against Public Prosecutor Anderson; shortly before his assasination the young prosecutor had summoned to declare 400 individuals involved in the coup d'état of the Boliviarian Republic of Venezuela in April 2002.[4]

Where is Héctor Pesquera today?? Not a difficult question to answer. He leads a leisurely life in the South of the United States, and holds the post of Security Adviser for Florida Ports and Airports. Undoubtedly, the boat Santrina, with Posada Carriles aboard, slipped into the US while Pesquera drank whisky and turned his head in the other direction. He also chose not to notice, when he was a super agent of the CIA and FBI, the 14 of 19 members who were training in Florida to fly into the Twin Towers on September 11th.

It is a crucial moment in the case of the Five. The US Government and the terrorists of the Miami mafia will grant impunity for confessed criminals like Posada, Bosh, Pesquera, Frometa and Co. and for our Five brothers they hope to construct another wall of injustice.

There is not the faintest sign that the US Government wants to repair the severe damages it has caused the Five and their families, such as those demonstrated in the Group on Arbitrary Detentions of the High Commission for Human Rights in Geneva on May 27 th ; nor did they listen to plees from the 3 Atlanta judges who decided to revoke the sentences given to the Five through 93 pages of arguments stating the need for changing the hearing to another city.

On the contrary, our Five brothers remain encarcerated in maximum security prisons without the fundamental right of receiving visits from their wives or a child like Ivette, who in her seven years of life has seen her father a number of times that she can count on her fingers. Torturing the emotions of a human being, the most complete and intimate love, when these beings are defenseless, is what is the Five are suffering. Gerardo who is deprived of the affection of his wife Adriana and Rene who cannot look into the eyes of his wife, Olguita or receive the kisses of his lovely daughter Ivette. Such scars will be with those people for life.

The US distributes the sacred right of who can receive and who can give love, who can keep prisoners unlawfully and who can receive impunity.

What is the moral behind this perverse Empire that masacres, violates and tortures defenseless nations, that scorns and tricks its own people, that invents enemies, weapons of mass destruction and asymmetric wars to plunder the resources of our peoples? How can the US speak of democracy, liberty and human rights?

The destiny of these Five heros will be decided during that week of February 13 th .

The brilliant defense lawyers have more than enough solid arguments to expound the three questions that the 12 judges in Atlanta would like to hear.

International solidarity is more necessary than ever to support the lawyers and the Cuban people in their mission for justice. We must make ourselves heard with reason and truth.

We must not stop writing, even for one day, to the 1503 mecanism of the High Commissioner for Human Rights requesting intervention in the case. We ask personalities, intellectuals, artists and parlimentarians to send letters to the US Attorney General, demanding the freedom of our Five brothers, unjustly encarcerated.

We will move heaven and earth until they are freed. They well deserve it.

Graciela Ramirez,
International Committee for the Justice and Freedom of the Five

Letters to the 1503 mecanism should be sent by fax, email or post to:

Treaties and Commission Branch
OHCHR-UNOG
1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland
Fax: (41 22) 917 90 11
E-mail: 1503@ohchr.org

Letters to the Attorney General of the United States, Alberto Gonzalés:

Mr. Alberto Gonzalés
United States Public Prosecutor
US Department of Justice
950 Pennsilvania Ave, N.W
Washington, DC 20530-0001
Fax: 202 307 6777
E-mail: askdoj@usdoj.gov