Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada
Ceremony of presentation with the award “Félix Elmuza” to journalists José Manzaneda (Spain) and Pablo Fernández and Santiago Vega (Argentina).
Havana, April 30th, 2010
Cuban journalists pay tribute to those who deserve it. José Manzaneda and Cubainformación do something that is essential but also very difficult.
Disseminating the truth about Cuba is tantamount to challenging the powerful propaganda offensive with its innumerable resources which Washington has carried out against our revolution for more than half a century. That war against us is twofold: on one hand, flooding the world with lies and slanders against the Revolution and on the other, concealing the main aspects of Cuban reality with an iron fist.
The best example is how the case of our five anti-terrorist heroes is hidden. Pablo Fernández and Santiago Vega and other Argentine friends forged a solidarity initiative that hopefully will be replicated in other places. It is a tough fight to confront the taming of the mind and subjection to lies and silence carried out by the merchant-owners of what used to be called journalism.
We honor real journalists, fighters for truth, when we pay tribute to Felix Elmuza, who gave his life for truth, justice and freedom; forgive me for alluding to the sewage, because there are those who debase and prostitute the noble profession.
During the so-called trial of our five compañeros in Miami, those who participated in it were besieged and harassed every day by thugs with press credentials. This was protested again and again, even to the judge, and the government was begged to stop that sorry spectacle. What we know now, but didn’t know then, was that those so-called journalists, the whole dirty campaign unleashed against our five brothers, were employees paid by the United States government to promote anti-Cuban hysteria and terrify the members of the jury.
It is necessary to scale mountains to shout the truth about the Five to the four winds. Physical and moral mountain ranges must be overcome, the equivalent of conquering steep slopes blasted by wind and snow must be accomplished for others to discover a story silenced, forbidden. We need another victory of the Liberator, returning again from the Caracas Valley to the Altiplana demanding liberty and justice.
On June 14 the U.S. judicial system will get its last chance to correct, even if belatedly, the arbitrariness it committed almost twelve years ago. That is the deadline for its proponents to ask the Miami Court to reconsider the case of Gerardo Hernandez Nordelo.
The accusation against him became infamous at the end of the trial when the prosecution itself acknowledged it had failed because it totally lacked evidence. Nevertheless Gerardo was convicted of a crime that did not exist, for an event in which he did not participate at all. The barbaric sentence that was imposed - two life sentences plus fifteen years in prison - is cruelly compounded by the prohibition to receive visits from his wife since that long ago 1998.
His situation should cause universal outrage and scandal. Rarely has there been such injustice and cruelty to a young man of proven innocence and incomparable altruism.
Gerardo Hernandez was born on June 4. On that date two years ago, the Atlanta Court of Appeals issued a ruling ratifying his disproportionate sentence and the 15 year sentence for René González and, at the same time, annulling the sentences for Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez and ordering that those three be resentenced.
That night I had the rare privilege of speaking on the phone with Gerardo. He had just learned of the singular birthday gift he had received. He did not speak of that. I remember his words, which have stayed with me ever since; referring to his compañeros that would be resentenced, "Prof, don’t get confused, free them. I endure what I must endure. Trust me, Prof, but do you what you have to do to get them out."
We try to fulfill his mandate. But first we try for remedy from the Court, and then that the U.S. Supreme Court agree to revise the unjust decision. Our petition generated unprecedented solidarity. Ten actual Nobel prizewinners, several parliaments and hundreds of parliamentarians, attorneys, individuals and organizations and institutions and legal and humanitarian associations around the world supported us. Without any explanation, the high court justices, at the behest of the White House, refused to consider the matter. The announcement was made on the day Gerardo and Adriana celebrated, at a distance, their wedding anniversary.
We were involved in the resentencing process for Ramon, Antonio and Fernando. I must say that in all communications with them they insisted again and again that, rather than their own situation, their main concern was Gerardo’s fate.
The resentencing did not put an end to the injustice. We managed to eliminate the life sentences hanging over Ramon and Antonio and reduce Fernando’s years in prison, and will continue to litigate about them and Rene, using all the possibilities apparently offered by the U.S. system. Every day that any of the Five spends in prison is an affront to justice.
Gerardo's case is much more complicated. All the avenues that the intricate U.S. system theoretically offers are now closed to him. All that remains is the extraordinary “habeas corpus” procedure that gives very remote and exceptional possibilities to the accused.
Gerardo himself has said it. Justice will only come when rendered by a jury of millions. There needs to be many actions to overcome the silence, so that the American people know the truth and demand their government to unconditionally and immediately release the Five.
To achieve this much needs to be done. Let's do it.
