(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the 24 March 2005 interrogation of Oscar Mario González, of the independent news agency Grupo de Trabajo Decoro. González was interrogated in Havana by state security agents. They attempted to blackmail him into ceasing his work as a journalist. “A Cuban journalist is yet again being harassed by the political […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the 24 March 2005 interrogation of Oscar Mario González, of the independent news agency Grupo de Trabajo Decoro. González was interrogated in Havana by state security agents. They attempted to blackmail him into ceasing his work as a journalist.
“A Cuban journalist is yet again being harassed by the political police for the sole reason that he refuses to conform to the ‘code of conduct’ imposed by the government,” RSF said. “We reiterate our condemnation of these arbitrary and absurd methods aimed at silencing the island’s independent press.”
On 24 March, González was summoned and questioned for two and half hours by state security agents. “They told me I criticised the government too much and that they would not allow this to continue,” he told RSF.
The agents offered him the possibility of leaving Cuba to visit his daughter, who lives in exile in Sweden, providing he stopped working as a journalist. “I had an exit permit that was taken away from me,” he explained. “When I was summoned on 24 March, the police told me I could get it back if I stopped practicing my trade.”
González rejected the offer, even though he has not seen his only daughter for three years, and has not seen his grandson for seven years. “My daughter came to visit me in 2002. The police warned me that, if I continue to write, the next time she will be refused entry into Cuba.”
González said he would not give in to the state security agents’ blackmail, “even if the price I must pay is not seeing my family again.” He could therefore be summoned for further questioning at any time. “I merely describe today’s Cuban reality and the regime cannot tolerate that,” he added.
Three of the 21 journalists who have been in prison since a March 2003 crackdown are members of the Grupo de Trabajo Decoro news agency. The three journalists are Héctor Maseda Gutiérrez (serving a 20-year sentence), Omar Moisés Ruiz Hernández (18 years) and José Ubaldo Izquierdo Hernández (16 years) (see IFEX alerts of 22 March and 13 January 2005, 30 August, 1 June, 21 and 10 May, 23 and 19 March, 26 and 14 January 2004, and others).
