(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the arrest of independent journalist Oscar Mario González, of the Grupo de Trabajo Decoro news agency, who was detained at the same time as at least 15 other dissidents on the morning of 22 July 2005. Referring to the 21 other journalists who are already held in difficult conditions in […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the arrest of independent journalist Oscar Mario González, of the Grupo de Trabajo Decoro news agency, who was detained at the same time as at least 15 other dissidents on the morning of 22 July 2005.
Referring to the 21 other journalists who are already held in difficult conditions in prisons throughout Cuba since 18 March 2003, RSF said González had become “the 22nd example of the deplorable state of press freedom in Cuba.”
More dissidents were arrested during the week of 18 July than at any time since the so-called Black Spring of March 2003. Thirteen of those detained on 22 July were still imprisoned on 25 July, including González, who is reportedly being held at a police station in the Havana municipality of Playa. The exact circumstances of his arrest are unknown. He has been allowed to receive some packages but he has not been allowed any visits.
González was summoned and questioned by two state security agents in Havana on 24 March and was told he would not see his family again if he continued to work against the government as a journalist. He was offered the possibility of going to Sweden, where his daughter lives, but refused.
Three of the journalists held since March 2003 for threatening “the state’s independence and territorial integrity” are members of the Grupo de Trabajo Decoro news agency. They are Héctor Maseda Gutiérrez (who is serving a 20-year prison sentence), Omar Moisés Ruiz Hernández (who was sentenced to 18 years) and José Ubaldo Izquierdo Hernández (16 years) (see IFEX alerts of 20 and 12 July, 22 March and 13 January 2005 and others).
