CHAPTER 5: THE UNITED STATES STEPS UP THE RECRUITMET, FINANCING AND USE OF MERCENARIES IN ITS ATTEMPTS TO UNDERMINE THE RIGHT OF SELF-DETERMINATION OF THE CUBAN PEOPLE.

Many different forms of aggression have been used as part of the undeclared war -which has become the true state policy- waged by United States´ power circles against the Cuba.

Recruiting, guiding and providing financial and logistical support to mercenaries on Cuban soil who are at the service of US policy have been key objectives in the design and implementation of their anti-Cuban strategy.

Mercenaries at the service of the imperialist policy against Cuban people — always following precise orders from US special services— have changed their “methods of struggle” to meet the requirements of  each stage in the strategy of aggression towards the Island. They moved from invaders to terrorists and from terrorists they have turned into alleged human rights “defenders”.

The covert operations of the US special services against Cuba started as early as the summer of 1959. This has been proved in reports declassified by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

In a meeting held on March 17, 1960, attended by the former Vice-President (Richard Nixon), the Secretary of State (Christian Herter), the CIA Director (Allen Dulles) and others, President Eisenhower approved the so-called “Program of Covert Operations Against the Castro Regime”, introduced by the CIA. It authorized the creation of a secret intelligence and action organization inside Cuba and the necessary funds were allocated for that purpose.

In a declassified memorandum on the progress of that meeting, General Goodpaster wrote: The President said that he did not know a better plan to handle this situation. The main problem is information leaks and security errors. Everyone must be prepared to swear that he (Eisenhower) knows nothing about this. […] He said that our names could not be involved in anything that was to be carried out.

The truth is that when Eisenhower realized that the United States was loosing grip on Cuba day by day, he ordered to increase the support for counterrevolutionary groups inside Cuba and gave green light to prepare the Bay of Pigs invasion, a large-scale military attack later ratified by his successor, John F. Kennedy.

On April 17, 1961, Washington hurled 1,500 mercenaries on the Cuban people. The majority of those leading the troops were former military men from Fulgencio Batista’s pro-American tyranny, overthrown two years earlier by the Rebel Army.

The Bay of Pigs invasion was defeated in less than 72 hours by the Cuban people and army. The mistake of the United States administration was to underestimate the fighting determination and courage of a people defending its right to a dignified and independent life.

More than 90% of the invading troops were taken prisoner. In spite of the seriousness of their actions — more than a hundred Cuban patriots were murdered by the mercenaries— all invaders arrested were treated in an exemplary manner by our people. The physical integrity and human dignity of each of them was strictly respected and excellent medical assistance was provided to the wounded mercenaries.

The Court that tried the prisoners was extraordinarily lenient. It was only demanded to pay reparations which the United States administration never did, not even partially. On December 1962, Cuba agreed to exchange 1,113 mercenaries for 53,000,000 USD worth in medicines and baby food.

After the resounding failure of the mercenary forces at the Bay of Pigs, president Kennedy set up a special committee within the National Security Council which later approved several operations — such as “Operation Mongoose”— aimed at using all means available to help the Cuban people overthrow the communist regime from inside the country and put in place a new government with which the United States can live in peace .

Over the years, Washington has persisted quite steadily in its motivations, recruitment methods, forms of payment and assignments for these mercenaries, as part of its anti-Cuban policy. Only the attire and the aggression tools provided to anti-Cuban mercenaries have been changed.

The inauguration of the Reagan administration in the United States in the 80s, imposed significant and tactical changes in US strategies to overthrown the Cuban Revolution.

Overnight, notorious terrorists and CIA agents of Cuban origin came on the scene disguised as human rights defenders and “peaceful Castro opponents” and well-supplied with offices, “organizations” and links with international NGOs.

According to Philip Agee, former CIA agent, it was decided, in the early 80´s, that terrorist actions alone would not be sufficient to impose a regime change in Cuba. Terrorism did not work out, neither the Bay of Pigs invasion, nor the diplomatic isolation of Cuba that was gradually reduced, or the economic embargo. Cuba would now be part of a world-wide to fund and foster the development of non-governmental and volunteer organizations, which later would be acknowledged as civil society within the U.S. global and neo liberal policies. The CIA and the Agency for International Development (AID), would play a key role in this program, as well as a new organization funded in 1983: The National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

This was the period when the Cuban American National Foundation was founded with the manifest purpose of “promoting a peaceful transition to democracy in Cuba”. Experience has shown that the  CANF never abandoned the use of terrorist actions against the Cuban Revolution, - evidenced by the fact that several of its head representatives have a direct responsibility in plans to assassinate the Cuban Head of State - organizing and funding terrorist attacks on hotels and resorts in Cuba at the end of 1990s.

Small groups of allegedly “peaceful dissidents” and “human rights defenders” were created inside Cuba; with the direct involvement of diplomats from the US Interests Section. People recruited had previously been implicated in violent activities; some were even former officials, policemen, former campaigners and other lowlifes from Fulgencio Batista’s dictatorial regime.

Then, out of the woodwork, alleged activists and human rights groups, funded and run by the United States administration, popped up in Cuba. These people recruited and financed as any other mercenary, carry out missions at the behest of the United States with the purpose of destroying the constitutional order chosen by Cubans and to enforce the provisions of the Helms-Burton Act.

In respect to the current President George W. Bush, the imperialist appetites of the circles shaping up its regime have been intensified by the amount of power given to the most aggressive, reactionary sectors of the Cuban born terrorist mob.

In recent years, with George W. Bush's administration style, the U.S. has tightened, to an unprecedented degree, the blockade and other hostile policies towards Cuba, the actions of public and covert interference, the top government officials’ threatening statements and most particularly, the direct and increasing involvement of U.S. diplomatic personnel in Havana to promote the subversion of Cuba’s constitutional order. Official funds allocated for these operations have exponentially increased.

Experience has shown that the mercenaries recruited on Cuban soil by the United States to implement its policy aimed at ruling the Cuban people do not have the potential —due to popular rejection, lack of a genuine social ground and a self-generated plan— to become, by themselves, a challenge to Cuba’s revolutionary process. Nevertheless, danger lies in the possibility that mercenary activities could be used - exploiting the U.S. government proven capacity to manipulate the media - under the pretext of carrying out or supporting a possible American military aggression to Cuba, real and upcoming under the present circumstances.

The seriousness of the threats posed to the Cuban nation’s very existence is corroborated by the astounding increase in the funds and materials the U.S. allocated to recruit and pay its anti-Cuban mercenaries and by the decision to reach unprecedented levels on involving US agencies in destabilizing, wearing down and tightening the stranglehold on Cuba (see Chapter 2 on the report submitted by the so-called “Commission for the Assistance to a Free Cuba”).

In the review of the anti Cuban strategy proposed by the loathsome Commission on July 2006, it is advised to allocate, in the next two years, 80 million USD to destabilize the system freely chosen by Cubans. Not quite satisfied with that nonsense, they also recommend to use 20 million USD a year to promote similar actions once “the dictatorship comes to an end.”

Truth is that the “dissidence in Cuba” and the “fostering of democracy among Cubans” has become a profitable business, not only for mercenaries hired inside Cuba to plot against their own people and for the Miami-based terrorist mob of Cuban origin, but also for anyone in Europe or Latin America who declares himself against the Cuban revolutionary process.

Suffice it to look into a report of the General Accounting Office published on November 2006, where the twists and turns of the financing of anti-Cuban activities by the USAID are clearly explained. Well-known personages like Mario Vargas Llosa and Vaclav Havel have profited from the publication of anti Cuban articles and documents. Likewise, the report reveals the U.S. public funds diversion allegedly devoted to “assist the Cuban people” to purchase video-games, mountain bikes, fur coats, cashmere sweaters, crab meat, and Godiva chocolates, among other items.

In this context, the magnitude and aggressive nature of the U.S. administration’s recent misleading and slanderous campaign against Cuba, following the due sentencing of a group of mercenaries recruited, paid, trained and instructed by the superpower’s administration is, therefore, hardly surprising.

This slanderous campaign —still going on today with the cynical, complicit and active help of several client governments of the Empire — has resorted to sophisticated disinformation techniques developed by the Nazi-Fascists services, unjustifiably and repeatedly depicting the justly convicted mercenaries by giving the false epithets of “dissidents”, “peaceful political opponents”, “human rights defenders”,  “independent journalists, librarians or unionists”. The idea is to make people believe that the mercenaries were “arbitrarily and unjustly” convicted simply for “peacefully exercising the right to freedom of speech, opinion and association.”

It is clearly stated in the Charter of the United Nations, as well as in the two International Agreements on Human Rights, that ”All peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development” and that all States shall promote and respect this right in compliance with the Charter of the United Nations. In accordance with and by virtue of the exercise of this right, the Cuban people have established its Constitution and its law.

No one has the right to question the constitutional order adopted by a people, in the exercise of its sovereignty. Neither does anyone have the right to judge the actions of the Cuban people without note of the permanent and serious external threat posed to its existence as an independent nation by the United States' hostility. 

In such circumstances, the Cuban people, like any other nation, have the right to defend itself against the political, diplomatic, economic, commercial, financial, radio and television aggressions inflicted on it by the United States for over 4 decades.

The United States bans its citizens from having any form of correspondence with any foreign government in connection with any dispute or simple disagreement that affects them. However, it expects Cuba to tolerate the recruitment of mercenaries and their carrying out of activities, mercenaries who not only maintain correspondence with an imperialist power but also follow instructions from and accomplish missions aimed at implementing a hostile and aggressive foreign policy to the detriment of the Cuban people, with the intention of overthrowing Cuba’s legitimately elected authorities and destroying the constitutional order freely chosen by its people in a referendum.

The rights and freedoms proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as set forth in article 29, cannot, in any case, be exercised in opposition to the objectives and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, including sovereign equality, independence and the territorial integrity of all nations.

Asking the government of Cuba to release from jail or reduce the severity of the sentences of mercenaries who were judged and convicted by competent and independent courts, in strict compliance with law adopted by its Parliament, is tantamount to asking it to interfere with the  way its judicial system works and to open its door to impunity. This would violate not only Cuba’s Constitution and Law but also all existing principles and norms of the International Law.

The case of the mercenaries tried and sanctioned for actions against the independence and territorial integrity of the Cuban State.

The actions of mercenaries at the service of U.S. anti-Cuban policies multiplied in 2003, after the superpower’s government made decisions and issued orders pointing in that direction.

From the minute he arrived in Cuba in September 2002, the then head of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana increased the frequency of the meetings with his mercenary agents recruited here. His meddling, provocative statements and actions also increased, in flagrant violation of basic diplomatic conduct norms.

In an attempt to persuade them to stop their goading, illegal behavior, the U.S. Interests Section and its Head were advised, through diplomatic channels, of their violations of Cuban and international law. Nevertheless, the Head of the US Interests Sections persisted in his activities, promoting new and more serious subversive acts.

Because of the increasing frequency and the seriousness of the crimes committed by these mercenaries who, with their actions, were threatening the independence, territorial integrity and economy of the Cuban state, dozens of them were arrested on 18 and 19 March 2003 and tried on 4, 5 and 7 April of the same year.

Twenty-nine trials were held in Cuba, in several provinces, all of which took place in open courts. The courts handed down sentences of 6 up to 28 years of imprisonment. In spite of the serious nature of the crimes committed and the dangers to Cuba’s national security they entailed, no death penalty, or life terms were handed down, although anti-Cuban propaganda has falsely claimed this was so.

The police officers who detained the mercenaries did not use even a minimum amount of violence or force. The mercenaries did not resist arrest, since they were fully aware of the nature of the crimes they had committed and had no moral justification or legal principle to validate their deeds. 

Today, most of these mercenaries are still in prison serving their sentences, although 16 of them were allowed to serve their sentences outside of a penal institution, purely for humanitarian reasons.

All of those given jail sentences were involved in activities designed to overthrow the political, economic and social order chosen by the Cuban people and enshrined in the Republic’s Constitution. All of them were proven to be guilty of crimes directly aimed at damaging the nation’s sovereignty. All of them acted under the financing and instructions of an imperialist power.

None was tried and sentenced for exercising or defending freedom of opinion or expression. The only common factor which binds them is an unbridled greed for money and contempt for their homeland and people. All were found guilty of serious crimes at the behest of the superpower which intends to surrender their people through hunger and disease. All served to the imperial ambitions of an administration which has brutally reinforced a genocidal blockade over 40 years and has raised hostility and aggression towards Cuba, to unprecedented levels.

All acted to the detriment of the Cuban people’s human rights, especially its right to self-determination, to peace and development, with the further aggravation of having acted under the financing and instructions of those in United States of America who intend to fabricate an artificial crisis to serve as a pretext for a military invasion to the Island.

What, concretely, brought the 75 mercenaries before a judge?

- Systematic participation in meetings arranged by the U.S. Interests Section in Havana with U.S. congressmen and businessmen visiting the Island with the purpose of obstructing the efforts of those in the United States who work to relax or lift the genocidal blockade imposed on Cuba. The sentenced mercenaries have worked arduously in favor of the blockade on their people and against the implementation of successive resolutions of the UN General Assembly which have demanded —the last was backed by 183 Member States— the end of this unilateral and illegal policy. That is to say, they have violated not only Cuba’s legislation, but also the customary rules of International Law.

- Fabricating statistics, rumors or distorted information about Cuban economy and society, aimed at encouraging the massive withdrawal of foreign investment from Cuba and scaring away potential investors, thus reinforcing the negative impact of the U.S. blockade on the human rights of the Cuban people. These mercenaries even threatened foreign investors, warning them that, following the destruction of Cuba’s current constitutional order, their investments would not be respected.

- Conspiring to destabilize the country and dismantle the constitutional order that was chosen by the Cuban people, in full exercise of its sovereignty, under the instructions of the U.S. administration and the anti-Cuban Miami-based terrorist mob. They have encouraged, organized and carried out plans aimed at fomenting upheavals, chaos and discontent in the population hoping to trigger a massive uprising that will do away with the nation’s institutional and legal order or, at the very least, project an image of nationwide anarchy that will serve as a pretext to a foreign intervention.
- Having accepted money and gifts from the government of the United States of America and the anti-Cuban terrorist Miami-based mob as payment for their criminal anti-Cuban services.

- Periodically supplying information to and having meetings with U.S. intelligence services’ officials and agents and with well-known representatives and messengers of the anti-Cuban Miami-based terrorist mob. Following detailed instructions to collect and deliver to the U.S. Interests Section in Havana information of strategic and operational value about Cuba’s economy and national security.

- Fabricating false allegations to damage the country’s image. These fabrications, sent to U.S. agencies in exchange for money, were extensively used in the aggressive anti-Cuba media campaigns orchestrated by U.S. governmental agencies. These campaigns have had a negative impact on the development of vital sectors to the country, such as tourism. 

- Distorting Cuba’s role on international cooperation in areas such as the fight against terrorism, against drugs, against people trafficking or the promotion and protection of human rights. Repeating false allegations, fabricated by U.S. intelligence services, to include Cuba permanently on every list Washington comes up with regarding states unilaterally condemned for their misconduct.

- Fabricating false news and rumors hurting the dignity of millions of Cubans and their elected representatives.

- Having perpetrated acts which jeopardized the physical and moral integrity of millions of Cubans, as well as the independence that was achieved at the cost of the blood, pain and sacrifice of millions of Cuba’s best citizens.

Several of the sentenced mercenaries held “Free Access Passes” to the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, a privilege only granted by embassies and entities around the world to their officials and employees.

Receipts and payrolls for cash remittances and payment in kind sent by the U.S. government to its mercenaries were presented and confirmed on the trials. These were delivered in different ways; some were sent through commercial companies; funds and equipment were sent through anti-Cuban terrorist mob organizations based in Miami; using the services of messengers or “mules” that came to Cuba as “tourists”, or simply delivered directly by the officials of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

For example, according to the receipts and bills confiscated, Oscar Espinosa Chepe received, between January 2002 and January 2003, at least 7,154 USD from the U.S. government and its agents. A total of 13, 660 USD, hidden in his home, was confiscated and he was unable to present legal sources to justify such amount.

Nearly 5,000 USD were confiscated from the home of another mercenary, Héctor Palacios; this money was a reward for his anti-Cuban actions for serving the U.S. government.

Marta Beatriz Roque –released on humanitarian grounds in July 2004- had received 70,141 USD from the U.S. up to June 20, 2005.

All the mercenaries were tried under the provisions of Article 91 of Cuba’s Penal Code, Law 62 of 1987, and of Law No. 88 “Protection of Cuba’s National Independence and Economy”, the latter being a sort of antidote law passed to fight back the U.S. policy of hostility towards Cuba and in particular, the Helms-Burton Act.

It would be worth to remember that Cuba was not the only country that considered as a crime the collaboration with the extra-territorial enforcement of Helms-Burton Act. The European Union, for example, adopted regulations to this effect and another group of countries such as Canada, Mexico and Argentina adopted laws that punish any collaboration or compliance with the Helms-Burton Act.

The offence for which the mercenaries were condemned, “Acts against the independence or territorial integrity of the State”, is described in Article 91 of the Cuban Penal Code and reads:
Article 91 : “He or she who, at the service of a foreign state, acts with the objective of undermining the independence or territorial integrity of the Cuban State, shall receive a jail sentence of between 10 to 20 years, or the death penalty”.

The sentenced mercenaries, according to the behavior and serious offences committed, should have received heavier sentences than those granted, as also legislated in many countries of the world.

Criminal proceedings were carried out summarily, by virtue of Law No. 5 of 1977, Law of Penal Proceedings. Summary trials were held in these cases, in strict compliance with the law, due to the serious nature of the crimes committed.

A summary trial is held under the jurisdiction of the President of the Supreme Court to reduce the trial celebration time which, in no case, implies any curtail to due process of law. This type of proceedings exists in the legislations of more than 100 countries in the world, including the United States. In Cuba, its existence dates back to the 1888 Law of Criminal Prosecution. This was the law proceeding in force until 1973, when new provisions, which borrowed much from the previous law, were established.

The mercenaries were not sentenced by the government; they were tried and sentenced by independent, competent courts in compliance with due course of law.

All exercised their right to a defense counsel who, according to Cuban legislation, can be appointed by the defendant or, failing this, the court appoints a public defender. More than 80 % of the counsels for the defense were appointed by the accused. All of the defense lawyers had prior access to all records of the charges.

All seizure and confiscation of goods were always carried out with an authorized court warrant and after the illegal origin of these goods was proven.

There is not a shred of evidence suggesting that any form of coercion, pressure, threat or blackmail was used to obtain the accused’ statements and confessions.

The accused were brought before judges who had been appointed before any charges were laid, judges who already held office and were working in the relevant courts. No judge was appointed summarily and no court was specifically set up to judge one of these cases.

Each of the sentenced mercenaries had an oral hearing in which their statements were heard by competent courts and judges, and were able to exercise their rights to have a legal defense and to present witnesses and experts that could be examined by defense attorneys.

The hearings were not only oral but also public. An average of 100 people was present at each trial, so that nearly 3,000 people attended the trials, namely relatives, apart from witnesses, experts and other Cuban citizens interested.

The accused and their defense attorneys exercised the right to adduce any evidence and call any witness they deemed necessary, in addition to the evidences presented by the investigative officers and the Prosecution. The defense attorneys called 28 witnesses different from those called by the Prosecution; 22 of which, a clear majority, were authorized to take the stand. All defense attorneys had prior access to the prosecution’s records.

As provided in Cuban legislation and as informed to the accused at their trials, all had the right —exercised by most — to appeal to a higher court, in this case, the Supreme Court.

They were neither independent unionists nor journalists, let alone librarians, as the enemies of the Cuban Revolution have ad nauseam repeated.

None was a journalist, much less independent. None reported the real developments; they fabricated facts or simply distorted facts with aforethought and by fraudulent means, under Washington's orders and financing. Several “independent journalists” could scarcely write more than a line without grammar or spelling mistakes. They were not independent since they were hired hands following the orders of a foreign government which acted as censor, editor and monopoly owner of the media that published their work, as well as their own minds.

None was a union leader or could have been, because the overwhelming majority of those sentenced had not, based on their decision, been employed for several years.
A look at the U.S. official NED’s figures would be enough to see the upfront commitment of Washington authorities with the funding of their mercenaries in Cuba. The 2005 NED’s anti-Cuban program, comprised 17 headings to guarantee part of the money for the payroll of the U.S. anti-Cuban policy, with funds that amounted to 2,365,000 USD.

Freedom of opinion and expression are fully achieved in Cuba. There are no illiterates. Easy access to the widest variety of information is granted to all citizens, so that people may decide by themselves what the real true is. Private national or transnational monopolies of information and communications, that in other countries push the ideas and points of view of the ruling elites, are banned by law in Cuba.

Cuba is tiressly working on programs to bring general and comprehensive education to the people, so that they could successfully prevent the penetration of ideological and cultural imperialism, supported by U.S. information and entertainment transnational companies.

In Cuba everyone has access to the means of information and communications, which are used to serve society’s most crucial needs on education for children and young people, in a spirit of social justice, liberty, equality and human solidarity.

Medical care provided to the mercenaries in prison. The truth about some of the cases used by the anti-Cuban media campaign.

The human dignity and physical and psychological integrity of the convicted mercenaries has been strictly respected. While in prison, they have enjoyed the same extensive benefits as all of Cuba’s inmate population (See Chapter 6, Part III, of this document.)
The allegations of violating the human rights of any of the mercenaries are absolutely untrue.

None has suffered corporal punishment, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, humiliation or mistreatment of any kind. Food and drinking water supply has not been reduced to any sentenced mercenary and none has been limited or deprived of the excellent medical services provided, on a free cost basis, to all Cubans detainees and prisioners.

Based on the crimes committed and sentences imposed by the court, there is no discrimination whatsoever in the way the mercenaries were treated as compared to the rest of the inmate population.  When necessary, all have received appropriate medical care and treatment and enjoy the benefits and rights established on the penitentiary law and regulations.

The right to family visits, phone calls and mailing exchange is also respected. Everyone has enough time everyday to practice exercises in the open air.

Everyone has the right to religious assistance, and those who requested it exercised it effectively.

The mercenaries’ right to the use of conjugal blocks for marital visits has been respected. They are also allowed to access the mass media, particularly,to watch television until broadcasting ends.

Highly qualified doctors and nurses have assisted the mercenaries whenever they have complained due to pains or illness symptoms, or whenever relatives, guards or officials from different areas of the prison or even other inmates have suggested the medical assistance.

Whenever necessary, mercenaries have been admitted to the penal wards in public hospitals of the national medical care network. There, they have received medical assistance with state of the art technologies and medications developed by Cuba.

Any mercenary prescribed a special diet by a doctor, has received it. Most of the ailments which the mercenaries suffer had been developed prior to their arrest.

Whenever an imprisoned mercenary has fallen ill, his or her relatives have received regular information from medical staff on the patience follow up, treatment and medicines prescribed. Each and every concern expressed by relatives and friends has been responded and attended to.

The nature of the Cuban penitentiary system, its health care sub-system and the benefits and rights inmates enjoy were corroborate by some members of the diplomatic corps serving in Cuba, during the visits paid to several prisons in October 2004. A wide spectrum of information was provided on these visits and diplomats had direct contacts with male and female prisoners.

Everyday, Washington politicians find more difficulties to keep, on public light, their lies and disinformation campaign about mercenaries in Cuba.

All mercenaries in prison, like the rest of Cuba’s penal population, are provided with extensive benefits, such as: familiar visits, right to use matrimonial quarters, phone calls (100 minutes per month) and religious assistance.

The benefit of Conditional Releases

The releases conducted between 2004 and 2006 of 16 mercenaries under Conditional Releases, based on their health conditions was a heavy blow to the anti-Cuban media campaigns. No released mercenary has been able to show any credible evidence of mistreatment, humiliation or degrading treatment of any kind. None suffered from health deterioration as result of imprisonment conditions or treatment. None could cite a single occasion in which medical assistance was denied or restricted.

It is worth to highlight that the decision to grant the 16 releases by virtue of Conditional Releases was based only on strictly humanitarian grounds. All mercenaries were given the opportunity to voluntarily undergo the necessary medical examinations to determine whom should be granted a Conditional Release.

All Conditional Releases were based on rigorous medical criteria.

The granting of Conditional Releases proves, once again, the magnanimous nature, the profound humanism and the total void of hatred or rancor which characterize the Cuban Revolution, which, as aforementioned, has provided irrefutable evidences in this regard. In Sierra Maestra, the Rebel Army shared, on equal basis, their scanty medicines and meals with both revolutionary soldiers and the seized tyranny’s troops sick or wounded. Is there any better example of humanitarian treatment granted to the mercenaries seized after the Bay of Pigs defeat?

The Conditional Release is a permit granted for justified reasons and as long as required. Article 31 of the Cuban Penal Code refers to the Conditional Release granting. Section 3 paragraph b) and section 4 of that article specifically set forth:

(…) 3. In those cases sentenced to temporary imprisonment:

(…) b) the court which handed down the sentence can, on justifiable grounds and on prior request, grant Provisional Leave as long as necessary. The Ministry of the Interior can also issue such leave, on extraordinary grounds, and must inform the Chief Justice of the People’s Supreme Court.

4. The duration of the Conditional Releases and the leave permits from a penitentiary establishment to which the previous section refers, are subtracted from the duration of the prison term, as long as the inmate have a good behavior during the conditional release or leave permit. Similarly, the sentence reductions granted to the inmate while serving the sentence are also subtracted.

The Conditional Release proves, once again, the profoundly humanistic nature of the Cuban penitentiary system as it is enshrined in the Cuban penal law and adequately applied to the cases required. The respect for the law is part of our culture and guides the conduct of the Cuban authorities.

How different the situation of the Cuban Pennitenciary System is from the situation of the American jails or in the concentrations camps located within the Guantanamo U.S. Naval base perimeter, which have been set up for five years against the all international community, will!

How different the humanistic and respectful treatment to inmates at Cuban penitentiary centers is from the systematic practices of torture and degradation inflicted to prisoners by U.S. troops in Iraq!

How huge differences between the treatments of these mercenaries in Cuban jails are from the ones inflicted to the Five compatriots serving unjust sentences in U.S. prisons for fighting against terrorism!

Strictly abiding by reason and Law, with meticulous respect for dignity and the physic and psychological integrity of the human being, Cuba will continue taking the necessary steps to defend its people from the hostile policy, blockade and aggressions of the U.S. government.

The mercenaries of a foreign power policy seeking to destroy the constitutional order of the Cuban people will never enjoy impunity in Cuba, nor would enjoy impunity in any sovereign State determined to protect the respect for the will of its citizens.

The Cuban law establishes the sanctioning mechanism to punish the offenders. The Cuban government will enforce the provisions, adopted by the National Assembly of People’s Power, as representative of the people and after prior extensive consultations with them. The Cuban Constitution and Law express the sovereign will of the Cuban people and no one can be above them.

Cuba knows reason and justice are on its side.