Tsunami of International Support for Cuban Five Floods U.S. Supreme Court CUBA, March 6, 2009. A record-breaking total of twelve AMICUS briefs requesting review of the convictions of the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters held in US prisons were today lodged with the United States Supreme Court, attorney Thomas Goldstein informed today. The petitioners include ten Nobel laureates, a former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, numerous U.S. and foreign bar associations and human rights organizations, hundreds of parliamentarians, and several ex-Presidents, including two former Presidents and three current Vice-Presidents of the European Parliament, according to information posted on the webpage of the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five. The Cuban Five were arrested in 1998 after they collected information on Florida-based ultra-right organizations, which have carried out terrorist actions against the Cuban people over the past four decades. The petitioners have asked the US Supreme Court to review the fairness of trying Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labañino, Rene Gonzalez and Antonio Guerrero (internationally known as the Cuban Five) before a Miami jury, a city whose history of violence and intimidation against supporters of the Cuban government precludes a verdict free from retaliation by the anti-Cuba community. "The trial and conviction of the Cuban 5 is a national embarrassment," explained Michael Ratner, President of the Center for Constitutional Rights, which represented the Nobel laureates in filing their *amicus* brief. "Our clients, ten Nobel Prize winners acclaimed for their efforts to advance human rights, believe the trial was an international embarrassment as well." Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, President of the U.N. General Assembly, also made a strong plea before the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva this week for the freedom for the Cuban Five. "We are very hopeful about meaningful and credible change being brought by the new U.S. Administration. The immediate ex-incarceration of the five Cuban heroes would help strengthen our confidence that the promised change is for real," he said. The U.S. government's brief in opposition is presently due at the US Supreme Court April 6. The Court is likely to decide whether to grant a review of the case before its summer recess in June. (Cubaminrex- ACN)
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