Prison officials have denied Raul Arencibia Fajardo access to proper medical attention for over a month, his wife, Olga Ibarra Echevarria said in a statement.
He "has a permanent cough, sore throat and high fever due to the lack of medical attention," she said after meeting her husband in prison on October 7.
"My husband told me don’t ever stop denouncing these atrocities. On the 6th of this month he was taken to the hospital of the prison Combinado del Este, where they took x-rays of his lungs but could not perform an x-ray of his head for the power went out," Ibarra added.
"They kept him all day in a "tapiada" without medicine," she claimed.
"To this day they have not given my husband the results of the test and prison officials cite the reason being the lack of ransportation."
Human rights watchdogs have linked these kind of medical problems to the poor conditions of Cuba’s prisons. Arencibia Fajardo was one of 17 dissidents, who were arrested in December 2002 by Communist authorities, according to Amnesty International.
He has been linked to Lawton Human Rights Foundation of Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, another Christian dissident whose health has reportedly deteriorated after prison officials refused to give him enough food and medicines, his family and dissident sources said.
THREE YEARS
Arencibia Fajardo was sentenced to three years in prison in what human rights watchers described as "an unjust trial" on charges of contempt and public disorder, along with dissidents Virgilio Marante Guelmes and Orlando Zapata Tamayo, who was also recognized as prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International.
Christian human rights groups have joined Amnesty International in fighting for the release of over 70 known political dissidents who have been arrested since 2002, in what was seen as a fresh crackdown on dissidents of authorities loyal to the ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
The Cuban leader has made clear he "is still in one piece" after he tripped on a step and tumbled to the ground late Wednesday, October 20, when leaving the stage at a graduation ceremony. The 78-year old Castro reportedly fractured a knee and arm in that incident.
WITH AUTHOR STEFAN J. BOS
