"torture" in prison, BosNewsLife learned Thursday, September 21. In a statement from prison obtained by BosNewsLife, Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, 45, said the government of the Communist island "tortured me during eight years; they have done so trying to drive me insane though, thank God, I have been able to preserve my sanity…"
Dr. Biscet claimed that prison authorities and others "continue torturing me because I live in a box with no windows or natural light, no water, with a mattress that feels as if one were sleeping on a plank, a stone unfit for a human being."
He also expressed concern that he was "surrounded by criminals and under the threat, as it has happened on previous occasions, of being attacked by the government who instigates these dangerous prisoners."
DOCTOR
A medical doctor by profession, Dr. Biscet established the Lawton Foundation for Human Rights, an organization that promotes universal human rights through non-violent civil disobedience.
He was released October 31, 2002, after serving a three-year sentence at a maximum-security prison 700 km away from his home. However was detained again in 2003 for organizing informal discussion meetings for the dissident groups he was trying to establish. He was later sentenced to 25 years in prison along with scores of other human rights and democracy activists in a major crackdown on dissidents in March 2003.
He has been confined in a punishment cell for long periods of time over the past two years and human rights activists say he has been denied food at times while his health deteriorates, human rights investigators say.
GOVERNMENT
"I believe that what the government is doing is torturing me to humiliate me so that I abandon the struggle on behalf of the freedom of my country but, thank God, I have been able to keep up my stance and will continue doing so with God’s help," Dr. Biscet said in the remarks obtained by BosNewsLife.
In previous statement obtained by BosNewsLife, his wile Elsa Morejon Hernandez said her husband "suffers from hypertension, chronic gastritis, and high cholesterol [and] has not been able to receive the food items his family brings him."
Dr. Biscet said that he and his detained supporters "began a fast in prison [in July] because I believe we should pray to God and demand our rights before the government, the right to be free which belongs to every person just for being a citizen."
NO RIGHTS
He stressed that Cuba has "lived so long without any rights, under a dictatorship, that I believe that we must demand rights that belong to us and, in everyone’s interest, these liberties must be observed… To live a full life, it is essential to live in freedom and the Cuban people are denied these rights."
He said he and “other brothers [in prison] demand that the government sign the international covenants of civil, political, economic, cultural and social rights.” There has been some hope expressed by American officials that life for dissidents and Christians may improve after ailing 80-year old Cuban Fidel Castro put his brother Raul in temporary charge of the Cuban government July 31 as he prepared for intestinal surgery.
Although the specifics of Castro’s medical problem have been treated as a secret in Cuba, a former top CIA analyst for Latin America said last month, he doesn’t believe he will live much longer.
Brian Latell, author of a biography of Fidel Castro, said he expects Raul Castro to forge a relationship with the United States, a move that is expected to positively impact political and religious prisoners. (With BosNewsLife Research and reports from Cuba).
