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Communist Party organises
raids on journalists involved in independent
training
Reporters
Without Borders,
December 1, 2005.
Reporters Without Borders today condemned
an operation by government agents and paramilitaries
on 22 November in which intimidation and
force was used to prevent participants in
a training workshop for independent journalists
from attending a party to mark the end of
the course.
"We condemn this all the more firmly
as it was targeted at journalists and would-be
journalists whose only crime was to get
training outside of official channels and
to want to promote a free, quality press
in Cuba," the press freedom organisation
said.
Among those who received visits at home
from paramilitary groups members were students
Feliberto Pérez and Julio Sánchez,
who were threatened with reprisals if they
left their homes.
Alexander García Mujica, the editor
of the Villa Blanca Press agency, and Félix
Reyes Gutiérrez of the Cubanacán
Press agency were also forced to stay in
their homes. García was warned that
if he went out, "no one will be responsible
for what happens to you." Reyes was
put under surveillance by Communist Party
members and his telephone was confiscated.
Alejandro Tur Valladares, the editor of
the Jagua Press agency and a member of the
training panel, was arrested as he was leaving
his home and taken to a Communist Party
office where he was threatened with imprisonment
and was not released until six hours had
passed. The same happened to student Francisco
Blanco Sanabria.
Cubanacán Press editor Guillermo
Fariñas, who coordinated the workshop
training, received a visit from three military
personnel the day after the party. He told
Reporters Without Borders the three soldiers
said to him they would not tolerate any
more independent training.
The workshop was organised by the Marta
Abreu Social Studies Forum and the Free
Cultural Institute of the central city of
Santa Clara, founded in April 2001 by independent
journalist Omar Moíses Ruiz Hernández,
who was arrested in March 2003 and is now
serving an 18-year prison sentence.
Reporters Without Borders defends imprisoned
journalists and press freedom throughout
the world. It has nine national sections
(Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany,
Italy, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland). It
has representatives in Abidjan, Bangkok,
London, Moscow, New York, Tokyo and Washington.
And it has more than 120 correspondents
worldwide.
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