Central Europe Online.
January 19, 2001
Detainees do not meet Czech diplomat, Cuba claims the opposite
PRAGUE, Jan 19, 2001 -- (CTK - Czech News Agency) Czech Foreign Ministry
spokesman Ales Pospisil today described as untrue the claim by a top Cuban
diplomat in Prague that Cuba allowed the Czech charge d'affaires in Havana today
to visit Czech MP Ivan Pilip and his companion who are in Cuban detention.
The meeting between the detainees and the Czech charge d'affaires, Josef
Marsicek, did not take place. The Cuban side is lying, Pospisil told CTK. Pilip
and Jan Bubenik, an ex-student activist, have been detained since Friday for
having met members of the Cuban opposition. The Cuban side probably wants them
to be tried as U.S. agents. Marsicek was denied access to the prisoners because
of his lacking the necessary authorization from the Cuban Foreign Ministry,
Pospisil said.
On Tuesday the Cuban authorities promised that they would enable a meeting
of Pilip and Bubenik with members of the Czech diplomatic mission in Cuba. At
5:00 p.m. CET today, the Cuban charge d'affaires in Prague, David Paulovich,
told CTK that the meeting had taken place. Marsicek "was enabled to meet
the two men on Saturday, Sunday and Thursday," Paulovich told CTK after a
phone conversation with the Cuban authorities. Unlike the Czech Republic, Cuba
allows prisoners to receive visits according to international conventions,
Paulovich replied to CTK's question whether he could confirm it for sure that
the meeting had really taken place. 6:00 p.m. CET today was the deadline for
Havana to formally acquaint Pilip and Bubenik with charges brought against them.
The Czech Foreign Ministry has not yet received any official information
from Cuba. Prague does not know which law or laws the two had breached and why
they are denied contacts with the Czech diplomatic mission, Pospisil said.
Diplomatic channels between Prague and Havana seem to be closed at the moment,
he added. European Parliament chairwoman Nicole Fontaine and other European
officials today asked Cuba to immediately release the Czech detainees. The Czech
ambassadors to EU countries were instructed by the government today how to
proceed in the case of Pilip and Bubenik. "The idea of a joint action, as
resolute as possible, can be spoken about," the Foreign Ministry said in a
statement today.
Foreign Minister Jan Kavan, who has been recovering from a heart operation
in the Konstantinovy Lazne spa, west Bohemia, told journalists today that the
Czech Republic had turned for assistance in the case to the EU member countries
and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). He said he
had sent personal letters to Chilean President Ricardo Lagos and Mexican Foreign
Minister Jorge Castaneda asking them for assistance. The Czech government will
discuss the Cuban incident at an extraordinary meeting tonight. ((c) 2001 CTK -
Czech News Agency)
Government asks Kavan to organize assistance to prisoners in Cuba
PRAGUE, Jan 19, 2001 -- (CTK - Czech News Agency) The cabinet has assigned
Foreign Minister Jan Kavan with informing third countries' foreign ministers
about the detention of two Czech citizens in Cuba and asking them for
assistance, deputy premier Vladimir Spidla said after an extraordinary cabinet
meeting tonight.
The meeting had been convoked to discuss the imprisonment of Ivan Pilip, a
deputy from the right-wing opposition Freedom Union, and ex-student activist Jan
Bubenik in Cuba. They were detained last Friday for having met Cuban dissidents
and on Tuesday they were placed in the Villa Marista prison for dissidents in
Havana. Premier Milos Zeman did not take part in the meeting because he is
currently on an official visit to Estonia.
He however supported the convocation of an extraordinary meeting. He said
that if Pilip and Bubenik were only faced with expulsion from Cuba, "the
government would sure not stand aside." Zeman said in the Estonian capital
of Tallinn that the government would do its utmost to help Czech citizens,
irrespective of whether the person in question is a deputy or not. "This
applies in case that he/she does not commit a criminal offense which is out of
question in this case," Zeman added. Deputy premier and Justice Minister
Pavel Rychetsky said that the aim of Kavan's planned step was to provoke a joint
action with EU and other nations, and that the government ascribed great
importance to Latin American countries in negotiating with Cuba.
Rychetsky said he would turn to the Cuban Justice Minister because
international agreements on legal assistance were being violated. Earlier today
Kavan announced that the Czech Republic had asked the EU member countries and
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) for assistance.
Kavan also sent personal letters to Chilean President Ricardo Lagos and Mexican
Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda. The government will attempt to deliver to Cuba
another protest note, which it approved today. "We are very much interested
in it being really delivered," Rychetsky said. Cuban charge d'affaires in
Prague David Paulovich has reportedly stopped communicating with the Foreign
Ministry and does not accept any written material.
That is why the government "will seek other diplomatic channels,"
Rychetsky said. Cuba prevents Pilip and Bubenik from contacting the Czech
mission in Havana thus violating international conventions, deputy foreign
minister Hynek Kmonicek said after the government meeting. "Consular
officials have the right to visit state citizens who are in prison, in custody
or who are detained," Kmonicek said quoting a consular convention.
Paulovich today told CTK that if he wanted to visit jailed Cuban citizens, he
must make a written request and wait for a reply even several weeks.
He said that Pilip and Bubenik had been detained on Friday and that the
Czech envoy visited them on Saturday and Sunday. According to the Foreign
Ministry's information, there has only been one contact between the Czech
representative and the detainees. ((c) 2001 CTK - Czech News Agency)
Prague seeks international help to free Czechs held in Cuba
PRAGUE, Jan 19, 2001 -- (Agence France Presse) Prague has asked EU nations
and Latin American nations for help in securing the release of two Czech
nationals arrested in Cuba on subversion charges, foreign minister Jan Kavan
said.
Kavan sent letters Thursday to Chilean President Ricardo Lagos and Mexican
Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda as well as EU nations and the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to solicit aid in the bid to free
former Czech finance minister Ivan Pilip and countryman Jan Bubenik.
The pair were arrested in Cuba last weekend, and accused by authorities
there of "attempting to establish subversive contacts with
counter-revolutionary residents" outside Havana.
Kavan expressed astonishment at the actions of the Cubans, who had sent back
to Prague two Czech diplomatic notes seeking information on the matter and
calling for the men's release.
He also rejected accusations in the ruling Cuban Communist Party's official
newspaper, Granma, that Pilip and Bubenik were "U.S. agents".
The Czech government -- in the absence of prime minister Milos Zeman who was
visiting Estonia -- held an extraordinary meeting late Thursday to consider the
situation.
Prague will send another protest note to Havana, via a different diplomatic
route, deputy prime minister Pavel Rychetsky said.
Cuban charge d'affaires in Prague, David Paulovich, has stopped
communicating with the Czech foreign ministry, said Rychetsky, who accused Cuba
of violating international law.
State radio reported a six-strong delegation of Czech deputies is to travel
to Cuba to seek the pair's release.
European Parliament President Nicole Fontaine said Thursday she had called
on Cuban President Fidel Castro to immediately release the two Czech nationals.
Pilip is now a right-wing deputy of the Czech Republic's Parliament and
Bubenik was a student leader of the 1989 "Velvet Revolution".
No trial date for the Czechs has been announced. Cuba has tried several
foreign nationals for interference in its domestic affairs, but never anyone
holding the rank of parliamentarian Pilip.
"The indictments against the two Czech politicians demonstrate that the
Cuban regime does not respect fundamental rights recognized in international
conventions, such as freedom of expression and association," said a
telegram to Castro by Fontaine, made public here.
"Furthermore, the isolation of the two detained men, who have not been
able to contact their embassy, constitutes another violation of human rights."
The United States on Thursday condemned the arrests and demanded that
authorities on the communist-ruled island release the pair immediately.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Washington agreed fully with
the Czech government's denunciation of the arrests as "groundless."
((c) 2001 Agence France Presse)
Cuba seeking closure of Czech diplomatic office
MIAMI, Jan 18, 2001 -- (CTK - Czech News Agency) Cuba wants to harass the
Czech staff with a view to forcing it to close the Czech embassy in Cuba, an
unnamed Czech diplomat tells the daily El Nuevo Herald in connection with two
Czechs detained last week by the Cuban authorities and accused of being U.S.
agents.
The accusations of former finance minister Ivan Pilip and former student
activist Jan Bubenik of subversion are pointless, the diplomat said. The daily
writes that the ongoing crisis is part of a clash developed between Havana and
Prague since the moment a new democratic government was installed in the Czech
Republic.
The diplomat said that in the early 1990s Havana provoked a crisis, which
escalated by the closure of cultural centers in Prague and Havana. At that time
Havana exorbitantly increased the rent for the Czech center in Havana which had
to be closed. The Cubans, too, subsequently closed their center in Prague, the
diplomat said, adding that Cuban authorities evidently resented Czech magazines,
books and films which could be seen at the Czech center in Cuba.
The daily writes that Cuban dissidents Antonio Femenias and Roberto
Valdivia, who Pilip and Bubenik met in the Cuban town of Ciego de Avila, were
questioned again by the Cuban security authorities. Femenias and Valdivia said
that they had received neither money, nor medicines, nor political literature
from the two Czechs, the daily says. ((c) 2001 CTK - Czech News Agency)
Czech diplomat meets with Cuban counterparts
HAVANA, Jan 18, 2001 -- (Agence France Presse) A Czech diplomat met with
Cuban counterparts Wednesday as a diplomatic crisis intensified after the arrest
of two Czech nationals on charges of subversion.
Josef Marsicek, charged with negotiating for the Czech Embassy, was in the
Cuban foreign ministry for less than an hour and left without commenting on his
visit.
Over the weekend, Cuban authorities arrested two Czechs, including a former
deputy minister, accusing them of "attempting to establish subversive
contacts with counterrevolutionary residents" outside the Cuban capital and
said Tuesday the men would stand trial.
Ivan Pilip, is a right-wing deputy of the Czech Republic's Parliament, and
Jan Bubenik, was a student leader of the 1989 "Velvet Revolution."
No trial date for the Czechs was immediately set. Cuba has tried several
foreign nationals for interference in its domestic affairs, but never anyone of
the rank of parliamentarian Pilip. ((c) 2001 Agence France Presse)
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