News
US Lawyer Backs Cuban 5 at Event
The trial against five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters, imprisoned in the United States, and its arbitrariness were denounced before democratic lawyers of the world Monday on the third day of their 17th Conference.
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PL
Date
The trial against five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters, imprisoned in the United States, and its arbitrariness were denounced before democratic lawyers of the world Monday on the third day of their 17th Conference.
In that International Association of Democratic Lawyers (IADL) meeting, US National Lawyers Guild Chairwoman Marjorie Cohn reviewed the highlights of the case of the Five, as they are known in the world.
Cohn demonstrated the arbitrariness, partiality and motives of the sentences ordered against Gerardo Hernandez, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez, Ramon Labanino and Rene Gonzalez, arrested in September, 1998, when they were monitoring criminal actions by anti-Cuban groups based in Florida.
In her speech, the US lawyer said that after a seven-month trial, the Five received in June, 2001, accumulated sentences of four life imprisonments plus 75 years from a court in Miami.
Among other specifications at the antiterrorist-law commission, she said those Cuban fighters had peacefully penetrated criminal groups of exiles.
The federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) should have worked with them to prevent those actions against Cuba but instead, the US government accused them of being non-registered agents and of conspiracy, she said.
She also said the charge of conspiracy is usually used in US political trials, and supported the opinion in this reference of her colleague Leonard Weinglass, who is representing Antonio Guerrero.
She stated that according to Weinglass, the US authorities were never able to prove the crime of espionage, because the accused did not have any secret information. However, the sentence for conspiracy is the equivalent to having proved that they committed such act, she said.
In 2005, another court of appeals' panel of judges totally overthrew the charges against the Five.
However, a year later the US Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez appealed and that court withdrew its decision, in which it recognized that the federal trial should have been held out of Miami, because it was impossible to hold an impartial trial there, under the influence of Cuban-American groups.
The process returned to that Florida city and the same judge that had ordered the first sentence ratified it, she stated and said the process is now in the hands of the Supreme Court.
In contrast, Cohn highlighted how terrorist elements of Cuban origin freely roam US territory, as Luis Posada Carriles, notorious CIA agent, confessed perpetrator of the detonation of a Cubana de Aviacion airline passenger plane and the mastermind behind several explosions in Havana hotels.
The US attorney also denounced Washington's illegal blockade against Cuba, a measure that dates from almost 50 years ago to be the longest in the history of international relations.
No country has the right to change another nation's system, she said and recalled that the International Civil and Political Rights Convention, a treaty that the United States ratified, recognizes self-determination as a human right and guarantees all the people's free determination.
In that International Association of Democratic Lawyers (IADL) meeting, US National Lawyers Guild Chairwoman Marjorie Cohn reviewed the highlights of the case of the Five, as they are known in the world.
Cohn demonstrated the arbitrariness, partiality and motives of the sentences ordered against Gerardo Hernandez, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez, Ramon Labanino and Rene Gonzalez, arrested in September, 1998, when they were monitoring criminal actions by anti-Cuban groups based in Florida.
In her speech, the US lawyer said that after a seven-month trial, the Five received in June, 2001, accumulated sentences of four life imprisonments plus 75 years from a court in Miami.
Among other specifications at the antiterrorist-law commission, she said those Cuban fighters had peacefully penetrated criminal groups of exiles.
The federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) should have worked with them to prevent those actions against Cuba but instead, the US government accused them of being non-registered agents and of conspiracy, she said.
She also said the charge of conspiracy is usually used in US political trials, and supported the opinion in this reference of her colleague Leonard Weinglass, who is representing Antonio Guerrero.
She stated that according to Weinglass, the US authorities were never able to prove the crime of espionage, because the accused did not have any secret information. However, the sentence for conspiracy is the equivalent to having proved that they committed such act, she said.
In 2005, another court of appeals' panel of judges totally overthrew the charges against the Five.
However, a year later the US Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez appealed and that court withdrew its decision, in which it recognized that the federal trial should have been held out of Miami, because it was impossible to hold an impartial trial there, under the influence of Cuban-American groups.
The process returned to that Florida city and the same judge that had ordered the first sentence ratified it, she stated and said the process is now in the hands of the Supreme Court.
In contrast, Cohn highlighted how terrorist elements of Cuban origin freely roam US territory, as Luis Posada Carriles, notorious CIA agent, confessed perpetrator of the detonation of a Cubana de Aviacion airline passenger plane and the mastermind behind several explosions in Havana hotels.
The US attorney also denounced Washington's illegal blockade against Cuba, a measure that dates from almost 50 years ago to be the longest in the history of international relations.
No country has the right to change another nation's system, she said and recalled that the International Civil and Political Rights Convention, a treaty that the United States ratified, recognizes self-determination as a human right and guarantees all the people's free determination.