Leading Cuban political prisoner Orlando Zapata died in hospital on Tuesday, 85 days into a hunger strike, medical officials said, as “indignant” dissidents blamed the government for his death.
A spokesman for Havana’s Hermanos Ameijeiras hospital, where the 42-year-old political prisoner was transferred late on Monday from a smaller clinic near his prison in the eastern province of Camaguey, said Zapata died at 1pm.
Jailed since 2003 and deemed a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, Zapata had been on a hunger strike to protest prison conditions that he blamed for his deteriorating health.
PHOTO: AFP
The movement “is not seeking martyrs,” said Oswaldo Paya, leader of the Christian Liberation Movement dissident group. Zapata died “defending the freedom, rights and dignity of all Cubans,” he said.
In Camaguey, authorities had placed the dissident in a provincial hospital before he was transferred by ambulance to Hermanos Ameijeiras, one of the biggest in the capital and outfitted with more care and surgical options.
Hours before Zapata’s death, the banned Cuban Committee for Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN) had said his condition was “very serious.”
Early this month, Cuban police harassed, beat and briefly jailed some 35 dissidents marching in Camaguey protesting the “cruel and inhuman treatment” of Zapata, CCDHRN said.
The group’s director, Elizardo Sanchez, said it was the first time in nearly 40 years that a Cuban opposition figure has died while on a hunger strike.
Zapata’s demise is “bad news for the human rights movement and for the government as well,” Sanchez said.
In Miami, a Cuban exile group quoted his mother as saying authorities essentially killed her son in Havana.
“They have done him in. My son’s death was a premeditated murder,” Reina Tamayo said in a statement released by the Cuban Democratic Directorate.
Hector Palacios, one of 75 political prisoners convicted in 2003 and who met Zapata in prison, said that “people are indignant” and that a national mourning and fasting period was being considered.
“I’m crushed,” said Palacios, who has been released for health reasons. Zapata “had no alternative but to decide on the hunger strike. The authorities took no pity on him, they just let him die,” he said.
Zapata was convicted in 2003 for political activities anathema to the only one-party communist regime in the Americas. He received a similar sentence to the other 75 dissidents, but while jailed his sentence was boosted to 25 years in subsequent trials.
The Cuban government denies holding any political prisoners, instead calling those imprisoned “mercenaries” in the pay of US opponents of the regime. Dissident sources however put the number of political prisoners at 200 in a country of more than 11 million.
Palacios said the timing was terrible for Havana. Just as Latin American leaders wrapped up a Rio Group regional summit in Mexico, “the world learns that in Cuba at this moment a man has just died from lack of attention,” he said. “It’s a political crime.”
Zapata’s death could also cast a shadow over a visit to the island by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio da Silva, who arrived late on Tuesday.
Cuban dissidents had written a letter to da Silva urging him to intercede to try to help Zapata or secure his release.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number