International Parliamentary Union members call for release of Five
Campaign News | Saturday, 22 October 2005
More than 50 MPs from across the world sign petition
GENEVA 22 Oct: More than 50 members of parliament from different countries meeting in this city signed a petition this week to demand freedom for the five Cuban political prisoners in US jails. The parliamentarians are in Geneva for the 113th Interparliamentary Union Assembly.
The legislators include MPs, deputies and senators and they represent different political parties from Latin America, Europe, Asia and Oceania. They joined a petition to the US Attorney General that states that considering the nullification of the sentence by an appeals court in the US in August, nothing justifies their continued incarceration and the Five should be immediately released from prison.
Gerardo Hernandez, Rene Gonzalez, Ramón Labanino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez were monitoring extremist Cuban American groups in South Florida to obtain information about their terrorist activities against Cuba.
The Geneva assembly elected Pier Ferdinando Casisni, speaker of Italy’s House of Deputies, as the new president of the Interparliamentary Union. The Cuban delegation to the meeting was headed by National Assembly Vice President Jaime Crombet.
Meanwhile in France, several parliamentarians who represent the Communist Party also signed the letter to the US Attorney General.
The president of the Communist group in the French Senate, Nicole Corvo, was the first to join the call, which states that although the biased Miami trial against the Five has been declared void, the Cubans remain in arbitrary incarceration, confined to maximum security prisons.
“The French Communist Party fully supports the international campaign to free Rene Gonzalez, Gerardo Hernandez, Ramón Labanino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez,” stressed Daniel Cirera, head of International Relations of the party.
Letters to the US Attorney General were also sent by deputies Fabienne Pourre, who chairs the Europe-World-Globalization Commission, and Jean-Claude Lefort, member of the National Assembly’s International Relations Commission.
http://www.periodico26.cu/english_new/giants/news/freedom231005.htm
