Human Rights Watch today called on the Cuban authorities to release two prominent Czech citizens who have been held in detention since January 12. The two detainees, Jan Bubenik and Ivan Pilip, were reportedly charged on Monday with the crime of acting against state security related to rebellion.
Cuban laws provide cover for all kinds of human rights abuse.
Pilip, a former finance minister and current member of the lower house of the Czech parliament, and Bubenik, a former student leader, entered Cuba on January 8. On January 11, Pilip and Bubenik met with two independent journalists in the province of Ciego de Avila, Antonio Femen as Echemend a and Roberto Valdivia Hern ndez, and were arrested the following day. The two Cuban journalists released a statement not long after the Czechs' arrest saying that they had met with Pilip and Bubenik to discuss the political, economic and social situation of their respective countries. The Cuban authorities have become increasingly hostile toward the Czech Republic, particularly since the latter country began co-sponsoring a U.N. resolution condemning human rights abuses in Cuba. Relations between the two countries began to deteriorate with the fall of communism in then-Czechoslakia in late 1989, and the rise to power of former dissidents like Czech President Vaclav Havel.