Date: 2009-02-10
Speaker: LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Florida

This last December 6. 2 months ago. was the ninth anniversary of the imprisonmentthe cruel and unjust imprisonment in a cold and damp cell in the most inhuman of conditions--of the great Cuban leader in the fight for democracy and human rights in that enslaved island. Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet. Dr. Biscet is prohibited from even walking in the prisons yard. and he is incarcerated along with common criminals. Dr. Biscet was released from prison in 2003. for a few weeks. before being rearrested and subsequently sentenced to 25 years in the gulag due to his peaceful prodemocracy activities. Biscet personifies the opposition to the brutal totalitarian regime Fidel Castro and his *brother. who the dictator has now given some additional titles to because of the ailing tyrants failing health. Dr. Biscet is an admirer of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. A physician by training. he began his opposition to the totalitarian regime by speaking out against the regimes forced abortion when there is any indication whatsoever that a pregnancy may have an abnormality policy. Biscet described that policy as inhuman. He was immediately fired from his job at the hospital. prohibited from practicing his profession as a physician. and his wife Elsa Morejon was also fired from her job as a practicing nurse. Within hours. the couple and their son were summarily evicted from their apartment and their physical possessions thrown into the street. Fortunately. an elderly patient of Elsa allowed the family to move into her house. Dr. Biscet continued peacefully denouncing the totalitarian regimes absolute denial of human rights to the Cuban people. and. because of that. he has been unjustly and cruelly imprisoned for 9 years and counting. Hundreds of other brave human rights activists are also suffering in the political prisons of the Cuban totalitarian dictatorship for the crime of supporting democracy and liberty and opposing tyranny. including 23 known journalists thrown into dungeons because of articles they wrote that bothered the dictator. No regime in the world has more journalists in prison. with the possible exception of another totalitarian dictatorship in an obviously much larger nation. communist China. A few weeks ago. the respected international organization. Reporters Without Borders. gave one of those Cuban journalists in the gulag. Ricardo Gonzalez Alfonso. sentenced by the Cuban tyrant to 20 years in prison in 2003. and currently in very poor health. the Reporters Without Borders Journalist of the Year Award. Reporters Without Border is to be commended. Mr. Speaker. Three other Cuban prisoners of conscience. Aldolfo Fernandez Sainz. Pedro Arguelles Moran. and Antonio Diaz Sanchez. are known to have begun a hunger strike due to brutal conditions they are subjected to. Where is the outrage. Mr. Speaker? Where is the international solidarity? Where is there one word of coverage of this in the worlds press? The reality is that for too many in the world today Cubans are supposed to be content with their lot. to be quiet. to. in the words of one of our colleagues in this Congress recently. to move on. The regime that enslaves a Nation and imprisons hundreds of heroes simply for their beliefs deserves unilateraJ rewards and concessions. many argue. such as more travel or dollars. But Dr. Biscet and the many other heroes imprisoned in the Castro brothers gulag will not be able to be ignored forever. They must be freed. And political parties must be legalized. as well as independent press agencies. and labor unions. And free and fair elections must take place in Cuba. Many of those imprisoned today. Mr. Speaker. will be democratically elected leaders tomorrow. That is what is going to happen in Cuba tomorrow. Today. as they suffer the most unjust of cruel imprisonment. we here remember and honor them and. once again. demand the immediate release of all prisoners of conscience in the Castro brothers infernal gulag.