Car accident and kidnapping of Jose Daniel Ferrer

SANTIAGO DE CUBA.- The leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), José Daniel Ferrer García, remains unaccounted for, according to CubaNet, Carlos Amel Oliva Torres, the organization’s youth leader and relatives.

«Nobody has seen Ferrer, we are missing him and we do not rule out the possibility of him being beaten. His family was told at the police station that he had refused the conditions that had been put to him to give him the visit and that it was planted, «said Oliva Torres.

Ferrer García was arrested on the night of August 3 after a supposed automobile accident, in which State Security agent Dainier Suárez Pagán was implicated, accusing Ferrer of «attack», according to Captain Roberto told his relatives .

«Today was his wife Nelva Ortega and one of his children Daniel Ferrer Cantillo to visit, and they told him that he did not want to see them, now the case went to the Prosecutor’s Office and we have to wait 72 hours more to have an accurate answer, but as it passes we report it as missing, «said Oliva.

With regard to this our organization wants to record that «we do not believe in any information that we from any official of the Ministry of the Interior, we demand that they let see José Daniel Ferrer, and we will only issue a criterion on their physical and psychological integrity when a relative I can see it really. Meanwhile we do not believe in any opinion of any officer of the Minint, and we continue giving it as missing and possibly beaten, «said the young man.

Along with José Daniel Ferrer, the activist and driver of the car, Ebert Hidalgo Cruz, was arrested and is currently in the Criminal Operations Unit of Versailles.

Haydeé Hidalgo, daughter of the detained activist, recounts the most bitter minutes lived after seeing her father today during the visit, with tears in her eyes and a lump in her throat told one by one, «the saddest 10 minutes I’ve lived» .

«When we arrived Lieutenant Colonel Vaillant warned me and my brothers that we could not talk about the case for which my father had been arrested, we could only talk about family situations. When I saw him he was in depressing conditions, I felt like I wanted to die, since I was suffering from head injuries, and there was a blood stain on my shirt. He was anxious and with the presence of a nervous tic moving his legs and trembling. When I tried to see if he had marks on his body, he held himself up and down so that I would not see him, with tearful eyes he told me that he would stay firm and that we would stay united and strong. Today I fear for his life, since I know that he is being tortured there, psychologically and physically, «the daughter sealed after breaking into tears without saying another word.

Then Brother Ebert Luis Hidalgo added that throughout the interview they were accompanied by several soldiers and police dogs, but Lieutenant Colonel Vaillant, when they asked any questions about the case or his health, stomped on the floor as a form of intimidation and torture psychological, so he would not say anything.

Oliva Torres said that they have several statements of eyewitnesses on video, who said they saw that the agent was launched in front of the side of the car to be able to charge charges to José Daniel, «what they wanted was to blame him and make a crime,» he said. .

Later on, he said that the police officer, Dainier Suárez Pagán, is developing his repressive daily tasks in the town of Palmarito de Cauto, Mella. «He continues driving his motorcycle as if nothing, and this clearly indicates that he has no injuries.»

According to an observer of the event that was in the medical post in Mella, revealed that the agent arrived very upset and without asking permission he took the phone and said: «boss we already have it, do we accuse him?». Then he started to annoy the doctor who was treating the patients to get him a certificate of serious injuries, to which the doctor replied: «Sir, you do not have any slight injuries», but after his insistence she told him that He undressed partially to examine him, but he refused. The witness could not give references of if the doctor came to issue the certificate for injuries, because the rest of the conversation was behind closed doors.

To days of its seventh anniversary, the opposition Patriotic Union of Cuba has to date more than 50 political prisoners in prisons of the regime, being recognized inside and outside the Island as the most numerous and active among the Cuban dissident organizations.

After the question that if this new cause against the main leader of the organization will dent in the operation of the same, Oliva Torres answered: «the regime is who is betting on this, and should be clear that with imprisoning José Daniel and Ebert are not going to eliminate our activism within the Patriotic Union of Cuba, nor our support for the Cuba Decide Campaign. We will move forward, because this is a peaceful organization where each member feels an important part of something just, and we will move forward as long as there is only one activist in the streets. »

José Daniel Ferrer and Ever Hidalgo were arrested last Friday in Palmarito de Cauto. Activists of the opisición assure that they look for to process them to remove them of the streets and to restrain their political work against the regime.

MIAMI.- José Daniel Ferrer, national coordinator of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), reportedly went on hunger strike on Wednesday, August 8, according to his wife and son’s own prison agents where the detainee remains in custody. since last Friday.

The information was received in Miami by his brother Luis Enrrique Ferrer, who in statements to DIARIO LAS AMERICAS said that José Daniel would have made that decision because he was told that he would be allowed to see his family members on the condition that he did not give details about the process that continue against him.

The well-known opponent, resident in eastern Cuba, was arrested on Friday, August 3, around six in the afternoon, accused of attacking the life of a political police agent of the regime, identified as Dainier Suárez Pagán.

Luis Enrique Ferrer, who also represents UNPACU in South Florida, explained that on the day of the event, José Daniel was traveling in a car at the service of the opposition organization through the streets of Palmarito de Cauto, accompanied by the opponent, Ever Hidalgo. Cruz, who was driving the vehicle.

He assures that they had traveled to that place to visit the youngest daughter of José Daniel, who was sick, when in a very hilly street of the town the agent Suarez stepped out and threw himself in front of the vehicle to cause an accident.

Luis Enrique points out that due to the low speed at which the vehicle was being driven, the accident was very slight, so the alleged injured person received no major damage, to the point «that he was able to move himself to a polyclinic, where he requested that they will practice x-rays. Even at the scene of the accident, the police never showed up. »

However, four hours after the event, after 10 o’clock in the evening, a strong operative of the State Security surrounded the house of Jose Daniel, in Santiago de Cuba, where he had already returned and they took him arrested along with Ever Hidalgo .

Since then, no one was certain of where José Daniel was being held, because they denied information under the pretext that until the first 72 hours after the arrest, the case would be under the control of the prosecution and it would be that entity that would decide which charges would be impute the opponent.

For Luis Enrique, the alleged accident was a «planned event» to get his brother José Daniel out of the streets because of his strong political activism against the regime.

The police unit where José Daniel is arrested was attended this morning by his wife, Nelva Ortega and his son José Daniel Ferrer Jr., aged 15. Given the refusal of the agents to let him see, the relatives decided to remain in front of the police station, in protest.

According to the information offered by Luis Enrique, Ever Hidalgo, who is being held in the Operations Center of the Political Police in Santiago de Cuba (similar to Villa Marista) allowed him to receive a visit from his two sons in the morning hours of this Wednesday. Luis Enrique says that Hidalgo’s daughter had the impression that her father looked very nervous in restless, and had the traces of a wound still bleeding on the head.

Similarly, the daughter of Hidalgo appreciated that his father was evading talking about the process that is the subject with José Daniel Ferrer, and said: «Do what I do, I remain firm,» at the same time they left tears of the eyes.

Luis Enrique presumes that in the case of his brother they have avoided letting him see, to give him time to erase the marks of the blows that have surely been given him since the day he was arrested.

In the opinion of other people consulted by DIARIO LAS AMÉRICAS, following the arrest of José Daniel, «everything seems to be channeled under the accusation of having attacked an agent of the dictatorship,» which according to reports received from the island, he is in the streets, exercising his usual functions.

In addition to the operation that the Political Police has mounted around the houses of all the leaders of the organization, both in Santiago de Cuba and in Havana, the telephones also keep them intercepted.

Also, residents of the town where the incident took place, on condition of anonymity, have said that the police are taking statements from false witnesses at the scene of the events, in order to present evidence in a possible trial against José Daniel Ferrer and Ever Hidalgo.

Opponents to the castro regime in Miami filed a complaint about the arrest from the moment that Ferrer disappeared. When speaking with DIARIO LAS AMÉRICAS, the president of the Democracy Movement, Ramón Saúl Sánchez, said that the well-known opposition was «intercepted» by a Cuban State Security agent while traveling on board in a vehicle.

José Daniel Ferrer founded the UNPACU in 2011, after being arrested in 2003 as part of the so-called Group of 75 for his opposition work. He was released with extra-penal freedom under an agreement with the dictatorship and the Spanish Government, in which the church served as mediator.

In turn, the leader of the Cuba Decide project, Rosa María Payá, said she fears for Ferrer’s life and said that at the moment the opposition «is a hostage of the dictatorship», for which he called the international community and organizations that watch over human rights to intervene to achieve their liberation.

«José Daniel Ferrer has been one of the most important leaders of Cuba Decide, and this is a reprisal against us and against the UNPACU,» said Payá, one of the visible faces of exile at the moment in Miami.

Also, Luis Enrique Ferrer explained that taking advantage of the circumstances of the apparent accident, the regime forces were in charge of moving the vehicle involved and kept busy with the idea of ​​confiscation, «taking into account that it is a car at the service of the UNPACU.»

Source: Cubanet, Diario Las Americas