Cuban Hunger Strikes as Means of Pressure

Five Cubans are currently on hunger strike, a form of protest that has a long history in the country.

Although most hunger strikes end after a few days, others continue for much longer - in some cases until the protester dies. In the last three years, more than a dozen prisoners have died while on hunger strike.

Enrique Figuerola Miranda, 34, a leading member of the Patriotic Union of Cuba, UNPACU, is among the five currently on hunger strike. In pre-trial detention in the Boniato prison in Santiago de Cuba accused of attempted murder, he has not eaten since April 20.

Figuerola Miranda was arrested in July 2012, but although his case has come to court on three occasions, trial has been suspended for unknown reasons each time.

In Havana province, dissidents Miguel Alberto Ulloa Ginar, 23, and Reinier Mulet Levis, 26, both members of the Cuban Republican Party detained in Havana since April 10, are also on hunger strike.

The pair, who have not eaten anything since July 2, are accused of damaging state property after they wrote protest slogans on pavements, electricity posts and walls in Cokímar in the capital's Habana del Este municipality.

The slogans included "Freedom for Calixto Ramón". Calixto Ramón Martínez Arias is a journalist detained in September 2012 and released this April. He staged three hunger strikes while in detention, the last one joined by 60 sympathisers around the country. (For more, see Freedom for Detained Cuban Journalist and Sixty on Hunger Strike in Eastern Cuba.)

On June 24, Leoncio Rodríguez Ponce announced he was resuming a hunger strike because the authorities had not fulfilled a promise to send him back to Guantánamo, his city of origin. He had been transferred to a prison in the Pinar del Río province, on the other side of the island, as punishment for a previous hunger strike which he began along with 17 other prisoners in Guantánamo province, to press for improved prison conditions.

Osvaldo Rodríguez Acosta, leader of the Cuban Patriotic Alliance Movement began a new hunger strike on July 12 because the authorities failed to review convictions against him, his wife and his son. He recently ended a 40-day hunger protest in the Combinado del Este prison. (See Three Members of Dissident Family Face Trial in Cuba.)

One of the first recorded hunger strikes in Communist Cuba was that of Roberto López Chávez, 25, who died in December 1966 in the Isla de Pinos prison after 70 days.

Another prominent case was that of Pedro Luis Boitel, a dissident who spent 53 days on hunger strike before dying in May 1972 in Havana's Castillo del Príncipe prison.

There were no further fatal hunger strikes for nearly 40 years, until Orlando Zapata's death in February 2010 after 83 days.

Zapata was a construction worker born from Holguín province who received a lengthy prison sentence for dissident activities in 2003. He began his protest to demand better prison conditions and recognition as a political prisoner.

There was widespread international criticism following his death, although President Raúl Castro responded by dismissing hunger strikers as foreign agents.

"We will never yield to blackmail by any country or group of countries, no matter how powerful they may be, and no matter what happens," he said at the time.

Prisoners who mount hunger strikes are placed solitary confinement and are deprived of medical attention. They also risk beatings by prison warders, and are frequently refused water for days at a time in an attempt to break their will.

Activists say these tactics were used on Ramón Alejandro Muñoz González, a member of the Independent Afrocuban Foundation. He was beaten by staff in the Combinado del Este prison and later confined in a punishment cell where he was denied access to water. He subsequently gave up his hunger strike and remains in prison.

When Wilberto Parada and Roberto Hernández, both members of UNPACU, were detained in Havana, they fasted for more than 30 days to press home their claim that there was no reason for their arrest. They gave up at the end of June.

Parada's wife Yudislely Rodríguez said, "The prosecution has not determined what crimes they will be charged with or how long they'll be in prison."

Hunger strikers have also been known to sew their mouths shut with string or wire as an added demonstration of their commitment.

"A person who goes for over 20 days without eating runs the risk of contracting several stomach illnesses and infections from which there is no chance of recovery," Dr Eduardo Herrera Durán said, adding that a prolonged hunger strike was "effectively suicide".

Sometimes protests are successful. Luis Enrique Santos Caballero, a 46-year-old activist and member of the Pedro Luis Boitel National Movement for Civil Resistance, stopped eating on May 24 after police evicted him from the house where he lived.

After 17 days refusing food, Santos Caballero was taken to a civilian hospital in Santa Clara province. He ended his protest on July 18 after the authorities offered to rehouse him.