US slams Cuba dissident arrests as 'intimidation tactic'

US slams Cuba dissident arrests as 'intimidation tactic'

Washington (AFP) - The United States on Monday blasted Cuba's recent
mass arrest of dissidents as an "intimidation tactic" to silence
critics, and called for the end to such detentions.

Cuban authorities broke up a Sunday march by the Ladies in White,
arresting about 100 of the opposition activists as they marked the 20th
anniversary of the sinking of a tugboat in which 37 people drowned while
seeking to flee the communist-ruled island.

"We strongly condemn the Cuban government's continued use of this
intimidation tactic to silence its critics and disrupt peaceful
assembly," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement.

"We urge the government of Cuba to end these practices and respect the
universal human rights of the Cuban people."

Relatives who lost loved ones in the tragedy blame the regime for what
happened, while Havana maintains it was an accident.

Psaki described the tugboat as having been "sunk by the Cuban government
20 years ago."

The Ladies in White, formed in 2003 by wives and relatives of political
prisoners, marches in the Cuban capital every Sunday after mass at Santa
Rita parish church.

Since theirs is the only group with government permission for regular
protests, arrests are few and infrequent.

But on Sunday, dozens of police surrounded the large crowd of marchers
two blocks from the church after they headed toward the sea instead of
along their usual route.

Source: US slams Cuba dissident arrests as 'intimidation tactic' - Yahoo
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