Professional Background
Normando
Hernández González is a writer and independent journalist. He is the
director of Camagüey College of Independent Journalists.
Current Status
Normando
Hernández’s health situation is grim. In December of 2006, he was
rushed in critical condition to the Amalia Simoni Provincial Hospital
in Camagüey after suffering from fainting spells. During his hospital
stay, he experienced nausea, diarrhea, fainting spells, fatigue and
fever. Nonetheless, he was kept in a room without a bed, table or chair
for an entire week. His food was thrown under the door on a tray and he
spent all day sitting on a bucket.
On December 27, State
Security soldiers removed Hernández from the Amalia Simoni Provincial
Hospital and took him back to Kilo 7 prison. Doctors claimed that the
hospital was lacking in the resources needed to treat Hernández’s
delicate condition.
Back at Kilo 7 prison, Normando Hernández’s health deteriorated further
due to a chronic gastro-intestinal disorder, which causes constant
diarrhea, headaches and intermittent fever. Furthermore, he suffers
from poor gastro-intestinal absorption and has lost at least 35 pounds.
In
April 2007, at the urging of Hernández’s mother, Costa Rican
legislators granted Hernández a humanitarian visa. In June, Cuban
officials refused to honor the visa. On September 10, 2007, Costa Rican
legislator Jose Manuel Echandi Meza presented a formal complaint to the
UN about Cuba's denial of an exit permit to Normando Hernández
González. The Costa Ricans say Cuba is violating Normando's "right to
health and freedom."
On September 14, 2007, Hernández was
moved from Kilo 7 Prison in Camagüey to the Carlos J. Finlay Military
Hospital in Havana. According to State Security officials, he will
receive a general checkup.
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Case History
On
March 18, 2003, Normando Hernández González was arrested in his
hometown of Camagüey, Cuba, along with 74 other journalists considered
to be dissidents by the Cuban government. Thirty-three-year-old
Hernández was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment under Article 91 of
the Cuban Criminal Code for reporting on the conditions of state-run
services in Cuba and for criticizing the government’s management of
issues such as tourism, agriculture, fishing, and cultural affairs. For
several months following his imprisonment, Hernández was kept in
solitary confinement and allowed only four hours of sunlight a week, no
access to television or radio, and extremely restricted communication
with his family. Furthermore, he was given only polluted water and
inadequate food, denied the right to practice religion, and offered
only the most basic medical services. In August, after engaging in a
hunger strike with seven other inmates in protest of the deplorable
prison conditions, Hernández was transferred to Kilo 5½ prison in Pinar
del Río, over 400 miles from his home and family.
In Pinar del
Río, Hernández was denied access to the outside world in any form, and
forced to share a small, filthy cell with insects, rodents, and
prisoners considered dangerous or mentally unstable. In March 2004,
Hernández’s wife, Yaraí Reyes Marín, was granted visitation rights and
spent a week traveling across Cuba to see her husband. Upon her
arrival, Reyes was stripped and interrogated by prison officials, and
ultimately neither she nor her daughter was permitted to see Hernández.
While at Pinar del Río, Reyes learned that Hernández had been badly
beaten by the Prison Chief of Security, and that his health was rapidly
deteriorating- claims which were both denied by prison officials.
Between February and May, Hernández was transferred three times to
different cells with similarly poor conditions, and uniformly denied
access to basic medical treatment.
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