When it comes to confronting the Cuban dictatorship, I do not particularly subscribe to the tactic of hunger strikes. For one, the Castro regime could not care less if a political prisoner harms their own body or starves him or herself to death. In fact, despite the public relations challenges it may present, the dictatorship ultimately views the death of a political prisoner as one less dissident they need to deal with.
Nonetheless, I can understand why Cuban political prisoners, who have no weapon to combat the tyranny of the Castro regime other than their own bodies, resort to hunger strikes. It is an act of desperation. And let no one forget that it is the world’s apathy for the misery suffered by Cubans that has played a major role in bringing about this desperation.
Cuban political prisoner Osvaldo Rodriguez Acosta starts hunger strike
Osvaldo Rodríguez Acosta, right, and his wife, Juana Castillo.Cuban political prisoner Osvaldo Rodriguez Acosta on Jan. 24 started a hunger strike to demand that prosecutors invesigate police for stealing money from him and his family, according to a report posted by the CIHPRESS news agency.
“I demand they open an investigation because that is a violation,” said Rodriguez, head of the Cuban Patriotic Alliance Movement.
Rodriguez, his wife Juana Castillo and their son Osvaldo were beaten and arrested Sept. 23. They were charged with assaulting an Interior ministry official during an earlier raid.
Castillo was released Jan. 1 after more than three months in jail. The couple’s son remains held, facing charges of attempted murder and destroying state property after someone damaged the windshield on a police vehicle.
The family has denied the charge.
The elder Rodriguez is currently an inmate the El Combinando del Este prison in Havana.