Cuban dissident “Antúnez” arrested after video testimony to U.S. Senate

Posted on Tuesday, 06.12.12

Cuban dissident "Antúnez" arrested after video testimony to U.S. Senate

Wife says dissident known as Antúnez was beaten in Cuban police lockup
By Juan O. Tamayo
jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com

Cuban dissident Jorge Luis García Pérez, known as Antúnez, was arrested,
beaten in a police lockup and is being held in an unknown location after
he testified by video-conference before a U.S. Senate subcommittee, his
wife reported Monday.

Another dissident, meanwhile, said neighbors in the eastern town of
Palma Soriano reported a gasoline bomb went off in an empty field Sunday
and a second one was found intact. Neighbors said investigators told
them the bombs might be the work of government opponents, Dunieky
Dominguez Gonzalez, a Palma Soriano dissident, said in a telephone
interview. Anti-government violence is extremely rare in Cuba.

Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera, the wife of Antúnez, said that she and two
supporters were heading to the State Security headquarters in the
central city of Santa Clara to demand information on where her husband
is being held.

García told the Senate Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs
Thursday that the Obama administration's policies toward Cuba amount to
"appeasement (that) only strengthens the repressive apparatus and the
impunity of the aggressors."

He and dissidents Loreto Hernandez and Jonniel Rodriguez walked out of
Antúnez's house in the town of Placetas at 3 p.m. Saturday and were
arrested and taken to a police lockup, Pérez Aguilera said.

When she and another dissident went to inquire about the men, she said
State Security agents punched and kicked them. After she screamed, Perez
Aguilera said, her husband and other prisoners started yelling in
protest, prompting police to fire pepper spray into the cells and beat
Antúnez until he fainted.

He was removed from the lockup around 7:30 p.m., she said, and has not
been heard from since. The others were released late Saturday and early
Sunday.

Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., who chaired the subcommittee where Antúnez
testified last week, said he was "outraged but not surprised" at his
arrest, "further proof of the brutality of the Castro brothers' regime."

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/06/12/2844551/cuban-dissident-antunez-arrested.html