​El Héroe de la República de Cuba y Licenciado en Relaciones Internacionales, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, fue presentado hoy como nuevo Vicerrector del Instituto Superior de Relaciones Internacionales  “Raúl Roa García” (ISRI), en un sencillo acto presidido por el Canciller Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla.
 
Egresado de esta institución universitaria en 1988, Gerardo regresa ahora al ISRI para compartir sus conocimientos y experiencias con un joven y entusiasta colectivo de estudiantes y un experimentado colectivo académico encabezado por su Rectora Isabel Allende Karam.
 
Junto a esta noticia, circula también en las redes sociales la buena nueva de que Gerardo y Adriana esperan ahora dos hermanitos para la pequeña Gema.

CUBADEBATE
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​by EVA GOLINGER
 
It was nearly nine o’clock that Wednesday December 17, 2014 when I saw a tweet by Rene Gonzalez, one of the five Cuban spies who had been imprisoned in the United States for over a decade. THEY RETURNED! I had to look twice. Could it be true? I quickly started searching in newspapers and digital media for any news about the Five, as they were known in Cuba, but all pointed to Rene’s tweet. Minutes later, in three consecutive tweets Rene presented concrete evidence to allay any doubts. The papers for the release from prison of Gerardo, Ramon and Antonio were signed. They were free.
 
Previously, on December 4, Gerardo was abruptly transported from the maximum security prison in Victorville, California where he had spent most of his 16 year prison term and taken to a penitentiary center in Oklahoma City. Without knowing why he was there he was put in the “hole”, another term for solitary confinement in a cell with no window or contact with other prisoners, subjected to brutal and inhumane treatment by the guards. He was left there for eleven days. On December 15, he was suddenly transferred to a prison hospital in Butner, North Carolina. He was not even given time to gather and bring the few personal possessions he had accumulated over the last 16 years in prison.
 
Across the country in Florida, Antonio was awoken at five o’clock in the morning on Monday December 15, in his prison cell in Marianna, a medium security penitentiary. He was only told to pack his personal items, nothing more. He complied, not knowing where he was being taken or why. He was then transported in a private jet to the prison hospital in Butner. There, he thought he’d have to adapt again to a new surrounding and make his life in that prison.
 
That same day, Ramon, still registered under the false name he used during his intelligence mission in the United States, Luis Medina, was also taken from his cell in Georgia to the prison hospital in Butner. He wasn’t given any instructions or information about the reason for his transfer. It was not until the next day, on December 16, that all three – Gerardo, Ramon and Antonio – met face to face in the same place, and they knew from that moment on they were going home.

They found it impossible to contain their happiness. Between smiles, jokes and hugs, US officials got so nervous that when they brought the three of them to the plane on the early morning of December 17, they forced them to speak English. Perhaps the feared Castro-spies would still be conspiring against the country that had deprived them of their freedom for the past 16 years. In a final blow, as the plane approached their homeland, the authorities covered the windows of the plane. They couldn’t even see the arrival into Cuba.
 
Antonio was first off the plane. He wanted it to be Gerardo, but because of the way they had been seated on the plane, it just wasn’t possible. The humid air from the tropical island entered him like a breath of love, and at that time, he said, their haunted past just evaporated. Suddenly they saw their family and exploded with joy. Antonio, with his mother Mirta in an embrace of infinite love; Ramon covering his wife Elizabeth with affectionate kisses; and Gerardo, caressing his beautiful wife, Adriana, with her belly full of life. In a symbolic, nationwide embrace, President Raul Castro was there to receive them, alongside the other two former Cuban spies, Rene Gonzalez and Fernando Gonzalez, who had been released months earlier.
 
GERARDO AND ADRIANA
 
Gerardo Hernandez was given two life sentences plus fifteen years in a high maximum security prison in the United States for espionage-related charges.
 
Gerardo is a handsome man, with a friendly and youthful face. He is more reserved than the other four, and appears to deeply ponder his words before saying them out loud. When I saw him for the first time at the International Press Center in Havana, we hugged and he told me he always read my writings when he was in jail. We talked for a long time in a rather large room, accompanied by Ramon and Rene.
 
His relatives were in the room and everything had the feel of an informal interview. He told me about the motives behind his clandestine work in Miami and details of his operational activities. He was the team leader, the head of the “Wasp Network” whose agents infiltrated anti-Castro groups to discover and prevent their violent actions against Cuba. He used a false identity during his seven years of intelligence work in the United States until his arrest on September 12, 1998. Gerardo was in charge of coordinating and processing the intelligence information he collected from the agents who had penetrated anti-Castro organizations in Florida. He then would send it all to Havana through various secret methods. Gerardo was the link between the undercover agents and the Cuban government.
 
After a while, I asked Gerardo if I could accompany him to his house to talk to him with his wife, Adriana. I wanted a more casual, comfortable and familiar atmosphere to better understand their story. Graciously, he accepted my request and we got in his car and drove off. We arrived at his residence that warm day, and Gerardo went in first to let Adriana know we were there. When I entered, the first person I saw was Gema, then three months old, in a little bassinet in the foyer. She was beautiful. Her gorgeous round face and the depth of her clear blue eyes were captivating. “What a beautiful Gem”, I exclaimed, and Gerardo answered, “Yes, she looks like her Mom”. Adriana, entered the room and greeted me warmly. She is a very pretty woman who exudes remarkable internal strength. She offered us a drink to freshen up and we went into the courtyard to sit down and talk.
 
“I want to show you something first”, said Gerardo, carrying a plant in his hands. “One day we went to a place around here and they gave us this bonsai”. He showed it to me closely, holding it up high. “You see, my wife is a bit small in stature, but very beautiful, and I always called her bonsai. In the letters I wrote her from prison, I would always refer to her as Bonsai”. They both laughed. “Because of this, the Americans thought that she was a spy and her nickname was Bonsai”, Gerardo said while chuckling. Sure, they can laugh now at the absurd treatment they received from US authorities, but in reality the lengthy separation Gerardo and Adriana suffered was excruciatingly painful.
 
Leaving the bonsai in the garden, Gerardo picked up little Gema in his arms and walked over to a large comfortable chair and sat down. Adriana sat on the arm of the chair, gently leaning on her husband as though she never wanted to let him out of her touch. Looking at that beautiful, young couple with their aura of happiness, preciously holding their adorable baby girl close between them, I wanted to know how this all happened. “Tell me how it all began and how we got to this point”, I asked, nodding my head towards Gema. The story of Gerardo and Adriana is a true love story.
 
“I was studying international relations”, began Gerardo, “and I had to take three or four guagaus (buses) to get to my school. One day, at the bus stop I saw a very beautiful young woman and fell right in love with her. It was love at first bus”, they laughed. “I was immediately tormented, I could not think of anything else but her and that night I wrote a poem. It was called ‘A woman whose name I do not know’, because I didn’t even know her name, I only knew I loved her”.
 
“I was 16”, added Adriana, “and he was 21. I was not interested in him. I was into my studies and did not want to be distracted”. But Gerardo was insistent and persistent. He tried his best to coincide again with Adriana at the bus stop, but it took him a lot of time, patience and coordination to make it happen. All the while, he carried the poem he had written for her in his pocket. He was determined to find her again and not let her get away without at least trying to talk to her. A few days later, Gerardo’s wish came true, he ran into Adriana at the bus stop and handed her the poem he had written about her.
 
“The poem became reality. It said we were going to meet again and fall in love”, revealed Adriana. “One day we went to sit on the boardwalk overlooking the sea. We were watching the boats. Gerardo signaled to my left and told me to look at a big boat out in the water. Then he pointed towards the other side, saying an even bigger boat was there. When I went to look that way, his face was right next to mine and we kissed. In that instant, I fell in love with him”.
 
They married when Adriana turned 18 in 1988, and months later, Gerardo went to fight in Angola with the Cuban internationalist brigade. He was awarded for his bravery and skills, and Cuba’s intelligence agency took an interest in him. Shortly thereafter, Gerardo was recruited as an intelligence officer and commissioned to lead a special mission in the United States. Adriana knew nothing about his real work. She thought he had joined the ranks of Cuban diplomacy, as he had told her, and when her husband had to go abroad before they had even been married and lived together for a year, she thought he was going to work at the Embassy of Cuba in Argentina. “It was the special period in Cuba, we had severe economic difficulties in our country and families could not accompany the diplomats abroad”, she explained.
 
In reality, Gerardo had left for Miami under another identity. He began his new secretive life as a Puerto Rican named Manuel Viramontez. Gerardo coordinated a team of Cuban agents who had infiltrated several groups of exiles in Miami that were known for their violent actions against Cuba. Different from the glamour of James Bond films, Gerardo’s work was tedious and meticulous. Once he received intelligence from his agents through intricately arranged clandestine meetings, he would verify, process and then communicate the information to headquarters in Havana. Then, he would follow through with whatever instructions were sent back to him. He was only able to visit Cuba and Adriana two or three times maximum during each year. He would travel to Cancun, Mexico as Manuel Viramontez, where he was met by Cuban officials who then gave him his real passport to return home to visit his wife.
 
In the mid-nineties, after several years on this mission, separated in distance from each other, Gerardo and Adriana talked about their desire to start a family and have a child. “We could never find the time and right circumstance to do it”, said Gerardo. “We always thought the time would come later”.
 
But a few years later, something totally unexpected happened. On September 12, 1998 at 5:30 am, a dozen heavily armed FBI agents entered his humble apartment in Miami and arrested him. “I told them my name was Manuel Viramontez and I was Puerto Rican, an American citizen. They told me they knew who I really was and what I was doing. I said nothing else”.
 
For months, Adriana heard nothing from her husband. No letters, no calls, no visits. The news of his arrest hadn’t come out publicly because he wasn’t using his real name, nor did he reveal it to the FBI. Finally months later, after much worry and despair, officials from the Interior Ministry in Cuba knocked on her door and asked to come inside. They told her about Gerardo’s real work and his unfortunate arrest. He wasn’t alone, they informed her, several others were arrested with him. She was told to not say anything to anyone else in her family. “It was difficult because no one could know that Gerardo was imprisoned in the US. I had to act like everything was normal”, she related.
 
Finally, Gerardo’s real name became public during the beginning of his trial after an acquaintance had recognized his picture in a local Miami paper, and Adriana didn’t have to keep silent anymore about her anguish. But when she tried to apply for a visa to see him in prison, her request was denied by the US government. “They accused her of being an intelligence agent as well”, said Gerardo. “It was a way to blackmail me. They did everything to try and force us to betray Cuba and when they realized we weren’t going to, then they denied the visa to her as punishment”.
 
Gerardo was given two life sentences plus fifteen years, a completely disproportionate and unjust sentence (that’s another story). “They wanted me to collaborate with the US government because it would have been a major blow to Cuba. None of the officers who were arrested betrayed our country, though the US kept trying until the last moment”.
Sixteen years went by before Adriana and Gerardo would see each other again. Countless attempts to visit him throughout more than a decade were all rejected by the United States. The years were passing by and she was unable to achieve her dream of having Gerardo’s child. But she never faltered in her love for him, nor did she seek solace in other men. Instead, she fought for his freedom every day, traveling the world to plea with international solidarity groups, celebrities, parliaments and governments to join the struggle for his release.
 
By 2012, Adriana was 42 years old with a husband sentenced to two life terms in prison in the United States. They had been together since she was 16. She had known no other love, nor did she desire to. However, her chances of achieving motherhood were rapidly decreasing. Instead of giving up, Adriana began a low profile international humanitarian campaign to plead for her right to have a child with her husband. “I had not been charged with anything, why then were they denying me my right to have a child with my husband?”
 
Many around the world heard their pleas and sympathized with their situation. “I want to mention some people who have made this possible”, Gerardo told me in our conversation, Gema asleep on his chest. “Vilma Espin, who was president of the Federation of Cuban Women, had a very large role in supporting Adriana”. I asked if it was true that a US official had also helped. “Yes, it’s true. A US senator, Patrick Leahy and his wife helped us”, he said.
 
“They listened to me”, chimed in Adriana. “I met with the Senator and his wife and they understood the humanitarian side of my situation, and they graciously helped me”.
 
In early 2014, while the governments of Cuba and the United States had already begun secret negotiations to restore relations, another plan was underway. President Obama had authorized Adriana’s humanitarian petition and one day in April, a frozen capsule was taken by a US official from the maximum security prison in Victorville, California, to a fertility clinic in Panama. When Adriana arrived in Panama, she was nervous and excited about what could happen. “We did not know if it would work, the procedure was done and I left and went back to Cuba”, she said, still with an air of wonder about the miracle that came to life.
 
At that time, nobody knew what would happen months later between the US and Cuba. It was impossible to imagine both Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro simultaneously announcing on television that relations between the two Cold War enemies would be restored. Adriana had to keep her pregnancy secret from everyone except the few Cuban officials who knew, and Gerardo. Neither she nor Gerardo were aware of the negotiations between Washington and Havana that were underway, they were only told that the pregnancy must be kept secret from the public. She was just happy to have a baby growing inside her and felt that even though she would not have her husband with her at least she would have his child.
 
“How did you find out about his release from prison?” I asked her. “They told me in a very delicate way, because my pregnancy was already far along (8 months) and they didn’t want me to get too excited and risk going into labor”, she replied.
 
On December 17, a plane embellished with the US flag landed in Cuban territory and Gerardo, a man condemned for life, was now free. The first embrace between Gerardo and Adriana was filled with intensity, happiness, tears of joy and pure love. She had resisted and stood strong for 16 years, as he had too, always faithful, loyal and committed to each other and their country.
 
Twenty days after his release and arrival to Cuba, Gema was born with both her mother and father present to receive her into this world. “It was the happiest day of my life”, said Gerardo, with no doubt.
 
“We want her to be a happy and cheerful girl like all other children, and have an ordinary life like everyone else”, Gerardo said to me, our conversation coming to an end. I watched them with a sense of transcendence. Their story is not just a personal story. It’s the story of Cuba, the story of a nation – a people – that have withstood and remained steadfast, loyal, dignified and strong in the face of the toughest and most powerful obstacles, and they prevailed. And it was all done for love. Love of country, love for the people, love for humanity.
 
I looked at Gerardo and gestured with my hands towards Gema in his arms, and said with an uncontainable smile, “I’m sure she will be far from ordinary”.
 
***
 
Within the story of the Cuban Five, there is a wealth of experiences and lessons emblematic of the greatest struggles of humankind. The sense of duty that guided each of them gave them the strength to resist through insufferable conditions. The thread woven through all their stories, that kept them strong with clear hearts and minds, was always the unconditional support of their wives, families, mothers, sisters, sons, daughters and friends around the world. They were never alone, even during the 17 months they were forced into inhumane solitary confinement, the “hole”. As Antonio said, they were never really prisoners. “Every night in my prison bed, as I laid my head on the pillow knowing that I had fulfilled my duty, I knew I was free”.
 
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Eva Golinger is the author of The Chavez Code. She can be reached through her blog.
 
COUNTERPUNCH

​Gerardo Hernández is one of the three of the Cuban Five who had been behind bars since 1998, until U.S. President Obama freed them on December 17, 2014. The release of the three was part of the agreement negotiated between the U.S. and Cuban governments concerning future relations between the two countries. Two of the Cuban Five, René González and Fernando González were released in 2011 and 2013 after serving their full sentences. Cuba maintained its absolute insistence that the remaining three prisoners be freed and as the international protests continued to grow, freedom for Gerardo, Ramón and Antonio became a vital issue in the negotiations.
 
Introduction by Heide Trampus and MC'ed by Juan Carranza. Presentations by:
Jorge Garcia, United Steelworkers Canada
Lisa Makarchuk, Friends of Cuba Against the U.S. Blockade
Joe Mihevc, Toronto City Councillor, Ward 21
Pablo Godoy, United Food and Commercial Workers Canada
Miguel Figueroa, Communist Party of Canada
Brian Gordon Sinclair, author and dramatic interpreter of Ernest Hemingway
Javier Dómokos Ruiz, Consul General of the Republic of Cuba in Toronto
Gerardo Hernández, one of the Cuban Five anti-terrorist fighters unjustly imprisoned in the USA (Sept 1998-Dec 2014)

LEFTSTREAMED COLLECTIVE
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On this day a year ago, Gerardo Hernandez woke up in solitary confinement in a U.S. prison for the last time. In the early morning, guards took him, shackled, from the cell and bundled him on to a plane. Mr. Hernandez had been in jail for 16 years, sentenced to two life sentences plus 15 years. The day before, terse State Department officials had come to tell him he would soon be going home; nevertheless, he couldn’t quite believe it when the plane took off and headed south.

He landed on a tarmac in Cuba, alongside two comrades, a free man. Hours later, he was sitting beside Raul Castro as the Cuban President announced the normalization of relations with the United States.

“Until that moment, nobody imagined how far things had gone,” Mr. Hernandez, a former undercover agent of the Cuban government, recalled in a recent conversation with The Globe and Mail.

Mr. Hernandez is articulate, warm and humble; his is the freshest and most-admired face of institutional Cuba these days. Mr. Castro has pledged to step down in 2018, and there is widespread speculation here that the 50-year-old Mr. Hernandez will be tapped for a senior role in the new political formation that succeeds him.

Mr. Hernandez was the leader of the “Cuban Five” sent to Miami in the 1990s to infiltrate the hard-line anti-Castro community of Cuban exiles who boasted about carrying out acts of terrorism in their former homeland.

The cell of agents, known by the code name The Wasp Network, was cracked by the FBI and the men were arrested in 1998. They were tried in Miami and found guilty of a host of illegal activity, including conspiracy to commit espionage and, most gravely, conspiracy to commit murder, in connection with an incident in which the Cuban government shot down two exile-piloted planes that it says entered Cuban airspace, killing the pilots, who were U.S. citizens.

In Cuba, the jailed men were portrayed as heroes paying a huge price for their service to the homeland. The government angrily pointed out that it had provided the FBI with information, gathered by these same agents, that exiles known to have carried out violent acts against Cuba were walking free in Miami.

But in the United States, the story of the Five was almost unknown and it seemed Mr. Hernandez and his fellow agents might never come home – until their exchange in a prisoner swap became the linchpin of the surprise end of the long Cold War with Cuba. Three of them were released on Dec. 17, 2014. The other two had been returned to Cuba earlier.

Things had gone far indeed, as the United States ended more than 50 years of isolation of Cuba and restored diplomatic relations. Mr. Hernandez went from maximum-security prison in California to adulation in Havana. He has spent much of the past year on a global “thank you tour” for those allied nations that lobbied for the Cuban Five, including Venezuela and Brazil.

“You can imagine him as president, he is so beloved,” said Ariel Terrero, director of the Jose Marti International Journalism Institute in Havana. A year after his return, people still stop Mr. Hernandez to ask for selfies everywhere he goes. “But then a lot of people also say he has given so much already, he should be permitted a quiet life now,” Mr. Terrero added.

When Mr. Hernandez arrived in Mr. Castro’s office a year ago – a moment shown live on national television – his wife, Adriana Perez, who had never been granted a visa to visit him in jail, flew into his arms. Many Cubans were startled to see that she was pregnant – nine months pregnant, as it happened. Their daughter, Gema, was born just three weeks after his return.

It emerged that Gema’s conception was a part of the great Cuba-U.S. thaw. Ms. Perez was past 40 and despairing of ever being able to fulfill their dream of having a child when she had the chance to meet U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy and his wife on a visit to Cuba. She pleaded with them to help arrange for Mr. Hernandez to inseminate her, and they agreed – a good-faith gesture, as Mr. Leahy was also hoping to persuade Cuba to provide better treatment to Alan Gross, a U.S. government contractor imprisoned as a spy in Cuba after he was caught giving out telecommunications equipment.

So State Department officials arranged for the clandestine hand-carried export of Mr. Hernandez’s sperm, delivered to Ms. Perez at a clinic in Panama. The resulting pregnancy nearly derailed the secret talks on normalizing relations, forcing the United States to plead with Cuba to keep Ms. Perez and her belly hidden in the last days of negotiations, lest they trigger awareness some sort of deal was afoot and provoke backlash in Miami.

When President Barack Obama announced the change in relations with Cuba, he thanked Canada for facilitating the secret talks that brokered the détente. There is another Canadian behind the scenes in the Cuban Five story: veteran Halifax journalist Stephen Kimber, who in 2013 publishedWhat Lies Across the Water: The Real Story of the Cuban Five.

On a holiday in Cuba in 2004, Mr. Kimber noticed “Free the Five” propaganda posters; his interest eventually grew into an obsession that led him to read tens of thousands of pages of documents to reconstruct how the men wound up in jail. His account – particularly details of the biases in the legal proceedings for the Five – was startling.

And while it wasn’t a bestseller, it was circulated in influential political circles in Washington, where those seeking a détente with Cuba found in it a basis to persuade the Justice Department that the trials could be revisited.

The release of the Five was non-negotiable for Cuba, and fundamental to any deal with the United States, Mr. Kimber said in a telephone interview from Halifax.

The book is now being made into a film, a Cuban-Canadian co-production spearheaded by Barrie Dunn, producer of the Trailer Park Boys movie.

Mr. Hernandez returned to a vastly different Cuba than the one he left – one where the economy had collapsed with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the future seemed bleak, indeed. Today, a process of economic reform has small businesses opening on every corner; Internet access is still limited but spreading and dropping fast in price.

“When I left the country, people had money but they had nothing to do with it – now it’s the opposite,” Mr. Hernandez observed in his smooth English, which bears small hints of prison inflection. “Some people are making some money – in my time, you didn’t see that.”

With that comes a new inequality, and Mr. Hernandez’s analysis speaks to the big questions that preoccupy the regime today.

“Most Cubans, including myself, know where they want to go: toward the most equitable society possible. You cannot avoid a certain level of inequality in a society, but we need to figure out a system that helps the people at the bottom more than others. We have to figure out a system to produce wealth, and our economic system is not working as well as we would like. Part of that can be blamed on the [U.S.] blockade, but not everything.”

He added, “One good thing is that we know what our problems are, and we discuss them openly – a few years ago we didn’t discuss.”

Mr. Hernandez is an enthralled father, eager to show off pictures of baby Gema, and he appears a remarkably light-hearted soul– perhaps surprising, Mr. Kimber pointed out, given his extensive experiences in solitary confinement and exposure to vicious prison environments where other inmates were murdered.

He betrays no bitterness. “I believe that if I keep hatred in myself, they win,” he said. And he won’t begrudge the years that were stolen from his life with Adriana. “Today was another day I stole off my two life sentences,” he said with a grin.

And how will he use those days? “Be useful. I’m a soldier,” he said. He speaks easily about the flaws in Cuba’s revolution, but it is obvious he remains intensely loyal to it. He will do whatever the government asks of him, he said, then hastened to emphasize that he seeks no formal position. “Having a larger role in Cuba is more complicated, so I hope it’s not larger,” he said. “There are many people better prepared than me to tackle the problems we’re facing.”

Mr. Kimber, who corresponded extensively with Mr. Hernandez while the latter was in prison and has since spent time with him in Cuba (where the book was recently launched in Spanish), said the Five, all of them smart and articulate, are a political asset the regime is unlikely to squander. “Whether they have political ambitions or not, the government has plans for them, he said. “Gerardo, in particular, is as good as any politician I’ve ever seen. … He is incredibly smart, accessible, and also a pragmatist– if you were going to try to make a deal, this would be a good person to make it with.”

Mr. Hernandez displays a keen sense of the urgency of safeguarding Cuba’s interests. The generation that delivered the revolution is “by natural law, passing,” as he put it delicately, and young people born in the post-Soviet era have known only hardship.

“Some people … don’t give history the weight it deserves: Imperialism doesn’t disappear because we have diplomatic relations,” he said. “Many powerful interests are looking at this [thaw] as an opportunity to achieve what they couldn’t do before,” in terms of undermining the Castros, Raul and his older brother, Fidel – now through a rush of international capital rather than sanctions.
​
“But people are not naive,” Mr. Hernandez said, before turning to the next knot of well wishers seeking photos and a handshake in the office where he met with The Globe. “And the majority of people don’t want us to give up what the revolution brought us and go back to what Cuba was in 1959.”

THE GLOBE AND MAIL

El Héroe de la República de Cuba sostuvo este viernes un encuentro con miembros de esta red,  la cual apoyó la lucha por la liberación de los cinco antiterroristas cubanos

Juventud Rebelde 
digital@juventudrebelde.cu

BRUSELAS, septiembre 18.— El Héroe de la República de Cuba Gerardo Hernández sostuvo este viernes un encuentro con miembros de la Red de Abogados Progresistas de Bélgica, la cual apoyó la lucha por la liberación de los cinco antiterroristas cubanos.
Durante las conversaciones Edith Flamand, miembro de la Red, le confirmó que aún «me parece un caso irreal. En cuanto lo estudié supe que era completamente injusto. Finalmente logramos despertar de esta pesadilla que fue una mezcla de esperanza y desesperación» 
Flamand recordó su participación en la audiencia realizada en Atlanta el 20 de agosto de 2007 como parte del proceso de apelación, así como su trabajo con la Comisión Internacional de Investigación creada en Londres.
La idea de organizar una Comisión acerca del caso surgió en septiembre de 2012 durante un intercambio entre el abogado Jan Fermon y Olga Salanueva, esposa de René.
La propuesta, llevada al Encuentro Europeo de Solidaridad con Cuba, celebrado el propio año en Berlín, obtuvo un respaldo masivo de los grupos presentes.
Por su parte, Hernández agradeció en nombre de sus hermanos de lucha y de los familiares, el apoyo recibido por esa organización. Su respaldo y en general el de toda la solidaridad nos ayudó a resistir cada día en prisión, recalcó.
El presidente estadounidense, Barack Obama, no hubiera firmado nuestra liberación si no se hubiera sabido que era una injusticia, lo cual resultó posible gracias a la presión y al trabajo realizado por la solidaridad, enfatizó.
Estar en la cárcel fue muy revelador porque descubrimos elementos del sistema penitenciario estadounidense. A las personas que no tienen dinero sólo les queda usar un abogado público. Conocimos seres humanos inocentes de los cargos que se le imputaban, añadió.
 
JUVENTUD REBELDE

President Salvador Sánchez Cerén held a private meeting with the Five, who arrived in the country accompanied by various family members, after visiting Nicaragua

Author: Prensa Latina(PL) | internet@granma.cu

Yesterday, the President of El Salvador, Salvador Sánchez Cerén received the five Cuban anti-terrorists who were unjustly imprisoned in the United States.

The leader held a private meeting with Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González and René González, who arrived in the country accompanied by various family members, after a visit to Nicaragua where they attended events commemorating the 36th anniversary of the Sandinista Revolution.

”You are messengers of hope and the dignity of the peoples of Latin America. We have a lot to learn from you. Know that your story will continue inspiring our people to keep the ideas of justice and freedom alive,” stated Sánchez Cerén on receiving the Five.

According to the President, the experience of these men “symbolizes the victory of life over terrorism and death, they are an example of dignity and love for the homeland which fills all Latin Americans with pride.”

Sánchez Cerén also welcomed the new chapter being opened in relations between Cuba and the United States which represents “a sign of understanding and respect for the sovereign equality of states and the people’s right to self-determination.”

Gerardo Her­nán­dez, speaking on behalf of his compañeros, stated that being able to share with the Salvadoran people “is a triumph of solidarity and unity,” rooted in the fundamental message that “when one perseveres and remains true to their principles, although the victory might be slow in coming, it always arrives and just ideals and loyalty triumph.”

”We, the Five, are of course inspired by the example of resistance and struggle of our people, our Revolution, but we also draw inspiration from the example of struggle, sacrifice and resistance of the Salvadoran people,” he stated.

Participating in the private encounter were First Lady of El Salvador, Margarita Villalta; Minister of Foreign Relations, Hugo Martínez; Presidential secretary for technical issues, Roberto Lorenzana; and Minister of Governance, Franzi Hato Hasbún.

Before the meeting, held at the Presidential Palace, the Five – as they are known – thanked the Salvadoran people for their solidarity and support.

The Five were arrested in 1998 in Miami, where they had been monitoring anti-Cuban terrorist groups, which have killed and injured thousands of people, and caused substantial material damage in Cuba.

In 2001, after a biased trial, full of irregularities, denounced by personalities such as former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark, the Five were sentenced to long prison terms.

The struggle for their release sparked a global movement which received support from solidarity organizations including groups from the U.S., governments, personalities such as Nobel Prize winners and international associations, in addition to important sectors of the Salvadoran population.

Of the Five, René González and Fernando González returned to Cuba in 2011 and 2013, respectively, after completing their sentences in full.

The three remaining anti-terrorists were released and returned to Cuba on December 17, 2014, within the context of the initiation of the process toward the re-establishment of diplomatic relations announced by Presidents of Cuba, Raúl Castro, and the United States, Barack Obama, that day.

GRANMA

El reverendo Raúl Suárez acababa de hablar sobre la fe y la esperanza en las sesiones de la Comisión de Relaciones Internacionales del Parlamento cubano, cuando entró al salón –suponiendo ya habían dado el receso– un padre con su pequeña niña en un brazo y en la otra un bolso cargado con todo lo necesario para atender a un bebé de un poco más de seis meses.

Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, uno de Los Cinco Héroes cubanos, sorprendió este sábado a todos los diputados con su presencia; nadie lo esperaba, apareció de improviso con la pequeña Gema, que nació en enero pasado. Sobrevinieron expresiones de cariño, afecto, el bullicio típico de la alegría desbordada.

Muchos de los parlamentarios que hoy constituyen esta Comisión, trabajaron por la liberación de Los Cinco durante más de 15 años, fundaron grupos de solidaridad en el mundo, discursaron, dieron todo su apoyo en pos de la excarcelación de ellos.

Ahora, mientras unos aprovecharon para el apretón de manos, el abrazo, la foto con Gerardo, Gema y Adriana, otros le preguntaron por la recién concluida gira por África.

La reunión del grupo de trabajo parlamentario se trastocó en reunión familiar y el Héroe Cubano, enfundado en un pullover rojo con la mítica imagen del Che que inmortalizó Korda, aprovechó el momento para, en nombre de Los Cinco, agradecer a todos por el trabajo realizado durante tantos años a favor de su liberación de las cárceles estadounidenses.

El que Gema esté aquí es también un triunfo de la Comisión de Relaciones Internaciones de la Asamblea, subrayó Gerardo, y confesó sentir un gran orgullo porque Adriana Pérez, su esposa, sea diputada a la Asamblea Nacional del Poder Popular.

Apenas éramos dos periodistas en la sala y la tentación por entrevistarlo muy grande; no queríamos importunarlo, pero la ocasión era de oro. Accedió gustoso y en medio del bullicio, casi arrinconado en un extremo del salón y asediados por los flashazos de las cámaras comenzamos a dispararle preguntas.

El regreso a África

Gerardo contó sobre lo agotadora que fue la reciente gira de Los Cinco por África, en especial por Sudáfrica, porque fueron 13 días intensos. Desde antes del amanecer salían a las actividades y regresaban tarde en la noche, pero “valió la pena, porque fue muy emotivo”, señaló.

Dijo que fue muy emocionante regresar a Angola, donde tres de ellos cumplieron misión internacionalista en décadas diferentes y ahora tuvieron la oportunidad de estar en esos mimos lugares.

René y yo en Cabinda, en décadas diferentes y Fernando en Lubango, con la oportunidad de encontramos a gente con la que luchamos en aquella época en las mismas unidades donde habíamos estado, narró.

En Sudáfrica se reunieron dos veces con los cinco gobernadores y el Presidente, a quienes conocen como los seis grandes del país. La gente bromeaba que no sabían qué tenían Los Cinco porque en años no habían visto que por ningún visitante tuvieran en el mismo lugar a los seis grandes y dos veces, contó.

Fue una gira extraordinaria, positiva, recibimos mucho cariño, tanto del pueblo de Sudáfrica, y de Namibia, como de Angola, y estamos conscientes de que no es solo por Los Cinco, sino por el pueblo de Cuba y la Revolución, apuntó Gerardo.

Para el Héroe, el contacto con el pueblo africano y las múltiples muestras de afecto y orgullo le reafirmaron que el extraordinario esfuerzo que hizo la Isla en aquellas tierras lejanas y la sangre derramada no fue en vano.

En los tres países donde estuvimos existe un gran agradecimiento por el sacrificio que hizo Cuba y por el aporte a la liberación de los pueblos africanos, dijo.

En el Parque de la Libertad, en Sudáfrica, donde una pared recuerda a los héroes y mártires de la lucha contra el apartheid, fue muy conmovedor ver que allí también están los nombres de los cubanos, incluso algunos conocidos de Los Cinco.

Un momento muy especial en Sudáfrica fue la visita a la celda donde Nelson Mandela estuvo encerrado por décadas en la prisión de Robben Island.

Según Hernández Nordelo, al asomarse por la pequeña ventana de la celda le tomaron varias fotos y una de ellas fue portada al día siguiente en un diario de esa región, y pensó en cómo habría podido resistir Mandela todos esos años en aquel espacio tan reducido sin un baño o un cubo para hacer sus necesidades.

Pensé en cuánto nos inspiró a Los Cinco Mandela con su ejemplo de resistencia, reveló.

Más de seis meses después del 17D

Casi siete meses después de regresar a Cuba, Gerardo Hernández declaró que se siente muy bien.

Los Cinco no tienen ningún trauma a causa de la cárcel, ya lo había dicho, que con los primeros tres o cuatro abrazos que recibimos al llegar ya comenzamos a olvidar la injusta prisión y estamos muy contentos, dijo.

Gerardo confesó que cada vez que salía a la calle se aturdía un poco, pues durante 16 años en una prisión de máxima seguridad el contacto humano fue muy reducido, el solo hecho de que alguien caminara muy cerca disparaba una alarma interna; al llegar a Cuba fueron múltiples los abrazos, pero como él mismo dice: “a las cosas buenas uno se acostumbra rápido”.

En cuanto al restablecimiento de relaciones diplomáticas entre Cuba y Estados Unidos, dijo que su mensaje es que una vez más se demuestra que Los Cinco estuvieron siempre en el lado correcto de la historia.

Nos sentimos orgullosos de habernos mantenido firmes como nación, fieles a nuestros principios, y eso nos ha traído esta victoria y el restablecimiento de relaciones diplomáticas.

Gerardo, quien vivió durante varios años en el país norteño, considera que el egoísmo, el individualismo y las divisiones raciales y sociales son los mayores lastres de la sociedad norteamericana.

El sistema está diseñado para que las personas piensen en sí mismas y no en la sociedad en su conjunto; te educan para que te preocupes por cómo tener más y pisotear a cualquiera para lograrlo, apuntó.

Historia de encuentro con Fidel

Ante una pregunta de la AIN sobre las historias que le contaron a Fidel, Gerardo señaló que el líder histórico de la Revolución Cubana se emocionó mucho con las anécdotas de la prisión.

Le conté a Fidel una que sucedió al principio de estar encarcelados: nos transportaban desde el edificio de la prisión hasta el de la corte y pasamos frente a un preso con cara de loco que supimos era marielito, quien al sabernos cubanos gritó: ¡Resistan…! y una mala palabra, ¡Resistan porque Fidel nunca los va a abandonar a ustedes!

Recordó que en medio de tantas mentiras sobre Los Cinco en aquellos días, tildándolos de espías, que ese hombre dijera eso fue conmovedor.

Hablamos con Fidel de muchas cosas, la situación actual del mundo, la escasez de alimentos que provoca el cambio climático, de los cultivos prometedores de la moringa y la morera, y el Comandante nos planteó que todavía no hay una conciencia generalizada sobre la importancia que pueden tener estos cultivos, relató.

Al final del diálogo apuramos una pregunta ante el reclamo de Adriana que cargaba a Gema al otro lado de la sala: “¡Niño, vamos!”.

¿Qué proyectos tiene Gerardo en lo laboral? Mi único plan es seguir sirviendo al pueblo de Cuba donde se considere necesario, mi formación es en la esfera de las relaciones internacionales pero no tiene que ser necesariamente allí.

El día que vengan a plantearme una tarea va a ser porque consideraron que voy a ser útil y pa’ lante, donde sea, iré, concluyó, no sin antes bromear: “Eso de que sea donde sea que Adriana no lo oiga”.

(Tomado de la AIN)


Gema de brazo en brazo