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| Inmates injured in 2nd melee at Havana prison |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 04/08/2005 |
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Prison inmates set mattresses and other materials ablaze in violence that left several prisoners seriously injured, a veteran rights activist said Thursday. The Tuesday night disturbance, later controlled by Cuban authorities, was the second in less than 20 days at the Combinado del Este Prison, which houses thousands of inmates. Elizardo Sánchez, head of the Havana-based Cuban Commission on Human Rights and Reconciliation, learned of the disturbance from prisoners' relatives who were contacted by authorities. Cuba's communist government issued no official report on the incident at the prison in Havana, and it was unknown how the disturbance was controlled. Freddy Ibañez Blanco, 33, was being treated in a hospital and had been visited by relatives, said Sánchez. He added that inmates' relatives told him that dozens were injured in Tuesday's disturbance. ''We've received reports that several of them suffered very intense burns,'' Sánchez said in a statement. An earlier disturbance at the same prison erupted March 19 when a group of inmates protested as officers tried to transfer some of them to another area, the government reported. Officers quelled the disturbance without the use of firearms and there were no deaths or serious injuries, Cuban officials said at the time. Sánchez said that Tuesday's unrest was the result of excessive sentences, poor food and insufficient medical care at the prison. At least a dozen of the 75 activists rounded up in a crackdown on dissent two years ago are housed at the prison, many in hospital wards to receive treatment for various aliments. None were involved in Tuesday's disturbance, Sánchez said. |
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