A Cuban Prisoner of Conscience

Dr. Oscar Elias Bisce, prisoner of Conscience. A giant among men. He has been an outspoken critic of the Castro regime. Dr. Biscet is a medical doctor by profession. In 1997 he founded the Lawton Foundation for Human Rights, one of the first independent civic groups in Havana. After he, on behalf of his foundation, sent to authorities a statistical report of the practice of aborting babies and many times if those babies lived afterwards, they are not provided with emergency care and are just left to die.

In the investigative study "Rivanol: A Method for Destroying Life", of the 36 pregnant women that received abortions by this method, 27% gave birth to live babies, so the study found that most abortions conducted with the use of this chemical resulted in live premature births, the horrendous part of this was that no medical care was provided and the babies were left to die. Prior to these abortions these babies were healthy and had no congenital defects. Abortions are performed routinely in Cuba.

He was fired and forbidden to practice medicine, additionally his family were evicted from their home. He is currently serving a 25 year prison sentence. He is kept in solitary confinement, in a vertical box, about the size of a portable bathroom. He has remained true to his convictions, in spite of the torture he has endured. Dr. Biscet was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George Bush.

Since When is Che a Hero?

Every time I see a teenager with Che Guevara's picture plastered on a T-shirt I feel sad. I wonder if they even know who this man really was. The truth is; they don't know, but they think they do and they proudly ware his picture.

Cubans on the other hand, know too well who this man was. An Argentinian mercenary and mass murderer who by his own admission executed and send thousands of Cubans to the firing squads, without luxury of a trial. During the first years of the Castro regime, Che was the head executioner. He is also responsible for founding the work camps, where the opposition were sent, including my father, who did nothing against the communist regime.

My Spanish teacher in High School, once told me, that as a University Student in Havana, she attended a rally, where the Comandante Che Guevara was speaking and she said, that he was a handsome man, that he had blue eyes, and a bigger than light persona, but that she had never seen so much hate, in one man's eyes as she did in his.

I remember as a student in Cuba how his image was used by the Communist Regimen to indoctrinate us. Our teachers used to tell us, that he was still alive and one day, my little brother came home and told my mom, that Che and all the others were still alive and that he should think Che for the shoes he was wearing. My mom, who was a rebel said......___Really, well let me have those shoes your wearing and go tell Che, to buy some knew ones-good grief. I know they meant that he was alive in all of us, but let me tell you, that sack of crap was not alive in me. I hated Communism from the moment I took my first breath.

In part their brainwashing was successful, but for the most part, the majority of us new better; we just couldn't say anything. The reality was that Fidel Castro send Che to Bolivia in the sixties and abandoned him. He left him there to die, because he couldn't take the competition. Che was outshining him and that was just not acceptable. In the end he was shown the same mercy, he had given his victims.