Havana - 12 September, 2007
1. Cuba's Minister of Culture Abel Prieto and book editors at conference room in International Press Centre:
2. Close up, book on table
3. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Abel Prieto, Cuban Minister of Culture:
"It is truly unacceptable that a case of violation of elemental justice should be hidden from North American public opinion as well as much of the public opinion of the world. This is because the large media companies that form opinions and tell people what they should be concerned with, do not pay attention to this case and to this process and do not reflect it."
5. Audience
6. Close up, relatives of the Cuban Five
7. Close up box with new books
8. People receiving book
FILE - February, 2007
Havana
9. Various of roadside billboard with pictures of the Cuban Five and slogan (Spanish) "Freedom Now"
10. Various of book covers with pictures of the Cuban Five (MUTE)
Washington, DC - 12 September, 2007
11. Attorney for the five Cubans, Leonard Weinglass walking to podium
12. SOUNDBITE: (English) Leonard Weinglass, Attorney for the Cuban Five:
"This, like the Pentagon Papers trial, is a case that reveals the untold story of the low intensity war, which Danny Glover referred to (in a video introduction) emanating from these shores against the country that is 90 miles away. A war that has lasted for more than 4 decades and of which the American public knows virtually nothing."
13. Audience
14. Reverse shot of Weinglass speaking
15. SOUNDBITE: (English) Leonard Weinglass, Attorney for the Cuban Five:
"Cuba protested each and everyone of those acts, it was introduced into evidence in the trial with the Five. The US did nothing. Cuba went to the UN and asked the UN to pass a resolution against terrorism, years before 9/11... It is still on the agenda of the UN. They haven't acted on it. And when finally nothing else would work, Cuba sent these five men to the United States."
FILE - February 2007
Havana
16. Olga Salanueva, wife of Rene Gonzalez (one of the Cuban Five) and daughter Ivette Gonzalez
17. Medium of the two looking at pictures
18. Medium of Rene Gonzalez in photograph with his daughters/pull out to medium
19. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) Olga Salanueva, wife of Rene Gonzalez:
"I did not request a visa to reside in the United States. I know this is not possible anymore, plus we want to live in Cuba when he comes back when he is freed. But I think it is my right to visit him. It is the right of every prisoner to receive the visit of his wife, of his family. The family that we created together. "
20. Pan of billboard with names of Cuban Five
21. Medium of billboard (Spanish) reading "They Will Return"
Cuba's culture minister Abel Prieto appealed to world opinion on Wednesday to take up the case of five Cubans convicted on espionage charges in the US.
He called a news conference in Havana on Wednesday to launch a new book on the case of the Cuban Five, celebrated in their home country but little known in the rest of the world.
Fidel Castro's government sent Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labanino, Rene Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez to South Florida to gather information about anti-communist exile groups and send it back to the island using encrypted software, high-frequency radio transmissions and coded electronic phone messages.
Leonard Weinglass, attorney for the Five told a student audience in Washington DC that it followed terrorist attacks by anti-Castro Cuban exiles:
"Cuba protested each and everyone of those acts. The US did nothing. Cuba went to the UN and asked the UN to pass a resolution against terrorism, years before 9/11... It is still on the agenda of the UN. They haven't acted on it. And when finally nothing else would work, Cuba sent these five men to the United States", he said.
The book, compiled with writings from 17 Cuban authors with an epilogue by the President of Cuba's National Parliament, reveals what Weinglass called "the untold story of the low intensity war...emanating from these shores against the country that is 90 miles (140 kilometres) away."
Weinglass said the unfair treatment received by the Cuban Five in the United States' judicial system is part of "a war that is lasted more than four decades and of which the American public knows virtually nothing."
"It is truly unacceptable that a case of violation of elemental justice should be hidden from North American public opinion as well as much of the public opinion of the world", said Prieto during Wednesday's press conference.
Weinglass said the five men were trying to gather information that might prevent exile groups from waging more attacks, such as the bombings at Havana hotels that killed an Italian tourist in 1997.
The five were convicted of being unregistered foreign agents and three were found guilty of espionage conspiracy for failed efforts to obtain military secrets.
Hernandez was also convicted of murder conspiracy in the deaths of four Miami-based pilots whose small, private planes were shot down in February 1996 by a Cuban MiG in international waters off Cuba's northern coast.
They were sentenced to terms ranging from 10 years to life in December 2001, but the case has ping-ponged through the court system the last six years due to a round of appeals.
In August 2005, a three-judge panel of the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta tossed out the verdicts, saying the five didn't receive a fair trial because of anti-Castro bias in Miami. But the convictions were reinstated exactly a year later by the full 11th Circuit.
Among the allegations of unfair treatment cited by the defence and various organisations that support their release, is the refusal to grant visas to the wives of two of the detained Cubans to visit their husbands during the nine years they have spent behind bars.
The US has denied visitor's visas to the wives of Rene Gonzalez and Gerardo Hernandez.
In February, Olga Salanueva, wife of Rene Gonzalez told AP Television "it is the right of every prisoner to receive a visit from his wife, of his family, the family that we created together."
"I think it is my right to visit him," she added
Although the five men's so-called "Wasp Network" spy ring recovered no US secrets, federal prosecutors argued for stiff penalties, saying they were well-trained spies who ran foul of federal law by failing to inform the government of their presence.
While serving their sentences, the men have become celebrities in their homeland. As Castro celebrated his 81st birthday last month, messages that the five hope to "celebrate all those future anniversaries together in our beautiful fatherland" were published in the Communist party newspaper.
The agents are currently seeking a new trial that they hope will overturn their prison sentences, which range from 15 years to life.
The book entitled "From the Loneliness and the Hope", (Spanish : "Desde La Soledad y La Esperanza") is accompanied by a music CD with compositions from ten Cuban musicians and composers.
