[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 102 (Friday, July 20, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H4369]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        BIRTHDAY OF A CUBAN HERO

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Diaz-Balart) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DIAZ-BALART. Mr. Speaker, today is the 40th birthday of a brave 
human rights activist and pro-democracy leader, Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet, 
who at this moment finds himself serving a prison sentence in a Cuban 
gulag for peacefully protesting for democracy in Cuba, after being 
taken before a farce of a trial in Havana on February 25 of last year.
  Dr. Biscet was born in Havana on July 20, 1961. In 1985, he obtained 
a degree in medicine, and late in that decade he began to openly oppose 
the totalitarian regime that oppresses the Cuban people.
  In 1997, Dr. Biscet was one of the founders of the Lawton Foundation 
for Human Rights, a humanitarian organization created to demand 
fundamental human rights from the Cuban totalitarian regime.
  In February of 1998, Dr. Biscet was officially expelled from the 
Cuban health system and he was prohibited from practicing medicine. 
That same year, he and his family were thrown out of their home, and 
his wife was fired from her employment due to her pro-human rights 
activities. Both of them, in fact, were forced to depend on the charity 
of their friends and of those who wished to see Cuba free.
  On October 28, 1999, Dr. Biscet held a press conference before the 
Ibero-American Summit began in Havana. During the press conference, 
along with other pro-democracy activists, Dr. Biscet announced that 
they would carry out a march calling for the release of all political 
prisoners and for the respect of the human rights of the Cuban people.
  During the press conference, two Cuban flags were exhibited upside 
down as a symbol of protest for the innumerable human rights violations 
that the regime commits continuously.
  On November 3 of 1999, just a few days later, Dr. Biscet was arrested 
and taken to a dungeon known as ``Cien y Aldabo'', where he was thrown 
into a cell with common criminals for the alleged crimes of ``abuse of 
national symbols, public disorder, and inciting delinquency.''
  Dr. Biscet represents the noblest aspirations of the Cuban people. 
His efforts as founder and leader of the Lawton Foundation for Human 
Rights have won him the respect and admiration of human rights 
activists throughout the world, and have inspired many to continue the 
struggle for freedom in Cuba.
  The Castro tyranny, fearful of the effectiveness of Dr. Biscet's 
message, has arrested him more than two dozen times in the last few 
years. It has fired him from his job, along with his family, thrown him 
out of his house, he has been subjected to psychiatric examinations, 
and has been constantly pressured by the regime to leave the island, 
something that he refuses to do.
  Before being sentenced at his farcical trial, Dr. Biscet asked all 
Cubans, those living in the oppression on the island and those in 
exile, and all others throughout the world who support freedom for 
Cuba, to unite in prayer for the freedom of all political prisoners and 
of all the Cuban people. From his cell, he has remained firm in his 
principles and has asked the international community to demand justice 
for the people of Cuba.
  It is most appropriate that as we send our message of solidarity to 
Dr. Biscet today on his birthday, we commit ourselves to working with 
all devotion and dedication so that freedom-loving individuals like Dr. 
Biscet do not have to spend their precious lives in the isolation and 
inhuman conditions of totalitarian dungeons.
  There is a program that has been set up to try to help Cuban 
political prisoners by having families in the United States adopt, if 
you will, the family of a Cuban political prisoner for at least a year.
  A well-known pro-democracy activist, Vicki Ruiz-Labrit, is 
coordinating the program. They have a phone number. We all should help. 
It is 305-461-6700. We should all help by adopting the family of a 
Cuban political prisoner, and in that way, helping the most suffering, 
those who suffer the most in the totalitarian island just a few miles 
from our shores.
  Dr. Biscet, on your birthday, inside your prison cell I know that you 
cannot now hear my words, but I salute you and express my profound 
admiration for you, and through you, for all Cuban political prisoners.

                          ____________________