Gorki Aguila, 39, was ordered to pay 600 Cuban pesos, or
about $30, for playing his music too loud during rehearsal, his
father Luis Aguila said.
The bushy-haired rocker was arrested on Monday as his band,
Porno para (for) Ricardo, was recording its latest album.
News of the arrest quickly spread through the blogosphere
and on Friday a crowd of foreign diplomats, foreign
correspondents, government press officials and Aquila
supporters waited in the street outside the court.
His songs have fiercely criticized Cuba's communist
government and its leaders Fidel and Raul Castro, which band
members blamed for his arrest.
The Cuban government has said nothing about the case.
The group's CDs are banned in Cuba but copies are
circulated underground.
Aquila, who was led into court in handcuffs, was freed
after the hearing, which was closed to the press.
The original charge of social dangerousness pertains to
people who authorities believe are likely to commit crimes, and
can include such things as habitual drunkenness, drug addiction
and anti-social behavior.
Aguila went to prison previously on drug charges he said
were the result of entrapment by the Cuban government.
The illegal but tolerated Cuban Human Rights Commission
said its preliminary investigation of the latest charge found
Aguila committed no crime and called for the case to be
dismissed.
The human rights commission recently issued a report saying
the Cuban government had 219 political prisoners behind bars
and that short-term detentions of government opponents had
increased dramatically in the first half of 2008.
Cuban officials view dissidents as mercenaries working with
the United States to subvert its government. The United States
has had a trade embargo against Cuba for 46 years and its
diplomats in Havana openly work with the opposition.
(Reporting by Jeff Franks and Esteban Israel; editing by
Michael Christie and Eric Beech)
No comments:
Post a Comment