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 Danilo Maldonado, 32 and known as "El Sexto," has been held
since December for painting "Fidel" and "Raul" on the backs of a
pair of pigs in apparent reference to former leader Fidel Castro
and his brother and current president, Raul Castro, Amnesty said
in a statement.
"We are declaring him a prisoner of conscience. At the moment,
he is the only prisoner of conscience in Cuba. However, we are
evaluating a number of other cases," said Josefina Salomon, a
spokeswoman for the human rights group.
The Cuban government did not immediately respond to a request
for comment. Officially, the government maintains it does not
have any political prisoners, and characterizes Cuba's small but
vocal dissident community as mercenaries paid by U.S. interests
to destabilize the government.
In conjunction with detente reached with the United States last
Dec. 17, Cuba released 53 prisoners that the U.S. government had
considered political.
But Maldonado was detained eight days later when police
discovered the animals in the trunk of his taxi before he
intended to display them in a Christmas Day art show, Amnesty
said.
He has been on a hunger strike since Sept. 8, Amnesty said.
"He has been held for a long time in a high security prison,
without formal charges and without trial," said Elizardo
Sanchez, leader of the dissident Cuban Commission of Human
Rights and National Reconciliation.
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The commission estimates there are about 60 political prisoners in
Cuba, including some two dozen held for peaceful political protest.
Raul Castro and U.S. President Barack Obama surprised the world last
December by announcing the two former Cold War foes would seek to
restore diplomatic ties, which happened eight months later.
Castro and Obama shook hands on Tuesday during a rare
one-on-one-meeting at the United Nations.
"To jail an artist for painting a name on a pig is ludicrous. Cuban
authorities are using any cowardly excuse to silence Danilo and send
a message to others that any criticism of the government and its
officials will not be tolerated," Carolina Jimenez, Americas Deputy
Director for Research at Amnesty International, said in the
statement.
(Reporting by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Chris Reese, Bernard Orr)
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