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CUBA
Jubilee for prisonsPray for release of prisoner
Cuban dissidents recently released from Communist prisons prayed on July 9 for the release of another dissident from prison on the day set aside by the Catholic Church as the Jubilee Day for Prisoners.
“It was very important for us to be able to participate in this way, to speak our faith,” said Marta Beatriz Roque, who was freed with two others in late May. “Above all, we need to pray for our brother in the cause, Vladimiro Roca.” The three had attended a Mass in the Church of the Virgin of Charity of Cobre with Cardinal Jaime Ortega of Havana.
It was the first time that Roque, lawyer Rene Gomez Manzano, and engineer Felix Bonne had been seen together in public since their release. Roque said the government did not impede their attendance of the Mass. The three and Roca had been arrested in 1997 for distributing pamphlets critical of the government.
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