Cuban ex political prisioner, Eusebio Peñalver Mazorra, dies

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Cuban ex political prisioner, Eusebio Peñalver Mazorra, dies
By Ariel Remos

Eusebio Peñalver

By Ariel Remos DIARIO LAS AMERICAS

With profound grief we consign the death in the city of Miami of one of the most outstanding figures of Cuba’s political prisoners: Eusebio Peñalver Mazorra.

Peñalver is a legend of courage in the struggle against the Castro tyranny, from which he separated as soon as Castro took power and showed his true colors.

Born in Ciego de Avila, province of Camagüey, Cuba, on July 1st, 1936, at the beginnings of 1960 he was on the mountains of Escambray, already having joined the First National Front of the Escambray. He was captured that same year and condemned to 30 years of prison and forced labor, of which he served 28 years.

He suffered the most brutal tortures as a result of continuous harassment for 24 hours a day and seven days a week, as he describes in an autobiographical piece, tortures against which he built a shield of virile resistance, honoring his condition of “plantado”. In a 1999 interview with The Associated Press, he defined a "plantado" as a person who firmly plants his feet while struggling for freedom and democracy in Cuba.

He came to the United States as an exile in 1988, and since then has spent every day and every hour fighting for Cuba’s liberty in Los Angeles, California, through his involvement in the LIBREPROC Association, the World Federation of Cuban Political Prisoners and in Miami, Florida as delegate and president of "Plantados until Freedom and Democracy in Cuba," and also as president of Unidad Cubana (Cuban Union).

Peñalver received love and admiration from his peers and friends because of his chivalry, generosity, frankness, sense of humor, and strength of character to never deviate from what is morally right.

May the soul of Eusebio Peñalver Mazorra rest in the peace of the Lord.

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