SANTA CLARA, Cuba — Cuban opposition activist Guillermo Farinas ended his 134-day hunger strike Thursday, following signs the communist government is making good on its promise to release 52 political prisoners.
Farinas drank sips of water at a hospital near his home in the central city of Santa Clara, said Licet Zamora, a spokeswoman for the 48-year-old psychologist and freelance journalist. Zamora described Farinas’ condition as “grave” after he recently suffered a potentially fatal blood clot in his neck.
Kept alive by intravenous feeding, Farinas had refused food and water since shortly after the Feb. 23 death of fellow dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo, who died after a lengthy prison hunger strike of his own behind bars.
Under a Wednesday agreement brokered by visiting Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, authorities promised to free five political prisoners as soon as possible and force them to head to Spain — then release 47 more in the next two or three months.
Cardinal Jaime Ortega, the archbishop of Havana, called five prisoners to say they should prepare to be released and leave the country in coming days. Six others were being transferred to jails closer to their homes.
“I feel a bit nervous, happy, grateful to the church and to Spain,” said Mireya Penton, mother of 33-year-old Lester Gonzalez, one of the five told he would be released. “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.”
In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton applauded the deal but said it had been too long in coming.
Clinton declined to say how it might affect U.S.-Cuba relations.
