Mario Chanes de Armas was a revolutionary, sailing with Fidel and Che on the Granma.(The Week ...)(Obituary)(Brief article)

Mario Chanes de Armas was a revolutionary, sailing with Fidel and Che on the Granma. He was caught and jailed by Batista. Once the revolution succeeded, he happily resumed his life. But he soon landed back in jail---because he was a freedom-lover, never wanting Communism or any other form of tyranny. Interestingly, Castro jailed him on the same charges Batista had. And Chanes sat in prison for 30 years, six of them in solitary confinement (no window, barely enough room to stand up). As the Financial Times said, Chanes was "the longest-serving political prisoner in the western hemisphere," spending longer in jail than Nelson Mandela. Mandela's case was known, worried over, and agitated about worldwide. But, as the FT said, "the stories of Chanes and his fellow Cuban political prisoners received little publicity outside the Cuban exile community in Miami." The first ...