State Security Stops Martha Beatriz Roque and Miriam Leiva From Meeting with the Pope

State Security Stops Martha Beatriz Roque and Miriam Leiva From Meeting
with the Pope / EFE-14ymedio
Posted on September 21, 2015

EFE/14ymedio, Havana. 20 September 2015 — Opposition member Martha
Beatriz Roque Cabello reported that on Sunday afternoon State Security
stopped her – for the second day in a row – from personally greeting
Pope Francis. Their meeting, which was to have taken place in Havana
Cathedral, had been agreed upon as a way redressing what happened on
Sunday to this former Black Spring prisoner who was detained as she was
on her way to the Apostolic Nunciature.

On Sunday morning, the secretary of the Apostolic Nunciature in Cuba had
assured Ms. Roque Cabello that he was surprised by the previous day's
arrest, but that everything was now in order for her to greet the Pope
that same day. However, the taxi taking her to Havana's historic center
was intercepted on its way by a car with four State Security agents who
did not allow her to reach the place, the activist said.

"If you have something to say to the Pope, tell us, and we'll tell him,"
Roque Cabello said one of the State Security agents told her. The
dissident was held for fifteen hours at a police station before being
released.

In the case of Miriam Leiva, her detention unfolded under similar
circumstances, as she was traveling in a shared taxi. "The car was
forcefully intercepted by State Security. They took me to a police
station, and there an official warned me that I could not participate in
any activity related to the Pope's visit," Leiva reported to the EFE
news agency.

On the way to Havana Cathedral, where Francis celebrated Sunday vespers
with priests, men and women consecrated to religious life, and
seminarians, the Papal entourage stopped at the Church of the Sacred
Heart of Jesus and Saint Ignatius Loyola on Reina Street.* The Pope took
a brief tour of the interior of the church, and then continued on his
way to the historic center of Havana.

*Translator's Note: Commonly called "Iglesia de Reina," "Church of Reina
(Queen [Street])," and consecrated in 1923, it is widely considered one
of Cuba's most beautiful churches, and its tallest, with a fifteen-story
bell tower. It is the mother church of the Jesuit Order in Cuba.

Source: State Security Stops Martha Beatriz Roque and Miriam Leiva From
Meeting with the Pope / EFE-14ymedio | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/state-security-stops-martha-beatriz-roque-and-miriam-leiva/