Attorneys for the Cuban Five argued on Monday before a federal appeals court that the jailed men deserve another trial. The men were arrested in 1998 and convicted of spying for the Cuban government three years later. They maintain they were sent to the United States to monitor violent exile groups calling for the overthrow of Fidel Castro. In August 2005, a three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta tossed the verdicts, saying the five didn’t receive a fair trial because of anti-Castro bias in Miami. But the convictions were reinstated exactly a year later by the full 11th Circuit.

Andres Gomez, Alianza Martiana: “Five Cubans were falsely accused by the United States government of being in the United States to spy on the government of the United States. The government of the United States knows that these five men were in the United States, specifically Miami, to infiltrate extreme right-wing Cuban terrorist organizations operating out of Miami, which for 40 years have perpetrated acts of terrorism on the Cuban people and against others here in the United States who have been against their objectives and their methods.”

Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark spoke on behalf of the Cuban Five.

Ramsey Clark: “I think the thing that needs to be recognized is that if you want to stop terrorism, you don’t persecute people who are engaged in trying to prevent terrorism.”