Dissident allowed to leave Cuba to receive top award

HAVANA -- Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya received permission to leave Cuba on Saturday, three days before he is to receive the European Union's top human rights award.

Paya leads a Christian-oriented group that advocates nonviolent change in Cuba's communist system. He led an island-wide petition drive called the Varela Project that seeks a referendum on whether Cubans favor guarantees for rights such as freedom of speech and private business ownership, broad electoral reforms and freedom for political prisoners.

Paya had been trying for weeks to get an exit visa so he could go to Strasbourg, France, to accept the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought on Tuesday. European politicians and diplomats had urged Cuba to grant him permission to travel.

"I am going to receive this prize in the name of the Cuban people," he said, hours before he was to board a flight for Spain.

On Friday, Paya's house was vandalized with bumper stickers and the flag of Alpha 66, a militant group that subscribes to the violent overthrow of President Fidel Castro. Paya said he believed government security forces -- not Alpha 66 -- were behind that event.

Militant exile groups have accused the Varela Project of being too moderate -- though Paya said scores of people who signed the petition were detained or questioned.

In May, Varela Project organizers turned in stacks of petitions they said were signed by 11,020 people asking Cuba's parliament for the referendum. Paya said Friday organizers have since collected an additional 10,000 signatures.

The Cuban parliament has not responded to the Varela Project request, though Cuba's government has repeatedly referred to dissidents on the island as insignificant in number and as paid agents of the United States.