Cuban Bloggers Beaten, Detained

Three bloggers in Cuba were forcibly detained by Cuban secret police on Friday. One of the bloggers was Yoani Sanchez, whose blog details life in Cuba and the reality of living under Communist rule.

Yoani Sanchez, an award-winning blogger in Cuba, whose "Generation Y" blog gets more than 1 million hits each month, was brutally beaten by Cuban police on her way to a peaceful demonstration. Another blogger, Orlando Luis Pardo, was also detained with her. Police in plain clothes demanded that Sanchez and Pardo enter their car in order to keep them from participating in the march. When they refused, the men forced them into their car, beat them, and drove them back to her apartment in Havana. The third blogger, Claudia Cadelo, was taken away in a separate car. Sanchez described the beating she sustained to the El Nuevo Herald at the hands of the special agents as "No blood, but black and blues, punches, pulled hairs, blows to the head, kidneys, knee and chest. In sum, professional violence." According to CNN, Sanchez is in serious pain and plans to visit a hospital. Sanchez detailed the encounter in an article titled "A gangland style kidnapping" on her blog. Time Magazine recently named Sanchez as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. The Cuban government did not allow her to leave the country to accept the award in New York.