Bayamo, September 24 (RHC)-- A rally was held in the eastern Cuban province of Granma, calling for the immediate release of Puerto Rican political prisoner Oscar Lopez Rivera, who has been locked up in U.S. prisons for nearly 35 years.

At a ceremony in Bayamo on the 147th anniversary of the Grito de Lares against Spanish colonial rule in Puerto Rico, the residents of the eastern city pointed to Puerto Rican solidarity in the struggle for the liberation of the Cuban Five -- Gerardo Hernandez, Rene Gonzalez, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez.

At the event, organized by the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples, ICAP, organizers addressed the legal complexities of the case of 72-year-old Oscar Lopez Rivera, who was sentenced in 1981 to 55 years imprisonment for alleged seditious conspiracy.