HAVANA (Reuters) – Cuba, trying to deflect international criticism over the recent hunger strike death of a political prisoner, said yesterday it would not be “blackmailed” by another dissident hunger striker, whom it accused of being a convicted criminal.

The Communist Party newspaper Granma, which reflects government policy, said in an article that Guillermo Farinas, who began his hunger strike last month, had served prison terms after being jailed in 1995 for beating a woman and in 2002 for beating an old man who was trying to stop “a terrorist act”.

Granma said Farinas, who is now at home and has vowed to starve himself to death if necessary in his stated aim to achieve the release of 26 ailing political prisoners, became a dissident only to “evade justice.”

Farinas, 48, launched his hunger strike on February 24, a day after prisoner Orlando Zapata Tamayo died from an 85-day hunger strike to protest prison conditions.

Zapata’s case drew international condemnation of Cuba and calls for the communist-led country to release its estimated 200 political prisoners.

After his death, Cuba said he was just a common criminal, but dissidents called him a martyr.

Farinas, who lives in Santa Clara, southeast of Havana, has said he wants the Cuban government to release 26 political prisoners said to be in ill health and is prepared to die if necessary.