Opponents Ciro Perez, 61, Arturo Suarez (46) and Rolando Jimenez (41) departed on a commercial flight with a dozen family members and arrive on Friday in Madrid, confirmed family in Havana.
These three are the first political prisoners to travel to Spain off the list of the 52 opponents who were in prison for the 75 convicted in 2003, the government promised to begin releasing in July following an unprecedented dialogue with the Catholic Church.
Thirty-nine of the 52 have already been released and emigrated to Spain -13 rejected for the moment leave the island, so that those who left on Thursday a total of 42 prisoners freed since last July.
Perez was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 1994 for possession of weapons, illegal exit and piracy; Smith to 30 years in 1987 for piracy and illegal exit, and Jimenez, the only group recognized as a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, 12 years for espionage and contempt in 2007.
The Church announced that five other prisoners, nor are the case of 75, Juana Maria Nieves, Domingo Ozuna, Misael Mena and Jose Luis Ramil, convicted of piracy, and Juan Francisco Marimon, accused of terrorism, will be released soon and will travel to Spain. Nieves was sentenced to 15 years in 1999; Ozuna to 15 years in 2000, Mena Fernandez to 17 in 1999, Ramil to 12 in 1994 and Marimon to 10 years in 2003.
The approval of five new releases came the same day that Farinas, a psychologist of 48 years, won the European Parliament this year after starring in a hunger strike of 135 days to demand the release of political prisoners.
"That way, add 47 prisoners who have accepted the proposal out of jail and travel to Spain," said a statement from the Church.
The opposition accused by Havana to serve the interests of Washington, believes that their families are being forced "into exile" in Spain, which offered to receive them as guest country in the process.
The Parliament President Ricardo Alarcon, said in July the official will release all political prisoners who were not involved in bloodshed and in October, Cardinal Jaime Ortega told reporters that besides the release of 52 would be released other prisoners.
Cuban dissidents, who celebrated the award for freedom of conscience granted to Farinas, agreed that the award could affect the fragile relationship between Cuba and the European Union, but ruled to stop the releases.
"They are the result of an agreement with the Church and the Government of Spain, so it does not have influence," he told AFP Bertha Soler, an activist of the Damas de Blanco, a group of wives of political prisoners and who won the Prize Sakharov in 2005.
"I do not have an impact. The government will look away as ever," minimizing the award, said Elizardo Sanchez, who heads the illegal but tolerated Cuban Commission for Human Rights and Reconciliation (CCDHRN), which calculates to nearly one hundred opponents in prison, out of 52.
In the absence of official information, as the government does not recognize the existence of political prisoners, various entities within and outside the island have developed their own lists of political detainees.