A/HRC/4/12 page 7 II. POSITIVE ASPECTS 12. Despite a particularly unfavourable environment, the efforts of the Government of Cuba, especially in the budgetary field, have enabled it to maintain a sound health system which has helped to lower infant mortality and extend the life expectancy of all its citizens. 13. Where education is concerned, 100 per cent of children attend school, and data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and UNESCO place Cuba among the leading United Nations Member States in respect of school success rates, particularly in mathematics. 14. Illiteracy (now 0.2 per cent) is being wiped out. 15. In efforts to combat discrimination against women, the level of female employment in the public sector has stood at 49.6 per cent since 1996, and there has been a steady rise in the proportion of women in the National Assembly and the judiciary, and in decision-making posts. 16. Cuba has ratified a number of conventions in the field of human rights and has submitted reports to the appropriate treaty organs. 17. In 2004, the Cuban authorities released 18 prisoners on health grounds, and, in 2006, Héctor Palacios Ruíz was released on parole on health grounds. III. SUBJECTS OF CONCERN 18. One subject of concern relates primarily to the arrest of almost 80 persons in March-April 2003 in what the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention regards as arbitrary detention. In its opinion No. 9/2003, the Working Group categorized them as persons detained in contravention of articles 19, 20 and 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (see E/CN.4/2004/3/Add.1). These persons were arrested while working as journalists, writers, members of associations, human rights defenders or members of opposition trade unions and political parties. 19. Most of those detained support the Varela project, which involves the collection of signatures for the organization of a referendum on changing the electoral system and fostering other legislative reforms. 20. The charges levelled against the accused persons fall in some cases solely under article 91 of the Cuban Criminal Code, covering acts contrary to the independence or integrity of the State, and in others under article 91 combined with Act No. 88, on protection of Cuba’s national and economic independence. 21. Several of the accused persons have been charged with such actions as receiving funds from foreign countries or engaging in activities deemed to be subversive by the State, giving interviews to Radio Martí, a network broadcasting from the United States, communicating with international human rights organizations, possessing radio or video equipment, or participating in trade unions, associations or academic groups deemed to be “counter-revolutionary”.