HAVANA, Cuba (AP) -- U.S. and European diplomats visited the home of jailed Cuban reporter Raul Rivero Monday, offering support to relatives of the dissident and others put in prison after a government crackdown on the opposition last year, Rivero's wife said.

James Cason, chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, and officials from half a dozen European countries arrived together on the same day Rivero was awarded a press freedom prize in Belgrade, Serbia-Montenegro.

The diplomats said they lamented the imprisonment of all the activists and called for their immediate release, according to Blanca Reyes, Rivero's wife.

Rivero was sentenced to 20 years in prison last year after being found guilty of working with U.S. diplomats to undermine Cuba's socialist system -- allegations he and Washington deny. He was one of 75 Cuban activists sentenced to prison in April 2003.

The prize was awarded to Rivero on World Press Freedom day by Koichiro Matsuura, director of the Paris-based United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, or UNESCO.

The prize is a tribute to Rivero's "brave and long-standing commitment to independent reporting, the hallmark of professional journalism," Matsuura said at a U.N.-organized conference.

Rivero is among the few independent reporters in Cuba with professional training and experience. He has published numerous volumes of poetry and news reportage and is considered by some to be one of the island's best poets.

In March, Cuba protested UNESCO's decision to award Rivero the prize.

"It is deplorable and embarrassing that the Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Award has been used for ends separate from UNESCO's fundamental ideals," said Cuba's Foreign Ministry.

The $25,000 prize, established in 1997, is named after the Colombian journalist murdered in 1987 for denouncing his country's powerful drug barons.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press.