Protest marchers beaten, detained

José Daniel Ferrer with his son in an archival photo. (Cubanet)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Miami, 22 December 2022 — Daniel Ferrer Cantillo, son of Cuban political prisoner José Daniel Ferrer García, leader of the opposition organization Unión Patriótica de Cuba, arrived in Miami after suffering “various pressures” to try to convince his father to leave the Island, as he told América Tevé.

“They wanted me to get my father out of prison; they were going to use me to try to get him out of the country, and I did not accept any condition that they put on me,” Ferrer said on América Tevé radio.

In the interview, released exclusively on Wednesday, the young man confirmed that he “recently” visited his father and that he continues on a hunger strike after beatings suffered in prison.

“He was super weak, physically he is very thin. He told me that he had been hit countless times in the ribs and kidneys that left them destroyed (…); since that day he began a hunger strike,” he told journalist Mario J. Penton.
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January 3, 2023 by Alberto de la Cruz

Almost 700 public protests documented in Cuba during the month of December. The Cuban Observatory of Conflicts (OCC) documented 692 public protests during December 2022, 400 more than in November and 100 more than in July 2021 when the largest uprising in decades took place on the island.

According to the organization’s latest report, there were 366 spontaneous protests and 326 as part of organized campaigns. In total, there were 3,923 protests throughout the year, which is much higher than the 3,300 documented by OCC during the crucial year of 2021.

Protests took place in 12 of the country’s 15 provinces, despite the increase in repression by the regime against those who dissent. The majority of protests took place in Havana (170), Santiago de Cuba (66), and Villa Clara (41), the report said.

Hundreds of them were sparked by demands for economic and social rights, among them critical social media posts, videos, or statements made to independent journalist over the growing insecurity, the government’s mismanagement, the horrible state of the electrical grid, water, health, housing, and transportation.

A large number of the protests denounced the shortages, the high prices caused by inflation, and other issues affecting the economy (especially during the Christmas and New Year season), as well as acts carried out by organized campaigns against economic stagnation, the government’s investment policy, and social issues such as gender violence.

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Cuba Condemns 15 Protesters of 11J (11 July 2021) to Sentences of Up To 13 Years – Translating Cuba

During one of the days of the trial, two of the attorneys criticized the proceedings against the protesters. (Capture)

EFE (via 14ymedio), Havana, 25 January 2023 — A court in Havana handed down sentences which ranged from four years of “limited liberty” to 13 years in prison to 15 protesters from July 11, 2021 (11J), the largest protests in decades.

According to the decision, dated January 23, which EFE accessed this Wednesday, the People’s Provincial Tribunal in Havana convicted them of “sedition,” but issued sentences that, for the most part, were shorter than those sought by the prosecution.

The sentencing, which still is not final and could still be revised, followed a trial that took place last November and that garnered a lot of media attention on the island.

Among those on trial was Jonathan Torres, a young man who at the time of the events was 17 years old (the only minor in this trial). The minimum age of criminal responsibility in Cuba is 16. He is one of the 55 people between 16 and 17 years of age who have faced criminal prosecution for the events of 11J, as confirmed by Cuba’s Attorney General.

In Torres’s case, the tribunal sentenced him to four years of “limited liberty” (though the Prosecutor sought five.) This means that he will not go to prison, but rather, will have his movements controlled by a judge.

Similarly, three people were sentenced to correctional labor without internment and another three with internment. In the statements made to EFE, Orlando Ramírez, Torres’s step father, described the proceedings as a “show” and, although he believed the determination to be a “victory,” he added that “really [the trial against his stepson is an error because he did not do anything.”

In sum, sentences totaling 75 years in prison were handed down to the protesters.
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The artist has been in jail since July 11, 2021. (Screen capture)

14ymedio, Havana, 7 February 2023 — Artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, prisoner at the maximum-security prison in Guanajay (Artemisa), has been on a hunger strike for seven days to demand his freedom, according to what curator Claudia Genlui published on Tuesday on her Facebook wall.

“I just spoke with Luis Manuel Otero. With a broken voice, he could barely speak. Luis has been on a hunger strike for seven days and a few days ago, he added a thirst strike,” explained Genlui, who currently resides in the United States.

“State Security once again ignores” the strike status of the leader of the San Isidro Movement, adds the activist. “Aware of the delicate state of Luis’s health, who has led several strikes in prison, they do not listen to his main demand: his freedom.”

In her text, Genlui also issued a warning: “Anything that happens to Luis Manuel is the responsibility of the dictatorship,” and questions “until when will they continue to destroy the lives of so many Cubans? until when will they continue to destroy a country that does not belong to them?”

“Aware of the delicate state of Luis’s health, who has starred in several strikes in prison, they do not listen to his main demand: his freedom”
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POSTED BY JOHN SUAREZ , February 16, 2023

"Long live human rights, with my blood I wrote to you so that this be saved as evidence of the savagery we are subjected to that are victims of the Pedro Luis Boitel political prisoners [movement]" - Orlando Zapata Tamayo, letter smuggled out April of 2004*

Orlando Zapata Tamayo tortured and killed by prison officials on February 23, 2010
Fact #1 Orlando Zapata Tamayo was murdered by Cuban government officials

Both Abel Lopez Perez and Reina Luisa Tamayo charge that Cuban prison officials denied Orlando Zapata Tamayo water in an effort to break his spirit. Reina Luisa Tamayo in an interview with Yoani Sanchez, hours after her son’s death denounced that officials had denied him water.[1] Abel Lopez corroborates the charge stating: “Before Zapata was checked into the hospital, he was regularly taking some vitamins. He was in a weak state of health. A military chief known as ‘Gordo’, who was the one responsible for ordering all of Zapata’s things to be taken out of the cell and to stop giving him water, also took his bottle of vitamins and poured all the pills down a drain. He told him, ‘Those who are in protest here don’t drink vitamins. I think those are pills sent to you by the Yankees so you can continue your hunger strike.’ Those were the exact words said to him, I verified them. His vitamins were taken away, as were any other medications. And they stopped giving him water for a while.”[2] This type of practice was also documented in the 1966 death of another Cuban hunger striker, Roberto López Chávez.[3], [4] Denying water to a man on water only hunger strike is cruel and inhuman treatment that contributed to his death.
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March 18, 2023 by Alberto de la Cruz

Despite being the shortest month of the year, State Security thugs in communist Cuba were busy this February, carrying out 247 documented acts of repression, 84 more than in the previous month. While the island’s dictatorship is unable to provide food, medicine, or even basic needs to the Cuban people due to the lack of resources, it apparently has more than sufficient means to brutally oppress them.

Via ADN Cuba (my translation):

Insecurity in Cuba: Report reveals nearly 250 acts of repression in one month

During this last month of February, there was “an increase in repression” by Cuban authorities, said the legal assistance organization Cubalex in its monthly report on the human rights situation released this week.

The team of monitors at Cubalex documented 247 acts of repression this past month (84 more than in January) among 34 categories of incidents of oppression. More than 85% of the incidents were carried out by State Security against members of independent civil society, according to the report.
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March 18, 2023 by Alberto de la Cruz


When the violent wave finished washing over the island, 75 innocent Cubans had been arrested. In the aftermath, they were all put on trial and long prison terms were handed out, some as many as 25 years, for the “counterrevolutionary” act of exercising free speech. The day was March 18, 2003, which later came to be known as Cuba’s Black Spring of 2003.

That was 20 years ago, but nothing has changed in Cuba since then. On yet another anniversary of the Black Spring, the brutality and repression of the Castro dictatorship is still ominously present, as the regime’s response to the peaceful protests on July 11, 2021 make clear. Over the past 20 years, the Castro regime has only become more brutal, more violent, and more oppressive. Journalists, activists, and artists are constantly harassed, beaten, arrested, and imprisoned, filling the island’s prisons with more political prisoners. Every year human rights and democracy activists are arrested by the thousands while State Security agents continue to terrorize anyone who dare to speak out.

But the saddest thing about this anniversary is that 20 years later, the international community continues to look the other way as the Castro dictatorship brutalizes, imprisons, and assassinates its opponents with complete impunity.

The 20th anniversary of Cuba’s Black Spring is yet another reminder that the darkness that enveloped and smothered the island 64 years ago remains.

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According to the images circulating on the networks, the demonstration was dominated by women and young people. (Collage)
14ymedio, Mexico, 6 May 2023 — Hundreds of Cubans took to the streets to protest, asking for “freedom” in the municipality of Caimanera, in Guantanamo, this Saturday afternoon. Several videos circulating on networks, as well as live broadcasts through Facebook, recorded the demonstration, where women and young people predominated.

The protest was repressed by uniformed men from the National Special Brigade of the Ministry of the Interior known as the “black berets,” who arrested several of the demonstrators. The images transmitted from the scene show the military, in the rain, beating several people and arresting others.

This Sunday, the independent journalist Yosmany Mayeta Labrada shared three images through his Facebook account and reported the arrest of Yandris Pelier Matos, Felipe Correa Martínez, Rodi Álvarez González, Luis Miguel Alarcón Martínez and Daniel Álvarez González after the massive protest in Caimanera.

Opposition member Yeris Curbelo Aguilera also told Mayeta Labrada that “the municipality remains completely militarized until now.”

After 11 p.m. this Saturday, NetBlock, an observatory that monitors Internet connection outages around the world, reported that Internet traffic had collapsed on the island after the protests in Caimanera and that it had subsequently been restored, but only partially.
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May 25, 2023


A vigil was held in front of the Cuban Embassy in Washington, D.C one year ago today, Wednesday, May 25, 2022, at 5:00pm to mark 50 years since student leader Pedro Luis Boitel Abraham died on hunger strike at the El Príncipe Prison in Havana where he was tortured. His oppressors remain in power in Cuba.

Activists gathered in front of the Cuban Embassy to remember Pedro Luis Boitel who died during a hunger strike on May 25, 1972. He had suffered years of torture at the hands of prison officials, and having completed his prison term, he was not freed, leading to his final hunger strike. This crime remains unpunished like the others of the Castro dictatorship. Demonstrators paid homage to Pedro Luis and other Cuban martyrs, and asked for an end to impunity.

During the vigil demonstrators gathered signatures for a petition calling for the freedom of all Cuban political prisoners. Petition is also online and calls for the end of repression on the island and the freedom of all those imprisoned for exercising their fundamental human rights. The petition has been signed by more than 600 parliamentarians, prominent diplomats and international political figures and is still open at this link: https://chng.it/Pq5hG9fc
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14ymedio, Havana, 21 May 2023 — Police barricades in front of homes and internet cuts on the cell phones of opponents, activists and independent journalists marked this May 20 on the Island, during the 121st anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Cuba. Part of the editorial staff of 14ymedio was incommunicado throughout the day due to the interruption of its mobile lines.

The area of the Havana coast was also, from the early hours of this Saturday, under an intense operation. The call launched by some activists to remember the founding of the Republic caused State Security agents and uniformed police to patrol the area, stand on the corners and monitor everyone who approached the Malecón.

At the confluence of Galiano Street with Malecón Avenue, several police vehicles and a large operation were observed around noon. This newspaper received reports from military service recruits who were transferred from their units to monitor the coastal area because “something is going to happen on May 20,” according to the mother of one of these young people.
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14ymedio, Havana, 21 May 2023 — Police barricades in front of homes and internet cuts on the cell phones of opponents, activists and independent journalists marked this May 20 on the Island, during the 121st anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Cuba. Part of the editorial staff of 14ymedio was incommunicado throughout the day due to the interruption of its mobile lines.

The area of the Havana coast was also, from the early hours of this Saturday, under an intense operation. The call launched by some activists to remember the founding of the Republic caused State Security agents and uniformed police to patrol the area, stand on the corners and monitor everyone who approached the Malecón.

At the confluence of Galiano Street with Malecón Avenue, several police vehicles and a large operation were observed around noon. This newspaper received reports from military service recruits who were transferred from their units to monitor the coastal area because “something is going to happen on May 20,” according to the mother of one of these young people.
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NEWs from Cuba Archives

July 9, 2023

On July 11, 2021, a spontaneous street protest in San Antonio de los Baños, near Havana, went viral on social media and thousands took to the streets all over Cuba, marching peacefully and chanting for freedom. Authorities violently put down the protests, militarized the country, and arrested thousands; at least 1,555 detentions were documented by the group Justicia 11J. Peaceful demonstrations and arrests have continued all over the country; to date, at least 909 individuals have been sentenced to prison, 773 are still in custody, and 84 have been forced into exile. After the protests, the Cuban government enabled and encouraged a huge mass exodus that has cost many lives; in 2022 alone, Cuba Archive reported 263 deaths and disappearances of Cubans fleeing the country by land or sea. In the 22 months from July 2021 to May 2023, 391,282 border encounters with Cubans, presumed entries, have been reported in the U.S. alone.

Since July 2021, 21 Cubans have been killed by state agents enabled and empowered by the Cuban government. Cuba Archive has to date documented 4,374 extrajudicial killings by the Cuban regime (partial list) since January 1st 1959, of which 3,069 were ordered executions without due process of law. This number excludes thousands more deaths of a political nature from other causes. (All victims profiled below have a record in Cuba Archive's database.)
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POSTED BY JOHN SUAREZ , JULY 13, 2023

"The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting." - Milan Kundera.


Thirty Seven July 3, 1994 “13 de Marzo” Tugboat Victims.

Three Cuban families totaling about 70 persons looking for a better life away from the regime boarded the Cuban tugboat "13 de Marzo" in the early morning hours of July 13, 1994. The captain of the tug was among those who wanted to depart. Despite their best efforts, an informant had already reported them to State Security..

On July 12, 1994, around 6:00 p.m., Cuban state security knew that the "13 de Marzo" tugboat was going to be taken and had nine hours to prepare their response. What happened on July 13, 1994, was planned ahead of time.

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August 3, 2023 by Alberto de la Cruz

The Cuban people continue taking to the streets in protest, while the communist Castro dictatorship continues to cling to its failed socialist policies and violently oppressive nature.

Via Martí Noticias (my translation):

Report documents almost 600 protests during July in Cuba

The Cuban Observatory of Conflicts documented 589 protests in July in the fifteen provinces of the island and the municipality of Isla de Pinos.

Out of the 327 public demonstrations based on Civil and Political Rights, 146 were motivated by repression against more than a thousand political prisoners and their families, as well as against influencers, civil society activists, and ordinary citizens.

“134 of them were, in some way, acts of defiance against the Cuban police state,” said Rolando Cartaya, a specialist from the Cuban Observatory of Conflicts, a program that is part of the Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba.

These actions are classified as demonstrations that show the propensity of citizens to openly express their discontent, such as what Osiris José Puerto Terry did when he revealed he was shot three times by two Black Berets on July 11, 2021, during the protests near the Toyo Corner in Havana.
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Between the Teatro Apolo in Barcelona and the EDP Gran Vía in Madrid, the Ballet Clásico de Cuba offered a total of 43 performances between July and August, from Thursday to Sunday. (Adelante)
14ymedio, Madrid, 18 September 2023 — Eight dancers of the Ballet Clásico de Cuba (formerly Ballet de Camagüey) stayed in Spain in August, after performing Swan Lake in Barcelona and Madrid. The director of the group herself, Regina Balaguer, reported this to an official newspaper, just a month after complaining to the Spanish press that the only thing that is talked about when they go on tour is the dancers who escape.

“We are not going to tie them up either, each one owns their life, but the most important thing is that they finished the engagement, except for two,” Balaguer told the Camagüey newspaper Adelante, without giving the names of the artists. “If it can’t be 24 swans, it will be 12, it will be 8, as in other companies,” she said. “It will not be the first time that we add second-year and third-year students,” she proposed as an “alternative,” and threw a dart at the deserters: “Most of us have a sense of belonging.”

In the interview with the provincial newspaper, the official acknowledged that the “exodus” is a “complex problem,” recalling that, although at this time it is “much more intense,” it has happened to the Camagüey Ballet throughout its history.
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14ymedio, Nelson García, Havana, 24 September 2023 — An improvised barricade erected by the neighbors of Dragones Street, between Rayo and San Nicolás in Central Havana, has forced the authorities this Sunday to move a water truck to the neighborhood suffering from the lack of water. The barricade, made with buckets, plastic tanks and other household goods, prevented the passage of vehicles and police patrols for hours.

“Many families with small children live here, and we haven’t had water for 35 days,” a 40-year-old woman, mother of two children, four- and six-years-old, who prefers anonymity for fear of reprisals, told 14ymedio. “We are forced to ask other nearby neighbors for water, because in these houses we haven’t seen a drop in weeks.”

“They didn’t even bring us a water truck,” the woman complains. “It all started with the people in the shelter,” she explains, alluding to a place on the block inhabited by numerous families who have been relocated to that property after losing their homes due to a building collapse. “That’s where everything started to heat up.”

The residents of the shelter began to close the street early in the day with the containers, buckets and tanks that they use to store water. “The police themselves tried to pass and couldn’t; they had to turn back,” adds another local neighbor. “Shortly after, people from the municipal government appeared, although people had gone there more than ten times to complain about the lack of water. As soon as they saw the protest, they appeared.”
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14ymedio, Havana, 4 October 2023 — The oral hearing of the trial against the Camagüeyan activist Aniette González was held this Wednesday in Camagüey and was concluded for sentencing. The opponent is accused of the crime of “insulting patriotic symbols,” after she posted photos of herself wrapped in the Cuban flag on social networks.

According to Cubalex, the Prosecutor’s Office, which in its petition requested four years in prison for the 43-year-old woman, alleged that she did not have a garment under the flag when taking the photos, so the images are considered “a lack of respect” for the patriotic symbol.

For her part, González’s lawyer stated that her client “was being judged for her political ideology” and emphasized in her defense that the opponent “was wearing clothes.”
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The three Cuban rowers are hoping to cross the US border. (Jit)
14ymedio, Havana, 17 November 2022 — The escape of athletes continues to fracture Cuban sports. This Thursday, the abandonment of the pentathlete Melissa Garlobo in Brazil, joined the Wednesday escape of rowers Ernier Tamayo, Alexei Carballosa and Nayala Torres in Mexico. According to journalist Francys Romero, the latter are close to “crossing Mexico’s border with the United States.”

So far this year “there are already 53 athletes of different specialties,” who take advantage of their stays abroad to end their sports relationship with the Island, the reporter said on his social networks.

Garlobo’s desertion occurred on October 28, just after finishing in 33rd place in the specialty tournament that took place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In this contest Cuba won six places for the Pan American Games in Santiago 2023. The decision of the granmense was signaled as “a serious indiscipline,” said the official media Jit.

Melissa Garlobo, together with Diana Leyva and Delmis Pérez, won the bronze medal in August during the Pan American Modern Pentathlon Open Championship in Santo Domingo, in the Dominican Republic, thus guaranteeing their participation in the Central American and Caribbean Games San Salvador 2023.
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