“All the people mentioned up to this point are women,” denounces the animal protection organization.
MIAMI, United States. – More than 62 members of Animal Welfare Cuba (BAC) in Havana have been summoned “by the political police and the Cuban State Security bodies” in recent days, according to the organization itself. a statement posted on Facebook.
“All the people cited up to this point are women,” states the text, which adds that there are already “new summonses” notified for the coming days, which, in the group’s opinion, confirms “a sustained pattern of harassment directed against the association.”
BAC maintains that, during these interrogations, the authorities exert “direct and indirect pressure” for those mentioned to leave the organization and “leave its founder completely alone,” although it recognizes that “many of them are no longer in BAC.” The purpose, according to the statement, would be to “cause fear, wear and tear and forced abandonment, to isolate the association and lead it to a situation of operational bankruptcy.”
In the same text, the organization assures that it keeps track of what happened in these summonses. “Many maintain permanent contact with the real internal structure of the association and transfer each information in a controlled manner through Signal, each question and each warning they receive,” he points out. BAC states that some collaborate “strategically, appearing to provide information to protect their personal integrity and, at the same time, allowing the association to anticipate movements, identify objectives and neutralize damage,” and emphasizes: “The association is aware of absolutely everything that happens in these summonses and will also be aware of the next ones to come.”
The statement also denounces infiltration within the movement itself. BAC claims to have “objectively identified after many tests” people who “were already part of the Cuban State Security bodies within the association,” who “deliberately infiltrated” and “actively cooperated with the counterintelligence mechanisms.” According to the organization, “their identities are fully documented” and “in the coming days” those names will be made “known to the corresponding authorities outside the Cuban sphere,” with the intention that “these behaviors will be recorded and judged tomorrow.”
In the same section, BAC says it has received information about a possible discredit offensive from other spaces of animal activism. “We received information that several ‘leaders’ of other groups are preparing to mount a campaign against BAC and isolate us and it seems something ‘genuine and natural’, working with the Cuban Security bodies,” the statement states, adding that the organization will remain “very attentive to adding them to the internal list.”
Among the “objectives” that BAC claims to have detected in these “harassment interviews” is the alleged intention to “seize the property acquired by the association to convert it into a shelter.” The organization describes that property as “a home purchased with years of collective effort, with donations from Cubans within the Island, from the diaspora and with personal contributions from the founder,” and considers that the eventual dispossession would seek “a material blow,” in addition to “a symbolic and psychological blow” against its work.
BAC also denounces a parallel operation to discredit its economic management. “The cards will be blocked, they will set up a campaign to discredit treasury management and build a story of alleged economic crimes,” says the statement, which mentions as a possible pretext “a tricycle that belonged to the founder and was lent at the time to BAC.” The organization affirms that financial transparency has been “one of the most solid pillars” of the project and describes what is described as “a maneuver designed to fabricate crimes where they do not exist.”
The statement insists that the current scenario is part of a previous process. “None of this started now,” says BAC, and places a precedent in April 2024: “Several coordinators were urgently summoned and received an explicit order: leave Animal Welfare Cuba, create a new association without its founder or ‘eliminate’ the founder of the project.” From that episode, according to the text, it was clear that it was “a structured and sustained plan” and that “the internal infiltration, the discredit campaigns, the deliberately provoked tensions and the attempt to ignore the legitimate leadership were not coincidental events.”
BAC affirms that, in light of this situation, it reconfigured its operation. “The figure of its founder was protected, vulnerable structures were dismantled, infiltrated spaces were purified and a parallel, discreet and operational coordination system was created, which is what supports the association today,” the statement indicates. This system, he adds, “is not visible, is not public and does not depend on easily identifiable groups.”
The organization also describes a growth in its social base and maintains that it stopped operating as a small group. “Animal Welfare Cuba became a real community of more than 56,000 people on social networks, where each follower is a potential volunteer, collaborator or active support,” he says. According to the text, this transformation prevents its dismantling through traditional means: “When action is needed, a small group does not respond: thousands of people respond, many of them anonymous, from different parts of the country.”
The statement also denounces acts of harassment on a personal level. BAC maintains that the founder’s relatives have been pressured and that “deliberate lies” have been used to cause distress in “his nervously ill mother,” in addition to “intervening” in his private life “as a tool of wear and tear.” “False profiles have been created” and “internal conflicts with his ex-partner have been promoted,” the text adds, describing a “sustained strategy of psychological pressure” through “false profiles and distorted information.”
BAC affirms that it transferred the information about what happened “directly and documented” to US authorities and a diplomatic representation that it identifies as a mediator. “Yesterday [lunes 26 de enero] All information has been transferred directly and documented to the United States Department of State, to the Embassy of USA in Cuba and to the Embassy of Panamawhich acts as a mediator,” the statement says. The organization adds that “every summons, every threat and every movement is being recorded and communicated.”
The text closes with a declaration of continuity of the project. “Animal Welfare Cuba is not going to disappear. If one space is limited, others are created. If some people are pressured, others take over,” he adds, and emphasizes that the organization, in his opinion, no longer depends “on visible names or fragile structures.” It also claims its origin: “This project was born from the civic protest in a Cuban university (…), from the opposed censorship, from an animal rights march in Santa Clara and from the demand for a true animal protection law.”
