Madrid Spain.- Cuba was rated as the country with the most attacks on press freedom in Latin America during 2021, according to the recent Report Shadow of the Red Voces del Sur (RVS), with a total of 1,129 alerts of violations of this right.
In the case of the Island, the cases analyzed were compiled by the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press (ICLEP).
The document denounces that the government of Miguel Díaz-Canel “has never shown a serious commitment to fundamental freedoms”, but has instead given continuity to the “autocratic, violent and profoundly anti-democratic political project that has been cemented in more than 60 years ”.
According to the report, the 1,129 alerts reported by the ICPL during the past year represent an increase of 228% compared to 2020. Of these, 66% correspond to arbitrary arrests, 22% to Internet restrictions and 7 % to assaults and attacks.
“The State, through forces such as the police or security agents, is the main aggressor of journalists, with an overwhelming majority of 99% of registered alerts. Arbitrary detention alerts increased by 425%, ”explains the text.
In reference to the popular protests of July 11, 2021 (J11), the Red Voces del Sur points out that at least 50 journalists and media workers were arrested in the framework of these demonstrations.
The organization highlights the cases of the reporter Lázaro Yuri Valle Roca, detained since June 15, 2021, for the alleged crimes of contempt and enemy propaganda; and the influencer Yoandi Montiel (El Gato de Cuba), who is serving a two-year prison sentence, also for “disrespect.”
“The repeated climate of harassment of journalists that has been maintained, causes unprecedented trends of self-censorship and exile, which are difficult to quantify. Retaliation came in other ways as well. At the institutional level, there are changes in the legal framework, to facilitate and justify the actions of state forces in instances such as arbitrary arrests,” the document indicates.
As well as denouncing that the state telecommunications company, ETECSA, activated a listening system to spy on and intercept communications from journalists and the media, and created Internet blackouts in the midst of the protests.
Faced with this situation, the Red Voces del Sur, which emerged in 2017 to monitor the attacks against these rights, asked the Cuban regime to “repeal repressive laws and instruments of the institutional machinery that prohibit the freedoms of the press, expression and association, and they serve to censor and structurally repress”.
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