The organization Prisoners Defenders (PD) recorded 27 arrests for political reasons in Cuba last October, for a total of 1,027 Cubans who still remain in prison. In his most recent report, released this fridayalso denounced that the island’s population is “fleeing en masse from the repression.”
The Madrid-based NGO pointed out that the Cuban regime is one of the few in the world that supports the Russian invasion of Ukraine and that Havana’s alliance with Moscow has not improved the living conditions of Cubans, who continue to suffer long blackouts, shortages and an unprecedented migration crisis.
Most of the new arrests are linked to the protests that took place at the beginning of October this year, indicates PD, and that they were due to the collapse of the National Electric System after Hurricane Ian passed through the west of the Island.
Although most of the arrests registered by PD respond to the months after the massive protests of 11J, the number of prisoners has grown significantly since the beginning of 2022.
Since November 2021, the number of 591 prisoners was increased by 684 arbitrary arrests in 2022, for a total of 1,275 prisoners of conscience. Of these, 247 were released under “very strong threats and mainly for full compliance with their sentences”, with 1,027 still serving sentences of up to 30 years.
The sedition charge affects another 180 Cubans, of which 175 have been sentenced to an average of 10 years in prison
In its count, the organization includes 34 minors – 29 boys and 5 girls – who are serving a sentence or are being criminally prosecuted. At least 15 have been sentenced to five years in prison for the crime of sedition, which has served to prosecute dozens of protesters.
The sedition charge affects another 180 Cubans, of whom 175 have been sentenced to an average of 10 years in prison. Another 743 inmates, designated by PD as prisoners of conscience, have been sentenced to prison terms.
The organization specifies that its list includes 121 women with political convictions and of conscience. This group includes transsexuals who are imprisoned among men, with total disrespect for their rights, where they suffer “indescribable situations for their sexual condition.”
On the other hand, the NGO Justicia 11J has documented 161 arrests of demonstrators who participated in 202 public protests between August and October 2022. Of these, five are under 18 years of age – the minimum criminal age in the country is 16 years – and 78 were still detained at the beginning of this November .
In the last three months, demonstrations have been registered in 14 of the 15 provinces of the Island, concentrated above all in Havana, where there were at least 55 protests, and in Matanzas, where 19 were verified.
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