The sanction was imposed after filming a tail for the purchase of liquefied gas. OCDH denounces violations of fundamental rights in the process.
Madrid, Spain.- The Popular Municipal Court of Santiago de Cuba sentenced Julio César Duque de Estrada Ferrer four years and six months in prison for the crimes of disobedience and attack, after filming a long tail with his mobile phone to buy liquefied gas.
The complaint was made by the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights (OCDH), which described the sentence as “a farce” and said that “the violation of multiple fundamental rights.”
The events occurred on September 5, 2024, when Duke of Estrada, 56, recorded on public roads and was approached by a counterintelligence officer, identified as Mario Raciel Soulary Garcés. The agent ordered him to stop the recording and deliver the phone. The observatory said that the action was “illegal, arbitrary and disproportionate”, since “recording with a mobile phone in a public space does not constitute a crime or threat to security.”
The report also criticizes that a military assumes civil police functions without justification: the use of military forces for these functions is contrary to international standards, except in exceptional situations that clearly do not apply in this case.
The OCDH emphasizes that rights protected by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights were violated, signed by Cuba, such as freedom of expression, information and circulation. In addition, he questions that the court “limits himself to ratifying repressive actions without any independence.”
On the other hand, Yaxys Cires, director of the OCDH strategy, declared Martí News that this conviction constitutes a direct attack on freedom of expression. The opponent warned that what is being punished is not only the specific fact of the video, but the right of a person to document what happens in public spaces.
“It would be more than, in addition to enduring poverty and extreme misery, people cannot report or tell what is happening. Who did commit a crime and arbitrary action was the counterintelligence agent who assaulted him and tried to snatch his cell phone,” he said in this regard.
Duke of Estrada is also the father of the political prisoner Dairon Duque Estrada Aguileracurrently imprisoned. This new case confirms the regime repression pattern against citizens who exercise basic rights.
