The artists Maykel Castillo Osorbo and Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, leaders of the San Isidro Movement, will receive this Wednesday the 2022 Freedom Award granted by the human rights organization Freedom House.
As we face daunting challenges to freedom around the world, it is an honor to celebrate the incredible courage of this year’s Laureates in standing up to tyranny. a statement from the NGO to its president, Michael J. Abramowitz.
With both activists in jail without trial, the award will be received by the art curator Anamely Ramos, who is in Washington after the island’s regime prevented him from returning. This award has been given since 1943 to outstanding leaders who have defended freedom and democracy.
Osorbo, arrested on May 18, 2021, was transferred on May 31 to the maximum security prison of Kilo Cinco y Medio, in Pinar del Río, where he remains.
He is accused of attack, public disorder and evasion of prisoners or detainees, because in a demonstration on Damas street, in front of the headquarters of the San Isidro Movement, he refused to get on the patrol, when the police tried to arbitrarily arrest him, on April 4 of last year. “He now faces up to 10 years in prison on trumped-up charges,” Freedom House said in its statement.
Despite being arrested at different times, both Cuban artists share the same tax file, accused of attack, public disorder
Osorbo, remember the organization, is one of the creators of the song Homeland and Lifealong with Yotuel Romero, Descemer Bueno, the duo Gente de Zona and El Funky, which has become a hymn for Cubans in their fight against the dictatorship.
Otero Alcántara, for his part, was imprisoned on July 11, before he could participate in the protests that day, and is being held in the Guanajay prison. His health has deteriorated as a result of several hunger strikes, before and during his imprisonment.
Recently, Amnesty International denounced that Otero Alcántara lost the sight of one eye in prisondue to the lack of medical attention that was denied to her at the beginning of April, according to complaints from the activist and artist Claudia Genlui.
Despite being arrested at different times, and not on the same April 4, the date of the events for which they are accused, both Cuban artists share the same tax file, and Alcántara is also accused of outrage against national symbols. , for making the work of art drapeau. He faces a request for seven years in prison, but a trial date has not been set for either of them.
Freedom House will also present the award to Carl Gershman, who was president for nearly 40 years of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), dedicated to strengthening democratic institutions around the world, according to the statement.
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