Holguin/More than 50 people, including family, friends and activists, have gathered since the early hours of this Thursday in front of the Popular Provincial Court of Holguín, where a hearing is being held on the case of the young creators of the independent project El4tico. The view responds to a resource habeas corpus admitted by the court itself in favor of Kamil Zayas Pérez and Ernesto Ricardo Medina, arrested on February 6.
Coinciding with the increase in people gathered in front of the court, there were internet outages in the area that interrupted the arrival of messages and reports from the place of the concentration, while Zayas and Medina remained inside the building.
On its Facebook page, the Holguín Provincial Prosecutor’s Office justified its decision to open criminal proceedings against the creators of the platform. He accuses them of “propaganda against the constitutional order” and “instigation to commit a crime,” through publications that incited the population and members of the Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior to change the constitutional order and “defamed State institutions.” The note indicates that Medina and Zayas are under the precautionary measure of provisional detention, while “investigation proceedings to obtain evidence” continue.
The judicial day has been preceded by a new act of harassment
The judicial day has been preceded by a new act of harassment. The activist Yanet Rodríguez Sánchez, who presented the appeal habeas corpus in favor of those detained on February 9, tried to leave his home this morning to go to court, but political police agents prevented him. There were at least two police patrol cars and a motorcycle in front of his house, and two plainclothes officers blocked his attempt to address the court.
Rodríguez Sánchez has also received intimidating phone calls and messages in recent hours. Since this Thursday morning she remains incommunicado and arbitrarily detained in her home, a form of detention de facto that the Cuban authorities use recurrently to prevent the participation of activists in public demonstrations.
The admission of habeas corpus by the First Criminal Chamber of the Provincial Court of Holguín constitutes a rare occurrence within the Cuban judicial system, where this type of appeal rarely succeeds when it comes to arrests with political background. On the Island there is no real separation of powers and the courts, like the rest of the public institutions, operate under the “guidelines” of the Communist Party, the only legal one.
The contrast with other recent cases is evident. In Havana, for example, the appeal was denied habeas corpus presented on behalf of Ankeilys Guerra Fis, a 23-year-old young man detained since January 14, 2026 and held incommunicado in Villa Marista, the headquarters of State Security. Guerra was violently arrested at his home for alleged critical expressions on social networks. The court rejected the appeal, alleging the lack of data on the crime charged, the file number or the exact place of detention, information that the authorities themselves systematically refuse to provide.
The hearing forces the Prosecutor’s Office to formally present the charges, justify the legality of the detention and explain the conditions in which the detainees are found.
In Holguín, relatives and friends of Zayas and Medina have expressed their concern both about the absence of official information and about the detention conditions of the young people at the province’s Criminal Instruction headquarters, a center popularly known as “Everybody sings,” due to the violence of the interrogations carried out there. During the operation that culminated in their arrest, State Security agents seized computers, mobile phones, cameras and other work equipment used by young people to produce critical audiovisual content about the political and social reality of the country.
This Thursday’s hearing requires the Provincial Prosecutor’s Office to formally present the charges – if there are any -, justify the legality of the detention and explain the conditions in which the detainees are found, as part of the judicial review derived from the habeas corpus. The process has aroused the attention of human rights organizations, independent journalists and activists inside and outside the Island, who consider the case a direct violation of freedom of expression and due legal process.
In recent hours, messages of solidarity have multiplied on social networks under the hashtag # TodosSomosEl4tico, with calls for the immediate release of the young people and complaints of judicial arbitrariness. In contrast, party authorities – including the first secretary of the Communist Party in Holguín, Joel Queipo Ruiz – joined a campaign of public lynching, calling the young people of El4tico “mercenaries” and “traitors”, among other insults common in official discourse.
In front of the court, the atmosphere remains peaceful, although full of tension and expectation. The relatives – including Doris Santiesteban Batista, Ernesto’s wife – continue to wait for news from inside the judicial building, hoping that the day will mark a turning point in a case that once again highlights the use of the Cuban judicial system as a tool of political control and punishment of dissent.
