MADRID, Spain.- The Cuban Mercedes Vasallo Herrera, 51 years old, was assassinated this weekend in the town of Carlos Rojas, in Jovellanos, Matanzas province.
The unfortunate news was released by the activists from the Women’s Network of Cuba Marthadela Tamayo and Annia Zamora.
As specified by Marthadela Tamayo through the social network Facebook, the victim was killed with a knife and also received a strong blow to the head. Vasallo Herrera’s body was found by her grandson, under the bed.
With this crime, there are ten registered femicides in Cuba so far this year.
Just last week, five femicides were confirmed: The 17-year-old Leidy Bacallao was murdered by her ex-partner at the police station of her community, the Camalote Popular Council, located in the Nuevitas municipality, Camagüey province. Arletis Almarales Alberteris, 40 years old and a physiotherapist at a San Germán Nursing Home, in Holguín, was fatally attacked by her ex-partner on the public highway. Yanet Rodríguez, 33, was killed by her ex-partner, in San Agustín, La Lisa, in Havana. While Arisdani Viamontes Thomas she was murdered in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Camagüey; and Neisa López Vargas, in Bayamo, Granma.
before this recent increase of femicides in Cuba, the women’s rights organization Red Feminina de Cuba issued a statement demanding public policies and legal mechanisms that protect the integrity of women.
The statement highlights that a Comprehensive Law against Gender Violence, independent of the Family Code, would regulate the measures against violence by an Organic Law, which means “that we would convert living without violence into a right of women that the State has the obligation to fulfill”.
