The Cuban activist and businesswoman Saily González Velázquez, along with others such as Salomé García Bacallao, and relatives of those arrested on July 11 (11J), have started a campaign on social networks for the Spanish press agency EFE to cover the trials against prisoners.
“We still have time to get the foreign press accredited in Cuba to cover the trials of political prisoners. Several family members and activists have already joined the campaign. [con las etiquetas] #EFECubreLosJuicios and #SOSCuba. Let’s support them, “González said on his Twitter account from Santa Clara, where he works in the private sector.
For his part, García Bacallao, stressed that “from January 11 to 14, four children will be tried in Holguín for the political crime of sedition” and so far the Spanish agency “has not covered any ordinary trial of more than 200 protesters from 11J “.
Activists and citizens of the Island have joined the initiative, using the hashtag #EFECubreLosJuicios in their networks as a way to demand that the agency report on these processes in which some have already received sentences that exceed 20 years of deprivation of liberty. .
González explained to this newspaper that he shared the idea with one of the WhatsApp groups where some relatives of the July 11 detainees and civil society actors are gathered. “There every now and then there is an occasional initiative to support political prisoners and it occurred to me to launch this campaign to give visibility to this situation since we have no other way to help them because in Cuba there are no legal tools that allow us to support them” , he detailed.
“We still have time to get the foreign press accredited in Cuba to cover the trials of political prisoners. Several family members and activists have already joined the campaign.”
In addition, he says that the campaign is fundamentally based “on the responsibility that EFE has as an accredited international press in Cuba to cover these trials” and for being very “replicated in other European media.”
About twenty family members have joined the initiative, says González. “Let’s hope they will join in more because the important thing is to pressure EFE to respond, or if not, make it clear that the agency is being an accomplice of the dictatorship and demonstrate the lack of mechanisms that Cuban civil society and the relatives of the political prisoners to get justice done. “
Jonathan López Alonso, a relative of the political prisoner Andy García Lorenzo, assures that what they want with this campaign is “that these media that are accredited in Cuba and do not do their job, do it.” The trial of this young man will take place on January 10 and he is accused of public disorder, contempt and attack.
“They do not cover almost what the opposition and Civil Society do in Cuba. EFE covered what happened with Yunior García in November when they besieged him, but it is not fair that they cover that and not this. Why don’t they do it Also with these trials, what is important when they are asking for sentences of up to 25 years? “, denounces López.
Bárbara Farrat Guillén, mother of young Jonathan Torres, 17, who has been in prison since August 13 awaiting trial for his participation in the 11J protests, has also joined the campaign, as well as activists Daniela Rojo, Camila Rodríguez and Leonardo Fernández Otaño. The latter in his messages of support also includes complaints to other international press agencies such as AP, Reuters, AFP or CNN television.
“Family members are not used, like almost no citizen here in Cuba, to using the mechanisms that exist, they do not know them in the first place, they do not understand themselves as citizens with rights”
Although support for the initiative is growing, activist Saily González regrets that family members “have not yet made up their minds to take over public spaces” and are reluctant to “use the few mechanisms we have to exercise our rights or at least try” because in their Opinion is something that civil society “would be happy” to support.
“Family members are not accustomed, like almost no citizen here in Cuba, to using the mechanisms that exist, they do not know them in the first place, they do not understand themselves as citizens with rights. Regarding what they decide, we continue to occupy our social networks, because the streets will belong to the revolutionaries, but the social networks are ours, “he says.
Last november, the Cuban authorities withdrew press credentials from the EFE Agency journalists in Cuba, on the eve of the outlawed Civic March for Change. Later, some of the credentials were restored, but according to the agency explained, his delegation in Havana is depleted and needs to return to work of all your team.
Since then, EFE has warned its subscribers that these decisions of the Cuban authorities in recent months “have decimated the team of the delegation” in Havana, where currently “only two journalists can continue to carry out their work.”
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