Havana Cuba. – “The food is very poorly prepared, they are cooking without salt and without oil; They gave us soup with a boiled potato for lunch, no one would eat that. They are starving us,” denounces the political prisoner Osvel Barzagas Claro from the Isle of Youth. on phone call made this Monday to the opposition activist Dayris del Sol.
“I was very upset. He told me that they are starving, that they barely give him one or two meals a day, ”Del Sol assured. CubaNet. In a second call, made minutes later, “he told me that one of the guards, hearing him complain, told him that if he didn’t like the food, he shouldn’t eat it.”
Last June, Osvel Barzagas Claro, activist of the Partido Autónomo Pinero, was sentenced to 10 months in prison for an alleged crime of “disobedience”. The Prosecutor’s Office filed charges against him for breaking his cell phone before handing it over to State Security for confiscation.
The incident occurred on April 21 of this year, when State Security officials Iraimis Durán Elías, head of the Department against the Counterrevolution on the Isle of Youth, and his subordinate, Wilmer Martínez Góngora, imposed a fine of 3,000 pesos with the corresponding confiscation of your cell phone based on Article 68, paragraph i, of the Decree-Law 370.
On this occasion, Barzagas remained detained and held incommunicado for four days at the territory’s police station. First they told him that they would charge him with “attack” but finally they charged him with “disobedience.” He was released on bail of 6,000 CUP. On July 11, the Municipal Court of the Isle of Youth ratified the sentence.
“(…) I clarify that the gentlemen did not have an order to confiscate or occupy my cell phone, which they told me was verbal. It is a total abuse of power. In my country, Cuba, they do not respect human rights; In Cuba, we citizens do not have any type of right. I know that this is a hoax and the work of State Security, which I hold responsible if anything were to happen to me in prison, even the slightest. This shows me that I am not wrong, neither I nor those who think differently. Homeland, life and freedom for all political prisoners, down with the dictatorship, long live human rights, long live free Cuba”, public on his Facebook profile upon learning of the ratification of the sentence.
Before being transferred to prison known as “La 60”, in the same territory, express: “I consider myself to be another young man who has been a victim of the repression of this government, just for thinking differently. I am not a criminal and I have never been penalized; here, on the Isle of Youth, everyone knows me and loves me. I call on international public opinion to be aware of everything what is happening in Cuba with all the young people who, like me, are being victims of repression of this government.”
According to point 22” of the “United Nations Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners”, known as the “Mandela Rules”, every prisoner “You will receive from the administration of the penitentiary establishment, at the usual hours, good quality food, well prepared and served, whose nutritional value is sufficient to maintain your health and strength.”
Barzagas was among the protesters of the July 11 (J11), 2021 on the Isle of Youth; He was arrested that day and released a month later on bail, a measure that was later commuted to an administrative fine of 3,000 pesos by virtue of Decree-Law No. 310, article 8, subsection 3.
Currently, Prisoners Defenders records the record figure of 1,026 political prisoners in Cuba.
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