MADRID, Spain.- Diplomats from the United States Embassy in Cuba held a meeting in the municipality of Perico, province of Matanzas, with Sonia Álvarez, wife of the opponent Felix Navarro Rodriguez and mother of the political prisoner Sayli Navarro Álvarez, according to the diplomatic headquarters in a post on social networks.
According to the statement, the meeting also included activists Iván Hernández Carrión and Asunción Carrión Hernández. During the exchange, the US representatives expressed the firm support of the US Government for the families and reiterated their demand that Félix and Sayli Navarro, as well as all people considered political prisoners in Cuba, be released.
The Embassy pointed out that these types of meetings are part of its direct contacts with relatives of detainees and civil society actors in different locations in the country, within the framework of its monitoring of the human rights situation.
Félix Navarro Rodríguez is president of the Pedro Luis Boitel Party for Democracy and one of the island’s historic opponents. He was sentenced to nine years in prison for the alleged crimes of public disorder, contempt and attack, after participating in the protests of the July 11, 2021 in Perico, Matanzas.
Like thousands of Cubans that day, Félix Navarro and his daughter Sayli Navarro Álvarez demonstrated peacefully in the streets of their municipality, in the context of a national social outbreak. The next day, both went to the Perico police station to inquire about the people detained during the demonstrations. There they were arrested.
Sayli Navarro was released shortly after, while her father was transferred to the State Security operations center in Versalles, Matanzas. At the end of January 2022, the Cuban regime held the trial against father and daughter, which concluded with a sentence of nine years in prison for Félix Navarro and eight years for Sayli Navarro.
After the appeal trial, held in April 2022, Sayli was transferred to prison chained by her hands and feet, without being allowed to say goodbye to her. his mother.
In January 2025, Félix Navarro had been released on parole, as part of an agreement between the Vatican and the Cuban government. However, on April 29, the Supreme People’s Court revoked that measure, alleging that the opponent failed to comply with the conditions imposed during his trial period, including leaving his municipality without authorization and leaving his job.
Since his re-entry into prison, family members and activists have denounced a rapid deterioration of your state of health, which has revived concern for his physical integrity and for the general situation of political prisoners in Cuba.
