No More Youth Political Prisoners!

Cuban Political Prisoners

Informe del Centro de Información Hablemos Press reports on the violations of human rights in Cuba during the month of May. The report tells various stories of the people who were victims of the injustices of the Cuban government throughout the last month.  

Raúl Castro continues to follow his brother’s footsteps in the slogan of “more repression” against the political opposition. The repression has continued ever since the crackdown on the opposition in 2003. Political activists are being taken from their homes, arrested, harassed, and threatened by police units. Rarely are the arrests legally legitimate. The circumstances under the arrests of political opposition are unjust. Many people are taken from their houses at odd hours of the night. Others are taken by officials in unidentifiable cars while they are walking down the street. On May 8th, Miguel López Santos was arrested on his way to Mass.

The government does not permit any form of protest in public. If there is any sign of political opposition in public, people are immediately detained.   On May 7th, the political police and agents from the Interior of Ministry entered the houses of Odalias González Naya, Leydi Coca Quesada, and Sandra Guerra to threaten the women that if they continued to participate in any activities in support of the Ladies in White, they would be placed in prison. On the 14th of May, directors of the Juventud Activa Cuba Unida (JACU) were arrested from their homes. The State Security confiscated all of their work materials.

Any reunions in memory of Orlando Zapata Tamayo were broken up by the political police. Tamayo died on 22 February 2010 after an 85 day hunger strike to demand the release of prisoners of conscience. On May 15, the State Security set up a block to limit any access to the house of Reyna Luisa Tamayo Danger, mother of Orlando. People attempted to pay respect to his mother after his death and were denied entrance by security forces.

 Around 200 political prisoners remain in jail under inhumane conditions. According to the report, the jails are functioning similarly to concentration camps. Prisoners in need of medical attention are disregarded. The prisons are infected with rodents. The guards threaten prisoners that if they complain about the prison conditions, then they will respond to their complaints violently.  Overall, the jails are overcrowded. Raimundo Perdigón, an independent journalist, says that most of his meals consisted of food that was unidentifiable to him. On May 8th, Manuel Chaman Molina attempted suicide after one year of torture and discrimination for having AIDs.  Ángel J. Moya Acosta woke up one morning to the blaring sound of the radio. The guard woke him up and handcuffed him threatening to spray his face with pepper spray.

At the end of May, Cardinal Jaime Ortega met with Raúl Castro.  The Catholic Church asked the government of Raúl Castro to release the political prisoners who were ill and to stop the repression against the Ladies in White, wives and relatives of jailed Cuban dissidents.

*This is a summary of the report issed by Informe del Centro de Información Hablemos Press. Click here for the full report in Spanish.