On Sunday night, the activist Henry Constantín was detained at Customs at the Ignacio Agramonte International Airport of Camaguey, on his arrival from Miami. The dissident was taken to a police station where they confiscated his cellphone and laptop, according to what he told 14ymedio. The independent journalist was released around ten at night and says he will begin the legal process to recover his belongings.
Constantín arrived in Cuba around four in the afternoon on a American Airlines direct flight and was held at the airport until after eight o’clock at night. The officers of the General Customs of the Republic insisted on seizing their belongings to “review their content,” but the activist emphatically refused.
Constantín, who is the director of the literary magazine Time for Cuba, told them they could search the devices in his presence, but not out of sight. After four hours of waiting, Constantín was taken to a police station in the Montecarlo neighborhood.
At the National Revolutionary Police (PNR) unti, the soldiers took his “prints of all kinds,” he explained to this newspaper. The reporter refused to sign the record of the seizure of objects when the police told him that they would not give him a copy of the document.
After the Immigration Reform implemented by the Government in 2013, it has become a common practice to confiscate computers, video cameras and cellphones from activists arriving in the country.