14ymedio, Havana, 28 March 2024 — The independent platforms Alas Tensas and Yo Sí Te Creo en Cuba (YSTC) confirmed this Thursday the death of Yudeisi Pedroza, murdered on March 25. According to the 14ymedio record, Pedroza’s is the 14th femicide registered this year. The 45-year-old victim was killed in her home in the municipality of Sibanicú, in Camagüey, allegedly at the hands of her ex-partner. According to the activists, Pedroza was the mother of two children, one of whom is a minor.
The news of the femicide was disseminated on Monday by the “influencer” Niover Licea, who said he had contacted people close to Pedroza. According to Licea, the aggressor waited for the woman to be alone in her house and attacked her with a mocha (a type of machete), leaving several cuts on her body.
The news of the femicide was disseminated this Monday by the “influencer” Niover Licea
On March 6, the platforms reported the murders of the Cuban women Dinosca Rivera Martí, a resident of the town of Carlos Rojas, in Matanzas, and Martina Hernández, a resident of Becerra, a rural neighborhood in the city of Las Tunas.
The murder of Rivera Martí, 34, happened a day earlier at the hands of her partner and father of her children. “The aggressor attacked her on the public road after she left her two young children at school, who at least did not witness the event,” the feminist platforms explained.
In the case of Hernández, whose age could not be specified, the murder occurred on February 12, also at the hands of her partner.
So far, independent platforms have not confirmed the femicide of Samantha Heredia, a 22-year-old nurse, allegedly murdered in Santiago de Cuba by her husband, Dr. Pedro Carmenate, at the beginning of March.
Days ago, Alas Tensas and YSTC also reported the murder of two elderly women: Paulina Chiquitica Collazo Diago, which occurred in Los Arabos, Matanzas, “under extreme violence,” and María, 92 years old, at the hands of her son-in-law in Lawton, on March 3.
The two platforms consider both cases as femicides, though 14ymedio does not.
In 2023, the number of people convicted of femicides in Cuba tripled compared to the 2022 record
The average profile of victims of femicide in Cuba in 2023 – when 87 such murders were counted – is that of a 37-year-old woman, with at least one minor in her care, murdered by her ex-partner.
For its part, the Attorney General’s Office acknowledged that since 2021 and until the end of October 2023, 117 femicides had been registered on the Island. This figure differs from those collected by independent platforms and media.
During a congress of the Federation of Cuban Women in 2023, President Miguel Díaz-Canel revealed that the Island tripled the number of people convicted of femicides that year compared to the 2022 record. According to him, 93% of the penalties were for more than 20 years in prison, and in five cases it was life imprisonment.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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