Cuba: Major Physical and Psychological Tortures Against Jose Daniel Ferrer are Denounced

José Daniel Ferrer is not well physically and does not know how much longer he will be able to resist, according to his social media. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, December 5, 2021 —  Patriotic Union of Cuba (Unpacu) coordinator, José Daniel Ferrer, is subjected to ever greater “torture, as much physical as psychological” in Mar Verde prison, Santiago de Cuba, where he is being held. As his sister Ana Belkis Ferrer, made known on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Cuban Prisoners Defenders (CPD) accused the Cuban regime of “slowly killing José Daniel Ferrer” with “sonic attacks, psycho-pharmaceuticals, preventing his family from bringing him food.” They stated that he does not receive “medical attention” and he is held “in inhumane confinement within four walls, without seeing the sun and in isolation.”

At the beginning of November, Cuban Prisoners Defenders requested the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, to intercede “immediately” in favor of opposition leader José Daniel Ferrer. They warned that Unpacu’s coordinator denounced “a constant noise in his head like crickets, sounding constantly in an unbearable manner,” which results in a constant headache.

Last Friday, Ferrer was allowed a visit from his wife, Nelva Ismarays Ortega Tamayo, with little Daniel José and his daughter Fátima Victoria Ferrer Cantillo. “The Raúl Castro and Díaz-Canel dictatorship allowed this second family visit to  José Daniel Ferrer García in almost five months of unjust, arbitrary and criminal confinement.”

In an extremely arbitrary measure, they prevented José Daniel Ferrer Cantillo from seeing his father. It was understood to be “punishment and vengeance” for the young man “for going out once again to the streets demanding freedom on November 15th,” the day Archipiélago called for a peaceful protest, which was ultimately thwarted by the harassment and repression on the part of State Security.

In August, the People’s Provincial Tribunal in Santiago de Cuba notified Ferrer that he must comply with a four-year prison sentence imposed by the tribunal in February 2020 for “injuries and imprisonment” against a third person. The opposition leader was detained since the protests on July 11th, until that moment he had enjoyed a modified sentence which allowed him to remain free.

The tribunal considered the Unpacu coordinator to have maintained “an attitude contrary to the requirements he must meet” because he did not have a job and “on various occasions has adopted behaviors that are incorrect and challenge authorities in the fulfillment of their functions.”

Translated by: Silvia Suárez

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