The writer left at 3 pm to make his peaceful protest, which he did every 18th, and by midnight there was no news of his whereabouts.
14ymedio, Madrid, January 19, 2025 — Writer Jorge Fernández Era was detained for 16 hours, from 3 a.m. Sunday until 7 a.m. Monday, as he confirmed after his release. The activist had been missing since leaving his home Sunday afternoon to participate in the peaceful protest he holds on the 18th of each month. Although State Security has intervened on previous occasions to prevent him from participating in this activity, this time none of his family or friends had been able to locate him by calling police stations in Havana. His wife, Laideliz Herrera, announced the news in a Facebook post shortly after 7 p.m.
“My husband, Jorge Fernández Era, left at 3:00 pm for Central Park to exercise his constitutional right to peacefully demonstrate, and he has not returned,” she alerted.
Activist Jenny Pantoja later shared the same concern, adding that her attempts to locate him were proving fruitless. “Several of us have called the police stations and they tell us he’s not at any of them, that he doesn’t appear in the system. We know how you and the State Security operate. You put activists and opposition members in jail and don’t register them. That’s why they don’t appear in the National Repressive Police (PNR) system,” she denounced.
Pantoja, visibly upset, warned the authorities of the consequences if the situation continued. “I’m just telling you: release him, or you’ll have to deal with many more people detained, and the situation will become much more complicated,” she added. The message also included a reference to
the information released this Sunday regarding the approval of “plans and measures for the transition to a State of War.”
“We don’t believe in a State of War, because that’s the phase Cuba has been living in for a long time now: total repression and no constitutional guarantees,” Pantoja retorted.
Other Cuban activists and opposition members had joined their demands, including the professor and intellectual Alina Bárbara López, who began these peaceful demonstrations, which Fernández Era joined in April 2023. The academic started this activity precisely as a result of the writer’s arrest that year and decided to do it periodically, every month in Matanzas, due to the political situation in the country, which has meant, both for her and for those who have decided to support her, several arrests in the last two years.
López also faces trial for contempt, disobedience, and assault, crimes for which the prosecution is seeking a four-year prison sentence. But this hasn’t stopped her from continuing her protests, and just yesterday she was able to hold one in Matanzas. At midnight, knowing that Fernández Era was still missing, she warned: “If we don’t hear from him tomorrow, we will act accordingly, with civic responsibility and determination.”
Activist Miryorly García was able to demonstrate this Sunday, writing on social media, “about the deplorable state of the Cuban nation and the need for change that will return sovereignty to the Cuban people.” The editor has been leading a campaign for days demanding amnesty for Cuban political prisoners, a campaign that has garnered over a thousand signatures.
“Solidarity has been criminalized, but it is a matter of humanity to defend our brother or sister, daughter or son, mother or father, wife or husband, relative, neighbor or friend, fellow citizen. We must transform the shame of silence into the power of empathy, rise above fear, and let the punishment become inspiration,” he reminded everyone yesterday in a post in which he insisted on the importance of joining this demand despite the legitimate fear among the population. “Nothing changes if we continue doing the same thing. It is, despite the consequences, about changing ‘How long?’ to ‘Enough is enough.’ Because if we unite, we won’t fit in the prisons; we are more,” she urged.
Last December, Jorge Fernández Era was also arrested during his monthly protest, this time in Matanzas, but he was located by his family in the usual way and released a few hours later. On several of the many occasions the writer has been arrested, he has denounced mistreatment, including his arrest in July 2025 , when he was beaten by a lieutenant colonel from the Zanja police station in Havana.
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