The most recent Prisoners Defenders report adds two new prisoners of conscience and subtracts 16, for suicide, expatriation or completing their sentences
14ymedio/EFE, Havana, September 16, 2024 — The number of political prisoners in Cuba barely decreases, according to the latest monthly report of Prisoners Defenders (PD), published on Monday. At the end of August, the NGO, based in Madrid, recorded a total of 1,105 prisoners, 14 fewer than those listed in July. Two were added to the list, while 16 were subtracted. One of them, Yosandri Mulet Almarales, had committed suicide, and the rest had either been forcefully expatriated or completed of their sentences.
In the statement, the organization emphasizes “the horrible situation experienced by prisoners, who are hungry, sick, without medical attention and being tortured.” At least 62 of the politically motivated prisoners suffer from mental health disorders and don’t receive psychiatric care or medications, in addition to being victims of abuse.
The report also points out that the “lack of food, zero medical care and the denial of medications are three common forms of torture for Cuban political prisoners and prisoners of conscience in Cuba.”
According to its records, 329 of the 1,105 political prisoners suffer from “serious pathologies that put their lives at risk,” including cases of diabetes, hypertension, cerebral ischemia, hepatitis B, malnutrition, anemia and cancer.
One example is Lizandra Góngora Espinosa, who suffers from uterine fibroids. “She does not receive medical care nor does the State provide her with her medications in prison,” says PD. Góngora Espinosa was arrested for demonstrating on 11 July 2021 – ’11J’ – and sentenced to 14 years for the “fabricated crimes” of attack, public disorder and sabotage. The activist is serving her sentence in the Los Colonos forced labor prison, on the Isle of Youth, where she was transferred in March 2023 from Havana, where she resided with her five children, four of them still minors.
PD says the doctor told her that “there is a line of 1,300 people waiting to have surgery,” and that “most Cuban women live with fibroids, so nothing will happen to you.”
This is another of the tortures pointed out by the NGO: keeping her away from her family, who were able to visit her for the first time in five months in August 2023, thanks to a trip that lasted several days. While waiting for surgery for her fibroids, Góngora Espinosa is incommunicado. PD says the doctor told her that “there is a line of 1,300 people waiting to have surgery” and that “most Cuban women live with fibroids, so nothing will happen to you.”
Also, Prisoners Defenders says that 30 minors are still on the list of prisoners, of which 28 are serving their sentences and two are being criminally prosecuted “with precautionary measures without any judicial protection.” The minimum criminal age in Cuba is 16 years.
Prisoners Defenders reported that 15 of the minors have been convicted of sedition, with an average sentence of five years of deprivation of liberty.
It also highlighted the “discriminatory and abusive” treatment suffered by the 117 women included in its list of political prisoners.
The statement added that since July 2021 – when the largest anti-government protests in almost six decades took place on the Island – “Cuba has had a total of 1,583 political prisoners in its jails.”
The PD report coincides with those of other organizations, such as Justicia 11J and the Cuban Prison Documentation Center, which, after the death of Mulet Almarales, warned that there are a dozen political prisoners at risk of suicide. Abuse and torture are widespread in all these cases.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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