Hundreds remain jailed in Cuba a month after July protests amid pandemic crisis

A month after the largest street demonstrations Cuba had seen in six decades, hundreds of people remained locked in the island's prisons. On July 11, thousands had poured into the streets shouting for freedom and against dictatorship—acts of defiance in a country where dissent against the government is forbidden. The government's response was swift and severe. President Miguel Díaz-Canel issued what he called a "combat order" to suppress the protesters, and according to eyewitness accounts and photographs, many were arrested and beaten.

Cubalex, an independent legal organization documenting the detentions, recorded that more than 800 people were arrested on July 11 and in the raids that followed over the subsequent days. By early August, the organization estimated that at least 371 remained in custody, though the Cuban government released no official figures and independent verification was impossible. Laritza Diversent, Cubalex's director, told journalists that the true number was likely far higher. Families had been discouraged—sometimes by police, sometimes by defense lawyers—from filing complaints, and some had even asked the organization to remove their relatives' names from its list. Those who had been released faced ongoing legal jeopardy: fines, bail requirements, house arrest, and the uncertainty of pending trials or appeal decisions.

The timing made the crisis acute. Cuba was experiencing its worst moment of the pandemic. Hospitals were overwhelmed, essential medicines were scarce, ambulances were unavailable, and medical staff were stretched beyond capacity. Thousands of new COVID cases were being reported daily, with dozens of deaths. Inside the prisons, conditions were deteriorating rapidly.

Rocío Brito Torres, twenty-two years old, was arrested on July 20 while visiting a neighbor in Matanzas province, nine days after the initial protests. She had participated in online chats where demonstrators coordinated their plans to march. Her one-year-old daughter, Karoline Pereira Brito, had not been able to breastfeed for nearly a month. Her grandmother, Elizabeth Álvarez, described the child as deeply affected by the separation—the infant had never been apart from her mother and was struggling to eat solid food. Rocío herself was suffering physically, her breasts engorged and painful from the accumulated milk. While imprisoned, she contracted COVID-19. Her father died of the virus while she was locked away, and the authorities would not release her to be with her family. No one had been allowed to see her, and her condition remained unknown.

Christopher Lleonart Santana was fourteen years old and had been receiving psychiatric treatment since age five for a mental disability. On July 17, at three in the morning, police arrived at his home. They woke him, compared him to a photograph, left, then returned and took him into custody. He was held at a police station for twelve hours under investigation, then transferred to a juvenile detention facility called "el Combinadito." According to Cubalex, roughly a dozen minors remained imprisoned for actions related to the July 11 protests, and Christopher was the youngest documented case. His mother, Naika Rosa Santana, had not been permitted to see him since his arrest, only occasional phone calls. In those early conversations, he told her he was being beaten. She did not receive his psychiatric medications until August 9, and even then was not allowed to see him. The authorities accused him of throwing a stone at a state-run store, though the circumstances were unclear and his mother questioned whether he had truly done it or been coerced into signing a confession. She lived in fear that her son, who had attempted suicide before as a result of his condition, might try again in prison, far from her care. Under Cuban law, minors under sixteen could not be charged with crimes, yet Christopher had been arrested without legal representation and subjected to interrogation without a parent or lawyer present—violations of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which Cuba had ratified.

Edelmer Góngora, thirty-seven, was a street vendor in Holguín with exostosis multiplex, a rare genetic disorder that severely limited his mobility. He had attended the July 11 protests despite his physical limitations. His sister Dayamí said it was impossible that he could have thrown stones—he could barely move his hands and legs and had undergone multiple surgeries since childhood. Yet he was arrested. In prison, he developed scabies, his back became burned, and he developed a fever that his sister feared was COVID-19. His case officer and his lawyer were also sick with the virus. He was denied bail. "It is a complete lack of humanity what they are doing to my disabled brother," Dayamí said.

Miriela Cruz Yanis, Dayron Fanego's mother, was desperate to find her twenty-two-year-old son after his arrest on July 13. When police at the station refused to tell her anything, she made a decision born of desperation. She had painted a shirt with slogans—"Murderers," "Down with Díaz-Canel," "Down with dictatorship," "No more hunger," "No more repression." She wore it under her blouse to the police station and removed her outer shirt, demanding to be arrested with her son. Instead, she was beaten severely, stripped to her undergarments, and taken to prison herself. She had lung cancer and was supposed to have a CT scan and a vaccine during those days, but could not go because she was detained. She spent seven days in prison, four of them without her cancer medications. She was released after paying a fine of eight thousand pesos—about three hundred thirty dollars—and was charged with violent robbery, a charge she did not understand because she had not been allowed to read what she signed. But what tormented her most was her son's suffering. He had told her that six men had beaten him together. Another former cellmate had confirmed the same account. "That is what keeps me from sleeping," she said. "I don't care about the blows they gave me. I don't care about my cancer. But a mother cannot think about what they are doing to her son."