This May 20, on the anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Cuba, State Security intensified its repression against activists and independent journalists, with acts of harassment that began days earlier.
Cubalex documented multiple repressive actions, including police surveillance, house arrests, threats, selective internet cuts, illegal summonses, detentions and enforced disappearance.
-The opposition member Silverio Portal Contreras was besieged by State Security, preventing him from leaving his home in Havana.
-The student Leonardo Romero Negrín was arrested He was violently detained by members of the political police while walking in the street. They forced him into a vehicle and took him to the police station located on Dragones Street in Havana. He was released that same day after being fined.
-Journalists Yoani Sánchez and Reinaldo Escobar they reported Selective internet outages and a police surveillance operation at the base of the building where they reside in Havana. Cubanet News reported At least three journalists on the island—Osniel Carmona, Anay Remón, and Enrique Díaz—were without internet service on their mobile phones. Yindra Elizástigui, mother of political prisoner Luis Robles, was also affected. denounced the selective cutting off of your internet access.
-The journalist Yunia Figueredo was cited He was verbally ordered by a State Security officer to appear on May 21 at 9 am at a PNR unit, although he assured that he would not attend and denounced the presence of police surveillance at his home since Sunday.
-Activist Rosalí Sierra Jaramillo, from the United Anti-Totalitarian Forum (FANTU), was threatened for speaking out against the government. While she was standing in line at a store, a man approached her and warned her that if she continued “speaking out against the Revolution,” she would be “neutralized” and would not be able to raise her two children.
-On Sunday, several Ladies in White were detainees in Havana, Villa Clara, Holguín and Matanzas to prevent them from attending mass. Yolanda Santana y Gladys Capote They were besieged in their homes, while the activist María Cristina Labrada reported a selective internet outage. Activists from the Committee for Racial Integration (CIR) they reported Regarding internet outages and surveillance from Sunday, extending until Monday the 20th.
-Yolanda Santana Ayala reported They also reported an interruption in their internet service starting at 6 a.m. on Sunday, May 19. Berta Soler Fernández and Ángel Moya Acosta also reported connection outages.
-Three State Security agents prevented The writer Jorge Fernández was violently abducted as he left his home on Sunday, while he and his wife were going to buy groceries. He was threatened with arrest and informed that he was under house arrest. Furthermore, their internet access was cut off.
-The journalist Boris González Arenas also reported A selective internet outage that lasted until Monday the 20th. Activist Miryorly García Prieto reported who had been under police surveillance around his home since Saturday, and activist Boris Agustín Osorio was aforementioned verbally to appear on the 20th at 10 am at the police station located on Dragones Street.
-Activist Agustín López Canino was arrested He was arbitrarily detained on May 19th following a large-scale police operation. Since then, his whereabouts have been unknown. Previously, on May 15th, he was summoned to the PNR (National Revolutionary Police) unit in Calabazar, where he was forced to sign a statement admitting that he had called on the people to demonstrate in the streets.
-Activist Laura María Labrada Pollán also reported A selective internet outage. Luis Wilber Aguilar Bravo, father of Walnier Luis Aguilar, the political prisoner of July 11, denounced the presence of police surveillance in the vicinity of his home.
-The journalists from the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press (ICLEP), Juan Manuel Moreno Borrego in Havana, Antonio Suárez Fonticiella in Villa Clara, Mabel Páez Díaz in Artemisa, Orlidia Barceló Pérez and Pedro Luis Hernández Hernández in Sancti Spíritus, received threats They faced the death penalty if they left their homes on May 20. They were subjected to illegal house arrest starting on May 19. On April 29, these same journalists were besieged and threatened to prevent them from going out into the streets to report on the repression in the context of International Workers' Day.