67 years of prisoners of conscience in communist Cuba: Where is the outrage?
“The noblest way to avenge an insult is not to imitate he who has offended us.” – Jorge Manuel Valls Arango 1933 – 2015, a Cuban prisoner of conscience and a poet he spent 20 years and 40 days in a Cuban prison
Selection of the over 1,200 political prisoners jailed today in Cuba. [ Office of Carlos A. Gimenez ]
There is talk of change in Cuba, and since the capture of Nicolas Maduro on January 3, 2026 there is also hope that it can take place soon. Existing U.S. law outlines what real change in Cuba would look like, and it has three fundamental conditions: 1) The liberation of all political prisoners. 2) The legalization of all political parties, labor unions, and the press. 3) The scheduling of free, multiparty elections for the Cuban people. This would immediately end the U.S. economic embargo on Cuba. Former Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart, who passed away last year, drove this point home in July of 2021 following massive nation wide anti-government protests.
Freedom House on March 6, 2026 highlighted the cases of two Cubans, Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel ‘Osorbo’ Castillo in their social media.
Today we recognize the courage of Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel Castillo Pérez, who used their art to push back against the Cuban government’s restrictions on artistic freedom and expression—and were unjustly imprisoned for it. We reiterate our call for their immediate… pic.twitter.com/PPqT05FDXY
— Freedom House (@freedomhouse) March 6, 2026
There are currently identified over one thousand two hundred prisoners of conscience in Cuba. Most were jailed for taking part in nationwide protests in July 2021 demanding freedom, human rights, and an end to dictatorship. This is a partial number gathered by non-governmental organizations. Official numbers are not provided by the Cuban government.
Cuban prisoners of conscience have been a reality in Cuba since 1959. Some of them participated in the struggle against Batista, and made Fidel Castro’s rise to power possible, but there nonviolent dissent condemned them to decades imprisoned.
Huber Matos, a school teacher, declared himself in opposition to Fulgencio Batista on March 10, 1952 the day that Cuban democracy came under attack. Following the extrajudicial killing of some of his former students he joined the armed struggle and ended up being one of the leaders of the revolutionary insurrection that drove Batista from power early on New Year’s Day 1959.
Huber Matos fought against Batista. Spent 22 years jailed for nonviolent dissent with communist rule.
Less than a year later he would be on trial for his life. What was his crime? Warning Fidel Castro in several private letters, where he tendered his resignation only to have it refused, that communists were infiltrating the revolutionary government. In these letters he plainly stated:
“I did not want to become an obstacle to the revolution and I believe that if I am forced to choose between falling into line or withdrawing from the world so as not to do harm, the most honorable and revolutionary action is to leave.”
Fidel Castro made the letters public generating the crisis and denouncing the charge that communists were infiltrating the government. He ordered Camilo Cienfuegos, another popular revolutionary leader, to arrest Matos. The Castro brothers began to prepare a show trial and the execution by firing squad of Huber Matos for treason.
The revolutionary tribunal was prepared. Fidel Castro spoke to Matos promising that if he confessed to everything that he would not face any prison time and could go home. Matos refused, and as the show trial began and they tried to shut him up – he refused. He went on to speak for more that three hours and concluded his testimony stating:
“I consider myself neither a traitor nor a deserter. My conscience is clear. If the court should find me guilty, I shall accept its decision – even though I may be shot. I would consider it one more service for the revolution.”
Revolutionary officers that had been convened at the trial to chant “to the execution wall” instead, moved by his testimony, rose up and applauded Matos. Instead of the firing squad the revolutionary tribunal sentenced him to 22 years in prison in December 1959.
Huber Matos would serve every day of those 22 years suffering beatings and other tortures.
Labor union organizer Mario Chanes de Armas jailed with Castro by Batista in 1953. For his nonviolent dissent Castro jailed him for 30 years
Mario Chanes de Armas, a regional leader of the Cuban Brewery Workers joined Castro’s efforts to overthrow Fulgencio Batista. Both were jailed by Batista for their anti-regime activities. Mario Chanes took part in the July 26, 1953 assault on the Moncada Barracks and was wounded. He was put on trial with the Castro brothers, and sentenced to 10 years in prison, but was pardoned with them after 22 months.
Mario Chanes trained in Mexico and returned to Cuba on the Granma yacht with the Castro brothers, and Ernesto “Che” Guevara to defeat Batista.
Chanes could have had any position in the new regime, but opted to return to his brewery job. After two years of watching Castro betray their movement, Chanes spoke out against the communist influence in the revolutionary government. Chanes was tried as a counterrevolutionary and in 1961 imprisoned for 30 years.
Over the past sixty seven years the international community has too often normalized the systemic injustices perpetrated by the Castro dictatorship. Between 1959 and 1988 no international organizations were allowed to visit prisons in Cuba. This included the International Committee of the Red Cross. This was at a time that prisons were filled with prisoners of conscience and political prisoners in Cuba.
Ricardo Bofill: human rights defender and prisoner of conscience
Independent human rights organizations in Cuba are not legally recognized by the Cuban government. The Cuban Committee for Human Rights was formally established on January 28, 1976 but did not become fully active until 1983 because State Security arrested everyone shortly after it was founded.
Seven years later, in October of 1983, in the Combinado del Este prison, several prisoners of conscience who had similar aspirations met. Paradoxically, what the regime did was to join together many of those who were already marching along similar paths, and the Cuban Committee for Human Rights eventually re-emerged where many political projects usually end. In truth, there were only seven: Ricardo Bofill, Gustavo Arcos Bergnes (then incommunicado on the ground floor and with whom the others could only speak when they took them out to the prison yard), Elizardo Sánchez Santa Cruz (who was already in the Boniato prison, but kept in contact with the others through family members), the former director of Pabellón Cuba, Teodoro del Valle, the poet René Díaz Almeyda, the diplomat Edmigio López Castillo and Ariel Hidalgo.
In 1987 the documentary “Nobody Listened” captured the human rights reality in Cuba with interviews with former political prisoners, archival footage of firing squads and other instances of repression. Former prisoners described show trials, extajudicial executions, and cruel and unusual punishment that rose to the level of torture. This in an environment were the international community was not listening.
Featured in the documentary was Jorge Valls Arango, poet, author, human rights defender, and lay Catholic.
Jorge Valls fought against tyranny and barbarism his whole life and in Cuba that meant challenging the dictatorships of Fulgencio Batista and Fidel Castro.
He suffered prison and exile during the Batista regime.
During the Castro regime he was arrested in 1964 and sentenced to 20 years in prison for testifying in defense of a friend who was being subjected to a show trial.
In the 1987 documentary Nobody Listened. Janet Maslin of The New York Times in 1988 reviewed this film and highlighted the formerly imprisoned poet.
Jorge Valls, a writer, on the other hand, points out that at least ‘’free thinking dwelt behind prison walls; it was truly the free territory of Cuba.’‘ As for public free expression at the time of the revolution, Mr. Valls says: ‘’None of that in 1959! Just extraordinary exaltation, fanatical idolatry of the victorious warrior, and rampant folly that made everything acceptable.’‘
Jorge in this documentary on the human rights situation in Cuba in the first three decades of the Castro dictatorship gives a powerful testimony in defense of freedom of expression and human dignity that remains relevant toda
Poet, former prisoner of conscience Jorge Valls
However things were about to change on the international front.
The Cuban Committee for Human Rights was able to document human rights abuses and smuggle these reports out of the prisons and out of Cuba reaching the international community. It was their work combined with the diplomatic pressure of the Reagan Administration that on March 8, 1988 the Cuban government was finally called to account for systematically denying access to Cuba’s prisons.
On March 11, 1988 Havana invited the United Nations Human Rights Commission to investigate human rights in Cuba. Over the course of the next year not only the UN Human Rights Commission, but also the International Committee of the Red Cross, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch were able to enter Cuba and document the human rights violations in the island.
This was the first and last time these organizations were allowed into Cuba to visit Castro’s prisons. The lack of outrage turned into a permanent acceptance of injustice in Cuba.
Thirty seven years have passed since the last time the International Committee of the Red Cross was able to visit Cuban prisons. Meanwhile the International Committee of the Red Cross has visited the U.S. Guantanamo detention facility over 100 times since 2001.
During the Cuban Black Spring in 2003 over a 100 activists were arrested and 75 of them were subjected to political show trials and condemned to prison terms ranging from 15 to 25 years in prison. A Czech film crew in Cuba filmed and interviewed activists before the crackdown and then interviewed their friends and family members after the show trials.
Out of this crackdown the wives, daughters, and sisters of these activists formed the Ladies in White and began organizing for their freedom. Regular marches, literary teas, and lobbying both the Cuban government and the international community. Some have been jailed, others beaten, and one of the founding leaders, Laura Inés Pollán Toledo, died under suspicious circumstances on October 14, 2011. There are still extrajudicial executions in Cuba by Castro's secret police. Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, and Harold Cepero were murdered in a state security engineered killings on July 22, 2012, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in their June 9, 2023 report on the merits.
Prisoners of conscience have died in Castro's prisons while protesting mistreatment at the hands of Cuban officials. This has gone on for decades. Some of the high profile cases stretch out over more than a half century: student leader Pedro Luis Boitel (1972), human rights defender Orlando Zapata Tamayo (2010), UNPACU member Wilman Villar Mendoza (2012) and political prisoner Yosvany Arostegui Armenteros are but a few that have been well documented.
Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. issued a prophetic warning in his "Letter from Birmingham Jail" when he observed, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” The international community has paid a price for its acceptance of these continuing injustices. Venezuela is now suffering a human rights crisis, a product of a Cuban occupation and the imposition of these systemic injustices on a new and larger population.
From upper left to bottom right: Maykel Castillo Pérez (Maykel ‘Osorbo’), Sayli Navarro Álvarez, Loreto Hernández García, Roberto Pérez Fonseca, Félix Navarro, , Donaida Pérez Paseiro, and Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara (Amnesty International)
On January 19, 2026 Amnesty International’s regional director for the Americas urgently called for the immediate release of all Cuban prisoners of conscience, and an end to politically motivated detentions.
“The Cuban authorities have an obligation to guarantee the full and unconditional freedom of all prisoners of conscience. Sayli Navarro Álvarez, Félix Navarro, Loreto Hernández García, Donaida Pérez Paseiro, Roberto Pérez Fonseca, Maykel Castillo Pérez (Maykel ‘Osorbo’), and Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara must not spend another day in prison. The authorities must also put an end, once and for all, to detentions for political reasons,” said Ana Piquer, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for the Americas.
On April 18, 2026, Sayli Navarro Álvarez will mark four years of serving an unjust sentence in the La Bellotex prison in Matanzas, Cuba. There, she is enduring harsh living conditions, unhygienic conditions, cramped quarters, poorly prepared food, an abundance of cockroaches and mosquitoes, and a bed bug infestation.
Sayli Navarro became a Lady in White, together with her mom, over 23 years ago campaigning for her dad’s release following his arrest in March 2003 during the Black Cuban Spring. Her dad, Felix Navarro, is currently a member of the International Society for Human Rights (ISHR) board of directors. Amnesty International recognized him as a prisoner of conscience in 2003.
Both Sayli and Felix are longtime human rights defenders who have reported on systematic human rights violations in Cuba. They were detained after visiting a police station to learn more about the situation of the nonviolent demonstrators who had been imprisoned during the July 11, 2021 protests in Cuba.
Felix Navarro was arbitrarily jailed on July 12, 2021, never released, and taken to prison following a political show trial. Sayli was also detained on July 12th, but was released hours later, and had been staying with her mother, who is in poor health. She has also spoken out against her father’s arbitrary imprisonment.
On March 2, 2022 the Cuban dictatorship confirmed the prison sentences against two Cuban human rights defenders. Félix Navarro Rodríguez, ( then 68 years old), condemned to 9 years in prison. His daughter, Sayli Navarro (then 35), was condemned to eight years in prison.
Sayli was taken, with her hands and feet chained, to prison on April 18, 2022. Eleven months later, on March 18, 2023, a recording was released of her stating that state security is pressuring her to go into exile in order to be freed from prison, and that she rejected their offer.
“My husband Loreto is dying” – Donaida Perez
Black activists, and leaders of the Yoruba religion, Loreto Hernández García and Donaida Pérez Paseiro, who are prisoners of conscience detained only because of their political beliefs, and who should be immediately and unconditionally released. Loreto is not receiving adequate care in prison, and there is concern that this neglect may be fatal.
Amnesty International released an urgent action for the married couple on June 21, 2023 which contained the following text.
Cubans of all ages and walks of life have been charged, put on trial, or given harsh sentences for peacefully participating in protests in July 2021 in largely unfair and opaque proceedings mostly held behind closed doors. Among those imprisoned are spouses Donaida Pérez Paseiro, Black activist, priest, and President of the Free Yoruba Association of Cuba (“Yorubas Libres de Cuba”) and Loreto Hernández García, Black activist, priest, and Vice-President of the Free Yoruba Association of Cuba. The Yoruba religion is an African diaspora religion. They are imprisoned in Guamajal prison in Villa Clara province, central Cuba.
On 15 July 2021, police officers arrested Loreto Hernández García. His family maintains that authorities have placed him several times in solitary confinement, sometimes lasting 15 days, sometimes more. In February 2022, the Popular Municipal Court of Santa Clara (“Tribunal Municipal Popular de Santa Clara”) sentenced him to seven years in prison for “public disorder” and “contempt.” Donaida Pérez Paseiro was detained just a day after Loreto Hernández García. In February 2022, the Popular Municipal Court of Santa Clara sentenced her to eight years in prison for “public disorder”, “contempt”, and “assault” (“atentado”) against an official.
Based on the information available to Amnesty International, they should never have been charged with these offences. The organization notes that “contempt” and “public disorder” are charges frequently used in Cuba to limit the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. The government also use other charges such as “assault” or “damages” (“daños”) when trying to unlawfully crack-down dissent. Furthermore, in connection with the charge of assault, the organization found that was no concrete and individualized allegations against Donaida.
There was a striking lack of evidence against her.
Both Black activists were tried along with 14 other protesters in an unfair trial. The judgement repeatedly refers to the protester’s political opposition to the government – something which should have no bearing in a criminal case – in a discriminatory and stigmatizing manner.
Likewise, the judgment makes it clear that the defendants’ alleged role as leaders of the anti-government protests has been considered an element of criminal responsibility.
The judges appear to have relied almost exclusively on witness statements from law enforcement officials, a common occurrence in Cuba. At the same time, the judgment dismisses all the statements by the defendants’ and by the witnesses proposed by the defence, vaguely arguing that they contradicted what the police declared.
Additionally, in Cuba, defence lawyers must belong to an official organization which, according to many sources, is closely controlled by the State. Therefore, they can only act somewhat independently when representing their clients.
Independent human rights monitors and independent media were prevented from monitoring any of the trials of the 11 July protesters. Cuban authorities have never responded to Amnesty International’s requests to monitor the trials.
According to Loreto’s family, Loreto suffers various health problems, including diabetes and hypertension, which are not being treated in prison. In May, Loreto was hospitalized without a precise diagnosis, according to reports from his family published in the media. According to his family, Loreto is in a delicate state of health due to complications from diabetes. Currently, he is in the prisoners’ wing of the Celestino Hernández Robau Provincial Hospital, known as Hospital Viejo, in Santa Clara, Cuba. The organization is concerned about allegations that he is not receiving adequate treatment.
Amnesty International considers Donaida Pérez Paseiro and Loreto Hernandez Garcia prisoners of conscience and calls for their immediate and unconditional release.
Amnesty International’s Prisoner of Conscience determination is based on the information available to Amnesty International regarding the circumstances leading to the person’s detention. In naming a person as a Prisoner of Conscience, Amnesty International is affirming that this person must be immediately and unconditionally released but is not endorsing past or present views or conduct by them
Military confiscated syringes that his mother was able to obtain so that Roberto Pérez Fonseca could receive intravenous Omeprazole during his stomach ulcer crises. His health is in a precarious state due to the multiple punishments in solitary confinement, a recent episode occurred around mid July 2024, and his increasingly frequent asthma and stomach crises. Source: Albert Fonseca over X on August 22, 2024
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel Castillo Pérez “Osorbo”.
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara is a visual artist. He was last arrested, and detained on July 11, 2021 before he could join in the 11J protests mentioned above. In 2021, Time Magazine recognized Luis Manuel as one of the 100 most influential people.
Maykel Castillo Pérez “Osorbo” is a rap singer and he has been in pre-trial detention for over a year. He was taken by the political police on May 18, 2021. He is also a two-time Latin Grammy winner for the song he co-wrote and performed with other Cuban artists in 2021 called Patria y Vida.
They are both members of the San Isidro Movement, an artists collective, that defended artistic freedom.
“Castillo’s last statement to the judge during the trial was, ‘Espero que la sentencia de usted, señora jueza, sea la de su conciencia,’ which translates to: ‘I hope your sentence, madame judge, is one dictated by your conscience.,” reported NBC News.
On May 17, 2022 Luis Manuel delivered a message from prison. “In an audio recording from his prison cell at Guanajay on May 17, Otero Alcántara said: ‘I dream that no Cuban will be the enemy of any other Cuban. Today for these dreams I am ready to sacrifice the artist’s flesh, my artist’s flesh, and my freedom-loving spirit,’” reported PEN International.
Luis Manuel was sentenced to five years and Maykel Castillo to nine years in prison on a range of charges related to their participation in a peaceful demonstration and an artistic performance, and their criticism of President Miguel Díaz-Canel”, reported Amnesty International.
Reuters reported at the time that “the U.S. Embassy in Havana on [June 1, 2022] criticized the trial of two Cuban artist-dissidents as neither ‘free nor fair’ on social media, fueling a growing standoff over human rights just weeks after Washington moved to ease sanctions on the island nation.”
However, one need not rely on U.S. diplomats on the reality that trials in Cuba are neither “free nor fair.” The president of the Supreme People’s Court (TSP), Rubén Remigio Ferro, dispelled them in a video revealed by DIARIO DE CUBA entitled “How Justice Is Decided in Cuba” that demonstrates that the judiciary is subordinate to the Cuban Communist Party, the Council of State, and works with the secret police, and prosecutors office to ensure that acquittals are kept at a minimum.
This was a political trial and a mockery of justice.
People of good will are not remaining passive before this injustice. Protests have been carried out in Miami, Madrid, New York and elsewhere to demonstrate solidarity with both Luis Manuel and Maykel.
They all remain in unjustly imprisoned today.
Please amplify their names, their plight, and join in the demand for their freedom. Let us also remind policy makers in the world's democracies and in the Cuban dictatorship that freeing all political prisoners is one of the three conditions for lifting U.S. sanctions on Havana.
