Mayelín Rodríguez Prado was arrested after uploading images to Facebook of a small demonstration in Nuevitas in August 2022
At the age of 22, Mayelín Rodríguez Prado received the heaviest of the sentences the Cuban government handed down to a group of 13 people who demonstrated in August 2022 in the municipality of Nuevitas, in central Cuba. Prado, who is the mother of a little girl, will serve 15 years in prison for publishing the protests through the social network Facebook.
Prado recorded the moment in which Cuban police beat three girls during the demonstration, as well as other repressive actions against protestors. The young woman, whose daughter at the time was less than a year old, was detained at her home after the protest and held in solitary confinement at a State Security facility.
The judicial sentence issued by the Municipal Court of Camagüey, to which the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH) had access, states that the court agreed to punish Prado as “author of an intentional and consummated crime of enemy propaganda of a continuous nature” and “author of an intentional and consummated crime of sedition.” The court also announced sentences of between four and 14 years for 12 other participants in the demonstration for the same crimes. According to the Cuban Penal Code, sedition is a “crime against the internal security of the State,” and anyone who “tumultuously and by means of express or tacit agreement, using violence, disturbs the socialist order” can be prosecuted on that charge.
cmon Cuba you’re supposed to be cool, don’t be this guy
Yeah, I’m re-assessing my thoughts on Cuba. I was under the vague impression that they didn’t have the same rot at the core of the CCP and USSR. Maybe they don’t and this is a particular low point. Either way, bad look.
seems like the blockade is working as intended
At least I get to live in the US where the right to protest is protected. /s
I swear people on here think the right to protest is some magical talisman that protects you from the consequences of your actions.
If you break other laws the right to protest doesn’t somehow stop that being illegal - you cant just wear a free Palestine shirt and go shop lifting or break into someone’s house.
It is about not making protesting illegal in the absence of other crimes - like for example it is in Cuba where this person didn’t commit other crimes but is arrested simply for documenting.
I see you’ve been relying on the mainstream news narrative. There was nothing illegal about the protests until after the police started cracking down.
Then there was UCLA where pro-Israel counter protesters were dragging protesters out and beating them with sticks while an army of cops half a block away stood around with their thumbs up their asses.
It’s the neoliberal way to keep protesting legal while making it all but impossible to actually do so without breaking some minor law. Then the police come in huge numbers with riot gear, rubber bullets, and chemical agents that aren’t even legal in a warzone. Suddenly it’s a “violent” protest.
Neoliberals are always on the side of the protesters starting about 10 years after the protests are over. Until then they always wring their hands and whine about how the protest was done. This is all the exact shit they said about every protest of the civil rights movement.
Sure, yet even with your very biased telling of events it’s still nothing like the situation in Cuba
Also, if you have any evidence of an actual crime happening before police crackdowns start, I’d live to see it. (Not something lame like loitering). If you think I’m biased, then show me I’m wrong.
I guess Cuba and America aren’t so different after all…
Waiting for the Tankies to tell us how this is actually a good thing
Wondering how they can tie this to American sanctions like they do with every other issue Cuba has.
So I will take a stab at it
Sanctions aren’t relevant here to the outcome though you could relate them to the need for protest which still wouldn’t justify the outcome. It would let you side with the protesters for being the power of the people and exemplifying Juche
however the US’ track record with both Cuba and the governments of other American countries does reasonably lead to paranoia
Also worth noting Cuba is a dictatorship not communist
Agreed, but to your last point, it is also worth noting that there are different economic models under authoritarian regimes. Both Nazi Germany and the USSR were dictatorships. Is it Marixist Communism in Cuba? No. But it is recognizable as a communist state as was perpetuated by the Soviet Union historically, regardless if you feel the term has been misappropriated.
Like this.
“Every possible means should be undertaken to promptly weaken the economic life of Cuba,” Lester D. Mallory, then the deputy assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, said in April 1960, arguing that U.S. policy should aim “to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”
That wrong doesn’t excuse someone being locked up for the “crime” of taking pictures of police brutality.
Right. But it does tie it to the American sanctions like every other issue Cuba has.
I’m not a tankie, and it’s not a good thing, but this isn’t exactly a great time for the US to puff it’s chest out about our right to protest and protections for whistle blowers.
They didn’t mention the US
Did you read the article?
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian A. Nichols also criticized the convictions. " The harsh sentencing this week of up to 15 years in prison for Cubans who peacefully assembled in Nuevitas in 2022 is outrageous,” he said on X. “The Cuban government’s continued repression of Cubans striving to fulfill their basic rights and needs is unconscionable.”
born yesterday comment
But whatabout…!
By referring to “tankies” it was already an implied comparison between Cuba and more western democracies, and this is the Midwest instance. Accusations of “Whataboutism” are way overdone.
It seems the convergent evolution of government is authoritarianism. All governments seem to eventually move towards it.
It takes efforts to have a democracy
If you can keep it
“Keep your democracy. I saw democracy failing somewhere and being displaced by authoritarianism so I’m just opting for going straight to authoritarianism. I am smort but, also, do not trust me with the ability to influence my own society. I also don’t see the irony of expressing here how my society should be run (even though I’m anti-democracy).”
Screw this.
Maybe they deserve the embargo.
Don’t you have a flag to wave over a razed hospital somewhere?
How could Joe Biden allow this to happen?
That’s satire, right? Cuba is a completely different country
That should be obvious.
It should be, but you know Poe’s law. People blame POTUS for ridiculous stuff.
