A former Cuban judge advocates a national dialogue to avoid a “social outbreak” as in Venezuela.
More than 90,000 people are imprisoned in Cuba, according to official data provided to Civil Rights Defenders and Prisoners Defenders for “two sources of the highest level of the Cuban state”, a figure that places the Caribbean island as the country with the most incarcerated people in the world, in proportion to its population, according to the ranking of the Institute for Crime and Justice Policy Research.
The General Directorate of Prisons of Cuba recognizes more than 90,000 prisoners, to which we must add 37,458 people in “other situations of judicial and police control,” which yields a total of 127,458 “between convicted and convicted.”
“Therefore, Cuba would actually be the first country for persons deprived of liberty in the world, if the ranking of the Institute for Crime and Justice Policy Research, instead of contemplating false information provided by ‘Granma’ informally in 2012, had take into account the real data “, both NGOs have pointed out. It would be ahead of the United States or El Salvador, among others.
Annually, more than 32,000 criminal cases would be initiated in Cuba, with between 35,000 and 40,000 defendants, of which more than 90 percent are found guilty, that is, between 32,000 and 37,000. And, among those guilty, 69 percent are sentenced to deprivation of liberty, either prison or “correctional work,” that is, between 22,000 and 25,000.
NGOs have called attention to the so-called “antisocials”, “prisoners who have not committed a crime but are declared in a state of danger – with the possibility of committing it – as they observe a ‘behavior contrary to socialist morality’ “. “They are the lazy and thugs of the Francoist law,” said Javier Larrondo, of Prisoners Defenders, in the presentation of prison data, which was made this Monday at an event held at Casa Árabe.
According to these sources, there are 8,400 “antisocial” prisoners at the moment. Each year 3,833 cases of this type are treated with a level of convictions greater than 99.5 percent, of which almost 77 percent are admitted: 2,929 with deprivation of liberty and 885 with alternative measures such as community work.
THE ‘ANTISOCIAL’
“Prisoners for antisocial conduct suffer less anticipated release than the rest,” they have denounced, explaining that “the Criminal Code itself prevents family members or the insured himself from requesting the anticipation of his freedom, unlike in the rest of the cases” .
They have also pointed to cases that are aired through “direct attestations”, “accusatory procedure that is frequently used for its speed and effectiveness against dissidents, entrepreneurs and any type of person who considers an urgent danger to the regime, which entails not only preventive detention, but very summary processes. “
In addition, they have stressed that, “at the same time as this repressive trend, there is an explicit political will to increasingly release prisoners, due to prison overpopulation and the costs that this entails, as of before 2017”.
Thus, some “21,600 common prisoners obtain benefits of early release in Cuba each year,” of which between 2,000 and 3,000 are released from prison via a presidential pardon. “In this regard, Larrondo has stressed that” they are never political prisoners. “
“In this way Cuba maintains a policy of criminal rigor while draining inmates’ prisons. This double game serves the purpose of the Ministry of Interior to maintain order … while not excessively increasing the expenses that this entails “, they have emphasized.
DIALOGUE VS. “SOCIAL BURST”
In this context, Edel González, a Cuban jurist who came to preside over the Judiciary in a province and form part of the special reserve for the direction of the Supreme Court but which since 2018 is in Peru, has proposed to initiate a dialogue on Human Rights to correct “mistakes”.
“I am a Cuban jurist, I do not come to speak on the part of the Government or the opposition, I come to reflect an echo of voices that are present in Cuba and that many times, for fear of expression, they are not heard,” he said. saying.
González has considered that “there is a conflict between the State and the citizen” in Cuba due, on the one hand, to ideological reasons and, on the other, to the economic situation, of which he has blamed both the “internal blockade” and that of U.S.
In the ideological sphere, he has argued that the mere fact that the Constitution declares the socialist model “irrevocable” implies that “he who has a different ideology has no place”. When “any type of opinion on Human Rights is expressed, without being linked to any foreign country, we are declared enemies and we are persecuted,” he acknowledged.
