Arbitrarily detained 68-year old Cuban dissident with Covid-19 on day 26 of hunger strike

We fear for his life, and demand his freedom.

Felix Navarro Rodriguez (age 68) jailed for inquiring about detainees has been on hunger strike 26 days

Dr. Omar Vento tonight demanded the release of Cuban dissident Félix Navarro who is unjustly imprisoned, tortured, ill, and has been on hunger strike for 26 days. In poor health, his life is in danger and Dr. Vento holds the Castro regime responsible for what may happen to him. 

68-year-old Felix Navarro Rodriguez was arrested and charged with public disorder while inquiring about detainees the day after the protests in the city of Matanzas, 55 miles east of Havana. 

Mr. Navarro Rodriguez is a Cuban human rights defender, and the Castro regime does not recognize that category as legal. Protesting his unjust imprisonment,  Felix initiated a hunger strike on August 23rd and has maintained it to the present day. On September 11th he was weighing in at 132 pounds. 

He is a husband and father.

Felix Navarro with his daughter Sayli

On September 17, 2021 the State Department spokesperson tweeted about his concern for Felix Navarro.

Felix Navarro is in critical condition and Cuban authorities continue to deny his family access to him. The United States asks #JailedForWhat and calls for his immediate release.

— Ned Price (@StateDeptSpox) September 17, 2021

Rosa Maria Paya returned to Cuba today, May 8, 2017 under a climate of repression

Alert: arrest of Cuba Decide coordinators prior to the arrival of Rosa Maria Paya in Havana Cuba. 

Rosa Maria Payá on her way to Havana this morning.

Today May 8, 2017, Cuba Decide's coordinators: Sayli Navarro, Iván Hernández Carrillo and Félix Navarro Rodríguez had been arrested by police security agents and police. Arbitrary arrests occurred early in the morning as they headed to the Jose Marti International Airport to welcome the Cuban Decide promoter Rosa Maria Payá.

CUBA 🇨🇺 Arrestan a activistas Sayli Navarro @felixncuba @ivanlibre cuando se dirigian al aeropuerto a recibir a Rosa Maria Payá. ¡Alerta! pic.twitter.com/2kaYzx0EJk

— Juventud LAC (@JuventudLAC) May 8, 2017

Rosa Maria returned to Havana as part of her work for the campaign which aims to bring about the Binding Plebiscite.  The people arrested include: Sayli Navarro and her father Felix Navarro at 5:30am in Perico, Matanzas and Iván Hernández Carrillo at 5:00am in Colon, Matanzas.

They were on their way to Havana to wait at the airport for the arrival of Rosa Maria Payá in order to work on Cuba Decide. Before the news of the recent arrests and in what appears to be an offensive against the organizers of Cuba Decide. 

Rosa Maria still decided to continue her trip and landed in Havana today at 10:45 am and was subjected to a thorough search and interrogation before being allowed to leave the airport.

At 12:40pm Sayli Navarro reported over twitter that she and her dad had just been freed, but that Iván was still being held.

Iván Hernández Carrillo tweeted at 5:09pm that he had been held in detention for nine hours beginning at 4:30am at the police headquarters in  Colón, Matanzas. In a second tweet at 5:10pm Ivan reported that Félix Navarro and his daughter Sayli were arrested in Perico, Matanzas at 5:15am and freed seven hours later at 12:20pm.

Please follow them on social media for future updates: @RosaMariaPaya @SayliNavarro @felixncuba @ivanlibre

Former prisoners of conscience released after arbitrary detention

Following a night in jail, former prisoners of conscience tweet about their detention and release

Librado Linares (left) and Ivan Hernandez Carillo (right) freed

First the good news, Sayli Navarro, the daughter who tweeted last night about her father's arbitrary detention at the hands of  State Security, along with three other activists, has her dad back home tonight.

Unfortunately, the news from the detained activists is not so good. Prison conditions continue to be poor, and nonviolent activists like themselves are housed in the same cell with murderers. Cubans are still being arrested and thrown into those same cells solely for trying to leave Cuba without the dictatorship's permission which in the regime's penal code is called "illegal exit" and runs afoul of international human rights standards, specifically Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Librado Linares over twitter reported: 

Felix Navarro, Ivan Hernandez Carillo, Guillermo Fariñas and I arrested in Matanzas for 24 hours after campaign meeting For Another Cuba.  

Ivan Hernandez Carillo offered a detail break down of what had taken place from his detention until being taken handcuffed to the point of his release from custody at 11:27am:


Just released, they have left me standing in a thicket in the middle of the highway that connects Matanzas with Limonar. They seized (stole) all that I brought with me: copies of El Nuevo Herald, literature, my phone book & news photocopies When they took the phone, they had the audacity to erase many of the phone numbers in my contacts. I was locked up in 1 cell with 7 more where we didn't know whether it was day or night.All was wet, closed & with 1 bulb. Among those who they locked me up with was one of the criminals who murdered and burned a young car rental driver near Perico. In the cell also had 2 other Cubans imprisoned for "illegal exit" which had three days before attempted to escape. Felix Navarro remains detained, Librado Linares was released same as Guillermo Fariñas, Fariñas hasn't arrived home

Felix Navarro, Sayli Navarro, Sonia Generosa Álvarez Campillo,

Sayli Navarro reported a short time later that:

They bring Felix Navarro handcuffed to Penas Altas and leave him abandoned there. By God's will four brothers arrested last night were freed. I APPRECIATE the concern of ALL and the support Congrats! :) 
My father @felixncuba just arrived home in Perico. @IvanLibre goes on to Colon. We'll continue struggling for another Cuba

Former Cuban prisoners of conscience arbitrarily detained

Daughter tweeted tonight about her dad's arbitrary detention at the hands of  State Security along with three other activists

Tonight Sayli Navarro reported on detention of four activists

 The total number of Cubans arbitrarily detained in 2012 is greater than the totals for 2010 and 2011 combined. The Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation on Tuesday reported a total of 6,035 detentions so far in 2012. The arbitrary detentions of nonviolent activists in Cuba can be expected to continue and increase as International Human Rights Day (December 10) approaches.

Sayli with her dad Felix Navarro who is in jail tonight

Tonight over the course of four hours Sayli Navarro, the daughter of former prisoner of conscience Felix Navarro, lost contact with her father and an hour later began to tweet as new details emerged. The worry that his disappearance caused, of what could be happening to him along with other activists and the knowledge that they must have been taken by State Security. She reported how her father must have been detained along with other former prisoners of conscience Librado Linares, Ivan Hernandez Carillo and Sakharov prize winner Guillermo Fariñas because their whereabouts were unknown and their cell phones were not functioning.

Librado Linares and Ivan Hernandez Carillo detained with Sayli's dad

Sayli would learn from opposition activist, Jorge Luis Artiles Montiel, that 3 Ladies in White along with six other activists had initiated a sit-in in front of the Third Union of Santa Clara to protest the arrest of the four activists.

An hour later Sayli tweets that Jesus Hernandez has told her that a State Security official in Villa Clara who goes by the name of Pablo Hechemendia is confirming that the four dissidents have been detained in Matanzas.

Finally, in her last tweet at 10:26pm Sayli reports that  the state security agent Lieutenant Colonel Pablo Hechemendia assures that tomorrow at 8:00 am the four detainees will be released.

Three of the four men detained were Amnesty International prisoners of conscience imprisoned during the Cuban Black Spring in 2003 and sentenced to long prison sentences for their nonviolent activism. They refused to go into exile spending more time in prison with no guarantee of an early release.

8th Anniversary of the Black Cuban Spring

The high price of a Cuban Education


Eight years ago on March 18, 2003 the dictatorship in Cuba began a massive crackdown rounding up leaders of Cuba's civic society in an operation which it claimed would destroy the Cuban democratic opposition. Seventy five of these opposition leaders were sentenced to lengthy prison sentences and declared prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International.



Instead it led to worldwide condemnation of the regime, and the emergence of the Cuban Ladies in White, a group of women dedicated to obtaining the release of their unjustly imprisoned husbands, fathers, brothers and sons. Eight years later all but two of the group of the 75 remain in prison: Felix Navarro and Jose Daniel Ferrer Garcia.















Sadly, that does not mean things have gotten better. Scores of political prisoners remain imprisoned and new ones await show trials in the days that follow. In addition the Castro regime organized rent a mobs to harass and assault the Ladies in White eight years to the day of their loved ones' detentions and unjust imprisonments in what became known as the Black Spring. Activists were detained prior to and on the morning of March 18 to avoid having them carry out activities of remembrance on this day. For example, Yoani Sanchez reported various detentions in the early morning hours, among them Cuban blogger Katia Sonia who had been detained at 5:00am as she attempted to reach the home of Laura Pollan, one of the leaders of the Cuban Ladies in White. Laura Pollan's home had been surrounded by State Security to arrest anyone trying to reach her home.

Laura Pollan, leader of the Ladies in White, flashes an L for liberty
Photo by: Adalberto Roque, AFP, Getty Images, Reuters

Although last year's observance was marked by violence carried out by rapid response brigades and State Security agents this year was particularly poignant because the world learned in real time that the dictatorship obligated university students to participate in the act of repudiation. Education is not free in Cuba and in some ways is the most expensive in the world. What price do you place on your dignity or your soul?

Castro rent-a-mob harassing Ladies in White

At 11:02am on March 18, 2011 the dictatorship organized a rent-a-mob of students from the CUJAE to carry out an attack on the Ladies in White in a so-called "act of repudiation." According to Yoani Sanchez, the CUJAE is the university of specialties in engineering and the students are frequently used as shock troops. She concludes tweeting that "the university in Cuba is not really free, you pay with the currency of ideological submission, and being turned into shock troops.

Human Rights Watch in their November 18, 2009 report New Castro, Same Cuba described the state of fear:

Fear of repression shapes behavior, pressuring Cubans to participate in pro-government activities and discouraging them from voicing dissent or participating in activities that may be perceived as “counterrevolutionary.” Individuals who express unpopular political views live in constant fear of being harassed, beaten, or arrested.

In addition students that do not go along with regime activities are expelled from university. If you want to complete your university education then when you are told to harass and assault the Ladies in White you have a choice to make. Expulsion from university and identification as a dissenter that will also place your family under a microscope by State Security that may open them to rent-a-mobs visiting their home.

A day later, on Saturday March 19, 2011 the rent-a-mobs returned to Laura Pollan's home and continued to harass these courageous Cuban women.

Either way it is a high price to pay for an education.

Transfering some political prisoners to their home provinces is a first step

They can either kills us, put us in jail or release them. We will never stop marching no matter what happens. - Laura Pollán, Lady in White marching in Cuba, March 2010

Orlando Zapata Tamayo did not die in vain and Cuba's Ladies in White's courageous resistance to government organized mobs and violent intimidation did not go unnoticed. The current hunger strikers demanding improved conditions and the release of sick political prisoners are being heard not only in Cuba but around the world. Thanks to human rights activists like Juan Carlos Gonzalez Leiva the facts are getting out there.

Amnesty International is calling on the Cuban dictatorship to reform itself by revoking its repressive laws and releasing its prisoners of conscience.

This has led the dictatorship to reach out to the Cuban Catholic Church and for the first time in half a century ask it to serve as a mediator between the democratic opposition and the regime in power.

Cuba's Catholic Church said in a statement today that six men, [Felix Navarro, Jose Luis Garcia, Ivan Adolfo Hernandez Carrillo, Diosdado Gonzalez, Arnaldo Ramos and Antonio Ramon Diaz ] who were among 75 government opponents jailed in a 2003 crackdown, were in the process of being transferred to prisons nearer their families. The statement by the Archbishop of Havana is signed by Orlando Márquez Hidalgo in Havana, dated June 1, 2010 and contains the following list of transfers:

1- FÉLIX NAVARRO RODRÍGUEZ, from Ciego de Ávila to Matanzas
2- JOSÉ LUIS GARCÍA PANEQUE, from Granma to Las Tunas
3- IVÁN ADOLFO HERNÁNEZ CARRILLO, from Villa Clara to Matanzas
4- DIOSDADO GONZÁLEZ MARRERO, from Pinar del Río to Matanzas
5- ARNALDO RAMOS LAUZURIQUE, from Sancti Spíritus to City of Havana
6- ANTONIO RAMÓN DÍAZ SÁNCHEZ, from Ciego de Ávila to City of Havana

Amnesty International recognizes all these men as prisoners of conscience but the dictatorship continues to refer to them as mercenaries. The 2010 Amnesty International report found that in Cuba there were 55 prisoners of conscience detained solely for the peaceful exercise of their right to freedom of expression.According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights prison conditions in Cuba are harsh and run afoul of international standards.

Human rights reporting; the weekly public marches; the hunger strikes; fasts; protests; strikes; and public displays of dissent fall under non-violent resistance. The dictatorship in Cuba is heavily armed with all the instruments of repression at the disposal of a totalitarian state, but it cannot survive when confronted by an adversary committed to speaking truth to power and armed with the moral authority endowed by the courage and cleverness in carrying out a disciplined non-violent struggle. The Ladies in White demonstrated this over seven years and with great courage in March of 2010 facing down violent and aggressive government mobs. Orlando Zapata Tamayo demonstrated it carrying out a 83-day water only hunger strike and when prison officials tried to break him by denying him water for more than two weeks. They failed, but only succeeded in being complicit in his death. Both actions required courage, discipline, and determination.

Non-violent discipline as described by Gandhi is essential to achieving victory in a struggle against a powerful adversary. "For non-co-operation is a measure of discipline and sacrifice and it demands patience and respect for opposite views. And unless we are able to evolve a spirit of mutual toleration for diametrically opposite views, non-co-operation is an impossibility. I have learnt through bitter experience the one supreme lesson to conserve my anger, and as heat conserved is transmuted into energy, even so, our anger controlled can be transmuted into a power which can move the world."