The Cuban political prisonerBárbaro de Céspedes Hernández was sentenced totwo years of deprivation of liberty for the alleged crime of attack, in a trial held this Monday in the Municipal Court of Camagüey
The court's ruling determined a joint sanction of 2 years, less than the 3 years and 8 months requested by the Prosecutor's Office for the accusations of attack, disobedience and contempt, a report fromRadio Television Martí.
De Céspedes - known as “El Patriota de Camagüey” - received this new sanction,despite being serving another sentence since last December, when he was sentenced to one year and six months in prison on charges of disobedience and instigation to commit a crime, for his participation in the massive protests of July 11.
At that time his daughter,Daymis de Céspedes Sánchez, He described the trial against his father as a circus, in which the Prosecutor's Office did not even present witnesses or solid evidence in the accusation of disobedience.
The charge of instigation to commit a crime was based on the activist's post on Facebook inciting the people to take to the streets, when they had already started protests in Camagüey during thesocial outbreak last summer.
A publication ofMarta Beatriz Rodríguez Barreiro Dances, shared in the Facebook group “Cubans de Corazón 100 x 100,” asked if the activist's actions, "his verses by José Martí, his cross carried on his back dragged to the church, his lyrics of the national anthem sung in the street , his tattoo of homeland and life, saying what it feels like to love his people and ask for freedom”, are really “causes, contempt”.
Last February, “El Patriota de Camagüey”He declared a hunger and thirst strike in prison “willing to die for his freedom”, which is whywas transferred to a punishment cell in prison Red Ceramics in Camagüey.
In a letter written by the activist, and which his daughter assured was prior to the declaration of his strike, De Céspedes stated: "I am innocent of everything that I am accused of and if my crime is to think, express myself and demonstrate against communism "I assume all responsibility, I will never renounce my principles and if I have to die for it, may 'the country see me proud'."
Since he was arrested, the family of the “Patriota de Camagüey” has sent himmultiple messages of support. “Grandpa, we need you, we miss you. You are the most important thing in our lives. Every night we ask God to get you out of those bars, because you are the best grandfather in the world,” expresses one of the messages spread by his grandchildren on Facebook.
“I will always love you, even if I do not agree with your absurd, brave, selfish, sincere decisions, which hurt and make you proud, which hurt and kill. I never imagined that there was someone in these times capable of sacrificing their life out of conviction,” his daughter also wrote on social networks.
A text published on Facebook by the independent journalistHenry Constantín Ferreiro, after learning of the new sanction imposed on Bárbaro de Céspedes, mentions the activist's mother, who in the midst of her advanced age hopes to see her son's freedom.
“Elena, very old, lived with Bárbaro until he was imprisoned on October 10. Since then she has lived alone, and the day before yesterday she fell and hit herself in several places. "She clarifies that the fall was 'because she was old,' but she says that her other children think it was because she was thinking about Bárbaro," she said.
In the post, Constantín also reflects: “How many mothers are in Cuba today with their children unjustly imprisoned, how many mothers today are suffering from a system that pays with jail time for Cubans who protest and demand to live in a better Cuba, without emigrating. Elena wants her son free. We also".
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