Uncertainty grows following riot at high-security prison in Ciego de Ávila

Uncertainty is increasing following independent reports thatthe riot was heavily suppressed that began on February 18 in the Canaleta prison in Ciego de Ávila.

"A young man, barely a child, protested because he wasn't being given food. He was faint from hunger. He was brutally beaten. Hours later, he was found hanging in his cell. This triggered the riot in the Canaleta prison," is heard in the testimony of a political prisoner spread by the organization Prisioners Defenders.

Witnesses report at least 7 dead. Coffins and ambulances were seen in the early morning. Shouts of FREEDOM could be heard a kilometer away, according to the report.

"What happened in Canaleta, Cuba was not an incident. It was a massacre," adds Prisioners Defenders.

Independent media outlets like Diario de Cuba confirm that Giorkis Vargas Ramos, a member of the dissident group Cuba Primero, and Yumel Rodríguez Carbó, imprisoned for a common crime, are critically injured following the riot.

The opposition leader José Daniel Ferrer, who has been reporting on the incident from the beginning, stated that among the deceased are Walfrido Archival, Pilita, and Eduardo Rodríguez Ulloa, the Chinito de Colorao.

Ferrer assured that there could be around thirty injured, that visits to the prison have been suspended, and that many inmates will be transferred to other provinces.

The riot

Last Thursday, a burst of screams, metallic clanking, and slogans against the regimeshattered the silence of the Canaleta provincial prison in the early morning.

From within the penal facility, regarded as a high-security prison, audios began to circulate featuring voices chanting “Freedom,” “Homeland and Life,” and “Down with Díaz-Canel,” while denouncing abuses and extreme survival conditions.

The agency EFE confirmed the riot based on reports from the NGOs Prisoners Defenders and the Cuban Prison Documentation Center (CDPC).

A testimony from an inmate, provided to the agency, claimed that police forces were called in as reinforcements to the prison and that they used "rubber bullets," "pepper spray," and physical violence in an attempt to suppress the protest.

According to that testimony, the catalyst for the uprising was "hunger" and "mistreatment" in prison, along with widespread discontent with the Cuban government.

So far, the official media have not commented on the serious incident.