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The Cuban political prisoner Lizandra Góngora declared a hunger and thirst strike this Wednesday from the Los Colonos prison, on the Isle of Youth, according to a report by the Cuban activist and cousin of the opposition figure, Ariel Góngora, in a live video posted on Facebook.
The decision was directly motivated by statements from the ruler Miguel Díaz-Canel, who on April 9 denied in an interview with NBC News the existence of political prisoners in Cuba, asserting that those individuals were incarcerated for vandalism and crimes against the Cuban constitution.
"She is going to stand her ground to make the appointed position of Díaz-Canel aware that they are indeed political prisoners and that her incarceration, her political imprisonment, must be respected," explained Ariel Góngora during the live broadcast.
According to her confidant, the hunger and thirst strike is the last resort she has to be heard and to stop the repression against her, following the accumulation of reprisals from the regime: the refusal to grant her the minimum security regime that she was legally entitled to since October 10 of last year, the forced separation from her family and psychological torture.
Góngora has been unable to see his five minor children, who live in Havana, for about four months.
Ariel Góngora noted that each time Lizandra goes three or four months without contact with her children, her mental state deteriorates severely.
"She prefers to die with her head held high, rather than on her knees; the only thing she always mentions is her children," he said.
The health situation of Góngora is delicate. She was diagnosed in March 2023 with a five-centimeter uterine fibroid that causes her to have hemorrhages, and the prison authorities have denied her surgery, citing a lack of specialists on the Isle of Youth.
Family members and exiled activists have sent him medicine and vitamins to compensate for the lack of official medical care.
"She entered in poor health, she has fibroids, she has sickle cell disease, but she has received care thanks to many siblings who have contributed to her medications," acknowledged Ariel Góngora.
It is not the first time that Góngora has resorted to this extreme measure. He did so in September 2022 at the El Guatao prison, along with other political prisoners, and on that occasion, he emerged with serious repercussions and severe weight loss.
She was sentenced in 2022 to 14 years in prison, the harshest penalty imposed on a woman for the protests of July 11, 2021, for participating in the demonstrations in Güira de Melena, Artemisa.
Ariel Góngora directly held the regime accountable for what may happen to her: "From now on, whatever happens to her, you are responsible. The Castro dictatorship, you are responsible."
Góngora is not the only political prisoner on hunger strike. The political prisoner from 11J, Ángel Jesús Véliz Marcano, has been on a hunger strike for eight days in the Kilo 9 prison in Camagüey, according to his mother, Ailex Marcano. She also stated that she has not received any information about his health condition.
"Freedom for all political prisoners, freedom for Cuba, and it is forbidden to forget and forbidden to surrender. This is until they are free," concluded Ariel Góngora in his broadcast.
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