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Mike Waltz, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, commemorated this Saturday the fifth anniversary of 11J with a direct message of solidarity towards the Cuban political prisoners and condemnation of the Havana regime.
"Five years ago, the Cuban people filled the streets and demanded freedom. The regime responded with clubs, prison cells, show trials, and fear. Today, over 800 political prisoners remain behind bars: artists, rappers, poets, fathers, daughters, brothers. They dared to say what millions know: Cuba deserves to be free. We stand with them. Homeland and Life," Waltz wrote from his official account @USAmbUN on X.
The message arrives during a week of intense diplomatic activity by the ambassador regarding Cuba. On July 7, during an extraordinary session of the UN General Assembly called by the Cuban regime to discuss the U.S. embargo, Waltz displayed photographs and read the names of political prisoners to the member countries.
In that same session, the ambassador was involved in a tense exchange with the Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, who tried to interrupt him while he condemned the situation of the detainees.
"Stand with the Cuban people, do not side with the regime that has broken this country. You cannot do both at the same time. The time has come to make a decision," Waltz warned the representatives of the nations present.
The next day, on July 8, the U.S. formally demanded the release of political prisoners before the UN, citing more than 775 people imprisoned for peaceful activism.
Among the mentioned cases are the rapper Maykel «Osorbo» Castillo Pérez, coauthor of "Patria y Vida" and sentenced to nine years, and the poet Duannis León Taboada, 24 years old, sentenced to 14 years and held in solitary confinement in Combinado del Este.
The fifth anniversary of the 11J arrives with record figures of repression. The organization Prisoners Defenders documented 1,306 political prisoners in Cuba as of July 9, 2026, the highest number recorded to date. At least 338 of them remain imprisoned for offenses directly related to the protests of 2021.
The most emblematic case is that of Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, leader of the San Isidro Movement, whose five-year sentence officially ended on July 9, but who remains missing after being transferred from Guanajay prison without notification to his family. Amnesty International denounced the situation as a forced disappearance on July 10.
This Saturday, the U.S. Embassy in Havana also called for the release of political prisoners, and representative Mike Hammer visited the families of those detained on July 11 in Cuba.
Senator Marco Rubio warned that Washington will use "all available tools" to push for reforms on the island and demanded the immediate release of political prisoners.
The amnesty announced by the regime in April 2026 for over 2,000 inmates explicitly excluded those convicted of "crimes against authority," the legal framework used to criminalize the protesters of July 11, which left hundreds of people imprisoned precisely for taking to the streets five years ago without any benefits. The organization Justicia 11J summarized the significance of the date this Saturday with a powerful statement: "No cause can move forward if it abandons its prisoners."
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