The Cuban State Security kidnapped historian and activist Alina Bárbara López Hernández this Saturday while she was attempting to conduct her monthly civic protest in Matanzas, coinciding with Nelson Mandela International Day. Her associates reported the kidnapping on her Facebook profile and demanded that she appear "unharmed" within an hour.
According to the post shared from her own account, López was first taken to the station of the National Revolutionary Police and then taken by State Security agents to an unknown location. When inquiring about her, the authorities refused to confirm whether she was there or not.
"State Security has kidnapped Alina and she is currently missing. She was at the PNR station, taken by them, and at this moment they are not saying whether she is there or not. Therefore, she is kidnapped. Where is Alina Bárbara? They have one hour for her to appear unharmed," read the message posted on her Facebook.
The detention this Saturday represents an escalation compared to previous arrests, where at least the location of her detention was known. On this occasion, the authorities' refusal to disclose her whereabouts led her defenders to label the situation directly as a kidnapping.
The activist had published a call for civic resistance on Friday in tribute to International Mandela Day, ironically predicting that she would be detained again. "If there is a place where Mandela's teachings are needed, it is Cuba, a country where freedom and prosperity have been outstanding debts for decades," she wrote.
The arrest this Saturday is not an isolated incident. López Hernández has been holding peaceful protests on the 18th of every month since March 2023 in the Liberty Park of Matanzas, demanding amnesty for political prisoners, an end to repression, and a constituent assembly.
So far in 2026, the regime has systematically detained her every time she has attempted to protest: 12 hours on February 18 alongside activist Leonardo Romero Negrín, almost 10 hours on April 18 held at the Playa Police Unit, and approximately 10 hours on June 18, accused of violating her precautionary measure.
As of June 18, 2024, López is under precautionary measure of house arrest, accused of the crime of "assault" alongside sociologist Jenny Pantoja Torres. The prosecution is requesting four years of imprisonment.
The trial, initially scheduled for January 30, 2026, before the Popular Municipal Court of Matanzas, was indefinitely suspended by Judge Ysenia Rodríguez Vázquez without setting a new date, a move that the defendants interpret as a tactic of prolonged harassment.
In February 2026, the State Security lieutenant colonel Rogelio Cuesta Aragón threatened her with charges of "incitement to commit a crime," warning her that she was "a hair's breadth" away from facing that new charge.
Despite all these pressures, López has maintained her monthly protests, arguing that civil disobedience is the instrument the Cuban government fears the most. "We must make protest and disobedience our civic weapons," she wrote on Friday, just hours before being abducted.
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