The youth collective 'Fuera de la Caja Cuba' revealed on Monday that during the police summons of two of its members, State Security agents warned them that even uttering the phrase "how long?" could constitute a crime of incitement.
The report, published on the official account of the collective on X, exposes the extent to which the regime has criminalized even the most basic expression of citizen discontent and fearfully pursues anyone who raises their voice to denounce its sinister desire to remain in power.
"One of the things that shocked us the most in the summons of Betty and Abel was that they warned us that even a 'How long?' could be considered a crime for alleged incitement. In the minds of the repressors, logic does not apply. Freedom of expression is a utopia," the collective wrote.
The individuals mentioned are Amanda Beatriz Andrés Navarro ("Betty") and Abel Alejandro Andrés Navarro, siblings and members of the group, detained for more than eight hours on July 2 at the National Revolutionary Police unit on Aguilera Street, in the 10 de Octubre municipality of Havana — a duration that the group itself reported as exceeding the legal limit.
That same day, in an operation that the collective described as coordinated, Anna Sofía Benítez Silvente and Pastor Rolando Pérez Lora were also summoned at the Alamar station, with the apparent purpose of preventing the activists from attending a celebration at the residence of the head of mission of the United States Embassy, Mike Hammer.
During the interrogations, possible charges such as "incitement to commit crimes," "defamation," and "disparagement of heroes" were mentioned. The harassment did not stop there: in mid-July, a State Security agent again threatened Abel, the same official who had interrogated him weeks earlier.
The warning regarding the phrase «How long?» is not a minor detail. That question is widely repeated in the comments and posts of Cubans on social media as an expression of frustration over prolonged blackouts, shortages, and the general decline in living conditions.
The Cuban Conflict Observatory recorded 107 street protests in June 2026 —the highest monthly figure up to that point, with 82 in Havana alone— and over 1,400 expressions of conflict in July, including 72 in-person protests.
Outside the Box Cuba emerged in January 2026 in the municipality of Cerro, Havana, founded by four young individuals around twenty years old: Karel Daniel Hernández Bosques, Amanda Beatriz Andrés Navarro, Abel Alejandro Andrés Navarro, and Mauro Reigos Pérez.
They use art, theater, and videos on social media to promote critical thinking and challenge state indoctrination, identified by their red hats bearing the slogan «Make Cuba Great Again».
Since their emergence, they have suffered an escalation of reprisals: disabling of phones in March, summons to family members in April, and prolonged interrogations in July. In May, Mike Hammer met with group members, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio publicly expressed support for them, which raised their international profile and apparently intensified the regime's pressure.
The legal framework supporting these threats is the Cuban Penal Code of 2022, whose article 268.1 punishes public incitement to commit a crime with penalties ranging from six months to one year, which are increased when social media is used, while article 124 imposes penalties for propaganda against the constitutional order of up to ten years in prison.
Amnesty International warned that this code has reinforced severe restrictions on freedom of expression and allowed for the criminalization of critical content on social media.
In the replies to the collective's post, a user summarized the mood of many: “Let’s make it go viral. Let’s do everything that bothers the dictatorship, which is almost everything.”
Filed under: