Oscar Casanella is a Cuban activist and a biochemist by profession, born in Havana, Cuba, on February 22, 1979.
Casanella, who worked as a professor at the University of Havana and as an associate researcher at the National Institute of Oncology and Radiology (INOR), began to feel pressure in 2013 to sever his friendships with political opponents, or else his labor rights would be restricted, and he was even threatened with expulsion from INOR, which ultimately happened in June 2016 under the pretext of workplace indiscipline. That same year, he was also expelled from the Faculty of Biology at the University of Havana, where he served as an adjunct professor and received no salary.
Since then, the young scientist, who has unsuccessfully appealed to the Labor Justice Organ (OJL) of the company MEDICUBA regarding the unjust nature of his dismissal, has dedicated himself to denouncing the abuses and sanctions he has faced from the State Security Organs and the deputy director of INOR, Lorenzo Anasagasti.
"Many Cubans find themselves in a significant ethical and personal conflict when forced to choose between their profession and their personal life and beliefs," Casanella stated regarding the controversial friendship that connects him to Ciro Javier Díaz Penedo, Gorki Luis Aguila Carrasco, Lia Villares, Ariel Urquiola, among others.
In August 2019, together with other professors and university students, they joined a letter to the Government requesting that it uphold the law and put an end to discriminatory and punitive measures in the country after the First Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Higher Education (MES), Martha del Carmen Mesa Valenciano, published a controversial text stating that "the Cuban university professor must be a defender of our political convictions."
Casanella, through his social media, highlights the food shortages faced by the Cuban people by posting about the long lines Cubans endure to obtain food, as well as other events that reflect the deterioration, unsanitary conditions, and precariousness of a suffocated society that is calling for changes in government management.
Like other Cuban activists fighting for change in Cuba, he has personally experienced the repressive violence of Cuban agents. In 2019, while participating in the independent march against homophobia, he was struck in the chest and abdomen by four officers who inflicted multiple injuries requiring stitches and hospital care. He was subsequently arrested.
In December 2019, when he was about to accompany the mother of Cuban biologist and activist Ariel Urquiola, he was detained by agents of the Cuban police to prevent him from going to the airport.
