The Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU) is a non-violent opposition organization that brings together Cuban dissidents. It was founded on August 24, 2011, by José Daniel Ferrer García after he was released from prison in March 2011 and refused to leave the country.
Although it began with just twelve members, UNPACU now has over ten thousand affiliated activists and 122 cells. As of 2017, they reported that 53 of their activists were imprisoned in Cuba on political grounds.
UNPACU has representation in both the United States and the European Union.
On the organization's website, it states, "UNPACU's activism is based on non-violent resistance and disobedience, the same principle that underpinned the so-called 'color revolutions,' whose action frameworks were articulated by Gene Sharp."
Recognized by Amnesty International since its inception, this movement has denounced the harassment, intimidation, and detentions that its members have suffered at the hands of Cuban authorities.
As part of its growth and consolidation, UNPACU absorbed the peaceful dissident organization FANTU in 2013, led by the renowned dissident and journalist Guillermo Fariñas.
Among its objectives, the organization actively denounces the lack of civil liberties as well as the precarious economic situation on the island.
In January 2012, one of its members, the Cuban dissident Wilman Villar Mendoza, aged 31, died at the Juan Bruno Zayas Hospital in Santiago de Cuba after a 50-day hunger strike that he had begun in prison following a four-year sentence for contempt related to his participation in a peaceful protest.
