The Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU) is a non-violent opposition organization in Cuba 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.
Despite starting with just twelve people, 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 for political reasons.
UNPACU has representation both in the United States and in 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 has underpinned the so-called 'color revolutions,' whose guiding actions were articulated by Gene Sharp.”
Reconocida por Amnesty International desde su creación, este movimiento ha denunciado el acoso y la intimidación y las detenciones que han sufrido sus miembros por parte de las autoridades cubanas.
As part of its growth and consolidation, UNPACU absorbed in 2013 the peaceful dissident organization FANTU, led by the renowned dissident journalist Guillermo Fariñas.
Among its objectives, the organization actively denounces the lack of civil liberties as well as the economic precariousness experienced on the island.
In January 2012, one of its members, the Cuban dissident Wilman Villar Mendoza, 31 years old, died at the Juan Bruno Zayas hospital in Santiago de Cuba after a 50-day hunger strike he had begun in prison following his conviction for contempt, which resulted in a four-year prison sentence for participating in a peaceful demonstration.
