The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders calls upon the international community for help to the leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba held by the regime incommunicado since July 11.

Mr. José Daniel Ferrer has been deprived of liberty and held incommunicado since July 11, 2021, for exercising his right to peaceful protest in the demonstrations, which occurred that day in various cities on the island, the author of the statement said.

Cuban opposition leader, along with his son José Daniel Ferrer Cantillo, were going to the Céspedes park, to join the protesters in the city of Santiago de Cuba. But agents of the secret police, the National Revolutionary Police, arrested them several hundred meters away from their house.

The family of the UNPACU coordinator has not obtained access to his investigation file. Allegedly, the police transferred Mr. Ferrer García to the Mar Verde prison.  The regime made such a decision after the judge revoked house arrest issued by the Municipal People's Court of Santiago de Cuba.

His wife, Ms. Nelva Ismarays Ortega Tamayo, Mr. Ferrer Cantillo, and the activist Mr. Roilán Zárraga arrived last Thursday at the Mar Verde prison to investigate the whereabouts of the opposition leader.

Instead of providing information, the prison authorities called the PNR, which detained Mr. Ferrer's wife, son, and friend. The regime imposed fines on the three.


"A victim of forced disappearance"

On Tuesday, Amnesty International, declared Mr. Ferrer a victim of forced disappearance, an independent Radio Martí reported.

The leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba is in detention without his whereabouts being known, without any information being given to his family, legal representatives or organisations about his state of health, conditions or the place of his detention, stated Ms. Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International representative for the Latin America.

It constitutes a forced disappearance, concluded Ms. Guevara-Rosas.