The Cuban justice sentences the two main opponents of the San Isidro Movement to five and nine years in prison

What the Cuban dissidents expected and feared finally happened.

Plastic artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and rapper Maykel Castillo, the two most visible heads of the opposition San Isidro Movement (MSI), were sentenced this Friday by a Havana court to five and nine years in prison, respectively.

During the trial, held on May 30 and 31 without access to the foreign press or diplomats, Alcántara was accused of the crimes of "outrage against the symbols of the country", "disrespect" and "public disorder", while Castillo faced charges for "defamation of institutions and organizations, heroes and martyrs", "attack", "disrespect" and "public disorder".

When announcing the ruling, the Cuban Attorney General's Office considered the facts "proven" and "their social harmfulness",

Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel Castillo have been in provisional prison since last year and are considered prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International.

Both are the most visible leaders of the so-called San Isidro Movement, made up of a small group of opposition artists, creators and journalists who for a little over four years have promoted different critical

, street actions, bull runs and hunger strikes to make visible the lack of freedoms on the island and denounce police harassment for their dissidence.

The two were detained dozens of times before their final arrest last year.

In 2020 they participated in a hunger strike to demand the release of one of the members of the MSI, which had great international repercussions and ended when the police forcibly entered the premises where they were locked up.

This motivated an unprecedented planting of young artists in front of the doors of the Ministry of Culture, on November 27 of that year.

Since then, the MSI and its activists have been criminalized by the authorities, who have accused their members of being "mercenaries at the service of the United States" to provoke " media

" and "internal destabilization" with the aim of promoting a "change of regime” on the island.

In April 2021, the two staged another unusual public protest when a group of neighbors prevented the police from detaining Castillo.

He escaped by bicycle with handcuffs on one arm and later met with Alcántara at the MSI headquarters.

There, sheltered by passers-by, they shouted slogans against the government and the president and sang the song

—in whose video clip Castillo, one of its authors— participated, which later became the anthem of the opposition during the historic demonstrations of September 11. July.

Alcántara was accused of "outrage against the symbols of the country" for a controversial

that he starred in 2019 under the title

(flag, in French), which consisted of wearing the Cuban flag on his body for a month (on the street, when going to the bathroom, when riding a bus, when queuing at a store) to draw attention to the right to everyone to use the national flag after the enactment on the island of a new "Symbols Law".

According to the Attorney General's Office, in the case of his conviction, the court "argued the express intention, sustained over time, of offending the national flag, through the publication of photos on social networks where it is used in denigrating acts, accompanied by expressions notoriously offensive and disrespectful, underestimating the feelings of nationality and pride that the Cuban people profess to our national flag”.

Regarding the sanction against the protesting rapper Maykel Castillo, the Prosecutor's Office assures that the court assessed his "manifest purpose of outraging, affecting the honor and dignity of the highest authorities of the country", using "false images of these manipulated digitally, which he made public in social networks;

and with the same purpose, he made direct interventions from his personal profile to dishonor the function that law enforcement officers fulfill in society, which compromised social and collective coexistence and entailed an affront towards them.”

In the same process, Félix Roque Delgado (to 5 years in prison), as well as Juslid Justiz Lazo and Reina Sierra Duvergel (to 3 years in prison, replaced by the same period of correctional work without internment), were sentenced for "attack". for preventing Castillo's arrest by the police in April 2021.

The initial prosecutor's request against Alcántara and Castillo was for 7 and 10 years in prison, respectively.

The sentences, which can still be appealed before the Supreme Court, were immediately criticized by non-governmental organizations and opposition activists, who claim that the trials were "political" and the sentences "excessive and of an exemplary nature", and decided in advance.

In recent days, the Supreme Court announced the final sentences against more than 450 participants in the massive protests of July 11 last year, dozens of them sentenced for "sedition" to sentences of more than 20 years in prison.

Although Cuba's highest court reduced some of the sentences after appeals,

confirmed the lengthy prison sentences for many of the participants in last summer's demonstrations.

According to the opposition, with these trials, and also with that of Alcántara and Castillo, the government is trying to corner political activism and silence the voices of protest at times of great popular unrest due to the deterioration of living conditions.

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