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Arbitrary Detention, Ill-Treatment, Abusive Trials Affect Hundreds

(Washington, DC) – The Cuban government has systematically engaged in arbitrary detention, ill-treatment of detainees, and abuse-ridden criminal prosecutions in response to overwhelmingly peaceful anti-government protests in July 2021, Human Rights…
Uniformed police officers shove a man into a car by the head
News

Latin American, US, EU Leaders Should Condemn New Restrictions on Internet

(Washington, DC) – A new decree and accompanying legislation announced by the Cuban government severely restricts freedom of expression online and threatens users’ privacy, Human Rights Watch said today. Governments in Latin America, as well as the…
Cuban Rolando Remedios shows a photo on his mobile phone of him being arrested during the July 11 protests. Remedios was released on August 6. 
News
Just as largely unprecedented mass street protests erupted on the streets in Cuba [“In the streets, Cubans ‘have lost their fear’, ” front page, July 13], the Coast Guard’s interdiction of a boat off the coast of Key West and summary return of Cubans…
A Coast Guard Station Marathon boat crew and 15 migrants aboard 45-foot Response Boat-Medium near Big Pine Key, Florida on July 3, 2021. Photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Ryan Estrada. Source: United States Coast Guard
News

Internet Outages as Protesters Are Detained, Held Incommunicado

Since July 11, thousands of Cubans have taken to the streets across the country in landmark demonstrations protesting longstanding restrictions on rights, scarcity of food and medicines, and the government’s poor response to the Covid-19 pandemic.…
Plainclothes officers detain a protester during a protest in Havana, Cuba, Sunday, July 11, 2021. 
News

Arbitrary Detention, Restrictions on Movement, Communications

(Washington, DC) – The Cuban government is committing systematic human rights abuses against independent artists and journalists, Human Rights Watch said today as it released a video on the abuses. In recent months, Cuban authorities have jailed…
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, an artist who has vocally criticized repression in Cuba, speaks during an interview at his home in Havana, Cuba, on May 2, 2018. Police and intelligence officers in Cuba have repeatedly harassed and detained Alcántara.
Video
(Washington, DC, June 30, 2021) – The Cuban government is committing systematic human rights abuses against independent artists and journalists, Human Rights Watch said today as it released a video on the abuses. In recent months, Cuban authorities…
News

Critics Imprisoned, Fined, Harassed

(Washington, DC) – The Cuban government is using regulations designed to prevent the spread of Covid-19 to harass and imprison critics, Human Rights Watch said today. On November 26, 2020, Cuban security forces detained 14 government critics in…
Artists Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Anamelys Ramos present a habeas corpus regarding detained musician Denis Solís, in Havana, on November 10, 2020. Otero Alcántara and Ramos were arrested on November 26.
News

YouTubers Have Faced Police Harassment and Death Threats

Cuba’s government has a well-documented history of harassing dissidents, journalists, and opposition party members. Now it has a new target: social media influencers. On October 14, police arrived at the homes of four Cuban YouTubers about to…
Screenshot from a video showing Ruhama Fernández. 
News

General Assembly Members Should Not Vote for China, Saudi Arabia

(New York) – United Nations member countries should not vote for China and Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s most abusive governments, for seats on the UN Human Rights Council, Human Rights Watch said today. Russia’s numerous war crimes in Syria’s…
A view of the United Nations General Assembly, at UN headquarters, October 1, 2018.
News

Camila Acosta Endures a Year of Harassment, Arrest, and Forced Relocation

The Cuban government’s brutal restrictions on free speech fall particularly hard on journalists. Camila Acosta has learned this from experience. In just the one year since August 2019, when she began working as an independent journalist for the news…
Journalist Camila Acosta wears a facemask saying “no to Decree 370,” a 2019 law curtailing free speech in Cuba, on August 1, 2020.
News

Covid-19 No Excuse for Arbitrary Detention, Communication Restrictions

(Washington, DC) – Cuban authorities committed numerous rights violations in June 2020 against people organizing a protest over police violence, effectively suppressing the demonstration, Human Rights Watch said today. Many Cubans planned to gather…
A man is detained at the site where a protest against the killing of a Black man by police was due to take place in Havana, Cuba, June 30, 2020.
News

Receiving Governments Should Press for Change

The Cuban government imposes draconian rules on doctors deployed in medical missions globally that violate their fundamental rights, Human Rights Watch said today. Governments seeking support from Cuban health workers to respond to the Covid-19…
Medics and paramedics from Cuba pose upon arrival at the Malpensa airport of Milan, Italy, Sunday, March 22, 2020. Fifty-three doctors and paramedics from Cuba arrived in Milan to help with coronavirus treatment.
News
A new treaty to deepen the link between environmental protection and human rights in Latin America and the Caribbean has the potential to reduce the conflicts that lead to the murders of so many environmental defenders in the region.  The…
Bernardo, a man in his 30s, was born in a quilombo (Afro-Brazilian) community of around 60, men, women, and children in Minas Gerais State, southeast Brazil. Bernardo told Human Rights Watch that he feels powerless against aerial spraying of pesticides. “
News

Entitled to Consultation on Communal Ownership

  (Washington, DC) – A draft law before the Antigua and Barbuda Senate would deprive Barbudans of communal land where they have lived for generations, Human Rights Watch said today. The Antigua and Barbuda government should consult with the…
201807wrd_americas_barbuda
Report
Summary Every day I fear for my safety living in this country because of my sexual orientation. I am alive but if anyone ever find out and wanted to find out, they can kill me …I am an easy target for anything. —Peter, Dominica,…
News

Repeal Colonial-Era Laws

(Bridgetown, Barbados, March 21, 2018) – Discriminatory laws in Eastern Caribbean countries make lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people targets for discrimination, violence and abuse, Human Rights Watch said in a report…
Jason (pseudonym), a 40-year-old gay man from Barbados.
News
Canada’s Supreme Court on June 28, 2017 upheld a lower court’s injunction to require Google to delist web pages from a company that had been copying and selling a product belonging to Equustek Solutions Inc.. Google had already delisted all the company’s…