This past Sunday, Cuban authorities detained Berta Soler, the prominent leader of the opposition group Ladies in White, as she was leaving their headquarters in Lawton, Havana. The Cuban American National Foundation shared the news on the social media platform X, noting that Soler had been threatened just the previous week by a known enforcer named "Felo."
"Felo" had warned Soler that she would be jailed if she participated in a demonstration on September 22, following her refusal to accept a deal that would have compromised her activism. Despite the threat, Soler declared in a Facebook live session, "I will be on the streets, and only God knows what might happen. There is no agreement with the oppressor."
Recurring Arrests and Continued Defiance
This incident is part of a long-standing pattern, as Soler has been arrested many Sundays while leaving her home in Lawton. She was released early last Tuesday, having been detained the previous Sunday near the Ladies in White headquarters by plainclothes agents, as reported by Cubanet.
During her detention at the Cotorro police station, in a dimly lit cell, "Felo" proposed that if Soler and her husband, former political prisoner Ángel Moya, ceased their activism, they would be allowed to leave Cuba temporarily to visit their family in the United States and return. Soler, however, was resolute in her refusal. "I believe this ultimatum from the Cuban regime, this opportunity to temporarily leave the country by lifting the travel ban, is their way of getting rid of Berta Soler and Ángel Moya and silencing the Ladies in White. But they played that card very poorly because I am not someone who makes deals with State Security," she told the press.
Political Prisoners in Cuba: Latest Figures
The organization Prisoners Defenders (PD) has reported a decrease in the number of political prisoners in Cuba, following the suicide of one inmate, the forced exile of another, and the completion of sentences by 13 individuals. Data shared on X also revealed two new political prisoners, bringing the total to 1,105 as of the updated August report.