Press Release
Couragous speech by political prisoner Yoandris Gutierrrez Vargas during arbitrary trial in Bayamo due to July 11 protests.
Yoandris Gutiérrez Vargas
Contact: John Suarez (612) -367-6845/ Janisset Rivero 786-208-6056
Center for a Free Cuba. Washington DC, June 7, 2022. On May 26 and 27, imprisoned opponent Yoandris Gutiérrez Vargas and 14 others were put on trial for taking part in the nonviolent protests that took place in the City of Bayamo on July 11.
During the oral hearing, Gutiérrez Vargas denied the prosecution’s accusations of violent acts that never occurred and rebuked the Prosecutor, according to a document sent by his family to members of the Eastern Democratic Alliance.
“Yoandris asked the Prosecutor: What is it to be a counterrevolutionary? Because I love my country. I am not leaving Cuba. I am proud to be Bayamese. They will have to bury me in the cemetery here. And I repeat, I am not leaving Cuba. How can an officer studying at a military school in this country lie so easily in front of this court? They have invented a great lie, a comedy against me, I have never hit anyone, much less threw stones, however they did hit me. I do not deny participating in the march. There is the video and I had thousands of reasons to do it. If they are going to judge me it will be for that and as José Martí said, with the poor of the earth I want to cast my fate,” says a note from his family.
His aunt Sonia Echavarría Guillén denounced that they are accusing him of crimes that he did not commit. “He told me that they are accusing him of crimes that he did not commit. The one who was dragged and beaten was him. He went out in a peaceful march, and told me that depending on what they ask of him unfairly, that he is going to stand up for life or death because he did nothing of what they are telling him. Where he is in prison they are harassing him, they say things to provoke him: you are a coward, we are going to send you to Havana far away, they start telling him all this, provoking him”, denounced Mrs. Echavarría through a audio message.
Yoandris Gutiérrez Vargas was arrested in the streets of Bayamo on July 11 after receiving a brutal beating by State Security agents. He is in Las Mangas Prison where he has staged hunger strikes and protests against the arbitrariness committed against him. In March 2022, his family was visited by political police agents who investigated details of his private life.
The prosecution is asking for 11 years in prison.
