An activist from Caimanera detained by police while filming a protest in front of the police station

Yeris Cúrvelo Aguilera is a coordinator of the Eastern Democratic Alliance (ADO) in the municipality of Caimanera in the Guantánamo Province. He is also a reporter in the independent audiovisual agency Palenque Visión. Yeris was detained while covering a protest carried out by Bárboro Mozo Palomo, a citizen of Caimanera, who was showing near the police station a banner saying “Down with injustice. I was unjustly fined 2000 pesos.” When Yeris was recording the event, a police officer tried to rip the phone out of his hand. However, Yeris managed to throw his phone to a passer-by he knew so the record was saved. After that, the officer detained Yeris and took him to the police station. There, Lieutenant Colonel Padillas, the delegate of the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) in Caimanera and Lieutenant Colonel Onmy, the police chief in the municipality along with an unknown State Security official threatened him that if he dared to publish the video, he would be fined based on the Decree 370 and put in prison. Yeris was released five hours later without any further consequences. He published the video on the day after his detention, 12 March, in the Cubanet News.