and fear for their families back home
“We thought this would never end, but God heard us,” says one of the 135 exiles. Former prisoners confirm physical and psychological torture.
HAVANA TIMES – “It was an ordeal I thought would never end,” says Jose Enrique Sanchez, one of the 135 political prisoners exiled on September 5th to Guatemala by the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo. “We lived in precarious conditions,” “we endured psychological torture,” “threats to our families,” “they told us we would pay dearly for this,” recalls Sanchez, who spent 17 months in the La Modelo prison.
Sanchez’s testimony is echoed by another dozen political prisoners who were exiled by the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship and interviewed in Guatemala by Confidencial.
“We were asleep, and they (the police) started beating us with batons at midnight. Some officers would throw buckets of water nearby so we couldn’t sleep. We were fed from buckets, often with insects, and when we got sick, they only gave us pain pills,” Sanchez recalls. He was imprisoned for participating in the traditional Judea in Masatepe.
Sanchez, whose family had a tradition of celebrating the Judea, also remembers that officers told him, “You will pay dearly for this, we’ll send you to a worse place,” and that police chiefs threatened reprisals against his family.
Harsh Interrogations
Jared Ramirez, another exiled political prisoner, confirms that he suffered torture from the moment he was arrested for celebrating Nicaraugan Sheynnis Palacios’ victory as Miss Universe 2023. He was detained the same night he went out with a blue and white flag to celebrate.
“They took me to the Metrocentro roundabout where there are always police, and they kept me there for two hours, hurling insults at me and psychologically mistreating me,” he recounted.
The psychological torture worsened when he was transferred to the District I jail and then to District III. In both stations, he was severely interrogated. They demanded to know where he worked, who he was with, and asked for names of opposition neighbors. When he was taken to La Modelo, the torture didn’t stop.
“They told us we’d never get out. We saw our families once a month for 30 minutes. Common prisoners had more time. It was very, very hard. We thought it would never end, but God heard our daily prayers. We prayed every day, asking the Lord for our freedom, wherever it might be,” he explains.
The muralist from Estelí, Oscar Parrilla, was also detained for celebrating the Miss Universe victory through his art. The painter recounts that, in prison, like the others, he endured harsh conditions. “Many times they left us without water. The heat was unbearable,” he said.
Parrilla also recalls that the food they were served was terrible. “The beans were bloated with baking soda, and the rice was mushy. A few weeks ago, I even found a ball of salt in the rice,” he says.
They also played mind games with them, Parrilla confirms. They made them believe several times that they would be released, but it was a lie. “They took us out to shave and for sun exposure on unusual days,” so when they took them out for exile this last time, he didn’t believe he would leave the prison.
“It wasn’t until US embassy diplomats boarded the bus and explained the situation that I really believed we were being freed,” Parrilla confesses.
“We Didn’t Even Have the Right to a Bible”
Adriana Zapata, who was imprisoned for printing a photograph of imprisoned