Cuba frees jailed opposition leader as part of Biden deal

Cuba on Thursday released jailed opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer, the dissident's family confirmed, part of a landmark deal struck with departing US President Joe Biden in return for sanctions relief.

"Thank God we have him home," Nelva Ortega told AFP of her husband, who has been in and out of prison for the past two decades, his latest stint stretching to three-and-a-half years.

Ferrer, 54, is the most high-profile of the prisoners that Cuba began releasing Wednesday after Biden agreed to remove the communist island from a list of terrorism sponsors -- part of an eleventh-hour bid to cement his legacy before handing power next Monday to Donald Trump.

Under the deal, Cuba has promised to release 553 prisoners.

So far it has only released about two dozen, according to rights groups. They were mostly people arrested for taking part in mass July 2021 anti-government demonstrations sparked by recurring power outages and food shortages.

AFP saw four prisoners emerge from the San Miguel del Padron prison on the outskirts of the capital Havana on Thursday morning. All were jailed for taking part in the 2021 protests.

Marlon Brando Diaz, who was serving an 18-year sentence, said he was thankful to "be given a new chance in life."

"It's a new start," he said, his voice trembling with emotion as he was reunited with waiting family members.

Cuba's removal from Washington's list of state terrorism sponsors paves the way for increased US investment in the Caribbean island, which has been under a trade embargo for over six decades.
In a sign that the thaw may be short-lived, Trump's pick for secretary of state, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, suggested he could reverse Biden's decision.

The son of Cuban immigrants, Rubio is vociferously critical of that country's government and said Trump's incoming administration was not bound by Biden's policies.

"There is zero doubt in my mind that they meet all the qualifications for being a state sponsor of terrorism," he told his US Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

Analysts said Cuba's drip release of prisoners was aimed at ensuring Trump upholds the deal agreed with Biden when he returns to the White House, with the remaining prisoners acting as Havana's bargaining chip with the Republican leader.

"We're in a kind of hostage negotiation here," Michael Bustamante, chair of Cuban studies at the University of Miami, told AFP.

Ferrer, from the eastern province of Santiago, has been in and out of prison for the past 20 years.

A fisherman and father of six, he was one of 75 political prisoners sentenced to 25 years imprisonment in 2003, as part of the so-called Black Spring wave of repression unleashed by authorities.

He was released in 2011, alongside 130 other political prisoners, following mediation by the Catholic Church, but resisted pressure to go into exile.

Later that year, he founded the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), one of the most active opposition organizations in a one-party state that bans opposition political parties.

He was re-arrested on July 11, 2021, after trying to join the biggest protests since the communist revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power in 1959.

A month later, he was sent back to prison to finish serving a term of four-and-a-half years imposed in 2020 on charges that included beating a man, which he denies.

His imprisonment has been a point of contention between Havana and Washington, which along with the European Union and the Catholic Church has regularly called for his liberation.

Bustamante described his release as "pretty big" news.

"He is someone who has stayed the course," Bustamante said, noting his "long history of political activism."