Prisoners Defenders
Spain-based NGO tracking Cuban political prisoners; H1 2026 count tracking past 1,300.
Prisoners Defenders recorded 1,306 political prisoners in Cuba on 9 July 2026, the fifth anniversary of the 11J protests, up from 1,281 in June and including, for the first time, 40 detained minors.
Last refreshed: 17 July 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
How many political prisoners does Cuba hold, five years after the 11J protests?
Timeline for Prisoners Defenders
Published its 9 July political-prisoner census
Cuba Dispatch: 1,306 prisoners, and 40 of them minorsMentioned in: OCDH logs 1,949 acts of repression
Cuba DispatchPublished its H1 2026 political-prisoner census
Cuba Dispatch: Cuba's prisoner count nears a recordLogged 1,281 political prisoners in Cuba, one of whom died in custody
Cuba Dispatch: 332 repressions as the market opensPublished the May 2026 census recording 1,281 political prisoners and one death in custody
Cuba Dispatch: A record prisoner count, and a deathBackground
Prisoners Defenders is a Spain-based NGO founded by Cuban dissidents in exile, focused specifically on tracking Cuba's political prisoners. It builds its data through a network of on-island contacts and family members of detainees, producing a named-case registry cross-referenced against the Cuban government's own release announcements.
That methodology has made the group a primary reference point for the international community assessing Havana's amnesty claims. Its findings feed directly into US and EU decision-making: OFAC weighs its data alongside congressional pressure from Florida Republicans, and the EU cites it in human rights dialogues that condition the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement.
The Cuban government dismisses Prisoners Defenders as a tool of the exile lobby and denies holding political prisoners at all, a position its own named-case data has repeatedly contradicted.
Its Cuba prisoner count keeps rising
Prisoners Defenders' monthly census has climbed every month in 2026: 1,250 at the end of March, 1,260 in April, 1,281 in May, and 1,306 on 9 July, the fifth anniversary of the 2021 protests. On 30 June the group logged more than 175 new political prisoners added in the first half of the year, 114 of them jailed for protest, association or expression, including nine minors aged 15 to 17.
The July count added a data point the group had not previously published: 40 detained minors, 16 of them held in adult facilities rather than youth detention, a finding that comes from Prisoners Defenders alone and has not yet been corroborated by OCDH or Amnesty International.
Its data debunks Cuba's amnesty claims
When Cuba announced amnesties of 51 prisoners in March and 2,010 in April 2026, Prisoners Defenders checked its named-case registry against both releases and found neither included a single political prisoner. Amnesty International and OCDH reached the same conclusion independently on 16 April, giving Havana's 'indulgence' framing no corroboration from any of the three organisations that track named cases.
That triangulation is why Western governments use Prisoners Defenders data specifically: the US and EU have made prisoner releases a condition for sanctions adjustments, and the group's April count of 1,260, a record at the time, undercut Havana's amnesty narrative just as diplomatic talks were under way.
How many political prisoners are in Cuba as of July 2026?
Were any political prisoners released in Cuba's 2026 amnesty?
Who verifies Cuba prisoner release claims?
Who runs Prisoners Defenders and where are they based?
How does Prisoners Defenders verify its political prisoner figures?
Why does Prisoners Defenders data matter for US Cuba sanctions?
