(CMR) Twenty Cubans who participated in unprecedented anti-government protests last year, including five minors, were sentenced to up to two decades in prison for sedition last month.
Human rights group Justicia 11J, which gets its name from the date the protests started, on July 11, published the names and ages of 20 people sentenced in the eastern province of Holguin.
Hundreds of other people are awaiting verdicts following trials elsewhere in the country.
Thousands of people frustrated with shortages, low salaries and power outages took to the streets in cities across Cuba on 11 and 12 July. This was the largest such protest in decades on the island. This lead to the arrest of over 1000 people.
Among those sentenced last month, a 50-year-old man reportedly received the harshest penalty of 20 years in jail, while five youths aged 16 and 17 were sent away for up to five years.
Although the legal age for adulthood in Cuba is 18, legal responsibility and obligatory military service are from 16.
More than 700 Cubans, including 55 under 18, have been charged in the protest. The Cubalex rights group said one person died and dozens were injured in the resultant clampdown, and 1,355 were detained. Of that number, more than 700 remain behind bars.
A total of 172 people had been convicted, though no details are known about their sentences, before the 20 from Holguin.
The government's response to the protests elicited global condemnation.
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