A prominent Cuban dissident is scheduled to defect to the United States on Saturday after completing a five-year prison sentence in the communist-run Caribbean country, according to his supporters and U.S. embassy officials.
Artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara has been granted parole to enter the United States, a Facebook page run by his family and supporters announced Friday.
“Following the brutal oppression he endured, Luis accepted asylum as the only way to continue his work as an artist and activist since early 2023,” supporters said on Facebook.
“The State Security Service left him no other option to release him from prison.”
A U.S. embassy official told CNN that he has been released by the Cuban government and is scheduled to fly to the United States tomorrow with his family. The official added that the embassy had asked for his release.
CNN has contacted the U.S. State Department for more information.
The Cuban government has not yet commented on his plans for release.
Otero Alcantara is the most high-profile dissident jailed in Cuba since July 11, 2021, during protests against Cuba’s lack of freedom and economic decline.
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Before their arrest in 2021, Otero Alcantara and other members of his San Isidro Movement used social media to document their campaign against government censorship and the Cuban police and security authorities that monitor their every move.
His protests and hunger strikes frustrated the authorities and led to multiple detentions.
In addition to being a critic of the Cuban government, Otero Alcantara is also an internationally acclaimed artist. He won a Grammy Award for his song “Patria y Vida” (“Homeland and Life”), which condemned the failures and repression of the Cuban government.
