One of Cuba’s most prominent dissidents, José Daniel Ferrer, who has challenged his country’s Communist regime for years, was released from prison on Monday and immediately left the island for exile in the United States with his family.
The Cuban foreign ministry said Mr. Ferrer had been freed because of a formal request from the U.S. government following a letter made public this month in which Mr. Ferrer said he wanted to leave the country because of harsh prison conditions and threats against his family.
“The dictatorship’s cruelty against me has surpassed all limits,” he wrote last month. “I have suffered beatings, torture, humiliation, threats and extreme conditions.”
Mr. Ferrer’s departure represents a blow to Cuba’s opposition at a time when the country is enduring its worst economic crisis in decades and many younger Cubans are abandoning the country. But his arrival in Miami was welcomed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is the son of Cuban migrants.
Mr. Ferrer’s “leadership and tireless advocacy for the Cuban people was a threat to the regime, which repeatedly imprisoned and tortured him,’’ Mr. Rubio said in a statement. “We are glad that Ferrer is now free from the regime’s oppression.’’
Mr. Ferrer, 55, has been at the forefront of the Cuban opposition movement for two decades.
While most opposition leaders were based in Havana, the capital, Mr. Ferrer’s movement was centered in Santiago de Cuba, the country’s second-largest city, in the eastern part of the country. He was arrested during a protest there that was part of island-wide demonstrations in July 2021 that rattled the government and were brutally put down.
Mr. Ferrer had been in prison before, one of a group of 75 dissidents arrested in 2003 and considered “prisoners of conscience” by international human rights groups.
Cuba denies that it holds political prisoners, citing laws that prohibit anti-government activities.
Mr. Ferrer was released in 2015 along with 52 other prisoners as part of a landmark agreement between Cuba and the United States under President Barack Obama. That agreement led to a fleeting moment of hope that the relations between the two countries might be on the mend after decades of hostility. But the détente was short-lived and hostilities have ratcheted back up.
After Mr. Ferrer joined mass anti-government protests in 2021, he was quickly arrested and ordered to prison for four years. He was released in January in a deal brokered by the Vatican, as part of a last-minute agreement in the final days of the Biden administration to remove Cuba from the U.S. list of countries that sponsor terrorism.
That deal was torn up immediately after Mr. Trump took office. Cuba was put back on the terrorism list and Mr. Ferrer was sent back to prison, where his health is reported to have suffered.
Mr. Ferrer had been one of the few remaining opposition figures not in exile.
“It is a sad day for all Cubans when the only solution to political problems is exiting the country,” said Joe Garcia, a Cuban American and former member of Congress from Miami.
But few will begrudge Mr. Ferrer his decision after so much personal sacrifice, Mr. Garcia said. “You can’t blame him. It’s the product of impossible expectations and overwhelming pressure.”
Though Mr. Ferrer was long considered resolute in his determination to never abandon Cuba, his decision to leave was not entirely unexpected.
It follows a steady stream of dissidents and journalists who have chosen the same path, as well as an exodus of several million ordinary people since Communist rule was established following the Cuban revolution in 1959. Migration has surged to it highest levels in recent years as the country’s economy has cratered.
Among those still detained and considered political prisoners are Maykel Castillo, a rapper who featured in an opposition anthem, “Patria y Vida” — “Homeland and Life’’ — and Luis Manuel Otero, an artist and activist who has publicly denounced the government.
Mr. Ferrer, in a letter to family and friends from prison last year, complained of being held in solitary confinement for long stretches and not being permitted family visits or telephone communication for over a year and a half.
“The dictatorship has buried me alive; they want to silence me at all costs,” he wrote. “I hope I am wrong, but when so many flee from terror and horror, those who remain suffer serious consequences.”
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