As a result, they too were arrested, albeit for short term.
Here's the disturbing testimony of their arrest:
Idania Yánez Contreras described her time behind the bars as "horrible." According to the dissident, in her cell "the guards, under the orders of State Security, were screaming obscenities at us" and even threatened with raping the women. Yanez denounced that one of the obscene threats she has not been able to forget was that "they began to tell me 'I am going to sleep with Idania because she has the largest ass.'" She added that the guards were "raffling" the women amongst themselves, choosing which one they would rape.
Meanwhile, Damaris Moya also suffered verbal and physical attacks. "I was treated horrible under the orders of Captains Andro, Yuniel Monteagudo and another by the last name Gil," denounced the co-president of the Central Opposition Coalition, adding that the initial violence occurred in front of her young son who is only 13 months old. "He was desperately screaming in the arms of his grandmother while the agents were applying martial arts immobilization locks on me. And that’s how they dragged me to the police vehicle and later to the detention center." In the case of her husband, Yanoisi, he was beaten and "choked and he now has his face swollen... they also punched him on the stomach and in the testicles."
The same official - Yuniel Monteagudo - was also responsible for the brutality against Antunez, even while he was detained in the back seat of a police vehicle. "That official told one of the Rapid Response agents: ‘punish him during the entire trip,'" explained Antunez, "and then they started to punch me the entire way. While he was hitting me he was saying 'piece of shit nigger, scream 'Fidel Lives.'" The dissident responded with the contrary. "I started to scream 'Down with Fidel,'" amid even more blows, "and that’s how the entire trip was until we reached the police unit of Santa Clara." The blows against Garcia Antunez resulted in numerous swellings on his head, and he is currently suffering from dizziness and lack of vision in his left eye, where he was also hit.
However, the dissident affirmed that although 2012 began with lots of violence against the peaceful Resistance, something positive was that during one of the marches in demand for freedom of those who were detained on that morning, "neighbors of Santa Clara were also fed up with the violence and joined the protest…they would scream 'abusers,' 'hunger and misery' and some of these citizens were even arrested." Antunez, like Idania Yanez and Damaris Moya also affirmed that they would not give in or give up in the face of the terror that the Cuban dictatorship tries to impose on its people. "Despite the beatings," assures Antunez, "I feel satisfied and convinced that now, more than ever, we are witnessing the final days of the tyranny." The dissident classified 2012 as a year of "importance" for the Cuban Resistance.
Damaris Moya also sent out a direct message to dictator Raul Castro. "If the supposed measures which Castro was enforcing are just to massacre us, well then we will be massacred because we are going to continue with our marches demanding food for the people, demanding justice and always out on the street." Idania Yanez echoed this same attitude: "Here we are, and we are going to continue with our actions."
