LA GUINERA, Cuba—Cuba on Wednesday began releasing prisoners jailed following anti-government protests in 2021, making good on a deal agreed with the Biden administration this week.
Outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday removed Cuba from a blacklist of nations that sponsor terrorism and rolled back a raft of sanctions implemented by Donald Trump during his first presidency that have contributed to the communist-run island’s worst economic crisis in decades.
Hours after the U.S. announcement, Cuban leader Miguel Diaz-Canel said Cuba would “gradually” release 553 prisoners from its jails following talks with the Vatican.
In La Guinera, one of Havana’s poorest outlying neighborhoods and a hotspot for protests in 2021, Dariel Cruz Garcia walked alongside his mother on Wednesday morning, embracing neighbors and old friends….