Cuban Protestant pastor Lorenzo Rosales Fajardo has been released from prison as part of a mass amnesty following the United States' decision to remove Cuba from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Pastor Rosales Fajardo was among 553 political prisoners freed as a gesture of goodwill. Earlier this week, Afro-Cuban Yoruba religious leader Donaida Pérez Paseiro was also released, although her husband, Loreto Hernández García, remains in prison.

Pastor Rosales Fajardo was arrested during the peaceful protests that took place across Cuba on 11th July 2021. He was later convicted on false charges of ‘disrespect’, ‘assault’, ‘criminal incitement’ and ‘public disorder’ in December 2021.

In May 2022, his family was informed that he had been sentenced to seven years in prison, a reduction from the initial eight-year sentence communicated to the United Nations. He was first held in Boniato Maximum Security Prison but was later moved to a minimum-security facility closer to his family in early 2023.

In February 2024, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention declared his detention to be arbitrary.

CSW's Director of Advocacy, Anna Lee Stangl,said: "CSW welcomes the release of Pastor Lorenzo Rosales Fajardo and of Donaida Pérez Paseiro, neither of whom should ever have spent a day in detention in the first place. They have endured abusive treatment and been forcibly separated from their spouses and children since July 2021. We call on the Cuban government to immediately release Loreto Hernández García, and to ensure that Pastor Rosales Fajardo and all political prisoners and their families enjoy their freedom without any further harassment."