HAVANA, Oct 25, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - A Cuban court has ordered jail sentences of up to six years for six people who "disrupted public tranquility" with a pot-banging protest against electricity blackouts last year, according to a case file seen by AFP.

Three people were given six-year sentences and another three sentenced to five years by the court in Villa Clara province in the central part of the communist island.

They were among hundreds of people who took to the streets during protests last October as the country was plunged into darkness amid a series of power blackouts.

The protesters engaged in "pot-banging and using other metallic objects to create loud noises, which disrupted public tranquility," said the ruling dated October 20.

They also "interrupted traffic."

Pot-banging, called "cacerolazo" in Spanish, is a popular form of protest using empty pots originally done to denote hunger and economic deprivation.

The Madrid-based Cuban Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement that the sentences "criminalize civic protest, serving as an instrument of repression and denial of human rights."

Protests on the island of 9.7 million people, previously unthinkable, have surged since 2022 as Cuba grapples with its worst economic crisis in decades, marked by daily power outages which averaged 15 hours per day in September.

At least 180 people were detained in protests over blackouts between 2022 and September 2025, according to Laritza Diversent of rights group Cubalex.