U.S. Accuses Cuba of Inhibiting Emigration
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WASHINGTON — The Clinton administration accused Cuba on Monday of reneging on a 6-year-old emigration agreement by refusing to allow Cubans with valid visas to leave for the United States, causing many to try a risky escape by sea.
In a sharply worded diplomatic note to President Fidel Castro’s government, the State Department identified 117 Cubans who had scrupulously followed the procedures outlined in the 1994 Washington-Havana migration pact but still were denied exit permits. The note said the cases all were recorded during a recent 75-day period.
“The government of Cuba is increasingly obstructing the safe, legal and orderly migration of individuals from Cuba,” Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said late Monday in a written statement. “The result is to cruelly deny long-separated families a chance to reunite, and to heighten the chance that Cubans will risk their lives trying to reach the United States through illegal means. Havana’s present policies are in violation of bilateral commitments, international norms and fundamental human decency.
“Over the past year, the Cuban government has engaged in ceaseless rhetoric about migration issues, including the importance of family reunification,” Albright said in an oblique reference to the controversy over Elian Gonzalez, a 6-year-old shipwreck survivor eventually returned to his father in Cuba. “Now would be a good time to back that rhetoric with responsible action.”
State Department spokesman Philip T. Reeker said the “snapshot list” of people recently denied exit permits included 16 relatives of previous defectors now living in the United States and 17 people trained in the medical professions. One would-be refugee was denied an exit permit because he was unable to pay the “exorbitant fees” of $550 charged for processing the document, Reeker added.
He said many Cubans denied the exit permits attempt to reach the United States, often in boats that are not seaworthy, resulting in an unknown number of deaths.
“There are people that are interdicted at sea . . . who have the appropriate [U.S.] documentation to come to this country,” Reeker said.
The 1994 agreement was intended to stop such hazardous voyages. The United States and Cuba agreed on a procedure that would allow 20,000 Cubans, plus immediate family members, to leave legally for the United States each year. The U.S. Interests Section in Havana issues visas for family reunification and for applicants who can demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution. A lottery is used for the remaining spots.
In return, the administration agreed to return to Cuba migrants picked up at sea without the required documents.
Despite the State Department’s complaints about U.S. visas that were issued but couldn’t be used, the Cubans do allow the vast majority to be used.
The Cuban Interests Section in Washington had no comment on the administration’s charge that Havana is violating the agreement and had no explanation for the numbers of Cubans denied exit permits even though they had obtained U.S. visas. But in a statement, the diplomatic mission blamed the United States for encouraging Cubans to emigrate.
“Only the criminal, immoral and discriminatory policy of the U.S. government, specifically manifested in the so-called Cuban Adjustment Act, is responsible for the continuing deaths of Cubans who try to reach American soil,” the interests section said.
The law cited by the Cubans has been on the books since 1966, when Congress decided that Castro’s government was so repressive that all Cubans who reach the United States should receive virtually automatic political asylum.
Reeker scoffed at the Cuban response.
“The Cuban government has just recently decided to use the Cuban Adjustment Act as a scapegoat for their own internal problems,” he said. “Cuban migrants who were interdicted at sea do not cite the Cuban Adjustment Act as the reason that they’re seeking to leave Cuba.”
He said the would-be emigrants blame “the oppressive policies that the Castro regime carries out and, frankly, a failure to live up to their international agreement on these migration accords.”
Reeker said that Cuba has systematically violated the 1994 migration agreement virtually since the day it was signed. Usually, he said, U.S. officials protest the denial of exit permits during twice-yearly negotiations on the subject. But he said the Cubans canceled migration talks scheduled for mid-June and have refused to agree to a new date. Under those circumstances, he said, Washington had no option but to protest in a diplomatic note.
Reeker said it seems clear that the Cubans have a policy of refusing to allow the emigration of doctors and other medical practitioners because all such individuals were refused exit permits. He said there is no way to determine the basis on which others were rejected because there was no similar pattern.
However, he said, it is particularly cruel for the Castro government to deny exit permits to Cubans hoping to join immediate family members already in the United States. Although not all family reunions were turned down, he said, “we want to draw specific attention to those cases where families are needlessly separated due to the arbitrary Cuban policy.”
“We think that they need to issue exit permits to all those individuals who have valid U.S. entry documents, and at various times we’ve offered specific instances to them, as we have again today, where families were separated by their policies,” he added.
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