Kathlyn Gay - Leaving Cuba: from Operation Pedro Pan to Elian
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Many Cuban exiles in the United States and elsewhere work with not only AI but also with other groups attempting to gain the release of political prisoners as well as prisoners of conscience (people jailed for their religious convictions). Cuban exiles also make tremendous efforts to stay in touch with and help support family members in their homeland, sending them American dollars and up to $800 million annually in food and medicine.
Thousands of Cuban exiles still want to go back home. If they could they ''would go back yesterday," as is commonly expressed, because they had never planned to stay in the United States. In fact, some have lived for years with the belief that Castro would fall from power at any time and they could safely return home. Still other exiles say they are not sure they can ever go home again to live, primarily because they have become "Americanized" and now have children of their own; if those children were uprooted to move to Cuba, they (like their parents before them) would be strangers in a foreign land.
Only a few of the experiences of Cuban children of exile are included in this book, but they represent the tens of thousands involved in mass migrations for more than forty years. They also clearly show that countless exiled Cubans as well as Cubans in their homeland continue to hope and work for freedom.
Page 100
Cuba declared the Rescue planes had been in Cuban airspace, but Brothers' leader Basulto, who had flown another plane that returned safely, denied the charges. The United Nations conducted an investigation that showed the planes had been over international waters, and the UN Security Council condemned Cuba's actions.
About the time that the Brothers to the Rescue planned its ill-fated mission in 1996, a coalition of independent dissident groups in Cuba called Concilio Cubano was preparing to meet in Havana. Several months earlier the Concilio had received permission from the government for an open meeting to discuss a peaceful transition to democracy in which Cubans worldwide could participate. Its agenda also included amnesty for political prisoners and a judicial system guaranteeing human rights.
The Cuban government, however, began to harass and arrest leaders of the coalition, and officials of the Cuban Interior Ministry went to the home of the late Sebastian Arcos Bergnes, vice president of the Cuban Committee for Human Rights and a longtime activist for democracy, to inform him that the coalition would not be allowed to hold its conference. Arcos (who died in 1997) reported that the Concilio organizers agreed to postpone their meeting in order to avoid violence. On the day of the planned Concilio meeting, the Rescue planes were shot down, and many Castro critics in Cuba and in the United States are convinced that the murders of the Cuban-American airmen were one more form of retaliation against those fighting for a free Cuba.
Page 101
Chapter 8 Prolonged Concerns
The deaths of the American pilots sparked retaliation by the U.S. government. Although the Clinton administration had been trying to encourage some cooperative efforts between Cuba and the United States, the shoot down ended what had been an increasing number of cultural and academic exchanges. Direct flights between Miami and Havana were also stopped. In addition, Clinton signed the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996, better known as the Helms-Burton Law, which he had previously opposed. This law greatly strengthened sanctions against Cuba.
By March 1998, in the aftermath of the January visit by Pope John Paul II to Cuba, the Clinton administration announced some U.S. policy changes. Direct humanitarian charter flights to Cuba were resumed. U.S. families were allowed to increase cash payments to their relatives in Cuba. And new efforts were initiated to allow the sale of medicines, medical supplies, food, and
Page 102
agricultural equipment to the Cuban people. In January 1999, President Clinton broadened these policies and included a measure to expand people-to-people contacts, such as between academics and athletes. The latter measure paved the way for the Baltimore Orioles baseball team to play an exhibition game in Cuba in March 1999, and in May the Cuban national baseball team played at the Orioles park at Camden Yards.
The Cuban government has criticized the new measures, insisting that nothing has really changed in the U.S. embargo policy. That policy continues to spark debate in the United States and around the world, and a variety of humanitarian groups, some U.S. legislators, and the United Nations have spoken out against it. In his historic Cuban visit, Pope John Paul II repeated his long-held view that the U.S. embargo against Cuba should be lifted for humanitarian reasons, a belief shared by many religious leaders throughout the world.
Over the years groups have endorsed a variety of approaches for achieving democracy and human rights in Cuba. According to a March 1999 issue brief for the U.S. Congress:
Some advocate a policy of keeping maximum pressure on the Cuban government until reforms are enacted, while continuing current U.S. efforts to support the Cuban people. Others argue for an approach, sometimes referred to as constructive engagement, that would lift some U.S. sanctions that they believe are hurting the Cuban people, and move toward engaging Cuba with dialogue. Still others call for a swift normalization of U.S.-Cuban relations by lifting the U.S. embargo.
Page 103
Anti-Embargo Arguments
In 1996 the American Association for World Health (AAWH) sent a medical team to Cuba to investigate the effects of the trade embargo. The AAWH issued a report in 1997, declaring that "the U.S. embargo of Cuba has dramatically harmed the health and nutrition of large numbers of ordinary Cuban citizens. It is our expert medical opinion that the U.S. embargo has caused a significant rise in suffering and even deaths in Cuba."
Since passage of the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992, ships from other countries that have been to Cuba are prohibited from visiting U.S. ports for six months. "This provision has strongly discouraged shippers from delivering medical equipment to Cuba. Consequently shipping costs have risen dramatically and further constricted the flow of food, medicines, medical supplies and even fuel for ambulances," the AAWH report states, adding:
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