Miami – Cuban exile activist Ramon Saul Sanchez on Wednesday ended his 12-day hunger strike after the White House pledged to review the U.S. “wet-foot, dry-foot” immigration policy with exile leaders.
“It was a spiritual victory, because a people has wielded the force of dignity through non-violence to make itself heard,” Sanchez, head of the leading Cuban exile organization Democracy Movement, told EFE.
Sanchez, 51, began the hunger strike on Jan. 6 in Miami to protest the repatriation of a group of 15 Cubans.
“I’ve just been told that there is official confirmation that a dialogue has been opened on the (wet-foot, dry-foot) policy,” said Sanchez, who was lying down inside a makeshift tent and accompanied by a group of supporters.
Under Washington’s wet-foot, dry-foot policy, Cubans intercepted at sea by U.S. authorities are sent back to the island unless they can demonstrate that they have been politically persecuted, while those who reach American soil are allowed to remain and apply for permanent residence.
The recent repatriation of the 15 that was the immediate motive for Sanchez’s protest prompted debate on what could or should be considered U.S. “dry land.”
Those would-be immigrants were sent back after being detained on the pilings of a remnant of an old bridge in the Florida Keys, a span not any longer connected to land.
