Havana – The latest incident of Cubans being smuggled off the island rekindled the argument this week over illegal emigration and brought new condemnations from Cuba on the responsibility of U.S. and Mexican authorities in human trafficking.
The incident took place before dawn Wednesday on the coast of Pinar del Rio province, some 150 kilometers (93 miles) west of Havana, when the Cuban border patrol detected a speedboat trying to take 43 people off the island illegally.
Killed in the clash was speedboat pilot Geovel Gonzalez Morera, while two other crew members were injured, the Cuban American Rosendo Salgado Castro and Julio Rafael Mesa Fariñas, now in stable condition at a Pinar del Rio hospital, according to local televison.
The speedboat, according to the same source, belonged to John Alberto Garcia, a Cuban residing in Miami, and had been used in many previous cases of illegal human trafficking in Cuba. Its registration had been changed and it sailed without lights.
The smugglers were helping to leave the island 43 people, including seven children, from various provinces around the country.
Official Cuban media have reported an increase in human trafficking across routes established in Quintana Roo state on the Mexican Caribbean, from where the illegals reach the U.S. border on foot.
According to the Cuban Adjustment Act that has been in effect in the United States since 1996, Cubans who enter U.S. territory have the right to obtain residency after one year in the country.
Cuba has insistently complained about the effects of this law and has asked Washington to repeal legislation that, it believes, stimulates illegal emigration.
Cases investigated, said host Randy Alonso Friday night on Round Table, Cuban state television’s top show, confirm “the existence of criminal networks dedicated to human trafficking in South Florida and in Quintana Roo state, Mexico, that is admitted by authorities of both states.”
The official daily Granma also referred Thursday to the growing traffic of Cubans through Cancun, Isla Mujeres and elsewhere in Quintana Roo towards the United States, in operations mounted by Cuban boat captains, Mexican fishermen, “authorities of the Mexican government, and of the anti-Cuban lobby there with connections in Miami.”
According to local media, human-trafficking networks charge between $8,000 and $12,000 per emigrant who wants to leave the island by boat.
Already this year, according to data provided by Cuban television, at least 18 people have died in illegal departures from Cuba and 13 speedboats have been seized.
In 2005, 42 people are known to have died in illegal departures and Cuban authorities arrested 67 people – mostly from the island and from Mexico – while 26 boats were impounded.
Since July 1999, some 400 people have been arrested in Cuba for illegal human trafficking.
According to U.S. Coast Guard estimates, last year 2,600 Cubans were intercepted at sea, the highest number since the exodus of Cubans on rafts in 1994, when 37,000 were intercepted.
