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Cubans' New Route To U.S. Goes Through Mexico

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By MARC LACEY, The New York Times

Published: October 16, 2007

CORTES, Cuba - Cubans are migrating to the United States in the greatest numbers in more than a decade, and for most of them the new way to get north is first to head west - to Mexico - in a convoluted route that avoids the U.S. Coast Guard.

U.S. officials say the migration, which has grown into a multimillion-dollar-a-year smuggling enterprise, has risen sharply because many Cubans have lost hope that Raul Castro, who took over as president from his brother Fidel in 2006, will make changes that will improve their lives.
Cuban authorities contend the migration is more economic than political and is fueled by Washington's policy of rewarding Cubans who enter the United States illegally.

In fact, unlike Mexicans, Central Americans and others heading to the southwestern border of the United States, Cubans do not have to sneak across. They just walk up to U.S. authorities at the border, benefiting from lax Mexican enforcement and relying on Washington's 'wet-foot, dry-foot' policy, which gives them the ability to become permanent residents if they can reach U.S. soil.

That is what Jose Luis Savater, 45, a refrigerator repairman from Havana, did in early October to reach South Florida, which remains the goal for most migrating Cubans.

It took Savater almost four days to reach Isla Mujeres, Mexico, in a rickety boat made of wood, fiberglass and aluminum and powered by a jury-rigged motor used for irrigating fields. The 15 men and one woman with him took turns bailing.

'It's extremely dangerous,' Savater said by telephone from Cancun. 'I saw myself dead. I suffered a lot.'

But his next step was far easier: a flight to Matamoros, a border town just across from Brownsville, Texas, with the help of money wired from relatives in South Florida.

Some U.S. officials are calling this new approach - Cubans' strolling up to desert border stations and seeking political asylum - dusty foot.

Statistics make it clear that Cubans believe that although it is considerably longer, the route through Mexico from the tiny bayside village of Cortes and other new launching spots on the western side of Cuba increases their odds of reaching Miami. Almost twice as many - 11,487 - took it in fiscal 2007, which ended in September, as in fiscal 2005.

By comparison, the Coast Guard intercepted just 2,861 Cubans crossing the Florida Straits in fiscal 2007, and 4,825 others reached U.S. soil and applied for residency, according to the Coast Guard.

The figures show that in fiscal 2007, migration from the island reached its highest level since 35,000 Cubans left in a mass exodus in 1994.

'The reason why people are willing to risk their lives to leave Cuba is the lack of hope and expectations,' said Sean Murphy, the U.S. consul general in Havana.

The new route is not just diverting migrants. Smugglers are shifting too, resulting in turf battles that are thought to be behind a string of killings over the summer of Cuban nationals in the Yucatan Peninsula, where many migrants come ashore.

That area also is crisscrossed by narcotics traffickers, and there is fear the two businesses could merge.

The new route has attracted the attention of officials throughout the region, because Cubans sometimes go off track and land on other Caribbean islands or farther south in Central America.

Manuel Aguilera de la Paz, Cuba's ambassador to Mexico, told reporters this month that migration is at the top of the agenda as Mexico and Cuba seek to improve strained relations that prompted the two countries to briefly withdraw their ambassadors in 2004.

The Coast Guard's aggressive patrols in the Florida Straits prompted migrants to turn to the new route, most agree.

Those patrols were increased after the 1994 exodus, which led the Clinton administration to adopt the 'wet-foot, dry-foot' policy. The Coast Guard returns migrants who are caught at sea to Cuba, where authorities have said they will not face retribution.

'It's practically Mission Impossible to go directly to Miami,' said a U.S. official who is tracking the issue but did not have approval to speak about it.

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