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Parents Have Defected, But Children Still Stuck In Cuba

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The Associated Press

Published: November 19, 2008

MIAMI - The children of more than a dozen Cuban doctors and medical professionals who defected from the communist island nation are not being allowed to travel to the United States even though they have visas, their parents said Tuesday.

The parents are all Cubans who worked in countries such as Venezuela and Belize as part of a Cuban government program. Most fled to the United States, but their children remained in Cuba.

A 2006 Homeland Security policy would allow them to bring spouses and children to the United States, but critics charge Cuba has made that difficult.

The parents spoke Tuesday at the Miami headquarters of The Cuban American National Foundation, a U.S. group known as CANF that represents Cubans in exile.

Foundation lawyers said they know of 18 cases involving more than 20 children who have been barred from leaving the island, but said there could be many more.

Officials with CANF called preventing the families from reunifying a "human rights violation," and their lawyers said they planed to lodge complaints before the United Nations and the Organization of American States. Cuba has been suspended from the OAS since the 1960s.

"They are being held hostage," said Manny Vazquez, an attorney for CANF.

It is not clear what success the complaints could have.

The communist government often withholds visas for the family members of citizens it considers traitors for not returning to Cuba after it sends them to work in government-sponsored events or missions overseas.

CANF president Francisco "Pepe" Hernandez said that now is a good time to pressure the Cuban government. The government is likely to "try to get on the good side" of President-elect Barack Obama and therefore may be more willing to release the children, he said.

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