By Anita Snow, Associated Press Writer. Yahoo! News. July 4, 2000
HAVANA (AP) - Fidel Castro's point man on Cuba-U.S. affairs lambasted American immigration policies he blames for the Elian Gonzalez case, saying that a law allowing Cubans to stay if they reach American soil encourages people to make dangerous journeys across the sea.
``The United States has to put its house in order'' on migration issues, Ricardo Alarcon, the president of Cuba's National Assembly, told The Associated Press on Monday.
He said that while Elian's case wound through the courts, the United States deported thousands of illegal immigrant children from Haiti and other nations.
"No one knows their names,'' said Alarcon.
Alarcon served as an adviser to the child's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, during his fight to bring the 6-year-old back to Cuba last week.
Now that Elian has been returned, Cuba is pushing ahead with a new campaign against those immigration policies and other laws aimed at punishing the communist island
A primary target is the Cuban Adjustment Act, a 1966 law that allows Cubans who reach the United States to apply for legal residency after one year in the country. Under migration accords with Cuba, the United States repatriates most other Cubans who are picked up at sea.
Havana maintains the policy encourages Cubans to make unlawful and risky crossings to the United States, despite migration accords between the two countries that are designed to discourage illegal migration.
The United States is obligated to issue a minimum of 20,000 visas annually to Cubans for legal migration. Many others who cannot get visas, try to reach American soil on their own, often paying illegal alien smugglers up to $10,000 for the trip.
``If they love Cubans that much, perfect, then give me a visa my friend and don't make me throw myself into the sea,'' Alarcon said.
The law was passed at the height of the Cold War, when all Cubans were considered to be political refugees and worthy of asylum.
These days, Cubans leave their country for a variety of reasons. The communist government maintains most leave for economic reasons and are no different from migrants from Haiti, Mexico or other countries in the Western Hemisphere.
The Elian dispute prompted Havana last month to cancel regularly scheduled migration talks with the United States. Asked when they would be rescheduled, Alarcon would only say ``someday.''
With Elian back, marches, rallies, debates and forums will be held ``every day of the year'' for an indefinite period, the Communist Party daily Granma wrote Monday.
``There will be no weariness or wavering,'' it wrote, encouraging Cubans to collect the special editions that state newspapers will be publishing in the coming weeks on U.S. policies toward Cuba, including the Cuban Adjustment Act and long-standing American trade sanctions against the island.
Evidently hoping to harness the enthusiastic support that Cubans showed for the little boy who lost his mother at sea, a huge rally will be held in a different provincial city every Saturday, as was done while Elian was in the United States.
In addition, a televised round-table will be broadcast live every weekday evening, much like the ones that for months updated Cubans on developments in the Elian case.
Copyright © 2000 The Associated Press.
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