Yahoo! June 16, 2000
Elian Protesters Suing Officials
By Mildrade Cherfils, Associated Press Writer.
MIAMI, 15 (AP) - More than a dozen protesters and bystanders who claim they were beaten or sprayed with tear gas during the raid to seize Elian Gonzalez two months ago are suing federal officials.
In a lawsuit filed Thursday against Attorney General Janet Reno, Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder and Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner Doris Meissner, 20 protesters and bystanders claim federal agents used excessive force and violated their constitutional rights during the
April 22 raid.
The early morning raid on the Miami home where 6-year-old Elian had been living with relatives reunited him with his father, who wants to take the boy back to Cuba.
Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch, a conservative group that filed the lawsuit, said the agents indiscriminately sprayed tear gas on everyone near the house during the raid, including elderly women who were praying, neighbors standing in their front yards and people who were leaving their homes on
their way to work.
``These individuals were needlessly gassed, beaten, threatened, cursed at, knocked down, hit in the head and harmed in ways that no American deserved to be harmed,'' Fitton said.
The lawsuit seeks damages in excess of $100 million.
At a news conference Thursday, Sandy Cobas said she had been standing behind a barricade when agents raided the home and at first thought they were terrorists sent by Cuban President Fidel Castro.
``They came in and started gassing,'' said Cobas, 47. ``Everyone thought they were actually Castro's people.''
INS spokeswoman Maria Cardona said her agency had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment.
A similar lawsuit was brought by Donato Dalrymple, who with his cousin rescued Elian off the Florida coast last Thanksgiving after a boat the boy had been on with his mother capsized and his mother drowned. Attorneys have also filed individual lawsuits on behalf of Cobas and Michael Stafford, a
protester who claims he was beaten during the raid. All three individual lawsuits seek damages in excess of $100 million.
Cuba Condemns Miami Family's Latest Elian Appeal
HAVANA (Reuters) - The Cuban government, immersed in a patriotic campaign to bring home 6-year-old shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez from the United States, condemned the latest legal bid by his U.S. relatives on Thursday to block his return.
``These are part of the maneuvers the relatives have been doing for a long time to make that boy lose his identity,'' Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Aymee Hernandez said.
Elian's Miami relatives, in a move likely to further delay his return to Cuba and a resolution of a seven-month-old dispute over who has custody over him, asked a U.S. appeals court earlier in the day to reconsider its decision denying him a political asylum hearing.
Elian was rescued at sea after a shipwreck last November that killed his mother, and lived with his relatives in Miami. He was reunited with his father Juan Miguel Gonzalez, who came to the United States from Cuba, after a dramatic predawn raid by armed U.S. federal agents in April.
The dispute over the boy has turned into one of the biggest political battles between President Fidel Castro's government and anti-communist Cuban exiles in Miami since the 1959 Cuban Revolution.
``We are not going to give up demanding that this boy returns here to our country,'' Hernandez said at a news briefing, adding that the relatives' appeal ``prolongs more and more the inevitable return of Elian to Cuba.''
The boy is currently living in Washington with his father and an entourage of Cuban friends. They are waiting for the appeals process to be exhausted and are bound by a court ruling preventing Elian's departure in the meantime.
In their latest move, lawyers for Elian's Miami relatives, said they wanted the full 12-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Appeals Court in Atlanta or the original three judges to rehear their appeal for Elian to be granted an asylum hearing.
The three-judge panel on June 1 upheld a federal judge's ruling turning down the relatives' demand on the grounds that only the child's father could speak for him.
Cuban state media continued to criticize the Miami relatives on Thursday. Castro was expected to attend a televised round-table discussion in the evening to analyze their new move.
Conference Highlights US Heartland's Interest in Food And Medical Sales to Cuba, Study Quantifies Possible Sales
SOURCE: World Policy Institute. Company Press Release. Thursday June 15, 12:17 pm Eastern Time
WASHINGTON, June 15 /PRNewswire/ -- Delegations of farmers, local officials and company representatives from across the United States discussed how lifting the food and medicine embargo on Cuba would effect their communities at a conference today entitled: The Domestic Impact of U.S. Unilateral
Food and Medical Sanctions: Case Study Cuba. The day-long informational conference, geared to members of Congress and their staff and sponsored by the World Policy Institute, was held in Room 1539 of the Longworth House Office Building in Washington D.C.
Respected economist and former Chairwoman of the U.S. International Trade Commission, The Honorable Paula Stern Ph.D., President of the Stern Group, a Washington D.C. based trade consulting firm, presented a first-ever analysis of the national economic impact of the almost four-decade long food
and medical embargo on Cuba.
``The aggregate of the food and medical exports to Cuba could amount to $444 million and approximately 6,000 associated U.S. jobs under partial liberalization. In a scenario of unrestricted trade, the aggregate of food and medical exports could amount to $1.6 billion with 20,000 associated
jobs,'' Dr. Stern said.
``Canada, Mexico, and Europe sell pork to Cuba. Canada sold the majority of the 10,000 metric tons that Cuba imported in 1998. U.S. producers expect to capture the majority of the market when the embargo is lifted. For comparison purposes, in Mexico where the U.S. and Canada compete directly,
the U.S. has a 95% market share,'' Alan Tank, President and CEO, National Pork Producers Council of Desmoines, Iowa said.
``Shipments of Chinese, Thai and Vietnamese rice take weeks to reach Cuba, while Gulf shipping points for higher quality U.S. rice are days away. Proximity means transportation costs would be significantly lower. Cuba's current rice imports are reportedly purchased on a cash basis, indicating
that Cuba's limited supply of hard currency would not be an impediment to commercial sales of U.S. rice,'' Dennis DeLaughter, Chairman, U.S. Rice Producers Association of Houston, Texas said.
``Sales to Cuba are a humanitarian issue for struggling Mississippi Delta farmers,'' Lloyd Moore, Mississippi Black Farmers and Agriculturists Association in Yazoo City, Mississippi said. ``Lawmakers promised us they would open new markets when they cut our subsidies back in 1996. Cuba is the
market we care about.''
``The Texas Farm Bureau strongly supports the lifting of sanctions on food and medicine specifically as they apply to Cuba. Hopefully we can have a vote in the House of Representatives on this issue before the election this fall,'' Steve Pringle, Texas Farm Bureau, Waco, Texas said.
``With normalized trade relations between the U.S. and Cuba, New Orleans and the river region could see 15,000 new jobs,'' Nicholas Robins, Ph.D. Tulane University, Louisiana said. Other conference participants included Mayor Michael Dow, Mobile Alabama and Tom Donohue, President and CEO of the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
``We've spoken to hundreds of people around the country in preparing for this conference. The Elian Gonzalez issue seems to have convinced the heartland of America that U.S. policy toward Cuba is dictated by a small group in Miami who do not have the interests of America at large in mind,'' said
Lissa Weinmann, Director of the Cuba Education Project at the World Policy Institute.
The World Policy Institute at the New School University in New York City is a research and education policy center that seeks innovative solutions to critical problems facing the United States and the world.
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