By David Stout. The New York Times. August 29, 2000
WASHINGTON, Aug. 28 -- The State Department accused Cuba today of causing widespread suffering by refusing to allow Cubans to leave the island even if they hold United States visas. Meanwhile, the United States has told a high Cuban government official that he cannot attend a meeting at the
United Nations of lawmakers from around the world.
The department lodged a formal protest with Cuba today over what it described as Cuba's arbitrary denials of exit permits. But a State Department official said this evening that American unhappiness with Cuba did not prompt the United States to bar Ricardo Alarcón, the president of the
Cuban National Assembly, from attending the session at the United Nations.
Cuba's treatment of people who want to leave the country is "beyond misguided" and constitutes flagrant human-rights violations, the department official, Peter Romero, said.
Mr. Romero, an assistant secretary of state who specializes in Latin American affairs, said Cuba's oppressive Communist regime and the country's policies toward migration had separated families and had impelled some people to try perilous ocean crossings to the United States, resulting in
numerous deaths.
He said that, when not denying exit permits outright, Cuba has charged as much as $600 for an adult permit and $200 for a child's permit -- sums beyond the reach of most Cubans.
In recent months, Mr. Romero said, Cuba has repeatedly failed to live up to a 1994 agreement that supposedly provided for the orderly migration of 20,000 Cubans plus their relatives to the United States. Moreover, he said, Cuban officials have refused even to discuss American complaints
seriously.
"We're hoping this note does the trick," Mr. Romero said. But he said the denial of a visa to Mr. Alarcón, a former Cuban foreign minister and onetime representative to the United Nations, was not done in retaliation. Mr. Romero said the meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Union
this week was not even sponsored by the United Nations, even though the group is meeting there.
Mr. Alarcón was among the most prominent backers of the Cuban relatives of Elián Gonzáles, the child who was found floating on an inner tube in the ocean last November after his mother and several other people drowned. The boy was returned to Cuba after a prolonged struggle
marked by international recriminations and American politics.
Earlier today, Philip Reeker, a State Department spokesman, said that for privacy reasons, the department does not discuss visa applications or denials.
Roberto García, an official of the Cuban diplomatic mission in Washington, said today that the United States' "criminal, immoral and discriminatory" policy was causing suffering, both on land and on the ocean, by tempting Cubans to try to reach the United States in hopes of
being treated better than refugees from other Latin American countries.
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