WASHINGTON, Jan 7 (Reuters) - A Florida delegation led by two Miami-area mayors met with U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno on Friday to urge her to allow a 6-year-old boy embroiled in an international custody battle to stay in the United States.
A Justice Department official said Reno agreed to listen to them, but said the meeting should not be viewed as a sign that Reno was wavering or reconsidering a decision on Wednesday to send Elian Gonzalez back to Cuba to be with his father.
Addressing the politically charged case, Reno said on Thursday that she fully agreed with the decision by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS) to reunite Elian with his father in Cuba by Jan 14.
The boy has been staying with relatives in Miami since he was picked up at sea on Nov. 25 after survived the sinking of a refugee boat off the Florida coast. His mother, who was divorced from his father, was among the 11 people who drowned when the boat capsized.
His relatives in Miami, backed by the large U.S. Cuban exile community, demanded Elian be allowed to stay in the United States, while his father and the Cuban government said he must be returned to the communist-ruled island.
Those who flew from Miami to see Reno in the hastily arranged meeting were Miami Mayor Joe Carollo, Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas, Roger Bernstein, a lawyer for Elian's Miami relatives, and Alberto Hernandez, a representative of the Cuban-American National Foundation.
``I am in the process of considering the issues raised in this meeting, as well as those expressed by Mr. Bernstein and his colleagues in their letter of Jan. 5, 2000, and any relevant issues raised by the state court action that was filed today,'' Reno said in a statement released after the
meeting.
``I plan to respond as quickly as possible,'' she said.
The attorney had written to Reno seeking to reverse the INS decision and to grant the boy a political asylum hearing.
The official said Reno had planned on Friday to send back a letter formally rejecting the request, but now would wait because of the meeting.
The official said Reno's view remained that she knows of no basis for reversing the INS decision that the boy's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, has a close relationship with his son and truly wants him back.
22:55 01-07-00
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