Yahoo! June 7, 2000
Parents Support Baseball Defector
By Vivian Sequera, Associated Press Writer.
SAN NICOLAS, Cuba (AP) - A sports agent says Cuban baseball player Andy Morales is seeking U.S. political asylum. Morales' parents say that is OK with them.
"I don't care what uniform - whether it be from here, from there, Colombia, Venezuela or Japan,'' Adelso Morales, Andy's father, said Tuesday. "But he has to play. It's in his blood.''
Agent Gus Dominguez said Morales was picked up at sea and interviewed by American authorities aboard a U.S. Coast Guard cutter. The Coast Guard would not confirm that.
Morales is a 25-year-old third baseman who hit a home run last year in an exhibition against the Baltimore Orioles. The elder Morales and his wife, Magdalena Leon de Morales, said they had not heard directly from their son since he disappeared just before the weekend. All they knew were the
reports circulating Sunday among neighbors in their hometown of San Nicolas, about 30 miles southeast of Havana.
``Our message for him is that he be the happiest man in the world, and that his father and his mother will be happy for him as well - even though we may never hear from him again,'' Adelso Morales said.
``That he should not worry, that we will be fine, thinking of him,'' added Morales' mother, as she sat in a wooden rocking chair in the living room of the small, white family home. ``Whatever he has decided is fine with us.''
Andy Morales, his parents' first child, is clearly the family's pride. The living room wall is decorated with a black and white photograph of their son playing baseball three years ago.
There is also a clock, a wall tapestry rug and other gifts he bought for his parents on 13 trips to countries such as the Netherlands, Venezuela, Colombia and the United States.
Andy Morales has two children: Andy Jr., 10, and Yandi, 4 months. He lived in another community near San Nicolas with his second wife, Daiyana, and Yandi.
Dominguez said Sunday that Coast Guard officials told him Morales was one of 31 would-be immigrants found on a boat stranded near Key West over the weekend.
Immigration and Naturalization Service officials also would not confirm whether Morales was among the Cubans aboard a power boat that ran out of fuel Friday.
Morales would be the latest Cuban national team member to defect, following such current players as New York Yankees pitcher Orlando ``El Duque'' Hernandez, his half-brother, San Francisco Giants pitcher Livan Hernandez, and New York Mets shortstop Rey Ordonez.
About 35 Cuban baseball players have defected in the past 10 years. The Cuban government has not commented on reports about Morales' possible defection.
In the Cuban national team's 12-6 win over the Orioles in May 1999 in Baltimore, Morales delivered the clinching blow, a three-run homer in the ninth inning. He zoomed around the bases with his arms spread wide, looking like a kid imitating an airplane. Zigzagging his way home, he gestured at
his teammates in the third base dugout and pointed to the sky before he touched the plate.
Professional sports are banned in Cuba. Top athletes are given favored treatment by the communist government, but salaries and living standards pale beside those of millionaire athletes abroad.
The elder Morales said his son was earning 520 Cuban pesos a month, the equivalent of about $24.
Morales' parents said they are anxiously awaiting news from their son. Until then, they have told Andy Morales Jr. that his father is playing baseball on tour.
``When we know something official, we will start telling him bit by bit,'' the elder Morales said. ``The boy will understand.''
Two Cuban Doctors Missing
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) - Police in Zimbabwe denied on Tuesday that they had arrested two Cuban doctors who attempted to defect by handing themselves over to Canadian diplomats in Harare.
The U.N. refugee agency said the doctors - identified as Noris Pena, 25, and Leonel Cordova, 31 - failed to show up for an interview on their status Friday and were believed held by police in the Zimbabwe capital.
But police said they don't have them. ``We never took them,'' said police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena.
Bvudzijena said he did not know the whereabouts of the pair and they had not been reported missing to police.
The Miami Herald reported Tuesday that the doctors had been abducted from a Harare house by Cuban diplomats aided by Zimbabwean security agents.
Cuban Ambassador Rodolfo Sarachino was unavailable Tuesday, his office said. His staff refused to accept calls relating to the doctors.
Sarachino confirmed last week that the two were among a group of 152 Cuban doctors and medical workers sent to assist Zimbabwe's ailing health service.
The doctors told the independent Daily News they chose the assignment in Zimbabwe with the intention of seeking asylum at the Canadian diplomatic mission here.
When they showed up at the mission two weeks ago, Canadian diplomats referred them to the U.N. High Commission for Refugees to evaluate their status as asylum seekers, the newspaper said.
The doctors had been in Zimbabwe a little over a month.
Since independence from British colonial rule in 1980, Zimbabwe has maintained close cultural and ideological ties with Cuba.
Cuban Ball Player Poses Delicate Problem for U.S.
By Frances Kerry
MIAMI (Reuters) - Cuban baseball player Andy Morales was still on a U.S. Coast Guard vessel seeking political asylum Tuesday, posing authorities with a knotty new Cuban migrant problem.
Neither the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) nor the Coast Guard would confirm Morales was among a group of 31 would-be Cuban migrants intercepted at sea off Florida three days ago and now on board a Coast Guard cutter being interviewed to see if any of them merit political asylum.
But a sports agent, Gus Dominguez, has said Morales, who has played as a third baseman for the Cuban national team, is among the group and is seeking asylum.
The INS, fresh from a six-month saga over Cuban castaway Elian Gonzalez, must tackle another delicate Cuban case as it decides whether, as a well-known sportsman in President Fidel Castro's communist Cuba, Morales would face political persecution if he were sent home.
Every year, hundreds of Cubans try to leave on rafts or on boats organized by smugglers and are admitted by the United States as exiles from communism if they make it to the shore. They are generally sent back home if they are intercepted at sea by the U.S. Coast Guard.
Coast Guard spokesman Petty Officer Robert Suddarth, while declining comment on whether Morales was among the group, said that at mid-day Tuesday, the group of 31 Cubans was still on board the cutter, and INS interviews were taking place. There was no word yet on when a decision might be made.
INS spokesman Don Mueller said the agency never commented on individuals, but noted that INS policy with Cubans intercepted at sea was to give them an initial interview aboard a Coast Guard vessel.
A migrant with a good case for asylum would be taken to the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay on the southeastern tip of Cuba for a more in-depth asylum interview, Mueller said. If after that it was found the person was eligible, he or she would be entitled to seek asylum in a third country.
The Morales case comes amid the still unresolved feud over Elian Gonzalez, a 6-year-old boy who survived a migrant voyage in which his mother and 10 other people died only to get caught in a battle between Miami relatives who wanted to keep him in the United States and his father who wanted him
back in Cuba.
The relatives are still contesting an INS decision not to grant the child an asylum hearing against his father's wishes, although after an appeals court decision that went against them last week, their chances of success look slim.
Morales is the latest in a line of baseball players from Cuba's amateur system who have left to seek what can amount to massive fortunes in the United States. In Cuba, the best players are treated as heroes and get special privileges but earn only about $25 a month.
A leading Cuban exile organization, the Cuban American National Foundation (CANF), urged authorities not to send the player home.
``(Defecting) Cuban baseball players are considered traitors by Fidel Castro,'' said CANF spokeswoman Ninoska Perez, recalling the case of pitcher Orlando ``El Duque'' Hernandez.
He was banned from playing in Cuba in 1996 on suspicion of considering defecting, after his half-brother Livan Hernandez slipped away from the national team in Mexico in 1995.
Orlando Hernandez, given work as a physical education teacher at a mental hospital after his ban, left Cuba on a small boat in December 1997. He later signed a $6.6 million contract with the New York Yankees and pitched in the 1999 World Series.
Cuba says no illegal immigrants are ill-treated on return, and U.S. diplomats have a monitoring system to check on repatriated people. But Perez said the monitoring was a ''myth,'' adding that some people returned home after trying to leave have lost their jobs and been ostracized.
The policy of sending intercepted migrants back to Cuba was agreed between Washington and Havana in 1995 after a flood of more than 35,000 rafters left the island in 1994. Last year, 1,108 would-be migrants were returned to Cuba after being intercepted by the Coast Guard.
As a player, Morales appeared to be a notch below the Cuban stars who are virtually assured immediate and lucrative success if they make it to the United States.
In Cuba, experts said he was not a regular member of the national squad, and was unlikely to make it into the team going to the Sydney Olympics. Morales had a solid but unspectacular season with the Havana Province team.
Morales' biggest moment was notching a home run in a 12-6 victory by the Cuban national team over the Baltimore Orioles in an exhibition game in May 1999.
U.S. Wheat Growers in Cuba
By Anita Snow, Associated Press Writer.
HAVANA (AP) - Representatives of American wheat farmers are meeting with Cuban trade and food officials amid hopes that the U.S. government will ease restrictions on sales of food and medicine to the communist island.
The visit by U.S. Wheat Associates, an international wheat promotion organization, is the latest in a recent series of trips to Cuba by representatives of American farmers who want the U.S. trade embargo eased so they can sell their products here.
``Cuba has to pay a high price for a product, and we are denied a market,'' said Paul Dickerson, vice president of overseas operations for the group that promotes U.S. wheat in foreign countries.
``If it were not for the embargo, the United States would probably be the largest supplier'' of wheat to Cuba, Dickerson said.
Arkansas lawmakers and rice farmers made a similar visit here last week to explore markets for their state's agricultural products, which include pork, poultry and soybeans. President Fidel Castro met with the Arkansas delegation before it left, demonstrating growing interest here in doing
business with American agriculture.
``The Cubans would love to buy food from the United States,'' said Dickerson. He estimated transport costs could be sliced in half if Cuba had wheat moved across the Gulf of Mexico from the United States.
Cuba currently is the European Union's largest market for wheat in Latin America region. The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that Cuba imports 950,000 metric tons of wheat annually, most of it from Europe.
The United States is the largest exporter of wheat worldwide, trading about 30 million metric tons of the 104 million metric tons traded globally by all countries. The largest market in the Caribbean for American wheat is the Dominican Republic, which imports about 250,000 metric tons annually.
U.S. Wheat Associates officials on Monday visited with officials from Cuba's Foreign Trade Ministry and Food Ministry, as well as state enterprises that manufacture pasta, crackers and cookies. It is the group's fifth trip to Cuba since early 1998.
On Tuesday, the group is to hold a marketing seminar at the Foreign Trade Ministry and to meet with millers from flour mills in Havana, as well as other representatives of the state food industry. The organization plans to meet with church and other humanitarian organizations before returning to
the United States on Wednesday.
The U.S. House is debating legislation that would allow food and medicine to be sold to Cuba. The Senate overwhelmingly approved a similar trade measure last year, and the House Appropriations Committee approved the measure 35-24 earlier this month.
Some 220 House members have signed a letter supporting an easing of the 38-year old sanctions against Cuba, but there has been fierce opposition from others.
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Copyright © 2000 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. |