From David Adams In Miami. The Times. UK, March 29 2000
US IMMIGRATION officials moved yesterday to terminate the temporary legal status of six-year-old Cuban castaway, Elián González, and began preparations to send him back to his father in Cuba.
The move came after the boy's relatives in Miami refused to comply with a government order that they agree in writing to hand the boy over pending the outcome of a legal appeal.
After meeting officials at the Miami offices of the Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS), a spokesman for the relatives lashed out at the Clinton Administration. "They [the INS] are following orders either from Clinton or from Fidel [Castro] and they need to answer to the community
and to the world," Armando Gutierrez said.
Although an Appeals Court has agreed to hear the case, under US immigration law the Government has sweeping powers and is not required to wait for the courts to rule.
Elián has never formally been admitted into the US and instead was issued a temporary "parole" to enter the country after being rescued at sea in November and brought ashore by the US Coast Guard for medical treatment.
In a letter to Lazaro González, Elián's great uncle, who has been looking after the boy for the past four months, the Justice Department said the written guarantee was required by law as a condition of the parole allowing him to remain in the care of his great uncle.
"The INS has placed us in an untenable position," said Linda Osberg-Braun, one of the family's legal team. The lawyers insist that Elián will suffer "irreparable harm" if he is returned to his father because of the political conditions in Cuba.
On Monday night about 100 hardline exiles held a candle-lit vigil outside the great uncles' house in Little Havana, a working-class district and the core of the Cuban American community, vowing to resist any attempt to remove the boy. Some exiles are threatening to form a human circle around the
boy to prevent federal agents from taking him away.
Copyright 2000 Times Newspapers Ltd. |