The Associated Press. The
Sun-Sentinel. Web-posted: 10:42 a.m. Jan. 17, 2001
HAVANA -- The corpses of two Cuban military cadets who died in mid-air after
stowing away in the undercarriage of a London-bound British Airways jet were
being flown back Wednesday to the Caribbean island.
The case of Alberto Vazquez, 17, and Maikel Fonseca, 16, who hid in the
Boeing 777's wheel well before take-off at Havana airport on Christmas Eve, has
shocked Cubans and brought a personal investigation by President Fidel Castro.
A short official statement Wednesday said the corpses would reach Cuba
Wednesday night, presumably for burial by relatives, and blamed the incident on
U.S. immigration policies.
"These adolescents are the latest victims of the Cuban Adjustment
Act," the statement said, referring to a 1966 U.S. law which gives
preferential treatment for residence to Cuban immigrants reaching American soil.
Cuba says that law stimulates dangerous illegal immigration bids --
mainly by sea, but sometimes also by air -- although U.S. officials respond that
Castro's authoritarian political system and economic failures are driving people
out.
The two stowaways, who took advantage of the darkness, heavy rain and
long grass to evade perimeter guards at Havana airport, had dreamed of living in
the United States, according to a message left behind by one of them.
But after dying presumably from freezing temperatures and lack of
oxygen, their bodies were later discovered in Britain, one in a Surrey field
after falling out of the aircraft, and the other at London's Gatwick airport.
"Bitter and painful events like these, which have again stirred
the Cuban people, will only cease with the end of that monstrous law, which has
cost countless lives," Cuba's statement added.
The youths' case was the third known incident of deaths in the last 12
months involving Cuban nationals who have hidden in the undercarriage of
Europe-bound planes.
Copyright 2000, Sun-Sentinel Co. & South Florida
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