Saturday, November 21, 2015

Why are Cuban refugees trying to get into Nicaragua?

As you may recall, the advocates of changing our policy toward Cuba always said that Cubans will be better off once U.S. tourists start spending money in the island or businesses start opening up shops to sell this or that. It worked so well in Vietnam that they decided to do it in Cuba.
Call it the unintended consequences of reestablishing relations but a lot of people in Cuba are not waiting for “the Yankee dollar”. They are leaving Cuba instead. They want out!  
I’m not talking about an orderly exit of Cubans as happened before. In fact, it’s the exact opposite and it will be reaching the U.S.-Mexico border very soon.   
According to news reports, the Cuban wave is coming and we are not talking about baseball players: 
According to Diario de Cuba, the number of Cubans arriving in the United States has increased 78 percent this year compared to 2014.
This comes after Washington and Havana began to restore bilateral relations, which had been broken since 1961, last December.
Luis Enrique Ferrer García, who serves as the Cuban Patriotic Union’s (UNPACU) international spokesman, tells the PanAm Post that “the recent exodus provides further evidence of the Cuban people’s desperation.”
We saw a story this week of 700 Cubans storming the Nicaragua border:
On Sunday, November 15, the Nicaraguan government deployed the military and police and ordered them to close down the border, preventing nearly 1,000 Cubans from continuing their travels. The migrants had entered Costa Rica the day before using special transit visas.+
Despite the Nicaraguan government’s best efforts, around 700 Cubans still managed to cross the border.
However, nine kilometers into Nicaraguan territory, the group of migrants clashed with a small battalion of Nicaraguan security forces in anti-riot gear, who then expelled them from the country
 
So what’s going on?  What are Cubans doing trying to get into Nicaragua?  The answer is that they want to get into Mexico and eventually find their way to the U..S. border.
As we’ve posted before, there is a huge disillusionment in the island, specially the young people who see no future at all.    
Second, they want to get here before the U.S. cancels the Cuban Adjustment Act. Over the years, Cubans have been legalized  by simply showing up in the U.S. It will change very soon because it makes no sense to treat Cubans differently than, say, Mexicans.  
The Cuban government is once again “in your face, Obama” by blaming the U.S. for the refugee crisis. They blame it on the aforementioned act, a rather ludicrous charge since they’ve grown accustomed toremittances and visits by these “legalized Cubans” in the U.S.
So get ready for another refugee crisis.  
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