Loved ones oppose travel limits to Cuba (Bush Cuba policy rebuked by Cuban-Americans)

[Mika]

Loved ones oppose travel limits to Cuba
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/cuba/story/543895.html
Two U.S. citizens who have relatives in Cuba
denounced Bush administration regulations
that limit their ability to visit family on the island.

Baltasar Martín Garrote's mother is 85, has leukemia, and broke her pelvis and hip in a fall at home in Matánzas, Cuba, three months ago. Her son in Miami desperately wants to take care of her but can't because of Bush administration Cuba travel restrictions.

''I will not be able to see my mother until 2010 under the current restrictions we are challenging,'' said Martín Garrote. ``I pray to God that she will remain alive until 2010 but given her advanced age, her ailment, it may not be possible.''

Martín Garrote, 53, was one of two U.S. citizens who appeared at a news conference Thursday at Democracy Movement headquarters to complain about the 2004 travel restrictions that prohibit U.S. citizens and residents from visiting relatives in Cuba more than once every three years -- regardless of emergencies. Prior to 2004, Cuban Americans could travel once a year.

Beth Boone, artistic and executive director of the culture and arts group Miami Light Project, also is unable to see her husband who lives in Cuba. She traveled to Cuba with their 3-year-old son in November to see her husband but will not be able to visit again for three years.

The American Civil Liberties Union Florida affiliate called the news conference to publicize a lawsuit in Vermont federal court in which plaintiffs are seeking to persuade a judge to lift travel restrictions.

ACLU chapters in Florida, Vermont and Massachusetts joined the lawsuit last week and a hearing has been scheduled in Burlington, Vt., on Wednesday, said Howard Simon, the Florida ACLU executive director.

Ramón Saúl Sánchez, the Democracy Movement leader, said he backs the lawsuit because travel restrictions divide exile families and violate their civil rights.

''We should be in the business of protecting rights and not diminishing them,'' Sánchez said. ``To deprive the Cuban people in exile of the right to travel to their homeland in the name of freedom constitutes an act contrary to the values of freedom.''

Sánchez said restrictions were partly responsible for a recent increase in Cuban migrant smuggling.

''The imposed family separation by the Cuban regime, coupled with the travel ban against Cuban exiles of three years between trips, contribute to the increase of human smuggling as relatives on both sides of the Straits of Florida miss each other,'' he said.

The White House and the State Department had no immediate comment.

But in the past one of the principal supporters of the travel restrictions, Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart has said lifting the restrictions could open the floodgates to U.S. tourist travel to the island.

''The U.S. tourism ban, which is the most important aspect of the embargo, would simply become unsustainable if Cuban-American members of Congress advocated unrestricted travel for Cuban exiles,'' the Republican told The Miami Herald recently. ``How could I ask my colleagues from other states to continue prohibiting travel to Cuba by their constituents if I were advocating unrestricted travel to Cuba for Cuban Americans?''

A structural engineer, Martín Garrote left Cuba for Mexico in 1994, then resettled in the United States in 2000 and joined the Democracy Movement.

Martín Garrote said he fled Cuba because he disagreed with Cuba's communist government.

''I want to see democracy in Cuba,'' he said.

He said that from 2002 to 2006 he was unable to visit his mother because the Cuban government rejected his travel requests. His mother obtained a visa to visit him in Miami thanks to help from Diaz-Balart, he said.

Soon after arriving she became ill and was hospitalized.

She recovered and flew back to Cuba. Last year, Martín Garrote finally traveled to Cuba and saw his mother, Elsa Garrote, for 12 days. He also visited an aunt, Maria Dolores Garrote, 87 and blind.

Boone, 46, met her husband, a hip-hop musician she declined to identify, while visiting Cuba in 2002 as part of a cultural-exchange program.

Boone choked back tears when she talked about her November visit.

''It was a wonderful visit and it was as much filled with joy as it was with pain because we can't go back for three more years,'' she said.

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Interesting that this story dares to mention a common occurrence... that Cubans travel to Miami to visit relatives and then return home - and in this story with the help of RW congresscritter Lincoln Diaz Balart, the most vocally adamant and hypocritical congressperson seeking to deny travel to/from Cuba.

[Judi Lynn]

1. Also, don't forget the State Congress people who go out of their way to write legislation

which makes it far harder on Cubans who DO go to Cuba, as they are getting stripped of food stamps, housing assistance, etc. once it is learned they've been there. They can thank Senator David Rivera for that, and can thank other legislators for other similar moves to cripple them economically in FLORIDA, just like another kind of embargo, only on this side of the water!