This content was published on June 28, 2022 – 02:11
Havana, Jun 27 (EFE) .- A boat that left the north coast of the western province of Mayabeque with 15 people bound for the United States was shipwrecked and so far six of the travelers have been found, the Ministry reported on Monday. of Interior of Cuba (Minint).
“In the early hours of June 22, members of the National Revolutionary Police detected a citizen on the coast, near the thermoelectric plant in Santa Cruz del Norte, Mayabeque, with sunburn and symptoms of dehydration,” said the note from the Minint, released by the state Cuban News Agency.
That person was part of “a group of 15 men who had jumped into the sea” in the area of Jibacoa (Mayabeque) on the night of June 20 with the aim of leaving the country, but the next day the boat “had sunk a considerable distance from the coast”.
A unit of the Border Guard Troops, an aerial means of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR), firefighters, private boats, collaborators and the civilian population, undertook search and rescue actions in the area and proceeded to review the coastline, detailed the Minint.
He also indicated that as a result so far six of the people who made up the group of migrants have been assisted.
“The search actions continue, as well as the investigations by the competent authorities for the total clarification of this painful fact,” the statement added.
The Ministry criticized the migratory policy of the United States towards the island, which it describes as “irresponsible” and considered that the measures of the economic embargo applied by Washington to Cuba generate “enormous socioeconomic difficulties for the population”, a factor of “stimulus” to illegal departures from the country.
In another report, the Minint reported an incident that occurred on June 18 in which an agent from that institution was injured during a confrontation with armed traffickers who entered Cuban waters through the central province of Villa Clara on a speedboat.
He also described a similar event during the pursuit of a vessel -with US registration-, whose crew members carried firearms and one of them died in the confrontation with the Cuban border guards.
For several months, the flow of irregular Cuban migrants seeking to enter the United States using the sea as routes or following different routes through various Central American countries such as Nicaragua, Panama and Honduras has increased significantly.
The Cuban Government insists on demanding from the Washington Administration compliance with the migratory agreements signed between the two countries, according to which the US must deliver 20,000 visas per year, and Havana affirms that this figure has not been executed for four years in a row.
The Havana Executive also attributes the increase in illegal migration to the validity of the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, which allows Cubans to apply for permanent residence in the United States after one year and one day of remaining in that country.
Last April, delegations from Cuba and the United States resumed their bilateral dialogue on migration issues in Washington, the first at a high level since the arrival of Democratic President Joe Biden to the White House.
In May, the United States announced several measures in relation to Cuba, including the increase in the consular services of its embassy on the island and the reestablishment of a family reunification program that had been suspended for years with the accumulation of up to 20,000 applications. . EFE
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