The computer teacher Raidel and the fishermen Osmel and Rosniel, all Cubans, were arrested this Tuesday by agents of the municipal police of Isla Mujeres, in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo.
According public MacrixNews The arrival of a raft with the legend “Pinar del Río” was warned by security personnel of the Palladium hotel, who requested the support of the police in a possible case of human trafficking.
The Cuban rafters were walking along the beach near the five-star resort, owned by the Spanish chain Palladium Hotel Group, when they were intercepted by police officers, who were told that they had no documents and intended to go to Immigration to request asylum. The 26-year-old computer teacher was the only one who presented his identity card.
The Mexican publication indicates that the rafters were read their rights and taken to the facilities of the Municipal Public Security of Isla Mujeres, where a judge referred them to the immigration authorities, but a source from the National Migration Institute (INM) assured 14ymedio that the police did not follow the protocols established for the retention and transfer of undocumented immigrants.
“It is said that the rafters were arrested shortly before nine in the morning for ‘altering the order’ of the place, when it was reported that they were walking on the beach,” said the immigration agent. “The police had to notify Immigration to follow the protocols, not handcuff Cubans, put them on a patrol car and treat them like criminals.”
The INM source confirmed that the three rafters requested refuge, for which they are being advised to carry out their procedure. Last February, the Mexican Commission for Refugee Aid (Comar) pointed out that 8,302 Cubans requested asylum in 2021 and this year the processes already total 2,004.
The state of Quintana Roo has become a route for the illegal entry of Cubans in recent years, for which the INM raised its alert in February before a possible arrival of rafters. Between October and December 2021, 29 rafters who arrived at Isla Mujeres were detained. Of 60 Cubans detained in that same year, Migration deported 45 and 15 received legal advice to obtain refuge.
On February 12, another boat was abandoned on the eastern coast of the island area of Isla Mujeres, at the height of the Colegio de Bachilleres. And ten days earlier, personnel attached to the Fifth Naval Region rescued seven Cuban rafters, who were shipwrecked 43 nautical miles northeast of Isla Contoy.
In their transit through Mexico, migrants request a humanitarian visa in order to reach the northern border states, cross into the United States and request asylum. Precisely this weekend, 120 Cubans surrendered in Kinney County, Texas, according to data published in the account Sheriff’s Office Facebook page. On Saturday, a group of 39 women, men and children from the island were discovered.
According to data from the Customs and Border Protection Office (CBP), last January, the last month for which records are available, 9,827 Cuban immigrants were detainedabout 13 times more than the 732 in the same month of 2020, when Trump was still in the White House.
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