SAN LUIS POTOSÍ, Mexico.- Approximately 50 Cubans have been stranded in Peru after missing a flight to Nicaragua due to a storm that prevented the plane from leaving Havana airport on time, according to journalist Mario J. Pentón on Tuesday. Marti News.
The Cubans were detained in Lima, Peru, where they would only make a stopover until they reached Nicaragua, but a flight from the airline Avianca was delayed and they will have to return to Cuba.
“We are here, stranded in Peru, around 50 Cubans. We all had tickets “on a plane with a final destination of Nicaragua, but due to a storm in Havana, our flight was delayed and we missed our connection,” Cuban dissident Midaisy Marrero Gil told Pentón.
Marrero explained that the airline has not taken responsibility. “They have left us here, we have been at the airport for three days, sleeping on benches and suffering from the cold,” he added.
“We are being scammed. The airlines are taking all our money and killing our hopes of escaping Cuba. They sold us plane tickets without properly informing us of the restrictions and now they are not refunding our money,” said the Cuban woman, stranded in Peru.
She also complained that products at the airport are expensive and sold in dollars: “An apple costs $2.50 and we are three people. What food can I buy with that money? We are eating on the floor, sleeping on benches and suffering from the cold,” said Marrero Gil.
“Legally, I was able to leave Cuba with a plane ticket, but now I am stuck here. If the airlines are under pressure to stop these flights, why did they sell me the ticket in the first place? They are robbing us. I have all the documents in order, but still, I cannot move forward. Cuban opponents have no way of leaving Cuba legally,” she said.
Avianca and flights to Cuba
At the end of June 2024, thousands of people were also affected and stranded on the Island after the cancellation of the flights of the Colombian airline, after the determination of the company not to resume travel between Bogotá and Havana
Cubans who hoped to reach Nicaragua by flying to Colombia first ran out of options, according to a report by Marti News.
Many people said they sold their belongings to obtain passage to Bogotá and then continue on to Nicaragua, on their way to the United States.
Some people had purchased tickets from Bogotá to San Salvador and then to Managua, the capital of Nicaragua, a country that does not require visas for Cubans.
Avianca’s announcement came after announcing in April that it would resume flights after four years of inactivity.
As part of the financial structure for obtaining a loan, in 2018, 78% of the common shares of Avianca Holdings SA were transferred to a company incorporated in Delaware, USA, owned by the company Synergye, which turned Avianca into a company subject to US jurisdiction.
That year, after reviewing the case since the transfer, Avianca identified that its commercial operations to and from Cuba could have unintentionally violated the U.S. Regulations for the Control of Cuban Assets of the United States Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
In November 2023, the US State Department had announced in a statement a new visa restriction policy targeting individuals involved in operating flights to Nicaragua, a route frequently used by irregular migrants.
According to the report, charter companies were “offering flights and charging extortionate prices” that lead migrants to a “dangerous land route to the U.S. border.” USA”.
They also made it clear that, as part of a comprehensive approach to address irregular migration, Washington was implementing visa restrictions under INA section 212(a)(3)(C) against “owners, executives and/or senior officials of companies that provide charter flights to Nicaragua designed primarily to migrants irregular migrants to the United States.”
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