MIAMI, United States. — The United States will soon begin deporting inadmissible Cuban migrants who enter the border with Mexico. This was recently announced by Johana Tablada, Deputy Director General for the US of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX), in statements offered to the magazine OnCuba.
Questioned about the state of relations between the two countries, the official pointed out that collaboration and understanding on different issues, including immigration, has increased.
“The returns of Cuban migrants intercepted at sea continue, and as I understand it, return flights for those called inadmissible are going to resume very soon, people that the United States does not accept in its territory and that it was agreed that they would be returned to Cuba as part of the bilateral agreements. All of this should constitute a discouragement to irregular emigration,” said Tablada.
The official acknowledged that the United States delivered in 2022 the 20,000 immigrant visas promised in the agreements between the two countries, and also highlighted the restoration of consular procedures in Havana.
According to the deputy director general for the US of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX), Havana has insisted that the northern country resume the issuance of non-immigrant visas in Havana, which must still be applied for in a third country.
“We are asking the United States to restore non-immigrant visas, which is an issue that seems important to us. In 2018, there were more than a million Cuban trips between the two countries, most of them round-trip. If a person who has her life in Cuba, who has a business, who has a job, wants to go to the United States to visit a relative and then come back here, we don’t see why he can’t do it. It seems to us that granting these visas can also contribute to discouraging illegal emigration,” said the official.
In recent months, officials in Havana and Washington have held talks to address the mass exodus of Cubans to the United States, the largest migration crisis on record between the two countries.
Between October 2021 and September 2022, more than 220,000 migrants from the Island arrived in the US through the border with Mexico, a number that has continued to increase during fiscal year 2023.
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