The Cuban regime described the current migration crisis as "the largest in the history of Cuba," but blamed the U.S. government for the massive exodus that has driven hundreds of thousands of Cubans to leave the Island.
This was acknowledged by the Deputy Director General for the United States of the Cuban Foreign Ministry, Johana Tablada de la Torre, in a press conference held in Havana, during which she attributed the flow of migrants to that country to its "maximum pressure" policy towards the Havana regime.
"We reiterate that the blockade and the additional high-pressure measures imposed by the United States government represent the most significant issue in the current bilateral migration scenario," the official stated.
He also emphasized that "the impact of these extreme and inhumane measures on our population is the main incentive that explains the unprecedented increase in the current migration flow, which is disproportionate and is, in essence, the largest migration wave in the history of Cuba".
This Tuesday, the 38th Round of Cuba-United States Migration Talks will take place in Washington. U.S. and Cuban officials will meet to discuss the implementation of the Migration Agreements between Cuba and the United States, a series of bilateral commitments that date back to 1984.
The meeting takes place amid diplomatic tensions between both nations, following the protests on March 17 in several cities across the island, as the Cuban regime blames the U.S. government for promoting these demonstrations.
In his statements, Tablada de la Torre denounced that the United States embassy in Havana has not resumed the issuance of family visit visas (a policy that was resumed in August 2023), or the resumption of professional and cultural exchanges with that country, something that also contradicts the May 2022 announcement by the Biden administration.
Furthermore, he described the immigration measures implemented by that administration as a failure (including the humanitarian parole that has allowed the emigration of 81,000 Cubans since its implementation until February 2024) and revealed that the wave of migration to the United States has intensified in recent months.
“Nothing indicates that this is going to change,” said the official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX) before reiterating that the Cuban regime has “the willingness to cooperate in promoting safe and orderly migration.”
The Cuban delegation, led by the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carlos Fernández de Cossío Domínguez, will insist in Washington that “the interventionist actions and programs of the United States government aimed at undermining the constitutional order, with destabilizing purposes, also violate the spirit of the existing agreements.”
The regime persists in its strategy of blaming the United States for the massive exodus of hundreds of thousands of Cubans in the past two years and holding it responsible for the consequences of this "irregular and disorderly migration."
The goal is to pressure the Biden administration to lift "the blockade," or at least to remove Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, and for this they rely on the "strong idea" that the United States has created "extraordinary and artificial incentives for Cuban emigration."
The economic crisis, inflation, widespread scarcity, poverty and growing inequalities, the lack of rights and freedoms, or repression do not constitute "factors" triggering the stampede undertaken by a significant percentage of the Cuban population to any point on the planet.
The emergence of citizen discontent in the streets, on social media, and within Cuban families has been the main trigger for the regime's repression, but it has also inspired its strategy to relieve social pressure: emigration.
To achieve this, they have maneuvered with allied regimes such as that of Nicaragua, with which they agreed on visa exemption for its citizens, and through which most of the Cuban migrants have exited or are waiting to cross the southern border of the United States.
When it's not "the blockade and additional measures of maximum pressure," it's the "extraordinary and artificial incentives for Cuban emigration." The fact is that the regime does not take responsibility for the stampede of hundreds of thousands of Cubans in recent years and dresses its survival plan and its "political project" to maintain power in various justifications.
The 200,000 that the United States thought would rise up against the government... emigrated, said Tablada de la Torre to the channel Russia Today last October, acknowledging with evident satisfaction the master move of the regime to maintain the statu quo, a goal that will also drive its negotiation strategies in Washington this Tuesday.
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