First colonel of MININT head of Immigration was able to travel to the United States.

The first colonel Mario Méndez Mayedo, head of the Identification, Immigration, and Foreign Affairs Directorate (DIIE) of the Ministry of Interior of Cuba (MININT), is in New York as part of an official Cuban government delegation attending the United Nations General Assembly.

The presence of the high-ranking official from MININT in the United States has caused surprise because there are sanctions against that Cuban state agency for human rights violations on the island.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Cuba did not mention his name in the official list of the delegation visiting the United States these days, but his presence was confirmed by an article from Cubadebate, which pointed him out among the officials meeting with Cuban Americans at Cuba's mission to the UN.

Mario Méndez Mayedo is a key official in immigration matters, which makes his participation in this trip notable. Despite the sanctions, the colonel received a visa under the obligations of the United States as the host country of the UN.

During his stay in New York, Méndez Mayedo has not been photographed at the official events of the Cuban delegation and does not appear to have participated in meetings on migration with the Biden administration, although he has previously led negotiations on the subject.

In 2016, she traveled to Miami to discuss human trafficking and immigration fraud with officials from the Barack Obama administration.

The only public event in which he has been identified so far was at a meeting at the Cuban mission to the UN. There, alongside the Director General of Consular Affairs and of Cubans Residing Abroad (DACCRE), Ana Teresita González Fraga, he explained the new migration and citizenship laws approved in July by the National Assembly.

That Immigration Law expands the powers of the Ministry of the Interior to impose travel bans for reasons of national security.

The Human Rights Foundation has pointed out Méndez Mayedo for his role in imposing travel restrictions on dissidents, including him in its database of human rights violators.

The Cuban exile community does not understand how it is possible that more and more cases of regime officials traveling to the United States are being reported, whether on professional visits, invited by family, or even establishing their residences in Florida thanks to the benefits of humanitarian parole.