US reopening visa, consular services at Havana Embassy

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
4 Jan 11:26

The US Embassy in Havana says it is expanding consular operations and restarting the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program.

US consulate in Havana (Reuters)

Five years after it was closed due to alleged mysterious "sonic attacks" on diplomatic staff, the US consulate in Havana resumes full immigrant visa services for Cubans on Wednesday.

The reopening comes amid a record exodus from Cuba to the United States, mainly by undocumented migrants, as Cuba suffers its worst economic crisis in 30 years due to Washington's harsh unlawful sanctions imposed against the Caribbean island.

"The United States is working to ensure safe, legal, and orderly migration of Cubans by expanding consular operations in Havana and restarting the Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program (CFRP)," the US Embassy in Havana said in a statement last week.

The consulate would open fully for "immigrant visa processing," though tourist visas remain off-limits for now.

The US consulate in Havana was closed under the former US President Donald Trump's administration after diplomatic staff and their families reportedly fell ill with symptoms later nicknamed Havana Syndrome.

No warming of ties

Since Joe Biden replaced Trump as president in 2021, several high-level meetings have sought to find a solution to the migratory standoff. In May last year, the consulate resumed "limited" visa services.

Jorge Duany, a Cuba specialist at the Florida International University, considered that the talks were "limited to migration issues" and did not indicate a general warming of ties.

"For the time being the changes in American policy towards the island have been minimal," Duany indicated.

Cuba has been under US sanctions for 60 years. After a four-year relaxation during the presidency of Barack Obama, relations deteriorated under his successor Trump, who reinforced sanctions.

Despite election promises, Biden has not reversed the measures, in fact hardening his speech following US-backed anti-government riots on the island in July 2021.

Washington has kept Cuba on its so-called list of countries deemed "sponsors of terrorism" and recently added it to another of countries "undermining religious freedom."

The Caribbean island nation was hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic, which crippled its critical tourism sector. Remittances sent from abroad — which in 2019 reached $3.7 billion and is another vital source of income for Cubans — also largely dried up in recent years with travel blocked.

"There is a direct link between the upsurge of extreme (US) measures against the Cuban economy and the dramatic migratory flow," Johana Tablada, a senior official in Cuba’s foreign affairs department, told AFP in November.

Last year, Washington gave more than 20,000 visas to Cuban nationals — the first time since 2017 that it complied with a provision under a 1994 bilateral agreement to issue this number every year.

American authorities claim that more than 326,300 Cubans — some 2.9% of the country’s population of 11.2 million — entered the US illegally in the 12 months from December 2021. In 2021, during the pandemic, the number was just 39,000.

Departures shot up since November 2021, when Cuba's ally, Nicaragua, eliminated the visa requirement for islanders, meaning many would-be migrants now fly to the Central American country to start the dangerous trek on foot to the United States.

Cuban FM: US ignored UN vote to lift embargo on Cuba 29 times

It is noteworthy that during his speech at the UN General Assembly in New York in late November 2022, Cuban Foreign Minister Rodriguez Parilla decried the 60 years of US economic embargo against Cuba which he described as "vast, cruel and immoral."

Parilla explained that "the government of the US is reinforcing pressure on banking institutions, companies, and governments throughout the world that are interested in establishing relations with Cuba, and the US continues to obsessively pursue all sources of foreign exchange coming into the country to bring about the economic collapse of the nation."

The Cuban diplomat recalled that the UNGA had voted 29 times, with an overwhelming majority, to end the "ruthless and unilateral" embargo on Cuba, noting that the US ignored the assembly's decision 29 times.

"Thirty years have now elapsed since the first general assembly voted against this blockade, and at this time, the US continues to ignore the almost unanimous demand from you to cease its illegal and brutal policy against Cuba," Parilla indicated, urging the US to remove the Caribbean island from the list of "state sponsors of terrorism."