Cuban migrants remain in limbo

“This policy stimulates irregular emigration from Cuba to the United States and is a violation of the letter and spirit of the migratory agreements in effect [between the United States and Cuba] in which both countries have taken on the obligation of guaranteeing legal, secure and orderly migration”, the Cuban Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

This surge is reportedly due to fears that America will repeal the so-called “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy that grants residency to Cubans that reach us soil.

Finding precisely how many Cubans have entered the United States since December is not easy, for a few come with one of 20,000 lottery visas the Clinton Administration granted Cuba in 1996 during the balsero crisis. The migrants have no intentions of returning to Cuba.

Gonzalez said that the aim is to seek an “immediate” solution to the problem being experienced by Costa Rica after hundreds of Cuban migrants were denied entry into Nicaragua by Managua and have remained stranded near the border.

In recent months, the number of Cubans making their way north from South America to Panama and through Central America before finally arriving at their goal, the Mexican border with the United States, has accelerated.

As relations between the United States and Cuba begin to normalize for the first time since the Cold War, it appears that there’s a massive wave of Cubans eager to reach America.

They say the Cubans at the Nicaragua-Costa Rica border are living a similar experience just 21 years later.

Despite assurances from the Obama Administration that the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966 grants Cubans preferential treatment when they arrive in the United States, with or without visas, Cubans are taking no chances. A few said they had crossed the Caribbean to Venezuela via Trinidad and Tobago.

Fellow migrant Johannes Burgos, 26, said he and 12 others were forced to pay $1,500 each to a group of coyotes who threatened them as they were entering Panama.

Earlier this month, Nicaragua was still open to migrants.

Frustrated Cubans staged protests at the crossing, and this week trucks stretched back more than 4 km (2.5 miles) into Costa Rica.

A spokesman for Costa Rica’s immigration authority confirmed a group of Cuban migrants was blocking the border Tuesday and refusing to allow traffic to pass.

Police also fired shots into the air, and one went off so close to Rivacoba’s ear his hearing is still impaired. Also they have enabled shelters, with the help of the Red Cross, churches and civil society organizations.

“If you work for a year in the United States it’s like working for 10 years in Cuba, or more”, the 28-year-old said.