By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Staff Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

CHANGES to Cuban exit policy will not affect illegal migration from the country to The Bahamas, according to Ernesto Soberón Guzman, Cuban Ambassador to the Bahamas, who pointed to US migration policy as counterproductive on the issue.

In an interview with The Tribune, the ambassador said illegal migration from Cuba has been primarily for economic reasons and not

politically motivated.

“I don’t think,” said Mr Guzman, “that this migration policy has any relation to illegal immigration. The illegal migration [issue] is related with the policy of the US against Cuba, and the benefits that the Cuban migrants get when they arrive in the US by illegal means.

“Cuban migrants are the only illegal migrants that have the right to get citizenship in the US when they arrive in US soil.”

He added: “If any Latin American or Caribbean people arrive by illegal means to the United States, they repatriate them.

“Cubans know if they arrive there by illegal means, they get the citizenship. This is a criminal policy because a lot of Cubans died during this travel by illegal means to US.”

In October, the Cuban government announced plans to terminate the exit visa requirement under Migration Law 1312.

The updated policy, which also extends the limitations on the length of stay allowed from 11 months to two years, will be effective January 14.

Mr Guzman dismissed concerns expressed by Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell last week over the impact the relaxed laws may have on illegal migration.

“It will promote a legal migration not illegal migration because it will be easier for Cubans to travel abroad.

“It will depend on the other government giving them the visa, if the other country doesn’t give it, they cannot do it,” he said.

“It depends not only on the Cuban side, but on the rest of the world.”

He added that public perception of Cuban migration has been negatively portrayed by the media to illustrate political dissent.

“If you analyse Cuban migration within the last 25 years, this is an economic migration. The only difference is in the case of Cuba they try to show this economic migration as a political migration.”

Mr Guzman said: “When we organize the repatriation process with government of The Bahamas, we saw in the forms that they completed in the detention centre, they are looking for better economic situation. It had nothing to do with the political situation.

“If you go to Miami now, interview Cuban youth they are economic migrants not political.”

The country hopes the revolutionary legislative changes will allow Cubans living abroad to strengthen ties with family and their homeland.

Ambassador Guzman added: “It’s proof that things are changing in Cuba, but changing because the Cuban people want to change, not because no one come to us and tell us what we have to do.”