Poor people, even lost their truck! I think I would rather let the Cubans stay and live in freedom, than allow millions of Mexicans, who already live in a free country, sneak across the border and stay.
"Ingenuity, however, didn't translate to success. The U.S. Coast Guard took the dozen Cubans aboard the truck back to the island last weekend."
This is outrageous. Mr. Bush, you better get your priorities straight. You pay no attention to illegals pouring over the border and draining our system, yet you send men and women of courage back to a filthy commie prison - or worse. Amigo, you might want to rethink your policies.
The CG has no moral right, or legitimate claim to navigational hazards if they are aware of the craft and tracking it. Let them come. These are exactly the kind of people we want. Ingenuity, courage and a bitchin' cool truck besides. What the hell is wrong with the Coast Guard? Let 'em run the truck up on the beach and welcome them to America.
Maybe Chevy could even be there to offer them a contract for a cool new series of work truck ads...
U.S. returns hijackers, guards to Cuba after promise of no executions
By Rafael Lorente
Washington Bureau
July 22, 2003
WASHINGTON -- The United States on Monday repatriated 12 Cubans who allegedly tried to commandeer a boat from Cuba to Florida, in a sign that the two antagonistic governments are willing to work closely to discourage illegal migration.
The 12 Cubans, and three security guards who allegedly were kidnapped during the incident, were returned to Cuba after Washington received assurances from Fidel Castro's government that, if tried and convicted, they would not be executed. At most, Cuban officials said, the 12 would receive 10-year jail sentences.
Havana hailed Monday's action. "I think it's something positive," said Miguel Alvarez, adviser to Ricardo Alarcon, president of the Cuban National Assembly. "It puts out a message which varies from everything that had been done before."
But the decision was not well-received in South Florida, where Cuban-Americans frown upon negotiations with Castro's Cuba and typically support granting Cuban immigrants asylum in the United States. Many say Cuban government officials cannot be trusted to honor their promises, noting three Cuban hijackers were quickly tried and executed last April.
"This action makes the U.S. complicit in the fate of the returned refugees," Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Miami, said in a statement. "This act of infamy in coordination with the Cuban tyranny is a condemnable monstrosity." Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart, the other two Cuban-American Republicans from Miami, also condemned the return.
Six-day odyssey
Joe Garcia, executive director of the Cuban American National Foundation, blamed the return on the Bush administration and on Ros-Lehtinen and the Diaz-Balarts, whom he faulted for not having more influence with the White House.
"This is a betrayal by this administration," Garcia said. "And what it demonstrates is the impotence of our Republican congressmen within this Republican administration. When you sell yourself cheap, you get treated cheaply."
The 15 Cubans -- 14 men and one woman -- were taken by U.S. Coast Guard cutter to the port of Orozco at Bahia de Cabañas and turned over to Cuban authorities just after 10 a.m. Monday.
The return ended a six-day trip that started last Tuesday on a Cuban-government owned 36-foot vessel at the port of Boca de Nuevitas, about 340 miles southeast of Havana. Officials said the boat was taken from Cuba with the Cuban navy in pursuit. The boat briefly entered Bahamian waters before heading toward the United States. With the permission of the Cuban government, the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted the vessel in international waters, 60 miles southeast of Miami. The boat was returned last week.
FBI agents and officials from the Department of Homeland Security interviewed the Cubansaboard a Coast Guard cutter and determined that they took the boat unlawfully and kidnapped the three security guards, a State Department official said. Another administration official said several of the Cubans waved machetes at Coast Guard personnel as they boarded the stolen vessel last week. Pepper spray was used to subdue them, the official said. Because they had committed crimes, they were not eligible for entry into the United States, officials said.
The decision to return the Cubans was made after a task force from the Departments of State, Justice and Homeland Security determined a case could not be made to try them for hijacking in U.S. courts, several officials said. It is unclear whether the incident was a hijacking, from a legal standpoint.
Because the Cuban-flagged boat was stopped in international waters, Washington would have to get consent from Havana under international law to try the Cubans in the United States for attempting to assault the Coast Guard crew, officials said.
"This was done after taking into account our obligations under international law, our migration accords with Cuba and our commitment to ensuring a coherent migration policy that protects our borders," State Department Spokesman Philip Reeker said Monday.
According to an administration official, the decision to return the Cubans came together quickly. Thursday afternoon, Cuban diplomats asked State Department officials why they could not be repatriated. They were told Washington was wary of returning them because of the April execution by firing squad of three hijackers who were caught by the Cuban navy.
That night, Cuban diplomats contacted the State Department and promised that the 12 would be tried but would receive sentences of no longer than 10 years.
"This was an unsolicited representation on their part," the official said.
Havana's assurances
The State Department then asked for written assurances and demanded that they be made public. The first written draft was in the hands of Bush administration officials by Saturday and, after revisions, was put forward as a formal diplomatic note by Havana that night.
"The fact is, a crime was committed," the official said. "The migration policy is safe, legal and orderly and only safe, legal and orderly."
On Monday, Cuba issued a statement reiterating that the 12 would be tried and, if convicted, would receive no more than 10 years in prison -- even if that required executive clemency to reduce their court-assigned sentence.
After the return of the Cubans was announced on Cuban television, an announcer read a statement from U.S. Interests Section Chief James Cason condemning hijacking.
Philip Peters, vice president of the Lexington Institute and a proponent of improving relations with Cuba, said Monday's repatriation makes it clear that hijacking is not the way to reach the United States.
"The desire here is to send the strongest possible signal to Cubans who might be thinking of hijacking a boat that there's no profit in it, that they won't make it to the United States," Peters said.
But Jo Anne C. Adlerstein, an immigration attorney in Newark for Proskauer Rose LLP, said the United States mishandled the situation. Adlerstein said the United States should have taken more time to determine whether those on board had a credible fear of persecution and were entitled to political asylum.
"We are now all of a sudden going to trust assurances from the Cuban government that these people will be treated leniently," Adlerstein said. "As far as I'm concerned, there's going to be blood on the hands of somebody."
A State Department official on Monday denied that the United States had negotiated away the due-process rights of the 12. "The Cubans have not said that they will serve 10 years," the official said. "They have said that the charges they face carry a sentence no longer than 10 years. They've made it public and we expect them to uphold it."
Ridiculous. We really do have some idiots in government :-(.
When you're this clever ... you deserve to make it across. Period.
D
''They are very creative people,'' he said.
---
And desperate. People don't understand how terrible things must be in Cuba, that drives so many people to risk their lives at a chance at freedom.
It was Clinton who changed the US policy towards Cuban refugees, and have them be hunted by the Coast Guard.
Bush needs to change it back.
Didn't they sink this truckboat? Somebody should haul it up and put it on display.
