Cuba rejects the migration pact

Havana. Cuba criticized the Action Plan on Governance and the Declaration on Migration adopted at the Ninth Summit of the Americas held in Los Angeles, California, from which it was excluded by the host United States, and considered both agreements ineffective and biased.

“The Western Hemisphere Declaration on Immigration and Protection of Immigrants imposed by the United States at #IXCumbre is an example of its racist, xenophobic and looting of immigrants,” Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said in one of several Twitter posts dedicated to the Western Hemisphere headquarters. which concluded on Friday in California City.

The United States excluded Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua from the meeting because it believed that they did not meet basic democratic standards.

At the end of the summit, twenty countries adopted the so-called “Los Angeles Declaration” to promote “orderly” immigration on the continent under the principle of shared responsibility, as requested by the Democratic government of the United States, Joe Biden.

The Cuban Foreign Minister said that this text “does not address in any way the real causes of migration,” noting that “it will be impossible to obtain tangible results in managing irregular migration flows if real dialogue and cooperation are not achieved.”

More than 100,000 Cubans have immigrated irregularly to the United States since Biden came to power, who did not follow through with what was announced in 2020 during his election campaign. Until recently, compliance with bilateral immigration agreements was still frozen, as well as keeping the US Consulate in Havana closed, on the orders of his predecessor, Republican Donald Trump (2017-2021).

As part of the immigration agreements accepted at the summit, the United States will this summer resume the family reunification program for Cubans that was suspended during Donald Trump’s presidency, as part of implementing the policy changes toward Cuba announced by Biden in May.

The Cuban Family Reunification Program, created in 2007, allows citizens or residents of the United States to request a special type of admission to the United States for their relatives in Cuba.

Regarding the signed Democratic Governance Action Plan, Rodriguez said, “It is unbalanced and biased and ignores the political and social diversity and pluralism of our region.”

He noted that the United Nations and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States recognize that “there is no single model of democracy and that the inalienable right of every State to choose its own political, economic, social and cultural system must be respected.”

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Facing criticism from the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, of the Caribbean island’s communist government, Rodriguez said this official “should do himself the favor of remaining silent.”

Rodriguez concluded that the summit “gave clear signals to his government about the continental rejection of attempts to define democracy and define who the true representatives of the countries of the Americas are.”