U.S. Moves to End Buca’s ‘Trafficking in Humans’ : Says Fees Are Levied for Visas

The United States today announced that it is tightening its 26-year-old trade embargo on Cuba, including measures to end what it called Cuba’s trade in human beings.

State Department spokesman Charles Redman told reporters that the measures approved by President Reagan include an end to the possibility of Cubans getting U.S. visas in third countries. He said a presidential proclamation ending the issuance of such visas would “prevent the Cuban government from trafficking in human beings by charging citizens and residents of the United States thousands of dollars to finance the indirect travel of their Cuban relatives to the United States through third countries.”

As Much as $30,000 Paid

Redman alleged that Cuba has charged up to $30,000 for an exit permit enabling its citizens to go to a third country to pick up a U.S. visa. He said Panama is the country most frequently involved.

“This often involves payment of bribes to Cuban and other foreign officials in an effort to circumvent U.S. policy,” he said of the procedure.

Washington halted the issue of visas by its diplomats in Havana after Cuban leader Fidel Castro suspended the so-called Mariel agreement of December, 1984.

Under the agreement, suspended six months after it was signed, Washington agreed to issue visas to regulate Cuban emigration of up to 20,000 people a year in return for a Cuban promise to take back thousands of criminals and mentally ill people who reached the United States when Castro emptied his jails in 1980 and sent people on a boat flotilla to Florida.

Crackdowns on Trade

Among the other measures Reagan approved were crackdowns on trading with what Redman called Cuban front companies in Panama and other Central American countries, closer controls on organizations promoting travel to Cuba and tighter restrictions on sending money or goods to the island.

“The objective is to tighten enforcement of the embargo denying to the Castro regime economic benefits from the United States while Castro continues to ignore international obligations and to pursue policies inimical to U.S. interests,” Redman said.

“The Castro regime controls all convertible currency sent to Cuba and provides the Cuban recipients with only a small share of the value of the money or goods sent,” he added in explanation of the crackdown on Cubans here sending money or commodities to their relatives.

To Identify Companies

U.S. investigators will identify the alleged Cuban front companies and publicize their findings to discourage Americans from doing business with them, and, he implied, prosecute people where necessary.

U.S. officials, who asked not to be identified, said the aim of the measures is to persuade Castro to restore the Mariel agreement by exacting a price for its continuing suspension.

The crackdown will not affect the existing U.S. government policy of allowing certain categories of Cubans to emigrate directly to the United States.

Earlier this week, the State Department announced that two U.S. officials soon will begin interviewing more than 100 long-term prisoners, recently released prisoners or relatives of Cubans who came to the United States in 1984. The interviews are aimed at determining the eligibility of these Cubans to be admitted to the United States.