Washington opines about lifting of Cuban travel restrictions
Transcript of press briefing by Victoria Nuland, spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department on Oct. 16.
QUESTION: I wonder if you have a reaction – well, I hope you would have a reaction to the announcement today from Cuban officials on the exit bans and the exit visas.
MS. NULAND: What Brad is referring to is that the Cuban Government today announced changes to their exit permit requirements to allow Cuban citizens to depart the country without explicitly having exit permits. This is consistent with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which provides that everybody ought to have the right to leave any country, including their own, and/or to return to their own country, to come in and out.
We obviously welcome any reforms that will allow Cubans to depart from and return to their country freely. We remain committed to the migration accords under which our two countries support and promote safe, legal, and orderly migration. Our own visa requirement remains unchanged. Our understanding is that this exit permit regime is going to take effect on January 14th, so we are analyzing, obviously, all of the details and any implications it may have for our processing, et cetera.
QUESTION: So just two things with that. Firstly, this was something that the United States had long called for; that’s correct?
MS. NULAND: Yes.
QUESTION: Secondly, what –
MS. NULAND: Very few countries, as you know, have exit permit requirements. I mean, if you want to leave the United States, if you want to leave most countries around the world, if you have a passport, you can go.
QUESTION: And what implication – you mentioned implications. Just could you spell out what this might mean for certain asylum laws in the United States? And correct me if I’m wrong, there’s certain congressional legislation on people who enter the United States from Cuba. Would this change any of that?
MS. NULAND: I don’t think it changes any U.S. laws on the books. I think the question becomes whether more Cubans desire to travel and are applying for visas and all those kinds of things. So obviously, we need to see how it affects the flow of travel. We obviously always urge Cuban families to use legal family reunification and other immigration mechanisms that are already in place.
With regard to acts on the books, I think you’re – I assume you’re talking about the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966 which –
QUESTION: I didn’t know the year. Sorry.
MS. NULAND: Yeah. There you go. Before you were born, I think, Brad. Which provides an avenue for Cuban – most of you, actually – provides an avenue for Cuban nationals to apply for adjustment of status and become lawful permanent residents of the United States. The Department of Homeland Security is the lead agency on the implementation of that, because it applies to folks who are already in the United States. So I would refer you to them for any specific questions.
QUESTION: And then just lastly on this, this was a – I mean, in your view, this was a human rights violation, in a sense, because under the Universal Declaration they should have had this right, freedom of movement to leave their own country. Will the United States be offering any carrot to – I don’t know – incentivize further reforms from the Cuban Government at this point?
MS. NULAND: Well, as you know, we’ve been very outspoken. We are not shy in all of our public and private comments on Cuba that we want to see the human rights of the Cuban people respected. This is certainly a step, but I would advise that even with regard to this step, we await further information, because as I said, it’s not being implemented until January 14th.
We need to see how it is implemented. For example, we understand that current Cuban passport holders who don’t already have an exit permit are going to be required to revalidate their passports before they’re allowed to travel. And we would note that the Cuban Government has not lifted the measures it has in place to preserve what it calls the human capital created by the revolution. So the question is going to be whether those other requirements are going to continue to restrict the ability of the Cuban people to take advantage of this change.
QUESTION: So you’d be worried that maybe this new right that’s being granted wouldn’t be extended to people of certain political convictions, maybe human rights defenders, that have been targeted in the past?
MS. NULAND: I think the point I’m trying to make is that the Cuban Government has kept for itself a couple of other checks on the ability of people to leave freely, including this issue of revalidating passports, this issue of claiming that they can preserve the human capital of the revolution in the country. So we just need to all see how it’s implemented.
