Flotilla of small boats 'off to collect Cubans’

Press, 23 April 1980, Page 9

Flotilla of small boats 'off to collect Cubans’

NZPA-Reuter Miami, A small armada of Florida fishing boats was headed for Havana yesterday to pick up thousands of Cubans . who took refuge at the Peruvian Embassy there, according to Cuban exile leaders in Miami. “It’s like Dunkirk when the British rescued their men from across the English 1 Channel,” said a senior Cuban exile leader, who did not want to be identified. “There are about 50 vessels from cabin cruisers to fishing boats on their way to Havana,” he added. The United States Coast; Guard station at Key WestL Florida, said it knew nothin// of a mass evacuation effoy n but a spokesman that two small boats maj an unannounced trip to rf R vana and returned yestenF J* with* 40 refugees. J lr However, the Cuban efe rt leader said: “After the ft g two boats landed every W c; seems to be sailing ove/to Havana to pick up the /u- h gees.” I a The Communist fety tl daily, “Granma,” whic; re - ri ported the first two boa at* 7 rival at the port of Nriel, tl

ii ( sqme oOkm'yest of Havana,, . (gave no ! iai But if s'd they were the )r first of sv'eral expected to P sail in'frm Florida to pick 10 up an'esimated 8000 of the in origii/1 embassy occupants 0 who re waiting at home with n and exit visas for son/ country to admit them. , n ! Mother 1200 to 1500 reT mafed inside the compound “'wife. 800 have already left ’’ I frf Peru, Spain, and Costa d I pfa. I ?Grahma” said that those 5- pl inside would be the last 1 0 / leave Cuba. y/Sources at the United i /fates mission in Havana said ;t iney knew nothing of the , Twats’ arrival, which followed j nhe suspension by Cuba of a , refugee airlift operation to j Costa Rica. - $ Cuba objected to Costa - Rica’s turning its territory i into-a staging area for the 1 redistribution of the refu- : gee-s to other South Ameri- 1 can nations. The Cuban Government i has said that ten European : and American Governments that have indicated their : readiness to admit a total of : 7000 will have to send in I their own aircraft and fly '

, them directly to their respecI tive countries. The United States has pledged to take, in a total of 3500 but it has yet to process and evacuate them. Co-sta Rica was reported earlier this week to have offered to take in all 10,000 men, women and children who flooded the Peruvian mission on Easter week-end after Cuban authorites removed security forces there. President Rodrigo Carazo was said to have asked Cuban authorities to resume the airlift to the Costa Rican capital of San Jose. Diplomatic sources in Havana said the request was likely to be turned down as merely a ploy to get the refugees out. Forty-two Cuban refugees who arrived in Madrid yesterday complained they had been stripped of‘all their po-session-s before leaving Havana airport. “They even took the earrings from the women,” one said. The Cubans made up the second batch of the 500 refugees Spain has pledged to take. About 50 arrived last Friday. .