Stranded at Nicaragua border, Cuban migrants' American dream in peril

Stranded at Nicaragua border, Cuban migrants' American dream in peril
PENAS BLANCAS, COSTA RICA | BY DAVE GRAHAM

In the week Cuban migrant Lenin Rivacoba has slept rough on Costa Rica's
border with Nicaragua, he was briefly blinded by tear gas, lost hearing
in one ear and is now almost out of money.

But Rivacoba, whose first name was given in honor of Soviet
revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, says he would rather perish than return to
his family in Cuba because it would mean giving up on their dream of
forging a new life in the United States.

"It's get there, or die," said Rivacoba, a 30-year-old teacher and
father of two whose grandmother sold her house for $5,000 to pay for his
passage to the United States. "I can't return. They're waiting for me to
start sending money back."

Rivacoba is part of a tide of Cubans rushing to the United States
because they fear the recent rapprochement between Havana and Washington
could end preferential U.S. policies for Cuban migrants.

While migrants from across Latin America struggle to get green cards and
many live illegally in the United States, fearful of deportation, Cubans
receive residency with ease under the U.S. Cuban Adjustment Act of 1996.

Along with over 1,000 tired but determined Cubans, Rivacoba has been
stranded here since Nicaragua's leftist government, a close ally of
Cuba, refused to let them cross the border last week.

Blocking traffic at the border in a bid to force Nicaragua to relent,
many of the Cuban migrants say they sold their belongings to make the
journey and that there can be no turning back.

From babies to grandparents, blacks to whites, they have turned the
Penas Blancas border station into a temporary shelter with makeshift
beds, piles of luggage and improvised washing lines. Hundreds of others
are being housed in buildings around the small town of La Cruz nearby.

Since U.S.-Cuban ties began to thaw in December, the number of Cubans
heading through Central America has leapt.

According to U.S. Customs and Border Patrol data published by the Pew
Research Center, 27,296 Cubans entered the United States in the first
nine months of the 2015 fiscal year, up 78 percent from 2014.

Two-thirds arrived through the Border Patrol's Laredo sector in Texas,
though the number arriving mostly by sea to the Miami sector also
surged, more than doubling from the previous year to over 7,000, the
figures showed.

The vast majority at the Nicaraguan border say they flew from Cuba to
Ecuador and then started the trek north through Central America. A few
said they had crossed the Caribbean to Venezuela via Trinidad and Tobago.

All of them said they left Cuba to improve their economic lot, and a
substantial number were also worried the U.S. "wet foot, dry foot"
policy could soon end.

"People say it's going to change in January," said Yahumara Ramirez, a
39-year-old nurse who was deported back to Cuba in 2013 during her first
attempt to reach the United States.

Under the policy, Cubans who set foot on U.S. soil can stay, while those
captured at sea are sent back.

Cuba's Communist government on Tuesday blamed U.S. Cold War-era
immigration legislation for the migrant crisis, but U.S. officials have
repeatedly said there are no plans to change it.

EXTORTION

Many of the stranded Cubans here have followed a route snaking from the
Colombian city of Ipiales, through Cali and Medellin and into Panama via
Puerto Obaldia.

The Colombian section has become notorious, with tales widespread of
extortion by both police and coyotes - the smugglers used by migrants to
evade authorities.

Alberto Perez, a 24-year-old aspiring actor, said he had to pay
officials bribes of $20 or more 18 times crossing Colombia.

"They say it's for 'collaboration'," he said wryly, adding that police
patrols would radio on ahead to colleagues to alert them when Cubans
were coming.

Fellow migrant Johannes Burgos, 26, said he and 12 others were forced to
pay $1,500 each to a group of coyotes who threatened them as they were
entering Panama.

The migrants said Panama and Costa Rica treated them well, but they
cursed Nicaragua, whose President Daniel Ortega has been an ally of
Cuba's government since the Cold War era, for closing its border.

Earlier this month, Nicaragua was still open to migrants. But Costa
Rica's temporary closure of its border with Panama after the bust of a
human trafficking ring unleashed a surge northward when it was reopened
last weekend.

Nicaragua responded by sealing the border with troops.

Frustrated Cubans staged protests at the crossing, and this week trucks
stretched back more than 4 km (2.5 miles) into Costa Rica.

Costa Rica has called for a regional summit to create a corridor to let
the Cubans pass, arguing they will otherwise fall into the hands of
smuggling gangs.

Rivacoba and hundreds of others had already crossed some 5 km into
Nicaragua on Sunday when police appeared and abruptly forced them back
using tear gas, he said.

Police also fired shots into the air, and one went off so close to
Rivacoba's ear his hearing is still impaired.

For all the frustration over Nicaragua, most of the Cubans' anger is
aimed at the Cuban government, which they accuse of cronyism,
mismanaging the economy and limiting free speech.

Fanning his 10-month-old son with a towel in the stifling heat of a Red
Cross border shelter, Yordanis Boza said even if detente between the
United States and Cuba helps the economy, it will not happen fast enough
for his wife and two children.

"If you work for a year in the United States it's like working for 10
years in Cuba, or more," the 28-year-old said.

(Additional reporting by Enrique Pretel; Editing by Simon Gardner and
Kieran Murray)

Source: Stranded at Nicaragua border, Cuban migrants' American dream in
peril | Reuters -
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/18/us-cuba-usa-migrants-idUSKCN0T731R20151118#oVPR7PaHvffgftfj.97