U.S. makes overture over boy, Cubans march
HAVANA - Thousands of Cubans marched in the streets on Thursday to demand the United States return a 6-year-old Cuban boat boy as the U.S. government made overtures to his father and the battle for custody edged toward a U.S. courtroom. U.S. officials sought a meeting with the father of Elian Gonzalez to resolve the custody dispute as his U.S. relatives prepared legal claims for guardianship and political asylum to keep him in the United States. In an extraordinary show of mass mobilisation by Cuba's ruling Communist Party, a sea of demonstrators stretching the length of Havana's five-mile (8 km) sea-front Malecon boulevard filed past the fortified U.S. diplomatic mission crying: "We Want Elian!" Young Elian was rescued two weeks ago after two days afloat on an inner tube following the sinking of an immigrant smuggling boat in which his mother and 10 others died. His case has exacerbated long-standing enmity between Cuban President Fidel Castro and the United States.My Sardonic Thoughts
- I'm having a real hard time with this one.
- This poor little child has lost his mother and grand-mother, and is now living in a foreign country, with a Great-Uncle and Great-Aunt. People he probably doesn't know very well.
- He almost drowned while trying to escape (or while his mother was trying to escape, bringing him) from Cuba.
- The US Coast Guard had to rescue him from the water.
- The US has a treaty with Cuba, that says anyone that makes it to US soil is free to stay in the US, but anyone that is found in the water, must be returned to Cuba.
- When this treaty was signed, in 1994, many, many Cubans were allowed, by Castro, to leave Cuba for the US.
- Since that release, many, many Cubans have been rescued from the water, and NOT RETURNED.
- So, Castro has stopped letting people leave.
- It really comes as no surprise to me, we (the US) have been extremely good at not living up to the treaties we have signed in the past - just ask a Native American.
- Is it no wonder that the Panamanians don't believe we'll really hand over the Canal at the end of December 1999?
- Is it no wonder that Castro refuses to deal with the US?
- Is it no wonder that the American people have lost faith in their government?
