Travel restrictions, Cuba and the ideological foundation of the Castro regime's anti-family policy cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 1/24 
On January 10, 2019 Secretary of State Pompeo requested that the U.S. Department of Transportation suspend all public charter flights between the United States and Cuban destinations, with the exception of Havana's Jose Marti International Airport. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 2/24
The objective, in suspending public charter flights to these nine Cuban airports, is to further impede the Castro regime from gaining access to hard currency from U.S. travelers that it is using to finance ongoing repression to support the Maduro dictatorship in Venezuela. 3/24
Not mentioned in the State Department press release, but one would imagine was also a consideration in the new restrictions, is the close relationship between Iran and Cuba. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 4/24
Fidel Castro visited Iran on May 10, 2001, four months before 9/11, where he was quoted by @AFP stating, "Iran & Cuba, in cooperation with each other, can bring America to its knees. ... The U.S. regime is very weak, & we are witnessing this weakness from close up." 5/25
Eleven years later on January 12, 2012 in Cuba, the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, declared "Our positions, versions, interpretations are alike, very close. We have been good friends, we are and will be, and we will be together forever." cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 6/25
In 2016 Vice News reported that in 2011 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was warned the Islamist militant group Hezbollah was setting up an operational base in Cuba to carry out attacks in Latin America that could involve attacks on US diplomatic posts or banks there. 7/25
The Brookings Institution has described Hezbollah as "Iran's most successful export." Ignoring this close relationship between the Castros and the Mullahs at a time of heightened tensions with Iran would not be prudent for American lives and property. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 8/25
Nevertheless, the usual suspects immediately emerged to denounce the measure as "a major blow to Cuban families," but most have rarely, if ever, mentioned the restrictions placed by the Cuban dictatorship on Cubans being able to enter and exit their own country. 9/25
Many who are pro-engagement with the Castro regime celebrated when the Cuban government in 2013 "liberalized" travel, but still maintained travel restrictions on Cubans. Travel was turned into another means of control to maintain power. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 10/25
If you dissent from the official line you can be barred from leaving or entering Cuba. It is up to the arbitrary discretion of the dictatorship. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 11/25
Today's announcement does not prevent Cubans returning to Cuba, but will require them making connecting flights in the island, or traveling by bus or car into the provinces. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 12/25
It is an inconvenience but considering the hard currency generated is used by the military & the secret police to repress Cubans & prop up Maduro in Venezuela, causing millions to flee & killing thousands of Venezuelans, than the policy's moral soundness becomes clear. 13/25
For example, these groups did not come together to denounce Cuba restrictions on Cuban nationals being able to return to their homeland to visit a dying parent, or attend their funeral. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 14/25
Blanca Reyes, a member of the Cuban dissident movement the Ladies in White left to Spain with her husband, prisoner of conscience Raul Rivero in Nov 2004. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 15/25
She requested to return to Cuba in July 2013 to visit her ailing 93 year old father but was denied. He passed away in Oct 2013. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 16/25
They didn't mention the Cubans, who despite having their passports, documents, & plane tickets paid for were barred at the airport w/in the past 2 weeks from returning to their homeland or of the complicit role of the airlines to serve as spokespersons for the dictatorship. 17/25
On Dec 31, 2019 Claudia Márquez Linares, a former indep journalist & founding member of the Ladies in White, flew from Puerto Rico to Panama where she had a connecting flight to Cuba but was told that the Cuban govt would not allow her to enter. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 18/25
She left Cuba with her husband in 2005, and has not seen her mother since then, and was trying to visit her. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 19/25
Fmr prisoner of conscience & member of the Christian Liberation Movement, Regis Iglesias, who was banished to Spain in 2010, was denied the right to return to Cuba on Jan 1, 2020 to spend time w/ his family & friends, despite having his passport & travel documents in order. 20/25
Furthermore Regis denounced the "complicit practice of @AmericanAir as a direct executor of violations of law, by abiding by & enforcing the arbitrary, illegitimate & illegal abuses of a dictatorship against its nationals only seeking to exercise their inalienable rights. 21/25
On January 2, 2019 Maikel Chang, a Cuban soccer player who stayed in the United States in 2012, was barred from entering Cuba to visit his family. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 22/25
Worse yet, the Cuban Embassy had given all indications that he would be able to return, and his family expected to see him, but permission was denied at the last moment. cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel… 23/25
223 Cubans have been identified that have been either denied the right to leave or enter Cuba. There are many more, but many are afraid to defy the dictatorship and suffer further reprisals by going public. 24/25 cubanexilequarter.blogspot.com/2020/01/travel…
