Political Quotes

“Today President Clinton has announced the conclusion of a new migration agreement with the Government of Cuba. This new agreement treats the more than 15,000 Cuban migrants currently detained at Guantanamo in a very humane manner, while putting in place safeguards to ensure that a similar flood of migrants is not encouraged at some future date. I want to commend the President for his decision to enter into, what I believe is a fair and balanced approach to handling the Cuban migrant issue. Under the terms of the agreement, Cuban migrants currently being detained at Guantanamo will now be eligible to be paroled into the United States, provided they qualify under United States immigration laws. Those paroled from Guantanamo will be counted in the annual 20,000 migration ceiling set last September in the context of the resolution of last year's Cuban migration crisis. This will mean that people at Guantanamo who have been in limbo since last year will now have the possibility of getting on with their lives. To continue to detain these people indefinitely was really inhumane, but nothing else could be done for them until this new agreement was reached with the Government of Cuba. In contrast to the treatment of those currently at Guantanamo, any future Cuban rafters intercepted at sea will be returned to Havana.”