By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
 

CARDENAS, Cuba –– Two months after Elian Gonzalez returned home here, a bitter dispute over Cuban migration to the
United States is threatening key agreements between the two countries that are designed to reunite families and discourage
Cubans from risking passage across the Florida Straits.

In recent days, Cuban and U.S. officials have said historic migration accords that for five years have helped prevent a large
Cuban exodus are in jeopardy. Semiannual talks between Cuban and U.S. officials to clarify issues related to those agreements,
signed in 1994 and 1995, have lapsed for more than two months, and no new talks have been scheduled.

At the heart of the debate from the Cuban perspective is the Cuban Adjustment Act, a 34-year-old law Fidel Castro's
government has attacked ceaselessly in a media campaign here as "murderous," saying it entices illegal Cuban immigrants with
the promise of almost automatic U.S. residency. The U.S. government fired back this week in a formal protest that accused
Havana of blocking the departure of more than 100 Cubans who had been granted visas to enter the United States legally.

"Over the past year, the Cuban government has engaged in ceaseless rhetoric about migration issues, including the importance
of family reunification," Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright said in a statement this week. "Now would be a good time to
back that rhetoric with responsible action."

Cuban officials, who have promoted mass rallies, weekly round tables and stories in state-run media critical of U.S. immigration
policy, acknowledge that cooperation with the United States may be collapsing. "We don't want [the talks] to be destroyed; we
think they are important," Ricardo Alarcon, president of the Cuban National Assembly, said in an interview. "We managed to
define a structure, a certain normalcy that has functioned pretty well. These agreements are now under attack."

Here, in the faded seaside town where Elian and his mother left illegally for South Florida last November on an unseaworthy
boat, the stream of Cubans leaving on favorable currents continues. Leonardo Perez, a carpenter, said that despite the risk and
an increased Cuban military presence offshore, more than 30 of his friends and neighbors have pushed off under cover of
darkness since Elian's return in June.

"You never know who is going until they leave," said Perez, 47, who tried unsuccessfully to reach Florida during a 1980 boat
lift, when an estimated 130,000 Cubans made the 90-mile voyage. He is now waiting for U.S. visas for his wife, two children
and a granddaughter. "You go to bed at night, and when you wake up you hear the news: 'They've gone.' "

The sharp immigration debate reflects a consensus among Cuban officials that Elian, the photogenic 6-year-old shipwreck
survivor, has presented a rare opportunity to push for change in decades-old U.S. trade and immigration policy. Cuba has
found a growing number of allies in Congress and among American business interests in support of loosening a 41-year-old
U.S. trade embargo, while Miami's Cuban exile lobby tries to recover from its public relations setback in the Elian case.

"The current U.S. policy toward Cuba is the result of inertia," Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said in an interview in
Havana last week. "The agenda of the majority of the people in the United States is the same as our agenda--normalization of
relations."

But the recriminations over immigration threaten to restore a more familiar, hostile tone to U.S.-Cuban relations. Last week, for
example, the State Department rejected a visa request by Alarcon to attend a meeting of international legislators at the United
Nations in New York, a decision seen in Havana as a product of the current dispute.

As part of the formal protest filed Monday with the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, Albright accused the Cuban
government of undermining accords designed to ensure more orderly, safe migration from the island nation of 11 million. The
agreements were prompted by a crisis in 1994 in which 38,000 rafters arrived in the United States in a chaotic exodus.

The agreements grant U.S. visas to 20,000 Cubans each year, including a portion reserved for those with families living in the
United States. They also permit the U.S. Coast Guard to return Cubans intercepted at sea to the Communist-ruled country.

In her letter, Albright accused the Cuban government of denying exit permits to 117 Cubans with U.S. visas within the past
three months, including a number with relatives active in the Miami exile community. At least one visa was issued a decade ago,
and several others date back four or five years. The visas must be renewed every six months if they are not used.

Ortelio Bichot Taguada, a Miami businessman, said his 31-year-old son was granted a U.S. visa in 1994 but has been unable
to obtain a Cuban exit permit. "He has submitted questions to the Ministry of Public Health, and he has never received a reply,"
Bichot Taguada said. "This has been very frustrating and disorienting. Four times the U.S. government has tried to ask about
this and received no reply."

Senior State Department officials say the Cuban government is denying exit permits with more frequency. Coast Guard patrols
are intercepting an increasing number of migrants holding valid U.S. visas but who were unable to get exit permits, U.S. officials
said.

Albright's letter also said that the $550 per-person price the Cuban government charges for exit permits is prohibitive, although
that figure has not risen significantly in some time. The fee, excluding the $50 cost of a passport, is equal to about four years'
salary for a typical Cuban.

Cuban and U.S. officials here say it is difficult to determine the extent of illegal Cuban migration. The Coast Guard is on track
to intercept 1,500 fewer Cubans this year than last year, but U.S. and Cuban officials agree that the 38 percent drop may be
the result of more sophisticated smuggling rings operating out of the United States and such places as Cardenas.

"People here sell anything," declared Rafael Lopez, a 22-year-old with a New York Yankees cap perched on his head, who
said town smugglers ask about $2,000 per person for passage to Florida in a small boat. The cost can be five times that
amount when arranged from Miami.

Alarcon said the Cuban government has been trying to send dozens of U.S. residents caught smuggling migrants back to the
United States to stand trial. The United States has refused to accept any of the 66 alleged smugglers, saying a trial in South
Florida relying on Cuban-gathered evidence would be impossible. Thus far, Cuban provincial courts have tried and convicted
about 20 alleged smugglers; prison sentences range from 15 to 20 years.

"You don't have a strong policy of punishing these people," said Alarcon, referring to the handful of smuggling cases tried
successfully in Miami. "It would be better for these cases to be tried there, and the most important reason is to send a signal to
smugglers that you are serious."

Cuban officials say the United States encourages illegal immigration through application of the Cuban Adjustment Act, which
was signed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1966. It allows Cubans who arrive in the United States the right to "adjust" their
immigration status to permanent residency after they have been in the country for a year and a day. Immigrants from other
countries must submit to an application process to receive residency status.

Cuban officials say the preferential process encourages such Cubans as Elian and his mother, who died on the voyage, to risk
their lives at sea. In the interview, Alarcon accused U.S. immigration officials of expanding the scope of the law in recent years
by applying it to Cubans who arrive illegally.

The act does not make a distinction between legal and illegal arrival. In April 1999, Immigration and Naturalization
Commissioner Doris Meissner issued a memo clarifying for field staff members that Cubans who arrive at "other than ports of
entry"--meaning those who enter the country by landing somewhere on the coastline--are eligible for residency.

This interpretation has been the subject of recent migration talks between the two countries, which were held most recently last
December but were postponed in June. Alarcon said any future talks should also focus on this issue, although one senior State
Department official said this week that "we don't negotiate U.S. law with the Cuban government."