Roxanna Pérez, 27 years old and a first lieutenant at the time of her resignation, is detained in the prison at 100 and Aldabó
14ymedio, Havana, 24 August 2024 — A former officer of the Cuban Armed Forces, Roxanna Pérez Rodríguez, is part of the group of 41 rafters intercepted by the U.S. Coast Guard Service and returned to the Island this Friday. The 27-year-old woman, who at the time of processing her resignation held the rank of first lieutenant, is detained in the prison at 100 and Aldabó, in Havana, and her family fears that she will be tried to serve as an example in a military court.
In a brief resignation note signed on June 6, addressed to the officer of Military Unit 2133 and published by the Click-Cuba media, Pérez claimed to be “disappointed” with the Armed Forces and alleged that she could not “perform correctly” in her duties. “My economic situation does not allow me to take care of my family and work at the same time,” she said.
Pérez said she did not agree “with the attention or treatment given to the officers,” nor with the treatment she received. She also revealed to her superiors that her sisters “left the country,” her mother would do it in the coming months and her emigrated family wanted to start the “claim” process so that the young woman, who has a child, could reside in the United States.
According to Click-Cuba, the former first lieutenant had been sanctioned for 10 months with a movement limitation, which only allowed her only to go from home to work. The cause: maintaining a romantic relationship with a Cuban-American.
On August 15, Pérez boarded a raft with two people identified as Yariel Duarte Rodríguez and Yohandra Miranda. At three in the afternoon the following day they were intercepted and transferred to a ship of the Coast Guard Service.
According to the La Tijera profile, Pérez was able to communicate with her family after her forced return. Her relatives “were told that they could bring her toiletries because her process was going to take a long time,” the publication said.
In fact, a note from the Ministry of the Interior published after the return of the rafters alluded to a person who “was on parole” for criminal sanctions at the time of leaving the Island and points out that “it will be made available to the corresponding courts for the revocation of that benefit.” However, the note does not expressly identify Pérez.
In the group returned this Friday there are 31 men, eight women and two minors. They were handed over by the U.S. Coast Guard to the Cuban authorities in the port of Orozco, in Bahía Honda, province of Artemisa.
With the arrest of these 41 rafters, there are now 980 irregular migrants who have been returned to the Island from different countries in the region so far this year, official media reported.
The Governments of Cuba and the United States have a bilateral agreement that all migrants who arrive by sea in the United States will be returned to Cuba. Deportation flights resumed in April 2023, mainly for people considered “inadmissible” after being held at the border with Mexico.
With the arrest of these 41 rafters, there are now 980 irregular migrants who have been returned to the Island this year
According to a recent report by the Customs and Border Protection Office, in June, 17,563 Cubans arrived in the United States. According to the data, with that figure, 180,925 Cubans have entered the United States in the last nine months. If that pace is maintained, at the end of the fiscal year (September 2024), around 245,000 Cubans will have entered U.S. territory.
Since the beginning of the year, Cubans were also returned on commercial flights from the Cayman Islands, the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic. In the last three years, Cuba has recorded an unprecedented migratory exodus both for the volume of migrants and for its temporary extension, due to the serious economic crisis on the Island, with frequent and prolonged power outages, shortages of food, medicines and fuel, inflation and a partial dollarization of the economy.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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