A number of high-ranking Cuban regime officials have left for the United States this year, including recently Fidel Castro's former close ally Manuel Menendez Castellanos, Cuban media report, as the island plunges into its worst crisis in decades.
According to the operating in USA According to the Cuban website Marti Noticias, Menendez Castellanos landed at the Miami airport on Thursday afternoon and was allowed into the United States on the basis of a family reunification.
Dignitaries flee Cuba
“After long hours of waiting at Miami International Airport, he was admitted to the United States. A group of people were waiting for him at the airport terminal,” reports Marti Noticias.
As reported, the former Cuban dignitary arrived in the US wearing a pink T-shirt, cap and mask. “I'm going home,” he announced. He did not want to answer media questions, the portal writes.
Fidel Castro led communist Cuba for almost half a centurykremlin.ru
Castellanos was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party Cuba (KPK) and a member of the local parliament, and according to his official biography, his “outstanding work and political career earned him numerous decorations and awards,” Marti Noticias reported.
According to his biography, he had been working for the Cuban regime since 1972, and in the years 1993-2003 he was the first secretary of the CPC in the province of Cienfuegos.
Cuba in crisis
Independent Cuban media have stressed that this is yet another in a series of former dignitaries or their family members who have left for the U.S. in recent months. According to the 14yMedio portal, they include Judge Melody Gonzalez, who is seeking asylum in the United States, as well as former secretary of the Santiago CPC Misael Enamorado Dager and former counterintelligence agent Yurquis Companioni.
The social and economic situation in this Caribbean country is now considered to be the worst since the revolution led by Fidel Castro in the 1950s. In the last two years, a record number of people have fled Cuba. Life and business activity on the island are further complicated by electricity shortages.
Main image source: Juancho Torres/EPA/PAP