Some Cuban doctors flee via Venezuela

Some Cuban doctors flee via Venezuela
Defectors shed light on medical aid missions
By Juan Forero
The Washington Post
Posted February 21 2007

BOGOTA, Colombia · Ariel Perez was, like thousands of fellow Cuban
doctors, a devoted soldier in Fidel Castro's most important overseas
mission: providing medical care to the poor in oil-rich Venezuela,
Cuba's most vital ally. But last year, Perez and two Cuban companions,
carrying rucksacks with a few belongings and holding just $1,300 among
them, sneaked across the Colombian border and promptly defected.

"From the moment I got there, I thought of it: leaving," Perez, 36, said
in an interview in Bogota, where about 40 Cuban physicians and other
medical professionals are living after fleeing Venezuela.

Now, Perez and the other Cuban defectors are providing a rare inside
look at a program that has helped define the close relationship between
Washington's two most formidable adversaries in the Americas, the
48-year-old communist government in Cuba and the populist administration
of President Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.

Cuba has dispatched more than 20,000 doctors, as well as thousands of
other specialists such as sports trainers and therapists, to Venezuela.
Chavez's government has paid for the service by providing Cuba with
nearly 100,000 barrels of oil a day, filling the void left by the Soviet
Union, Havana's longtime benefactor during the Cold War.

Bringing medical personnel to once-forgotten shantytowns of Venezuela
has been among the more popular of Chavez's many social programs, and
has helped consolidate Venezuela's self-styled revolutionary government.
Working from small brick modules, the Cubans examine newborns, provide
care for the elderly and make house calls -- all for free.

"Anyone who gets sick here can go at midnight to where the Cuban doctors
are, and they attend to you right away," Isalenis Arevalo, 24, who lives
in a poor neighborhood, said in a recent interview at her home in
Caracas. Before the Cubans arrived, she said, medical services were
practically nonexistent for residents in her district.

"You had to buy the medicines," said Arevalo, whose 7-month-old baby,
Adriana, receives regular checkups. "You had to go to the clinics and
pay high prices. The doctors didn't want to come to the barrios."

Chavez and other government officials have declared the program, called
Inside the Barrio, a success. But a Venezuelan medical association
critical of the Chavez government has expressed reservations about the
Cuban doctors' qualifications, and political opposition leaders have
criticized the program for its lack of transparency. Cuban doctors are
not permitted to talk to foreign journalists or diplomats. They must
seek permission to travel outside of their assigned municipalities, and
doctors who have defected say Cuban and Venezuelan intelligence
operatives kept close tabs on their whereabouts.

The doctors in Bogota spoke of the pride they felt delivering care to
the poor in the name of their small country, which has made health care
a priority since Castro took power in 1959. But they also talked of
being terrified working in Venezuelan neighborhoods buffeted by crime.

Most jumped at the chance to work overseas, seeing it as an opportunity
to earn far more than the $15 a month they were paid in Cuba. But the
workload was heavy -- from early morning until night, sometimes seven
days a week. And the pay, around $200 a month, quickly evaporated in a
country with high prices and double-digit inflation.

Although it is unclear how many have defected, Western diplomats in
Bogota said that in 2006 there were 63 Cubans, most of them presumed to
be medical professionals, who sought asylum in this country. That group
does not include those who headed straight to the U.S. Embassy seeking
help. U.S. authorities here referred questions about the Cubans to
Homeland Security officials in Washington, who did not return telephone
calls.

But Ana Carbonell, chief of staff for Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Miami,
a Cuban-American and a staunch opponent of Castro and Chavez, said that
"it's safe to say it's hundreds" of Cubans assigned to Venezuela who
have sought asylum in recent years.

The Bush administration, which has tried to further isolate Cuba and
provided tacit support for a failed coup against Chavez in 2002, has
tried to encourage more defections. In August, U.S. officials announced
a new policy that allows Cuban medical personnel -- identified by the
Department of Homeland Security as doctors, physical therapists, lab
technicians, nurses, sports trainers and others -- to apply for entry to
the United States at U.S. embassies in the countries where they serve.
Worldwide, as many as 500 Cuban medical personnel and their dependents
have applied, Carbonell said. About a third have been accepted.

Although a Homeland Security fact sheet on the new policy, the Cuban
Medical Professional Parole program, said adjudication of requests for
entry to the United States "may take two weeks or longer," some of the
medical personnel in Bogota have been waiting months. Several have been
rejected after undergoing extensive U.S. background checks meant to weed
out, among others, suspected spies.

"I don't know if it's going to come out," said one doctor, Cesar
Rodriguez, speaking of his request to reside in the United States. "The
embassy doesn't tell you anything."

Rarely are defections made public. Embassies in Latin America that
receive requests keep quiet to protect the asylum-seekers and not fuel
the indignation of the host government.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/cuba/sfl-acolomdocs21feb21,0,57775.story?coll=sfla-news-cuba