Prague town hall grants flats to Cuban refugees

Prague town hall grants flats to Cuban refugees
By ČTK / Published 26 July 2007
Prague, July 25 (CTK) - Prague town hall officials Wednesday gave keys
to three municipal flats to three Cuban families that recently received
asylum in the Czech Republic.

By granting the asylum, the Czech Republic fulfilled a request of the
USA that turned to its allies over the refugees.

A member of each of the families was persecuted or imprisoned for
political and religious reasons.

The Cubans will live at Prague's Cerny Most housing project. They
refused to meet journalists.

"They are very tired and frightened. They fear for the rest of their
families that stayed in Cuba," Prague councillor Jiri Janecek (the Civic
Democratic Party, ODS) said.

The refugees spoke anonymously with journalists over a cell phone. They
said they were happy that the Czech Republic had accepted them.

One of the Cubans said they wanted to prepare themselves for integration
into work.

He said they had been acquainted with the Czech Republic's history
during their stay at the U.S. naval base Guantanamo.

If one is not on the side of the government, problems arise, the
refugees said.

The families only managed to escape from Cuba at the fourth attempt.

The Cuban refugees arrived in Prague in March. It was the Czech
government that asked the Prague town hall to provide the flats.

"Prague has become a European metropolis and we must gradually return
what we were receiving under the totalitarian era," Janecek said.

The town hall also wants to help the Cubans find work, he added.

The two two-room and one three-room flats were given to the Cuban
families for one year. They can extend the rent contract for five years,
he added.

They will pay the usual rent of 55 crowns per one square metre a month,
Janecek said.

The Prague town hall provided the flats within the national integration
programme, under which it should provide housing for 32 people who were
granted asylum.

In the past four years, Prague provided housing to 131 asylum seekers.

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