AP
2 hrs 24 mins ago
BUENOS AIRES – Cuba's government has dropped its refusal to let a
prominent physician visit her family abroad, Argentina's government
announced Friday. The measure resolves one of the few disputes between
the two countries.
President Cristina Fernandez announced that Cuban officials told her
that Dr. Hilda Molina had been given permission to leave Cuba for
Argentina and she expressed "much satisfaction" at the decision.
Her left-leaning administration has had warm relations with communist Cuba.
Argentine news media has given extensive attention to Molina's struggle
to see the grandchildren who were born to her son and her Argentine
daughter-in-law after they left Cuba in 1994.
International human rights groups for years have lobbied the Cuban
government to give Molina permission to leave. Washington-based Human
Rights Watch in February featured Molina's case among examples of Cuba
denying exit visas to several categories of applicants, including health
care professionals.
While Cuba has sent thousands of doctors abroad on official aid
missions, it restricts individual foreign travel by physicians, arguing
that it has made too heavy investment in training them to see them
freely emigrate for higher salaries elsewhere.
Molina was a prominent neurosurgeon at a government institution until
1994, when she resigned after questioning the ethics of using human stem
cell tissue in studies on treating ailments such as Parkinson's disease.
That same year her son Roberto Quinones left the country with his
Argentine wife.
Daughter-in-law Veronica de Quinones told Argentine cable channel Todo
Noticias that she did not know if Molina would stay in Argentina or
return to Cuba.
Molina's son told Radio 10 that new news "surprised all the family with
great joy, because it something we have wanted for many years."
Cuba drops ban on letting doctor leave island - Yahoo! News (12 June 2009)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090612/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_argentina_cuba_2
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