U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has announced the expansion of an existing Cuba-related visa restriction policy that targets forced labor linked to the Cuban labor export program.
That program, as the State Department noted in a fact sheet earlier this year, sends tens of thousands of Cuban workers around world under multi-year cooperation agreements negotiated with receiving countries. The majority of the workers are medical professionals, and the Cuban government collects between $6 billion to $8 billion annually from its export of services.
The Cuban government promotes the program as altruistic, but the State Department noted that international observers and former participants say it is exploitive and coercive. In 2021, over 1,100 participants filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court and the UN. The majority reported that they did not volunteer for the program but were forcibly separated from their families. Most were subjected to surveillance, forbidden to interact with locals, restricted in their movements, given subsistence pay, and threatened with punitive measures, including loss of property, if they failed to return to Cuba.
Secretary Rubio noted in a statement that not only does the Cuban labor export program enrich the Cuban regime, in the case of its overseas medical mission, it deprives Cubans of medical care desperately needed at home.
The expansion of the existing Cuba-related visa restriction policy by the United States, said Secretary Rubio, “applies to current and former Cuban officials who are believed to be responsible for, or involved in, the Cuban labor export program, particularly [its] overseas medical missions.” It also applies to their immediate families. Secretary Rubio added that the State Department has already taken steps to impose visa restrictions on several individuals, including Venezuelans, under the expanded policy.
“The United States is committed to countering forced labor practices around the globe,” declared Secretary Rubio. “To do so, we must promote accountability for Cuban officials responsible for these policies, but also those complicit in the exploitation and forced labor of Cuban workers.”
