By Dalia Acosta
HAVANA, Jun 2 2000 (IPS)

Hundreds of thousands of women marched on the United States Interests Section in the Cuban capital Friday to protest the new delay in the return of six-year-old Elián González from the United States.

“Down With Lies, Bring Back Elián!” chanted the demonstrators, who numbered around 500,000 according to official estimates. The protest was called by the government of Fidel Castro Thursday evening, after a federal appeals court in Atlanta ruled that Elián could not apply for political asylum against the wishes of his father Juan Miguel González.

The appeals court ruled that an asylum petition signed by Elián while he lived with his relatives in Miami provided no basis for an Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS) asylum hearing, as demanded by the boy’s relations in the US.

But the three judges also ruled that the boy had to remain in the United States for at least 14 days, to give his Miami relatives a chance to appeal.

“United in the noble and humanitarian objective of the release and return of the boy and his family to the fatherland where they were born and wish to live, the people of the United States and Cuba will win out in the end,” stated an official communique published by the government-monopolised press Friday.

The text appeals to US public opinion while lashing out at Washington, stating that “vacillation by the authorities, opportunism and political cowardliness” were standing in the way of Elián’s return to Cuba, while the “interminable, muddy and arbitrary” legal custody battle dragged on.

The government of Fidel Castro is displeased with Thursday’s legal ruling, which was welcomed however in Washington by the boy’s father and his US lawyer Gregory Craig, who said there was no longer any uncertainty as to the final outcome of the case.

Although the verdict recognised Juan Miguel González’s right to speak for his son, it rejected Craig’s request that the boy’s father be recognised as Elián’s only representative in the case.

It also designated the boy’s great-uncle, Lázaro González, in whose Miami home Elián lived for nearly five months, as the boy’s “close friend.”

The dean of the University Havana law faculty, José Luis Toledo, criticised the court’s description of Lázaro González – who he described as Elián’s “primary kidnapper…who has known no bounds in disobeying the decisions of US authorities” – as a “close friend.”

Local analysts said the court decision, which stated that “no one should doubt if plaintiff returns to Cuba, he will be without the degree of liberty that people enjoy in the United States,” was unjustifiably politicised.

Elián was rescued at sea off the coast of Florida on Nov 25 by two men on a fishing expedition, after the boat in which he and 13 others were attempting to make it to the United States sank. His mother, Elizabeth Brotons, and 10 others drowned.

Elián was turned over to Lázaro González in the Little Havana neighbourhood of Miami. After a lengthy inquiry, the INS concluded on Jan 5 that his father was the only person who could speak for him, and set a Jan 14 deadline for his return to Cuba.

But Elián remained in the United States, caught up in a complex custody battle, and his father, who has been fighting for his return from the very start, flew to the United States in early April.

The six-year-old was only reunited with his father on Apr 20, after he was removed by federal marshalls from the home of Lázaro González.

“How long will this go on?” asked Ondina Hernández, 47, one of the thousands of women who gathered early Friday morning in a Havana square to march towards the US Interests Section.

“Here we all want Elián to come home,” Hernández told IPS. “We want it for him, for his family, and for ourselves as well. We have been protesting, holding open tribunals and round table discussions on TV for six months, and we will not rest until he is allowed to come back.”

For the first time since it called the campaign demanding Elián’s return, the government warned Thursday that there would be “public transport difficulties” as a result of Friday’s demonstration, and possibly on following days as well.

US Attorney-General Janet Reno warned that even if Elián’s Miami relations did not appeal to the Supreme Court, it would be at least three weeks before the boy could return to Cuba.

But former US attorney-general Ramsey Clark told a Cuban television reporter by telephone that if the case were appealed, the Supreme Court might not hand down a ruling until after the summer recess, which ends Oct 1.

Juan Miguel González’s lawyer said the problem was no longer whether his client could speak for his son, but when he could do so. Craig also urged the Miami Gonzalezes to accept the legal ruling with grace and dignity, and to allow Elián to go home without appealing the decision.

The Cuban government considers the retention of the boy, and consequently of his father, stepmother and half-brother, as “kidnapping.” It maintains that the real aim underlying the continued delays in Elián’s return to Cuba is to persuade Juan Miguel González to seek political asylum for himself and his son.

Parliamentary Deputy Lázaro Barredo said “political factors have prevailed over legal aspects” in the Elián case, and that the “continuing and premeditated delays” were aimed at satisfying the interests of the influential hard-line anti-Castro sector of the Cuban exile community in Miami.

Excerpt: