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Only one of the three categories agreed upon was fulfilled at a higher level, once the agreement came into effect again, namely, that pertaining to counterrevolutionaries sentenced with prison terms and their relatives. The quota for this category was fulfilled at 71.71 percent during the eight years in which the agreement was applied, while the quota of 20,000 a year for Cuban nationals who wanted to migrate to the United States was fulfilled only at 7.01 percent. And with regard to the commitment to grant, above and beond that 20,000, an additional number of "immigrant visas to residents of Cuba who are parents, spouses and unmarried children under 21 years of age of United States citizens", without including these visas in the annual number of immigrants previously indicated, it can be inferred from the abovementioned figures that it was fulfilled at 0 percent.

Of the total number of visas that should have been granted in accordance with the quota of up to 20,000 a year, which should have added up to 160,000 from the time the agreement was signed - that is, over the course of eight years, not taking into account the two years during which the agreement was suspended - only 11,222 were granted, i. e., 14.3 times fewer than stipulated.

According to our estimates - although we do not know the exact number of people of Cuban origin who have become and continue to become U.S. citizens throughout more than 25 years of legal and illegal migration to that country - close to 200,000 people did not receive visas. If the two years of the suspension caused by the provocation of the subversive radio station are taken into account, the number of those who did not receive visas, would be over 240,000 since the agreements were signed.

The United States failed spectacularly in fulfilling the agreements, and unscrupulously dodged the commitments it had made, while our country was humiliatingly deceived. Cuba, for its part, fulfilled to the letter its obligations under the agreement; it facilitated legal departures, and did not fail to receive a single one of the individuals on the list of excludables, who were sent back to Cuba. At the same time, despite the solemn promise made by the U.S. administration as part of the agreement, when it expressed its willingness "to implement - with the cooperation of the Cuban authorities - all necessary measures to ensure that Cuban nationals residing in Cuba wishing to emigrate to the United States and who qualify under United States law to receive immigrant visas, may enter the United States, taking maximum advantage of the number of up to 20,000 immigrants per year", the Cuban Adjustment Act, the main incentive for illegal exits, remained in full force.

Reagan, who had sufficient authority and ample support from Congress, and who could have repealed this law after signing the commitment to adopt all necessary measures to ensure that entry into the United States took place through legal means, did not do so. Either did the Bush administration. And the Clinton administration, which had a broad majority in Congress until January of 1995, was not even interested in the issue.

The fact is that as the agreement continued to be unfulfilled and the number of visas granted for legal travel to the United States decreased every year, the number of people who attempted to migrate to that country illegally increased every year:

2,060 in 1990;

8,593 in 1991;

9,584 in 1992;

15,772 in 1993;

and 15,067 in just the first half of 1994, for a total of 51,076 in four and a half years.

Those who actually arrived in the United States numbered as follows:

467 in 1990;

1,997 in 1991;

2,511 in 1992;

4,208 in 1993;

and 4,092 in the first half of 1994, for a total of 13,275.

During that period, in spite of the total lack of cooperation on the part of the U.S. government, the Cuban authorities managed to prevent the departure of three illegal migrants for every four who attempted to leave, which demonstrates the seriousness with which we assumed our commitment to normalize the flow of migrants. Despite Cuba's unilateral efforts, in the first half of 1994, the number of Cuban migrants who illegally arrived in the United States was 7.5 times higher than the 544 visas granted out of the quota of up to 20,000 visas that the United States should have granted for legal travel on the basis of the agreement signed.

Shortly after taking power, the Clinton administration, far from discouraging illegal migration in order to fulfill the commitments of this agreement, intensified the economic blockade against our country, at a time when the collapse of the socialist block and the disintegration of the USSR resulted in Cuba's loss of its main markets and most important sources of supplies of fuel, raw materials and equipment, as well as a significant part of its supplies of grain and other essential food commodities.

Months before assuming office, Clinton had already supported the bill introduced by Congressman Torricelli, a Democrat, which was approved by the U.S. Congress in 1992 and signed by President Bush on October 23 of that year. Some time later, already in office, Clinton would sign on March 12, 1996 - in the presence of the most notorious leaders of the Cuban-American National Foundation and its closest allies in Congress - the brutal Helms-Burton Act.

The huge accumulated potential of over 240,000 people who waited throughout ten years for the visas promised in the agreements signed on December 14, 1984, together with the Cuban Adjustment Act and a tightened blockade, in addition to over a thousand hours a week of incessant subversive propaganda and political and psychological warfare waged from the United States, encouraging social indiscipline, crime and illegal migration, inevitably had to cause - and eventually did cause - a serious migration crisis.

The total impunity and incentives with which all those who illegally left Cuba were received in the United States, were contributing to all sorts of acts of violence, the use of weapons, and even the murder of humble crew members or security guards during the hijacking of boats used to illegally migrate to the United States.

From the very first moment, the Cuban authorities were instructed not to attempt to intercept stolen or hijacked boats departing from the docks or coasts with people on board. These instructions were necessary in order to avoid accidents, for which our country would always be held responsible.

Earlier, precise instructions had been given not to use weapons under any circumstances to prevent such departures. Our country had no obligation to protect the coasts of the United States. Cuba, which had always authorized legal migration, finally ceased assuming sole responsibility for all efforts to combat illegal exits, while these exits were increasingly encouraged from the country where these illegal migrants were headed to. Our authorities limited themselves to trying to dissuade those attempting to leave with inadequate means of transportation, and to observing from their patrol boats those attempting to leave in one way or another, providing help when necessary, as they approached the numerous U.S. Coast Guard vessels awaiting them near the 12-mile limit of our territorial waters. Under these circumstances, only one thing could happen. This is how the third migration crisis arose.

Communications were established once again between the governments of the two countries through different channels. At no time did Cuba back away from the search for a genuine solution. As a result of intense negotiations between delegations from the United States and Cuba, which took place in New York, and with the cooperation of common friends of the United States and Cuba, the two sides eventually agreed upon certain formulas. While these were not linked to an end to the economic warfare against our country - a major factor spurring illegal migration - they included once again, and seriously this time as it appears, measures such as the granting of no less than 20,000 visas annually for legal and safe migration to the United States, and on this occasion, the commitment for the U.S. Coast Guard to intercept beyond Cuba's territorial waters those attempting to illegally migrate, and to send them back to Cuba. Our commitment was that those returned would be sent back to their place of residence with the guarantee that they would not be sanctioned in any way for attempting to leave the country illegally. This has been fulfilled in the case of all the people returned, without exception.

For our part, we committed ourselves to halting mass migration without the use of force, relying entirely on persuasive methods. The adoption of this procedure was a Cuban proposal.

Once again, with mathematical exactitude, we fulfilled this commitment, and we did it in just a few days, without resorting to the use of force at any moment, with the cooperation of the people and the proper use of the mass media to explain the contents and the fairness of the agreement. We set a deadline for the owners of vessels located on the coasts for migration purposes to remove them. The owners themselves cooperated. Means of transportation that could be used for illegal migration were intercepted on land. All this was easy to achieve. The combination of measures adopted at that moment by both sides almost totally paralyzed illegal exits from the country.

If we leave aside the fact that the U.S. authorities always select a percentage of illegal migrants for reasons that are neither explained nor clearly justifiable, which we suspect of being politically motivated to appease the die-hard enemies of the agreements, we can state that the migration agreements have been essentially fulfilled by both sides, in a rigorous and serious manner:

Close to 80 percent of illegal migrants intercepted at sea have been returned to the country.

No fewer than 20,000 visas have been granted to Cuban nationals each year since the agreements came into effect.

According to figures supplied by the Immigration and Aliens Department of the Ministry of the Interior, between October 1, 1994 and September 30, 1995, its offices received 26,634 citizens with visas granted by the U.S. Interests Section.

III PART