After being intercepted near the Florida coast, 69 Cuban raftsmen were repatriated to Cuba this Wednesday, January 24, according to an informative note from the United States Coast Guard (USCG).
In one of the three operations that arrested the Cubans, a Good Samaritan alerted the Key West Sector Coast Guard to a sailboat near John Pennekamp Park on Sunday afternoon.
Later that day, she was sighted by a Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater plane, a “wooden boat,” about 25 miles off Sugar Loaf Key.
In a third operation, one of the crews of the Air and Maritime Operations Service of Customs and Border Protection reported Monday 23rd .) approximately eighteen miles north of Matanzas, Cuba.”
“Illegal immigration to the United States is treacherous, and you could lose your life along the way. Please use the safe and legal means at your disposal to come to the United States,” Lt. Matt Miller of the Coast Guard 7th District.
According to a report by Project for missing migrants According to the International Organization for Migration, 69 Cuban migrants died in the Caribbean Sea in 2022.
Since Oct. 1, when the current fiscal year began, U.S. authorities have intercepted 5,321 Cubans, according to USCG reports, a number that’s growing by the day and just 861 fewer than the entirety of fiscal 2022, in which 6,182 raftsmen were intercepted.