A senior official at the Interior Ministry of Cuba, which has been sanctioned by the United States for its role in human rights violations, was granted a visa to travel to New York as part of the Cuban delegation attending the United Nations General Assembly.
Colonel Mario Méndez Mayedo, who oversees the ministry's department handling migration and foreign citizen issues, was not mentioned in the Cuban Foreign Ministry's list of delegation members. But an op-ed published by the local news outlet Cubadebate identified him as present at a meeting with Cuban Americans at the country's mission to the U.N.
The U.S. State Department stated that it takes seriously its obligations under the U.N. Headquarters Agreement, which includes the issuance of visas for certain travel to the U.N. headquarters.
Méndez has not been publicly photographed with the Cuban delegation during U.N. events, and it appears he did not travel to engage in discussions with Biden administration officials about migration, according to the Miami Herald.
Méndez has been included in a Miami-based Human Rights Foundation database for his alleged involvement in human rights violations, including restrictions on dissidents leaving or entering the country.
Cuban migrants keep a close eye on officials who travel to the U.S. or seek to do so. The Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba recently compiled a database including over 1,000 people who, it says, were part of the government and engaged in surveillance, harassment, bullying and the imprisonment of dissidents and peaceful demonstrators, and now want to go to the U.S.
Rolando Cartaya, a researcher for the organization, said 115 of those individuals are already living in the country. They include former high-ranking officials in the Communist Party, Interior Ministry officials, police officers, government attorneys and judges.
"These people who repressed us, who beat us, are living and enjoying freedom in this great country," said Elixir Arando, a member of the organization, in a press conference covered by the Miami Herald.
Attendants added that while former regime members have been moving to the U.S. for years, those included in the list have not publicly repudiated it and could pose a "national security" threat, Arando said during a passage of the conference.
Many have been entering the country through the CHNV humanitarian program that allows Cubans, along with Venezuelans, Haitians and Nicaraguans, to apply for asylum in the country.
More recently, Florida Republicans sent a letter to the Biden administration questioning how such officials were authorized to enter the country. The letter focuses one former official in particular and was addressed to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. It was signed by Florida Republican Rresentatives Mario Díaz-Balart, Carlos Giménez and Maríia Elvira Salazar, as well as Senators Marco Rubio and Rick Scott.
"Given this prohibition in U.S. law, it would seem likely to us that a high-level, longtime Cuban Communist Party member and agent of that brutal dictatorship would be inadmissible for U.S. entry," the letter adds, in reference to Manuel Menendez Castellanos, who according to Cuban outlets was a secretary in the party and close to Fidel Castro.
In July, Florida Republicans also introduced legislation aimed at banning states considered to be sponsors of terrorism from accessing TSA areas, following generalized uproar in the state due to a visit from Cuban officials to Miami International Airport.
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