MIAMI — At the request of the Cuban government, American Airlines did not allow Cuban activist Anamely Ramos to board a flight at Miami International Airport bound for Havana on Wednesday.
Ramos, an art professor and member of the opposition group San Isidro Movement, was trying to return to Havana from Miami, where she was visiting, when airline employees prevented her from boarding, telling her that the island’s authorities were denying her entry into the country.
The Cuban government has frequently denied entry to opponents and activists, but usually after they’ve already arrived on the island. Ramos is one of the voices most critical of the government within the group of artists and academics that make up the San Isidro Movement.
“Right now I have no country, nowhere to return to, no residence in any other country in the world, no visa to anywhere and here I am,” she said in an interview with the Miami Herald outside Versailles restaurant in Little Havana.
Ramos described American Airlines’ actions as “unfortunate.”
“No protocol can be above the human rights of a person,” she said.
The activist said that she met with several officials from Miami International Airport and American Airlines. The airline employees told her that they had to follow the protocol and abide by the decision of the Cuban government. According to Ramos, they also said that the island’s authorities had not communicated to the airline the reason why she could not enter the country.
“Cuba’s border cannot be at the Miami airport, it cannot be at American Airlines’ gate,” Ramos said during a press conference at the airport. “If the Cuban government doesn’t want to let me in for some reason, they have to solve it with me in Cuba.”
In a statement sent to the Herald, American Airlines said it had no choice but to deny her boarding the plane.
“American was notified the passenger is prohibited from returning to Cuba, and would not be allowed entry into the country,” the statement said. “In every country where we operate, entry requirements and traveler admissibility are determined by each country’s authorities, not by airlines. American had no discretion or choice in this matter.”
Most of the Cubans who have been denied entry by the government are residents or citizens of other nations, so they have been able to take flights back to the country where they live. But Ramos’ case is different because she legally resides in Havana and is in the United States on a visitor’s visa that expires in April. Since the visa allows only one entry, she would not be able to return to the U.S. if an American Airlines plane took her to Cuba and the island’s government did not allow her to enter.
“This is an immigration problem that transcends me,” she said at the press conference. “Cuba is causing an immigration problem with the United States.”
Following the islandwide demonstrations last July, the government jailed around 1,300 protesters, according to activist estimates, and has pressured several opponents to leave the country. Ramos recently drew attention again on social media to the imprisonment of two members of the San Isidro Movement, the artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and the rapper Maykel Castillo, both in jail since July 11 and in poor health, according to their relatives.
“What is happening to Anamely Ramos touches all of us who are abroad,” said Claudia Genlui, a member of the San Isidro Movement who lives in Miami and is the partner of Otero Alcántara. “I don’t think anyone has the authority to decide who enters and leaves a country that belongs to us and of which she is a citizen.”
Ramos told the Herald that she would continue to protest in a public place in Miami until her case is resolved.
“I insist that the Cuban state cannot continue carrying out this type of arbitrariness with its citizens,” she said. “My right to go back is legitimate.”
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