Migration Normalcy: Havana's Dialogue with Washington before the Balsero Crisis.

In April 1993, just days after Roberto Robaina became Cuba's foreign minister, he received a proposal for migration talks from the United States, the world's only superpower and the greatest threat to his government. Havana did not want their return, as it had already denounced all Mariel Cubans as "scums", supposedly seduced by a false promise of U.S. "paradise."[17] After months of U.S.-Cuban negotiations in 1984, however, the regime agreed to take 2,746 Cubans on the U.S. list. Because Havana chose not to disclose the U.S. part of the obligation to protect U.S. diplomats from further media inquiries, the agreement appeared to be no more than Havana's unilateral concession - in the eyes of both the U.S. and Cuban public. The U.S. government should focus on its own job as the defense of the borders surrounding Guantánamo "cannot be the task and obligation exclusively assigned to Cuban authorities."[44] An article published in I Bohemia i , a popular weekly magazine, argued that one of the "true causes" of these Guantánamo incidents was the very existence of the U.S. base "maintained by force in violation of Cuba's sovereignty." Complemented with analysis of the making of U.S. migration diplomacy, this study of Cuban emigration strategies goes beyond a U.S.-centric view, describes the transnational dynamics of U.S.-Cuban relations, and illuminates the overlooked diplomatic origins of the Balsero crisis. [Extracted from the article]