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Friday, January 7, 2000
Protesters disrupt Miami over Elian decision
Cuban boy's American family plans to request a federal restraining order
Associated Press
MIAMI - Hundreds of Cuban-Americans chanting "Liberty! Liberty!" blocked intersections and cut off access to the Port of Miami on Thursday to protest the U.S. government's decision to return 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez to his father in Cuba.
Police arrested about 80 people, including two prominent Cuban exile leaders, for refusing to disperse.
In Washington, Attorney General Janet Reno essentially ruled out any chance she will reverse Wednesday's decision by the Immigration and Naturalization Service to send the boy back to the communist island.
The boy was found Thanksgiving Day clinging to an inner tube at sea after his mother, stepfather and eight other people drowned while trying to reach Florida by boat.
He has been living in Miami with his paternal great-uncle and great-aunt.
A source close to the family said Elian's relatives told him he may be returning to Cuba and he said he did not want to go.
Lawyers for the boy's American relatives asked Reno to reverse the decision and planned to request a restraining order from a federal judge.
The INS has until Jan. 14 to send the boy back.
In Miami, several hundred protesters gathered outside a downtown federal building, pushed back police barricades and marched several blocks to the Port of Miami, where most of the arrests were made.
About 50 officers in riot gear guarded the port's entrance in the shadow of Freedom Tower, a former customs building where many Cubans entered the United States in the 1960s.
Police arrested people who sat on the pavement and others who crossed police lines.
Those arrested included Cuban exile leaders Ramon Sanchez, head of the Democracy Movement, and Jose Basulto, founder of Brothers to the Rescue, an anti-Castro group.
Elsewhere, small groups of protesters intermittently blocked intersections.
Gov. Jeb Bush lifted tolls on highways near protests to relieve rush-hour congestion.
At least 10 people carrying a large Cuban flag sat down in the middle of a main downtown street, crippling traffic during a downpour.
During the morning rush-hour, two dump trucks and a pickup truck slowed all three lanes of downtown-bound traffic to about 20 mph on the major east-west route in Miami.
The Florida Highway Patrol issued several citations and threatened to arrest drivers slowing traffic.
American officials had suggested that Elian's father come to Florida to get his son.
The U.S. National Council of Churches said the boy's relatives in Cuba want the organization to bring the boy back.
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© 1999 Caller-Times Publishing Company,
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