After years of being staffed sparsely, the United States announced that it would increase its staff in Havana’s embassy and offer limited immigrant visa services.
Timothy Zuniga Brown, the top diplomat at the U.S Embassy in Havana, made the announcement during a press conference.
The U.S. Embassy, Georgetown, Guyana will continue to be the main location for processing visas.
In 2017, the Trump administration reduced embassy staff due to unspecified health issues known as the Havana Syndrome that affected personnel and their families. The embassy’s ability process visas has been affected by a very small staff since then.
Guyana was the destination for visa processing. However, most Cubans find it very expensive to travel to other countries for visas. Cuba ranks among the top 10 countries that have the most people waiting on the family-sponsored immigration waiting list with nearly 91,000.
The number of Cuban immigrants arriving in the U.S. has increased. According to Customs and Border Protection data, there were more than 39,000 Cuban migrants in fiscal year 2022.
The drawdown of the embassy staff was one of many actions that then-President Donald Trump took in order to reverse former President Barack Obama’s historic thawing relations with the communist-run Island.
This is President Joe Biden’s first attempt to reverse the previous administration’s Cuban policies. The current policies have been reviewed for more than a year. Biden had previously campaigned for easing Trump’s travel restrictions and remittances restrictions. Instead, the Biden administration sanctioned additional Cuban entities as well as individuals in response to the historic protests of July last year.
Cuba has not experienced any cases of the “Havana syndrome” in recent years. Canada, whose consular staff were also affected, cut its staff by half. However, it still offers consular services.
