21 Cuban Dancers Defect to Mexico after Participating in Carnival Celebrations Agence France-Presse
go to original February 19, 2013

Twenty-one Cuban dancers missed a flight home after participating in carnival celebrations and may have defected from their communist-led homeland, officials said Tuesday.

The Cubans were among 93 members of a dance troupe named Guaracheros de la Regla that performed in the eastern state of Veracruz last week, but failed to board their February 14 flight to Havana, the National Migration Institute said.

"The fact that they decided to defect, or whatever it might be called, is a matter for another jurisdiction that has nothing to do with state or municipal authorities," said Veracruz Governor Javier Duarte de Ochoa.

The migration institute said it was not searching for the Cubans or emitting an alert because they are in Mexico legally with six-month visas that only bars them from working.

Cubans have defected from the island for years, often taking risky boat rides to the nearby US state of Florida.

The Cuban government eased its much-hated travel restrictions on January 14, scrapping a special exit permit that was required to leave the island.

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