Mexico Probes Corruption In Cubans’ Case

By MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press Writer

MEXICO CITY (AP) – The Mexican government said Friday it has fired two officials who oversaw immigration offices on the Caribbean coast because they contradicted themselves under questioning in the case of 33 Cubans snatched from government custody.

Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino also said that charges have been brought against “a significant number of immigration agents and officials,” but he did not specify how many or what those charges were.

Mourino said the two officials – who oversaw immigration offices on the Caribbean coast, where undocumented Cuban migrants increasingly land – were fired “because of the significant number of contradictions and inconsistencies” in their stories about the June 11 assault.

“Whether the investigation results in charges against the regional director and assistant director, their behavior was far from correct, and that is why they were removed,” Mourino told reporters.

The undocumented Cubans were taken by armed men from a bus carrying them to a government immigration detention center in southern Mexico. Some of the Cubans were later found in South Texas.

Mourino also expressed concern that the migrants were not detained at several checkpoints on their way to the United States.

Mourino said the migrants had falsified immigration papers, suggesting the gunmen were working for smugglers eager to get the Cubans to the United States.

According to authorities, the Cubans said they were taken to a safe house in the Gulf port of Veracruz, where the fake documents were made.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)