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NEWS
Cuban writer
stranded abroad demands right to decide when to go home
By ANITA SNOW
20 October 2006
HAVANA (AP) - A Cuban writer of detective novels and a new nonfiction
book about prostitution on the communist-run island says he has not
defected to Germany, but he doesn't know when -- or if -- he can return
home.
Amir Valle, now living in Berlin with his wife and their 5-year-old son,
says he planned to return to Cuba in a few months when he left the
island last fall for a book tour in Europe.
Despite differences with his government, "I had decided to remain in
Cuba because I feel that from there my way of thinking and acting is
most valid," Valle said.
But a year later, the celebrated 40-year-old author he says he lacks
papers from his own government allowing him to return. After months of
confusion about his migratory status, Valle now says that if he is
allowed back in Cuba, he'll return only on his own terms and timing.
"Many Cuban intellectuals have spent years asking for this absurd
regulation for entering and departing the country to be annulled," Valle
wrote from Berlin in a series of e-mail exchanges this week with The
Associated Press in Havana. "We have not received any answer, except for
the classic, 'It's under discussion.' "
Citing national security concerns, Cuba is among few countries requiring
citizens to obtain a government "exit permit" to leave, both for
temporary stays abroad and to emigrate.
Valle said he agreed to be interviewed in hopes of clarifying his
position and dispelling recent reports that he defected. He said
comments earlier this month at the Frankfurt Book Fair were misquoted,
leading some to believe he was seeking exile.
"My intention has not been to 'stay' in the classic sense," Valle wrote,
referring to Cubans who use trips abroad to leave the island for good.
Rather, Valle said, he demands "my right to return to Cuba when I deem
it convenient in accord with my current international commitments."
Why Valle currently does not have Cuban government paperwork allowing
him to return is unclear.
It's not uncommon for Cubans to overstay exit permits, creating problems
with immigration authorities back home that can take years to resolve.
Valle, accompanied on his trip by his wife, Berta, said he applied in
time to renew his exit permit for a longer stay, but the government
never responded.
Valle said he thinks his migratory woes are the result of official
displeasure over his book about prostitution, recently published by
Planeta of Spain as "Jineteras."
Valle's dark novels describing prostitutes, drug dealers, black market
vendors and others on the margins of Cuban society have received
official acclaim and several won national awards in Cuba.
But "Jineteras" is about real people, and includes extensive interviews
with some involved in illegal ventures on the island, including a
prostitute Valle says was famous in the 1990s.
The Cuban government has not officially commented on Valle's case.
But a woman in the international relations department of the official
Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba, which handled the paperwork for
Valle's trip abroad, disputed his story this week.
Declining to give her name, she angrily insisted that Valle's exit
permit was extended in March and the documents delivered to the Cuban
Embassy in Madrid. She offered no details, including how long the
extension was.
Valle said he first heard about the extension last month -- six months
after it reportedly was issued -- when he visited the Cuban Consulate in
Berlin to deal with his wife's migratory problems. He said the consular
official who told him about it never got back to him with details.
Valle said he planned a three-month trip when he left Cuba in October
2005 to promote his new novel at the Semana Negra de Gijon festival.
Like his earlier detective novels, "Santuario de Sombras," or "Sanctuary
of Shadows," follows police Lt. Alain Bec and his sidekick Alex Vega
through the dark side of Cuban life -- in this case the world of illegal
migrant trafficking.
After the book tour, the novel's publisher Almuzara of Spain invited
Valle to stay for a literary jury and Valle requested an extension on
his exit permit in late December.
Meanwhile, the buzz over "Jineteras" was heating up and Valle said he
gave several interviews in which he criticized his government and
probably irritated authorities.
Valle said government officials didn't like the book, which he says has
circulated widely through photocopies passed among friends.
Though he doesn't belong to Cuba's organized opposition, Valle said his
friendships with several well-known dissidents probably haven't endeared
him to officials, either.
"Although he has publicly criticized the government, he has always told
me that he wants to stay in Cuba," said moderate dissident historian
Manuel Cuesta Morua, who called Valle one of the most important Cuban
writers of his generation.
Valle said he traveled to Germany in the spring when his Spanish visa
expired to take a six-month fellowship, then later took his current
yearlong fellowship with the PEN Germany Writers in Exile program.
Valle and his wife were recently reunited with their child after their
government agreed to let him to travel to Berlin, where they now try to
sort out their future.
"I am not asking the Cuban government to let me enter the country,"
Valle said. "I am demanding my right to enter and leave when I decide
and am in condition to do so -- just like any other citizen of the
world."
---
Associated Press Writer David McHugh in Berlin contributed to this
report.
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