FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Reps. Green, Salazar, and Giménez Demand Justice for Trafficked Cuban Doctors
WASHINGTON—Today, Rep. Mark Green (TN-07) led a letter with Rep. Maria Salazar (FL-27) and Rep. Carlos Giménez (FL-28) to the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) regarding its actions to avoid accountability for the help it provided the Cuban regime in trafficking thousands of doctors and healthcare professionals to Brazil between 2013 and 2018.
Background: A group of Cuban doctors is suing PAHO for playing a major role in trafficking over 10,000 Cuban doctors to Brazil in violation of Brazilian, U.S., and international law. PAHO also funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to the Cuban government and pocketed at least $75 million in return. Additionally, PAHO is a Washington-based organization receiving tens of millions of dollars in U.S. taxpayer funding every year.
The lawmakers wrote: “PAHO’s determination to drag the case out endlessly by both preventing full disclosure of its conduct, and also consistently delaying and denying the doctors whose wages were confiscated by PAHO and Cuba their day in court, is unconscionable.”
The lawmakers continued: “The U.S. Government has the right and responsibility to demand that U.S. taxpayers not subsidize an organization that engages in and profits from human trafficking.”
In conclusion, the lawmakers demanded the conclusions of an independent investigation into PAHO’s role in the Mais Medicos program: “[I]t is now close to three years since that announcement, and PAHO has not released the Venable, or any, report to the State Department, to Members of Congress, or to the Plaintiffs’ lawyers in the litigation. The State Department, several inquiring Members of Congress, and the plaintiffs have been informed that as long as the litigation is pending, PAHO will not release the report. That attitude is unacceptable.”
Read the letter here.
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