Cuba Travel News and Information
Cuba News and Information
The Miami Herald
The U.S. Coast Guard handed down new restrictions Thursday on U.S. boaters heading to Cuba from the United States.
Under new regulations published in the Federal Register, U.S. vessels less than 100 meters long must have a new Coast Guard permit in order to travel from U.S. to Cuban territorial waters.
In order to obtain the permit, applicants will have to first provide the Coast Guard with ‘’evidence’’ that they have appropriate licenses from the U.S. Departments of Commerce and Treasury to travel to Cuba.
Those caught traveling from Cuba without a Coast Guard permit face a civil penalty of up to $25,000 for each day they are in violation and could receive an immediate, $10,000 ‘’ticket’’ from the Coast Guard. Passengers on boats the Coast Guard stops and believes are heading to Cuba may be asked to provide verbal assurances that they are not going to Cuba, according to a Coast Guard spokesman.
The new rules do away with a three-mile ‘’security zone’’ around the Florida Peninsula. Boaters previously had to apply for Coast Guard permission to exit the security zone with the intention of entering Cuban seas.
The ban on travel to Cuba may not “actually” be a ban and violation of the US Constitution because technically Americans can travel to Cuba but they can’t spend any money there.
NOW, the US government will have the right to stop any boat at sea just to ask if they are going to Cuba?
Outrageous.
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This is not a comment persae but an inquiry. Does this regulation effect only US Citizens eaving from a US port or does it also effect Canadians boats that leave from Key West or any other Florida port with Cuba as the destination for vacation time.
