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 | Tuesday, May 02, 2000, updated at 13:14(GMT+8) | ||||||||||||
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Elian's Father Seeks to Return to Cuba with SonJuan Miguel Gonzalez, the father of the six-year-old Cuban shipwreck survivor, Monday called a US appeals court to dismiss an asylum filed by their relatives in Florida and to let him go back to Cuba with his son, Elian.Gregory Craig, the attorney for Gonzalez, said in a court filing document that the US Immigration and (INS) was correct in determining in January that Elian belonged with his father in Cuba. "Juan Miguel has determined that Elian's best interests lie in being with his father, raised in a stable home environment in the town where his father, stepmother, little brother, grandparents and first cousins were born, grew up and now live," Craig said. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals based in Atlanta ruled last month that Elian should stay in the United States until the court rules on the asylum filed by the Miami relatives on behalf of the boy. "This father seeks to raise his family where he wants and how he wants. This right is no less important to people from Cuba than it is to Americans," Craig said. Juan Miguel arrived early last month to claim the custody of Elian, who had been taken care of by his relatives in Miami after the boy was rescued on November 25 when his mother were drowned in the Atlantic after their boat capsized. The Miami relatives have refused to hand over the boy to his father. But the boy was snatched away from their home in Miami in an operation by the federal agents and then returned to the father a week ago. The Gonzalez family now stays in Wye Plantation, Maryland waiting for a court hearing on whether Elian should stay in the US or not. Craig also attacked Elian's great uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, who refused to turn over Elian to his father and filed the political asylum for the boy. "Lazaro has used this nation's legal system in an attempt to destroy Juan Miguel's family. He now threatens to rob Elian of a childhood at his home with his father, his family and his friends. Nothing in law or humanity should compel such a result," Craig said. The Miami relatives also arrived in Washington after Elian was removed from them. Their request to see the boy was rejected by Juan Miguel.
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