US on guard for Cuba migration after Castro

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2008

MIAMI (AFP) — US authorities do not predict a fresh wave of Cuban migration amid political power-shifts on the communist island, but say they are on guard, after a string of regional migration crises.

As Cuba readies to name a new president Sunday, the Miami-based US Southern Command says it will await a Pentagon order if the Coast Guard needs backup in the Florida Straits, shark-infested waters between the US state of Florida and Cuba.

"We are not foreseeing at this point that any migrant crisis is going to take place, but if it were to happen, the Southern Command will join in if asked by the Homeland Security Department and ordered to by the Defense Department," the command's spokesman Jose Ruiz told AFP.

"We will provide support with navy ships if the...