With arrival of the Cuban Little League U12 Softball Girl’s team (Palmar) in Miami on a flight bound for Puerto Rico bound for a little league tournament, the delegation suffered a defection. This is something that has been very common as of late for these types of delegations.
The person who defected from the Cuban U12 squad was none other than one of its coaches Annia Hernández Peñalver who abandoned the delegation at approximately 3PM (Miami time) and turned herself in to Customs and Border Patrol officials in order to start the processing to claim political asylum in the United States.
The team who actually missed its connecting flight in Miami is scheduled to leave tomorrow for San Juan and will participate in a tournament commencing tomorrow in Guanica, Puerto Rico. The girls squad will play in the Latin American Region scheduled from July 8-13 and return to the island.
In an increasing humanitarian crisis in Cuba, food shortages and power outages has caused plenty of Cuban sports professionals to leave the island. Players defecting from a delegation has become a common theme and will continue to happen as long as the economic turmoil persists in the communists. Peñalver is not the first and definitely will not be the last defection a Cuban delegation will see in the near future.