The United States is set to remove Cuba from the bottom tier on its list of worst human trafficking centers, U.S. sources said, in what will be another step in the historic rapprochement between the former Cold War foes.
The upgrade would lift Cuba to the so-called "Tier 2 Watch List" from Tier 3, where it has languished for 12 years due to allegations of sex trafficking and what U.S. authorities have previously described as “coerced labor with Cuban government work missions abroad.” ...
...Senator Robert Menendez, a Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who has been a harsh critic of Obama’s Cuba policy, said forced labor continues in Cuba with the conscription of doctors and medical personnel to work overseas.
“It’s shocking. There is nothing that the Cubans have done to improve their standing,” said Menendez, who is the son of Cuban immigrants, in an interview. “You have to earn your way up the ladder, not just have political expediency be the reason that you get moved from Tier 3."
Menendez and human rights groups were also highly critical of the State Department’s plans, revealed last week by Reuters, to upgrade Malaysia from Tier 3, a move that could smooth the way for an ambitious U.S.-led free-trade deal with the Southeast Asian nation and 11 other countries...
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