BY LILA ARZUA

 Two of South Florida's congressional representatives are stepping up their criticism of the treatment of Cuban refugees at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, now that the military is preparing to also house top al Qaeda prisoners there.

 "It's a sad irony that those fighting for freedom will be placed with those who want to destroy democracy,'' said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Miami, at a news conference on the nearly 30 refugees in immigration limbo at the base.

 Ros-Lehtinen and Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, R-Miami, have sent letters to U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft and Navy Secretary Gordon England requesting the
 refugees, many of whom have been at Guantanamo for years, be released to the United States.

 All, they said, have family members -- mostly in South Florida -- who have signed or will sign affidavits asserting the immigrants will not be a public burden.

 Ros-Lehtinen and Díaz-Balart emphasized that they are not opposed to the captives from Afghanistan coming to Guantanamo, but rather the continued confinement of the refugees at the site.

 The Cuban detainees are awaiting transfer to a third country. Meanwhile, Guantanamo is being converted to hold suspected terrorists. Advocates fear it might affect the living arrangements of the refugees.

 One of those at the news conference was Alejandro Perera, a carpenter whose brother, sister-in-law and their two children have been at Guantanamo for more than three years.

 The Navy has repeatedly denied that the refugees at Guantanamo are mistreated. But that does little to allay Perera's fears about his relative's imminent neighbors.

 "I don't know how they are going to separate them,'' Perera said of the suspected terrorists.

                                    © 2002