Elvis Gregory: Olympic Silver Medallist

Elvis Gregory Dept: HAVANA - Sydney Gregory has never met her father, an Olympic silver medallist in fencing who defected from the Cuban team at a tournament in Lisbon in 2002 when she was 15 days old. But he recently rang from Italy with good news: Papa's coming home to visit, according to Winnipeg Free Press. Under Cuban law, those who abandoned their homeland have had to apply for permission to return, even for the kind of brief family visit Elvis Gregory hopes to make. Many high-profile people considered deserters have had their requests to return rejected by a communist-run government that complained about the large financial investment it made in their careers. Some didn't even bother to ask, knowing their petitions would be turned down and maria Victoria Gil negotiates through a doorway a large framed portrait of her son, swordsman Elvis Gregory, in Havana, Cuba, Friday, Nov. 16, 2012. Gregory, an Olympic silver medalist, who defected from the Cuban team at a tournament in Lisbon in 2002, hopes to return to Cuba next year so he can finally meet his only child, a 10-year-old girl who was only 15 days old when he abandoned his country. New migratory laws have now made it possible for high-profile defectors once considered deserters or traitors to return to the homeland they abandoned. The new rules could potentially affect many leading cultural and athletic figures, from musicians and doctors to ballet dancers. AP Photo/Franklin Reyes "I'm very happy," the 10-year-old girl said, smiling in her school uniform with a headband holding back her jet-black hair. "My father called me on the phone and told me he's going to come. I'm going to meet him!" (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.