State Department Grants Visas for Playmates of Elian Gonzalez 
MICHAEL HOLMES, WORLD NEWS: Elian Gonzalez remained out of sight on Tuesday. United States officials announcing that the 6-year-old Cuban boy and his family left an Air Force base for new housing. But the political fallout from the case has only intensified. Attorney General Janet Reno met with Trent Lott, the Republican leader of the U.S. Senate, to defend her decision to use force to take the boy from his Miami relatives. And a strike by Cuban Americans shut down parts of south Florida. In Cuba, too, the case continues to be headline news. CNN's Havana bureau chief Lucia Newman reports.</s>LUCIA NEWMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Elian Gonzalez may be happily reunited with his father, but that, according to Juan Miguel Gonzales and Cuban officials, is not enough. Even before leaving Cuba, Mr. Gonzalez had requested that a support team -- including 12 of Elian's first-grade classmates, his teachers and several medical specialists -- be allowed to go to Washington while Elian waited for a federal appeals court ruling. Now officials say is the time to establish what they call the minimum conditions for a normal life around Elian.</s>RICARDO ALARCON, PRESIDENT, CUBAN NATIONAL ASSEMBLY: If everybody agrees that we should be guided by the best interests of that child, well, nobody has condemned that child not to play, not to study, not to have a normal life. Nobody could. And that's why we believe that precisely because he's not returning immediately to his home and to his school and to his natural atmosphere, that he should have something of that being brought to Washington.</s>NEWMAN: Last month, the State Department issued visas to Elian's 10-year-old cousin, his kindergarten teacher and a pediatrician who, according to Cuban government sources, will now go to the United States to join Elian. Now Washington has agreed to grant visas to four more youngsters, accompanied each by a relative. The State Department, however, is calling them Elian's playmates, not classmates, in a clear attempt to distance itself from the Cuban government proposal to re-create a school environment for Elian for the duration of his stay in the United States. (on camera): Washington says a two-week stay is adequate for a visit by playmates. Cuban officials respond that while they're still studying the State Department's announcement, they want more visas and for a lot longer. Lucia Newman, CNN, Havana.