Mexico's navy rescued two rafts crammed with Cuban migrants off the coast of the Yucatan Peninsula about 12 nautical miles north of Puerto Progreso on Sunday.

As reported by CNN, 10 migrants on a wooden raft informed the authorities that they had set sail 16 days before from Isla de la Juventud, Cuba. An additional group of 13 migrants were also rescued after a fishing boat saw a raft floating around 133 nautical miles north of the port.

According to officials, the rescued Cubans were given food and medical attention and were then turned over to Mexico's National Migration Institute, which will start talking with Cuban consular authorities in an effort to coordinate the rescued Cubans' return back to their communist country.

Recently the trend of Cubans trying to reach the Unites States via Mexico has increased. As reported in the Arizona Daily Star, Mexico has actually become the main entry point for many Cubans hoping to get on track to becoming U.S. citizens.

Data provided by Customs and Border Protection states that the number of Cubans presenting themselves at ports of entry along the Southwest border without a visa has increased from less than 6,000 in 2010 to 17,500 in the last fiscal year. And as of last December, as many as 6,500 Cuban migrants have come through Mexico.

According to Marc Rosenblum, the deputy director of the U.S. immigration policy program for the Migration Policy Institute, Cubans who can actually afford to pay the cost of hiring a smuggler find that traveling first to Mexico and then making their way to the U.S. is a more effective and easier method to reach the U.S. than just taking a boat to nearby Miami.

Once in the U.S., Cubans are free to take advantage of a policy that allows them to stay in the U.S. as legal residents and eventually become citizens.