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Earlier this year, Cuba lifted a 60-year ban on professional boxing, which Fidel Castro imposed in 1962.

Before then, amateur boxers who wanted to turn pro, had to risk everything in order to defect.

Rachel Naylor speaks to Mike ‘The Rebel’ Perez, who escaped in 2007 with the assistance of Mexican gangsters, a fishing boat and an Irish promoter.

(Photo: Mike Perez (right) and Bryant Jennings during their heavyweight bout at Madison Square Garden on 26 July 2014 in New York. Credit: Getty Images)