The government of Nicaragua on Tuesday granted a three-month visa to Cuban pitcher Orlando ``El Duque'' Hernandez and six others with whom he fled from Cuba last month.

The seven are now in Nassau; an eighth refugee, Noris Bosch, flew to Miami on Sunday, taking advantage of a humanitarian visa issued days before by the U.S. State Department.

The visas granted by Managua would enable the seven refugees to remain in Nicaragua until they can firm up their plans.

Cesar Ubeda, a spokesman for the Nicaraguan Foreign Ministry, said from Managua that ``President Arnoldo Aleman, in a humanitarian gesture, acceded to the request from Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart [R-Miami] to grant temporary asylum to the seven Cubans in the Bahamas.''

Aleman's concession does not set a precedent for future cases, Ubeda added.

Diaz-Balart said Tuesday he expects the refugees to apply for residence in Costa Rica.

The Bahamian authorities announced Tuesday that they had asked Orlando Hernandez and Alberto Hernandez, a former catcher on the Cuban national team, to leave the country no later than today. The ballplayers and Bosch were granted humanitarian visas by the U.S. government Dec. 31.

Diaz-Balart thanked Aleman for what he called an ``extraordinary humanitarian gesture.'' The lawmaker said he feared that the five other refugees might suffer reprisals if they were returned to Cuba, because they helped the ballplayers to escape.

The Bahamian government is bound to repatriate Cuban refugees, in line with an accord signed with Havana, but made no effort to do so in this case.

Melvin Seymour, Bahamian immigration chief, said that special dispensation was granted to the ballplayers at the request of Cuban-American investor Gerardo Capo, who owns two hotels in the Bahamas.

Diaz-Balart said his office intercedes daily in cases involving Cuban refugees. He cited the case of six other Cubans held in the Bahamas, on whose behalf he has appealed to the United Nations high commissioner for human rights.

At present, 82 Cubans are in the Nassau detention center, along with several Haitian and Chinese undocumented immigrants.

Last year, 47 Cubans were granted political asylum in the Bahamas, while 120 were returned to Cuba.

Baseball agent Joe Cubas said in Nassau that he will accompany Orlando and Alberto Hernandez and their companions to another country, but declined to say if their destination would be Nicaragua.

The refugees will have to leave aboard a chartered plane, because no commercial airlines fly from Nassau to Central American capitals.

``We're trying to charter a plane to leave the [Bahamas] islands as soon as possible,'' Cubas said.

A French news agency reported Tuesday from San Jose that Orlando Hernandez had received official authorization to enter Costa Rica. The agency credited a source that did not wish to be identified.

The source did not indicate whether the Costa Rican authorization extended to the other six refugees.

``El Duque,'' a former pitcher for the Cuban national team, is the half-brother of Marlins pitcher Livan Hernandez, who defected in 1995.

As a result of Livan's defection, Orlando Hernandez was banned from baseball for life, along with shortstop German Mesa and Alberto Hernandez. Alberto is not related to Livan and Orlando Hernandez.

Cuban sports authorities charged the three with ``accepting bribes'' and ``receiving and not rejecting offers to defect'' from foreign sports agents.