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In pursuit of change to EU’s Cuba policy

28 July 2010 at 1629 in Diplomacy, EU, Germany, Government, International Relations, Spain by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

Deutsche Welle reports of a rebellious Spain hell-bent on pushing for change in the EU’s stance on Cuba:

As holder of the rotating EU Council presidency, Spain tried to massively influence the EU position on Cuba by pushing for increased dialogue and a normalization of relations despite Cuba not yet meeting the benchmarks set out in the Common Position.

“The relationship between the EU and Cuba has always been superficial,” Thiago de Aragao, Latin American senior research associate at the Foreign Policy Center, a London-based European think-tank, told Deutsche Welle.

“The only difference has been the relationship between Cuba and Spain, which due to history has been deeper. Spain has always had closer ties with Cuba. Spain has always been the most active EU state in encouraging talks between the countries in the hope of democratic openings.”

Spain’s argument that a more relaxed EU position would actually help achieve the human rights and democratic reform it sought took a massive blow in February with the tragic death of Cuban dissident Orlando Zapata, who died as a result of a hunger strike while in prison. Spain was forced to condemn Cuba along with the rest of Europe and the international community and reinforce the EU position on standing firm until human rights abuses ended.

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“Germany holds strong to the Common Position and has been quite critical to the Spanish efforts to change it,” Professor Guenther Maihold, the deputy director of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, told Deutsche Welle.

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“While Spain seems to see in the release of the prisoners a moment of change in the Cuban regime, many observers see heavy economic problems as a future trigger to some opening of the economic system of the island,” Professor Maihold said. “After the release of prisoners we have always seen the arrest of new people and no change in the general politics of the regime.”

It seems likely that the debate over the EU’s Cuba policy will continue once the bloc’s political summer break is over. Many in the EU see the release of the political prisoners by Cuba as a step toward Havana meeting the criteria Europe has set for the normalization of relations but not as a justification for increased dialogue or ties.

(Image: Spain’s push for a policy change is led by its foreign minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos. AP.)

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Diplomatic corner

23 July 2010 at 0956 in Diplomacy, Government, International Relations, Nomenklatura, Opposition, Politics, Raul Castro, dissidents, prisoners by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

  • European Union’s foreign relations ministers will begin debating early next week the consequences of the recent release of political prisoners in Cuba. [Europa Press]
  • Germany demands of Havana “true reforms,” i.e. free elections and respect human rights. [Clarín]
  • Dominican president Leonel Fernández meets with Army General Raul Castro and both countries sign agreements on diplomatic exchanges. [PL]
  • Ricardo Alarcón (Cuban parliament president) is in France meeting with French parliamentarians and socialist politicians. [CubaMinRex]
  • US diplomatic mission in Cuba convened a meeting with relatives of political prisoners who are refusing an offer to leave emigrate to Spain. [AFP]

(Image: Diplomacy board game from Avalon Hill.)

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Cuba politics: Freedom calls

14 July 2010 at 0937 in Brazil, Catholic Church, China, Commentary, Diplomacy, Fidel Castro, Government, Havana, International Relations, Nomenklatura, Opposition, Politics, Population, Raul Castro, Russia, Spain, US, Vatican, dissidents, prisoners by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

From the Economist Intelligence Unit:

No democratisation

If the prisoners — who include journalists, community organisers and opposition figures — are indeed set free, this would be a major concession on the part of the Castro government. It appears to be designed for external consumption, however. It could lead to improvements in Cuba’s foreign relations, particularly with Spain and other EU nations. EU foreign ministers will take up the issue of whether to uphold their “common position” on Cuba at their next summit in September. That position requires that the EU conduct an annual assessment of the human-rights situation in Cuba. Spain has been lobbying for some time for that requirement to be dropped.

However, the prisoner releases probably do not signal coming democratisation or any moves to provide Cubans with greater political rights. Moreover, there has been no fundamental shift in the tolerance of opposition. While discussions with Church representatives were under way in early June, the authorities rounded up and briefly detained 37 members of two dissident groups, Agenda para la Transición (Agenda for the Transition) and Unidad Liberal de la República de Cuba (the Cuban Republic’s Liberal Unity). Ostensibly this was to prevent two meetings due to take place in the house of a prominent dissident, Héctor Palacios, although the meetings proceeded any way.

Further, the Cuban Commission on Human Rights claims there are more than 100 additional political prisoners in Cuban jails.

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The administration of President Barack Obama has taken modest steps towards improving relations with Cuba, such as eliminating Bush-era restrictions on travel to the island by Cuban-Americans and on their remittance of funds to their relatives. However, aware that the Cuba problem cannot be solved easily or quickly, the Obama government has decided to make no additional moves on Cuba policy in the approach to the US mid-term elections in November. Nonetheless, a campaign in the US legislature to weaken economic sanctions has continued. Two bills are advancing through Congress, one to facilitate US food sales to Cuba (by eliminating the need for Cuba to pay in cash in advance) and the other to remove restrictions on travel for US citizens. Although improvement on the human-rights front would help these bills’ prospects, final passage is highly uncertain.

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In the absence of normalisation of political and commercial ties with Washington, Cuba’s relations with Venezuela will remain an important source of support for the economy. These are based on favourable terms of trade that link Cuba’s oil imports to the supply of healthcare and education professionals to Venezuela. If Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chávez, were to be forced out of office, there would be a risk that current arrangements might be scaled back.

Partly reflecting this uncertainty, the Cuban authorities will continue to broaden international economic ties with other friendly countries, notably China, Brazil and Russia, which are becoming ever-more important trade partners. Restoring good relations with the EU would also help to mitigate the growing reliance on, and risks associated with, Havana’s links to Venezuela.

 

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Prisoner release is no sign of a new era

11 July 2010 at 1244 in Catholic Church, EU, Fidel Castro, Government, Havana, International Relations, Nomenklatura, Opposition, Raul Castro, dissidents, prisoners by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

Columnist Andres Oppenheimer in today’s The Oppenheimer Report:

Cuba’s announcement that it will free 52 political prisoners over the next four months is a welcome development, but Spain’s Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos’ claim that this opens a “new phase in Cuba” is ludicrous.

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First, Cuba has a long history of using political prisoners as a bargaining chip, releasing a handful of prisoners in exchange for economic or diplomatic concessions, and later rounding up the next batch.

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Second, even if Cuba keeps its word and releases the 52 dissidents in an effort to get the European investments it desperately needs, that would only be less than a third of the island’s political prisoners.

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Third, we still don’t know whether this will be a prisoners’ release, or a forced deportation. In the past, Cuba has tended to release political prisoners who agree to go into exile. A Roman Catholic Church statement announcing the prisoners’ release last week said they “will be able” to leave the country, but did not specify what will happen with those who want to stay.

Fourth, and most important, the Cuban regime is not even talking about modifying articles 72 and 73 of its criminal code, an Orwellian legislation that allows it to put people behind bars before they committed a crime on the mere suspicion that they may commit one in the future.

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My opinion: I agree. Instead of following Moratinos’ recommendation, the European Union should be a little imaginative, and tell Cuba: “We applaud your move, and we are ready to lift our Common Position, but you must take a few minimal steps to show that you are ready to start abiding by United Nations-sanctioned fundamental rights.”

“Don’t panic, we are not talking about the big things, such as free elections, or a multiparty system, like the U.S. laws demand,” the Europeans could say. “We are just asking for small things, such as allowing all Cubans uncensored access to the Internet, freedom to meet with whomever they want, or allowing dissidents to write and publish on the island.”

Of course, the Cuban regime will not go along because it knows that it would not survive if Cuba ceases to be a police state.

But it would put Cuba’s dictatorship on the spot, and help put the latest headlines about the prisoners’ release in proper perspective.

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Diplomatic corner

9 July 2010 at 1548 in Catholic Church, Fidel Castro, Government, International Relations, Nomenklatura, Opposition, Raul Castro, Spain, US, Vatican, dissidents, prisoners by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

  • The European Union will revise its “Common Position” which conditions the position of the community over links with Cuba about the human rights situation on the island. [Clarín]
  • Cuban Catholic Church and the Spanish government set up mechanism to free Cuban political prisoners. [El País]
  • U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is “hopeful” after prisoners release and welcomes agreement between the Cuban Catholic Church and Cuban government. [IPS]
  • Despite the liberation of some Cuban dissidents, many stay in prison. [Human Rights Watch]

(Image: Diplomacy board game from Avalon Hill.)

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Hankering for freedom

8 July 2010 at 1524 in Catholic Church, Commentary, Diplomacy, EU, Fidel Castro, Government, Havana, International Relations, Nomenklatura, Opposition, Population, Raul Castro, Vatican, dissidents, prisoners by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

From today’s The Economist:

CUBA’S leadership understands only too well how starving to death can help a cause. In 2000 Fidel Castro, who had apparently been moved by the plight of Irish republican hunger-strikers, approved the construction in Havana of a memorial to Bobby Sands and his fellow prisoners. Gerry Adams, Sinn Fein’s leader, attended its unveiling.

Now, the same form of protest has been turned on Cuba’s rulers. In February Orlando Zapata, a 42-year-old plumber and bricklayer, died after 12 weeks without food. He was demanding better conditions in Cuba’s grim prisons. A second hunger-striker, Guillermo Fariñas, is critically ill. Although not in jail, he is calling for the release of 25 ailing prisoners. In an online letter he said dying would be an “honour”.

The tactic has worked. On July 7th, Cuba’s Catholic church announced that the government had told it that 52 prisoners arrested in 2003 would be freed from jail. Five were set to leave immediately, and the rest are expected to be liberated (but then exiled) in the next few months. If implemented, it will be Cuba’s first mass-release of political prisoners since 1998.

The hunger strikes were probably what prodded Raúl Castro, who became Cuba’s president in 2006, to act. They were attracting unwelcome attention. In May Jaime Ortega, the cardinal of Havana, negotiated the lifting of a ban on marches by the Ladies in White, a group of wives and mothers of political prisoners, and an end to their harassment by government-organised mobs. He later convinced Raúl Castro to free a paraplegic prisoner, Ariel Sigler.

International pressure also grew stronger. The church called in reinforcements from abroad: last month the Vatican’s senior diplomat, Dominique Mamberti, went to Cuba and met the president. That trip was followed on July 6th by a visit from Miguel Ángel Moratinos, Spain’s foreign minister. The timing of the prisoners’ release—as well as the decision to send the first five to Spain—seems to have been aimed at giving Mr Moratinos something to show for his effort.

Official Cuban media damns political prisoners as “mercenaries” in the pocket of the United States. This release will reduce their number by about a third, leaving 100 or so in jail—half the average of recent years. The outbreak of clemency suggests that Raúl Castro may have decided that exiling dissidents is easier than locking them up: as one Western diplomat in Havana says, the president “seems to view [the prisoners] as an unfortunate inheritance from his brother.” Their release will improve relations with the European Union, which will meet in September to discuss Cuba, and encourage those in America who want to loosen trade and travel restrictions on the country.

But Fidel Castro, who is still the power behind the throne in Cuba, may block any attempt to free the remaining prisoners, even if they are sent overseas. In 1955, as a young revolutionary, he was freed from jail by Fulgencio Batista, a dictator, following international pressure. He knows better than anyone what happened next.

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Castro brothers’ ambassador in Europe

7 January 2010 at 0903 in Diplomacy, EU, Government, International Relations, Spain by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

Miguel Angel Moratinos

Jorge Moragas

Jorge Moragas, coordinator for International Relations of Spain’s Partido Popular has said Foreign Affairs Minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos has become “the ambassador of the Castro brothers—Raúl and Fidel—in Europe” for his stubbornness in wanting to change the political policy of the European Union towards Cuba. (via EFE)

Moragas voices his opinion on a weblog hosted by Periodista Digital.

(Images: directe.cat and European PhotoPress Agency)

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Formal protest against EU diplomats

28 August 2009 at 1803 in Diplomacy, Government, Opposition, dissidents by Armando F. Mastrapa 3d

It looks like the EU diplomats who visited the wife of dissident Darsi Ferrer have hit a raw nerve with the Cuban government.  Ferrer was arrested last month on charges of buying bags of cement on the black market.  More on the Cuban regime’s reaction.

Cuba delivered a formal protest today to diplomats from five European Union embassies who visited the home of a jailed dissident.  The Ministry of Foreign Relations summoned the diplomats from Sweden, Great Britain, Hungary, Poland and Germany to denounce the visit, according to two of the officials.  Staffers at foreign embassies often have contacts with the families of jailed opposition activists, sometimes drawing rebukes from Cuba which sees the visits as meddling in its internal affairs…It was the European Union’s first contact with a top opposition activist since last summer, when it lifted five years of sanctions imposed for Cuba’s arrest of 75 leading dissidents.

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