| | |  Americas & Beyond | June 2009 
In Turnaround, Cuba Agrees to Talks With US
 Mary Beth Sheridan - Washington Post
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| | Cuba agrees to direct talks on migration. Migration talks were suspended by George W. Bush in 2003. (AFP) | | |
Cuba has agreed to open talks with the United States on issues ranging from immigration to anti-narcotics cooperation and direct mail service, a senior State Department official said today, in a sign that the island's communist government is warming to President Obama's call for a new relationship after decades of tension.
The breakthrough came shortly before Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton left on a trip to Latin America, where she is expected to face pressure to make further gestures to Cuba, including allowing it into the Organization of American States.
A senior State Department official, briefing reporters on the condition of anonymity, called the Cuban moves "a very positive development" and added: "It's our hope this will be understood in the region in a positive way."
In an initial bid to launch a new relationship with Cuba, President Obama last month scrapped restrictions on Cuban Americans traveling to the island and sending money there. But he has said the United States will not lift its economic embargo until the government of Raul Castro improves its human-rights record and makes democratic reforms.
Cuba had given mixed signals about how willing it was to respond to the Obama administration's overtures. But on Saturday, the State Department official said, the head of the Cuban Interest Section in Washington, Jorge Bolaños, formally accepted a U.S. offer, made this month, to re-open talks on immigration that the Bush administration had halted in 2003. Those were the highest-level talks between the two sides.
Bolaños also expressed interest in an earlier U.S. proposal to work toward resuming direct U.S. mail service to the island, the official said. It has been years since such service existed.
In addition, the Cubans indicated they would like to explore the possibilities of additional dialogue on counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism and disaster response, the official said. The U.S. and Cuban governments currently work together in an informal basis to stop drug runners.
No date was set yet for the talks, the official said.
Clinton is making her third trip to Latin America in four months, an indication of the Obama administration's attention to an area where U.S. influence has waned in recent years.
Clinton's visit, which includes high-level regional meetings and attendance at the inauguration of a new president in El Salvador, comes amid a dramatic shift. Once dominated by the United States, Latin America has diversified its trade, and the presidents of a few countries have taken a strong anti-Washington stance. Even pro-U.S. politicians in the region complain that they were ignored during much of the Bush administration as the United States concentrated on Iraq and Afghanistan. Clinton recently expressed concern about the growing role in the area played by China, Russia and Iran, and she is focusing intently on the region.
"We've had a big leadership push into Latin America.... there's been a real focus on engaging, there's been a real focus on filling space," a senior State Department official said, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity before the trip.
President Obama sought to repair relations with Latin America at a summit in Trinidad and Tobago last month in which he pledged to seek "an equal partnership" and not dictate to the region. But that display of goodwill is being put to the test over Cuba. Most Latin American countries would like to lift a 47-year-old ban on Cuba's membership in the Organization of American States at the group's annual assembly in Honduras on Tuesday, but Clinton has resisted.
The disagreement threatens to drive a wedge between the United States and its allies in the OAS, the main forum for political cooperation in the hemisphere. Clinton has said the OAS would violate its charter on democratic rights if it accepted the return of the communist-ruled nation unconditionally.
"They have to be willing to take the concrete steps necessary to meet those principles. We've been very clear about that - move toward democracy, release political prisoners, respect fundamental freedoms," Clinton told Congress recently.
Obama has reversed some Bush administration decisions on Cuba, lifting restrictions on visits by Cuban Americans and offering to re-open immigration talks after a five-year hiatus. But he is moving cautiously, wary of domestic pressure.
The move to re-admit Cuba to the OAS is strongly opposed by Cuban American groups and by some key U.S. senators. One of them, Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), has threatened to cut off the U.S. contribution to the OAS, about 60 percent of its budget. Last week, three former Bush administration officials who occupied senior posts dealing with Latin America - ambassadors Lino Gutierrez, Roger F. Noriega and Otto J. Reich - appealed to Clinton not to give in.
"Now more than ever, any actions that confer legitimacy on the unelected regime in Havana would be a betrayal of our Cuban brothers and sisters," they wrote.
Clinton's trip starts today in El Salvador with a meeting of Pathways to Prosperity, a Bush administration initiative to encourage greater commerce with its 11 free-trade partners in the region. The group was formed last fall, after Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez started assembling a bloc opposed to free-trade pacts with the United States. It includes Nicaragua, Bolivia, Cuba and Dominica.
On Monday, Clinton attends the inauguration of El Salvador's president, the first from the party formed by guerrillas who battled a U.S.-backed government in the the 1980s. The new leader, Mauricio Funes, is the latest sign of the "pink tide" that has washed over Latin America. He has said he will emulate moderate leftists like those governing Brazil and Chile, rather than populists like Chavez.
Clinton's trip wraps up with the OAS meeting.
Many members of the group say the ban on Cuba is outdated because it denounces the island's alignment with a "communist bloc" that disappeared after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Several countries, however, have indicated they are willing to require Cuba to fulfill some democratic requirements before it fully returns to the OAS.
In the end, lifting the ban would mainly be symbolic, because Cuba has said it has no plans to rejoin a group that it sees as U.S.-dominated. But the debate indicates the emotional punch Cuba still packs across Latin America.
Clinton's trip follows a March visit to Mexico and a swing last month through Haiti and the Dominican Republic on her way to the Summit of the Americas. Several top Obama administration military and political officials also have traveled to the region recently. |
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