Shift in policy towards Cuba gaining strength
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- 11 / 24 / 2009
The EU commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, Karel De Gucht, who is just back from a visit to Havana, Cuba, told Amanpour, "We have relations with a lot of oppressive regimes and we have a special regime for Cuba. It makes no sense
singularizing them."
His comments come amid indications that Spain, which will hold the presidency of the EU for six months beginning in January 2010, intends to soften the organization's policy toward Cuba. The European Union currently criticizes Cuba's human rights record, but does not support the U.S. trade embargo against Havana.
The Obama administration, which has offered Havana a "new beginning," insists it will maintain sanctions as long as Cuba refuses to release political prisoners and improve human rights. But many critics overseas and a rising number in the United
States say the embargo has totally failed to change the Cuban regime's policy and it is time for change.
Many in the U.S. Congress now support at least a relaxation of the government's travel ban on Americans wishing to go to Cuba.
The lawmaker leading that effort, Rep. Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Amanpour there's a better chance now than ever of getting that travel ban lifted. "
"I'm not here to say that getting rid of the travel ban will lead to immediate change in the regime," he added. "But in my heart of hearts, I believe that Castro does not want the travel ban to be repealed.
The congressman was supported by the director of Human Rights Watch's Americas division, Jose Miguel Vivanco. His organization has just released a scathing report.
Vivanco said the Obama administration should not only scrap the travel ban, but also the U.S. trade sanctions against Cuba because they have utterly failed in achieving American goals. "Regime change is rejected by the rest of the world. Nobody in Europe agrees with the U.S. Nobody in Latin America."
He said the United States should "build up a multilateral coalition that has the political power and the moral authority to exercise effective pressure on the Cuban government."
Lawrence Wilkerson, a former chief of staff to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, was damning in his criticism of the U.S. trade embargo on Cuba. He called it "stupid and idiotic," adding, "It makes no sense. We need to move towards normalized relations."
Wilkerson, who is now co-chairman of the U.S.-Cuba Policy Initiative at the New America Foundation and recently visited Cuba, told Amanpour, "We need to adopt a new policy. That policy needs to be a policy of engagement so that we can have more impact on raising the standards of living of the average 11.5 million Cubans and so we can be around when the change (in leadership) does inevitably occur."
He added, "We need to work on this together, unlike the previous administration I served. This needs to be congressional, and it needs to be executive, and it needs to be the American people."
The article qualified the embargo trade on Cuba "stupid and idiotic," adding, "It makes no sense. We need to move towards normalized relations."
Source: CNN.com
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