A turning point in Cuban-
American relations?
The Cuban transition has entered a new stage. Since the crisis of August 1994, the economic opening has widened in agriculture with the authorisation of agricultural markets; through fiscal reform and the development of private initiative. The restructuring of employment in public enterprises and its corollary, the growth of unemployment, the decrease in subsidies, and the first fruits of wage deregulation have already led to significant social and political changes, while the economic effects of the reforms still seem limited.
by Jannette Habel Paris ECONOMIC SURVIVAL still hangs by a thread. With a harvest of sugar cane at around 3.3 million tonnes foreign currency resources will not be sufficient. Neither tourism, nor the growth of joint ventures, nor the export of bio-technology and citrus fruits carry any solution to the key problem: the country has practically no credit (except at exorbitant rates) and its financing needs are henceforth decisive to its ability to emerge from recession. THE US EMBARGO forbids agreements with the organisations of multilateral loans. The aid accorded by the European Union or the Latin American governments is conditional. The possibility of signing a co-operation agreement with Europe, proposed by the Spanish government (which holds the Presidency of the European Union for the second half of 1995) will depend on the "progress" made by the Castro government in the field of human rights. Such an agreement (which would undoubtedly allow Havana to have access to the European Investment Bank) supposes that significant gestures will be made on the political level. The recent visit to the island by Eloy Gutierrez Menoyo must be seen in this light. The former organiser of the anti-Castro commandos Alpha 66 was captured in Cuba in 1965; arrested, he spent 22 years in prison before being freed through the intervention of Spanish Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez. Gutierrez Menoyo is the leader of the Miami-based "Cambio Cubana" group, which is considered to be moderate. His recent interview with Fidel Castro takes on a symbolic importance; "national reconciliation" with the "moderates" of Miami was part of a strategy whose objective is first and foremost to isolate the far right, grouped in Florida around the Cuban-American Foundation and its head Mas Canosa. The second meeting with the representatives of the exile envisaged for November 1995 in Havana can be placed in the same perspective; that of neutralising the Cuban-American lobby, Which has imposed its choices in Washington for thirty years, to prepare the conditions for an overall negotiation.
The internal policy considerations which weigh on the decisions of the White House are well known; the presence of a rich and powerful community, over-represented by the Cuban-American Foundation in a state - Florida — where their electoral weight and financial aid are crucial elements in every presidential election. FOR MORE THAN THREE DECADES, US policy have been founded on the conviction that there exists in Cuba forces capable of overthrowing the regime on condition that they are helped by external pressures. As put crudely by a Canadian diplomat "the Americans want the head of Fidel Castro and a government of their choice. In spite of all the predictions, the collapse that has been awaited for five years has still not happened. This cannot be explained solely by the repression — certainly very effective — of political liberties. Presented as a precondition for the lifting of the embargo and the restoration of normal US-Cuban relations, democratic rights and media liberalisation appear as the expression of a domineering and imperial will for a substantial part of the population of the island (more preoccupied with the satisfaction of their elementary needs). US policy is visibly hypocritical; the non-invitation of Cuba to the Summit of the Americas in December 1994 on the pretext that its president was not democratically elected contrasts with the invitation of the Dominican Republic, whose fraudulent elections have been criticised by the United States itself. This incoherence has led to a clear condemnation of the embargo by the 49th General Assembly of the United Nations on October 26, 1994 and repeated condemnations by the European Parliament and the Latin American governments. For these governments the stakes are sizeable: their almost universal desire is to reintegrate Cuba into the regional institutions, notably the Organisation of American States (OAS), as wished by its new President Cesar Gaviria.
International Viewpoint n° 270 - October 1995 23
* CUBA The restoration of diplomatic relations with Cuba by almost all governments in the Americas confirms their will to normalise exchanges with an isolated, weakened island, whose revolutionary allies on the continent have disappeared or have their backs to the wall. This continental political situation is obviously not unconnected to the recent decisions of Castro. The revolutionary organisations of central America are all bogged down in negotiations, often in difficult conditions, and 1994 was marked by major electoral defeats in key countries of the continent (notably Brazil). The relationship of forces has not been as unfavourable for the Cuban revolution since its NoT SINCE 1959 has Castro appeared so vulnerable. The US government initially envisaged the overthrow of Castroism as coming from the outside (from 1961 with the Bay of Pigs invasion), then the emphasis switched to the interior, with the Americans seeking to create the conditions for a popular uprising, through sanctions. Today Washington sees Castro's fall as inscribed in the order of things without any special effort being necessary to precipitate it. This is argued by some US diplomats and relayed by the editorialists of the Washington Post- and the New York Times, , for whom the reign of the leader maximo is reaching its end. Why then, they ask, take the risk of a confrontation or a crisis whose costs the US would bear in the area of migratory fluxes and for which the population would render the US responsible, when the country could fall "like a ripe fruit". Washington has never admitted that the legitimacy of Castroism stemmed from its role in the completion of the building of the Cuban nation. The historic affiliation established by Castro between the wars of independence, Jose Marti and the July 26 Movement (the generation of the centenary of Marti's birth), the resistance to the age-old annexationist will of the United States, have forged a national identity in the course of the years, reinforced by the hostility of the White House. But this latter could, in the light of the crisis, be embarking on a change of tactic, if one believes the words of President Clinton, proposing a "hand held out to the Cuban people"* so as to render possible "a peaceful transition to democracy". The recent agreements on emigration concluded between Washington and Havana could signal a significant reorientation in the policy followed towards Cuba for the past 35 years. The agreement of September 9, 1994 was signed after the crisis of August and the departure of several tens of thousands of boat people towards the coasts of Florida had obliged the Clinton government to negotiate with Havana. Immigration is the object of a growing unpopularity in the United States as shown by the success of proposition 187 in California, which involves the suppression of social benefits in health and education to illegal immigrants and their children. The September protocol envisaged that the United States would take in 20,000 Cuban immigrants a year, on condition that this was arranged through the legal framework of the American Interests Section in Havana. An end was put to the privileged status of the Cubans, who had benefited for more than thirty years from an almost automatic right of asylum. In exchange the Cuban government committed itself to preventing the uncontrolled departure of its residents. But the 24 International Viewpoint n° 270 — October 1995 negotiations did not clarify the status of the boat people of summer 1994, held on the US military base at Guantanamo on Cuban territory and in Panama. Around 30,000 balseros (with some thousands of Haitians) thus were stuck a few kilometres from the Cuban frontier, without being able to go to the United States or return to their country. Aside from the explosive character of this situation (some thousands of refugees were crowded together in camps under collective tents, without work, family or leisure facilities, and already several riots had taken place) the cost of this "stay" ($1 million a day) became unsustainable. A new accord was reached in May 1995, which completes that of September 1994 but goes further. An end was put to the presence of boat people at Guantanamo of whom the majority were allowed to go to the United States but, henceforth, illegal immigrants will be repatriated to Cuba by US coast guards. The "joint declaration" indicates that no sanctions will be taken against illegal immigrants; the consular officers in Havana will have a right of inspection on the treatment meted out to the returnees. This "normalisation of migratory relations", according to the terms of the declaration, is, beyond the apparent limits of its field of application, important in that it refutes in practice the characterisation of Cuba as an "outlaw state" in the manner of North Korea, Iran, Iraq and Libya, states defined thus by Anthony Lake "because they have not only chosen to remain outside the family, but moreover to attack its fundamental values" Whether one wishes it or not a certain legitimacy is thus given to the "Castroist dictatorship" inasmuch as one can judge it possible to return to it candidates for exile now treated as simple economic refugees. This explains the fury of a section of the Cuban community in Miami which for the first time, was not even informed of the secret negotiations engaged between Peter Tarnoff, the US under-secretary of state for political affairs, and Ricardo Alarcon, president of the Cuban parliament. Through these negotiations Washington also recognises that the overthrow of Castroism is not necessarily the most desirable solution for the region; as underlined by Peter Hakim and Michael Shifter; "for Washington the most difficult political challenges could come from its three closest neighbours; Mexico, Haiti and Cuba"7. As to the Cuban government, it registered its satisfaction at what Alarcon, the principal negotiator of the accords, has characterised as "a 180 degree turn", ", the product of a "previously absent political will" on the part of the nine presidents who preceded Bill Clinton.8 But this policy is ambiguous, for the White House has two irons in the fire; the proposed Burton-Helms law (sponsored by Jesse Helms, Republican chair of the senate foreign affairs committee, and representative D. Burton) involves a strengthening and an internationalisation of the embargo. Even before its adoption, this legislation was the object of a warning from the European Union, which, in May 1995, recalled its "opposition to the adoption of any measure of extraterritorial scope and counter to the rules of the World Trade Organisation". The development of commercial relations and the role of the European diplomacy is strongly displeasing to American businessmen. On the commercial plane the embargo has some perverse ettects; in particular, it torbids US businessmen from investing in Cuba while the opening of the
island to foreign investments. This new law is intended to stimulate the growth of European and Latin American investments and allow the renegotiation of the debt. In Europe, outside of spain, Germany, Britain, and Italy are increasingly interested in the Cuban market. THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION has increased its humanitarian aid. This amounted to 14 million ecus in 1994 and there should be a similar total for 1995 (it was three million ecus in 1992) Allocated through the intermediary of the Humanitarian Office of the European Commission, this aid is distributed by the NGOs in the hospitals and the medical centres. But the European Union does not directly accord the aid for development to Cuba, which is not part of the Lomé Convention (which organises the development aid of the EU towards the ACP - African, Caribbean and Pacific countries) and Cuba is the sole country of Latin America with whom the EU has not signed a framework agreement for cooperation. If the EU has criticised the US embargo for a long time, European policy remains very much determined by the progress realised on the level of the economic reforms and the democratisation of the regime. In the United States, the Kepublican majority in Congress could rally to the position of Helms. This latter, while in Miami during the commemoration of the 34th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs invasion, gave his support to the appeal of the Cuban-American Foundation for a naval blockade of Cuba.10 What will the US President do? Clinton has already announced that he will veto the budget reductions announced by the Republicans in the area of foreign aid, but no-one yet knows what his attitude is to the proposed Burton-Helms act. The risks of the Cuban transition cannot leave Washington indifferent; as much because of their potential impact in the United States as because of regional considerations. For the White House immigration has become a determinant problem of internal policy, as recent elections have shown. The Haitian crisis, together with the crisis of the Cuban balseros have tended to multiply migratory fluxes. A generalised Cuban crisis would have altogether more grave effects and could persuade the State Department to make the choice of stability, relying on the progressive marginalisation of the Cuban leader through a process of reforms. In Europe the emphasis is on a dialogue impelled by the moderate dissidents of the interior, or by the spokespersons of the exiles linked to the European Internationals (Socialist, Christian Democratic and Liberal) or by the church, to accelerate the political transition by imposing the recognition of the political parties based in Miami and the retirement of Fidel Castro. Havana stole a march in organising for the second time a conference on emigration in November 1995 (the first had taken place in April 1994) so as to involve itself in negotiations on the future of the country. After the visit by Fidel Castro to France, a mission led by France-libertés, including representatives of Medecins du Monde, the International Federation of Human Rights and Human Rights Watch, visited Cuba in May 1995. The expected release of six political prisoners by Castro is seen as a consequence of this visit.12 But this liberalisation, although conforming to the European demands, will not be considered sufficient for the bodies of the EU, which expect more radical institutional reforms in the area of human rights, allowing the untrammelled exercise of freedoms of expression and organisation which are today forbidden. Fidel Castro knows how to use the tactical differences that oppose Europe, as well as numerous Latin American governments, to the White House to play for time. The positions taken by the foreign affairs ministers of the 14 member states of the Rio group, meeting in Quito in May 1995, which unanimously rejected the Burton-Helms proposal as "illegal" and "unjust" comforted Cuban diplomacy.
International Viewpoint n° 270 - October 1995 25
News from the heart of Latin
EXTERNAL AGGRESSION is not the only danger facing the America's social
Cuban leader. Danger comes also from within, from the socio-economic mutation underway whose consequences are movements...
such that they threaten the cohesion and the popular support from which he has benefited. Castro is in effect the prisoner of a difficult contradiction; to survive he must agree to carry out reforms leading to the amelioration of the economic Published in Mexico six situation. But these reforms, by threatening social justice and times a year, covering jeopardising national independence, undermine the very Latin America and the world bases of his power, or at least his legitimacy. The Cuban people have resisted for more than three decades to defend their dignity, their sovereignty, and a project of a society
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7. Respectively president of the Inter-american Dialogue in Washington and professor of • 48 bed conference centre with six channel interpretation system,
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1. Washington Post National Weekly, July 5, 1993, cited in Thomas Paterson, Containing
Castro, Oxford University Press, 1994.
him or her of your solidarity.
2. See the article by Jessica Matthews in the Interational Herald Tribune, 5 April 1995
3. "Cubans like the others", International Herald Tribune, 4 May 1995
4. El País, 28 June 1995.
INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR
5. International Herald Tribune, 23 May 1995
RESEARCH AND EDUCATION
6. President Clinton's National Security Adviser in Foreign Affairs, vol. 73, no 2, March/April
1994.
no. 589.
8. Granma International, 17 May 1995
10. International Herald Tribune, 9 May 1995.
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