By Stabroek staff | July 14, 2010 in Editorial
A sustained effort of relatively quiet European diplomacy on the part of
the European Union and the Roman Catholic Church towards Cuba on the
issue of human rights, has brought a result, with the Cuban Government's
announcement at the end of last week of its intention to release
fifty-two persons held in prison for some years. The decision appears to
be qualified by a complementary decision that those released should go,
in effect into exile, to Spain.
Over the last decade or so, both the EU, and the Roman Catholic Church
in Cuba and in Rome, have been pressing the Cuban government to
undertake some movement on its detention of persons who had persisted in
publicly expressing opposition to the regime. The European Union had
virtually made such a Cuban response a sine qua non of the normalization
of relations with the Cuban government, but to the EU, the Cuban
response seemed to periodically meander between an intention to ease the
situation and resisting what it considered undue EU pressure. When,
earlier this year, the Spanish Government indicated that it intended to
make the amelioration of EU-Cuba relations one of the objectives of its
EU Presidency, it began a series of diplomatic manoeuvres towards the
Cuban Government in that regard. The response of the Cubans was, to the
EU, insufficiently responsive. But the death of Orlando Zapata, the
first of the prisoners on a protest hunger strike, and the unyielding
response of the Cuban government to international protest, narrowed the
negotiating space of the Spanish government. The adoption, however, of
the hunger strike weapon by yet another prisoner, gave the Roman
Catholic church an opportunity to heighten its intervention in a context
in which relations between the local Church and the State had also been
characterized by persistent discussions mediated by the Papacy.
The persistence of the Church and Cuban Archbishop Ortega, no doubt
bolstered by the determined intention of the second hunger striker,
Guillermo Farinas, to follow his predecessor in pursuing his objective
unto death, seems to have given the Cuban Government pause. President
Raul Castro had probably calculated that a second death would have
turned EU willingness to facilitate Cuba's normalization of relations
with the North Atlantic countries towards a hardening of relations
towards the regime, given, in particular, that, for one thing, the
Spanish Social Democratic government has always felt itself concerned to
take into account the concerns of international civil society, including
institutions like Human Rights Watch.
The Cuban government has been aware that, within the North Atlantic, or
Euro-American arena, it has been important to sustain a certain amount
of support from the Europeans and the Canadians, in the context of the
difficult evolution of economic policy which the post-Fidel
administrators of the system are seeking to undertake. And although they
have been somewhat harsher on President Obama now than they were on his
assumption of office, the Cuban authorities well know that in the
context of US-Latin American relations and the concern of leading Latin
American governments to encourage the US towards normalization, the
President is the most sympathetic American leader that Cuba could have
at this time. He has encouraged the continued expansion of agricultural
trade in particular with Cuba, at a time when the country's agriculture
is at one of its lowest ebbs since the Fidelistas came to power. At this
time too, in addition to having the sympathetic ear of President Lula,
and of President Calderon of Mexico who replaced a quite unsympathetic
President Vicente Fox, President Raul Castro must be well aware that the
international situation could not be more favourable to Cuba.
The American Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has given a hint of an
American willingness not to force the pace unduly, observing that the
promised released of the prisoners is "something that is overdue but
nevertheless very welcome". This probably sets the tone for the wider
sphere of American public opinion. But there will continue to be
pressure from the human rights groups who insist, first, that the
release of the prisoners on the basis that they leave their own country,
is really a half measure and still prejudicial to their human rights.
Secondly, they will continue to insist that the Cuban government give a
proper accounting of the number of persons actually held for actions
deemed "offences against the state", but which would be deemed, in the
West, part of the normal practice of their civic rights.
The Cuban government has also stood firmly on the issue of
non-interference in its domestic affairs, particularly by the Western
powers which it holds responsible for participation in an embargo that
strengthened the decline of the country's economic system. Indeed
earlier in this decade, they stoutly resisted pressure on themselves,
from Prime Minister Chretien of Canada, to ameliorate the human rights
position in Cuba, even though at that time Canada was one of the
countries maintaining a policy of economic openness and investment
(constructive engagement versus the US policy of confrontation) towards
the country. But the situation of the Cuban economy has become
immeasurably worse with the current global crisis, and in turn the
government seems not to have come to a conclusion to go through the
process, undertaken by the Chinese in the last two decades, of economic
liberalization of the major productive sectors of the economy, even when
largely state led. No doubt they take the view that too rapid economic
opening of an economy in such close proximity to the United States
would, unlike the case of the more distant China, lead to a rate of
political opening or liberalization that would systematically weaken the
political regime, in the terms that it exists today.
But the Cuban government will also be aware of the current rapidity of
global economic change. It will be well aware of a view, frequently
expressed in the United States today, that a unilateral opening of the
American economy vis-à-vis a Cuban economy in such close proximity,
would have effects on a Cuban population anxious to increase its
well-being which would probably be unwelcome to the regime, and which
the regime would also have major difficulty in inhibiting. Reference is
often made to the spread of internet technology and the US grant of
permission to extend the scale of remittances to Cuba, which have both
already substantially altered the access of the Cuban population to
enhanced welfare.
The issue of the release of political prisoners, a term which the Cuban
government does not accept as valid, must be seen in this context of the
evolution of both Cuban domestic circumstances on the one hand (a
worsening of the country's economic situation including the material
well-being of the citizens) and the evolution of pressures – diplomatic,
from the changing of global economy, and in the behaviour of some of its
sympathizers (Brazil, Argentina, Mexico) who all now seem to wish, while
supporting Cuba, to seek new types of relations with the major
Euro-American powers. For these sympathisers, as well as the traditional
powers, the question of the evolution of the Cuban political system is
becoming a matter to be persistently engaged, by Cuba itself, towards
some form of resolution.
The statement by the Vatican spokesman on the release of the prisoners
would seem to sum up this general sentiment: "The world looks with hope
at the events coming out of Cuba. We all hope that this path continues".
http://www.stabroeknews.com/2010/editorial/07/14/cuba%e2%80%99s-changes/
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