U.S., Cuba reach a deal — to talk some more

U.S., Cuba reach a deal — to talk some more

A day of negotiations on mutual economic damages goes nowhere
Another meeting is planned for next year
BY NORA GAMEZ TORRES AND GLENN GARVIN
ggarvin@miamiherald.com

After nearly six decades of accusing one another of economic damages
running into the hundreds of billions of dollars, the governments of
Cuba and the United States finally sat down to talk about it Tuesday.
And after a day of negotiations, they reached a firm agreement: to talk
again, next year.

"These things can take some time to slog through the issues," said a
State Department official involved in the talks, in a tone that sounded
anything but optimistic.

The talks, conducted in Havana for what the State Department official
(who didn't want to be identified), said was "the better part of a day,"
apparently didn't get much beyond a polite recitation of claims by each
side.

Both described the meeting in bilingual diplomatic bland-speak. "A very
respectful and professional exchange," said the State Department
official. "A respectful and professional climate," agreed a communique
from the Cuban Foreign Ministry.

Details were so scarce that neither side would even say what numbers
were put on the table, although a good deal of that information has been
publicly discussed in the past.

The State Department is pursuing about $1.9 billion (which rise to
around $8 billion if interest is included) in claims by U.S. citizens
and corporations for property confiscated in the early days after Fidel
Castro came to power in 1959.

It also raised the question of 10 or so legal judgments against Cuba in
U.S. courts, including some stemming from the 1996 shootdown of two
Brothers to the Rescue planes, that haven't been paid, and some
unspecified direct claims by the U.S. government against the Cuban
government.

Cuba, meanwhile, has said the United States owes it about $122 billion
for damage inflicted by the American government's economic embargo
against the island, as well as $181 billion in compensation for deaths
and injuries suffered during the Bay of Pigs invasion and other attacks
by U.S. security forces and Cuban exiles.

"I'm not sure we have absolutely exact figures to share with you," said
the State Department official, who did acknowledge that "the numbers are
large." And, she added, Tuesday's meeting was only "the first step in a
complex process that may take some time."

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