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| U.S.-CUBA RELATIONS
Will the Pope's visit affect how two countries deal with each other? January 28, 1998 |
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Questions asked
in this forum:
Will the Pope's visit amount to any significant change in either U.S. policy or political and religious freedoms within Cuba? What will happen if Castro opens Cuba up to the West? Why has the U.S. abandoned the policy of engagement in our own backyard? How does the U.S. hope to overcome the bitterness between the two countries?
NewsHour Backgrounders
November 24, 1997:
The life and times of Cuban-American exile Jorge Mas Canosa.
October 16, 1997:
Thirty-five years later, the Cuban Missile Crisis is viewed as one of the "hottest" moments of the Cold War.
July 11, 1997:
The fight over the Helms-Burton Act and the embargo on Cuba.
March 5, 1997:
Sec. of State Warren Christopher discusses U.S. foreign policy regarding Cuba
Browse The NewsHour's Latin America Index.
Outside Link
The VaticanPaul Guillory of San Diego, CA, asks Isn't Cuban's health care system, and thus the health of the Cuban people, suffering the most in the U.S. embargo? Is there any way to allow medicine into the country without changing the political goals of the embargo?
Riordan Roett, director of Latin American studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, answers:
As mentioned before, the policy of the U.S. towards Cuba is the captive of a small ideological minority of exiles from Cuba or Cuban-Americans who are fighting for their own agenda not that of the U.S. Embargos are basically political although they have serious economic and financial consequences. It makes no sense for the U.S. to maintain an embargo that basically impoverishes the Cuban people. I am sure Castro and the leadership of the Communist Party eat very well each night; the average Cuban does not. IF Castro is sick, he receives excellent medical attention; the average Cuban does not. Lifting the embargo to outside goods would place severe and ultimately untenable pressure on the Castro regime to liberalize and open the economy to the world.
Cuban Ambassador Fernando Remirec answers:
Despite our efforts and achievements in keeping the standards of health comparable with those of the developed nations, I can assert that the U.S. blockade imposed on us is affecting the Cuban system of public health. It stops us from accessing medicines and technologies exclusively produced by American companies or their subsidiaries. These facts have not only been provided by our reports: information provided by medical institutions and non-governmental organization of the U.S., like the one issued by the American Association for World Health, confirms them as well.
The international community has overwhelmingly and systematically condemned the U.S. blockade at the United Nations General Assembly. Last year this resolution was passed with 147 votes in favor.
It is our interest to live in peace and keep normal relations of respect with the United States. For that, the lifting of the embargo is a must, since current conditions do not allow the purchase of the medicines we need from the U.S. market, nor does it allow the purchase of other necessary products to guarantee the well-being of our people. We also think that we have a lot to offer to the American people on account of our achievements attained thanks to the talent of the Cubans in the branch of health that you mention; the blockade does not allow for this either.
Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart, (R-Florida), answers:
It is legal for U.S. medicines to be sold to Cuba, as long as they are not used for torture of political prisoners, Castro's biotechnology industry, or re-export. I would refer you to the well-documented report by Freedom House, the Washington-based, respected human rights organization, The Politics of Psychiatry in Revolutionary Cuba, for multiple examples of Castro's use of psychotropic and other drugs in the torture of prisoners.
Furthermore, if Castro does not wish to purchase medicines in the U.S., he can purchase them in any other country.
Medicines are available in abundance in Cuba to dollar-paying tourists and members of the dictatorship's hierarchy.
It is as absurd as it is unfair to blame the Cuban people's lack of medicines on the U.S. It is Castro who has destroyed Cuba; in 1959 Cuba was among the most advanced countries in the health field in all of Latin America.
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