US Willingness to Talk to Cuba re: Previously Agreed-To Immigration Consultations

[magbana]

Picked up from Karen Wald's cuba-inside-out list. Two articles further below. First is an AP articleabout "immigration talks" and the second is from NYT about general US willingness to talk with Cuba about previous immigration agreements. Prior to the articles, you will find Walter Lippmann's (ed. of CubaNews)comment about the second article. This is followed by Art Heitzer's comment on the first article.

There is more on this buzzing around, but I need to piece it together so it is not too confusing. Back later with more.
magbana

TOPIC: IMPORTANT ADDITION TO U.S. Signals Willingness to Talks With Cuba (
renewing previously agreed to immigration consultations)
http://groups.google.com/group/Cuba-Inside-Out/t/86b9aeab7c2d120e?hl=en
==============================================================================

From: "Karen Lee Wald"


See also our previous comments on this article:
----- Original Message -----
From: Walter Lippmann
To: CubaNews
Sent: Friday, May 22, 2009 2:20 PM
Subject: NYT: U.S. Signals Willingness to Reopen Talks With Cuba


VERY IMPORTANT. Read it all the way through, por favor. As this
further indicates, the ground is slowly slipping out from under
Washington's control of the OAS. In fact, what this really also
demonstrates is that the road to Latin America today ironically
goes through Havana. Washington's anti-Cuban chickens have now
come home to roost.)
==============================================================
(With a regional meeting in Honduras little more than a week away,
a new confrontation was already brewing between the Obama
administration and most Latin American governments over Cuba,
the one country in the Western Hemisphere that remains uninvited
to the gathering of the Organization of American States.

(At a June 2 meeting in Tegucigalpa, the majority of the
organization’s members are expected to propose a resolution that
would revoke the 47-year-old provision used to expel Cuba, citing its
alliance with “the communist bloc” that broke “the unity and
solidarity of the hemisphere.”

(Such a proposal would represent a daring departure for Latin American
governments, which have long considered the 1962 ban a cold war relic
but now are seizing on the Obama administration’s openness to some
engagement with Cuba.)


----- Original Message -----
From: Art Heitzer
To: nlgcuba
Sent: Sunday, May 24, 2009 2:16 AM
Subject: U.S. Signals Willingness to Talks With Cuba (renewing previously agreed to immigration consultations)


This is a rational and positive step, small as it is. Oddly, neither the NYT story below, nor the Miami Herald's report, were able to accurately state the basics of the former talks, in that they were semi-annual (every six months), not bi-annual (which would mean every two years). They were agreed to, to monitor the implementation of the 1995 immigration accords under President Bill Clinton. They also report, without rebuttal or any attempt at balance, that the talks were suspended due to Cuba's alleged lack of compliance with the accords.

As the bolded end of the Washington Post story below (from the AP) states, this was under Bush, as part of generalized hostility to Cuba, which it describes as being "during an especially prickly period" in 2003. According to the Cubans at the time, corroborated by US reports, the minimum 20,000 US visas which were supposed to be granted to Cubans to emigrate from Cuba to the US legally, was way behind schedule some 9 or more months into the US Fiscal Year, leading to increased pressure for illegal emigration -- which US law states is an act of aggression by Cuba against the US, under Helms-Burton, and for which the US president is already authorized to take action as he sees fit to protect US national security. A rash of hijackings followed, Cuba was forced to crack down (executing four failed hijackers), as the US was privately warning Cuba about Cuba's failure to stop unauthorized emigration and less privately citing the US "mission accomplished" quick success in Iraq as an example to Cuba. -- Art Heitzer

================
Administration Proposes Renewed Immigration Talks With Cuba

By Matthew Lee
Associated Press
Saturday, May 23, 2009



The Obama administration asked Cuba's communist government on Friday to resume talks on legal immigration to the United States. Such talks had been suspended by President George W. Bush.

The State Department said it had proposed that the discussions be restarted to "reaffirm both sides' commitment to safe, legal and orderly migration, to review trends in illegal Cuban migration to the United States and to improve operational relations with Cuba on migration issues."

President Obama "wants to ensure that we are doing all we can to support the Cuban people in fulfilling their desire to live in freedom," said Darla Jordan, a department spokeswoman. "He will continue to make policy decisions accordingly."

The move follows Obama's decision in April to rescind restrictions on travel to Cuba by Americans with family there and on the amount of money they can send to their relatives on the island.

It also comes ahead of a high-level meeting June 2 of the Organization of American States, where Cuba's possible reentry into the regional bloc will be discussed. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will attend the meeting in Honduras.

Clinton, however, told lawmakers this week that the United States would not support Cuba's membership in the organization until and unless President Raúl Castro's regime makes democratic reforms and releases political prisoners.

She and Obama have also said that broader engagement with Cuba, including the possible lifting of the U.S. embargo on the island, is dependent on such steps.

There was no immediate reaction from the Cuban government.

In Miami on Friday, the influential Cuban American National Foundation welcomed the news, saying that resumed migration talks could be "an opportunity to resolve issues of United States national interest."

However, three Cuban American members of Congress from Florida -- Republican Reps. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, his brother Mario and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen -- denounced the move as "another unilateral concession by the Obama administration to the dictatorship."

The twice-yearly immigration talks had been the highest-level contacts between the two countries, which have no diplomatic relations. Their goal was to allow tracking of adherence to 1994 and 1995 accords designed to promote legal, orderly migration between the countries, and to avoid a repeat of the summer of 1994, when tens of thousands of Cubans took to the sea in flimsy boats.

The Bush administration decided to scuttle the meetings in 2003, arguing that they were not crucial for monitoring the agreements. The suspension came during an especially prickly period in U.S.-Cuba relations.

=================
May 23, 2009, New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/23/world/americas/23cuba.html?_r=1&th&emc=th
U.S. Signals Willingness to Talks With Cuba
By GINGER THOMPSON
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration signaled Friday a willingness to reopen a channel with Cuba that was closed under President George W. Bush by proposing high-level meetings on migration between the countries.

The gesture comes as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is trying to fend off pressure from her Latin American counterparts to make an even bolder break from past policies by endorsing a proposal that would reintegrate Cuba into the Organization of American States.

A State Department spokesman, Ian C. Kelly, said, "We intend to use the renewal of talks to reaffirm both sides' commitment to safe, legal and orderly migration; to review recent trends in illegal Cuban migration to the United States; and to improve operational relations with Cuba on migration issues."

The high-level meetings became a biannual fixture in the mid-1990s after Cuba and the United States signed accords aimed at stemming massive waves of Cubans who were abandoning the island by boat. But President George W. Bush ended the meetings in 2004 - and effectively shut down most avenues of regular communication with Havana - after accusing Cuba of ignoring a variety of delicate issues, including exit visas, the treatment of Cubans repatriated to the island and the surveillance of dissidents.

Two months ago, President Obama lifted restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba for Cuban-Americans with relatives on the island. Even before the administration disclosed its latest initiative, outlined in a letter delivered to Cuban officials on Friday, it was clear that the reaction at home and abroad could pose significant political challenges.

Sarah Stephens, an expert on Cuba policy, praised the move, saying, "It is a signal not just to Cuba but also to the region that we're leaving behind our policy of isolation and moving in the direction of engagement."

Three members of Florida's congressional delegation - Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Mario Diaz-Balart, all of whom are Republicans - issued a joint statement denouncing the administration for proposing reopening talks with Cuba.

They said Mr. Bush had suspended the meetings because the Cuban government refused to give exit visas to Cubans who had received permission to enter the United States.

"The Obama administration should first insist that the Castro dictatorship complies with the accord before renewing talks," the lawmakers wrote. "Regrettably, this constitutes another unilateral concession by the Obama administration to the dictatorship."

Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, said, "The administration is missing opportunities to make real change in Cuba."

With a meeting of the Organization of American States scheduled in Honduras for June 2, a confrontation was already brewing between the Obama administration and most Latin American governments over Cuba.

A majority of the organization's members is expected to support lifting a provision that was used to expel Cuba from the organization in 1962, citing its alliance with "the Communist bloc" that broke "the unity and solidarity of the hemisphere."

Aware of the domestic political problems that any change in relations with Cuba could create, the Obama administration is trying to draw firm limits to any engagement. Senator Menendez, who is chairman of the committee that approves foreign assistance programs, has said he will withhold American financing to the O.A.S. - which amounts to about 60 percent of its budget - if it invites Cuba to rejoin.

Administration officials reiterated this week a long-term American determination to keep Cuba out of the organization until it demonstrated a willingness to adopt the democratic principles that are a part of the organization's charter. Cuba must be willing to "take the concrete steps necessary" to comply with the charter's principles, Mrs. Clinton told a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

"If Cuba is not willing to abide by its terms," she said, "I cannot foresee how Cuba can be a part of the O.A.S., and I certainly would not be supporting in any way such an effort to admit it."

José Miguel Insulza, the organization's secretary general, said in an interview that the proposal to lift the 1962 provision was not aimed at immediately readmitting Cuba. In fact, he noted that Cuban officials had spoken strongly against rejoining the organization, which it disparages as a tool of the United States.

Mr. Insulza said that the provision banning Cuba was forged during the cold war, in an international context that no longer existed. Today, Cuba is the sole Communist government in the hemisphere, and yet it has diplomatic relations with every nation in the region except the United States. The United States' effort to isolate Cuba for nearly five decades has not produced free and fair elections. It is time, Mr. Insulza said, to try a new way.

Before the Summit of the Americas in April, Mr. Obama lifted the restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba, hoping to appease calls from the region for an end to the American embargo.

Mr. Obama told his Latin American counterparts that his administration had demonstrated its willingness to move away from past American policies, and that the next move was up to Cuba. Latin American leaders, however, made clear that they wanted the United States to do more.

"I think the region is ready to close the old chapter and start a new chapter with Cuba," said Flavio Darío Espinal, a former ambassador to the United States from the Dominican Republic. "There has never before been this kind of confluence of opinions. But the key thing is going to be finding a way to break the ice."

Many polls have shown a majority of Cuban Americans support some form of diplomatic engagement with Cuba, but there remain powerful political figures, including Senator Menendez, who will not tolerate significant changes in American policy without significant changes in Cuba.

Mark Landler contributed reporting.

[magbana]

1. Article: "Why Opening Talks on Migration is Not a "Unilateral Concession"

Article preceeded by comments from Karen Wald and Walter Lippmann

re: FPA: Why opening talks on migration is not a “unilateral
Posted by: "Walter Lippmann" [e-mail] walterlx
Sun May 24, 2009 5:23 pm (PDT)


KAREN LEE WALD FURTHER POINTS OUT:
Walter's comment is important -- you can't talk about migration without talking about the "pull" effect of the Cuban Adjustment Act.

But there is also a little item sneaked in towards the bottom of the article about "independent journalists" who were drowned at sea trying to reach Miami illegally that needs a LOT more clarification....

1. push vs. pull --immigration and refugee advocates and attorneys have long distinguished between "push" type of immigration, which occurs when conditions in one's native country become so intolerable that an individual or group cannot continue to live there, and will go anywhere to escape (genocide, drought, tsunami, genital mutilation, death squads),

and "pull" type, which is when a particular country or region holds such an allure (usually economically) that people from other (usually nearby) countries or regions are drawn to emigrate to that country. It should be noted that despite distorted media reports echoing US government and corporate interests, the United States has always exerted a "pull" type of force, vastly increased by the Cuban Adjustment Act, luring Cubans to venture to reach that country illegally, by any means.

2. "Earlier this month, one such case was highly publicized, as at least 4 and more likely 8 independent journalists and librarians from the island were killed in a storm on the water." A whole book could be written, and numerous articles have been written, around that seemingly simplistic statement. I will raise only two here.

The concept of "independent journalists" is a phrase created by the US propaganda machine to imply that all regularly employed journalists in Cuba are NOT "independent" and not telling the truth, as the ones in the service (and pay) of US and European anti-Castro groups ARE the really independent and truthful ones (albeit they are not independent of the cash flows and political spin of such groups.

Second, these so-called "independent journalists" are the favorites of the US government. Why wouldn't the US Interests Section have simply given them legal visas to emigrate to the US if that was what these individuals desired? Why does someone have to leave Cuba illegally in order to receive the benefits of asylum --even if they have been playing the role of political dissidents??
===================================================
From: Walter Lippmann
To: CubaNews
Sent: Sunday, May 24, 2009 4:37 AM
Subject: FPA: Why opening talks on migration is not a “unilateral concession”

(A modest but possibly significant step, unsurprisingly the rightist
Cuban exile militants who want nothing but to maintain the blockade
of their former homeland, stridently oppose any communication with
Cuba's government. After half a century of hostility from the U.S.
against Cuba, it's important to clarify what's at stake, or what
could be at stake, in each step as they unfold between the Cuban
and US sides. This short commentary, which unfortunately omits any
mention of the Cuban Adjustment Act, is still quite useful and is
the kind of thing which anyone concerned with US policy toward
Cuba should read and share widely with others. Of course, due to
the Cuban Adjustment Act, people on the island, even more than
citizens of any other country on earth, are encouraged by the US
to leave their homeland in search of a better life in the U.S.)
=================================================================

Why opening talks on migration is not a “unilateral concession”
By Melissa Lockhart
Saturday, May 23
http://cuba.foreignpolicyblogs.com/2009/05/23/
why-opening-talks-on-migration-is-not-a-unilateral-concession/

Yesterday the Obama administration proposed reinstating high level meetings between Cuban and U.S. officials to discuss migration between the countries—a channel of communication that was closed in 2004 by George W. Bush. The last such talks were in mid-2003 and had happened fairly regularly before then. Bush called off further talks when the Cuban government began denying exit visas to individuals that had been granted permission to enter the United States.

Of course, the announcement was quickly followed by a denouncement by the three Republican members of Florida’s congressional delegation (Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Mario Diaz-Balart) who also opposed the easing of restrictions on family travel, remittance and communications announced two months ago by the Obama administration. Their view is, again, that these kinds of steps are simply unilateral concessions to a regime without any intent to make equal or reciprocal changes in its own policy.

They are missing the point. Opening talks is not to benefit or bolster the Cuban regime, and would not have that effect. It helps the people who migrate from Cuba to the United States by attempting to coordinate safe, legal and orderly migration. Cooperation on this issue is incredibly important. Under the current system, with no cooperation or coordination between the two countries, scores of Cubans are killed while crossing the Caribbean in attempts to reach the United States. Earlier this month, one such case was highly publicized, as at least 4 and more likely 8 independent journalists and librarians from the island were killed in a storm on the water.

With greater agreement on issuing of visas, treatment of Cubans repatriated to the island, and perhaps even review of the Wet Foot-Dry Foot policy (as it stands, Cubans who reach Florida beaches/land are allowed to stay in the country, and those who are intercepted at sea are returned to Cuba), these Cuban lives will be better protected.

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WALTER LIPPMANN
Los Angeles, California
Editor-in-Chief, CubaNews
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/
"Cuba - Un Paraíso bajo el bloqueo"
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