Cuba and US at loggerheads over immigration talks

by Marie Sanz

Friday, January 9, 2004

HAVANA, Cuba (AFP): Cuba and the United States traded accusations of blame on Wednesday for the failure of immigration talks that heightened tensions between the Cold War enemies.

Talks have been held since 1994 on the steady flow of Cubans wanting to escape Fidel Castro's communist island, to join the estimated 1.2 million already in the United States.

These have been the only official contacts between the two countries who have had no diplomatic relations for more than 40 years.

Cuba accused the US administration of cancelling talks provisionally scheduled to start Thursday.

Its anger has been heightened by a new attack from the top US diplomat for the Americas, Roger Noriega, a Cuban-born conservative, who highlighted US concern about Castro's close relations with some South American leaders and called him a "broken down ... old dictator".

The US State Department said Cuban intransigence was to blame for the failed talks.

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher, speaking as eight Cubans rescued from a small boat off the Florida coast were repatriated, said Washington would talk if Havana agreed to address US concerns over immigration.

Boucher said the United States wants a "productive agenda" that includes the five areas of concern: Cuba's refusal to grant exit permits to qualified people who want to go to the United States, its failure to arrange a new registration system for a visa lottery, the need for a deep-water port for repatriation, restoring US access to repatriated Cubans and Cuba's obligation to accept the return of its nationals rejected by the United States.

"Consequently when the Cuban government proposed January 8 for the next round of migration talks, we determined that, given the Cuban government's expressed unwillingness to engage on these five most important issues, another round of talks at this point did not serve our interests," Boucher said.

Earlier, the Cuban foreign ministry said the issues lacked "the slightest significance to the advancement of the migration accords" between the two sides.

The ministry accused the United States of unilaterally cancelling the talks. "The US rejection is an irresponsible action," it declared in a statement.

"Clearly, in the imperial language of the US officials, 'dealing seriously' means that Cuba should be willing to make every unilateral concession needed and give in to every whim and demand of the US authorities."

Cuba said it was willing to "seriously" discuss all issues raised by US authorities.

US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Roger Noriega stepped up the pressure on Tuesday by highlighting concerns about Cuban activism in Latin America, particularly the close contacts with Venezuela and its populist leader Hugo Chavez.

Castro "is increasingly active in the region and this is a great concern among Latin American leaders that I meet with because they understand that he is not committed to the democratic process," Noriega said. "He's a broken-down -- the old dictator. He's fishing in troubled waters."

The United States expelled one diplomat from the Cuban interests section in Washington last month. It expelled seven from the interests section and seven from Cuba's UN mission in New York last May.

The Cuban parliament has in turn approved an increase in the defence budget for 2004 with senior leaders emphasising the United States' "aggressive activities".

But outside of their sabre-rattling, trade between the two has been growing since the United States partially lifted restrictions on goods that can be sent to Cuba two years ago. US exports to Cuba last year were worth 692 million dollars, according to Cuban figures.

Kansas has become the first US state to sign a commercial memorandum with Cuba. 

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