PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AFP): Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg criticised on Wednesday Spain's decision to patch up diplomatic ties with Cuba's communist regime.
 |
Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg.
AFP PHOTO |
"The Czech Republic has a different long term opinion to that of Spain when it comes to dealing with the Cuban regime," said Schwarzenberg.
"There is not a change in Czech policy towards Cuba. The question of human rights constitutes one of the foreign policy priorities for the Czech Republic," Schwarzenberg said in a statement.
In May 2005 Schwarzenberg was one of several European lawmakers who were expelled from Cuba as they arrived to attend a congress of Cuban political dissidents.
On Tuesday, Cuba and Spain signed an agreement creating a mechanism for political consultation, including on the sensitive issue of human rights, during a visit by Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos.
Madrid has spearheaded efforts to revive European Union relations with Cuba, after Havana jailed 75 dissidents four years ago.
As one half of Czechoslokia, the Czech Republic was under Soviet rule from after WWII until 1989, since when it has been at the forefront of attacking human rights abuses under Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
In December the former anti-communist dissident turned president Vaclav Havel urged tourists to shun the Caribbean island as a holiday destination.
"I cannot go to Cuba to lounge on the beach and pretend not to notice anything while there are dozens of political prisoners behind bars," Havel said at a dissidents' conference in Warsaw.
| 
