Associated Press. 06/28/2000. The Dallas Morning News.
HAVANA - A senior Cuban official on Tuesday criticized a U.S. congressional plan that would allow the sale of American food to Cuba, saying the conditions it appears to impose could worsen the trade embargo.
Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban National Assembly, said news reports of the agreement indicated that it would impose conditions on the sale of food, such as barring U.S. financing for the purchases, and said nothing about exports of Cuban goods to the United States.
"This here not only doesn't modify the blockade but in some parts makes it worse," Mr. Alarcón told a forum on state television Tuesday evening.
However, Cuban shoppers and vendors welcomed word of the agreement, although they questioned whether it would have any effect on their everyday lives.
"The more products there are, the more sales there are," said Yasny Pérez Osorio, a vendor at a farmers market in Havana's Vedado neighborhood.
Aurelio Naranjo, a 74-year-old retiree, questioned whether the agreement would have much of an impact because it bars both the U.S. government and U.S. banks from financing such sales.
"It's a big problem," he said. "We can buy it, but how?"
According to government statistics, Cuba imports more than 300,000 tons of rice each year, half of it from Asia. In addition, Cuba imports about 950,000 tons of wheat a year, mainly from Europe. U.S. farm groups say they could provide it all.
Lawmakers from U.S. farm states reached an agreement early Tuesday on a deal to allow direct sales of U.S. food to the Cuban government for the first time in nearly four decades.
2000 The Dallas Morning News |