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By Anthony Boadle
WASHINGTON,
Jan 30 (Reuters) - Pope John Paul's visit to Cuba has stirred up a heated debate
in the United States that could lead to changes in the 35-year U.S. trade
embargo against the communist-ruled island, politicians said on Friday.
The Pontiff's plea for an end to U.S. sanctions has split hardline Cuban
exiles for years bent on bringing Fidel Castro's revolution to its knees through
an economic stranglehold.
In the U.S. Congress, the papal visit has strengthened the ground for
lawmakers who advocate relaxing the embargo to allow humanitarian aid through to
Cuba's needy population.
Legislation proposed by California Democrat Esteban Torres to allow the free
sale of U.S. food and medicine to Cuba for humanitarian reasons has obtained the
backing of 93 members of the House of Representatives and is expected to move
forward.
The bill is supported by religious institutions, human rights organizations
and businessmen represented by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
A sister bill recently introduced in the upper house by senators Chris Dodd,
a Connecticut Democrat, and John Warner, a Virginia Republican, has 17
co-sponsors.
"Pope John Paul II and President Fidel Castro have taken the first
steps towards change,'' said New York Democrat Jose Serrano, who sponsored a
bill to lift the embargo entirely.
"Now the United States has an opportunity to follow their lead and
begin a new era of reconciliation with Cuba,'' said Puerto Rican-born Serrano.
Critics of the embargo say it hurts the Cuban people rather than the
island's government and allows Castro to blame the economic crisis suffered by
Cuba since the collapse of the Soviet Union on the United States.
During his historic Jan 21-25 visit to Cuba, the Pope criticized the embargo
and asked the world to open up to Cuba, and for Cuba to open up to the world,
urging reconciliation with the exile community in the United States.
In a major shift of position, the leading Cuban exile organization, the
Cuban American Foundation, proposed on Thursday sending millions of dollars in
U.S. government aid to Cuba to be distributed by the Catholic Church or the
American Red Cross.
The proposal was endorsed by right-wing North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms,
a long-time advocate of harsh economic sanctions against Cuba's communist
government.
Helms, who sponsored legislation that tightened the embargo in 1996 by
seeking to discourage foreign investment in Cuba, said if Castro refused to
allow delivery of the donated aid it would be clear to all Cubans who was
causing their suffering.
In an unprecedented development, two Helms aides, Roger Noriega and Marc
Thiessen, visited Cuba this week in the wake of the Pope's visit and held talks
with Cuban officials.
The U.S. aid proposal caused in-fighting in the exile community and revealed
a growing rift over the embargo.
Two Cuban-American Republicans representing the Miami exile community in the
U.S. Congress, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Lincoln Diaz-Balart, criticized the plan
and angrily opposed any move to weaken the embargo.
But political analysts said the split had emerged because some exiles agree
with the Pope's message of reconciliation.
"The Pope is still working miracles. His visit has stirred things up
and forced a debate in Havana, Miami and Washington that too many people had
avoided for too long,'' said political scientist Lillian Pubillones of the
Inter-American Dialogue, a hemispheric relations think-tank.
Pubillones said Cuban Americans had begun to recognize that the U.S. embargo
was contributing to deprivation in Cuba.
Exiles remit an estimated $800 million a year to relatives, a major source
of hard currency for the Cuban government.
"Clearly, Cuban-Amercians are voting with their pockets for a end to
the embargo,'' she said.
The battle over the embargo follows other discussions such as the recent
freedom of expression debate over whether to allow Cuban musicians from the
island to perform in Miami.
Moderates hope the opening up of discussion on the embargo will lead to the
relaxing of regulations on remittances and travel to the island.
"The papal visit has made it easier for people who agree with lifting
the embargo but were scared that they would be branded as communists,'' said
Serrano, who in 1995 invited Castro to visit his constituency in New York's
Bronx.
"They can now say the Pope told us to end the embargo.'' REUTERS
16:02 01-30-98 |