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CUBA
NEWS
Yahoo!
Cuba and US at loggerheads over immigration
talks
HAVANA, 7 (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 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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