Published Friday, March 17, 2000, in the Miami Herald
U.S., Cuban scholars dodge disputes in Miami debate
By Juan O. Tamayo . jtamayo@herald.com
Cuban academics from both sides of the Florida Straits joined Thursday in an unusual show of coexistence in Miami, debating everything from Cuban politics to Cuban literature in an atmosphere of studied coolness on the opening day of a major conference on Latin America.
Havana's 124-member delegation made up one of the largest Cuban contingents ever seen at an academic meeting in the United States, reflecting President Clinton's recent efforts to promote ``people-to-people contacts with Cuba while maintaining the economic embargo against President Fidel
Castro's government.
Neither Cuba nor the U.S. State Department vetoed the participation of any Cubans in the conference of the Latin American Studies Association. ``Some visas came late, but all arrived, a LASA official said.
Fractious disputes are not unknown at such conferences, but the closest thing to a controversy to erupt so far came when a surprisingly small group of conference members from Havana submitted a resolution that would condemn the U.S. embargo against Cuba. It was considered unlikely to pass.
The absence of fireworks on the first day of the LASA conference served to allay early fears that the presence of so many Cubans connected to the government through their jobs at state-run universities might draw protest. The LASA conference has drawn about 2,800 U.S. and 2,200 foreign
university professors, many from Latin America, to three downtown hotels.
From Thursday to Saturday, LASA plans to stage 691 two-hour seminars on topics including agriculture, democracy, economic development and the environment, said Anthony Maingot, FIU anthropologist and LASA program chairman.
Cuba clearly drew major interest, with 36 seminars devoted to its issues -- second to Mexico's 69 -- that went from the opening session, ``001: Cuban Agriculture 1959-99 to ``684: Church-State Relations in Cuba.
Media reports last week on the Cuban involvement with the conference sparked a controversy in Miami, capital of the Cuban exiles. Miami-Dade authorities tried unsuccessfully to block LASA from using a county-owned hall for its opening reception Wednesday night, and one conference organizer said
he had received telephone threats.
RESPECTFUL TONE
But Cubans from the island and exiles appeared to go out of their way to avoid unseemly confrontations in the seminars Thursday, speaking in measured terms and in the passive voice -- ``the decision was taken -- to avoid laying blame.
``No one can miss the symbolism here, exulted Maingot, who arranged most of the panels, after two Havana economists and two exile sociologists joined to address one of the touchiest panels: ``Cuba in the '90s. Political, Economic and Social Realities.
But it wasn't all academic blandness at the LASA conference, held every 18 months.
One Havana academic discreetly criticized Havana's rejection of most private farm ownership, at the root of its communist system, saying that agricultural efficiency could improve if more land was in private hands.
Another grew visibly irked when an exile referred to poverty in Cuba, arguing that since the government guarantees all the basic needs of its people, Cuba has no real poverty, only ``relative poverty.
Miami Police patroled the halls of the three hotels and checked conference registration tags at key hallway intersections, but only three exile protesters had turned up as of Thursday afternoon to demonstrate against the presence of Cubans from the island.
ACADEMICS PAID
LASA, which usually pays the air fare and accommodations of most academics selected to address its seminars, said it was paying the expenses for about 70 of the Cuban professors and researchers.
Most of the other Cuban visitors will go on to speaking engagements at U.S. and foreign universities that are paying their way.
A group of 31 Cubans from Havana lost no time Thursday circulating the proposed resolution that would condemn the U.S. embargo and the Torricelli and Helms-Burton laws as ``interventionist and extraterritorial.
There was no clear explanation of why the other 93 Cubans at the conference did not sign the draft resolution. ``I doubt it means they support the embargo,'' joked a Cuban-American historian at the conference.
The Cubans have won votes on similar resolutions at past conferences by jamming the LASA business meetings held at the end of the sessions, when most delegates have already begun to return home, a LASA official said.
Past LASA business meetings have required the presence of only 5 percent of registered conference participants to vote on such resolutions. But this year the quorum requirement was raised to 10 percent.
Cuba denies plan to allow 'massive exodus' to U.S.
HAVANA -- (AFP) -- Cuba denied Thursday that it intends to open its borders and allow a massive exodus to the United States, the official newspaper Granma reported Thursday.
An editorial in the Communist Party daily acknowledged that there is growing support and ``radicalization'' for Cuba opening its borders in response to the delay in returning 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez to his father in Cuba and to protest a U.S. law that favors illegal Cuban immigration.
The daily said that ``many'' people in Miami are hoping for an imminent ``massive exodus,'' similar to the Mariel boatlift in 1980 that created a crisis between Washington and Havana.
``But no one has said that Cuba has made one single move in that direction,'' the daily said. ``On the contrary, it is thanks to the special forces in our country that there is control on the coasts'' and the number of immigrants is not greater.
``We have captured dozens of people who traffic in illegal immigrants, and if they are guilty, they could spend some 30 years or life in prison.''
The paper also claimed that U.S. authorities ``have not arrested anyone responsible for breaking their laws.''
On Tuesday, in another Granma editorial, Cuba accused the United States of violating bilateral migration accords signed in 1994-95 meant to crack down on illegal emigration from Cuba by allowing those that reach U.S. soil to stay.
In the summer of 1994, Cuba opened its borders and more than 30,000 people fled the island in fragile rafts in attempts to reach U.S. shores.
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