EU says no progress with Cuba on human rights

EU says no progress with Cuba on human rights
Mon May 11, 2009 7:00pm BST
By David Brunnstrom

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union and Cuba disagreed over the
communist island's human rights policy on Monday but a senior EU
official made clear he opposed any move to resume sanctions lifted last
year.

EU Aid Commissioner Louis Michel called instead for more dialogue with
the Caribbean island and diplomats said the Union was unlikely to revert
to sanctions next month when it reviews the decision to lift them.

"Our views did converge on the issues of climate change and U.N. reform;
they did not in the area of human rights," Czech Foreign Minister Jan
Kohout said after EU officials held talks with Cuban Foreign Minister
Bruno Rodriguez.

"We came back to the issue of political prisoners in Cuba and their
health, and the answer we got was that in Cuba there are no political
prisoners," he told reporters.

Despite this, Kohout said the talks had been "a real dialogue, not just
two monologues."

The 27 EU member states agreed last June to scrap sanctions on Cuba to
try to encourage democratic reforms, but decided to review the decision
annually.

"OBSOLETE" CRITICISM

"Cuba is ready to normalize relations, to establish a new start in the
relationships between the European Union and Cuba," Rodriguez said.

He said the common EU position on Cuba, with its emphasis on human
rights criticism, was "obsolete."

"It was imposed by a North American government which is not in power any
more, and I view it today as an obstacle to the process of
normalization," he told reporters.

He said all inmates in Cuba had undergone due legal process and were not
political prisoners.

"These are legal decisions, and not of a political nature," he said.
"The Cuban penal system fully complies with all standards in this domain."

Michel, who represents the EU's executive Commission, underlined the
importance of the resumption of dialogue and the coming to power of U.S.
President Barack Obama.

"Dialogue has been re-established, the cooperation has resumed, and you
also have a change of administration in Washington," he said.

"These elements should encourage us to reinforce the dialogue, to pursue
the dialogue and have a positive position in the (European) Council (of
EU leaders)."

Obama says he wants to recast U.S.-Cuban relations after half a century
of hostility, but wants to maintain a U.S. trade embargo imposed on the
island in 1962 as leverage for change.

But he has eliminated some restrictions and curbs on U.S. telecoms firms
wanting to operate in Cuba, while calling on Havana to improve human
rights to get more concessions.

(Reporting by David Brunnstrom and Marine Haas, editing by Mark Trevelyan)

EU says no progress with Cuba on human rights | Reuters (12 May 2009)

http://uk.reuters.com/article/globalNews/idUKTRE54A4P320090511?sp=true