CUBA
U.S.-Cuba dialogue team envisioned
The governor of New Mexico has asked South Florida exile leaders to lead
dialogue with Cuba.
BY FRANCES ROBLES
frobles@MiamiHerald.com
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson has an old idea that's been tried
before, which even its supporters say won't work: Create a team of
exiles to dialogue with the Cuban government.
Richardson pitched the idea to top Cuban officials while on a recent
trip to the island, and he's already approached Cuban-American leaders
who have agreed to participate, he told The Miami Herald in an interview.
He won't say whom.
The Cubans here went for it. The ones on the island -- not so much.
``They weren't crazy about the idea,'' Richardson said. ``They didn't
reject it. They said, `We always have dialogue,' but you can't have
dialogue without those who have the political clout.''
Richardson, a former candidate for president, visited Cuba in late
August on a trade mission. He returned advocating more legalized travel
to the island, and saying that the Cuban government must do its part, too.
His trip was met with eye-rolls in some sectors of Miami, where even the
people who promote dialogue said the plan would probably flop.
``I saw in the Cubans a lack of flexibility,'' Richardson said. ``I told
them, `Look, there has to be reciprocity. You can't just want the
embargo lifted and Radio Martí issues dealt with and an end to Guanánamo
and you guys don't do anything.' Let the Cubans take some steps.''
His dialogue suggestion goes back some 30 years, when a Cuban-American
banker named Bernardo Benes secretly negotiated the release of 3,600
political prisoners -- and became a pariah for it.
There was a time in this community that just advocating such missions
got you bombed and shot.
``Maybe Richardson is bored,'' Benes said. ``I applaud him.''
Benes said Richardson first approached him with that idea in 1997, the
morning after Richardson was named the U.S. ambassador to the United
Nations. That was a year after Richardson, then a U.S. representative,
had met with Fidel Castro and negotiated the release of three Cuban
political prisoners.
In 1994, three Cuban Americans flew to Madrid, Cuba and New York to meet
with the Cuban foreign minister. That year, a local delegation attended
the first migration conference there, which erupted in controversy in
South Florida.
Attorney Alfredo Durán, who met with the Cuban foreign minister in 1994,
said the challenge with negotiating with Havana is that they refuse to
set an agenda.
CUBA'S RESISTANCE
``I refuse to act like a seal and applaud,'' Durán said. ``They don't
want an agenda, and they really don't want to deal with Cuban Americans.''
But Durán supports Richardson's idea anyway, as does activist Ramón Saúl
Sánchez.
``Our experience has been that the government never talks to real
members of the opposition,'' Sánchez said. ``They try to have dialogue
that is basically a monologue. But if there is will by the government of
Cuba to dialogue, then you can rest assured you will find courage among
exiles to do the same.''
Bay of Pigs veteran and dialogue advocate Marcelino Miyares said the
trick is to start talks with ``easy'' topics like humanitarian issues.
``The Cuban government has never agreed to talk to the opposition inside
or outside Cuba, but that doesn't mean we should stop trying,'' said
Miyares, spokesman for Consenso Cubano, a moderate exile organization. `
``The only problem with Richardson is that he's too public,'' Miyares
said. ``This type of thing historically is done in a third country,
almost in secret.''
Critics say the idea is a waste of time cooked up by a politician
dodging personal problems.
POLITICAL PLOY?
Richardson was forced to withdraw his nomination as U.S. secretary of
commerce this year over a federal investigation into how a political
donor landed a lucrative transportation contract.
``You cannot substitute dialogue with political prisoners in Cuba with
dialogue with an ad hoc group of Cuban Americans,'' said Orlando
Gutiérrez, National Secretary of the Democratic Directorate, a human
rights group here.
``I think now he's seeking publicity and commercial and entrepreneurial
opportunities for New Mexico. He's had bad publicity and needs good
publicity with this diplomatic stuff.''
Jaime Suchlicki, who heads the University of Miami's Institute of Cuban
and Cuban American Studies, said Richardson is underestimating howlittle
Raúl Castro cares about the exile community.
``What does Raúl care about Cuban Americans?'' Suchlicki said.
``He has Venezuela, the Chinese just gave him $600 million, and Iran and
the Russians gave him millions. What does he need Cuban Americans for?''
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen called Richardson's proposal ``one of the
lamest'' ideas she's ever heard.
U.S.-Cuba dialogue team envisioned - Americas - MiamiHerald.com (9
September 2009)
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/story/1223973.html
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