It's been a good year for dictators in Cuba and beyond. If Spain's
foreign minister has his way, 2010 will be even better.
Havana's man in Europe is returning from Cuba with a simple request: For
his EU partners to drop their focus on human rights. After a two-day
visit with the Cuban government, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel
Moratinos will press his Continental counterparts to scrap their 1996
"Common Position" on Cuba in order to fully normalize ties with Raul
Castro's dictatorship.
This would be mainly a cosmetic change, since last year the EU abandoned
all diplomatic sanctions against Cuba, and Brussels says it expects to
pour some €36 million in "cooperation" funds into the country this year.
The Castro machine, which remains as repressive as ever despite the
substitution of Raul for Fidel, already benefits from preferred trading
status with the EU and counts the 27-nation block as its largest trading
partner.
The 1996 document is today the EU's only official caveat to ever-warmer
relations with Cuba. It lays out that its objective "is to encourage a
process of transition to pluralist democracy and respect for human
rights and fundamental freedoms." That position statement nudged
Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in 2008 to temper
praise for Havana with dissatisfaction with its human-rights record, and
Finnish President Tarja Halonen in 2007 to direct the world to be "firm"
as well as "encouraging" with Castro. In other words, it's not much.
Even so, Madrid tells us it will use its turn at the EU presidency next
year to try to do away with the text and relieve Havana of special
scrutiny of its political prisoners—numbering more than 200, at the
U.S.'s last count.
Consider Mr. Moratinos a trend-setter in the age of Obama, as the U.S.
president's own overtures to Castro (not to mention to Iran, Burma and
now Sudan) follow a distinctly Moratinian philosophy. This holds that
engaging dictators will yield better results than offering succor to
their dissidents, and that tyrants and terrorists are somehow more
malleable than their brutality suggests. Mr. Moratinos is the same
Socialist minister who has lobbied in the past to have Hamas removed
from the EU's blacklist.
To make his point in Havana, Mr. Moratinos did not meet with the
families of any political prisoners, nor any independent journalists,
nor any human rights organizations. Raul responded with the Castros'
standard parting gift for well-behaved guests: human life. He freed a
jailed Spanish businessman pending trial, and one political prisoner,
the Associated Press reported. We wonder what Mr. Moratinos could offer
for the other 199-plus, though we suspect the "change in attitude" he
wants toward the regime won't do it.
Despite his passion for engagement, Mr. Moratinos can expect resistance
from at least a few EU nations, namely the Czech Republic, the U.K.,
Sweden, and Germany, who are unlikely to grant Mr. Moratinos's request.
But overall, it's been a good year for autocrats in Cuba and beyond
seeking international legitimacy while denying their people basic
rights. If Mr. Moratinos has his way, 2010 will be even better.
Castro's Man in Europe - WSJ.com (20 October 2009)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704500604574484923135150240.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
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