Tough blow to Cuban exile hard-liners

By Max J. Castro
majcastro@gmail.com

A June 9th letter addressed to the U.S. Congress by 74 members of Cuban civil society, dissident, and human rights groups has struck one of the hardest blows against Miami Cuban hard-liners.

For years, the strategy of exile militants has been to force regime change in Cuba by strangling the island’s economy through the U.S. embargo. Now the United States House of Representatives is considering lifting the travel and facilitating agricultural sales through the Travel Restriction Reform and Export Enhancement Act (HR4645). The dissidents’ letter amounts to a ringing endorsement of the bill.

“We share the opinion that the isolation of the people of Cuba benefits the most inflexible interests of its government while any opening serves to inform and empower the Cuban people,” says the letter. It goes on to say that “We value the experience of the Western countries, including the United States, who favored opening and trade with all the countries of the former Eastern Europe. We are sure that isolation does not foster relationships of respect and support for peoples and groups around the world who are in favor of democratic changes in Cuba.”

The letter, signed by some of the most prominent opposition personalities in Cuba, sent shock waves through hard-liners in Miami and Congress. Representative Lincoln Díaz Balart thundered against the letter and called it a crude manipulation of the dissidents by groups in the United States, including the U.S. Chamber of Congress and the Cuba Study Group. Radio pundit Ninoska Pérez-Castellon, a member of the Board of Directors of the hard-line Cuban Liberty Council, said it was “a crass manipulation to use dissidents in Cuba to support two measures that will benefit the regime.” Pérez even engaged in a debate with Guillermo Fariñas, one of the signers of the letter, who is currently on a prolonged hunger strike in Cuba to obtain the freedom of 25 Cuban prisoners who are in poor health.

The charge of manipulation is an insult to the integrity, independence and intelligence of the signers of the controversial letter. The dissident’s letter addresses and rejects the major exile objections to lifting the travel ban and facilitating agricultural sales. It virtually demolishes the rationale for the embargo and confers the high moral ground to those in Congress and the public who for years have argued for relaxing the travel and trade bans. Among the signers of the letter are some of the most prominent dissident figures, including Elizardo Sánchez Santa Cruz, Félix Bonne Carcassés, Yoani Sánchez, Oscar Espinosa Chepe, Father José Conrado, and Dagoberto Valdés.

The letter demolishes the hard-liners’ longstanding argument that the end of travel restrictions amounts to an abandonment of Cuban civil society. It further argues that the travel ban amounts to a denial of the rights of American citizens. “Because the ability to travel freely is the right of every human being we support this bill.” The letter also states that the bill would “further facilitate the sale of agricultural products [which] would help alleviate the food shortages we now suffer.”

The dissidents’ letter undercuts the hard-line Cuban exile lobbies who had scored significant victories in restricting travel and trade during the administration of George W. Bush. It is a coup for the Cuban Study Group, an exile group which supports the new legislation.  It is a defeat for the hard-line lobbyists and exile organizations whose strategy has depended on the economic strangulation of Cuba. As of this writing, the Cuban American National Foundation, which in the past successfully pushed for tough sanctions against Cuba but has softened its stance in recent years, has not commented on the legislation.

The policy of isolating and economically strangling Cuba has been a failure for the last fifty years. It is a policy that is not supported by the American people. According to surveys, the policy is not even supported by a certain sector of Cubans in the United States. It is a policy that stands only with the support of a small but powerful minority within a minority. Now the dissidents’ letter shows that there is no support for the policy either among a wide sector of Cubans who can hardly be suspected of pro-Castro sympathies, the smear hard-liners have always used to smear any Cuban American who opposed any part of the embargo.

It is a time for a new policy. The dissidents have spoken. Members of the U.S. Congress and President Obama: the ball is in your court.