• The objective of this Blog is to facilitate access to research resources and analyses from all relevant and useful sources, mainly on the economy of Cuba. It includes analyses and observations of the author, Arch Ritter, as well as hyper-links, abstracts, summaries, and commentaries relating to other research works from academic, governmental, media, non-governmental organizations and international institutions.
    Commentary, critique and discussion on any of the postings is most welcome.
    This Blog on The Cuban Economy is dedicated to Cuba's Generation "A". Although inspired by Yoani Sánchez' original blog "Generation Y" this is not dedicated to those with names starting with the letter "A". Instead, it draws from Douglas Coupland's novel Generation A which begins with a quotation from Kurt Vonnegut at a University Commencement:
    "... I hereby declare you Generation A, as much as the beginning of a series of astounding triumphs and failures as Adam and Eve were so long ago."

La reconquista rusa de Cuba

Rolando Gallardo, Quito (Ecuador) | 03/06/2023

Analysis Original: La reconquista rusa de Cuba,

El gobernante cubano, Miguel Díaz-Canel, junto con el presidente ruso, Vladimir Putin. (Archivo/Kremlin)

Tras veinte largas sesiones intergubernamentales entre Cuba y Rusia y una visita de apoyo moral de Díaz-Canel al carnicero de Ucrania, el guerrerista Vladímir Vladímirovich Putin, el régimen de La Habana abrió los brazos a las propuestas y presiones de la oligarquía rusa. Cuba atraviesa la crisis económica, política y social más grande de su historia reciente y para los buitres del Kremlin la fruta está pasada de madura. Las condiciones dejaron de ser meros puntos de negociación para convertirse en un “lo tomas o lo dejas”.

¿Qué busca Rusia en Cuba ganando tierras en usufructo por más de 30 años? Este es el cuestionamiento al que nos inducen los medios oficiales, cuando, sin lugar a dudas, es el elemento menos importante en la jugada geopolítica que se está gastando el débil régimen cubano.

Pongamos atención. Rusia es un país de 17 millones de kilómetros cuadrados, mientras que Cuba no supera los 11.000. La pequeña isla del Caribe cabe 1.545 veces en el territorio de la Federación Rusa. Se podría pensar que las tierras fértiles cubanas son un apetecible premio para los agricultores rusos y empresarios siberianos cansados de la nieve y los surcos congelados, pero tales ideas serían propias de un aldeano irracional. Hay que saber que las tierras más fértiles de la superficie terrestre se denominan chernozem, y se encuentran solamente en el 7% del planeta Tierra y de esa cantidad el 74% se encuentran en Rusia. Para ser claros, Cuba cabría 23 veces en el territorio altamente fértil de Rusia, y ni siquiera estamos hablando de las otras tierras cultivables del país más grande del globo. Un pequeño detalle: Cuba no tiene ni un metro cuadrado de chernozem.

Es evidente que no son las tierras “privilegiadas” de Cuba las que convocaron a la décima primera reunión de negocios entre los oligarcas rusos y la desgastada cúpula de poder cubana. Las palabras de Boris Titov, el rostro más visible de los multimillonarios de derecha rusos y empresario cercano a la casa Castro, deben servir de alerta para comprender lo que se nos avecina.

Pero los rusos cogerán la tierra para emplazar sus empresas y negocios sin pagar y gozando privilegios que no se le ha dado hasta hoy a ningún intento de empresa cubana

Dijo el “camarada” Titov en la inauguración de la XI Reunión del Comité Empresarial: “Existe todo un conjunto de propuestas para los empresarios rusos, como por ejemplo el usufructo de tierras por más de 30 años. Se garantiza la eliminación de aranceles para la importación de productos de alta tecnología y el derecho para poder enviar a Rusia los beneficios y las ganancias obtenidas en los negocios (…). Actualmente el Gobierno de la República de Cuba garantiza que este proceso se hará en tiempos breves con privilegios para los empresarios rusos”.

Pueden parecer inocuas estas palabras, pero es necesario traducir de las intenciones rusas al español de barrio. Titov es el principal preceptor de las directrices (exigencias) políticas de los oligarcas rusos al régimen cubano. La denominada “hoja de ruta” entre Moscú y la Habana son los mandamientos para avanzar con las inversiones. El documento oficial se conserva bajo cierto secretismo, como de costumbre, pero publicaciones asalariadas del Gobierno de Putin ya aluden a ella utilizando esa denominación.

De lo que se ha publicado por medios rusos se comprende que las tierras en usufructo no son más que la eliminación de arriendos de terrenos para empresas rusas, agrícolas o tecnológicas. Ni los americanos fueron tan desahuacatados con el Tratado de Arrendamiento de Bases Navales y Carboneras. El “imperio” siempre pagó arriendo. Pero los rusos cogerán la tierra para emplazar sus empresas y negocios sin pagar y gozando privilegios que no se le ha dado hasta hoy a ningún intento de empresa cubana sin asociación directa con el empresariado militar de la cúpula castrista.

Los rusos podrán ingresar tecnología para sus negocios sin pagar los aranceles que los cubanos sí tienen que pagar incluso por artículos de primera necesidad. Ellos tienen garantizado de que no los molestarán en la Aduana de la República de Cuba, mientras que los ciudadanos de la Isla no cuentan con ninguna seguridad.

El más escandaloso de los privilegios es que “se garantiza la eliminación de aranceles para la importación de productos de alta tecnología, el derecho para poder enviar a Rusia los beneficios y las ganancias obtenidas en los negocios”, según explicó Titov. Si es otro país el que habla de salida de capitales de forma libre, el régimen de La Habana y su prensa gritarán que son capitales golondrinas y buitres.

Los rusos pueden ser lo que quieran, pero bobos nunca han sido. Cuba es un país en crisis política y social, carente de liderazgo y un hervidero de conflictos silenciosos entre militares

Es natural que las inversiones buitres de Rusia lleguen en este momento con garantías de retorno a las cuentas de los oligarcas fuera de Cuba. Los rusos pueden ser lo que quieran, pero bobos nunca han sido. Cuba es un país en crisis política y social, carente de liderazgo y un hervidero de conflictos silenciosos entre militares, cuadros selectos del Partido Comunista y allegados al poder. En un país cada vez más inestable es obligatorio tener una ruta de escape de capital que no choque con trabas burocráticas y las faltas de garantías jurídicas.

El vice primer ministro ruso, Dmitri Chernishenko, declaró durante la reunión en La Habana: “Los Gobiernos de Rusia y Cuba trabajan en la creación de las condiciones beneficiosas para los negocios, eso supone la eliminación de las barreras burocráticas, la reducción de impuestos y aranceles, el desarrollo de la infraestructura bancaria para garantizar el servicio ininterrumpido”.

Son muchos los optimistas en redes que ven en esta jugada la salvación de la dictadura y el reflote de la economía doméstica cubana. La gran pregunta que deberían hacerse es en qué moneda piensan pagarle a los rusos los productos agrícolas y tecnológicos que desarrollarán en Cuba. ¿Creen de verdad que los millonarios ultracapitalistas rusos liderados por Titov quieren acumular pesos?

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CUBA EMBRACES THE RUSSIAN BEAR AGAIN

May 23, 2023

Source:  14ymedio and Havana Times

By Yoani Sanchez (14ymedio)

HAVANA TIMES – In many Cuban houses there is still a wooden Matryoshka, an empty bottle of Moscow Red perfume, or a copy of Sputnik magazine. The Soviet presence was so intense on our Island that, for the children who grew up between the 70s and 80s, the USSR was like a powerful and severe stepmother. Today, we see the Kremlin envoys arrive again and, although they look different in their suits and ties, we know that they are seeking the same thing: to use our country as a geostrategic chess piece that is too big for us, very big.

The same day that the Group of 7 summit began in Japan, Cuba President Miguel Díaz-Canel ratified to the Russian Deputy Prime Minister, Dmitri Chernishenko, “Cuba’s unconditional support for the Russian Federation in its confrontation with the West.” In Hiroshima the meetings revolved around how to tighten sanctions to corner Vladimir Putin over his invasion of Ukraine, but in Havana the red carpet was rolled out for the former KGB agent’s narrow circle of power. It was no coincidence.

Increasingly isolated internationally and with a war in which it has not won the stunning victory it had hoped for, the Russian regime is in dire need of alliances. The urge is not only on the diplomatic level to pretend that it maintains loyal partners in some parts of the planet, but also for its friends help it evade sanctions. Until the beginning of the invasion, Putin had shown several signs of disinterest towards the Island, several joint projects were even canceled due to the inefficient actions of the Cuban side. But the war campaign changed everything.

Havana rapidly aligned itself with Moscow’s discourse and began to call the entry of troops into Ukrainian territory a “special military operation.” It avoided condemning the Russian actions at the United Nations and blamed Kiev for the start of the conflict. Then began a slew of announcements of new agreements signed, of credits granted by the Kremlin and of visits by officials to both sides of the Atlantic. As more photos surfaced with bureaucrats from both countries signing contracts and memorandums of understanding, concern grew among Cubans.

The unease that overwhelms us now comes for several reasons. We know the intensity of the presence that the Russians can have in our country, their infinite willingness and ability to meddle in ministries, offices and barracks. We know that the Díaz-Canel regime is bankrupt and that to save what remains of Castroism it is capable of auctioning off the Island piece by piece. We intuit that a fat check from Moscow would allow the unpopular engineer in the president’s seat to continue at the helm of the nation and reinforce the repression. We also understand that Putin is only interested in us because we are 90 miles from the United States, his archenemy, and located in Latin America, a region in which he wants to have a significant area of ​​influence.

Furthermore, we suspect that with those collar-and-tie envoys who arrive in Havana these days, a democratic change will not come to us, nor more freedoms, much less greater respect for human rights. It points to the opposite. When Chernishenko announced last Friday the creation of “a road map” to accelerate the rapprochement between the two countries, “which might require some changes in Cuban legislation,” he is not thinking of decreeing more spaces for dissidence or a framework of respect for independent media. Rather, it is about paving the way for the Russians to control portions of the national economy and run wild in other spheres as well.

They will bring us, yes, their methods. The ability for obscure agents of the political police to amass an empire, for Party bigwigs to take over the most appetizing industries, and for money from public property liquidations to end up mostly in in the hands of ideological comrades who will exchange their military uniforms for the elegant clothing of the oligarchs.

Translated by Translating Cuba

Read more from Cuba here on Havana Times

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‘NOW IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE’: CUBA GRAPPLES WITH IMPACT OF UKRAINE WAR

May 17, 2022,  Marc Frank in Havana

Cuba Abstains re Russion Invasion of Ukraine

Russia’s war in Ukraine has created fresh problems for its Caribbean ally Cuba, already shaken by street protests and facing severe financial stress amid tighter US sanctions and a pandemic-induced collapse in tourism.

Cubans have contended with chronic shortages of food, medicine and other basic goods for more than two years, owing to the country’s heavy dependency on imports and lack of dollars to pay. Now, there are fuel shortages, more blackouts and less public transport as the island’s communist government battles to secure costly petrol and diesel supplies.

 “It’s the war. We’re already screwed and now it will only get worse,” said Antonio Fernández as he waited at a petrol station in the Playa area of Havana, the capital, to fill up his battered Chevrolet, which doubles as a taxi.

Russia was originally supposed to be guest of honour at this month’s international tourism fair in the beach resort of Varadero until the closing of western air space to punish Moscow over its invasion made flights to Cuba prohibitively expensive. Thousands of Russian tourist bookings were lost. Tourism minister Juan Carlos García Granda said Cuba was working with Russian operators to see what could be done. “We want to rescue that market, which was the main provider during the pandemic,” he said this week.

Tourism is a mainstay of Cuba’s economy, but just 575,000 visitors arrived in 2021, compared with more than 4mn before coronavirus struck. A quarter of last year’s arrivals were from Russia. Cuba had hoped for 2.5mn tourists this year but the loss of its biggest market makes that a tall order. Russian tourists queue at Juan Gualberto Gomez airport in Varadero. Tourism is a linchpin of Cuba’s economy but visitor numbers have slumped © Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images

The worsening situation has fuelled an immigration crisis at the US-Mexico border, with about 100,000 Cubans crossing since October last year. That number is already greater than the number that fled in 1994, the last surge of Cuban migration, and is approaching the 1981 peak. The US has accused Havana of using migration as a safety valve to limit discontent in Cuba.

On the island, many foreign suppliers and investment partners are demanding cash on delivery having not been paid for months. Imports are down 40 per cent since 2019. The director of one Cuban company said his business was “already suffering from cuts in our monthly electricity allocation and last month our diesel was reduced to almost nothing”.

The Ukraine war threatens to torpedo any recovery in Cuba following a 9 per cent fall in gross domestic product in 2020-21. The country suffers triple-digit inflation, caused in part by a devaluation of the peso and demand for scarce goods. Even after the devaluation, the dollar still fetches four times the official rate on the black market.

Various western businessmen say payment problems in Cuba have worsened since the Ukraine invasion as the government struggles with high commodity and shipping costs. Some European traders were being paid via a Russian bank, said one trader, adding that this had now stopped.

“Ministries are going to all joint ventures asking what the minimum is they need to stay open,” said one foreign investor, adding that his Cuban partner had contributed nothing for months.

Economy minister Alejandro Gil admitted recent events were “greatly affecting economic activities”, citing high fuel prices as an example.

Pavel Vidal, a former Cuban central bank economist now at Colombia’s Pontificia Universidad Javeriana Cali, said sanctions against Moscow were weakening Russia’s ability to support Havana and would “add more problems to a balance of payments that has been in crisis for several years”.

 Moscow has sent several cargoes of food and humanitarian aid this year and did so in 2021, although trade and investment remain only a fraction of the levels in Soviet times. Russian president Vladimir Putin and his Cuban counterpart Miguel Díaz-Canel agreed during a phone call in January to deepen “strategic co-operation”, but past promises of Russian investment on the island have been slow to materialise.

The Ukraine war has been diplomatically awkward for Cuba, with its government blaming the conflict on the US and Nato while also calling for the respect of international borders.  Paul Hare, former UK ambassador to Havana, said Cuba, like other Russia- aligned countries, had been embarrassed by the invasion, noting how the island’s government had wanted to deepen relations with the EU. “That perhaps explains why Cuba didn’t vote against the UN General Assembly on March 2 condemning the Russian invasion but abstained,” he added.

Hare, now a senior lecturer at Boston University’s Pardee School of Global Studies, said the war had forced Cuba to pick the wrong side in what the EU considered a strategic threat. Relations with Brussels were already strained because of the draconian prison sentences imposed on hundreds of participants in last year’s anti-government protests.   “Cuba will be seen as complicit in Putin’s attempt to redraw the map of Europe and upend the world order,” he said.

Hal Klepak, a Canadian military historian who has written two books on Cuba, said the island’s armed forces remained heavily dependent on old Soviet equipment and Russian support. The first had been discredited in the Ukraine war and the second was now in doubt because of the invasion’s cost.

 Despite the problems, political change in Cuba 63 years after the revolution that brought the Castro brothers to power seems unlikely.  “Emigration serves as a safety valve for discontent,” said Bert Hoffman, a Cuba expert at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies. “As long as there are no signs of major elite splits then regime continuity is the most likely scenario.”

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REVERSING TRUMP MEASURES, U.S. WILL EXPAND FLIGHTS TO CUBA, LOOSEN REMITTANCES, AND RESUME FAMILY REUNIFICATIONS

Jose Mart Internati0nal Airport: Renewing Activity, I hope.

By Michael Wilner and Nora Gámez Torres

Miami Herald, Updated May 17, 2022 10:03 AM

Original Article: Reversing Trump Measures,

The Biden administration is restoring flights to Cuban cities other than Havana and reestablishing a family reunification program suspended for years, following recommendations of a long-anticipated review of U.S. policy toward Cuba, senior administration officials told McClatchy and the Miami Herald on Monday. The administration will also allow group travel for educational or professional exchanges and lift caps on money sent to families on the island.

The policy changes come after a months-long review that began in earnest after a series of protests roiled the island nation on July 11, prompting a new round of U.S. sanctions on Cuban officials.

Cuba is facing the worst economic crisis since the Soviet Union collapsed, with widespread shortages of food and medicines, and thousands of Cubans trying to reach the United States. One senior administration official said the new policy measures allow the administration to continue supporting the Cuban people and guarding U.S. national security interests.

“Our policy continues to center on human rights, empowering the Cuban people to determine their own future and these are practical measures intended to address the humanitarian situation and the migration flows,” the official said, adding that labor rights will also be at the center of any talks with the Cuban government.

As promised in his campaign for the White House, President Joe Biden will reverse several of the measures taken by his predecessor, including by allowing commercial and charter flights to destinations outside the Cuban capital. Currently, American airline companies can only fly to Havana, leaving Cuban Americans with few options to visit their families in other provinces.

The Cuban Family Reunification Parole Program, which has not taken new cases since 2016 and left 22,000 pending applications in limbo, will also be reinstated, the officials said, following bipartisan calls to address the issue. An administration official said the United States intends to uphold migration accords with Cuba from the 1990s, under which the United States committed to issuing 20,000 immigration visas to Cubans annually, a request made by a Cuban government delegation that recently traveled to Washington to discuss an ongoing wave of Cubans trying to reach the U.S. mainland by land and sea. One senior administration official also said the State Department will increase visa processing in the embassy in Havana, which resumed this month.

Other measures include lifting the cap on family remittances, currently $1,000 per quarter per person, with an eye on supporting the emerging private sector. The officials said the administration will encourage more electronic payment companies to work in Cuba to facilitate remittances. Official remittance channels were shut down after the Trump administration sanctioned Fincimex, the financial firm run by the Cuban military, and the Cuban government refused to pass the business to a non-military entity. Fincimex will not be removed from the Cuba sanction list, one senior official said, but the administration “has engaged” in talks with the Cuban government about finding a non-military entity to process remittances.

The administration will also expand travel to Cuba by once again allowing group travel under the “people-to-people” educational travel category, which was created under former President Barack Obama to allow Americans to visit the island on organized tours to promote exchanges between the two countries. The Trump administration later restricted most non-family travel to Cuba and eliminated the category in 2019. The U.S. officials said there will be more regulatory changes to allow certain travel related to professional meetings and professional research, but individual people-to-people travel will remain prohibited.

Other measures aim at supporting independent Cuban entrepreneurs by authorizing access to expanded cloud technology, application programming interfaces and e-commerce platforms. The officials said the administration will “explore” options to facilitate electronic payments and expand Cuban entrepreneurs’ access to microfinancing. Last week, the Treasury Department for the first time authorized an American company to offer a microloan and investment to a small Cuban private business.

The changes were announced later on Monday but will be implemented in the coming weeks. The Biden administration has fielded criticism for so far keeping in place most measures taken by President Trump, who vowed a “maximum pressure” campaign against the communist government over its role in Venezuela. But some Cuban exiles, Cuban American Republican politicians and activists on the island have expressed concern about any easing of sanctions at a time the government has cracked down on protesters and handed down harsh sentences to July 11 demonstrators. A senior administration official said the administration consulted the policy options with members of Congress and Cuban Americans.

Minutes after the official release, Sen. Bob Menéndez, a powerful Cuban American democrat who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, said the timing of the announcement risks “sending the wrong message” as Cuban authorities continue the crackdown on Cubans critical of the government. “I am dismayed to learn the Biden administration will begin authorizing group travel to Cuba through visits akin to tourism, Menéndez said in a statement. “To be clear, those who still believe that increasing travel will breed democracy in Cuba are simply in a state of denial. For decades, the world has been traveling to Cuba and nothing has changed. A senior administration official told reporters on Monday evening that the Treasury Department can audit these trips and the administration will ensure that group travel takes place according to the law. In a statement released Monday evening,

Cuban foreign affairs ministry called the policy changes a “limited step in the right direction” but not enough in modifying the U.S. embargo.

Relations between Washington and Havana soured over the island wide anti-government demonstration last July. President Biden ordered sanctions against the military, police and security forces involved in the crackdown. And Havana responded by saying the demonstrations were financed by the United States. The more recent spat involves the invitations to attend the Summit of the Americas, a meeting of leaders from nations in the hemisphere to be held in Los Angeles in June. The U.S. government has said Cuba will likely not receive one. A senior administration said the invitations have not been issued yet. But the current wave of Cuban migrants reaching the U.S. southern border got the two governments to sit down for the first time since president Biden took office. The Cuban diplomat leading the talks, Carlos Fernández de Cossio, said he left with the sense that the talks could be the first step to improving relations. A senior administration official said the U.S. delegation did not address policy topics beyond migration.

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WHY CUBA HAS THREADED THE RUSSIA NEEDLE FOR 60 YEARS

Abstaining in the recent UN resolution wasn’t the first time it had to defend Moscow while abhorring its actions.

RESPONSIBLE STATECRAFT, March 9, 2022

William LeoGrande

Original Article: Why Cuba Supports Russia’s Indefensible Invasion of Ukraine


Putin recibe a Díaz-Canel en Moscú

The UN General Assembly, meeting in emergency session, voted 141 to 5, to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. To the surprise of many, Cuba abstained, despite its close relations with Moscow and its belief that the West instigated the crisis by expanding NATO right up to Russia’s borders, ignoring its legitimate security concerns.

This is not the first time Cuba has been caught between loyalty to its most important ally and bedrock principles of its foreign policy — non-intervention and the right of small states to sovereignty, even in the shadow of Great Power adversaries. To understand Cuba’s position on Ukraine, we need only look back at previous occasions when Cuba had to walk the same diplomatic tightrope.

The Deep Roots of Cuba’s and Russia’s Friendship

Cuba’s friendship with Russia dates back to the 1960s, when the Soviet Union embraced the Cuban revolution, providing the arms Cubans used to defeat the U.S.-sponsored exile invasion at the Bay of Pigs, as well as the financial aid Cuba needed to survive the U.S. economic embargo. Soviet aid was “a matter of life and death in our confrontation with the United States,” Fidel Castro acknowledged. “We alone against a superpower would have perished.”

Relations with Moscow broke down after the Soviet Union collapsed, when Boris Yeltsin abruptly cut off economic assistance, plunging the island into a decade-long depression. But in 2000, President Vladimir Putin visited Havana to begin rebuilding relations. Over the next two decades, a series of trade deals deepened economic ties. Then, in 2009, Raúl Castro visited Moscow and the two countries agreed to a “strategic partnership” to include tourism, economic, scientific, and diplomatic cooperation, and renewed “technical military cooperation.” Five years later, Putin canceled 90 percent of Cuba’s $32 billion Soviet-era debt

When President Miguel Díaz-Canel went on an extended diplomatic tour shortly after his inauguration, Moscow was his first stop. When Cuba was reeling from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic in 2021, in desperate need of humanitarian assistance, Russia sent tons of food and medical supplies. Just days before Russia launched the invasion of Ukraine, Putin dispatched Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov to Havana to ”deepen” bilateral ties, and Russia agreed to postpone until 2027 payments on Cuba’s new $2.3 billion debt. 

Although Cuba is nowhere near as dependent on Russia today as it was dependent on the Soviet Union, Russia is once again Cuba’s principal ally among the major powers at a time when the United States has returned to a policy of hostility and regime change.

Czechoslovakia, 1968

When the Soviet Union and other Warsaw pact powers invaded Czechoslovakia on August 20, 1968, to depose the reform communist government of Alexander Dubcek, the Cuban government was silent for three days. Cubans were generally sympathetic to Dubček’s attempt to plot a course independent of Moscow because Cuba itself was in the midst of deep disagreements with the Kremlin over both foreign and domestic policy. In January, Fidel Castro had accused Moscow of delaying oil shipments as a warning about Cuba’s apostasy. 

When Castro finally spoke out, people were shocked that instead of condemning the invasion of this small country by its larger neighbor, he justified it backhandedly as a “bitter necessity” to preserve socialism in Czechoslovakia and the integrity of the socialist bloc. But, he asked rhetorically, would the new Brezhnev Doctrine apply to Cuba? “Will they send the divisions of the Warsaw Pact to Cuba if the Yankee imperialists attack our country?” He knew the answer was no. Cuba was too far away, and in Washington’s sphere of influence. 

The Brezhnev Doctrine’s implicit assertion of a Soviet security sphere in Eastern Europe, overriding the sovereignty and territorial integrity of other countries, posed an obvious problem for Cuba because of the doctrine’s uneasy similarity to the Monroe Doctrine. In the aftermath of Czechoslovakia, voices on the Latin American right were clamoring for Washington to invade Cuba in retaliation. 

Castro reiterated the importance of the principle of non-intervention, calling it a “shield” for weaker nations against the depredations of Great Powers. He acknowledged that the Soviet invasion was “unquestionably a violation of legal principles and international norms. From a legal point of view, this cannot be justified,” he admitted. “Not the slightest trace of legality exists. Frankly, none whatever.”

The speech marked a turning point in Cuba-Soviet relations. Moscow’s gratitude for Cuba’s support eased bilateral tensions and led to deeper political and military cooperation and increased economic assistance.

Afghanistan, 1979

In September 1979, Cuba hosted the Sixth Summit of the Movement of Nonaligned Nations and began its term as chair — the culmination of Fidel Castro’s ambition to become a leader of the global south. Just three months later, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, a nonaligned member. The invasion dealt a fatal blow to Cuba’s argument that the Soviet Union was a “natural ally” of the nonaligned, tarnishing its leadership of the Movement.  

The Security Council called the General Assembly into emergency session to consider a resolution condemning the invasion. Cuban ambassador Raúl Roa denounced the United States for “rolling drums of a new cold war,” but admitted that Cuba faced an “historical dilemma” because many of its friends saw the resolution as a defense of national sovereignty and peoples’ right to independence. “Cuba will always uphold that right,” Roa insisted, but Cuba would “never carry water to the mill of reaction and imperialism.” He made no effort to justify the Soviet action and said not one word in its defense. Nevertheless, Cuba voted no on the resolution, which was adopted 104 to 18.

Two days later, Fidel Castro hosted three U.S. diplomats who had come to implore him to speak out publicly against the Soviet invasion. Cuba did not support the Soviet action, Castro acknowledged. “Anything which affects the principle of non-intervention affects us, and we know it.” But whatever disagreements Cuba had with Moscow, it would not side publicly with the United States. “We have always had a friend in the Soviet Union and we have always had an enemy in the United States,” he said. “Therefore, we could not possibly align with the United States against the Soviet Union.”

Ukraine, 2022

After Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, the Cuban government’s public statements blamed the West for creating the conditions that led to the crisis by ignoring Russia’s repeated warnings about NATO expansion. Yet despite echoing Russia’s rationale for the attack, Cuba never endorsed it. On the contrary, in the UN General Assembly debate, Cuba’s representative. Pedro Luis Pedroso Cuesta, noted Russia’s “non-observance of legal principles and international norms.”

“Cuba strongly endorses and supports those principles and norms,” he went on, “which are, particularly for small countries, an essential reference to fight hegemony, abuse of power and injustice.” He repeated Cuba’s earlier call for a negotiated solution to the conflict “that guarantees the security and sovereignty of all and addresses legitimate humanitarian concerns…. Cuba will always defend peace and unambiguously oppose the use or threat of use of force against any State.” On the resolution condemning Russian aggression, Cuba, along with 34 other countries, abstained. 

Cuba as Collateral Damage

After Venezuela failed to vote on the UN resolution, senior U.S. officials traveled to Caracas to discuss with President Nicolás Maduro the possibility of lifting U.S. sanctions on Venezuelan oil sales to offset the shortage of global supply induced by the impending boycott of Soviet oil and gas. Heretofore, the Biden administration had refused to even recognize Maduro’s government. Cuba, with no oil to offer, received no such overture. 

The West’s sanctions against Russia are likely to hurt Cuba, too, making it even harder for Havana to conduct international financial transactions through Russian banks, and harder for Russian tourists to get to Cuba. At the dawn of the new cold war, Cuba is once again caught in the crossfire. 

Cuba no longer has any special ideological affinity for Russia and is far less dependent on it economically than it was on the Soviet Union in 1968 or 1979. But neither can Havana afford to spurn the one major power that has stood most consistently by Cuba’s side through decades of U.S. efforts at subversion. Realpolitik dictates that Cuba cultivate good relations with major powers like Russia and China so long as it lives in the shadow of a hostile United States. “Our isolation by the United States has forced us to ally with the rest of the world,” Castro told U.S. diplomats in 1979, explaining his refusal to denounce the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. 

So once again, Cuban diplomats are called upon to thread the needle, expressing sympathy and understanding for the indefensible actions of Cuba’s principal ally without actually endorsing them, and simultaneously trying to uphold the international principles of state sovereignty and non-intervention that their ally has violated — principles essential for the defense of Cuba’s own sovereignty. As Castro told the U.S. diplomats in 1979, “We are playing two roles…It’s not easy.”

So once again, Cuban diplomats are called upon to thread the needle, expressing sympathy and understanding for the indefensible actions of Cuba’s principal ally without actually endorsing them, and simultaneously trying to uphold the international principles of state sovereignty and non-intervention that their ally has violated — principles essential for the defense of Cuba’s own sovereignty. As Castro told the U.S. diplomats in 1979, “We are playing two roles…It’s not easy.”

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U. S. – CUBA RELATIONS I N T H E BIDEN ERA: A Case for Making Engagement Resilient as a Means of Providing Long-Term Support for the Cuban People

Complete Article: U. S. – Cuba Relations in the Biden Era  

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY


This paper makes a renewed case for engagement with Cuba as the best way for the United States to advance its national interests, reassert its regional leadership, reduce resistance to reform within the Cuban government, and promote a freer, more prosperous future for the Cuban people. It also argues that the United States should continue to highlight Cuba’s democratic failings and support actors across the spectrum of Cuban society who work to ensure that greater economic and civic
freedoms are guaranteed on the island.


The United States and Cuba must learn from both the successes and missed
opportunities of their last period of détente. As President Joseph R. Biden Jr. looks to fulfill his pledge to return to a policy of engagement with Cuba, both countries must strive to make the normalization of relations resilient in order to insulate progress from unpredictable political cycles. Getting there will require both governments to negotiate cooperation agreements and facilitate private sector economic arrangements that can sufficiently cement diplomatic relations and socio-economic integration between the two countries. In many instances, progress may only be achieved through individual but parallel policies that both reduce exposure to codified
U.S. embargo sanctions and generate the political space necessary for the U.S. Congress to lift them. For Cuba, this means taking advantage of the next four years to advance meaningful economic liberalization and guarantee greater rights for Cubans both at home and abroad. For the United States, it means abandoning its centerpiece policy of regime change and allowing Cuba’s future to be determined by and among Cubans themselves.


This may seem like a daunting task, but circumstances are still conducive for meaningful diplomatic breakthroughs between the historic Cold War adversaries. The devastating effects of the Covid-19 pandemic have prodded Cuba to finally overhaul its dual-currency system and commit to further market liberalization. Cuban authorities have an opportunity to signal to their citizens, the Cuban diaspora, and Washington that they are finally willing to bring their country into the 21st century. But effective follow-through is less likely if the United States continues to be seen as
attempting to exploit the crisis by maintaining blanket sanctions under the illusion that further pressure will cause the Cuban government to break.


Thus, we recommend that the Biden administration pursue a multi-pronged approach to get bilateral relations immediately back on a more constructive track, regain control of the narrative, and incentivize further reforms in Cuba. Prioritizing early moves that have a clear and visible impact on the lives of Cubans on the island and abroad will help restore public support for engagement among Cuban-Americans. The new administration should also place equal emphasis on addressing some of the more intractable issues that divide both governments early on.


Track 1: Restore Support for the Cuban People as a Policy Priority and Rebuild Trust
a. Reverse policies that have unduly harmed the Cuban people. This includes, but is not limited to, lifting restrictions on commercial and charter flights, ending remittance caps, restoring consular services in Cuba, restarting the Cuban Family Reunification Program, reinstituting the five-year multiple-entry visa for Cuban nationals, and revising banking and finance regulations to ensure the continuity of formal remittance transfers and correspondent banking in Cuba.
b. Restore support for the Cuban private sector as a policy priority.
c. Resume and bolster public health cooperation with Cuba to combat Covid-19.
d. Restore and strengthen working-level diplomatic ties by appointing an
ambassador to lead U.S. Embassy Havana (or a chargé d’affaires with
ambassadorial rank if the Senate is unlikely to confirm an ambassadorial
appointment), initiating bilateral talks to fully re-staff the U.S. and Cuban
embassies with security guarantees, and resuming bilateral cooperation on
national security issues.
e. Implement additional confidence-building measures—like ordering an
immediate apolitical review of Cuba’s re-designation as a State Sponsor of
Terror, updating and restoring the 2016 Presidential Policy Directive “United States-Cuba Normalization”, and once again waiving Title III of the Helms- Burton Act—that improve the climate for success on higher-profile, longer- term impediments to normalization, such as those identified under Track 2.
f. Create, through recurring public events, private consultations and official visits to South Florida, feedback mechanisms whereby the Biden administration can engage the Cuban American community on Cuba policy and gain input from a diversity of Cuban American community leaders and members in return.


Track 2: Tackle the “Tough Stuff” and Make Normalization Stick Through High-Level, Direct Diplomacy
a. Designate a Special Representative for Cuba or other high-level
administration official(s) to negotiate cooperation agreements, private sector economic arrangements, and roadmaps for resolving long-standing disputes between the United States and Cuba, with the aim of deepening socio- economic ties between both countries. Breakthroughs in negotiations on U.S. property claims, the Venezuelan crisis, and private sector trade can build momentum and shift the calculus for normalization on Capitol Hill.

Track 3: Respond to Openness with Openness
a. As the Cuban government moves to recognize greater rights for its
citizens and nationals, and opens opportunities for U.S. and diaspora direct
investment, respond with U.S. economic openings allowed by executive
authority.
b. In tandem with progress made under Track 2 and/or Track 3(a), seek
congressional support for repealing counterproductive codified Cuba
sanctions, as well as for other targeted initiatives that broaden forms of U.S. assistance and support to the Cuban people beyond democracy promotion alone.


Cuba, for its part, must overcome internal resistance to a more open relationship with the United States and be willing to make changes that will safeguard bilateral relations regardless of which U.S. political party is in power. The Cuban government has long opposed demands for concessions involving their internal affairs or foreign policy. Yet normalization would benefit from less emphasis on process and more emphasis on results. Whether Cuba takes steps toward guaranteeing greater economic and civic
freedoms as a result of bilateral negotiations or internal reforms, the fact remains it must take them if it wishes to free itself from the vicissitudes of U.S. politics.


Meaningful progress in state-diaspora relations, legal investment in the island’s private sector, and guaranteeing greater rights for all Cubans to participate in their county’s economic, political, and public affairs would materially reduce Cuba’s exposure to the dynamics of the Helms-Burton Act and other embargo laws. It would also help to generate the political momentum needed for the U.S. Congress to repeal these statutes once and for all. While standing on principle that it will not compromise its sovereignty, Cuba can and should make internal reforms that are in the interest of the Cuban people and have the corollary benefit of paving a sustainable road to full normalization with the United States. Reality requires movement and energy on both sides to achieve a more lasting rapprochement that can withstand further stress tests in the relationship that are bound to emerge along the way.

After 2020, the window for achieving significant progress toward full normalization may be finite, and the costs of not doing so could be severe. Failure to make relations stick this time around could entrench another generation of Cubans and Cuban Americans on both sides of the Florida Straits in prolonged patterns of mutual suspicion and hostility.

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RUSSIA POSTPONES CUBA DEBT PAYMENTS AMID WARMING RELATIONS

By Polina Devitt  and Dave Sherwood

MOSCOW/HAVANA Reuters, Feb 22, 2022

Original Article: Russia’s Renewed Purchase of Cuban Support

Russia has agreed to postpone some debt payments owed to it by communist-run Cuba until 2027, its lower house of parliament said on Tuesday, just days after the two countries announced they would deepen ties amid the spiraling Ukraine crisis.

The loans, worth $2.3 billion and provided to Cuba by Russia between 2006 and 2019, helped underwrite investments in power generation, metals and transportation infrastructure, according to a statement from the lower house, or Duma.


Russia and Cuba expand their ‘strategic’ ties

On Tuesday, Russian lawmakers ratified an agreement, originally signed with Cuban counterparts in Havana in 2021, that amended the loan terms, the statement said.

Cuba last week expressed support for Russia in its showdown with Western powers over Ukraine following a visit from Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov, and accused long-time rival the United States and its allies of targeting Moscow with what it called a “propaganda war” and sanctions. read more

Russia’s decision to soften the loan terms comes as Cuba wrestles with a dire social and economic crisis that has led to severe shortages in food and medicine, and it follows protests last year believed to be the largest since Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution.

Since the revolution, the two countries have had a long history of economic and military collaboration, though in recent decades those ties have faded.

Russia has, however, continued to deliver humanitarian aid and provide loans to the island.

Over the last decade, Cuba has also restructured debt with China, Germany and Mexico, as well as with Japanese commercial debt holders.  In October, Cuba reached a deal with the Paris Club of creditor nations to postpone an annual debt payment due in November until later this year. read more

Duma chairman Vyacheslav Volodin is expected to visit Cuba and Nicaragua on Feb. 23 and 24.

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THE CUBAN EMBARGO HAS FAILED

The U.S. should stop punishing the people of Cuba for their government’s crimes.

Note: Even US conservatives recognize the absolute failure and stupidity of the embargo on Cuba. A.R.

February 17, 2022

Doug Bandow

Six decades ago the Kennedy administration imposed an embargo on Cuba. A dozen American presidents have enforced the island’s economic isolation, substantially tightening controls in recent years. For a time Washington even cited Havana as a state sponsor of terrorism. The U.S. campaign, observed Mauricio Vicent of El Pais, is “without doubt the longest punitive measure ever imposed on a country in modern history.”

Washington’s efforts were reinforced by the collapse of the Soviet Union, which ended outside subsidies for the island. Cuba’s GDP shrank by more than a third during what was called the “Special Period.” Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez later stepped in, but Caracas’s economic collapse ended its bountiful subsidies as well. Through it all U.S. policymakers, Florida Cuban expatriates, and vote-seeking Republican politicians collaborated to wage economic war on the island.

Now, finally, the communist government has fallen. Political prisoners have been released. Castro family and friends have fled. Elections have brought to power officials promising to dismantle the socialist economy. The incoming government even proposed expanding Guantanamo Bay for the U.S.

Only kidding!

Washington’s policy has completely and utterly failed.

Fidel Castro has died and Raúl Castro has retired, but the communist government remains and includes several Castro family members. The jails are bulging after protests in July, with hundreds arrested and many simply disappeared without notice to their families. Trump administration sanctions, left in place by President Joe Biden, continue to cripple the private economy, which had been expanding and undermining government authority.

While it was expected to at least roll back the Trump administration’s measures, which hurt private entrepreneurs in Cuba more than government apparatchiks, the Biden administration has done nothing. Some Democrats speculate that the administration is waiting for the midterm elections to pass, or perhaps even for Biden’s reelection, just as President Barack Obama held off until his second term to act. Of course, Biden may not get a second chance.

The embargo may be the most complete, longest, and most enduring policy failure in American history. In 1959 Fidel Castro led a revolution against a U.S.-backed strongman, Fulgencio Batista. Castro proved to be even more despotic and turned to the Soviet Union for support. Washington imposed an embargo, which has metastasized through subsequent regulations and laws. The embargo was proposed, the outgoing Eisenhower administration admitted, to impoverish the Cuban people. The State Department’s Lester Mallory urged action that “while as adroit and inconspicuous as possible makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”

Decades later, Fidel Castro is dead and brother Raúl is formally retired. The presidency and party leadership have devolved upon the colorless functionary Miguel Díaz-Canel, who retains the founders’ willingness to suppress dissent and enforce obedience. Alas, the reality of Cuban communism does not reflect the rosy assessments of the happy lefty tourists who wander the island in search of a collectivist paradise.

Ever since Lincoln Steffens proclaimed of the Soviet Union, “I’ve seen the future, and it works,” progressives have visited new dictatorships hoping to spy the long-awaited utopia. Fidel Castro eventually became an enduring revolutionary hero. Where better for lefty intellectuals to vacation than Cuba for a guided tour?

Even today, many on the left excuse the repression of Castro’s regime. Cuban officials might occasionally make a mistake, they say, but most blame can be reliably placed upon the U.S. Last July Cuban demonstrators turned out shouting libertad! and were promptly dispatched in the usual communist fashion. Yet left-wing commentators were uncomfortable that the Cuban people desire what most people elsewhere desire: liberty.

Despite its remarkably good public relations, Cuba remains a dictatorship. Last year Freedom House rated Cuba toward the bottom of its global freedom rankings, deeming the country “not free” and giving it just 13 of 100 available points for its political and civil liberties. Explained Freedom House: “Cuba’s one-party communist state outlaws political pluralism, bans independent media, suppresses dissent, and severely restricts basic civil liberties. The government continues to dominate the economy despite recent reforms that permit some private-sector activity. The regime’s undemocratic character has not changed despite a generational transition in political leadership between 2018 and 2019 that included the introduction of a new constitution.”

The latest report from Human Rights Watch covered last year’s events, including the dramatic summer protests:

The Cuban government continues to repress and punish virtually all forms of dissent and public criticism. At the same time, Cubans continue to endure a dire economic crisis, which impacts their social and economic rights. … The government employs arbitrary detention to harass and intimidate critics, independent activists, political opponents, and others. Security officers rarely present arrest warrants to justify detaining critics. In some cases, detainees are released after receiving official warnings, which prosecutors may use in subsequent criminal trials to show a pattern of what they call “delinquent” behavior.

All this despite six decades of the U.S. generally increasing economic sanctions. Only President Barack Obama broke that pattern, rolling back some penalties and reestablishing full diplomatic relations. The Cuban people loved him for it. When I visited in 2017, cars still sported decals with Obama’s picture from his visit the previous year. The government underestimated his popularity. Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez complained about Obama’s “deep attack on our ideas, our history, our culture, and our symbols” and desire to use economic appeals to force political change.

However, President Donald Trump cared more about Cuban-American votes than Cuban lives and imposed additional sanctions, even adding a new twist, allowing U.S. lawsuits against foreign investors in Cuba. Human-rights activists long had criticized the embargo as counterproductive, used by the regime to excuse its failings and justify its crimes. Cuba’s small businesspeople and their employees, who invested or worked in tourist-friendly industries—restaurants, Airbnbs, and taxis—were even more critical. By discouraging U.S. visitors, Trump wrecked the nascent public sector, which at its height provided 40 percent of the island’s jobs.

Airbnb owner Julia de la Rosa complained to me that “So many people opened businesses for American tourists” who then were prohibited from coming. Workers had to return to unproductive state employment, strengthening the Castro regime’s control. In short, sanctions worked no better in Cuba than in Venezuela, Syria, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, whose governments refused to abandon their most important political objectives despite U.S. economic pressure.

Cubans expected Biden to return to the reform path. After all, he had pledged to “try to reverse the failed Trump policies that inflicted harm on Cubans.” Instead, after the July protests, he added new sanctions “to bolster the cause of the Cuban people.” And that was just a start, he warned: “There will be more, unless there’s some drastic change in Cuba, which I don’t anticipate.” Biden matched Trump in pious hypocrisy, announcing “we hear the cries of freedom coming from the island. We’re holding the regime accountable.”

Alas, the Díaz-Canel government did not fold. In fact, the invincibly ignorant Cuba hawks—most notably Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Robert Menendez—did the communist regime a favor by discouraging contact with America. Collin Laverty of Cuba Educational Travel, which develops trips to conform with U.S. law (and organized my second visit), observed: “If you want to create more space for debate, expanding the entrepreneurial class is one way.” Indeed, after encouraging the development of private business in a desperate attempt to spur the economy, the regime came to fear the rapid increase in private sector firms and cracked down.

Some on the left agree. Antoni Kapcia, who has written sympathetically of the Cuban revolution, noted:

I’ve always argued that if an American president really wanted to destabilize the Cuban system, they would get rid of the embargo, or promise to get rid of the embargo. To some extent, this is what Barack Obama did, at least in the sense of saying the established policy had failed and slightly easing some restrictions, although he certainly didn’t lift the embargo altogether. But most of the US presidents have done precisely the opposite, and tightened it, or at least continued the involvement. That gives the system and the leadership an alibi in Cuba. But it also plays into nationalism.

John F. Kennedy might be excused for not knowing any better when he embargoed the new revolutionary state. Joe Biden has no such excuse. Cuba’s continuing oppression of its people is a tragedy. However, after six decades of futile economic warfare, the U.S. should stop punishing the Cuban people for the sins of their government. Biden should live up to his campaign promise to empower “the Cuban people to freely determine their own outcome, their own future.”

Early morning 2011: Cuban emigration applicants awaiting entrance to the US “Interest Section”
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SIXTY YEARS OF THE CUBAN EMBARGO. WHAT EXACTLY IS IT?

Fidel Castro once called it ‘a tangled ball of yarn,’ and after six decades, Washington’s keystone regime change policy still hasn’t worked.

RESPONSIBLE STATECRAFT. https://responsiblestatecraft.org/ February 3, 2022
William LeoGrande

February 3, 1962, marks the sixtieth anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s Presidential Proclamation 3447 imposing an “embargo on all trade with Cuba” to punish Fidel Castro’s revolutionary government for its “alignment with the communist powers,” the Soviet Union and China. Despite having failed to bend Havana to Washington’s will over the past six decades, the embargo remains the centerpiece of the U.S. policy of “regime change.” Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Lester D. Mallory explained the strategy in 1960: “Every possible means should be undertaken promptly to weaken the economic life of Cuba…denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”

The anniversary of the embargo offers an occasion to delve into its complexities in order to better understand what Fidel Castro once called “a tangled ball of yarn.” 

What exactly is the embargo against Cuba?

“The embargo” is shorthand for a complex patchwork of laws and regulations that comprise the oldest and most comprehensive U.S. economic sanctions against any country in the world. Although President Eisenhower imposed some economic sanctions on Cuba in 1960, the current embargo began when President Kennedy proclaimed a ban on all trade with Cuba in 1962, and a year later invoked the Trading with the Enemy Act to extend the embargo to prohibit all transactions (trade, travel, and financial) unless licensed by the Secretary of the Treasury (at the president’s direction). Regulations governing implementation of the embargo and the licensed exceptions are codified in the Treasury Department’s Cuban Assets Control Regulations (CACR).

Several other statutes govern elements of the embargo:

—  The Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 authorizes humanitarian donations of food and medicine, and the sale of telecommunications services and medical supplies, albeit subject to detailed restrictions. It also prohibits trade between the subsidiaries of U.S. companies abroad and Cuba.

— The Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996 inscribed the embargo into law until Cuba becomes a multi-party free-market democracy and pays compensation for property nationalized by the revolutionary government. It also gives U.S. citizens, including naturalized Cuban Americans, the right to sue in federal court anyone, in the United States or abroad, who is “trafficking in” (benefiting from) nationalized property, and blocks the officers of foreign trafficking companies from entering the United States. 

— The Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000 (TWEA) legalized the sale of agricultural commodities to Cuba, but only for cash in advance. It also prohibits travel to Cuba for tourism, defined as any travel not already licensed at that time. 

— The so-called “Berman amendment” (named for sponsor Rep. Howard Berman) exempts artistic works and informational materials from the embargo.

— The Trump administration’s designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of international terrorism under the Export Administration Act of 1979 triggered a variety of economic sanctions, although most are already in place under the broader embargo. 

— Both the Trump and Biden administrations have imposed sanctions on Cuban individuals under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act of 2012, which freezes the U.S. assets and denies entry to the United States of persons guilty of corruption or serious human rights abuse. 

Why did the United States impose the embargo?

The embargo is sometimes justified as a response to Cuba’s nationalization of U.S. property in 1960, which amounted to over $1 billion in investment. However, the embargo was not imposed until 1962 as part of President Kennedy’s policy to destabilize the Cuban government through a combination of economic sanctions and covert paramilitary attacks. Since then, U.S. presidents have cited various rationales for continuing the embargo, ranging from Cuba’s partnership with the Soviet Union, to its support for revolutionary movements in Latin America and Africa, its human rights record, and its socialist system.

How has the embargo changed over time?

Every president has modified the embargo by using his licensing authority to loosen or tighten aspects of it. Take travel, for example. President Jimmy Carter lifted all limits on travel to Cuba in 1977. President Ronald Reagan reimposed a ban on most types of travel in 1982.  President Bill Clinton loosened travel restrictions by creating the people-to-people educational travel category in 1999. President George W. Bush eliminated people-to-people travel, President Barack Obama restored it, and President Trump abolished it again. Congress has also modified the embargo by statute. The most important change was the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act which inscribed the embargo into law. At present, the embargo’s impact is especially severe because President Trump added a series of new, expanded sanctions and President Biden has left those additional sanctions in place.

Why does Cuba call it a “blockade” rather than an embargo?

The Cuban government calls the embargo a blockade (el bloqueo) because its extraterritorial provisions restrict Cuban commerce with other countries. The United States tried to make the embargo multilateral from the beginning. In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson pressured the OAS into formally adopting a commercial and diplomatic embargo against Cuba, which lasted until the mid-1970s. Most European countries also limited their commercial ties with Cuba in response to U.S. pressure. Although the embargo cannot prevent other countries from trading with Cuba, it makes such commerce difficult: 

— The embargo prohibits the subsidiaries of U.S. companies that operate in other countries from trading with Cuba. 

— It prohibits other countries from exporting to Cuba any product with more than 10 percent U.S. content. 

— It prohibits foreign financial institutions from handling any U.S. dollar transactions that involve Cuba (so-called U-turn transactions). 

— It allows U.S. citizens who lost property after the Cuban revolution to sue in U.S. federal court anyone, including foreign companies, who do business with Cuba involving that property.

— It prohibits entry into the United States of any officers of foreign companies and their family members if those companies are doing business with Cuba that involves property previously owned by U.S. citizens.

— International financial institutions are required to conduct costly “enhanced due diligence” before engaging in transactions involving countries designated as state sponsors of international terrorism, which currently includes Cuba.  

— Multilateral international financial institutions cannot provide assistance to Cuba without losing a portion of their U.S. funding.

Is the embargo legal under international law?

Supporters argue that the embargo is legal because the United States has the right to decide whether or not it wants to trade with another country, and the embargo is justified by Cuba’s nationalization of U.S. property without compensation. Opponents argue that the embargo constitutes coercion intended to force regime change in violation of the OAS Charter and the UN Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention and Interference in the Internal Affairs of States. The UN Declaration recognizes “the sovereign and inalienable right of a State freely to determine its own political, economic, cultural and social systems,” and imposes on all states the duty “to refrain from any action or attempt in whatever form or under whatever pretext to destabilize or to undermine the stability of another State.” The consensus of international opinion is that the embargo is not consistent with international law, as reflected by the fact that last year,  for 29th time, the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly in favor of an annual resolution calling on the United States to lift the embargo. In 2021, the vote was 184 in favor, 2 opposed (the United States and Israel), with 3 abstentions.

How can the embargo override U.S. citizens’ constitutional right to travel?

Although the Supreme Court has recognized a right to travel in Kent v. Dulles (1958), it is not absolute. In two cases, Zemel v. Rusk (1965) and  Regan v. Wald (1984), the Court rejected challenges to the embargo’s restrictions on travel to Cuba, holding that the president has the authority to limit travel on grounds of national security. If you are a “person subject to U.S. jurisdiction” (i.e., a U.S. citizen, resident, or other person within the United States regardless of your nationality) you can only travel to Cuba under one of the 12 categories of travel licensed by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. 

Can Cuba buy food and medicine under the embargo?

Yes, but not freely or easily. U.S companies can export agricultural commodities to Cuba only if the Cuban government pays cash up front. No credit-based sales are allowed, which is not the way international trade normally works. U.S. companies can sell medical supplies to Cuba “only for the use and benefit of the Cuban people,” only if they are not used for biopharmaceutical purposes (for example, manufacturing vaccines), and only if the U.S. government certifies these requirements are met. These requirements are so onerous that many companies decide not to sell to Cuba rather than comply with them—a recent example being the company that decided to cancel a contract to sell Cuba ventilators during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Is the embargo responsible for Cuba’s economic problems?

In part, yes. The Cuban economy suffers from a number of chronic structural problems stemming from its adoption of a Soviet-style central planning model in the 1970s. Although it is pursuing market-oriented reforms, its structural weaknesses persist. They make Cuba especially vulnerable to external economic shocks and pressures, of which the embargo is the most significant and persistent. The Cuban government estimates that the embargo costs it over $3 billion annually in extra expenses it incurs trading with other partners. The UN Economic Commission for Latin America estimated that the embargo has cost $130 billion (in current prices) since it was imposed, or roughly $2 billion annually on average. 

Would the embargo end automatically if the president failed to renew it every year?

No. The statutory authority for the embargo under the Trading with the Enemy Act would lapse if the president failed to extend it every September as required by law, but the codification of the embargo under the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act would still remain in place.

Can the president lift the embargo unilaterally?

Legally, he probably could. Politically, he probably wouldn’t. Attorney Robert Muse and others have argued that because there are no limitations on the president’s licensing authority specified in either Trading with the Enemy Act or the CACR, the President could license the embargo out of existence in its entirety by simply authorizing a general license for all transactions with Cuba. The argument against this interpretation is that such an exercise of authority would violate the clear intent of the law since the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act places specific conditions on lifting the embargo. Muse responds that the law is an unconstitutional infringement on the president’s authority to conduct foreign policy, which President Clinton suggested in his signing statement. Politically, a president would have to be willing to risk a confrontation with Congress to take this step and thus far, every president has accepted the interpretation that the embargo can only be lifted under the terms of the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act or after its repeal.

How long will the embargo last?

As the embargo’s longevity suggests, there is no sunshine provision that would automatically end it. The Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act prohibits lifting it until the Cuban government has become a multi-party, free-market democracy, and until all the property of U.S. citizens, including Cuban Americans, nationalized after 1959 is either returned or compensated. The continuing influence of conservative Cuban Americans in the Republican Party and their electoral strength in Florida has transformed the embargo from a foreign policy issue into a matter of domestic politics. Consequently, Congress is unlikely to repeal the embargo in the foreseeable future.

But a realist president willing to declare openly what most foreign policy analysts acknowledge—that the embargo is a counterproductive failure—could use his (or her) executive authority to license broad categories of commerce and exchange, leaving the statutory embargo an empty shell.

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EL IMPACTO ECONÓMICO DE LAS SANCIONES ESTADOUNIDENSE A CUBA, 1994-2020

Pavel Vidal Alejandro

Resumen

Este estudio evalúa la sensibilidad de las series históricas del crecimiento del PIB cubano y de otros indicadores macroeconómicos a los giros (flexibilizaciones/endurecimiento) del esquema de sanciones estadounidenses en las últimas tres décadas, empleando como fuente de información las variaciones en los flujos de comercio de bienes, visitantes y remesas e indicadores financieros del período 1994-2020. Si bien se evidencia que un endurecimiento de las sanciones reduce el crecimiento del PIB cubano, también se ve que los impactos afectan significativamente el consumo de las familias y las dinámicas de las ventas y el empleo del sector privado, sin apreciarse un efecto significativo en los indicadores de la economía estatal. Las remesas son el fujo de mayor peso dentro del intercambio económico total Cuba-EEUU (el 8,3% del PIB cubano), con un impacto estadísticamente significativo en la trayectoria del consumo de hogares y mercados privados.

Introducción

Las sanciones económicas se definen como acciones que uno o más países toman para limitar o poner fin a sus relaciones económicas con un país objetivo en un esfuerzo por persuadirlo de que cambie sus políticas. Las sanciones pueden adoptar muchas formas: aranceles, controles de exportación, embargos, prohibiciones de importación, prohibiciones de viaje, congelación de activos, ayudas, cortes y bloqueos (Morgan, Bapat y Krustev, 2009).

La literatura sobre el impacto económico de las sanciones es amplia y heterogénea, tanto en metodología, presupuestos teóricos, estrategias empíricas y bases de datos empleadas como en resultados y conclusiones (Özdamar y Shahin, 2021). Si bien la mayoría de los estudios encuentra que las sanciones tienen un impacto negativo sobre la tasa de crecimiento del PIB del país sancionado, los flujos de inversión extranjera y sus finanzas internacionales, los efectos varían dependiendo del tamaño y dependencia entre los países involucrados, de la naturaleza unilateral o multilateral de las sanciones, de la participación de EEUU y/o de Naciones Unidas, entre otros factores. Algunos ejemplos recientes de esta literatura son Caruso (2003), Neuenkirch y Neumeier (2015), Besedeš, Goldbach y Nitsch (2017), Gurvich y Prilepskiy (2015), Hatipoglu y Peksen, (2018), y Bayramov, Rustamli y Abbas (2020).

Los países que imponen sanciones también incurren en costes económicos, al restringir sus transacciones, aunque pueden ser relativamente pequeños, especialmente en casos de sanciones unilaterales para economías grandes como la de EEUU (Farmer, 2000). Otra literatura intenta entender la probabilidad de permanencia de las sanciones (McGillivray y Stam, 2004) y encuentra que los cambios de liderazgo en los países involucrados son el mejor predictor de la duración de una política de sanciones. En cuanto a su naturaleza multilateral o unilateral, Miers y Morgan (2002) concluyen que el primero no es más efectivo que el segundo, como usualmente tiende a pensarse, sobre todo por lo difícil que resulta la coordinación entre varios implicados. Özdamar y Shahin (2021) llaman la atención que algunos temas como las criptomonedas y el flujo de emigrantes todavía no han sido debidamente estudiados dentro de la literatura sobre el impacto económico de las sanciones.

Cuando se menciona a Cuba en los estudios internacionales sobre sanciones, casi siempre se la usa como ejemplo de fracaso de estas políticas. El mismo consenso existe en la mayoría de la literatura que aborda el caso cubano detenidamente (LeoGrande, 2015; Von Burgsdorff, 2009; Lopez-Levy, 2011; Dominguez, Hernandez y Barbería, 2017; Alzugaray, 2017; Zimbalist, 2021; Mesa-Lago, 2021; Rodriguez, 2021).

Zimbalist (2021) concluye que: “el embargo y el esfuerzo de Estados Unidos para derrocar al gobierno de Castro han estado vigentes desde 1960 y han fracasado en todas las formas posibles. Obligaron a Cuba a arrojarse en brazos de la URSS, proporcionaron una excusa para los fracasos económicos de su revolución y para su control político estricto de la población, elevaron la reputación de Castro como nacionalista y líder de los países del tercer mundo que buscan una relación más justa e independiente con las superpotencias. Y fracasaron, por supuesto, en deshacerse de él. Si ha tenido éxito en algo, ha sido en hacer más difíciles las vidas de los cubanos. Y es aborrecible decir que tal resultado es un éxito, aunque muchos políticos norteamericanos parecen pensar de esa manera”.

Lopez-Levy (2011) destaca que, históricamente, dos argumentos principales han justificado la política de sanciones contra Cuba. Durante la Guerra Fría, Washington afirmó que la alianza del gobierno de La Habana con Moscú y su comportamiento internacional constituían una amenaza para su seguridad nacional. Tras la caída del Muro de Berlín el argumento principal ha sido que el régimen cubano viola los derechos humanos de sus ciudadanos, si bien ello no siempre ha coincidido con la política exterior hacia China, Rusia o Arabia Saudí. El embargo refleja en gran medida la influencia de una facción del exilio en apoyo a esta política para lograr un cambio de régimen.

Rodríguez (2021) señala sobre el controvertido tema de las indemnizaciones cuyo monto, de acuerdo con el valor en libro de las propiedades norteamericanas nacionalizadas, ascendía a 1.800 millones de dólares, pero que el cálculo del gobierno cubano sobre el perjuicio económico causado por el bloqueo a la isla se calculó hasta 2018 en unos 134.499 millones de dólares. El gobierno de La Habana reconoce las reclamaciones de EEUU por las propiedades nacionalizadas, pero no las de los cubanos emigrados.

Por su parte, Mesa-Lago (2021) apunta que “el embargo, aunque importante, no es el mayor problema que sufre Cuba, ya que posee relaciones comerciales con al menos 70 países e inversiones de muchos de ellos, en especial de Canadá (en los sectores turísticos o minero: explotación de níquel y petróleo), España (turismo también), China (diversos campos) y Venezuela (crecientes hasta 2014). Indudablemente tiene efectos negativos, como los requisitos que ha de cumplir la banca extranjera en sus transacciones para evitar sanciones de EEUU, el sobreprecio en la compra de mercancías de ese país, que se realiza a través de terceros, y los mayores costes de flete. El mayor problema que afronta Cuba es su “ineficiente sistema económico e incapacidad de generar bastantes exportaciones para pagar sus importaciones”.

A pesar del esquema de sanciones, un cierto flujo de comercio, remesas y visitantes se ha venido produciendo entre EEUU y Cuba, sobre todo desde los años 90, con mayor presencia en las dos décadas siguientes, con diferentes intensidades dependiendo del momento político. En relación a las remesas, Duany (2021) refiere que los cubanos residentes en EEUU han financiado buena parte de la modesta recuperación de la economía cubana desde la década de 1990. Los datos disponibles sugieren que éstas constituyen una fuente de ingresos fundamental en Cuba, quizá tan importante como en la República Dominicana, México, El Salvador y otras naciones latinoamericanas y caribeñas. En cuanto al sector turismo y viajes, Perez y Perelló (2021) resaltan que la reducción de las prohibiciones a los viajes de norteamericanos en el período de Barack Obama permitió mostrar el posible escenario de las visitas y turismo desde EEUU hacia Cuba en un clima de distensión política.

Esta información sobre la trayectoria cambiante de los flujos de comercio, visitantes, remesas y finanzas son el punto de partida del presente estudio para aproximar el impacto económico de las sanciones sobre el crecimiento económico cubano y sobre otros agregados macroeconómicos. Con las estimaciones no se busca aproximar el coste total de las sanciones. Tampoco se intenta valorar todo el beneficio que pudiera traer a la economía cubana el levantamiento futuro de todas las sanciones.

La estrategia empírica busca examinar la sensibilidad de las series históricas del crecimiento económico y de otros indicadores macroeconómicos a los giros (flexibilizaciones/endurecimiento) del esquema de sanciones en las últimas tres décadas, empleando como fuente de información las variaciones en los flujos de comercio de bienes, visitantes y remesas y de indicadores financieros. Además de estimar el efecto sobre el crecimiento del PIB, se desagregan los impactos específicos a través del canal comercial, de visitantes y de remesas, y se separan los impactos para indicadores de la economía estatal y del sector privado. Este último resultado contribuye al debate en cuanto a la posibilidad de diseñar acciones de sanciones económicas que sólo impacten al gobierno sin dañar el sector privado y las familias o, en cambio, diseñar acciones que beneficien al sector privado sin beneficiar al gobierno.La segunda sección de este trabajo resume los principales eventos políticos y legislativos que han implicado giros en el esquema de sanciones desde los años 90. La tercera sección examina los acontecimientos e indicadores más relevantes de la coyuntura económica actual. La cuarta sección describe los datos usados para las estimaciones y examina la trayectoria del valor del intercambio económico entre ambos países, presentes a pesar de las sanciones. La quinta sección explica los modelos econométricos y su especificación bajo la lógica de restricciones de balanza de pagos. La sexta sección discute los resultados relacionados con el impacto de las sanciones en el crecimiento del PIB, los canales de transmisión y el impacto diferenciado entre el sector estatal y el sector privado de la economía cubana. La séptima sección evalúa la robustez estadística de los resultados, empleando como alternativa a los modelos de vectores autorregresivos (VAR). Las conclusiones comentan las implicaciones fundamentales de los resultados econométricos para el debate actual sobre la política de sanciones estadounidenses contra la economía cubana.

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