Carlos Fernández de Cossío
When Trump came to power in 2017, there was pressure from the anti-Cuban sectors in the US for him to put Cuba on the State Department list of countries that allegedly sponsored terrorism. He resisted, to be truthful, until nine days before he left office.
It’s obviously a slander against Cuba, especially considering that Cuba has been a victim of terrorism organized in the United States. But beyond that, the importance is that once a country is placed in that list, as we’ve discussed, this automatically triggers a set of economic measures that have a chilling effect around the world because it threatens anyone who engages with Cuba.
The pretext used by the US government revolves around the Cuban role in the peace process in Colombia. Upon a request from the Colombian government, Cuba committed to host delegates from an insurgent group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), and the Colombian government delegates in Cuba.
Now, Cuba has been involved in the peace process of Colombia in the past, and we did so together with the government of Norway. Normally these commitments are quite complex because you have to first ensure your impartiality. Second, you must ensure the safety of all those participating. You cannot have any peace process if the participants didn’t believe this was the case.
We are going to continue in our determination to have our own political and economic system and to reject foreign interference from the US or from any country.
The government of Iván Duque, as a result of a terrorist attack that occurred in Colombia, simply decided to put an end to the negotiations. We have no quarrel with that decision. It’s a sovereign decision. But the government then demanded that Cuba hand over this ELN delegation.
There was a protocol of what should happen if the talks broke down, and we said we must be true to the protocols we signed. Cuba would not be trusted again with any peace process anywhere in the world if we were to hand over these people. We received the full support of the government of Norway, which was our partner in this process. Yet this was the excuse used by the government of Donald Trump to put Cuba in the list.
The paradox is that once a new government came into power in Colombia, new peace talks were carried out in Cuba. It was in Cuba where two fundamental agreements [between the Colombian government and rebel groups] were forged. None of this would’ve been possible if Cuba at that time would have bent over and said, “Sure, we’ll not respect our commitments.”
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Publish date : 2024-12-23 02:59:00
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