The Organization of American States (OAS) on Wednesday lifted a decades-old ban on Cuba’s participation in the group and cleared the way for the island’s return despite initial US objections.
The vote by acclamation to revoke a 1962 measure suspending Cuba from the group toppled an enduring landmark of the Cold War, and was just the latest in a series of events in the region to draw the communist-run island back into the hemispheric fold.
“The Cold War has ended this day in San Pedro Sula,” said Honduran President Manuel Zelaya immediately following the announcement. “We begin a new era of fraternity and tolerance.” Cuba’s isolation had already been melting away gradually, with the Cold War fading and left-of-center governments spreading in the Americas. Every country in the hemisphere except for the US has re-established relations with Cuba and the US embargo of Cuba is deeply unpopular throughout the region.
The action doesn’t mean Cuba will return to the 34-member body that helps coordinate policies and mediates disputes throughout the Americas. Cuban officials have repeatedly insisted they have no interest in returning to an organization they consider a tool of the US.
But it does map out a new, more collegial relationship between the US and Latin American countries, and could help nascent US efforts to start a dialogue with Cuba after more than four decades without diplomatic relations.
“This is a moment of rejoicing for all of Latin America,” Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Fander Falconi told reporters after the session. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega called the vote “news of hope.”
If Cuba later decides to join the group, the agreement calls for “a process of dialogue” in line with OAS “practices, proposals and principles” — a veiled allusion to agreements on human rights and democracy that the US has insisted upon.
Robert Pastor, a longtime foreign policy adviser on hemispheric affairs, called the final resolution a good compromise.
Requesting Cuba to seek a dialogue with the OAS “offers an avenue toward maintaining the Inter-American Democratic Charter,” said Pastor, a professor at American University in Washington.
“One hopes that the US will expedite its negotiations with Cuba and Cuba begins a dialogue with the OAS on a wide range of issues,” he said.
But US Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the vote only appeased Cuba.
“Now we know where the priorities of the OAS lie,” the Cuba-born Ros-Lehtinen said in a statement. “Rather than upholding democratic principles and fundamental freedoms, OAS member states, led by the OAS Secretary General, could not move quickly enough to appease their tyrannical idols in Cuba.”
“Today’s decision by the OAS is an affront to the Cuban people and to all who struggle for freedom, democracy and fundamental human rights,” she said.
US Representatives Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Mario Diaz-Balart, also Cuba-born Florida Republicans, called the vote “a putrid embarrassment” and said it showed the administration of US President Barack Obama’s “absolute diplomatic incompetence and its unrestricted appeasement of the enemies of the United States.”
The decision was made by consensus, meaning the US accepted it, though Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had lobbied personally for requiring Cuba to make democratic reforms and improve respect for human rights.
Still, Clinton applauded the final vote.
“Many member countries originally sought to lift the 1962 suspension and allow Cuba to return immediately, without conditions,” Clinton said in a statement issued by the State Department in Washington.
“Others agreed with us that the right approach was to replace the suspension which has outlived its purpose after nearly half a century with a process of dialogue and a future decision that will turn on Cuba’s commitment to the organization’s values,” she said.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to