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Cuba

1,158 Reasons To Think Again About the Pope’s Visit To Cuba

I’ve written here before about the Pope’s visit to Cuba and his disappointing silence about political repression there. Now we learn in the Miami Herald that his visit occasioned the detentions of 1,158 Cubans in the largest sweep in decades. The Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, an independent group, has issued a report listing all the detentions--more than half of which came during or just before the Pope arrived on March 26. The total of 1,158 is “the highest single monthly tally in the last five decades, only comparable to the huge sweeps carried out across the country” in 1961 after the Bay of Pigs. This should not come as a great surprise unless you think Cuba is in the midst of a Castro-led reform period. But it should occasion some comments from the Vatican, for the papal visit was what led to these detentions. Too quiet while in Cuba, the Pope should speak out more firmly now in favor of freedom there. The Herald story continues: The tally added fuel to complaints that the pope and Cuban Catholic Church turned a blind eye to the communist government’s human rights abuses in their efforts to gain more space for church activities on the island. The dissident Ladies in White have asked for a meeting with Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega Alamino “because the repression has grown worse here in Cuba, and what we’re seeing is a total silence on the part of the church,” group leader Bertha Soler said Tuesday. There are 1,158 new reasons for that silence to be broken.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams April 19, 2012 Pressure Points
Cuba

Lessons Learned: Bay of Pigs Invasion

CFR’s James M. Lindsay remembers the Bay of Pigs invasion, which began on April 17, 1961, and discusses the importance of preparing for failure and planning accordingly.

Explainer Video with James M. Lindsay and Hagit Ariav April 17, 2012
Immigration and Migration

Why the Summit of the Americas Matters

The sixth Summit of the Americas on April 14-15 is part of an intense spring of bilateral and regional interactions in the hemisphere. It will bring together thirty-three heads of state from nearly every member of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Cartegena, Colombia, to discuss regional issues ranging from expanding economic ties to turning back a surge in criminal activity. For the United States, this summit poses two main challenges. The first, largely overcome, is Cuba. In recent weeks, tensions have been high over Cuba’s exclusion from the OAS and its events. The Obama administration has repeated longstanding U.S. arguments that Cuba does not meet the OAS requirements of being a democratic nation. Most Latin American countries tend to see this ongoing exclusion (as well as U.S. foreign policy toward Cuba in general) as counterproductive. Through deft diplomacy, Colombia’s President Juan Manuel Santos found a solution--Raul Castro would stay home, but Cuba’s future participation would be discussed. In the end, only Ecuador’s president Rafael Correa made good on the threat of the ALBA bloc (comprising Venezuela, Ecuador, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and several island nations) to not attend without Cuba. The second challenge is to make actual progress on the agenda. The discussions will range from strengthening institutions for disaster preparedness to poverty and inequality reduction, regional infrastructure projects, and access to technology. One topic likely to dominate the meeting is security, and in particular the issue of drug legalization. A number of Latin American presidents past and present have supported the idea. Washington has said it is willing to listen to the discussion, though the National Security Council’s Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Dan Restrepo, confirmed that "the Obama administration has been quite clear in [its] opposition to the decriminalization or legalization of illicit drugs." Agreement on any of the region’s crowded list of complicated issues will be difficult. It may be harder still this year due to presidential elections in the United States, Mexico, Venezuela, and the Dominican Republic. As a result, there is little the United States can promise politically. It would be better for OAS states to focus on economic and energy issues, which will be propelled not just by governments but also by the private sector. A parallel CEO summit in Colombia, with more than 500 corporate leaders due to attend, could provide a further prompt for deal-making. Whatever the takeaways, the summit will provide, as it has in the past, a useful forum for heads of state and their staffs to come together and focus on issues of regional importance, and an opportunity for the United States to engage leaders in the region. Hemispheric Power Diplomacy The wave of recent U.S. diplomacy highlights the primacy of bilateral engagement with Latin America’s two largest countries: Mexico and Brazil. In March, Vice President Joseph Biden visited Mexico’s capital, meeting with President Felipe Calderón as well as the three leading presidential candidates. On April 2, President Obama hosted Calderón, along with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in Washington for the North American Leaders summit. Economic and security issues dominated the bilateral and trilateral discussions as the three nations worked to deepen the benefits of NAFTA, now nearing its twentieth anniversary. The diplomacy with Brazil has been even more energetic. In late March, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey met in Brazil with Defense Minister Antonio Celso Amorim and top-ranking military official General José Carlos de Nardi to discuss issues ranging from transnational crime to cyber warfare. President Dilma Rousseff’s April 9 visit to Washington included discussions with President Obama on economic ties, education, and U.S. monetary policy, among other issues. In Washington, and during her speeches at Harvard and MIT, she touted Brazil’s new Science Without Borders program, which plans to send up to one hundred thousand Brazilians abroad to study in the next few years, the majority to the United States. After the summit, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will head to Brazil to meet with their counterparts on a range of issues. These stepped-up interchanges highlight the new reality that for most regional issues--democracy, trade, environment, or security--the United States’ ability to make progress will depend on Brazil. These visits help lay the groundwork for a longer-term mature relationship with a rising Brazil on a world stage. Expanding Robust Trade The recent flurry of exchanges provide a strong base for refocusing U.S. relations in the region, recognizing the importance of the hemisphere for the country’s well-being. This should start with trade. Latin America today represents a good economic news story for the United States. Trade with Latin America has grown faster than virtually any other region in the world, reaching nearly a trillion dollars. U.S. shipments to its southern neighbors now total some $350 billion annually, roughly a quarter of all exports. With somewhat complementary industries and economies, expanding these sales further can benefit all sides. Energy too provides a promising opening, not just for the economies in the region but also for shifting the fraught geopolitical balance for the better. Brazil’s huge oil finds, Colombia’s rising output, and the possibility of renewed exploration and production in Mexico (if the next president reforms the oil sector to allow foreign direct investment in the same manner as Brazil’s Petrobras), would all benefit the United States. The hemisphere is also a renewable energy leader, with wind, solar, hydroelectric, and ethanol. If integrated, these alternative sources could further the quest for a cleaner and more competitive energy matrix worldwide. Finally, drug trafficking and organized crime networks increasingly affect public security across the hemisphere. This may perhaps be the most difficult area for agreement, as more nations now question the policies of the longstanding U.S. war on drugs. But with the threats transnational in origin, so too must be the responses, building and expanding on current regional coordination. The recent high levels of diplomatic engagement between the United States and many Latin American nations are in many ways just governments catching up with the already deep ties on the ground among families, communities, corporations, and supply chains. Sustaining this interest after the Summit of the Americas will serve Washington well, benefiting the U.S. economy, society, and global position as it tackles more recalcitrant problems worldwide.

Blog Post by Shannon K. O'Neil April 13, 2012 Latin America’s Moment

Cuba

The Pope’s Sad Trip To Cuba

The most significant statement made during Pope Benedict’s trip to Cuba this week was that made by the government minister in charge of economic reform, Marino Murillo, who said “In Cuba, there will not be political reform.” He’s right, although that is a truth too many people wish to obscure. The Castro regime took the occasion of the Pope’s visit to sweep up dissidents in a wave of arrests. None of that was surprising, but the Pope’s failure to advance the cause of freedom is sad indeed. The photos of him with Fidel and Raul Castro can only have demoralized those struggling and suffering for freedom in Cuba, for the Pope refused to meet with any dissidents at all. Moreover, his remarks were so carefully phrased that, according to press reports, most Cubans did not view them as a call for freedom--whatever the Pope’s intent. Of course the Pope is not a political figure, but he did rather clearly say he thought the U.S. embargo should end. If it was possible to be clear on that issue, why not on the far more fundamental issue of freedom? I know the Church plays a very long game, in Cuba as in China and everywhere across the globe, and this visit may have gained the Roman Catholic Church in Cuba a bit more freedom for itself to operate. But at what cost? "I’m deeply concerned that the Cuban church has negotiated political space for themselves in exchange for their moral imperative," Sen. Marco Rubio said this month. Perhaps the full measure of this papal visit cannot be made yet, and its longer-term impact will be positive. But seen from the week of the visit itself, it was a sad event that did little or nothing to bring moral and religious support to those suffering in the struggle for liberty in Cuba.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams March 29, 2012 Pressure Points
Cuba

Cuba: Another View

The views of my CFR colleague Julia Sweig on Cuba appear in an interview posted on our web site here under the title “The Frozen US-Cuba Relationship.” Ms. Sweig sees massive changes occurring in Cuba under Raul Castro: “Raul holds the reins… and, domestically, the politics of implementing a fairly wide range of economic and political and social reforms are his priority. In a deal that was coordinated with the help of the Cuban Catholic Church and Spain, he released all of the political prisoners in Cuba. He also is taking a number of steps that imply a major rewriting of the social contract in Cuba to shrink the size of the state and give Cuban individuals more freedom--economically, especially, but also in terms of speech--than we’ve seen in the last fifty years.” Why does Obama administration policy not react to these reforms? “The Obama administration, consistent with the approach of the Bush administration, has made a political decision to subordinate foreign policy and national interest-based decisions to domestic politics with respect to its Cuba policy.” I have a different take on events in Cuba. It seems to me the Castros, Raul and Fidel, are trying to move from a Soviet-style dictatorship to a Chinese-style dictatorship, one where there is no political freedom whatsoever but prosperity provides some support for the regime. The very week when Ms. Sweig’s interview appeared, so did this report from BBC: “Cuban police have arrested dozens of opposition activists, a week ahead of a visit by Pope Benedict XVI. Most of those detained are members of the protest group Ladies in White, who are demanding the release of political prisoners. Many were stopped as they staged their silent weekly protest march along an avenue in the capital, Havana. The group says the country’s Communist authorities have increased pressure on them in recent days.” This seems at variance with Ms. Sweig’s claims about increasing freedom of speech. So does this, from Amnesty International just a few weeks ago: “Cuban authorities have refused blogger Yoani Sánchez permission to travel to Brazil to attend a documentary screening on freedom of expression. Amnesty International believes that this refusal is a punitive measure in response to her outspoken criticism of civil and political rights in Cuba.” I also have a different explanation of the Obama administration’s policies from that of Ms. Sweig, who as noted above attributes them to domestic politics. In fact Mr. Obama changed U.S. policy to allow many more Americans to travel to Cuba, and to allow much more money to flow from Cuban Americans to relatives in Cuba—both terrific boons to the Cuban economy. What has been the regime’s response? On human rights matters, the repression continues. One of the worst examples occurred last month. As Amnesty reported, “Prisoner of conscience Orlando Zapata Tamayo died on 23 February following a prolonged hunger strike. He was one of 75 people arrested during a crackdown by the authorities in March 2003, and was serving a 36-year prison term at the time of his death.” And then there is the continuing imprisonment of an American aid worker, Alan Gross. Here is Ms. Sweig’s comment: “There’s been no real diplomacy; there’s no negotiating framework that I’ve seen for a very long period of time, and again, that has to do with domestic politics. It’s very hard to understand otherwise why this guy’s still in jail. The United States has repeatedly asked the Cuban government to release Gross unilaterally, with no commitments on our end. Asking for unilateral gestures, having rebuffed or ignored or failed to read the signals from Cuba, has created this impasse. Having said that, there can be a diplomatic, humanitarian solution, and I see no value to keeping Gross in jail and hope he will be released as soon as possible.” I take a different view. It is not at all hard to figure out “why this guy’s still in jail,” for we are dealing with a communist dictatorship. Ms. Sweig “sees no value” in keeping Mr. Gross in prison but obviously Raul Castro, the reformer, does, raising the question of whether Ms. Sweig’s understanding of the “reforms” and of Mr. Castro’s intentions and plans is accurate. Mr. Gross, 62, has been in a Cuban prison for two years and has been sentenced to a 15-year term for the crime described by The New York Times as “distributing satellite telephone equipment to Jewish groups in Havana.” As to the idea that there has been no diplomacy, in September former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson traveled to Cuba to discuss the Gross case and see Gross, at the invitation of the Cuban regime--but was not then permitted to visit the prisoner. What did Mr. Richardson make of it all? “Perhaps the Cuban government has decided it does not want to improve relations” with Washington, he said; “Perhaps that is the message it is sending….I have been here a week and tried through all means — with religious institutions, diplomats from other countries, all kinds of efforts — and I see that this isn’t going to change,” he said upon leaving. Ms. Sweig’s overall conclusion is that “Cubans want change and they want much more space--economic space, speech space. I would say political party space, like having a multi-party system, that’s not the top priority for Cubans. But what is a top priority is having the opportunity to make good for themselves with the wonderful education they have and to run businesses and to have the state get out of the way.” Here again we disagree, for I believe Cubans want to be free. I believe they also recognize that they will never attain the prosperity they seek so long as aged communist leaders control their economy. I cannot join in the supposition, so often made about people living under repressive regimes, that they don’t mind the lack of political freedom so much and just want a higher income. If the “Arab Spring” teaches anything, surely it is that even desperately poor people seek not only a better income but an end to censorship and torture and secret police raids and fake elections. This is a useful debate, I hope, and perhaps over the coming months we can continue it.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams March 19, 2012 Pressure Points
Cuba

Addressing the Risk of a Cuban Oil Spill

Is oil drilling in Cuban waters safe? Or might a “Cuban oil crisis” be upon us? And is the United States prepared for the possibility of a major spill just sixty miles from the Florida keys? They’re good questions, and ones that have been generating an increasing amount of buzz ever since Repsol finalized plans with the Cuban government to drill a well about thirty miles north of Havana. Drilling began the last week of January. One of my colleagues at the CFR, Captain Melissa Burt of the U.S. Coast Guard, and I just published a short piece making our case for why, and how, the the United States should address the threat of an oil spill emanating from Cuba. You can access the report here. Here’s our framing: "The imminent drilling of Cuba’s first offshore oil well raises the prospect of a large-scale oil spill in Cuban waters washing onto U.S. shores. Washington should anticipate this possibility by implementing policies that would help both countries’ governments stem and clean up an oil spill effectively. These policies should ensure that both the U.S. government and the domestic oil industry are operationally and financially ready to deal with any spill that threatens U.S. waters. These policies should be as minimally disruptive as possible to the country’s broader Cuba strategy." It’s politically tricky territory for the Obama Administration, certainly, and yet Captain Bert and I argue that there’s good reason for U.S. policymakers to take some basic precautions that need not comprise any significant revision to existing policy. These defensive measures can help lower the risk of a second Deepwater Horizon, this time coming from Cuba.

Blog Post by Blake Clayton March 8, 2012 Energy, Security, and Climate

Cuba

Guest Post: Colombia on the International Stage

This is a guest post by Sebastian Chaskel and Michael Bustamante. Sebastian Chaskel is a Master in Public Affairs student at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Michael Bustamante is a doctoral student in history at Yale University. Both served as research associates at the Council on Foreign Relations in the Latin America program. This post draws on an article published in the February edition of Current History. Today, Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos travels to Havana to meet with Cuban officials and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, currently convalescing in a Havana hospital. This hastily planned visit will last just a few hours,but the main item on the agenda holds broader regional significance. Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Nicaragua have pledged to boycott the upcoming Sixth Summit of the Americas if Cuba is not invited to participate. As host of the April event, the Santos administration is trying to broker a solution agreeable to all parties. President Santos is likely under no illusions about the waning salience of the Summit process and the Organization of American States to which it is linked. Colombia itself is a full participant in rival regional forums that have emerged in recent years to challenge the traditional U.S.-led inter-American system (for example, the newly minted Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, or CELAC). Yet Santos nonetheless stands to gain from a smooth summit meeting in Cartagena, especially on the symbolic front if he can broker Cuba’s ad-hoc participation in the face of U.S. opposition. (The OAS suspended Cuba’s membership in 1962, but lifted this suspension in 2009. Cuba has not requested formal readmission, and Washington opposes Cuba’s participation in the summit unless it meets requirements for full membership under the 2001 Inter-American Democratic Charter). President Santos is proving to be an able and independent leader in the international realm in more ways than one. In the 1990s and 2000s, Bogotá’s close security ties with Washington dominated discussions of Colombian foreign policy. Indeed, Colombia’s internal problems have long drawn more concerted attention from observers than its international ties, and with good reason. Yet since assuming the presidency in 2010, and no doubt owing in part to the dramatic (although still incomplete) improvement of Colombia’s domestic security situation over the past fifteen years, Colombia’s new president has pursued an increasingly diverse, mature, and noteworthy diplomatic agenda. The first foreign policy priority for President Santos upon taking office was repairing relations with Colombia’s immediate neighbors. The preceding Álvaro Uribe administration repeatedly alleged Venezuelan and Ecuadorian government complicity in providing refuge to the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) within their territory. As a result, on the day of Santos’s inauguration, Colombia’s ties with both governments remained severed. Eighteen months later, Colombia has restored formal relations with both countries. Trade and bilateral cooperation are on the rise. This diplomatic reversal has withstood a number of tests. In March 2011, to cite one example, the Colombian armed forces intercepted a shipment of Venezuelan uniforms and weaponry destined for the FARC. Still, in this instance and others, diplomacy helped avoid conflict. Santos has repeatedly urged Colombians to look toward the future, and since 2010, Venezuela has saw fit to arrest and deport various alleged members of the FARC and the Ejercito de Liberación Nacional (ELN, the second major armed rebel group after the FARC) back to Colombia. In exchange, Bogotá sent Walid Makled, a drug trafficker wanted in both Caracas and Washington, to Venezuela. Dialogue and negotiation, Santos seems to believe, will prove a better strategy for reducing the FARC’s ability to use Colombia’s neighbors as safe-havens. Of course, Colombia’s relationship with the United States continues to be critical, and in October 2011 the U.S. Congress finally ratified the bilateral free trade agreement that had languished on Capitol Hill since 2006. Yet surprisingly muted fanfare greeted news of the belated ratification in Bogotá. In a sense, Colombian foreign policy had already moved on. While the FTA was on hold in Washington, Colombia signed similar trade pacts with Canada, Chile, the European Free Trade Association, and the European Union. During President Santos’ tour of Asia in September, South Korea upgraded its relationship with Colombia to one of “strategic cooperation.” Meanwhile, exports to China have increased by 85 percent since 2006. Thus, even as the United States remains Colombia’s leading trade and diplomatic partner, and even as U.S. security and development assistance continues to flow, few Colombians see the long-sought FTA as the country’s golden ticket to success. It is but one piece of an increasingly multipronged global strategy. In general, Santos has been much less willing than Uribe to jeopardize relations with neighbors to shore up ties with the United States. In 2009, Uribe’s decision to allow the U.S. military expanded access to Colombian bases plunged his government’s relationship with almost all Latin American countries into crisis. By contrast, in August 2010, when Colombia’s Constitutional Court declared that agreement unconstitutional without congressional approval, Santos opted not to send it to Congress. Santos’ effort to broker a solution with regard to Cuba’s participation in the Summit of the Americas represents just the latest evidence of Colombia’s renewed assertiveness on the global stage. On the domestic front, too, Santos has emerged (somewhat surprisingly, given his pedigree in the Uribe government) as a reformist leader from the political center, pursuing bold legislation dealing with fiscal responsibility, corruption, and perhaps most significantly, comprehensive land and financial restitution for victims of Colombia’s devastating armed conflict. (For more on these programs, as well as some of potential complications or risks attendant to implementation, see our article in Current History). Regardless of whether today’s lightning visit to Havana resolves the current controversy over the upcoming Cartagena summit, Colombia appears to be coming into its own, at home and abroad. Faced with legacies of profound violence, corruption, massive forced displacement, and extreme inequality (at 0.58, Colombia’s Gini coefficient is one of the highest in the world), not to mention continuing conflict with the FARC and newer criminal gangs, clearly much progress remains to be made. Yet a year and a half into his presidency, Juan Manuel Santos has taken a number of important first steps to remedy widespread injustice at home and to pursue a more independent foreign policy in line with national interests.

Blog Post by Shannon K. O'Neil March 7, 2012 Latin America’s Moment
Cuba

Addressing the Risk of a Cuban Oil Spill

The imminent drilling of Cuba's first offshore oil well raises the prospect of a large-scale oil spill in Cuban waters washing onto U.S. shores. Washington should anticipate this possibility by implementing policies that would help both countries' governments stem and clean up an oil spill effectively. These policies should ensure that both the U.S. government and the domestic oil industry are operationally and financially ready to deal with any spill that threatens U.S. waters. These policies should be as minimally disruptive as possible to the country's broader Cuba strategy. The Problem A Chinese-built semisubmersible oil rig leased by Repsol, a Spanish oil company, arrived in Cuban waters in January 2012 to drill Cuba's first exploratory offshore oil well. Early estimates suggest that Cuban offshore oil and natural gas reserves are substantial—somewhere between five billion and twenty billion barrels of oil and upward of eight billion cubic feet of natural gas. Although the United States typically welcomes greater volumes of crude oil coming from countries that are not members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), a surge in Cuban oil production would complicate the United States' decades-old effort to economically isolate the Castro regime. Deepwater drilling off the Cuban coast also poses a threat to the United States. The exploratory well is seventy miles off the Florida coast and lies at a depth of 5,800 feet. The failed Macondo well that triggered the calamitous Deepwater Horizon oil spill in April 2010 had broadly similar features, situated forty-eight miles from shore and approximately five thousand feet below sea level. A spill off Florida's coast could ravage the state's $57 billion per year tourism industry. Washington cannot count on the technical know-how of Cuba's unseasoned oil industry to address a spill on its own. Oil industry experts doubt that it has a strong understanding of how to prevent an offshore oil spill or stem a deep-water well blowout. Moreover, the site where the first wells will be drilled is a tough one for even seasoned response teams to operate in. Unlike the calm Gulf of Mexico, the surface currents in the area where Repsol will be drilling move at a brisk three to four knots, which would bring oil from Cuba's offshore wells to the Florida coast within six to ten days. Skimming or burning the oil may not be feasible in such fast-moving water. The most, and possibly only, effective method to respond to a spill would be surface and subsurface dispersants. If dispersants are not applied close to the source within four days after a spill, uncontained oil cannot be dispersed, burnt, or skimmed, which would render standard response technologies like containment booms ineffective. Repsol has been forthcoming in disclosing its spill response plans to U.S. authorities and allowing them to inspect the drilling rig, but the Russian and Chinese companies that are already negotiating with Cuba to lease acreage might not be as cooperative. Had Repsol not volunteered to have the Cuba-bound drilling rig examined by the U.S. Coast Guard and Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement to certify that it met international standards, Washington would have had little legal recourse. The complexity of U.S.-Cuba relations since the 1962 trade embargo complicates even limited efforts to put in place a spill response plan. Under U.S. law and with few exceptions, American companies cannot assist the Cuban government or provide equipment to foreign companies operating in Cuban territory. Shortfalls in U.S. federal regulations governing commercial liability for oil spills pose a further problem. The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90) does not protect U.S. citizens and property against damages stemming from a blown-out wellhead outside of U.S. territory. In the case of Deepwater Horizon, BP was liable despite being a foreign company because it was operating within the United States. Were any of the wells that Repsol drills to go haywire, the cost of funding a response would fall to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund (OSLTF), which is woefully undercapitalized. OPA 90 limits the OSLTF from paying out more than $50 million in a fiscal year on oil removal costs, subject to a few exceptions, and requires congressional appropriation to pay out more than $150 million. The Way Forward As a first step, the United States should discuss contingency planning for a Cuban oil spill at the regular multiparty talks it holds with Mexico, the Bahamas, Cuba, and others per the Cartagena Convention. The Caribbean Island Oil Pollution Response and Cooperation Plan provides an operational framework under which the United States and Cuba can jointly develop systems for identifying and reporting an oil spill, implement a means of restricting the spread of oil, and identify resources to respond to a spill. Washington should also instruct the U.S. Coast Guard to conduct basic spill response coordination with its counterparts in Cuba. The United States already has operational agreements in place with Mexico, Canada, and several countries in the Caribbean that call for routine exercises, emergency response coordination, and communication protocols. It should strike an agreement with Cuba that is substantively similar but narrower in scope, limited to basic spill-oriented advance coordination and communication. Before that step can be taken, U.S. lawmakers may need to amend the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 to allow for limited, spill-related coordination and communication with the Cuban government. Next, President Barack Obama should issue an export-only industry-wide general license for oil spill response in Cuban waters, effective immediately. Issuing that license does not require congressional authorization. The license should allow offshore oil companies to do vital spill response work in Cuban territory, such as capping a well or drilling a relief well. Oil service companies, such as Halliburton, should be included in the authorization. Finally, Congress should alter existing oil spill compensation policy. Lawmakers should amend OPA 90 to ensure there is a responsible party for oil spills from a foreign offshore unit that pollutes or threatens to pollute U.S. waters, like there is for vessels. Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Congressman David Rivera (R-FL) have sponsored such legislation. Lawmakers should eliminate the requirement for the Coast Guard to obtain congressional approval on expenditures above $150 million for spills of national significance (as defined by the National Response Plan). And President Obama should appoint a commission to determine the appropriate limit of liability cap under OPA 90, balancing the need to compensate victims with the desire to retain strict liability for polluters. There are two other, less essential measures U.S. lawmakers may consider that would enable the country to respond more adeptly to a spill. Installing an early-response system based on acoustic, geophysical, or other technologies in the Straits of Florida would immediately alert the U.S. Coast Guard about a well blowout or other unusual activity. The U.S. Department of Energy should find out from Repsol about the characteristics of Cuban crude oil, which would help U.S. authorities predict how the oil would spread in the case of a well blowout. Defending U.S. Interests An oil well blowout in Cuban waters would almost certainly require a U.S. response. Without changes in current U.S. law, however, that response would undoubtedly come far more slowly than is desirable. The Coast Guard would be barred from deploying highly experienced manpower, specially designed booms, skimming equipment and vessels, and dispersants. U.S. offshore gas and oil companies would also be barred from using well-capping stacks, remotely operated submersibles, and other vital technologies. Although a handful of U.S. spill responders hold licenses to work with Repsol, their licenses do not extend to well capping or relief drilling. The result of a slow response to a Cuban oil spill would be greater, perhaps catastrophic, economic and environmental damage to Florida and the Southeast. Efforts to rewrite current law and policy toward Cuba, and encouraging cooperation with its government, could antagonize groups opposed to improved relations with the Castro regime. They might protest any decision allowing U.S. federal agencies to assist Cuba or letting U.S. companies operate in Cuban territory. However, taking sensible steps to prepare for a potential accident at an oil well in Cuban waters would not break new ground or materially alter broader U.S. policy toward Cuba. For years, Washington has worked with Havana on issues of mutual concern. The United States routinely coordinates with Cuba on search and rescue operations in the Straits of Florida as well as to combat illicit drug trafficking and migrant smuggling. During the hurricane season, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) provides Cuba with information on Caribbean storms. The recommendations proposed here are narrowly tailored to the specific challenges that a Cuban oil spill poses to the United States. They would not help the Cuban economy or military. What they would do is protect U.S. territory and property from a potential danger emanating from Cuba. Cuba will drill for oil in its territorial waters with or without the blessing of the United States. Defending against a potential oil spill requires a modicum of advance coordination and preparation with the Cuban government, which need not go beyond spill-related matters. Without taking these precautions, the United States risks a second Deepwater Horizon, this time from Cuba.

Policy Innovation Memorandum by Captain Melissa Bert, USCG and Blake Clayton March 7, 2012
Cuba

The Frozen U.S.-Cuba Relationship

Under President Raul Castro, Cuba has begun economic and political reforms while bolstering ties with Brazil and the Vatican. But Washington has failed to seize on opportunities for expanding relations, says CFR’s Julia E. Sweig.

Interview with Julia E. Sweig and Brianna Lee February 28, 2012
Cuba

Rousseff’s Shameful Sojourn in Cuba

The president of Brazil has been visiting Cuba this week. It should not be necessary to remind anyone that Brazil itself lived for years under a military dictatorship, or that Cuba is one of the few remaining dictatorships in this hemisphere. It would have been reasonable to expect some slight sympathy or solidarity for the people of Cuba, especially when human rights abuses there are so awful. It is only a matter of days since the death of political prisoner Wilmar Villar at age 31. He had been jailed for the crime of paticipating in a demonstration. Such is life in Cuba. But President Rousseff did not utter one word criticizing human rights abuses by the Cuban regime. The Wall Street Journal reported on what she did while in Cuba. during Tuesday’s visit, Ms. Rousseff criticized the existence of the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, where terror suspects are held, and the U.S. trade embargo, which she said contributes to poverty on the island....She declined requests for meetings by Cuban dissidents, and has said she won’t press the Castro brothers on the island’s human-rights record. "Human rights aren’t a stone to be thrown from one side to another," she said in Havana on Tuesday. This week, Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota said human rights aren’t an "emergency" issue in Cuba. Really? They were an "emergency" issue for Wilmar Villar. To express Brazil’s solidarity with the dictators, to indulge in cheap criticism of the United States, and to ignore the suffering of those struggling for freedom in Cuba, add up to a shameful performance by Ms. Rousseff and the government of Brazil.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams February 1, 2012 Pressure Points
Cuba

Trading Away Cuba Policy

Israel’s swap of roughly one thousand prisoners in exchange for Gilad Shalit demonstrates the extremely difficult choices any decent country faces when dealing with governments or terrorist groups that hold human life cheap. Whatever one’s view of Israel’s decision to make this swap, it is worth noting that Israel is exchanging prisoners--not changing its policies toward terrorism. This point becomes important when one discovers what the United States was apparently willing to give Cuba in exchange for the freedom of Alan Gross, a USAID contractor who is being held as a hostage in Havana. According to the Associated Press, the Cuban regime was told that the United States would not only free a Cuban spy held in prison here, but was "willing to consider": removing Cuba from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism; reducing spending on Cuban democracy promotion programs like the one that led to the hiring of Gross; authorizing U.S. companies to help Cuba clean up oil spills from planned offshore drilling; improving postal exchanges; ending a program that makes it easier for Cuban medical personnel to move to the United States.... Now, an administration spokesman told the A.P. that "the offer was only to discuss those issues after Gross was released, with no guarantees that U.S. policies would change." That is not a significant demurral, because it admits that in exchange for Gross’s freedom we were willing not only to engage in a prisoner swap but to bring into question key elements of our policy toward Cuba. It is especially offensive that we were willing to negotiate over support for democracy in Cuba, for that would mean that the unjust imprisonment of Gross had given the Castro dictatorship a significant victory. The implications for those engaged in similar democracy promotion activities elsewhere are clear: local regimes would think that imprisoning an American might be a terrific way to get into a negotiation about ending such activities. Every American administration faces tough choices in these situations, but the Obama administration has made a great mistake here. Our support for democracy should not be a subject of negotiation with the Castro regime.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams October 14, 2011 Pressure Points
Cuba

Hostages: Two Down, One to Go

American hikers Shane Bauer (L) and Josh Fattal attend the first session of their trial at the revolutionary court in Tehran February 6, 2011. (Hew/Courtesy Reuters) The announcement that the two American hostages in Iran, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, will be released on bail is very welcome. They have been imprisoned since July 2009, and it appears their release is an effort by Iran to eliminate this issue before President Ahmadinejad hits the United Nations in the coming weeks. But we have not fared so well in Cuba. There, former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson’s visit resulted in nothing. He was not even permitted to see the American hostage, Alan Gross, who has been in prison since December 2009. Richardson was invited to Cuba and had every reason to believe Gross would be released to him. But the Castro brothers remain as vicious as ever in their rule and their treatment of prisoners. The ball therefore bounces back to the U.S. government. What steps will now be taken to put more pressure on Cuba? How about this to start: reverse every move made by the Obama Administration to free up travel to Cuba. Such travel gives the Castros additional hard currency. A further step: the Administration should publicly appeal to university and church groups, which often sponsor travel to Cuba, to stay home. Visiting Cuba’s beaches while a fellow American is kept prisoner there is unconscionable, and the White House should say so.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams September 17, 2011 Pressure Points
Cuba

Key Days in Our Hostage Crises

Decisions will be coming in the next few days in the cases of our hostages in Cuba and in Iran. In Cuba, the “Supreme Peoples Court” heard the appeal of Alan Gross last Friday and should be announcing its decision very soon. Gross is an AID contractor who Cuba has jailed since 2009 on ridiculous charges that his work for AID was actually espionage. In Iran, Joshua Fattal and Shane Bauer have also been in prison for two years. They are hikers who strayed across Iran’s border from Iraqi Kurdistan and the espionage case against them is equally baseless. They are scheduled to go on trial this Sunday, July 31, the second anniversary of their arrest. One can make an argument for the Obama Administration’s low-key handling of these cases—if they end well, with the release of all three men very soon. Then the administration will be able to say that quiet diplomacy was the best bet and that release could not have been speeded up by louder criticism and more diplomatic attacks on Iran and Cuba. But that argument will work only if they are all released. If these “trials,” which are farcical and depend on decisions made at the top of each regime, do not result in the release of our hostages the administration will have to abandon its present tactics. Far more publicity and pressure will be needed. For example, the Obama Administration eased rules governing travel to Cuba this year. It is obscene that Americans are cavorting on Cuban beaches while their entire population is held prisoner by the Castro regime, but the loosening of travel regulations cannot be sustained if Cuba refuses to release Alan Gross. If the White House will not tighten them again, Congress should do so unless Gross is freed within weeks.

Blog Post by Elliott Abrams July 27, 2011 Pressure Points
Cuba

Sweig: Siginificant Change Unfolding in Cuba

Having just returned from Cuba’s Communist Party Congress, Council on Foreign Relations’ Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies, Julia Sweig, shares her analysis of the political and economic reforms introduced by Raul Castro.

Explainer Video with Julia E. Sweig May 2, 2011
Cuba

Cuba’s Reform-Minded Party Congress

As Cuba’s Communist Party convenes this weekend for the first time in fourteen years, President Raul Castro will look to clarify and gain support for economic reforms. CFR’s Julia Sweig says the country has made significant strides toward modernization and suggests the United States should amend its restrictive Cuba policies.

Interview with Aimee Rawlins and Julia E. Sweig April 15, 2011 Civil Society, Markets, and Democracy Program