Dear Editor,
As Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) meet in Havana, this week hopes are increasing for the embargo initiated by the US government in January 1962 to be lifted and moreso that Americans will be free to travel to the communist state without any restriction.
Caricom heads are looking at ways and means to strengthen co-operation in multilateral trade.. The Castro regime signed an agreement in 2002 with three big states in Caricom, Trinidad , Guyana and Barbados which broke the protocol and signed an accord for trade and economic agreement. The protocol calls for a meeting every three years and Tuesday,
December 9 is the 12th anniversary. In fact December 8 is called Cuba-Caricom Day.
Several recognized newspapers in the US are calling on the US government to remove the embargo on Cuba. There are signs of the removal since the Organization of American States (OAS) at its 39th summit in San Pedro Sula, Honduras in June 2009 lifted the trade embargo. Hilary Clinton who was the Secretary of State at the time was at the conference when the decision was taken. She made it clear at that conference that the United States will not remove the embargo until there are fair and free elections in Cuba and US detainees are released.
Despite travel restrictions on US citizens, more than 90,000 Americans visited Cuba last year, the most in 52 years. It seems as if the US is now in favour with people to people cultural exchanges.
Moreover Cuba is included in the global climate change programme and efforts are being made to include the communist island in the UN Post-2015 Development Agenda.
Despite its limited economic resources, the communist island has one of the best medical facilities and has trained thousands of doctors free of cost from other Caribbean islands and the wider world.
On the other hand, Cubans are not happy with the travel and economic restrictions imposed on them and they continue to flee their homeland for the United States in their quest for a better way of life.
Reports state that the number of Cubans fleeing has doubled during the past year. Meanwhile there are scores of Cubans who are detained in the United States for spying while there are also a few Americans who have been detained in Havana. One of them is 65-year-old government contractor, Alan P Gross, who was arrested in 2009 on espionage charges. The US government is calling for his release, but the Cubans are not prepared to do so until the US release at least three of their detainees.
A release from the Cuban Foreign Ministry stated that Caricom Chairman Gaston Brown, who is also Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Caricom Secretary General Irwin La Rocque and Cuban Prime Minister Raúl Castro will address the conference.
The OAS and Caricom have issued calls on the US government to lift the 52-year-old ban.
Yours faithfully,
Oscar Ramjeet
