Brussels, 20/06/2008 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 19 June, on the sidelines of the European Council, European foreign ministers decided to lift European diplomatic sanctions against Cuba. The aim of the European Union is to encourage Cuban authorities to keep up the pace of reforms initiated since Fidel Castro handed power over to his brother. The formal decision to lift sanctions will be taken on Monday during the meeting of agriculture ministers.
At the head of the member states that have worked to lift sanctions, the Spanish government welcomed this decision. “Spain has a special responsibility” in relations between the EU and Cuba, Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said on Friday 20 June. Considering the EU support in favour of “dialogue policy” with Cuba as essential, he said it was necessary to “take advantage of and intensify this area of dialogue”. On Thursday evening, Spain's Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos had said that the sanctions, decided in 2003 after the arrest of 75 Cuban dissidents and frozen since 2005, had served no purpose. He had also hoped it was possible to create the conditions for reaching signature of an association agreement with Cuba in 2010 under Spanish EU Presidency. There is a “real transition in Cuba making us open up our door”, explained Dimitrij Rupel, Slovenian Foreign Minister, expressing the hope that “Cuba will change”. Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn remarked that the aim of lifting sanctions was to have “better leverage, better pressure for dialogue on human rights”.
Until the very last moment, the Czech Republic, Sweden and Germany expressed their reluctance regarding the lifting of European sanctions. “We are still divided on how to judge the situation in Cuba”, Mr Asselborn acknowledged. In order to satisfy these three countries, he decided to review the political situation in the island in June 2009. “We shall examine the human rights situation each year and, on this basis, decide whether we shall continue our policy towards Cuba, or not”, the Czech foreign minister, Karel Schwarzenberg, stressed on Thursday evening. “Some have seen major changes. My microscope is not powerful enough to locate these particular changes”, the Swedish foreign minister, Carl Bildt, said sceptically.
The decision to lift European diplomatic sanctions against Cuba was welcomed by European Development Commissioner Louis Michel who states in a press release: “I am very pleased that the EU has taken this unanimous decision (…) which opens the way to more open and frank dialogue between Brussels and Havana on a series of challenges including human rights, the environment, science and technology”. (M.B./transl.jl)