Cuba seeks to broaden talks with US
Diplomat strikes conciliatory tone
UNITED NATIONS - Cuba is willing to hold talks with the United States on any level, Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said yesterday in conciliatory remarks aimed at the Obama administration.
Rodriguez said the island nation was waiting for a response from Washington to Cuba’s offer to broaden discussions.
His comments followed a testy exchange he had with a senior US official just before the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to condemn America’s 47-year trade embargo.
It was the 18th year in a row that the General Assembly has taken up the symbolic measure, and the first since President Barack Obama took office in January, promising to extend a hand of friendship to Washington’s traditional enemies.
That change in approach has been noticed by Havana, Rodriguez said.
“We are prepared to have a dialogue with the government of the United States at any level,’’ the foreign minister said in an interview after the vote.
Rodriguez said that Cuba formally offered in July to hold expanded talks with the United States to cooperate in combating terrorism and drug trafficking, and to work together to fight natural disasters, among other things.
“We are waiting for the North American response,’’ Rodriguez said.
He also said Cuba has been pleased by progress of ongoing talks on migration and reestablishing direct mail service. He called those discussions “productive and respectful.’’
Rodriguez’s tone in the interview was markedly different from that of his speech before the General Assembly, in which he claimed the embargo, which the Cubans refer to as a blockade, had cost the island’s fragile economy tens of billions of dollars over the years and prevented Cuban children from getting needed medical care.
“The blockade is an uncultured act of arrogance,’’ Rodriguez said, likening the policy to an “act of genocide’’ and calling it “ethically unacceptable.’’
US Ambassador Susan Rice reacted strongly, calling the Cuban diplomat’s statements hostile and “straight out of the Cold War era.’’
Rice said the Obama administration was committed to writing “a new chapter to this old story’’ by engaging with the Cuban government, and she used the bulk of her speech to highlight the steps Washington had already taken to improve ties.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said the General Assembly vote on the embargo ignored US efforts to help Cubans.
“This yearly exercise at the UN obscures the facts that the United States is a leading source of food and humanitarian relief to Cuba,’’ Kelly said. “In 2008, the United States exported $717 million in agricultural products, medical devices, medicine, wood, and humanitarian items to Cuba.’’
