Potential for stalemate: Cuba, the EU and the USA

Recent visits to Havana by EU aid minister Karel de Gucht and by Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos both addressed the issue of the European Union’s “common position” on Cuba, but from different sides. Moratinos wants to be entirely rid of the policy; de Gucht reinforced that it would only come down with concrete gestures from Cuba regarding improved human rights.

The EU common position, as adopted in 1996, is “to encourage a process of transition to pluralist democracy and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, via constructive engagement with the Cuban Government” (see here for further explanation). At the time it was passed, Spain’s Prime Minister (Jose Maria Aznar) was the one leading the push behind the measure. Now Spain has pledged to work to eliminate the common position, making a number of other EU countries uneasy. Moratinos affirmed Spain’s intentions while in Havana, and last Thursday, Spain’s Secretary of State for the EU did the same, noting that the EU maintains normal relations with other countries that are not “paragons of democracy.”

Spain may not have the full support of other EU countries—many have demanded explanation of what Spain plans as a replacement for the common position, and the EU aid minister asserted while in Havana this week that replacing the common position would happen only with a consensus that on Cuba’s part requires “gestures with respect to human rights”—but it does have certain power: Spain will hold the rotating presidency of the EU for the first half of 2010.

Yet always overshadowing its relations with other countries will be Cuba’s relationship with the United States, and indeed, the U.S.-Cuba impasse tends to put the EU in an awkward position on this. With a high level of mutual distrust and a history of U.S.-funded subversion and assassination attempts on the island, Cuba claims that it cannot trust the dissidents and regime opponents that exist in the nation. Therefore press is restricted, access to the Internet restricted, opponents are jailed, and so forth, in the name of protecting the nation. Without further progression in the level of trust between the United States and Cuba, it is unlikely that such conditions will change.

Ultimately, the gestures sought by the EU might only be as fast in coming as the changes in the US-Cuba relationship.