Pennsylvania to lobby against Cuba trade embargo

[Judi Lynn]

Pennsylvania to lobby against Cuba trade embargo
Mon Apr 19, 2004 07:26 PM ET
By Anthony Boadle

HAVANA, April 19 (Reuters) - Pennsylvania, the first northeastern U.S. state to send a trade mission to Cuba, pledged on Monday to lobby for an end to trade and travel sanctions against the communist-run island.

Cuba's food import agency Alimport said it would buy an initial $10 million of fresh fruit and vegetables, frozen processed food, milk, livestock feed and other agricultural products.

The Port of Philadelphia, once the second largest importer of Cuban sugar, signed a memorandum of understanding to reopen its docks to trade with Cuba under an easing of sanctions in 2000 that allowed food sales to the island.

"We intend to talk to our congressional delegation (in Washington) and encourage them to consider lifting the trade and travel restrictions," said Pennsylvania Agriculture Secretary Dennis Wolff, heading an 18-member business delegation to Cuba.
(snip/...)

http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=bondsNews&storyID=4871048

[Blayde Starrfyre]

1. I don't get it

Someone needs to explain to me why our government thinks it's OK to trade with some nations that abuse human rights (China, Israel, Saudi Arabia, etc.) but not OK to trade with another nation that abuses human rights, Cuba. Shouldn't there be a standard policy for trade with human rights abusers?

[Judi Lynn]

2. Pennsylvania agricultural trade mission negotiating food deals with Cuba

Posted on Mon, Apr. 19, 2004





Pennsylvania agricultural trade mission negotiating food deals with Cuba

ANITA SNOW

Associated Press


(snip)
"Philadelphia - the City of Brotherly Love - has the oldest port in the country and at the time the sanctions were put in place it was the second highest importer of sugar cane from this great country," McDermott said.

He said that after most of the American sanctions were imposed on Cuba in 1962, sugar processing plants operated by Diamond and other companies around the Port of Philadelphia were forced to shut down, throwing many Pennsylvanians out of work.
(snip)

Pennsylvania is the latest of about 10 states or ports - and the first from the northeastern United States - to sign such a letter of intent with Cuba under an exception to the U.S. trade and financial sanctions on the island. The state is similar in geographic size and population to Cuba, which has about 11.2 million people.

Like the earlier letters of intent, the one signed Monday called for state officials to push for an end to American trade and travel sanctions on the island. "We intend to talk to our congressional delegation about lifting the restrictions on Cuba," Wolff said.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/8469638.htm
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[Judi Lynn]

3. U.S. saber rattling worries Castro regime

Posted 4/19/2004 10:15 PM


U.S. saber rattling worries Castro regime
HAVANA — Ricardo Alarcón believes the Bush administration has Cuba in its cross hairs. He thinks it is only a matter of time before a U.S. invasion force descends upon this island nation in an attempt to force a regime change.
While the warning signs of this impending military action may have gone unnoticed by many Americans — some of whom would scoff at the idea of any U.S. invasion of Cuba — Alarcón, the president of Cuba's National Assembly, said they have not escaped the attention of Cuban leaders.

It's easy to dismiss such fears as a form of political cabin fever — the hallucinations of a communist government that for 44 years has been the target of a U.S. embargo meant to choke the life out of Fidel Castro's government — but you shouldn't. These warning signs have an ominous parallel to the United States' buildup to war in Iraq. In the months leading up to the Iraq invasion, President Bush and top members of his administration portrayed Saddam Hussein's government as a totalitarian state that possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD) that could be used against the U.S. Two months before he ordered troops into Iraq, Bush painted a chilling picture — that of a rogue nation about to unleash another terrorist attack on the United States.

Similar language is now being used to cast Castro's regime as a threat to U.S. national security.
(snip)

But President Bush's public position notwithstanding, Cuban officials still fear — and are preparing for — the worst.
Cuba "cannot avoid being bombed. We cannot avoid them landing. But what we guarantee is an organized hell for the invaders," Alarcón said.
(snip)

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnist/wickham/2004-04-19-wickham2_x.htm