Washington conference on Cuba fails to find consensus on embargo

By FRANK DAVIES
Herald Staff Writer

WASHINGTON -- U.S. policy designed to isolate Cuba has either been a failure
that should be scrapped or a success that's about to pay off, according to a wide
variety of U.S.-Cuba analysts who could agree Tuesday on only one point: The
Castro government consistently violates human rights.

But how the U.S. government should deal with Cuba proved as divisive as ever
during a conference hosted by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative policy
institute in Washington.

Staunch defenders of sanctions such as Roger Noriega, senior staff member of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Otto Reich, a former ambassador
to Venezuela in the Reagan administration, said U.S. policy was on the right
track and had pressured Castro into limited changes.

``How do we hasten change?'' asked Noriega. ``Lifting the embargo now would be
like buying stock on the way down. It's also the leverage we need in dealing with
a transition government'' after Castro.

Foes of sanctions, including Jose Miguel Vivanco, who heads the Americas
division of Human Rights Watch, and Wayne Smith, former head of the U.S.
Interests Section in Havana, cited their lack of effectiveness. In trying to isolate
Cuba, they said, the United States is itself isolated in the international
community.

``To be pragmatic, the strategy of isolation works only if it's part of a concerted
international effort to pressure Castro,'' Vivanco said. ``Only the United States is
trying to isolate Cuba, and that gives it zero leverage on human rights issues.''

Venezuelan author Ana Julia Jatar, who visited Cuba three weeks ago, said the
U.S. embargo was ``like trying to bomb the Cubans in Cuba so they have enough
power to overthrow Castro -- but instead the people are weaker.''

Smith claimed that sanctions have been counterproductive, and cited former
secretaries of state -- Republicans Henry Kissinger and George Schultz -- who
now oppose them.

But Reich and Jose Cardenas, director of the Washington office of the Cuban
American National Foundation, said any softening of U.S. policy would ignore the
lessons of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet bloc. They said hard-line
policies by the Reagan administration had accelerated the demise of the Soviet
Union and would do the same in Cuba.

Reich, now a consultant, criticized U.S. business leaders for seeking change
because they see Cuba as a lucrative market: ``It's immoral for some in the
business community to try to take advantage of captive populations, whether it's
in China, Iran or Cuba.''

At times, the debate on Cuba policy was simply a series of speeches by
individuals talking past each other. And as a couple of speakers noted, the
Heritage Foundation framed the topic -- ``Would easing the trade embargo soften
Castro?'' -- in a way that focused on immediate policy rather than post-Castro
Cuba.

Still, said Phil Peters, a former State Department official skeptical of sanctions,
``this is a discussion that needs to take place.''