In October 28th,
2000, President Clinton signed the bill including these new restrictions, thus becoming a
US law.
Likewise, the present Republican Administration of G.
W. Bush has spread the fallacy that sales of foodstuff and medicines to Cuba are allowed
since 1992; that in 1998 the Department of Commerce’s regulations were modified to
facilitate the granting of licenses for the sale of medical products; and that the US
Government supported the holding of the commercial Fair of medical products in Havana in
2000, where most exhibited products were sold to Cuban medical institutions, with a cost
of over one million dollar.
Regarding the Havana 2000 Fair of American Medical
products, it was never held with the support of the US government but rather despite the
US obstacles and limitations.
On this occasion, the Cuban enterprise EMIAT
negotiated three contracts to purchase medical equipment with the Chattanooga Group of
Tennessee, Llanna Instrument of Rhode Island and Striker of Florida, all of which were
disregarded by the Cuban counterpart when after some time, licenses were finally not
granted. The Cuban enterprise was obliged to have recourse to suppliers from other
countries.
Regarding this premeditated campaign of manipulations
and misinformation it is necessary to remember that the 1992 approval of the Torricelli
Act was chiefly aimed at the prohibition of Cuba’s trade with American-subsidized
enterprises settled in third countries. Of the overall volume of what Cuba then had, over
90% corresponded to foodstuff and medicines, representing as a whole over 770 million
dollars. Obviously, among the damages to the national economy, this Act especially meant a
setback for the Cuban imports of foodstuff and medicines, through American subsidiaries.
Those imports collapsed.
The explanation that the modifications to the
Treasury Department’s regulations facilitated the granting of license for the sale of
medicine and foodstuff is another wicked manipulation of facts. On the one hand, not only
has it made it all more embarrassing, but also now the processing of licenses takes longer
and has become picker. On the other hand, it has never meant a way of facilitating the
sales of medicine and foodstuff, precisely because of the lack of economic and financial
mechanism between the United States and Cuba.
The alleged amounts of those licenses represent only
the cost of the products they would involve, should sale operations be a fact, but they
never mean accomplished transactions.
Another important element that could not be
overlooked in an objective analysis of this matter is that the existence of a license
procedure for the alleged trade of medicines with Cuba is in itself a dissuasive and
intimidating factor for those who could in fact be interested in this trade, since they
are subject to unusual procedures and controls of normal commercial operations with any
country.
Would there really be political willingness for the
completion of these commercial transactions, restrictions on bank and credit operations
would have to be lifted, free access for vessels and planes to ports and airports of both
countries would have to be allowed, restrictions on travels on both directions would have
to be eliminated so that businessmen can carry on with their usual activity. Also, the
Cuban exports of commodities and services to the United States, would have to be okayed as
they are the necessary source of means to import from that country, among other measures.
On the other hand, the US government fallaciously and
recurrently refers to its approval of billions of dollars to Cuba every year as donations.
This information is a fabrication because donations to Cuba from NGOs and US religious
organizations have averaged some four million dollars a year. Moreover, these
organizations have been harassed on many occasions and US authorities have brutally
exercised pressure to block up those donations.
Adding to the escalation meant by the Torricelli and
Helms-Burton Acts and the new measures adopted late in 2000 within the new policy of
blockade against Cuba, the executive power of a new Administration with special links with
the Florida-based terrorist Cuban groups, has increased the danger of a strengthening of
the unilateral measures and the cruel warfare against the Cuban people.
Besides evidences indicating that President
Bush’s current Administration will bend on further reinforcing the perspective of
unilateral actions in foreign policy, that could gain intensity in the conservative
atmosphere of the new Administration, the fact that the circumstances that concurred in
the final outcome of the US presidential election in 2000, -with a relevant role of the
rightist Florida Cuban-American groups-, cannot be overlooked as they determined that the
new government had come into power with clear political purposes with the extreme right,
which has largely conditioned the policy towards Cuba.
In this regard, not only has President Bush appointed
or promoted the nomination of Cuban-American citizens linked to the Cuban American
National Foundation (CANF) –of evinced and proven terrorist nature- for key posts in
his cabinet or offices within the State Department, but his acts themselves and his public
statements, as well as those of his spokespersons’ ratify a tough language,
definitely eliminates the possibility that initiatives aimed at modifying the current
policy can progress under the present government or that these initiatives can aim at
distension, dialogue or the real easing of the blockade against Cuba.
In this sense, on the occasion of a reception hosted
at the White House to commemorate the date when the US imposed on Cuba a
Washington-controlled government in 1902, after forcibly usurping the independence
conquered from Spain after three decades of heroic fighting; a reception attended by the
top responsible people for the warfare against Cuba in the US Congress as well as the
leadership of the CANF, President Bush said that "not only sanctions (against Cuba)
were simply a political tool, but a moral principle, hence I will oppose any attempt at
weakening them". He also declared his support to the new Congressional initiatives
like the "Cuban Solidarity Bill" and the "Cuban Internal Assistance
Act".
Parallel to this, in the course of this year eight
new anti Cuban initiatives have been introduced in Congress, which, if approved, they will
further reinforce the US blockade against Cuba. Among them, being one of the most flagrant
and shameful the Cuban Solidarity Act, which in open and uncontrolled interference in
Cuba’s domestic affairs, is aimed at endorsing 100 million dollars in US assistance
for four years with the expressed purpose of encouraging and supporting internal
subversion in the country.
DAMAGE TO FOODSTUFF AND HEALTHCARE
As it has been pointed out, the creation of
difficulties with the supply of foodstuff, medicine and other commodities for the system
of public health has been a priority in the strategy of the US policy toward Cuba so that
the needs and limitations can incite an atmosphere of instability and dissatisfaction
among the population.
2.1 Feeding
In an attempt to save face before the public opinion,
because of the negative evidences of the negative impact of the blockade in the feeding of
the Cuban people, the US governments have frequently attested that the blockade does not
affect food acquisition because these can be purchased in any market or domestically
manufactured, but that the real problem is the incapacity of the Cuban economy to produce
foodstuff or generate resources to import them.
One of the main impacts of the policy of blockade is
precisely the impossibility of accessing the main world’s foodstuff producer, which
includes products from third country-based subsidiaries.
As referred in the aforementioned session, the US
attempts to generate difficulties in the feeding and health of the Cuban people gained
momentum with the adoption of the 1992 Torricelli Act.
IN 2000 ALONE , THE DIFFERENCE IN PRICES ON
ACCOUNT OF HAVING TO PURCHASE FOOD IN ALTERNATIVE MARKETS SIGNIFIED $38 MILLION USD
As a consequence of this policy, the country was
forced into everyday expenses in hard currency. Only in 2000, Cuba had to pay 38.0 million
dollars more in the purchase of foodstuff because of the difference in prices in the
alternative markets, as the country could not import directly from the United States.
If that year we could have made use of that amount of
resources in order to increase foodstuff purchases, this would have meant the possibility
of purchasing another 100 000 metric tons of bread wheat, another 20 000 metric tons of
wheat flour, another 40 000 metric tons of rice, another 5 000 metric tons of powder milk
and another 1 000 metric tons of chicken.
