By Dalia Acosta
HAVANA, Apr 1 2001 (IPS)

Cuba will propose a declaration against terrorism before the Inter-Parliamentary Union in order to reinforce its request for Panama to extradite Luis Posada Carriles, who allegedly masterminded an attack on a Cuban aircraft in 1976 and a an attempt on President Fidel Castro’s life in 2000.

US-Cuban citizen Posada Carriles has been held in Panama since last November for charges that he planned an assassination attempt against Castro during the Ibero-American Summit, which took place in the Panamanian capital.

The name Posada Carriles will not be the focus of the Cuban proposal at the 105th Conference of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), to take place April 7 in Havana. But Cuban analysts believe that his extradition is what has motivated the Castro government’s initiative.

The agenda of the conference, which is expected to draw some 1,500 lawmakers and personalities from more than 110 countries, includes debate on international law and on education and culture as tools of development.

The Cuban proposal bears the title ’The contribution of the world’s parliamentarians to the fight against terrorism” and represents one more step in Havana’s efforts to get Panama to hand over Posada Carriles, who is also charged with causing the 1976 in-flight explosion of a Cuban airline jet with 73 passengers on board. He was imprisoned in Venezuela for the crime, but later escaped.

He is blamed for several plans to assassinate Castro and for organising a wave of sabotage against the island’s tourism industry in 1997.

Panama’s President Mireya Moscoso said this month that she has doubts about Havana’s request, especially because the laws in her country prohibit the extradition of individuals to countries where the death penalty is legal, such as Cuba.

Diplomatic sources in Havana said they expect the Cuban proposal to have a global approach to terrorism and that it will not focus on terrorist attacks against the socialist-run island.

During and after the Summit in Panama, the Castro government came under harsh criticism for refusing to sign a condemnation of the terrorist acts committed by the Basque separatist organisation, ETA, in Spain.

Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque affirmed at the time that the text of the declaration was too limited during an era when most countries find themselves to be victims of one type of terrorism or another.

In order to be included on the agenda of the IPU Conference, the Cuban proposal must have more than two-thirds of the participants’ votes and accumulate more votes than any of the other six proposals in the running.

The Cuban document will be competing with initiatives presented by lawmakers from Spain, France, Iran, Iraq, Japan and Laos. After hearing reports from each country, the conference participants are to vote on the inclusion of just one of the seven proposals in the agenda.

Iraq, subject to international sanctions since it invaded Kuwait in 1990, hopes to prompt debate on the right of states to appeal decisions of the United Nations Security Council before an international legal forum.

The other proposals to be submitted for the vote focus on banning child labour (Japan), providing assistance to countries affected by disaster (Spain) and establishing safety rules for marine navigation (France).

In addition to the plenary session and committee meetings, the event will include a conference of women parliamentarians and others for special IPU commissions, including that of Human Rights, presided by Chilean Juan Pablo Letelier.

The IPU affirmed this month in a communiqué that Letelier’s committee will study the human rights violations committed in 31 of the countries whose parliaments are part of the organisation. The statement does not specify whether Cuba is among those countries.

The Castro government has been accused of limiting its citizens’ civil rights by prohibiting all forms of political opposition to the governing Communist Party and by restricting freedoms of expression and of the press.

In response to accusations of that stripe, Cuba has underscored its achievements in defence of the social and economic rights of its citizens.

A letter sent to the Inter-Parliamentary Union by the Moderate Opposition’s Panel of Reflection, a group that opposes Castro and operates on the island illegally, expressed the organisation’s desire that the Conference work on behalf of “the insertion of Cuba in the dominant currents of universal progress.”

The IPU dates back to 1889, when, under an initiative of French parliamentarian Frederic Passy and British lawmaker William Randal Cremer, the first body’s first-ever conference was held in Paris to debate international arbitration.

The Geneva-based organisation today unites the national parliaments from 140 countries and includes among its associate members the Parliamentary Assembly of the European Council, and the Andean, Central American, European, and Latin American parliaments.

Among the most numerous delegations that have confirmed their attendance at the Havana event are Canada, China, Germany and Russia, according to sources from the Cuban organising committee.

The Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Belize have requested to participate as observers, while one notable absence will be the delegation from the United States.

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