CUBA: Carter Meets with Dissidents REPEATING

By Patricia Grogg Reprint | | Print |

Patricia Grogg

HAVANA, May 14 2002 (IPS) - Former United States President Jimmy Carter held his first meeting with dissidents Monday in Cuba, on the second day of a visit carried out on the invitation of President Fidel Castro.

Carter met with two of Cuba’s most prominent dissidents: the head of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, Elizardo Sánchez, and Osvaldo Payá, the head of the Christian Liberation Movement.

Cuba’s opposition groups, which are illegal though tolerated, are written off by Castro’s socialist government as “mercenaries” in the pay of Washington.

However, the Cuban leader was unusually moderate Sunday when he said he would not be offended or annoyed by Carter’s scheduled visits with dissident groups.

“You will have free access to every place you want to see in Cuba, and we shall not take offence from any contact you may wish to make, even with those who do not share in our struggles,” Castro said in the welcome ceremony at the Havana international airport.

In his meeting with Sánchez and Payá, Carter, who served as president of the United States from 1977 to 1981, discussed Project Varela, a petition drive by a coalition of dissident groups that delivered 11,000 signatures to parliament last Friday seeking a referendum on economic and political reforms.

The one-hour meeting took place in the Santa Isabel Hotel in Old Havana, where Carter and his wife Rosalynn are staying.

At the end of the meeting, Payá – the driving force behind Project Varela – and Sánchez said Carter was thoroughly familiar with the initiative.

Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque told the press Sunday that Project Varela was an “imported” initiative to which the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Interests Section had “fully dedicated themselves.”

After Pérez Roque met with Carter on Sunday afternoon, the minister underlined the “broad and respectful” discussion they held on questions of mutual interest.

“We share the common hope that someday relations between the United States and Cuba will be normalised,” said the minister, who noted that the question was one of the main issues they discussed.

Although diplomatic ties between the two countries were cut off in 1961, the tension thawed somewhat during Carter’s term, when the U.S. and Cuban Interests Sections were opened in Havana and Washington to provide consular services and limited communications between the two countries.

According to Payá and other Project Varela organisers, more than 11,000 signatures were handed over to parliament Friday, in accordance with article 88 of the Cuban constitution, which stipulates that draft laws can be directly introduced by citizens if they are signed by 10,000 voters.

Project Varela is calling for a popular vote on freedom of expression and association, electoral reforms, greater opening for private enterprise, and an amnesty for political prisoners.

The broad coverage of the petition drive by the foreign press stood in sharp contrast with the near silence of the Cuban state-run media, which merely printed a few terse official statements.

Sánchez, who frequently meets with foreign delegations visiting Cuba, said Carter planned to meet Thursday with a bigger group of 15 to 20 other dissidents.

Castro met Carter Sunday in a charcoal grey suit rather than his trademark olive fatigues, in a ceremony reserved for special visitors, like Pope John Paul II in 1998.

In the ceremony, which was broadcast live by Cuba’s state-run television, Castro offered his guest “free and complete access, together with any specialised personnel of your choice,” to any of Cuba’s scientific research centres.

On Monday, Carter visited the Centre of Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB), one of the targets of accusations by officials of the George W. Bush administration that Cuba transfers technology abroad that could be used to produce weapons of mass destruction.

Last week, Undersecretary of State John Bolton told a meeting at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank in Washington, that Cuba has provided biotechnology to “rogue states.”

Carter was especially interested in finding out whether technology transfer arrangements between Cuba and other countries contained clauses prohibiting the use of such technology for purposes other than those specified.

CIGB director Juan Herrera ensured Carter that any changes in the technology transfer agreements must be previously consulted with Cuba.

According to Bush administration officials, Cuba provides technology that Iran and Libya could use to fabricate biological weapons.

But Carter said his talks with Cuba’s scientific community convincingly demonstrated to him that Cuba has no technology transfer programme with Libya, and that a new agreement with Iran for the production of the hepatitis B vaccine is still on the drawing board.

Carter said he hoped anyone who believes they have evidence backing such allegations would take advantage of President Castro’s offer to come and prove it.

He also said that in meetings with U.S. officials who briefed him for his trip to Cuba, “There were absolutely no allegations made or questions raised. I asked them specifically on more than one occasion if there was any evidence that Cuba has been involved in sharing any information to any other country on earth that could be used for terrorist purposes.

“The answer from our experts on intelligence was ‘no’.”

According to the Castro administration, Cuba has signed technology transfer agreements with Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, India, China, Egypt, Malaysia, Russia, South Africa, Tunisia, Algeria, the United Kingdom and Belgium.

Accords are also being negotiated with the Netherlands, Spain, Vietnam, the Ukraine, Germany and the United States.

Carter said he hoped that in the future there would be much closer scientific and medical cooperation between researchers in Cuba and the United States.

On the second day of his visit to Cuba, where he will stay through Friday, the former president also visited the Latin American School of Medicine and a training centre for social workers.