The recently concluded summit of 31 Western Hemispheric nations ended without a final declaration because of protests over the exclusion of Cuba.
The issue of Cuba’s absence from any diplomatic forums in the hemisphere where the U.S. is present has galvanized leftist leaders in Latin America for decades. An eight-member leftist bloc founded by Cuba and Venezuelan firebrand leader Hugo Chávez has said it will skip any future summits if Cuba was not invited.
But this weekend even some of the region’s more conservative presidents, like Mexico’s Felipe Calderón and Colombia’s Santos, joined the chorus of public demands for the communist island to be included in new summits.
All the countries except the US and Canada protested the exclusion of Cuba from these gatherings and warned that future summits may not happen unless Cuba is included.
Bill Maher says that Castro phobia makes no sense.
US foreign policy continues to be increasingly isolated because of being held hostage by the aging Cuban population in Miami.
I don’t understand Canadian opposition, it is not like there is a trade embargo here with them!
I don’t think Canada objects so much as really doesn’t much care one way or the other and is just staying out of it.
Is the official U.S. position still that Cuba must eventually be divvied up among the surviving Batista collaborators and their descendants? If not, what the hell do the right-wingers in the Cuban-American crowd think they’re up to? And if so, what the hell are our representatives smoking?
I guess since the advent of Harperism the Canadian government is more and more in lockstep with the US regime. It saves the pain of thinking for themselves even if it puts them on the wrong side of the issue.
We’d have been fucked if the cons had been running the country in 2003 and Bush told them to join in his little Irak venture.
Cuba could help themselves along in this regard by freeing Alan Gross, who they have imprisoned on trumped up charges. As it stands, the Cuban exiles in Florida are joined by others who might be more amenable to improving relations with Cuba if he were freed.
Canada’s objection to including Cuba in the OAS is that Cuba does not have a democratically elected government.