The award-winning Cuban blogger and writer Yoani Sanchez published an op-ed today in The New York Times called “The Dream of Leaving Cuba,” in which she describes the inability of many Cubans to gain the necessary permission to travel abroad. She is one of those Cubans. In fact, she has been denied the “white card” (carta blanca) 19 times since 2008.

Sanchez relates her most recent denial last year, and includes in the narrative a concurrent thread, as she received news of the violent beating and resulting death of a fellow dissident, Juan Wilfredo Soto, in the very same afternoon in May 2011. She ends her piece with the words: “I could only conclude that in Cuba, nothing has changed. We remain in the grip of the same limitations, caught between the high walls of ideological sectarianism and the tight shackles of travel restrictions.”

I was rather surprised to see her piece end there. Nothing has changed? That certainly is not the argument I and others have been making about what has been going on in Cuba recently. And part of the hope in making the counter-argument (everything in Cuba is changing!) is that change in Cuba will spur an update to the U.S. position toward Cuba: the Obama administration has countless times indicated that it is looking for more demonstrable reforms in Cuba if U.S. policy toward Cuba is to adjust. The embargo, which Sanchez, too, vocally opposes, has little chance of coming down if the Obama administration cannot point to something Cuba has done to deserve it: the seemingly straight-forward argument that the embargo has so clearly failed to achieve its objectives in its half-century of life — or that the embargo harms the Cuban people more than it harms the regime, or even that the embargo enables the Castro regime to continue to blame weaknesses in the Cuban system on repression of the island by the United States — does not appear to have received enough traction in the administration. They have asked for more proof of real, measurable changes occurring on the island.

There is, of course, a great difference between the kind of economic reforms we’ve seen and the political reform hoped for by Washington. Calls for democracy and free elections are not welcomed or tolerated. A one-party political system, where the Communist Party is the only legal option, remains in place. In fact, Raúl has made it clear that the economic reforms are meant to preserve the political system, and to make socialism “sustainable and irreversible.” And as Sanchez points out, many Cubans are still confined to the island without the right to travel abroad, and others endure harassment and worse for dissenting views.

But individual freedoms are expanding. A private sector is emerging as more freedoms are allowed to non-state economic actors. Cubans can now technically buy and sell homes and cars, and use hotels previously reserved for foreign tourists, although they are limited in these endeavors by a meager income. Taxis, restaurants, hair salons, and other small business have greater autonomy to determine their own prices, manage their revenues, and expand their businesses to fulfill demand. Dissident prisoners (130 or so) have been released from the jails that held them for years.

The difference between economic reforms and political reforms is important, and there are many Cubans that still have not felt the effects of any of the economic reforms yet enacted. But there is no question that under Raúl, the rules have changed more drastically than in entire decades prior. And we would do better to encourage these reforms, rather than ignore them.

(Photo credit: Getty Images)

This weekend’s Summit of the Americas may not include representation from Cuba, but Cuba is by no means absent from the Summit. In fact, general policy toward the island appeared to be the most significant issue dividing the Hemisphere in advance of this weekend’s meetings: Latin American nations saw Cuba’s continued exclusion from the Summit as counterproductive, while the United States insisted that as long as Cuba continued to fail to meet the democratic requirements of the Organization of American States, its leaders could not be involved in any of the Organization’s events (including the Summit of the Americas). With diplomatic aplomb, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos solved the issue by proposing to make Cuba’s future participation a topic for discussion at the Summit.

So Raúl Castro will not be in Cartagena, but the nations of the Hemisphere will discuss whether he could be invited in the future. And the leaders of the countries of ALBA that were threatening not to show up to the Summit actually agreed to attend following this resolution (all except Rafael Correa of Ecuador). The way is paved for the United States to maintain its opposition respectfully, while stepping aside to allow future policy to be determined by the apparent consensus of most all other countries in the Hemisphere.

Is that what will happen? Not yet, certainly. The meeting of foreign ministers that considered a proposal to invite Cuba to future Summits ended after the United States and Canada delivered their veto.

But the conversation did not end there, and it appears to be coming to a head, as ALBA countries have drawn the line on excluding Cuba. Bolivia’s Foreign Minister, David Choquehuanca, has stated: “This is the last Summit of the Americas unless Cuba is allowed to take part.” The foreign ministers of Venezuela, Argentina and Uruguay have all declined to sign the Summit’s final declaration unless the United States and Canada remove their veto of future Cuban participation. And the most moderate, conservative Latin American nations are taking a stand, as well. President Santos of Colombia and President Dilma Rousseff of Brazil have both agreed that there should be no more Americas Summits without Cuba included. President Santos opened the Summit today with a critique of Cuba’s absence, saying that the exclusion was an anachronism of the Cold War. He is a well-respected leader, and a strong ally, of course, of the United States.

Will the United States and Canada test the resolve of all of these leaders and maintain their veto? Or will they take advantage of this opportunity to step aside and accede to the majority consensus in a Hemisphere demanding exactly this kind of signal from its northern partners?

As President Obama noted, media tends to sweep over the progress made at these kinds of summits in favor of focusing on the “flashier” controversies. He’s right: there are a wide range of issues upon which the nations of the Hemisphere are finding means to cooperate during these meetings, under the theme of “Connecting the Americas: Partners for Prosperity” — from expanding access to information and communication technology for development to bolstering middle class populations. It would certainly be a shame to overshadow all of that by remaining stubborn on the Cuba issue.

(Photo credit: Carolyn Kaster, Associated Press)

On a visit to the Western Hemisphere last week from Rome, Pope Benedict XVI stopped first in Mexico, a country whose population is 80-85% Catholic. It is the most Catholic, in this sense, of the world’s Spanish-speaking countries. His second visit was to Cuba, a country that has been traditionally Catholic, but was officially an atheist state from 1959 until the fall of the Soviet Union, when it amended its statutes and declared itself a “secular state” instead. In fact, pollsters now call Cuba the least devout nation in Latin America – so perhaps the least Catholic of the world’s Spanish-speaking countries.

So why, with only two stops in the hemisphere, was Cuba a destination for the papal visit? Perhaps precisely because it is the country in Latin America where the Church’s influence has changed so dramatically in the last two decades, and where the Church has significant gains to consolidate. The Church has been a positive force in particular over the last couple of years in working with the Cuban government to negotiate the release of dissident prisoners that occurred in 2010 and 2011, which came as a very pleasant surprise for Cuba watchers. And after long years of oppression in the last half century, the Church is now much more respected by the government, and Catholic Cubans enjoy the right to worship: last Wednesday was even made a paid holiday for Cuban state workers to attend mass with the Pope.

But critics of last week’s visit pointed to the Pope’s comments before departing for Cuba (“Today it is evident that Marxist ideology in the way it was conceived no longer corresponds to reality… New models must be found with patience and in a constructive way.”), squared them against the fact that he would not be meeting with any dissidents during his visit on the island, and thus argued that he was perhaps not doing enough, not leaving a lasting impression on the island, and not using his visit to push for something big — whether that meant in terms of human rights or political change. The U.S. State Department, too, had urged the Pope to use his 48-hour visit to speak out against the regime. Anyone actually expecting this would have been disappointed.

The assessment is an impatient one. What did activists really anticipate from a two-day visit beyond what did happen? We saw Pope Benedict XVI meet with both Raúl and Fidel Castro, and speak openly and frankly with both. No morals or principles were compromised in those discussions or in his public addresses. He spoke of “reconciliation,” “unity,” “authentic freedom” and “greater openness.” He gave a sermon to an assembled crowd, with President Castro seated in the first row, that warned against the mindset of those that “close themselves up in their own truth and try to impose it upon others.” And he openly requested that the increasing religious freedoms granted to Cubans continue to be allowed to expand.

But he did not meet with dissidents, and some, including the Ladies in White, had requested an audience with him. Various reports cited hundreds of Cuban dissidents rounded up and held for the time that the Pope was in the country in order to avoid “problems” (though others cited peaceful protests by the Ladies in White proceeding with fewer issues than usual for the dissidents involved). What is the responsibility of the Vatican on these issues? Frankly, such meetings would have made the conversations with the Castros much more challenging, and the Church has already shown that it fully and publicly supports the freedoms of Cuban dissidents, so that is not in question. It could be argued that it is much more effective to push for those freedoms by speaking directly with the head of the country.

Key here is that the Vatican appears to understand something that has been so difficult for the United States to grasp, whether due to political realities or simply stubborn hard-headedness. Consistent dialogue and respectful exchanges of views will ultimately be more effective with Havana than an attempted one-way imposition of values. Raúl closed the Pope’s visit to the island not with a combative response to Benedict’s suggestions, but with a respectful statement that included the comment, “We do not think alike on all matters.“

The polite diplomacy therein is noteworthy. And the Church continues to make gains in Cuba with this tack: following Pope Benedict’s departure, Havana honored an appeal made during his visit and declared Good Friday a holiday for Cuban workers.

Any lessons to be learned there?

(Photo credit: Osservatore Romano via AP)

For those who have not yet read Andrew Sullivan’s Newsweek piece on Obama, published this past week, take note: it should be required reading for all U.S. voters as the country continues its journey toward the 2012 presidential election. Self-identified as a conservative-minded independent, Sullivan takes on the liberal, conservative, and moderate critiques of Obama’s term in office with dexterity — slashing some of the most pervasive arguments from both parties and all sides as fallacious, overblown, and often even factually or internally inconsistent — and maintains that the President’s character, record, and promise remain “grossly underappreciated.” But his main point is this: Obama has been pragmatic from the start, never focused on making short-term gains for which he can immediately and loudly take credit, but instead taking a long view strategy that entails slow, deliberate, unprovocative persistence and makes the changes he achieves more durable.

The point of Sullivan’s piece is not to deify Barack Obama. It is to ground an assessment of the President’s work in reality, which he does quite well. And it can remind Cuba watchers (myself included) of the character and nature of the man we’re considering when we discuss Cuba policy and Executive capabilities and actions.

First, it can help us to remember and recognize the sheer number of challenges the President faced when he took office. The economy was swirling lower into recession, with employment tumbling and our financial system threatening to pull the country into a true depression without swift and decisive action by the Executive and Congress. The U.S. global image was tarnished by our record on torture and by our bloated military presence and arrogant rhetoric. Yet still, not long into his time in office and even as he focused largely on addressing these and other pressing issues, President Obama fulfilled the only concrete campaign promise he made with respect to Cuba policy: he granted Americans unrestricted rights to send money to and visit family in Cuba. Even this small step was met with criticism, and attempts have been made in Congress to roll this policy back. But Obama has held his ground — quietly but firmly — threatening executive veto in order to make sure that his policy remains.

Second, we can recall the number of actors involved in affecting policy, which include, of course, not only the President and his administration but also the legislative branch and nongovernmental actors like lobbying groups, Cuban-American constituencies, think tanks, and others. The Executive seldom acts alone to change policy except, as we have seen, in situations deemed (correctly or not) particularly urgent and crucial to national security. Whatever the merits of changing U.S. policy toward Cuba, it simply does not fall into this category. And he does not yet have Congressional consensus on Cuba.

Third, we are reminded that Obama was not elected as a liberal crusader, but as a pragmatic, unifying reformist. Cuba policy may be ripe for change, but should the President unilaterally decree a set of changes called for by Cuba watchers, think tanks and other nongovernmental actors, he would have to willfully ignore a Congress that has been determined to avoid such changes. This is not his style. Ultimately, the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell” came from the President working with top military and defense leaders, and they (including Admiral Mike Mullen) came forward and made the case for doing away with the policy. Had Obama acted unilaterally, the repeal would no doubt have taken more heat than it did, would have met with more resistance, and might not have been durable in the long run. We can expect to see the same with further change to U.S. policy toward Cuba, or any changes put in place will be at risk of immediate opposition, counter-attack, and retaliation or repeal. Remember: pragmatic, unifying reformist, not crusader.

And finally, we are reminded that for Washington, Cuba has always been a long game. The basic tenets of our current policy toward the island have been around for half a century without yielding any measurable “success”. Any movement in broad perception, understanding and opinions has been glacial, but we are, however slowly, moving as a population toward a different consensus than that under which current policy was designed. And as more Americans learn about and visit Cuba under the current people-to-people travel regulations, the consensus can be expected to grow.

All of this does not have to make us more patient about seeing additional changes in long-standing U.S. policy toward Cuba. But it could help us see the long view. And perhaps the President is on track.

This year in Cuban history will be viewed as a significant one, having seen more economic change and reform on the island than some entire decades. But Washington’s response over the course of a year has proven insignificant.

Let’s start with a brief summary of the past year. In January, the executive branch of the U.S. government announced and published new travel and remittance rules with respect to Cuba, which increased possibilities for people-to-people travel. The effect has been gradual (OFAC in the Treasury is under-staffed and really quite slow), but greater numbers of cultural travel groups have received their necessary licenses and are leading trips to the island because of the new rules. February and March saw the trial of the infamous violent Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles, and a historic step in the United States to prosecute him for terrorist acts in Cuba (he was later acquitted, to the chagrin of many). Alan Gross, the USAID contractor who remains in jail in Cuba, was sentenced in March to 15 years in prison — a relationship-damaging development that has continued to be a point of great contention between Washington and Havana. In April, the Cuban Communist Party held their Sixth Party Congress and reviewed the terms of a great number of economic reforms, which have proceeded in implementation during the rest of the year. Yet in October we stood nearly solo at the United Nations as the world voted against the U.S. embargo on Cuba. We put Cuba again on our list of “State Sponsors of Terrorism,” though the evidence to support the designation has withered. And here we are in December with President Obama still apparently convinced that the release of political prisoners in Cuba and the drastic economic changes underway are not enough to qualify as the “change” that would merit a significant bilateral discussion.

Asi es la vida for Cuba-watchers. The most unexpected event of this year was not a “happening” at all: it is the lack of movement forward in Washington on Cuba issues, and the continuing age-old tendency to cater to the conservative Miami Cuban-American base — a demographic that is changing and adapting its views to new developments in Cuba more so than Congress and the current administration, it seems. We expected more this year, despite the myriad of other global challenges faced by the United States. Washington has found time recently to take a fresh look at Myanmar, but still not at our close neighbor Cuba.

With all of the events of the last year, here in the United States the individual whose name has received the most airtime — and who therefore receives our designation of person of the year – is Alan Gross. Mr. Gross has been held in Cuba since December 2009 for distributing communications equipment illegally on the island; his sentence of 15 years in prison for crimes against the Cuban state was upheld by the Cuban Supreme Court in August. U.S. officials have tried unsuccessfully to argue for his unilateral release: many experts have suggested a prisoner swap (modeled off of the Israel-Hamas prisoner exchange of Gilad Shalit for hundreds of Palestinians — but in this case just one for five), but this has not gained traction in Washington. Mr. Gross remains imprisoned.

The forecast for 2012 is unfortunately only a tick higher than bleak in terms of the U.S.-Cuba relationship. This is unlike me; I know. But 2012 is an election year, and Cuba policy remains contentious politically. There is frankly very little reason for an administration seeking re-election to take the kind of political risk that drastic (necessary) Cuba policy changes entail. But the island’s future looks positive, at least for the moment. The population is testing out new economic reforms, the reforms are pressing ahead to the long-run benefit of a troubled economy, and foreign businesses and investors remain interested in Cuba despite recent crackdowns on corruption that have affected foreigners as well as Cubans.

We’ll be here as this all develops.

I was rather surprised to see a Cuba headline make it to the front page of the New York Times recently.

The surprise is not because the placement is unmerited: indeed, such attention is quite timely and relevant. It is due to the fact that Washington still seems to be deaf to all of the changes occurring this year in Cuba. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced her intention to visit Burma on December 1 and 2 to meet with government and opposition leaders: she will be the first Secretary of State to visit the country in 50 years, and is doing so as a risky diplomatic bet, saying that she wishes to “test what the true intentions are [of the regime] and whether there is a commitment to both economic and political reform.” Tim LaRocco takes a look at these reforms here, by the way, and readers are quick to point out the fragility of the current positive international perspective on the nation.

But whether they’re fragile, overblown, on-target or off, Secretary Clinton is going in to check it out. Hey, Secretary! Take a look closer to home, too!

The broad, sweeping economic reforms in Cuba are having what appears to be an impressive impact. Rhetoric is converting at long last into concerted action. Not only have real estate and automobile sales been legalized, and private farmers authorized to sell directly to hotels and tourist industries, but Cuban authorities are rooting out long-entrenched corruption in many sectors in favor of reform.

A fight against corruption is of course a necessary element in the overhaul of an economy fraught with redundancies and inefficiencies. And despite the fact that Cuba continues to be in desperate need of foreign investment, Raúl is taking a principled stance: the crackdown on corruption scrutinizes and punishes foreign offenders, as well as Cuba officials. His Attorney General, Dario Delgado, insists that: “This is not a campaign, what is happening in the fight against corruption… This is permanent. This is systemic.” Havana is changing the rules of doing business, and doing so with great gusto with an eye to the future, even in a difficult economic time.

It is worth noting that many onlookers are skeptical about the nature of the crackdown, and the fairness (or unfairness) with which it is being executed. Foreign small businesses operating in Cuba are reporting their fear of being particular targets. But for years, any corruption arrests were practically limited to Cubans. The current more comprehensive review as conceptualized is vital, even if it ends up deterring some foreign investment.

My advice, and a perspective shared by some of the top economists on the island (including Omar Everleny Perez): the government must simultaneously encourage increased foreign investment and make the rules of operating in Cuba quite clear — and then maintain those rules of the game — to bolster the positive economic impact that the many reforms coming into effect will have on the island and mitigate the otherwise negative impact that a corruption crackdown scare will have. It is not clear yet whether Havana recognizes this need.

Cuba is known for having many of its drivers using refurbished and rebuilt classic American cars from the 1950s driving alongside Cold War era Ladas across the entire island. Anyone who has visited Cuba often would have enjoyed a ride in both types of vehicles. Since the end of September 2011, Cubans can now buy and sell any type of car whereas previously only cars purchased pre-1959 would be able to be sold, and a licence would be needed to purchase other newer vehicles. This licensing regime was not simply for a driver’s licence, but a license to purchase an automobile. A car in Cuba was often treated as a lifetime investment due to the high costs for such items and the difficultly in obtaining licensing to purchase an automobile. It will be interesting to see how exporting and selling cars to foreigners might take hold in Cuba as many of Cuba’s classics would be of great interest in the United States, and the embargo and still standing restrictions between trade and investment between Cuba and the US have not entirely degraded, although Americans now can visit Cuba if they desire.

The announcement today on the ability for Cubans to now sell and purchase private property is of greater interest as the previous barter system restricted the flow of investment in private property and limited the rights of full ownership of their property apart from the state. The basis of capitalism was always the ownership of property and recognition of those rights, and while Cuba’s government remains committed to the ideals of socialism and the Revolution, the opening of Cuba’s property to all of its citizens is an important milestone indeed. Regarding the ownership of property by foreign nationals, the details have yet to be set in stone, but it seems that the tradition of partial ownership by Cuban nationals in conjunction with the foreign national as seen in many Latin American countries could become the norm in Cuba. The exceptions to ownership will be limited to designated areas more open to increased foreign investment, and perhaps other locations restricted to foreign investment. Indeed when the new property rules become active on November 10th 2011, a new era in Cuba’s post-Revolutionary era will change the island nation forever.

Today, however, I spent a frustrating day getting into the details.

It began without much fanfare. We decided to look into sending a small delegation of our Board members to Havana for meetings with high level officials and NGO leaders, economists and academics, U.S. Interests Section representatives, and so on. The idea is a good one. This kind of exchange is worthwhile and necessary, and promotes greater understanding on both sides.

I knew from following travel developments closely that this kind of travel should be licensable. Certain I would be able to work through the license process quickly, I jumped into a review of OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) policies and began to comb through recent interpretations of the changes announced in April by the Obama administration.

But for some reason, I could not make what I was seeing in the regulations correspond to what I was reading from analysts and other Cuba watchers. Where was the clause that said my delegation could pursue a people-to-people license?

The disconnect was infuriating. The legal jargon was mind-numbing. I became certain that my group simply would not be allowed to travel. For the first time, these travel regulations seemed to have placed an actual roadblock before me.

Only after hours of reading and sifting and reasoning about how I could make this work for my delegation did my very kind colleague John McAuliff finally save me by pointing out that the document here on the OFAC website (to which the site links throughout the application process) is out of date. THIS is the one I should have been looking at all along.

And what a huge difference it made! For my special case, the language shift is dramatic in 515.565(b), from referring only to students in accredited U.S. institutions to developing an entirely new clause to include my group:

OFAC may issue a specific license to an organization that sponsors and organizes programs to promote people-to-people contact authorizing the organization and individuals traveling under its auspices to engage in educational exchanges not involving academic study pursuant to a degree program.

Hallelujah! So the new “loosening” did appear to have some beneficiaries.

… But apparently we beneficiaries are in for a logjam: the approval process. We may fit within the regulations, but so do thousands of others that have applied in the past several months and whose applications remain pending at OFAC.

Cuban media finally published the outcome of last month’s Communist Party Congress: a list of 313 “guidelines” to shape economic reforms in Cuba. The items include mention of changes across a number of sectors and important issue areas—from ration books (and their gradual retirement) to private sector employment (not far beyond barbers but including family restaurants), and from enabling the sale of houses and cars to expanding the ability of Cubans to travel abroad.

The published items still do not describe methods for implementation, but they display the broad set of intentions that color Havana’s vision for the future. These intentions alone indicate and confirm a willingness for change that has now been clear for quite some time from Raúl Castro and Cuban leadership.

The last item (expanding the ability of Cubans to travel abroad) is of particular interest, as we’ve been tracking for months many of the other outlined reforms. This last is rather new on our radar. The Congress apparently agreed “to study a policy that will allow Cubans resident in the country to travel abroad as tourists.” No further details are given, and there is no mention of the infamous carta blanca (“white card”), the exit visa required and often denied to Cuban residents attempting to travel abroad. Under the current system, travel abroad is not illegal technically, but the series of requirements to depart prevents most Cubans from doing so.

So our immediate questions would be:

• What will happen to the carta blanca?
• What is the projected timeline for implementation of such a reform?
• What economic benefit does the Cuban government hope to take from this reform?

The benefits are not immediately clear. In fact Oscar Espinosa Chepe, one of the first Cuban economists to respond to this item, was skeptical: he argued that it could create similar chaos to the beginning of the Castro era when many Cubans were leaving the island. A lot of Cubans would depart for good, he argues, because of the current economic challenges in Cuba.

But it is no doubt more reasonable to accept that one cannot keep an island of people in lockdown.

(AFP/Getty photo)

The patriotic displays this weekend in Havana (military marching through the streets, fighter jets flying over, Cubans participating in parades and celebrations) marked the 50th anniversary of the Cuban victory at the Bay of Pigs—or as Cubans call it, Playa Girón—in 1961. The Bay of Pigs invasion is, of course, the infamous failed attempt by CIA-trained Cuban émigrés to attack the island and overthrow Fidel Castro. Their attack was easily quashed, and the defeat became a thorn in the side of Washington and Miami as the victory for Havana evolved into something of a national myth. It was the tangible success to which the Cuban government could point and laud the strength of the revolution and its ability to stand up to the island’s imperialist neighbor.

The story remains so, and on Saturday the country retold the story. Playa Girón was the fulfillment of a national dream, Cubans know, as the socialist revolution stood up to imperialism and won.

On the U.S. side, the recollection is a completely different stripe. While Havana celebrates the defeat of an imperialist’s mercenaries, in Miami the survivors of the 2506 Brigade reconvene to commemorate the day Cuban patriots fought against a tyrant in the name of democracy and freedom.

The divide is wide.

But beyond all this, the bigger story is going on in Havana’s Sixth Communist Party Congress, where President Raúl Castro opened the gathering with a speech heralding a new era in Cuba. Politicians, he proposed, should be limited to two 5-year terms (himself included). Castro admitted that his generation had failed to prepare a new generation of leaders, and this would assist in achieving that end. He called to eliminate Cubans’ monthly ration books, as this was a drain on the state budget, though he promised to maintain free health care and education. But freer private enterprise and entrepreneurship, within the greater socialist system, will help to boost Cuba’s troubled economy, he argued. The parameters of changes are yet to be defined; the goal of the Congress is to outline these plans to make the economy more efficient.

And so Cubans are trying to reconcile a celebration of the success of the revolution at Playa Girón with a simultaneous Congress designed to enact the most significant overhaul of the Cuban system in over fifty years, because the system as it stands—the system they are celebrating—actually is not working. Amid the parades and speeches there is recognition of that great paradox, and worry and wonder of what comes next.

It’s a long way off, sure.

But Jimmy Carter seems to be the guy for it.

The former US President began a visit to Cuba yesterday at the invitation of the Cuban government. Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez, in fact, was there to meet Carter on the runway when his plane arrived. Carter is the only president—sitting or former—to have visited the island since Fidel Castro came to power in 1959, so his visit is indeed remarkable, and even more so because this is his second visit. In 2002 Carter flew in and Fidel Castro himself was there on the runway to greet him and take him on a tour of Havana. Fascinating.

On this visit, Carter is observing and holding meetings under the auspices of the Carter Center to “learn about the new economic policies and the upcoming Party Congress, and to discuss ways to improve US-Cuba relations.” He has already met with leaders of the Cuban Jewish community and with Cuban President Raúl Castro. He is expected to meet with Fidel Castro, as well.

But wait; there’s more.

Carter is also meeting tomorrow with members of the Cuban dissident community. He’ll see all of the individuals we’ve regularly noted here, including Yoani Sanchez, members of the Ladies in White, and individuals recently released from Cuban prisons. He has specified that he is not in Cuba to have Alan Gross released, by the way, though he’s apparently raised the issue with Cuban officials. He is there, he says, to contribute to an improvement in US-Cuba understanding and US-Cuban relations.

Allow me to repeat that Carter is visiting by invitation of the Cuban government. In the past (and not so distant past), meeting with dissidents has been considered an attempt to undermine the Cuban state; meeting with both government officials and dissident groups while visiting Cuba has been frowned upon and has generally irritated the government. In fact, foreign visitors almost never meet with the Cuban opposition in order to avoid angering the government. But Carter does not seem to be upsetting Havana in the same way that others have. The rules do not appear to apply to him, or perhaps he’s been more transparent with his hosts about his intentions. On his previous visit in 2002 (which, in terms of US-Cuba relations, was even colder), Carter also met with 20 dissidents.

So…

How about a US envoy to Cuba?

(Photo credit: Annemarie Poyo/The Carter Center)

Twelve and a half (12.5) – in years, the period spent in prison thus far by the Cuban Five, known in Cuba as “Los Cinco Héroes“, who are serving life sentences in Miami for espionage (in other words, working for Cuba as spies with the aim to—you guessed it—bring down the U.S. government). Havana argues that the Five should be released immediately and unconditionally.

1,696,141 – the number of Cuban Americans in the United States.

0.55 – the percent of the total U.S. population that identifies as Cuban American.

250,000 – the number of Cubans abroad that visited the island in 2009.

Forty-nine (49) – in years, the time since Cuba and the United States have had normal diplomatic relations. Today, Havana holds a U.S. Interests Section and Washington holds a Cuban Interests Section, but these are very different from the Embassies that would otherwise exist.

Fifty and a half (50.5) – in years, the time some form of the U.S. embargo against Cuba (el bloqueo) has existed. The embargo was partially enacted in 1960, later solidified in 1960, and officially codified into law in 1992 with the Cuban Democracy Act. The U.S. embargo against Cuba is the most enduring trade embargo in modern history.

6.87 – the percent of total Cuban imports provided by the United States. This is despite the embargo, of course, and makes the United States Cuba’s fourth largest supplier of imports, after Venezuela, China and Spain.

Fifty-two (52) – in years, the period that the Castros have been in power in Cuba.

One hundred sixty-three (163) – the combined age of the Castro brothers, who are, respectively, 84 (Fidel) and 79 (Raúl) years of age.

677 – days until the end of President Obama’s term. The history of the neuralgic US-Cuba relationship is long and the years are daunting, particularly when compared to a short four-year term that’s already more than half over.

According to US Census data, Miami is home to the largest Cuban community outside of the island nation; the New York metropolitan area is in second place, with a population of over 141,000 Cubans. So New York City’s embrace of Cuban culture is no surprise, but the city’s ability to put on the upcoming “¡Sí Cuba!” Festival is reasonably notable. Without the changes made to travel restrictions and people-to-people exchanges since the days of George W. Bush, this Festival would not have been likely to occur. Indeed, ¡Sí Cuba! will be the largest Cuban arts festival ever held in the United States.

The Festival will take place against a still troubled backdrop, but one that continues to show hints of change. The latest travel changes were announced by the Obama administration only a few weeks ago. And yesterday, two more Cuban dissidents were released from prison, lowering the total number of dissidents imprisoned since the notorious Black Spring crackdown of 2003 (when 75 were arrested and jailed) to seven. Although these two prisoners were cited widely to have been released “against their will,” requesting that all other prisoners be freed before them, the Cuban government is very clearly and deliberately following through on its agreement to release—one by one—each of these individuals.

Progress does not, however, appear to have been made on the case of Alan Gross, the US government contractor that Cuban prosecutors now plan to demand spend 20 years in prison. Speculation in the United States continues on this case as Gross has now spent over a year in prison: some opined that the US government should have sent the infamous Cuban Five back to the island in a rough “prisoner exchange” for Alan Gross. Others question the Obama administration’s relative silence on the issue, calling inaction a “Gross mistake” and Cuba’s treatment of Gross “A Blow to Obama’s Soft Cuba Policy.”

On the Cuban side, of course, the long-standing embargo and the imprisonment of their cinco héroes is enough to say that relations with the United States remain strained.

And yet the Festival will go on, and for the advocates of increased people-to-people contact, cultural exchange, and open travel: that is something.

The Festival will be a two-month marathon of art and culture from Cuba, beginning on March 31, 2011.

(Photo: Cubillos/AP)

The President’s annual State of the Union Address traditionally focuses largely on domestic issues, and this year’s was no exception. But every speech the Executive gives is carefully crafted to touch upon a wide range of issues and, to some extent, to gracefully address contentious issues that are the source of party divisions. Although Cuba was mentioned a total of zero (0) times in the State of the Union, we can still break down a few of the President’s comments and analyze their content in the Cuba context.

Our success in this new and changing world will require reform, responsibility, and innovation. It will also require us to approach that world with a new level of engagement in our foreign affairs…

Indeed: in a lot of ways over the past two years, the United States has looked inward. Cuba policy has been allowed to languish in order to focus on more urgent issues, mostly domestic, like the financial crisis. But now, President Obama tells us, we will again actively engage with the world.

Just as jobs and businesses can now race across borders, so can new threats and new challenges…

The challenges we face as a nation are often transnational in nature, and must therefore be addressed by cooperation between nations. We’ve addressed several of these in the past year as opportunities (and pressing necessities) for US-Cuba cooperation: including on ocean and environmental issues, particularly in the context of the BP oil spill; on immigration and human trafficking issues; and on drug trafficking issues.

No single wall separates East and West. No one rival superpower is aligned against us…

The Cold War is over, and the policies of that era are no longer appropriate for new circumstances in a multipolar world. Our Cuba policy was designed to respond to Cold War dangers; changing circumstances call for changing policies.

This is just a part of how we’re shaping a world that favors peace and prosperity. With our European allies, we revitalized NATO and increased our cooperation on everything from counterterrorism to missile defense. We’ve reset our relationship with Russia, strengthened Asian alliances, built new partnerships with nations like India… This March, I will travel to Brazil, Chile, and El Salvador to forge new alliances across the Americas.

This administration is set on improving the US diplomatic standing in the world after an administration that did damage to America’s image abroad. We’ve “reset” our relationship with a number of countries, including non-democracies like China, but have not done the same with Cuba. In this hemisphere, many nations consider Cuba policy to be an easy way to improve favor in Latin America; most countries have normalized relations with Cuba and frown upon the US stance toward the island. The intent to engage with the world is there; in practice in the case of Cuba, it remains imperfect.

I had the privilege on Friday of attending a Pacific Council on International Policy luncheon discussion with US Deputy Secretary of State James B. Steinberg, a thoughtful and intelligent State Department appointee who holds the position of Hillary Clinton’s top deputy. In the discussion a guest asked the Deputy Secretary an interesting question: why did the changes recently announced by the administration simply not go far enough, particularly for humanitarian organizations?

First, a bit of context. Last week, as many have already heard, the White House announced changes to regulations and policies governing certain travel to Cuba and non-family remittances to the island. The press release was titled “Reaching Out to the Cuban People”—no doubt an attempt to preclude Congressional opponents from claiming that the changes might be evidence of a soft stance against the Castro government. Democrat John Kerry, Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, commended the decision, saying:

“These measures, expanding people-to-people relations between the United States and Cuba and allowing Americans to send funds to Cubans for private economic activity, open the way for the good will of citizens of both countries to forge deeper ties that are in our national interest today and in the future. This is an important step. If governments cannot solve the problems between them, at least they should get out of the way and let citizens work toward finding solutions.”

So that’s something.

The individual asking the question above had a point, however, as he explained that his organization—which has operated for years in Cuba offering humanitarian aid—has to receive approval from the Treasury, the State Department, and who knows who else every time they head to the island. For him, it’s a bureaucratic nightmare that does not change at all with the new announcement.

The Deputy Secretary’s answer was defensive. He reasoned that the administration had made several improvements to Cuba policy since President Obama took office, and that Havana had made no effort to return the gestures of good faith. The stalemate since then (and the reason for not having gone further with the current policy changes) Steinberg attributes to lack of reciprocation on the Cuban side.

Another guest then took the floor. He countered Steinberg’s comments, arguing that amending our Cuba policy is not, in fact, something that should require reciprocation to proceed. He even guessed that the Obama administration itself recognized this.

Following the session, a fellow guest wondered aloud to me: Who had the stronger point? I responded by email as follows:

[Guest one] is correct to some extent: the trouble he has to go through to provide humanitarian aid in Cuba, a goal fully aligned with US government intentions, is laughable (except that it isn’t terribly funny). But his snippy anger with the Deputy Secretary and Obama is perhaps misplaced, as much of the regulations that affect his processes are in place due to congressional legislation that the Executive and the State Department really do not have the power to tear down. Obama is taking a few of the moves he can take without the support of Congress (not all, so as not to upset Ileana Ros-Lehtinen into noncooperation on other issues, but some), but there remains in place an embargo that complicates all dealings with Cuba and that the executive can do little to affect.

[The Deputy Secretary], to some extent, is also correct: the Obama administration made very public and considerable gestures to Cuba in lowering the restrictions on travel between the two countries. And they called for a signal of reciprocation and were spurned by Havana. The Cuban government’s argument, basically, was that lowering of travel restrictions is not a sign of good faith when it is something that should have been done years ago — “a day late and a dollar short”, if you will — and as long as the crippling embargo remains in place they don’t see that a small country like Cuba owes a gesture in return. So [Steinberg]‘s argument is a little misleading. Sure, we can say that the US did something and Cuba did not actively try to reciprocate, but that’s missing the point. They’re not so much trying to spurn us as they are trying to tear down the same embargo they’ve fought for years and thus far have no reason to believe it will be loosened.

[Guest two] has the strongest argument, if I interpret his comment correctly. There are long-standing policies that have done the United States no good and have affected zero political change in Cuba, and the Obama administration fully admits this yet will not tear them down. That is what [Guest two] was saying: that in the case of some of the long-standing Cuba policies, no reciprocal action by Havana should actually be necessary. The United States simply needs to improve its policy, do away with that which is anachronous, and approach Cuba in a new way, regardless of what Cuba is doing (but certainly made easier by the fact that Cuba is indeed pursuing important economic changes and has been steadily releasing political prisoners for the past seven months).

In the end, then, we continue to be headed in the right direction, we just have not gotten very far.