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Fidel Castro: Cuba doesn't fear dialogue with US
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HAVANA – Fidel Castro said Monday that Cuba is not afraid to talk to the United States and that the communist government does not thrive on confrontation as its detractors claim.
In a column published in state-controlled newspapers, the 82-year-old former president also praised U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, saying the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee "is walking on solid ground" with a proposal to appoint a special envoy to reshape U.S.-Cuba relations.
Castro wrote that "those capable of serenely analyzing the events, as is the case of the senator from Indiana, use an irrefutable argument: The measures of the United States against Cuba, over almost half a century, are a total failure."
And he repeated Cuba's willingness to talk with Washington, saying direct negotiation "is the only way to secure friendship and peace among peoples."
"There is no need to emphasize what Cuba has always said: We do not fear dialogue with the United States," he wrote. "Nor do we need confrontation to exist, as some foolish people think. We exist precisely because we believe in our ideas and we have never feared dialogue with the adversary."
Castro's conciliatory comments come amid speculation that the new administration of President Barack Obama may ease parts of the U.S. embargo of Cuba imposed shortly after Castro came to power in 1959.
Lawmakers in both houses of the U.S. Congress have proposed a measure that would prohibit the president from barring Americans from traveling to Cuba except in extreme cases, effectively lifting a travel ban that is a key component of the embargo.
Suffering from an undisclosed illness in a secret location, Castro was succeeded by his 77-year-old brother Raul as president nearly 14 months ago.
Seven members of the Congressional Black Caucus are in Havana this week to discuss ways to improve relations. Democratic Rep. Mel Watt of North Carolina said Fidel Castro's column made it "clear that both countries can exist without either dialogue or adversity to each other."
"But wouldn't it be so wonderful if we struck a dialogue and found the things that were mutually advantageous and mutually of interest to our two countries," he added, "and stopped the historical divisions that have separated us (though we are) so close geographically?"
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HAVANA – Fidel Castro said Monday that Cuba is not afraid to talk to the United States and that the communist government does not thrive on confrontation as its detractors claim.
In a column published in state-controlled newspapers, the 82-year-old former president also praised U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, saying the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee "is walking on solid ground" with a proposal to appoint a special envoy to reshape U.S.-Cuba relations.
Castro wrote that "those capable of serenely analyzing the events, as is the case of the senator from Indiana, use an irrefutable argument: The measures of the United States against Cuba, over almost half a century, are a total failure."
And he repeated Cuba's willingness to talk with Washington, saying direct negotiation "is the only way to secure friendship and peace among peoples."
"There is no need to emphasize what Cuba has always said: We do not fear dialogue with the United States," he wrote. "Nor do we need confrontation to exist, as some foolish people think. We exist precisely because we believe in our ideas and we have never feared dialogue with the adversary."
Castro's conciliatory comments come amid speculation that the new administration of President Barack Obama may ease parts of the U.S. embargo of Cuba imposed shortly after Castro came to power in 1959.
Lawmakers in both houses of the U.S. Congress have proposed a measure that would prohibit the president from barring Americans from traveling to Cuba except in extreme cases, effectively lifting a travel ban that is a key component of the embargo.
Suffering from an undisclosed illness in a secret location, Castro was succeeded by his 77-year-old brother Raul as president nearly 14 months ago.
Seven members of the Congressional Black Caucus are in Havana this week to discuss ways to improve relations. Democratic Rep. Mel Watt of North Carolina said Fidel Castro's column made it "clear that both countries can exist without either dialogue or adversity to each other."
"But wouldn't it be so wonderful if we struck a dialogue and found the things that were mutually advantageous and mutually of interest to our two countries," he added, "and stopped the historical divisions that have separated us (though we are) so close geographically?"
