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By Alfonso Chardy. [email protected]. Posted on Sat, Mar.
23, 2002 in The Miami
Herald
Jimmy Carter said Friday that he will travel to Cuba sometime this year -- a
trip that would make him the highest-ranking former U.S. official to have
visited the island since Fidel Castro seized power in 1959.
''We are making plans now and, as we have said, we have been invited to go
to Cuba and we intend to go,'' Carter said during an interview with CNN. "But
I'm not prepared at this point to give our goals and the names of people that
will go or when we will go because we haven't really made those plans yet.''
The trip could have significant impact on U.S. policy at a time when the
Bush istration is under increasing pressure to shift strategies and open up
to the Castro regime. While many of Congress have visited the islands,
Carter would be the first former president to travel there since the Cuban
revolution.
Carter told CNN that the Bush istration may not like the fact that he's
going but likely won't stand in the way. ''I expect to get their tacit approval,
not their blessing,'' he said. "We can't go, obviously, without the
permission of the government. My understanding is that they will give that
approval.''
REACTION
Cuban Americans reacted swiftly to Carter's announcement.
Joe Garcia, executive director of the Cuban American National Foundation,
said his organization welcomes the trip -- if Carter intends to tell Castro to
leave power.
Garcia said, however, that if Carter intends to promote better relations
with Castro, the influential exile organization would oppose the trip.
''If he is going the way he went to Haiti [in 1994] to tell [Haitian
military leader] Gen. Raoul Cedras to leave, then we welcome his trip to Cuba if
he is going to tell Fidel Castro to leave,'' Garcia said. "However, if he's
going to give legitimacy to a 43-year-old dictatorship, then I think it would be
unfortunate.''
While Carter declined to outline his objectives in Cuba, he indicated to
CNN's Judy Woodruff that his intention was to improve relations between Cuba and
the United States -- not to deliver an ultimatum to Castro.
Carter indicated for easing the embargo and allowing U.S. citizens
to travel freely to the island, though he spoke strongly in favor of democracy
on the island.
VISION FOR ISLAND
''As you probably would , when I was president, I departed from my
predecessors and unfortunately my successors, in lifting all travel restraints
on American citizens to go to Cuba almost immediately when I was president
within a few weeks,'' Carter said.
"And I also established interests sections, which is one step short of
full diplomatic relationships between Havana and Washington. And those interest
sections with staffs representing our countries have never been closed.
"So I think the best way to bring about democratic changes in Cuba is
obviously to have maximum commerce and trade and visitation by Americans and
others who know freedom and to let the Cuban people know the advantages of
freedom. That's the best way to bring about change and not to punish the Cuban
people themselves by imposing an embargo on them, which makes Castro seem to be
a hero because he is defending his own people against the abuse of Americans.'' | 
