The European Union agreed yesterday to launch negotiations with Cuba to increase trade, investment and dialogue on human rights in its most significant diplomatic shift since Brussels lifted sanctions on the Communist-ruled country in 2008.
After more than a year of discussions, EU foreign ministers decided to seek better ties with Havana to support the Caribbean island nation’s market-oriented reforms and to position European companies for any transition to a more open economy.
“These negotiations will help consolidate our engagement with Cuba,” the EU’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said after the decision.
“I hope Cuba will take up this offer.”
EU negotiators aim to agree the so-called Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement by the end of 2015 and say Cuba has signalled a willingness to sign.
While EU investment in Cuba and progress toward multiparty democracy are not expected to change dramatically in the near future, the pursuit of the accord is symbolic, highlighting the bloc’s warmer ties with Cuba in contrast to the United States, which has maintained an economic embargo on Cuba since 1962.
EU officials repeatedly said human rights would be a core issue in the negotiations, and the European Union’s ambassador to Havana said Cuban authorities had indicated that “everything could be on the table,” including human rights.
“That was the message at the very beginning of the process, but now we have to set agendas and there, of course, the more difficult issues will come out,” EU Ambassador Herman Portocarero told reporters in Havana.
Cuba and the EU share “common ground” on Cuba’s social and collective human rights, but differ on individual rights, Portocarero said. Cuba’s one-party system inhibits dissent and free speech.
Although US-Cuba relations have taken a more pragmatic tone recently, with officials from both sides pointing to improvements, Washington has barely budged since easing Cuban travel restrictions in 2011.
The US previously exerted pressure on Europe to isolate the Cuban government. But an EU official who met US officials last week said the EU’s overtures were met with Washington’s “full understanding.”
The EU official denied suggestions that Brussels was trying to “buy” democratic reforms in Cuba.