August 9, 2006

The Bush administration should act as a good neighbor toward Cuba instead of waging its political war against the island.

It is unseemly that the administration is trying to take advantage of the uncertainty over the health of Cuban President Fidel Castro.

Just two weeks after Castro underwent surgery, the Bush administration updated a May 2004 report entitled "Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba." It has even hired a transition director to oversee the implementation of the plan for a "transition to democracy."

Some members of Congress, such as U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Miami Republican, are going so far as calling upon the Cuban people take to the streets in defiance of any transitional government.

But all is calm in Havana. This is one more proof of a misguided policy that continues to rely on the fantasy of a few Cuban-Americans who still hold to the illusion of returning to Cuba in triumph 47 years after their defeat.

Even some Cubans who disagree with their own government have been voicing their opposition to the U.S. government's approach.

Oswald Paya, a leading political dissident in Cuba, told the Miami Herald: "I believe Cubans have to be the ones who solve our problems, and any interference serves to complicate the situations." He added: "The U.S. message should be to ratify that there is no such thing as a U.S. threat on Cuba, that there is no intention to intervene. It should say, 'Look, the Cuban process must be defined exclusively by the Cuban people.'"

Paya is right. Cubans on the island should determine their own future.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration should discard its failed policy. It should lift the travel ban against Cuba and end the embargo. The people of Cuba have suffered enough from U.S. policies. Castro's ill health is no excuse to make them suffer more.

After nearly five decades, the U.S. government must finally end the needless gap between these two neighbors.

Ana Perez is the former Cuba Program Director at Global Exchange, www.globalexchange.org. She can be reached at pmproj [at] progressive [dot] org.