Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has ac­cused for­mer re­gion­al lead­ers of hypocrisy, telling them to stop sup­port­ing a po­lit­i­cal sys­tem abroad that they would not want im­posed in their own coun­tries.

Her re­marks come as for­mer Cari­com lead­ers urge coun­tries to sup­port the an­nu­al Unit­ed Na­tions Gen­er­al As­sem­bly res­o­lu­tion call­ing for an end to Wash­ing­ton’s decades-old eco­nom­ic, com­mer­cial and fi­nan­cial em­bar­go against Cu­ba.

Among the sig­na­to­ries to the ap­peal is for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, whose en­dorse­ment places him along­side oth­er for­mer Caribbean lead­ers call­ing for in­ter­na­tion­al sup­port for the mea­sure. “I en­cour­age these for­mer Cari­com heads to lob­by to con­vert their own coun­tries in­to dic­ta­tor­ships run by the po­lit­i­cal par­ties that they didn’t be­long to,” the Prime Min­is­ter said in a re­sponse to Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.

“I think they should stop em­bar­rass­ing them­selves with this hypocrisy. My ad­vice is don’t sup­port an op­pres­sive po­lit­i­cal sys­tem im­posed in an­oth­er coun­try that you don’t want in your own; you make your­selves look ig­no­rant and con­fused.”

The in­ter­ven­tion has added a fresh po­lit­i­cal di­men­sion to the de­bate over Trinidad and To­ba­go’s for­eign pol­i­cy, par­tic­u­lar­ly fol­low­ing the coun­try’s de­ci­sion to ab­stain from last year’s vote, break­ing with the po­si­tion tak­en by most Cari­com mem­ber states.

The up­com­ing vote is sched­uled for to­day and to­mor­row.

The ap­peal by for­mer re­gion­al lead­ers re­flects a po­si­tion that Cari­com gov­ern­ments have his­tor­i­cal­ly ad­vanced through re­gion­al de­c­la­ra­tions and diplo­mat­ic en­gage­ment, call­ing for the re­moval of Unit­ed States re­stric­tions against Cu­ba.

The res­o­lu­tion, for­mal­ly ti­tled The Ne­ces­si­ty of End­ing the Eco­nom­ic, Com­mer­cial, and Fi­nan­cial Block­ade Im­posed by the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca Against Cu­ba, has been con­sid­ered an­nu­al­ly by the UN Gen­er­al As­sem­bly since 1992.

Al­though the res­o­lu­tion car­ries con­sid­er­able po­lit­i­cal and diplo­mat­ic weight, it is non-bind­ing and can­not com­pel the US to re­peal its sanc­tions. Wash­ing­ton main­tains that its pol­i­cy is in­tend­ed to pres­sure the Cuban gov­ern­ment over hu­man rights and po­lit­i­cal re­pres­sion.

Op­po­nents of the em­bar­go ar­gue that the re­stric­tions con­tribute to eco­nom­ic hard­ship for or­di­nary Cubans.

Pres­sure mounts over T&T’s po­si­tion

The Prime Min­is­ter’s re­sponse comes amid mount­ing calls for T&T to sup­port the res­o­lu­tion this year.

For­mer For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Dr Amery Browne has urged the Gov­ern­ment to vote in favour, ar­gu­ing that the coun­try should up­hold its long­stand­ing com­mit­ment to in­ter­na­tion­al law and Caribbean sol­i­dar­i­ty.

Speak­ing out­side Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day, Browne said T&T should stand with the ma­jor­i­ty of Cari­com coun­tries and sup­port the call for an end to the em­bar­go. “I be­lieve in Cari­com sol­i­dar­i­ty. I be­lieve in the right of na­tions to ex­press them­selves po­lit­i­cal­ly, eco­nom­i­cal­ly, with free­dom and with­out the bur­den of un­just sanc­tions, pres­sures, and much worse, star­va­tion, stran­gu­la­tion, a siege, a block­ade,” Browne said.

He crit­i­cised last year’s ab­sten­tion and called on the Gov­ern­ment to re­con­sid­er its ap­proach.

Browne al­so ar­gued that pre­vi­ous US ad­min­is­tra­tions had re­spect­ed T&T’s right to take a dif­fer­ent po­si­tion on Cu­ba, even when Wash­ing­ton dis­agreed with it.

Gon­za­les ex­pects an­oth­er ab­sten­tion

In­ter­na­tion­al af­fairs ex­pert Dr An­tho­ny Gon­za­les, how­ev­er, be­lieves T&T is un­like­ly to change its po­si­tion.

Gon­za­les said the Gov­ern­ment’s close align­ment with the US sug­gests an­oth­er ab­sten­tion is like­ly. “Well, I think the coun­try has aligned it­self with the Unit­ed States. And as it did last year, it will most like­ly do the same thing,” Gon­za­les said.

He point­ed to the Gov­ern­ment’s pub­lic crit­i­cism of Cu­ba’s po­lit­i­cal sys­tem as an in­di­ca­tion of a change in ap­proach to­wards Ha­vana.

Mean­while, 23 so­cial move­ments have al­so called on T&T to aban­don its ab­sten­tion and sup­port the res­o­lu­tion.

The coali­tion, rep­re­sent­ing work­ers, farm­ers, women, re­li­gious groups and oth­er sec­tors, has sent an open let­ter to the Prime Min­is­ter de­mand­ing that the Gov­ern­ment vote in favour of the res­o­lu­tion.

The lo­cal coali­tion’s let­ter goes fur­ther than a call for a change in T&T’s vote. It chal­lenges the un­der­ly­ing ra­tio­nale for the US em­bar­go, ar­gu­ing that the re­stric­tions were in­tend­ed to in­flict eco­nom­ic hard­ship on the Cuban pop­u­la­tion to force po­lit­i­cal change.

It al­so di­rects the Prime Min­is­ter to a re­port by the Unit­ed Na­tions Hu­man Rights Coun­cil’s Spe­cial Rap­por­teur on the neg­a­tive im­pact of uni­lat­er­al co­er­cive mea­sures on Cu­ba.