Increase of US Congress Debate on Cuba

The debate on Cuba in the US Congress is getting stronger, though after the call by President Barack Obama to lift the blockade, the Congress did not approve any concerte measure, said an article in Cuban newspaper Granma Tuesday.

The US Senate Committee of Assignments approved last week four amendments which are trying to eliminate the restrictions to the travels to Cuba and allow private credits for the sale of agricultural products to Cuba, said the article signed by Cuban reporter Sergio Alejandro Gomez.

This is just part of the law project for budget for financial services and government for the year 2017, and the plan includes export of equipments and telecommunication services, and tyhe authorization for supply of fuel in the airport of Bangor, Maine, US, by planes coming from third countries in a way to Cuba, or coming from Cuba.

In this context, Republican Senator Jeff Flake and Democrat Patrick Leahy are taking an initiative on the freedom to travel to Cuba.

This initiative is already counting on a majority in the Senate.

The article published in the Official Organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba clarifies that the route that these amendments must continue is long and complicated, due to the complexity of the legislative process.

The Cuban reporter says that many Cuban specialists were consulted, and all of them coincide on the fact that the initiatives in favor of Cuba have few possibilities to be approved, but it does not take out any merit to the support of the two US political parties to the relations between Cuba and the US.

US lawyer Robert Muse, an expert in the topic, the support of many highly known members of the Republican Party to the amendment in favor of allowing private credits to sale agricultural products in Cuba, is significant.

This proposal by Senators John Boozman, R-Arizona, and Jon Tester, Democrat of Montana, and was approved by 22 votes in favor and only eight against.

The powerful sector entrepreneurs in the field is one of those currently lobbying harder for a change of policy towards Cuba, however, these producers are among the most limited because the law requires advanced payment in cash of all food by Cuba.

But not all the measures in discussion are favorable to Cuba, since in the proper Senate there are two dispositions of negative cut towards the island, included in the Law of Authorization for the National Defense for 2017 that, of being approved, would prevent the cooperation between two countries in safety matters and also the return of the territory illegally occupied by the Naval Base in Guantanamo.

The author remembers that although Obama has wide executive authorities to empty the content of the blockade, only the Congress can eliminate it completely, since the above mentioned legislative organ approved the Helms-Burton Act in 1996.