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US downplays EU lifting of Cuba sanctions

The US on Friday downplayed the EU's decision to lift its sanctions on Cuba, even after a White House official a day earlier called it disappointing.

“The US and the European Union share common objectives in Cuba: freedom, democracy and universal human rights,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

On Thursday, National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Washington was “disappointed” at the EU decision, which he said should have come after human rights conditions improved in Cuba.

McCormack refused to describe the US reaction as disappointment, saying: “This is a tactical difference.”

“From our consultations ... we understand that the European Union will set human rights benchmarks for its dialogue with the Cuban government,” including the release of political prisoners, respect for civil and political rights and freedom of information for all Cubans.

“These benchmarks send the right message about what is important: the need for the Cuban government to change the way it treats its citizens,” McCormack said, adding the EU was expected to announce its conditions for normal relations with Cuba next week.

EU foreign ministers took the decision to lift Cuba sanctions in principle late on Thursday on the sidelines of an EU summit in Brussels.

The move, which is to become official tomorrow, is a largely symbolic gesture as the sanctions have been suspended since 2005. They were imposed in 2003 after Cuba jailed 75 dissidents.

In Cuba, the EU decision greatly disappointed opposition groups who had campaigned for the European sanctions to continue until Cuba made real strides toward democracy.

Former president Fidel Castro was also not pleased by the EU decision, which in a newspaper commentary he branded “a great hypocrisy,” since it comes only days after a “brutal” immigration law was passed in Europe that makes illegal immigration a crime punishable with up to 18 months in prison.

Castro, 81, also slammed the EU’s sanctions lifting decision because, he said, it is conditioned on human rights progress and democratic reforms in Cuba.

State Department spokesman Tom Casey on Thursday cautioned US friends and allies to “be cognizant of not taking actions that would appear to give additional legitimacy” to the Cuban regime.

Dissident groups in Cuba on Friday said six more among them were placed under arrest in Matanzas, 100km east of Havana.

Dissident groups have been warning that since Raul Castro, 77, took over from his ailing brother Fidel in February, they could appreciate no easing of the relentless repression of the communist regime.
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