The Cuban government accepted the resumption of political dialogue with the EU on Tuesday, said Javier Nino, EU representative in Havana. The move follows the EU’s lifting of sanctions on Cuba in June this year.
“The Cuban government agrees to begin dialogue ... The EU proposal is an unconditional dialogue, mutual benefit, mutual respect on a number of issues such as rights and environmental issues,” Nino said.
The representative said the Cuban Foreign Ministry announced acceptance of the proposal in a note handed from the ministry to the French embassy, the country currently holding the EU presidency.
“At this moment the two sides are negotiating over when [plans for] the dialogue can be firmed up, but ideally it will be relatively soon,” Nino said.
He said no date or venue had been set.
EU-Cuba relations were frozen in 2003 when the EU imposed sanctions on the island nation in retaliation for the imprisonment of more than 70 dissidents, and the execution of three men convicted of hijacking a passenger ferry and demanding it be taken to the US.
Meanwhile, bypassing its trade embargo on communist Cuba, the US has approved US$250 million in “farm sales” to Havana, including food and construction materials in an aid offer after Hurricanes Gustav and Ike devastated Cuba’s crops, leaving potential for a food crisis, US diplomats said.
The licenses for agricultural sales were approved after Ike lashed Cuba a week ago and “wood, a material essential to rebuilding, is included,” a State Department statement handed to reporters at the US Interests Section in Havana said.
The US State Department said in Washington earlier on Monday it regretted that Cuba had rejected its offer of up to US$5 million in aid for the victims of Hurricanes Gustav and Ike.
The US has tense and limited relations with its communist neighbor, which has been under a US embargo for more than four decades.
Cuba last week urged Washington to ease its trade embargo to allow US firms to open private lines of credit for food imports to the cash-strapped island of more than 11 million people.
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