Calls to Havana enliven U.S. debate of Cuba travel

BY LESLEY CLARK, Mimi Herald

WASHINGTON -- On one phone line was a senator from Florida talking to a hunger-striking dissident in Central Cuba about how President Barack Obama must resist ``commercial temptation.''

In another office on Capitol Hill, the call was with an opposition journalist in Havana, telling a crowded press conference that contact between Americans and Cubans is ``of the utmost importance.''

Lawmakers wrestling over whether to allow Americans to visit Cuba phoned dissident leaders on the island Thursday to underscore support for their opposing stances. The dueling calls came as members of Congress -- buoyed by a new president who has suggested a fresh look at Cuba -- introduced bills that would lift all restrictions on travel to Cuba.

Massachusetts Democratic Rep. William Delahunt held a press conference to discuss his bill -- with 122 co-sponsors -- that would end the limits on travel to Cuba for all Americans. Right now, travel to the hemisphere's last communist country is highly restricted to some lawmakers, scholars, journalists, farmers, and others with special licenses.

''I'm confident it will come to the floor,'' Delahunt said of the bill. ``We're not going to let a stone go unturned.''

Travel to Cuba is hotly debated in the exile community, where many conservatives believe that it boosts the Castro regime by supplying much-needed cash and does not hasten democracy. But to show that even members of Cuba's opposition favor more contact with Americans, event organizers called up Miriam Leiva, a dissident journalist from Havana.

She told a House conference room packed with journalists and activists that she believes U.S.-Cuba policy has been ``used by the Castro government as an excuse to justify repression.''

Among the supporters present: Miami Auxiliary Bishop Felipe de Jesus Estevez, who said restrictions ``inhibit the ability of ordinary church members and leaders to exercise their faith.''

Farm and business groups back the measure and The National Tour Association also lent its support.

On Monday, Sen. Richard G. Lugar, R-Ind., asked Obama to appoint a special envoy to engage Cuba in talks on migration and drug interdiction.

Florida Republican Sen. Mel Martinez, though, questioned whether U.S. tourists could bring about democratic change when Italians, Spaniards, Germans and Canadians have not.

''The change is needed in Havana, not Washington,'' Martinez said.

An hour before Delahunt's press event, Martinez called Cuban hunger striker Jorge Luis ''Antúnez'' García at his home in Central Cuba, where he's been fasting since mid-February. Antúnez and 16 other dissidents wrote a letter to Obama, hinting that the president should not be swayed by those seeking to make money off of trade with Cuba.

''We invite you,'' the letter said, ``not to sacrifice the moral leadership of the United States in the face of commercial temptations.''