Cuban diplomat promotes trade opportunities while in Pittsburgh

Cuban diplomat promotes trade opportunities while in Pittsburgh
July 1, 2014 10:11 PM
Michael Henninger/Post-Gazette

Jose Cabanas, top diplomat to the United States from Cuba, speaks to the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial board at the Post-Gazette building in
Downtown Pittsburgh on Tuesday.

The head of Cuba's diplomatic interest section in Washington was in
Pittsburgh the past two days meeting with business and academic groups,
taking in a little baseball, and hoping to promote a continuing thaw in
a relationship still profoundly chilled a generation after the end of
the Cold War.

Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills, invited Ambassador Jose R. Cabanas to
visit the city.

In a meeting with Post-Gazette editors Tuesday, Mr. Cabanas promoted the
potential for trade and commerce that could follow some future change in
the ties between the two wary neighbors. He holds the diplomatic rank of
ambassador, but the U.S. and Cuba do not officially exchange
ambassadors. Instead, diplomats such as Mr. Cabanas operate under the
umbrella of the two capitals' Swiss embassies.

He described offshore drilling as one huge opportunity in the near
future. Alluding to the renewed surge of young undocumented immigrants
on the southern border, he said that only measures to spread prosperity
more broadly in Central American and the smaller islands of the
Caribbean would contain such unregulated immigration.

"There's the danger of lost opportunity," he said.

There is trade between the counties, but since the Kennedy
administration, a variety of legislation, notably the 1996 Helms-Burton
Act, has sharply restricted it. Mr. Cabanas acknowledged that political
circumstances, including the influence of a Florida Cuban community
strongly critical of Havana's human rights record, don't suggest the
likelihood of any imminent change in the the geopolitical realities. He
said he is optimistic that attitudes of younger citizens of both
countries will set the stage for closer ties in the future.

"What I have found this time is completely different from what I have
found before," he said, emphasizing that he was not comparing the
attitudes of Washington administrations but the attitudes of ordinary
Americans he encounters in a variety of unofficial contexts.

Mr. Cabanas had dinner Monday evening in Pittsburgh with Mr. Doyle and
met public officials including county Executive Rich Fitzgerald and
Mayor Bill Peduto. The rest of his Pittsburgh itinerary included a stop
at Carnegie Mellon University and meeting with a variety of business
executives.

Former U.S. Rep. Ron Klink, who accompanied the group, said he hoped the
trip would pave the way for future contacts including a trade mission to
Cuba for local officials and business leaders in October.

Asked whether he were considering the potential trade mission, Mr.
Fitzgerald said, "We are looking at it if there are economic
opportunities for our companies."


James P. O'Toole: jotoole@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1562.

Source: "Cuban diplomat promotes trade opportunities while in Pittsburgh
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http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2014/07/02/Cuban-diplomat-takes-in-sites-scenes-of-Pittsburgh/stories/201407020072