US-Cuba Migration Talks in Havana; coming changes?

Voxxi

Migration talks, which have been suspended since 2011, resumed Thursday between the United States and Cuba.

While much remains to be seen as to the talks’ outcome, they may represent a changing relationship between the two countries. An easing of tensions could make it significantly easier for Cubans in the U.S. to travel or send remittances to their home country.

Reuters reported that Edward Alex Lee, the deputy assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere affairs, led the U.S. delegation, while Josefina Vidal Ferreiro, the director-general of the U.S. Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, led the delegation from Cuba.

According to accords from the 1990s, the U.S. and Cuba are supposed to have migration talks every six months to discuss the movement of citizens between the countries. Reuters noted that talks are meant to review the issue of legal, orderly migration. However, talks have been forestalled since U.S. contractor Alan Gross was imprisoned in Cuba in 2011.

Cuba Migration Policies

Currently, the U.S. issues at least 20,000 immigration visas annually to Cubans coming into the country. During 2013, the government issued 24,727 immigrant visas and 29,927 visitor visas, which is more than double the number it issued in 2012.

The current policy is to accept Cubans who reach U.S. shores by boat, a policy that Cuban governmental officials have criticized as encouraging illegal immigration. Historically, this has been a major issue of contention between the two countries. The colloquially named “wet foot, dry foot” policy, however, dictates that potential immigrants picked up at sea be turned back to Cuba.

The Obama administration has stated that though they hope for productive migration talks, there are no plans to change that policy. Rather, the diplomatic talks are meant to pick up the agreed upon meetings to review “safe, legal, and orderly” migration from one country to the other, according to the Miami Herald.

Recent Changes in Relations with Cuba

Diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Cuba over the last decade have been fitful at best. In 2003, the Bush administration suspended the biannual migration talks; it took until July of 2009 for the talks to resume, though the past few years haven’t seen any substantial changes in immigration policies on either side.

From 2009 to 2011, however, regulations loosened on travel from the U.S. to Cuba, signaling a potential desire on the part of the Obama administration to repair diplomatic ties. Cuba also recently loosened its travel restrictions, which spurred its citizens to make some 250,000 trips abroad, according to Yahoo News. This comes as a positive sign for the large community of Cuban exiles living in the U.S., who are often disconnected from family in their native country.

Over the past year, there have additional signs of positive forward movement. U.S. and Cuban officials have met multiple times, according to The Guardian, to discuss direct mail services and emergency coordination between the nations. The U.S. state department noted that the talks in September of 2013, on mail issues, were “fruitful,” though no deal has been struck. The migration talks this week may also touch on postal delivery.

More recently, at the December memorial service for Nelson Mandela, President Obama shook Raul Castro’s hand, which was made much of in the media. Some suggested that signaled reconciliation, while others felt it was just a handshake.

La reunion secreta de Fidel y Jimmy Carter en Venezuela

TIME

By Douglas Brinkley 

Carter, su esposa Rosalynn y en la casa de Fidel [marzo 31/2011]. Foto: Alex Castro/Cubadebate

Suddenly there was a knock on Jimmy Carter's suite at his hotel in Caracas, Venezuela, interrupting his scheduled interview with Flora Lewis of the New York Times. It was a member of Fidel Castro's entourage telling Carter's advisor, Robert Pastor, that the Cuban dictator was even then walking down from his suite three floors up en route to meet the former U.S. President. For months Carter had been trying to arrange a secret meeting with Castro: they eventually decided that the occasion of Carlos Andres Perez's inauguration as President of Venezuela in late February 1989 would be the ideal time. But Castro's timing was now off. A nervous Carter immediately sent somebody to detain Castro for the minute it would take to hustle Lewis out of the room; if the New York Times ran a story about Carter with Castro, the ex-president's relationship with the Bush administration would be terminated. (Dan Quayle, in Caracas representing the first Bush administration at Perez' inauguration, was already fuming about Carter's meeting that week with Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega.) "I almost picked her up and walked her to the elevator to get her out of there in time," Pastor recalled. "And ten seconds later Castro burst into the room."

It seems every time Jimmy Carter applies for a visa, somebody in the U.S. government flinches. This week Carter will become the first U.S. president — in or out of office — to visit Cuba since the Castro seized power in 1959. Pro-trade American farmers see Carter's mission as a potential icebreaker between the two nations; others who believe Castro has brought about progressive policies in health care and education applaud Carter for recognizing that Castro is a caring communist, not a murderous thug. And official permission for the trip was granted by the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control on April 5, which ruled that Carter, as head of a Carter Center delegation, was allowed to visit under the license category of "activities of private foundations or research or education institutions."

But that doesn't mean this Bush Administration is any happier than the last one about Jimmy Carter and Fidel Castro chatting behind its political back. The White House stands firmly behind Miami's Cuban-American community, which has stated that for Carter's mission to be successful he must tell Castro to relinquish dictatorial power at once. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer insists that Carter should take a tough message directly to Castro "to stop the repression and to stop the imprisonments, to bring freedom to the people of Cuba." As for the Helms-Burton Act, the embargo Carter has pushed to have abolished since leaving the White House, Bush is standing behind it as a "moral statement." Meanwhile, the State Department will unveil their revised policy on Cuba on May 20 when President Bush visits Miami to commemorate Cuba's independence from Spain. It is likely to set a hard line.

Then there's the matter of the war on terror — and whether Cuba belongs on the enemies list. In a May 6 speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington D.C., John R. Bolton, the undersecretary of state for arms control, publicly announced that American intelligence agencies have reached a stark conclusion. "The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort," Bolton said, in direct criticism of the Castro regime. Cuba "has provided dual-use biotechnology to other rogue states."

The Bush Administration, in fact, is convinced that Cuba is a genuine terrorist state only ninety miles from our shores capable of manufacturing genetically modified germ weapons. They've re-reported that in a speech delivered at Tehran University Castro boasted that Iran and Cuba could "bring America to its knees." Insisting that Cuba was just an innocent "lamb" trying to survive next to the American "dragon," Castro threatened that the "dragon would find its meal poisoned if it tried to eat the lamb."

Saturday, on the eve of Carter's six-day visit, Castro came out swinging. Speaking live on state television, Castro called on U.S. officials to "present even the most minimum proof" of the allegation Undersecretary of State John Bolton made Monday. "The only thing true in Bolton's lies is that Cuba is 90 miles away from United States territory?No one has ever presented a single shred of evidence that our homeland has conceived a program that develops nuclear, chemical or biological weapons," Castro said. "The doors of our institutions are open...Cuba has absolutely nothing to hide."

Indeed, Castro has promised Carter an island without restraints: he can travel and speak freely while in Cuba. And much of Carter's visit will have a human rights cast: a tour of the School for Social Workers (La Escuela de Trabajadores Sociales de Cojimar); a morning at the AIDS sanatorium "Los Cocos"; a discussion with the doctors at La Castellana Psychiatric Rehabilitation Center; and a luncheon hosted by farmers who want to export their agricultural goods to America.

But Castro is also hosting Carter for two official dinners, and the Bush Administration's fear is that every time Carter breaks bread with Castro, it will further legitimize his dictatorial regime in the eyes of the world community. Carter is also scheduled to deliver a 20-minute televised speech in Spanish from the University of Havana's main auditorium that is already being interpreted in Cuba as an anti-Bush gesture. Most troubling of all to the State Department is Carter's scheduled tour of the Biotech Institute (Centro de Ingenieria y Biotecnologia). They worry that Carter will be duped into believing that all Cuba manufactures in such facilities are pharmaceutical drugs and not deadly biological agents.

But for Carter and his effort to warm relations between the U.S. and its only enemy in the hemisphere, that 45-minute meeting 13 years ago in a Caracas hotel was a good beginning. "He surprised me with his intellect and humor," Carter told me in an interview. "Nothing much happened, but the meeting opened up a dialogue between us."

Encouraged, Carter tried to arrange a meeting with Castro when Bill Clinton was in the White House — only to have Vice President Al Gore shut him down. Eventually, Castro extended a verbal invitation to Carter when they were honorary pallbearers at the October 2000 funeral of former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. In January 2002 Carter received a formal written invitation from Castro to visit Cuba, and when the Treasury Department reluctantly signed off, the historic visit was on.

Carter is well aware that many Americans deem his post 9-11 journey to Cuba a potential mistake — he doesn't care. Even if Cuba does have biological weapons, he reasons, shunning the nation won't help eliminate them. But talking might.

"I look forward to this opportunity to meet with Cuban people from all walks of life and to talk with President Castro," Carter declared before his departure. "More than a century after Cuba's independence, our two countries have not yet developed a constructive relationship, and although official interest sections were established while I was president, for the last 41 years our two nations have not had normal diplomatic relations. I do not expect this trip to change the Cuban government or its policies. However, it is an opportunity to explore issues of mutual interest between our citizens and to share ideas on how to improve the relationship between the United States and Cuba."

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Douglas Brinkley is Director of the Eisenhower Center for American Studies at the University of New Orleans and is author of The Unfinished Presidency: Jimmy Carter's Journey Beyond the White House.

Read more: Our Ex-President In Havana - TIME http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,236991,00.html#ixzz2q0dT5mgH

Murio Robert A. Pastor quien preparo la reunion secreta entre Fidel y Carter en Venezuela

By Emily Langer

Carter and Pastor/ WP

Carter said in a statement after Dr. Pastor’s death that “because of his vision, boundless energy, and political skill, the Western Hemisphere is more democratic and developed today.”

At times, Dr. Pastor aided the former president with unexpected, practical problems. In 1989, he reportedly shepherded a New York Times reporter out of a Caracas hotel room so that Carter could have a long-sought, secret and — as it happened — spontaneous meeting with Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

“I almost picked her up and walked her to the elevator to get her out of there in time,” Dr. Pastor told Time magazine. “And 10 seconds later Castro burst into the room.”

Keep reading on The Washington Post >>

Obama shook Raúl Castro's hand after SIX MONTHS of secret U.S.-Cuba talks, report claims

Confirmed: 'We're in talks' with Cuba on a wide range of issues, said Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes (L), shown with the president on Air Force One

dailymail

By David Martosko, U.s. Political Editor 

The handshake seen 'round the water cooler was no fluke, it turns out.

When President Barack Obama approached the podium at Nelson Mandela's memorial service and made a beeline for a row of foreign leaders – stopping first to shake Cuban dictator Raúl Castro's hand – it came after representatives from the two historically antagonistic nations had already been in talks for six months.

'[B]ehind the scenes,' two Daily Beast national security reporters wrote on Tuesday, 'U.S. and Cuban officials have held midlevel discussions in Havana and Washington on a range of issues, including direct postal service, migration issues, disaster response, and search and rescue at sea.'

During the president's trip back from South Africa, Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters on Air Force One that 'it's been quite some time since the Presidents of the United States and Cuba were even in the same place.'

But he acknowledged that 'we’re in talks on issues associated with migration that, again, I think allow for there to be greater connectivity particularly among Cuban Americans and Cuba.'

News that the two leaders' deputies have been meeting in secret comes after nearly five years of a foreign policy thaw between the U.S. and the communist island nation, and nearly two decades after Mandela himself suggested that the two countries re-evaluate their icy Caribbean staring match.

The Obama administration has already turned heads by lifting an earlier prohibition on family travel and money transfers to Cuba. But a hostage situation and the iron fist that Castro wields against pro-Democracy activists have largely kept the U.S. at arms' length.

National Security Adviser Susan Rice laid out a case for the softer approach on Dec. 4 during a speech during a Washington, D.C. human right summit.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2522263/Obama-shook-Ra-l-Castros-hand-SIX-MONTHS-secret-U-S-Cuba-talks-report-claims.html#ixzz2nW99fhkl

Iran Delegates Break Off Nuclear Talks

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VIENNA, Dec. 13 (UPI) --

An Iranian delegation broke off talks with six world powers over implementing a landmark nuclear deal to return to Tehran, Iran's news agency said Friday.

The so-called expert-level delegates, meeting since Monday at the Vienna headquarters of U.N. nuclear watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency, halted the talks on enforcement mechanisms to return to Tehran for consultations, the official Islamic Republic News Agency said in a report monitored by United Press International.

The report did not say why the delegation, led by Iranian Foreign Ministry political and legal affairs Director General Hamid Baeidinejad, suspended the talks Thursday night.

Stephen Clement, leading the talks for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton on behalf of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany, had no immediate comment.

The suspension of the talks came hours after the Obama administration, facing growing pressure from Congress to maintain or increase economic sanctions on Iran, blacklisted more than a dozen companies and individuals for allegedly helping Tehran evade international oil sanctions.

At the same time, House and Senate lawmakers agreed Thursday not to vote on new sanctions this year, following a White House campaign to stall legislative action for at least six months while the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany negotiate a comprehensive deal over Tehran's nuclear program.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif told Time magazine in an interview published Monday any new sanctions would kill a comprehensive deal.

The talks in the Austrian capital were part of an interim six-month deal reached Nov. 24 in Geneva, Switzerland, calling for Iran to halt production of near-weapons-grade nuclear fuel in exchange for some relief from economic sanctions amounting to $6 billion to $7 billion.

Obama: Iran Deal Better than 'All-or-Nothing' Approach

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By William Bigelow 

Barack Obama, speaking at the Saban Forum of the Brookings Institute on Saturday, insisted that the deal he struck with Iran allowing Iran to keep its uranium enrichment while the West relaxed sanctions will “eliminate the incentive” for Iran to build nuclear weapons. Obama lambasted those, including Israeli prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who favor what he called an “all-or-nothing” approach in which Iran would dismantle its entire nuclear program before the West relaxed sanctions, saying:

You’ll hear arguments, including potentially from the prime minister, that said we can’t accept any enrichment on Iranian soil, period, full stop, end of conversation. One can envision an ideal world in which Iran said, ‘We’ll destroy every element and facility and you name it, it’s all gone.’ I can envision a world in which Congress passed every one of my bills that I put forward. There are a lot of things that I can envision that would be wonderful.”

Obama said there is no way to stop Iran from enriching uranium: “Theoretically, they will always have some capability because technology here is available to any good physics student at pretty much any university around the world. And they have already gone through the cycle to the point where the knowledge we are not going to be able to eliminate. But what we can do is eliminate the incentive for them to want to do this.”

He continued, “When I hear people criticize the Geneva deal say it’s got to be all or nothing, I would just remind them that if it’s nothing, if we did not even try for this next six months to do this, all the breakout capacity we are concerned about would accelerate in the next six months. They’d be that much closer to breakout capacity six months from now. And that’s why I think it’s important for us to test this proposition.”

Obama said that despite the fact that Netanyahu publicly denounced the deal, they share the same goals: “Bibi and I have very candid conversations and there are occasionally significant tactical disagreements. But there is a constancy in trying to reach the same goal, and in this case that goal is to make sure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon.”

Then Obama loaded his argument, insisting that sanctions were ineffective in turning the Iranians from their nuclear ambitions and cunningly making the opposition to the deal look as if it only came from Israel and its American supporters, ignoring the Arab states who are nervous about Iran’s nuclear ambitions: “The idea that Iran, given everything that we know about their history, would just continue to get more and more nervous about more sanctions and military threats and ultimately just say, ‘We give in,’ I think does not reflect an honest understanding of the Iranian people and the Iranian regime. I think even the so-called moderates or reformers inside of Iran would not be able to simply say, ‘We will cave and do exactly what the U.S. and the Israelis say.’”

The reality is: Sanctions brought Iran to the table. The Saudis and others in the Arab world don’t want a nuclear Iran. The deal does nothing to inspect the dangerous nuclear work done in Parchin.

But for Barack Obama, vilifying the Israelis and tacitly encouraging Iran to go forward with its deadly ambitions are the reality he has chosen.

Cancel All Talks With Cuba Until Mr. Gross is Released

cubaconfidential

By Chris Simmons

Silvio Canto, Jr., AmericanThinker.com

The Allan Gross story took a strange turn today.

Former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson made the following statement:
"Former U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson has admitted to Newsmax that he "screwed up" in his 2011 bid to free American Alan Gross, who has been held in a Cuban prison for four years.

He spoke to the press when it would have been better for him to keep quiet, he said on Newsmax TV's "Steve Malzberg Show."..."I screwed that one up," Richardson said.

"I thought we had a deal. I went in and talked to the Cubans. The Cubans were changing their policy at the last minute."

OK so Gov Richardson thought that we had a deal!

How about this deal?

President Obama should cancel any pending talks, especially visits to Cuba by US businessmen or public officials.

He should make it very clear that everything is on hold until Mr Gross is released unconditionally.

We must make it very clear that there is a price for jailing US citizens for no reason at all.

White House Says Uranium Enrichment Still on the Table in Iran Talks

breitbart

By AWR Hawkins 4 Dec 2013

On December 3rd, White House National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said that while the U.S. is not prepared to recognize Iran's right to enrich uranium, the Obama administration is "prepared to negotiate a strictly limited enrichment program."

According to The Jerusalem Post, Meehan said the administration is willing to do this because "Iranians have indicated for the first time" that they are willing to accept "rigorous monitoring and limits on level, scope, capacity, and stockpiles" of nuclear material.

Meehan says the administration believes that under such terms, it is possible to allow "a very modest amount of enrichment" while also eliminating "any near-term breakout capability."

Israel is opposed to "permanent enrichment capacity" for Iran at any level. They argue that leaving the infrastructure for enrichment in place necessarily gives Iran "the ability to manufacture a weapon."

W.H.: Obama “personally engaged” in trying to free Alan Gross

CBS News

White House spokesman Jay Carney said President Obama is “personally engaged” in working toward the release of Alan Gross, a U.S. government contractor who has been imprisoned in Cuba since 2009. But Carney said he was not sure if the president had read a letter from Mr. Gross pleading for assistance in securing his release on the fourth anniversary of his imprisonment.

“We reiterate today our call for the Cuban government to release Alan Gross. Mr. Gross's detention remains an impediment to more constructive relations between the United States and Cuba,” Carney said during Tuesday’s White House briefing. “The president has himself personally engaged foreign leaders and other international figures to use their influence with Cuba to promote Mr. Gross's release. The State Department has kept Mr. Gross's case at the forefront of discussions with the Cuban government and made clear the importance the United States places on his welfare. They have also engaged a wide range of foreign counterparts and urged them to advocate for Mr. Gross's release.”

Secretary of State John Kerry, who’s attending meetings in Brussels, Belgium, told reporters Tuesday that the U.S. has had “any number” of outreaches to Cuban officials and added that the U.S. is “currently engaged in some discussions” but refused to provide any more detail.

“These things are often best resolved in quiet diplomacy, under the radar screen, behind the scenes, and that is exactly what we have been pursuing,” Kerry said.
Meanwhile, Gross, who was arrested in Havana on Dec. 3, 2009 while working covertly on programs to promote democracy in the Communist-run country,wrote Mr. Obama a letter from his jail cell saying he feared the government had “abandoned” him.
“Officials in your administration have expressed sympathy and called for my unconditional release, and I very much appreciate that. But it has not brought me home. It is clear to me, Mr. President, that only with your personal involvement can my release be secured.  I know that your administration and prior administrations have taken extraordinary steps to obtain the release of other U.S. citizens imprisoned abroad – even citizens who were not arrested for their work,” the letter said.Carney said he didn’t know if the president had seen the letter, but that the White House was aware of it.

Cuba: Declaración del MINREX sobre Alan Gross y los espias cubanos presos

la declaracion que bien se atienen a limitar a la directora de estados unidos de la cancilleria cubana, aunque todos sabemos que ella es solo una mensajera, ratifica la postura tradicional del regimen de la habana y el caracter de medio de canje que constituye la detencion de alan gross. las condiciones estan creadas para que la administracion obama se pliegue a las demandas de los chantajistas de la punto 0 y punto 1.

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El 3 de diciembre, medios de prensa de Estados Unidos informaron sobre la carta que 66 senadores norteamericanos, demócratas, republicanos e independientes, enviaron al presidente Barack Obama, en relación con el caso del ciudadano estadounidense Alan Gross, quien cumple sanción de privación de libertad en Cuba. Los senadores instaron al Presidente a conferirle prioridad humanitaria a la liberación del Sr. Gross y dar cualquier paso que esté "en el interés nacional" de EE.UU., de manera expedita para lograr su excarcelación, manifestando que le brindarían su apoyo en la consecución de este objetivo.

Al respecto, la directora general de Estados Unidos del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Cuba, Josefina Vidal Ferreiro, emitió la declaración siguiente:
"El gobierno cubano reitera su disposición a establecer de inmediato un diálogo con el Gobierno de Estados Unidos para encontrar una solución al caso del Sr. Gross sobre bases recíprocas, que contemple las preocupaciones humanitarias de Cuba vinculadas al caso de los cuatro cubanos luchadores antiterroristas que están presos en EE.UU.
Continuar leyendo aqui >>

EE.UU. urge a Cuba a liberar a Alan Gross en el 4to aniversario de su arresto

Terra España

Foto reciente de Alan Gross en la prisión, distribuida por su familia 
cafefuerte.com

Estados Unidos urgió hoy de nuevo a Cuba a liberar "inmediata e incondicionalmente" al contratista estadounidense Alan Gross en la víspera del cuarto aniversario de su arresto, y consideró "gravemente decepcionante" que su encarcelamiento se haya prolongado tanto.

"Mañana, el trabajador humanitario Alan Gross comenzará un quinto año de injusto encarcelamiento en Cuba", indicó el Departamento de Estado en un comunicado.

Gross, de 64 años, fue arrestado y encarcelado el 3 de diciembre de 2009, y en 2011 se le condenó a 15 años de cárcel por lo que el Gobierno cubano describió como "acciones contra la integridad territorial del Estado".

El Gobierno estadounidense niega ese cargo y mantiene que Gross trataba simplemente de proporcionar acceso "sin censura" a Internet para "una pequeña comunidad religiosa" judía en la isla.

"Es gravemente decepcionante, especialmente teniendo en cuenta su declarado objetivo de proporcionar acceso a Internet a los cubanos, que el Gobierno de Cuba no haya permitido que Gross pueda volver para estar junto a su familia, donde pertenece", señaló el comunicado.

"Reiteramos nuestro llamado al Gobierno cubano, haciéndonos eco de muchos líderes extranjeros e incluso de aliados de Cuba, para liberar inmediata e incondicionalmente a Alan Gross", agregó.

La condena a Gross, que Washington considera injusta, y los desacuerdos en cuanto al destino de "Los Cinco" cubanos, de los que cuatro cumplen condena por espionaje en Florida, han enfriado en los últimos años el diálogo entre Washington y La Habana.

Estados Unidos ha pedido reiteradamente la liberación de Gross y lo hizo incluso durante el tenue acercamiento bilateral que escenificaron los dos países a mediados de este año, cuando mantuvieron un diálogo sobre migración y otro sobre la posibilidad de reanudar el correo postal directo.

Cuba, por su parte, mantiene que el proceso a Gross fue justo y asegura estar dispuesta a negociar con EE.UU. para resolver el asunto, que se ha convertido en el principal obstáculo para el avance de la política de apertura iniciada por el presidente estadounidense Barack Obama a su llegada al poder.

Gross es "un esposo, padre y profesional dedicado con un largo historial de proporcionar ayuda a comunidades desprovistas de los servicios necesarios en más de 50 países", insistió hoy el Departamento de Estado.

The Nuclear Deal With Iran Was About Trust, Not Verification | Foreign Affairs

By Kenneth Pollack

An Iranian boy holds the national flag with a plastic gun with in central Tehran, March 31, 2008. (Morteza Nikoubazl / Courtesy Reuters)

It is difficult to judge the nuclear agreement forged last weekend in Geneva as anything other than a good deal. The Iranians will be no closer to having a nuclear breakout capability when the deal concludes than they are today. The amount of money that the Iranians will get is paltry -- about $7 billion total over six months -- especially compared to the roughly $30 billion that Tehran will lose during that period as a result of the sanctions on oil sales and financial transactions, all of which remain firmly in place. The objections that have been raised to the deal so far are either specious or tautological, or require the kind of tenuous conspiracy thinking that we typically disparage when it comes from the Iranians. 

But the deal is only a small step in the right direction. Iran will end up somewhat farther away from developing a nuclear breakout capability, but it is hard to go much beyond that. There are so many ways for Iran to acquire the fissile material for a nuclear weapon that it is impossible to assess whether it will set Iran back by a week, a month, or a year. (Any such claims tend to reflect what the claimant wants you to believe much more than objective reality.) Moreover, the interim agreement will last for only six months and says nothing about what will happen at the end of that period. The hope is that the two sides will use the time to craft a comprehensive follow-on agreement; but the interim deal contains only the broadest signposts for such an agreement. Three years from now, if there is no comprehensive agreement, this interim deal is going to look irrelevant -- not bad, just immaterial. 

In that sense, the interim deal is only important to the extent it helps to produce that ultimate, comprehensive agreement. Fortunately, the deal has real value as a confidence-building measure.

Keep reading at Foreign Affairs >>

Kuwaiti Newspaper: Obama Negotiating with Hezbollah Terrorists

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By Joel B. Pollak 

The Obama administration has entered secret talks with the Hezbollah terrorist group, mediated by Great Britain, according to a report in the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai, as relayed by the Jerusalem Post Wednesday.

The State Department lists Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. Thirty years ago, Hezbollah bombed a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241. Hezbollah is currently helping to prop up the Assad regime in Syria, in a war that has claimed over 100,000 civilian lives. The organization is also dedicated to Israel's destruction.

According to the report, President Barack Obama opened the "secret indirect talks" to discuss "the fight against al-Qaida, regional stability, and other Lebanese political issues." Hezbollah is supported by Iran and has been involved in terrorism throughout the world. It has also been active in other conflicts, laundering money through the trade in illicit diamonds the fueled the civil war in Sierra Leone in the 1990s, for example.

Iran Strongly Rejects Obama Interpretation of Nuclear Deal

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By Ben Shapiro 

On Tuesday, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard news agency FARS released a statement from the Foreign Ministry denouncing the version of the Iranian nuclear deal released by the Obama administration on Sunday. “What has been released by the website of the White House as a fact sheet is a one-sided interpretation of the agreed text in Geneva and some of the explanations and words in the sheet contradict the text of the Joint Plan of Action (the title of the Iran-powers deal), and this fact sheet has unfortunately been translated and released in the name of the Geneva agreement by certain media, which is not true,” said Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham.

Afkham said that the negotiations between the White House, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany were lengthy and rigorous due to disputes over wording – and she added that the deal points explanation released by the White House was inaccurate. FARS released its own version of the agreement, which matched the text released to the press over the weekend.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry did not state what in the White House explanation of the deal it found objectionable, but its opposition to the White House’s version of the deal demonstrates that Iran is already working to undermine the supposed freeze on its nuclear program.

Iran also recognizes that it now has the White House boxed in, since President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry have been so adamant in pushing the Iranian deal; reinterpreting the deal by Iran puts both Obama and Kerry in the unpalatable position of having to disown a deal that was supposedly designed to buy time to come up with further negotiation points with Iran.

Valerie Jarrett, Chicago, and the Iran Deal

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By Joel B. Pollak 

www.trevorloudon.com

Last week, the Times of Israel reported that senior presidential adviser Valerie Jarrett had been leading talks with Iran in secret for a year before the formal negotiations in Geneva this month. While the White House denied the report "100 percent," the existence of back-channel talks has been confirmed by other reporting. The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that President Barack Obama had "personally overseen" the talks.

Almost anything "personally overseen" by the President Obama is likely to bear the heavy stamp of Ms. Jarrett, who is the president's closest adviser, despite a shocking track record of failure. In foreign policy, her most important mistake was her effort to dissuade the president from proceeding with the raid on Osama bin Laden. It was one of the few times that President Obama overruled her counsel--and one of his few successes.

Jarrett's involvement in Iran is cause for concern for three additional reasons--two minor and one major. One minor reason is that she was born there. That should not automatically disqualify anyone, of course, any more than being born in the Soviet Union would have disqualified an anti-Soviet dissident. But Jarrett was born in 1956 to American expatriates in the aftermath of the CIA-assisted coup that deposed Mohammad Mossadegh.

The Iranian regime remains obsessed with the Mossadegh coup as proof of America's innate evil--and for decades, some Americans have felt a sense of post-colonial guilt about it. That feeling may be particularly acute for an American born in the shadow of that event. The temptation to show contrition by acceding to Iran's goals, as a kind of restorative justice, could well shape Jarrett's involvement, and Obama's approach.

The second minor reason to worry about Jarrett's involvement in Iran is her political background. Her entrée into the world of left-wing politics in Chicago was through her father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, a journalist with somewhat radical views. Jarrett spoke out against antisemitism in the black community, for example, but also took anti-Israel stands, accusing pro-Israel Jews of "support of genocide" in the Lebanon War, for example.

These two reasons for concern are fairly minor, because they are based on mere speculation, and would have to be balanced out by other factors, such as Ms. Jarrett's personal associations with leaders of the pro-Israel community in Chicago. But the major reason for concern about her role is simply that Jarrett has banished, and repulsed, most of the Obama administration's most competent appointees from the White House.

One of the most important departures was that of Dennis Ross, who was brought into the White House early in the Obama presidency to advise the president on the Middle East. Ross, who advocated a tough approach to Iran, is widely thought to have been marginalized by the president's inner circle. He left the White House in 2011, ostensibly because he had only promised to serve two years, but likely because he was not being utilized.

Finally, it is worth noting that Jarrett, despite her expatriate origins, has little experience in international affairs, and is said to manage Obama's policies through a domestic political lens. If she was as involved in the talks as reports suggest, that could be a major reason for the president's eagerness to sign almost any deal, even one the French rejected as too weak. In any other administration, she likely would have been ignored.

Netanyahu: Iran 'Gets A Hell Of A Lot' In Nuke Deal

Read on breitbart >>

Also:

France Tougher Than U.S. on Iran >>

"New Democratic Opening": Agreement may pave the way for FARC to enter Colombian politics

(Reuters) - Colombia's government and Marxist FARC rebels reached a "fundamental agreement" on the guerrillas' future in politics, one of the thorniest issues addressed in peace talks in Cuba, according to a joint statement on Wednesday.
The FARC, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, has been fighting the government in a jungle and urban conflict that has killed more than 200,000 people in the five decades since it began as a peasant movement seeking land reform.
The partial agreement may pave the way for FARC to enter Colombian politics, which lead government negotiator Humberto de la Calle said would provide a "new democratic opening" that will lead to peace after an end of conflict. "Never again politics and weapons together."
Like other Latin American guerrilla groups, the FARC aspires to become a political party if a peace deal is signed.
"We are completely satisfied with what we have agreed on the point of political participation," FARC leader Ivan Marquez told Reuters. "We are doing well; in no other peace process have we advanced as much as we have here in Havana. We have taken an important step in the right direction to end the conflict and to achieve a real democracy in Colombia."
President Juan Manuel Santos, facing a barrage of criticism from the opposition for negotiating with the rebels, wants to show progress in the talks that have dragged on for a year and, until now, have yielded only incomplete agreement on the first of a five-point agenda.
The center-right Santos has seen his approval ratings slump in the last few months, partly due to the perception that he has offered too many concessions to the rebels in return for little.
Partial accord has been reached on land reform from an agenda that also includes reparation to the FARC's victims, tackling Colombia's drug trade, and an end to fighting.
Wednesday's development will likely lift Santos' popularity and provide momentum should he decide by the November 25 deadline to seek a second presidential term. Many believe a second term hinges on progress at the negotiating table.
The two sides are unlikely to reveal many details of the agreement, but Colombians will be looking for clues on how much government negotiators have offered the rebels and how they will pay for their crimes. Many will be unwilling to accept FARC leaders being given seats in congress - as the rebels have demanded - without first receiving jail terms and then passing through the electoral process.
While most Colombians are desperate to see an end to the war, initial euphoria over negotiations has worn off as many doubt talks will soon reach a successful end.
"Even though the agreement is partial, what was announced today is a defeat to those who have sought to darken or end the peace process and constitutes a strong basis to believe we could reach a definitive peace," Ivan Cepeda, a leftist congressman, said.
Opposition leaders like former President Alvaro Uribe are furious that the FARC has tried to dictate government policy while it continues to bomb economic infrastructure and kill civilians and military personnel.
(Reporting by Helen Murphy and Luis Jaime Acosta in Bogota, Marc Frank, Nelson Acosta and Rosa Tania Valdes in Havana. Additional reporting by Peter Murphy; Editing by Vicki Allen and Jackie Frank)

Sobre el dialogo genuflexo y hacendosito en Cuba

la estudiosa marlene azor, teoriza sobre el lugar de la negociacion en una cuba imaginaria:

ripioderebombar

"En  las elementales tácticas de negociación, se suele utilizar tres tipos de posturas: la persuasión, la cooptación y el alejamiento y/o ruptura. Es valioso colocarse en la postura de ganar-ganar como condición del éxito de la negociación, y estas técnicas facilitan los intercambios y pueden obtener resultados positivos para las partes incluidas. Si alguna de las partes insiste en llevarse todo el resultado positivo, y condenar al otro a la derrota, la negociación es un fracaso al corto y mediano plazo, es decir es condenada a la derrota definitivamente.

La postura negociadora de proponer un diálogo constructivo es muy valiosa y facilita la comprensión de los diversos intereses en juego. Sin embargo, puede ser grave como postura si no tiene en cuenta a los excluidos de la negociación".  

Continuar leyendo en Cuba Encuentro >>

---------------------------

lo que me resta es pedirle a norberto fuentes que ponga a disposicion de los comentaristas una edicion resumida de las 2,800 cuartillas de la "autobiografia" del demonio en jefe, a ver si cogemos el camino y no andamos por guardarrayas, que tiempecito suficiente ha transcurrido ya para que profanos y akademicos intuyan -al menos- que aqui el unico dialogo es el nuestro [del neocastrismo]: genuflexo y y hacendosito.

by the way. estimada marlene, para poner en practica "las elementales tácticas de negociación" se requiere disponer de una cuota de poder con capacidad de convocatoria [obligatoria] para la otra parte.

Putin to visit Iran for nuclear talks: report

spacewar

By Staff Writers

Moscow (AFP) July 24, 2013

President Vladimir Putin is to visit Iran in August to try to restart talks on Tehran's controversial nuclnegocear drive, a Russian newspaper reported Wednesday.
Putin's visit is planned for mid-August, shortly after Iran's moderate new president Hassan Rowhani takes office on August 3, Kommersant reported, citing sources in the Kremlin and the Iranian foreign ministry.
Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told AFP: "I cannot so far confirm this".
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Araqchi told the ISNA news agency: "I do not confirm the report regarding Putin's visit," which would be his first to Iran since 2007.
Moscow hopes the visit will provide impetus to restart the currently stalled talks on Iran's nuclear programme, Kommersant reported.
It cited a source in the Iranian foreign ministry as saying the trip would take place August 12-13. It said a Kremlin source confirmed the trip, but said it was not yet decided whether it would last one or two days.
Western governments have expressed cautious hopes for a change in tone in talks after the June election of Rowhani, a centrist cleric who has vowed to engage constructively with the international community in a bid to ease the burden of EU and US sanctions on Iran's economy.
Russia is a member of the so-called P5+1 group made up of the five UN Security Council permanent members plus Germany that has for years been engaged in talks with Iran to try to persuade it to curb sensitive nuclear activities.
After the last round in Almaty in April, the talks were put on hold as Iran prepared to choose a successor to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Ahmadinejad's eight-year term was marked by a defiant expansion of the Iranian nuclear programme, which fuelled Western suspicions that it masked a drive for a weapons capability.
Both the European Union and the United States slapped tough sanctions on Iran's key oil and banking sectors which have taken a heavy toll on the economy.
During his election campaign, Rowhani hit out at the "sloganising" of the Ahmadinejad regime, which he said had unnecessarily aggravated the sanctions, and promised a more conciliatory approach in a bid to get them eased.
Following Rowhani's election, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called on the West to consider relaxing the sanctions, saying Tehran was ready to make a major concession.

Kerry: Peace talks with Taliban need to ’get back on track’ after delay

usnews

Jacquelyn Martin / AP

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry walks through the airport with
Ambassador Ibrahim Fakhroo, Qatari Chief of Protocol after
being greeted on arrival in Doha, Qatar on Saturday.

By Catherine Chomiak, Akbar Shinwari and Daniel Arkin, NBC News

Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday that the U.S. wants to see proposed peace talks with the Taliban “get back on track” after being thrown into doubt this week amid a diplomatic dispute with the Afghan government.

“We need to see if we can get back on track,” Kerry told a news conference in Qatar. “I don’t know whether that’s possible or not.”

Peace talks between U.S. and Taliban representatives were thrown off course Wednesday after irate Afghan President Hamid Karzai  suspended his involvement due to a dispute over a recently opened Taliban office in the Qatari capital of Doha, which had been established in anticipation of the proposed talks.

In a statement, Karzai accused the U.S. of a "contradiction” after a sign that was placed over the Taliban office bore the name of the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan” – the country’s title during the Taliban regime of the 1990s.

Amid a diplomatic kerfuffle, the State Department on Wednesday announced that the Qatari government removed the sign board bearing the disputed name.

Related: Kerry calls Afghanistan's Karzai to ease anger over Taliban office

"The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs has issued a statement clarifying that the name of the office is the Political Office of the Afghan Taliban and not the Political Office of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, and that it had the sign with the incorrect name in front of the door taken down," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. 

Kerry on Saturday warned that the Taliban office may need to be shuttered if peace talks do not resume as planned.

“If there is not a decision … to move forward by the Taliban in short order, then we may have to consider whether or not the office has to be closed,” Kerry said.

The Taliban has offered to deliver the only known American prisoner of war from the 12-year-long conflict in return for five senior operatives held at Guantanamo Bay, Taliban sources told NBC News.

Related: Taliban offers to swap American POW for five Gitmo detainees

U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, 27, from Hailey, Idaho, has been held in captivity since 2009 after disappearing from his base in Afghanistan. His exact location is unknown, but he is believed to be held in Pakistan by the Haqqani network.

The negotiation's conditions require the Taliban to sever ties with al Qaeda, put an end to violence and accept the Afghan constitution, in particular protections for women and minorities, Obama administration officials told NBC News.