[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 118 (Friday, August 19, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 19, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                                  CUBA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Goss] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to take a moment to say that I 
think many Americans have just observed the President of the United 
States doing a press conference on the situation in Cuba, among other 
things.
  The President has indicated that we are basically adopting a 
different procedure toward people who are trying to flee from the 
oppression of Castro's Cuba. Apparently we are going to divert people 
who are leaving Cuba to get away from that oppression to other safe 
haven areas.
  Unfortunately, we have not had any specifics of that. We need to know 
what those safe haven areas are going to be.
  The President specifically mentioned, Mr. Speaker, that they were 
going to use Guantanamo Bay, which I suppose makes some sense because 
that is in Cuba. The problem with using Guantanamo Bay, of course, is 
that it may violate some of the contractual arrangements we have on 
that base.
  The other serious problem is that there are already about 15,000 
Haitian refugees as a result of our problem policy with regard to 
Haiti. So it seems to me that there is going to be a need to find some 
additional safe havens, because I do not think there is any likelihood 
that the cruel oppressive violation of human rights policies of Fidel 
Castro are going to change any time soon.
  Inevitably, there are going to be people who are trying to get away 
from the Castro regime especially at a time when the country's economy 
is crumbling very rapidly because they have lost some of the special 
arrangements they had with the former Soviet client states.

                              {time}  1420

  These are very tough times for Cubans in Cuba, Mr. Speaker, and it 
appears that now we have altered our policy to deal with their 
expression of trying to get away, but we really have not explained it 
very well. Mr. Speaker, I hope that the American people will be as 
curious as I am and asking the specific questions, as one reporter did 
of the President, saying ``Where specifically are these safe havens 
going to be, Mr. President,'' and the President was unable to say 
anything further except ``Guantanamo and other places we are working 
on.''
  The second point needs to be made, and I do not think the President 
responded to the question that I think I heard asked, and that is ``Why 
don't we tighten up the embargo, the sanctions on trade and commerce, 
with Fidel Castro the same way we have tightened them up on Haiti, 
which is nowhere near as serious a problem in terms of our national 
security or in terms of the friendly relations we have had with that 
country over many years.
  Yes, we have an illegal leadership going on in Haiti that is 
comprised of a military junta, but it has certainly never taken to 
hostility in the way Fidel Castro has exhibited. Yet we are really 
breaking our necks, spending many, many dollars trying to tighten the 
noose around Haiti, a small friendly neighboring country in the 
Caribbean, and we are not giving those same types of efforts to tighten 
the embargo down on Cuba.
  I would point out that friendly countries like Mexico, Jamaica, 
Spain, other Latin American countries are freely carrying on commerce, 
sort of flaunting the embargo at us. It seems to me that one of our 
areas of diplomacy clearly ought to be to get the cooperation of our 
allies to get serious about getting tough on Fidel Castro's regime.
  I think the final problem, Mr. Speaker, is I surely hope that we come 
up with a better program to deal with foreign policy in the Caribbean 
than we have been seeing in the Clinton administration so far. It is 
not that we have not tried to give them advice and good suggestions. It 
just seems like they are not listening.
  We may very well be looking at the prospect of people in the Florida 
Straits trying to get away from Fidel Castro and people in the Windward 
Passage trying to get away from the misery we are producing in Haiti, 
and our United States Coast Guard and Navy and a tent city on 
Guantanamo, all at a time when the third hurricane of the season hits 
next week. Let us pray that does not happen, Mr. Speaker, and let us 
pray that we get some foreign policy out of the State Department before 
then. I think it is important.

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