[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 60 (Monday, May 13, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S4248]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          SELLING FOOD TO CUBA

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, let me talk about two other issues 
briefly. One is a letter I received last Friday from Secretary of State 
Colin Powell. This relates to a decision by the State Department to 
cancel the visas for Cubans coming to our country to buy additional 
food. Since the hurricane, they have purchased over $70 million in 
American food. That is available for them to purchase because I and my 
colleague from Connecticut, Senator Dodd, and others changed the law to 
allow food sales to Cuba. Strangely enough, they have to pay in cash 
and do it through a French bank; nonetheless, they can finally buy 
American food.
  We ought never use food as a weapon, and we have done it for 40 years 
with Cuba. That is over. They are now buying food from this country. We 
had a group of people representing Alimport, including Pedro Alvarez 
and others, coming to this country to buy food. They were coming, in 
fact, to North Dakota and they were going to buy dried beans and wheat. 
They were granted a visa by the State Department, and then immediately 
that visa was revoked. I asked Secretary Powell, ``By what authority 
was it revoked and why?''
  Let me use a couple of charts to see what happened on this issue. 
This is a news story about it:

       A State Department official confirmed Wednesday that the 
     administration policy is not to encourage sales of food to 
     Cuba.

  In the letter from Secretary Powell, he disavows that, but that is 
what they told us: It is our policy not to encourage food sales to 
Cuba. I said it is a brainless policy to decide you do not want to sell 
food to Cuba; you ought to sell food to Cuba. We sell it to China, a 
Communist country. We sell it to Vietnam, a Communist country. And we 
are told we do not want to sell food to Cuba? Does anybody think Fidel 
Castro has not eaten a meal along the way because we had an obstruction 
on the sale of food to Cuba? No, it just hurts sick people, poor 
people, and hungry people. This is what this policy has represented.
  At a hearing last week when I raised this question with Secretary 
Powell, he said: I have never heard of this policy not to encourage 
food sales to Cuba. In fact, he said additional sales should be 
encouraged so long as American farmers benefit.
  The Farm Bureau said the cancellation of Mr. Alvarez's visa will 
adversely affect the sale of corn, rice, wheat, poultry, soybeans, 
lentils, and eggs, valued at $35 million.
  I received a four-page letter from Secretary Powell. Frankly, it does 
not answer any of the questions. It says Mr. Alvarez's visa was revoked 
because of a 1985 then-President Ronald Reagan directive. He also said: 
Mr. Alvarez was here once before and he lobbied to undermine the U.S. 
embargo. I guess when he was here before, he said Cuba would like to 
have a circumstance where they could buy food from American farmers. 
The State Department considers that undermining America's interest. 
Give me a break. Mr. Secretary, that does not undermine anything. I 
hope the State Department and others will pay a little more attention 
to the issue of terrorists getting bombs, not Cubans buying dried beans 
and wheat.
  The subcommittee which I chair is going to hold a hearing, and I will 
ask the Assistant Secretary, Mr. Reich, to come to Congress and explain 
who decided to revoke these visas.

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