On Cuba, Díaz-Balart speaks for McCain

John McCain has designated Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart (R-Fla.) as adviser and spokesman on matters related to Latin America, the Agence France-Presse reports. In St. Paul, Minn., the Cuban-born Díaz-Balart sat down Sunday with the French news agency to spell out the candidate's stances. Among them:
• In a McCain administration, "there would be an even greater interest on the part of the U.S. president [...] in the need to help the domestic opposition and the civilian society" in Cuba. That would mean maintaining the embargo "until a democratic transition occurs in Cuba" and three conditions are met: "the release of political prisoners, the legalization of all parties, the press and labor unions, and a call for an electoral process."
• The U.S. will maintain "a closer relationship with our friends, such as Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Peru and other, very friendly governments" in the hemisphere.
• "McCain is aware that [Venezuelan President Hugo] Chávez is a threat for the entire hemisphere, that Chávez is funding destabilizing elements throughout the hemisphere. There is a need to counter Chávez's efforts to destabilize the democracies in the hemisphere through the utilization of the economic power given to him by his oil. Much of the problem we have with Bolivia and Ecuador comes from the utilization by Mr. Chávez of Venezuela's resources to expand his influence and anti-American agenda. What we're seeing in those countries is very worrisome."
To read the AFP article (in Spanish), click here. [Photo shows McCain and Díaz-Balart in Miami in May.]
---Renato Pérez Pizarro.

Comments

[Walter Lippmann]

Lincoln's father was a fan of Batista:

Mr. SOURWINE. Did you ever hold office under any President other than Batista?

Mr. DIAZ BALART. No, Sir.

Mr. SOURWINE. Were you, then, a pro-Batista Cuban? You were part of the Batista government?

Mr. DIAZ BALART. Yes. I was pro-Batista before 1952, when the party that he founded-he called it a new party, and he called the Cuban youth to join that party in order to fight for order, for progress, and for stability of the Cuban country. And I liked those principles. I joined him in the opposition. I was the leader of the youth party in all the nation while we were in the opposition. And in 1952, when the coup d'etat took place-in 1952, 10th of March-I continued with Batista, because he promised to give the country progress and stability, and I was very much concerned with the terrible situation of my country before those years when the life, the human life didn't have any value at all. And being a Christian, as I am, I have always thought that it is not possible to think in any other human principle in any country if you dont have before anything the guarantee of the human life, and of the human dignity.

Mr. SOURWINE. When did you leave the Batista government?

Mr. DIAZ BALART. I was elected in 1954 a congressman, and I continued within the government of Batista with very definite and peculiar point of view, as head of the youth movement. We were asking Batista in private and in public for honesty in the government, for progress, for stability, for free elections, and there is a matter of record, even in the U.S. magazine like Time, of that time, when we asked in a big rally of more than 80,000 young men and women all throughout the island headed by me, we asked Batista to have free elections.

READ ALL OF HIS TESTIMONY HERE:
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/us-cuba/diaz-balart.htm