Costa Rican President Oscar Arias urges Latin American nations to prod Cuba toward democracy

Posted on Wed, Sep. 13, 2006

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias urges Latin American nations to prod
Cuba toward democracy
BY PABLO BACHELET
pbachelet@MiamiHerald.com

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias launched The Miami Herald Americas
Conference Wednesday evening with an impassioned plea to Latin American
nations to spurn populism and urge Cuba to take a democratic path.

''Latin America has reached a crossroads,'' the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize
winner told a dinner gathering at the Biltmore Hotel.

''It can consolidate the gains that it has made through economic
integration with the world, or it can slide backwards,'' he said,
``falling captive to populist rhetoric and to the shrill voices of those
who see globalization as the root of all evil.''

The Costa Rican leader narrowly won an election earlier this year on a
platform of joining a free trade agreement with the United States and
four other nations. Although he didn't single out Venezuelan President
Hugo Chávez, Chávez has been a critic of trade pacts with Washington.

But Arias' bluntest language was directed at Cuba, making him the most
outspoken Latin American leader on events unfolding in Havana after
Fidel Castro was pronounced ill on July 31 and replaced temporarily by
his brother Raúl.

Latin America, he said, can strengthen its democratic institutions and
``join together with one voice of hope so that the Cuban people can
enjoy the liberty that has been denied to them.''

His remarks came after Arias wrote an opinion piece in the La Nación
newspaper of San José, Costa Rica, on Aug. 29, urging Cuba to embrace
democracy. No other Latin American nation has so far joined Arias in
calling for democratic reforms in Havana.

He said Cuba was, ''plain and simple, a dictatorship'' that had ''robbed
the Cuban people of their liberty'' and ``condemned to poverty a nation
that could very well have been the first developed nation in Latin
America.''

He said countries like India and other Asian economic powers, as well as
Chile, had developed more and reduced poverty by embracing globalization
and Latin America needed to do the same.

He proposed the ''Costa Rica Consensus,'' to forgive debt and provide
financial assistance to countries that spend more on education, health
and housing and less on ``soldiers and weapons.''

He said the region needed to ``abandon the sterile debates, the excuses
and the tall tales of the past.''

The two-day Americas Conference will look at Latin America's role in the
global economy.

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