MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Rousseff downplays human rights issue during her visit to Cuba
The Brazilian president favours a strategic cooperation with Cuba Visiting Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff refused to criticize Cuba’s human rights record on Tuesday, saying the issue should not be used to score ideological points.
”One should sweep one's own house before criticizing others. We in Brazil also have (human rights problems). Therefore I am willing to discuss human rights from a multilateral perspective“ she told reporters before conferring with President Raul Castro.
Rousseff stressed that human rights should not be ”a weapon for ideological political warfare.“
In the case of Cuban opposition blogger Yoani Sanchez, who has been granted a visa by Brasilia, Rousseff said it was not up to Brazil to decide whether Cuban authorities should give the renowned dissident an exit visa.
Sanchez, who hopes to attend the premiere in Brazil of a documentary by Brazilian director Dado Galvao on February 10, has been denied permission to leave the island.
Known worldwide for her award-winning blog ”Generation Y,“ she won the 2008 Ortega y Gasset prize for online journalism from Madrid daily El Pais.
Rousseff has no plans to meet with dissidents, according to her entourage. But Brazil's first woman president confirmed that she planned to call on revolutionary icon and former president Fidel Castro.
”I await this meeting with a lot of pride” said the former leftist guerrilla who was tortured under her country's military dictatorship (1964-1985).
Rousseff restated her opposition to the 50-year-old US trade embargo against Cuba and said the best way of countering it was to offer “our collaboration to Cuba in various fields”.
She pointed to the “favourable strategic cooperation” between the two countries in areas such as biotechnology, an area where Cuba excels and in which Brazil can offer high tech capabilities. Rousseff' talks with her Cuban counterpart focused on increased economic cooperation.
Rousseff is expected to announce a 70 million dollars credit for Cuban small-scale agriculture, on top of the 450 million dollars Brasilia has already earmarked for the expansion of the port of Mariel, 50 kilometres west of Havana.
The two countries had record trade of 642 million dollars in 2011, making Brazil Cuba's second largest Latin American trading partner, after Venezuela. But Brazilian exports to Cuba account for 550 million of the trade, an imbalance that both sides want to correct.
Rousseff's visit came as Brazilian construction company Odebrecht announced it would sign an agreement with Cuba's state-run sugar producer Azcuba, to boost production in Cienfuegos province.
Diplomatic sources here said the two countries were also mulling an agreement for joint production of generic medicines and bio fuels.
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Read all commentsRousseff says:
Feb 01st, 2012 - 10:35 am 0Human Rights should not be “ weapon for ideaological political warfare”..
I say :
The charter of UN is not as clear as it could be when it comes to saving lives within countries in situations of mass cruelties...
Article 2.7 prohibits intervention--in matters which are essentially within a jurisdiction of any State-- there has been a result a long standing argument in international community between those who insist on -- right to intervene--in man -- made catastrophes and those who argue that the Security Council for all its power under Chapte VII to -- maintain or restore international security--is prohibited from authorizing and coercive action against sovereign States for whatever happens within their borders.....!......................
I can see that for my president , Human rights is not an weapon when you have ideological ties with the opressor, this message is clear. Roussef lost a big moment to shut the mouth.
Feb 01st, 2012 - 07:07 pm 0First he avoid the biggest and more important economic forum of the world to go to a “Social“ event, putting her own will before the country‘s one.
Now,that statement.
Sometimes i miss Lula, at least he knows where the country interest is located.
Greetings.
If you can do business with Cuba, do it and indeed, you should not use human rights as a weapon to hurt a nation with who you can do business with and from there improve people's life. For the rest she made sense, mind your own business.
Feb 02nd, 2012 - 04:08 am 0“First he avoid the biggest and more important economic forum of the world to go to a “Social“ event, putting her own will before the country‘s one.”
Didn't she go to Porto Alegre-RS for the World Social Forum?
Why bother a “club of crooks” in Davos, who created the so called credit crisis and now come with their solutions? Dilma didn't go because she understood that it was a waste of time.
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