Cuba to Show Opportunity of Economic Updating in Panama

Havana, Apr 6 (Prensa Latina) Cuba will show during the business forum, parallel to the Seventh Summit of the Americas in Panama, several opportunities its economic updating offers to the world, an official source stated today. Interviewed by the Cuban News Agency, Rodrigo Malmierca, Minister for Foreign Trade and Foreign Investment, said Cuba is going to the forum to show the possibilities this process is giving, as of the approval of Law 118 of the Foreign Investment and the Mariel Special Development Zone.

These are two essential issues to explain, as they are an expression on how much the island is making to update its national model, while it reflects how our country is today very different to previous decades, mainly in the economic sphere, Malmierca said.

In such sense, he stated that the current changes point to a more efficient model, where the state socialist enterprise and planning are playing a main role, but in which other non-state forms of production and services have also an important role.

In a context marked by the announcement of Cuba and the United States of moving forward to normalization of ties, Malmierca stated that the Cuban part has always been in favor of the existence of relations with the northern country, especially in the economic sphere, where the effects caused by the Washington economic blockade on the island still persist.

That policy imposed more than 50 years ago, remains intact today. Those measures, provided by U.S. President Barack Obama (as part of the December 17 normalization announcement) are incomplete and insufficient, and does not change the essence of that unilateral measure by the U.S government against Cuba, he warned.

The minister stressed that if diplomatic relations are re-established and some of the trade restrictions are lifted, U.S. business people will enjoy the same treatment to that offered to the rest of the world that maintains today ties with Cuba.

Although the U.S. president cannot eliminate the blockade, he has broad prerogatives “beyond the measures approved in January 2015,” which could contribute with substantive steps to move towards the normalization of bilateral relations, he said.