The Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Manuel Insulza, will travel to Havana invited by Raul Castro to participate in the II Summit of CELAC (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States).
On January 28 and 29, Insulza will join the rest of the presidents and prime ministers from the region who will participate in this annual political meeting, attended by all heads of state and government of the Western Hemisphere, except from the U.S. and Canada.
The presence of the Secretary General of the OAS in Havana has a very special diplomat significant because Cuba was suspended from the organization in 1962.
The separation of Cuba from OAS was formally lifted in 2009. But Cuba didn’t rejoin the organization although it was considered from that date a Member State.
Until 2012, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Cuba had on its website a page dedicated to the “shameful history of the OAS” and another to an account of the actions of that organization against the country.
However, the Government of Cuba has shown interest in attending the meeting, although the lack of consensus among the remaining 34 countries prevented it from being present in the recent Summit of the Americas held in April 2012 in Cartagena de Indias ( Colombia ) .
Insulza , meanwhile , said that he ” sees no reason ” why Cuba should not attend the next Summit of the Americas, to be held in Panama in 2015, and the Panamanian Foreign Minister Fernando Nunez Fabrega, said last year that “The time of the opening to Cuba , to smooth things over and animosity against Cuba, has come .”
However, the United States and Canada have so far maintained that Cuba should not participate in the Summits of the Americas until there is a democratic change on the island.
