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Fidel Castro's humiliation by Mexico's President Fox


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By Claudio Campuzano
SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

April 29, 2002

The reason Fidel Castro gave for making public his phone conversation with Mexico's president Vicente Fox on the eve of his attendance to the recent United Nations meeting at Monterrey, that gathered a large number of chiefs of state, was that he wanted to show that Fox "was a liar."

The Cuban dictator said the conversation showed that Fox had indeed pressured him to condition his assistance to Monterrey to President Bush's desire of not having to run into Castro at the summit meeting-and that the Mexican president had lied when he publicly said this was not so.

By reading the transcript of that conversation on Cuban television, in front of expressly invited foreign correspondents, Castro violated the established and respected custom of maintaining the privacy of communications between chiefs of state. Thus, the first thing Castro proved was that his word cannot be trusted.

"First of all, I would like to say to you that this conversation is private, between us two. Do you agree?," Fox said at the very beginning of the communication. "Yes, I agree," was Castro's answer.

A few days later, this is what Granma, the official daily of the Communist Party of Cuba, reported:

"Commander-in-chief Fidel Castro revealed Monday to Cuban and international public opinion that, in spite of denials by high officials of the Mexican government, it was the Mexican president Vicente Fox himself who conditioned the presence of the Cuban ruler in that country on the occasion of the Summit Over Development Financing at the city of Monterrey . . . Fidel read the transcript of the phone conversation with Mexico's chief of state, on the eve of that summit, in which Fox says that the presence of the leader of the Cuban Revolution would cause him many problems. Fidel explained that for ethical reasons and so that Mexico's prestige would not be damaged nor a domestic situation in that nation be provoked, Cuba has abstained from releasing the proofs of how his presence in Monterrey was subject to pressures and conditioning."

Why release the transcript now? Because Castro was furious that Mexico had voted at the Geneva meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Commission in favor of censoring the Cuban regime. Castro — who called that vote a "despicable betrayal — decided to make public the conversation he had with Fox, with the idea that it would show how the Mexican president had bent to U.S. wishes.

However, what the phone dialogue shows is that the explanations given later by Fox about his intervention in this matter were nothing more than a charitable lie to cover up the truth that Castro was so anxious to attend the meeting that he was ready to accept humbling conditions to be at Monterrey.

It shows too that Fox is not dumb and knows which are the national interests of Mexico he must have in mind. Between maintaining a good relationship with the president of the United States, the country that is Mexico's largest trade partner and the safety valve for its structural unemployment, and satisfying the ego of the decadent dictator of a country economically in ruins that has nothing to offer to Mexico, Fox opted for pressuring Castro to adjust himself to Bush's request.

A careful reading of the transcript of the conversation between Fox and Castro shows that, facing the pressure exerted by the Mexican president, the Cuban dictator raised only weak objections, that he quickly abandoned, and eventually accepted all the conditions imposed on him by Fox, from setting the day and time of his arrival and the day and time of his departure to even telling him how he should behave at the meeting.

Fox tells Castro he hopes "you can come Thursday and that you participate of the session and make your presentation . . . Later we have a luncheon, offered by the state's governor to the chiefs of state; I even invite you to be sitting next to me and, with the event over, let's say, you would return [to Cuba] . . . And that you leave Friday free for me — and this is what I ask of you — so that you do not complicate Friday for me . . .," the day on which Bush was arriving.

Castro responds: "Then I will accommodate you even more . . . It would be better if I arrive there at night . . . Around 10:00 at night or something like that." To which Fox interjects "Ah!, you would arrive Wednesday night," as Castro goes on to say "Yes, so nobody can see me . . . I will be seen in the morning there".

This is not good enough for Fox, and he pressures Castro even more: "Make it even later, more like midnight or the early [Thursday] hours."

Following Castro's "Okay," Fox reminds him of the luncheon: "It would be at 1:00 or 1:30 in the afternoon and, once you've eaten, you may go." Then the Mexican president asked of Castro that he refrain while at Monterrey of "attacking President Bush or the United States." And again Castro agrees, an agreement he indeed respected.

Fox closes the conversation reminding Castro of the logistics he has imposed on him: "You come with me to the luncheon and from there you go back [to Cuba]." Castro agrees: "And from there I follow your orders and go back."

It is true that, as Granma says, "it was the Mexican president himself, Vicente Fox, who conditioned the presence of the Cuban ruler in that country" during the Monterrey meeting. But it also true that Fidel Castro meekly accepted all the conditions imposed upon him by the Mexican president.

Claudio Campuzano (claudio-campuzano@hotmail.com) is U.S, correspondent for the Latin American newsweekly Tiempos del Mundo and editorial page editor of the New York daily Noticias del Mundo. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com

April 29, 2002

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