PARLIAMENT PASSED a resolution yesterday, sending an unequivocal message to the United States (US) that it should remove the 50-year-old economic embargo against Cuba.
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Dr Ken Baugh told his colleagues in Parliament that Jamaica would register a 'yes' vote today on a resolution being taken at the United Nations for the lifting of the decades-old blockade.
Developed and developing states have, for the last 18 years, passed an affirmative resolution in support of the dismantling of the economic and commercial blockade against the communist state.
Baugh's comments came yesterday during a debate on a private member's motion moved by Opposition spokesman on foreign affairs and foreign trade, Anthony Hylton.
Cold war relic
Hylton argued that the overwhelming majority of the international community felt that the economic blockade against Cuba was a relic of the Cold War era.
Highlighting the effects of the current recession on countries around the globe, Hylton indicated that the embargo against Cuba was particularly punitive at this time.
"We urge the Parliament through this resolution to send a message to President (Barack) Obama and the progressive forces within his administration and the US Congress that we share their determination and will to reset the policies on Cuba … " he said.
In his presentation to the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago in April this year, Obama suggested that his country would be seeking to forge a "new beginning with Cuba".
Hylton noted that officials from the US and Cuba have been holding behind-the-scenes talks on a range of issues affecting the normalisation of relations between Washington and Havana.
Member of Parliament for East Portland, Dr Donald Rhodd, who pursued studies in Cuba in the 1970s and '80s, spoke passionately about the contribution that country continued to make in the field of education to the developing world.
"The world has a moral obligation to support this resolution," he said.
edmond.campbell@gleanerjm.com