France: Forthcoming Book on U.S. Blockade of Cuba
Source: Prensa Latina, 08 August 2011.
A historical and legal analysis of U.S. political, economic and commercial sanctions against Cuba is the idea behind a book soon to be published by French Professor Salim Lamrani in his country.
The blockade is the most developed, sophisticated and long-lasting network ever implemented by one country against another, said Lamrani, an expert in Cuba-U.S. relations, in an exclusive interview with Prensa Latina during the Meeting of Coordinators of the Network in Defense of Humanity.
State of Siege: The U.S. Economic Sanctions against Cuba, a Historical and Juridical Perspective, is the title of the book, whose French edition will be launched at the offices of the newspaper L'Humanite in September.
The book, with a prologue by the former chief of the U.S. Interest Section in Cuba, Wayne Smith, reviews Cuba-U.S. relations from 1960, when the blockade came into force, to the current Barack Obama administration. It also analyzes the blockade's impact on Cuba's public health, the extraterritorial nature of anti-Cuba measures and U.S. society's opposition to Washington's hostile policy.
Lamrani, a journalist and professor at the universities of Paris-Descartes and Paris-Est Marne-la Vallee, stated that Cuba-U.S. relations can not be explained from the beginning of the Cold War, although that was Washington's political rhetoric from 1959 to 1989. However, after the demise of the former Soviet Union, the U.S. stepped up its sanctions on Cuba with the Torricelli and Helms-Burton laws.
The author mentioned a December 23, 1958 memorandum declassified by the U.S. National Security Council, quoting CIA Director Allan Dulles as saying, "We have to prevent Castro's victory."
An analysis of nationalizations during the early years of the Cuban Revolution, in the light of international law, shows that other countries affected, including European nations, accepted the measures. Only the United States demanded "effective, appropriate and rapid" compensation, Lamrani said.
