Spain plans to continue upgrading EU relations with Cuba (Roundup)

Jan 5, 2010, 15:24 GMT

Madrid - Spain plans to go forward improving the European Union's relations with Cuba despite a row over Havana's refusal to grant entry to a Spanish member of the European Parliament, Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said Tuesday.

'Isolation, blockage and embargo (against Cuba) do not lead to anything. They have not given any results in 50 years,' said Moratinos.

Spain took over the rotating EU presidency on January 1.

Moratinos made the comments while a secretary of state for Ibero-American affairs was meeting with the Cuban ambassador over the case of Luis Yanez, a member of the European Parliament who was barred entry at Havana airport on Monday.

Juan Pablo de Laiglesia told Cuban ambassador Alejandro Gonzalez Galiano that Madrid 'hoped' not to see more similar incidents, which did not favour developing bilateral relations, the Foreign Ministry said.

Gonzalez Galiano replied that Yanez had been refused entry 'in application of Cuban internal legislation.'

Yanez said his private visit to Cuba did not have a 'hidden agenda,' but admitted he might have contacted Cuban 'democratic' friends. Sources of Yanez' Socialist Party earlier admitted that he was known for his contacts with dissidents.

Moratinos said Cuba had 'made a mistake,' but that Spain would not change its plans to modify the EU's 1996 common position on Cuba, which links relations to democracy and respect for human rights on the Caribbean island.

The EU's new relations with Cuba would include initiatives in favour of human rights on the island, which had 200 political prisoners, the minister said.