Foreign policy in the United States. Hosted by the institute for policy studies, this is one hour and a half. The institute for policy studies, for those who dont know, and i should know, but sometimes the wording is a little hard to remember, is a progressive think tank dedicated to building a more equitable and ecologically sustainable and Peaceful Society and turn policies into action. That is where you are. Events coordinator here at the institute for policy studies. I will also mention a couple of relevant applications outside. And the , and nowonal community that the cuban five are free, we work for the end of the u. S. Blockade against cuba and normalizing relations between the United States and cuba. Also, im an organizer in the black alliance for peace, which stands against all unilateral sanctions. Today, you will hear a presentation that will unpack the current relations between the u. S. And cuba. A lot of misnomers and popular misconceptions about cuba that are a result of many reasons and strained relations. And then we also want to hear about the benefits of a normalized u. S. Cuba relations for both the people of cuba and the people of the United States. To so we are im going turn it over to miguel who will give this presentation. It will be great. Im sorry. A lot of people know why that mistake happened. It used to be something for so long. Since 2014, it is an official embassy. So im going to turn it over to him. He will give a presentation and then we will open it up for questions and answer for a halfhour and then we will be done. Let me say that miguel was appointed its in june 2014 to the then cuban intersection. Since 2006, he has worked in the ministry of Foreign Affairs in the north american divisions and the office of the minister. He served at the Cuban Embassy in canada as a member of the peoples Power Provincial Assembly of the city of havana and graduated summa come latte from the university of have been a faculty of law. He also has a masters of science and with foreign relations. O lets give it up for miguel [applause] good afternoon. Thank you so much for coming today. It is a pleasure for me to be here. I really believe this is very important. Today is a historic day. There is a vote in the United Nations right now about this. About the u. S. Blockade against cuba. 2015, came in 2015, june i started saying we were in the best moment in the relations in almost 60 years. Now in 2019, i cannot say that anymore unfortunately. But i will explain the history, the past, the present, and what we want for the future between both countries. This is a presentation i have been doing here in almost 46 american universities. Im trying to go everywhere to talk about u. S. Cuba relations. My passion. I believe we should have better relations. So this is something that people recognize of course, washington memorial here in washington, d. C. , but this is a memorial in havana, cuba. You will see how similar they are. We have the same colors in our flags. There is a lot of history between cuba and the United States. We kind o cannot change that. We cannot change the past. We can work for a better future. So i am going to start right now. I have some opening questions. What do you know about cuba . I believe this is very important. When i start with this question, people come with different answers and take cuba is famous because of cigars, rum. I say, what else . People say music. Ok, what else . People remember the missile crisis. That is the 1960s. What do you know about cuba . This is my first point. I really believe that there is not enough information about cuba. And there is a lot of information about cuba. I remember one student, not going to mention the university, that told me, i know about cuba. I said, what do you know about cuba . He said, i know i love lucy. Do you remember the tv series from the 1950s . You missed the last 50 years, and cuba is not ricky ricardo. How many of you would like to visit cuba . That is good. That is what we need. This happens every time. Every place i visit, people want to visit cuba. Again, for many reasons. They want to see the cars, the cuban history. I say that is my first advice. Go to cuba. See the real cuba. You consider cuba and the United States can have good relations . That is the question. Why not . Because cuba is a communist country. Ok. What about china . What about vietnam . The United States has wonderful relations with china and vietnam. Why not with cuba . How many soldiers have you lost in vietnam . According to what i read, 58,000 soldiers. How many in cuba . Oh, the problem is cuba has only one political party. Ok. United states has relations with countries that dont have political parties. What is the real question . Cuba. We could talk about that. I really believe the sanctions are the main violation of the rights of the cuban people the United States put for more than 60 years. Have you been in cuba . You can raise your hand. Ok. This is a good group. You can see the difference. I have been to 46 american universities. When i asked, would you like to visit cuba, they also yes. But when i ask if you have visited cuba, they have not been able to go to cuba. Why . Cuba is the only country in the world you need a license to travel to. Of aries are in the middle war right now. Your enemies in the middl right now, but you need a license to go to cuba. Why . Im going to start with this. Ok. What do you know about cuba . Of course, it is not i love lucy. Not scarface, not 20 montana, not what you see in the movies. You remember these movies from the 1980s or 1990s. According to this movie, the soviet Union Invaded cuba. It is not what happened but it is in your mind sometimes. This is a few good men. We can talk about guantanamo. You occupied guantanamo. It is part of the cuban territory. You have a base that nobody wants. According to this movie, when toni kroos arrived to guantanamo, he is dressed in white and somebody says dont dress in white because they will shoot you. Try to find one time that cuba has shot the u. S. Side. We have examples of u. S. Soldiers shooting cuban soldiers in the 1960s and people dying from that. Another example. You say, this is old. This is a navy survivor. It is a tv series. Now it is on netflix. You can see it. According to the president , the delegation wasnt to cuba and that delegation was captured by guerrillas. News, there are no guerrillas in cuba. This tv series, they believe it is true. So if you want a good recommendation, a good movie thet cuba, i recommend idea that the mafia was try to create a new havana was true. Bautista, the former dictator of cuba, trying to open the door for the mafia, was true. The golden phone, you can see it in havana. You can see the golden phone that was shown in the godfather, the second part lets start with this. Why the cuban revolution . I believe there is no country in the world, including any local economic where humiliation and exportation were worse than in cuba during the bautista regime. I will even go further to some extent because there were a number of things on the part of the United States. Now you have to pay for those things. In the agreement with the first cuban revolutionaries, that is perfectly clear. I was asked, do you know who says that . The majority do not know. Very easy. President kennedy. 1963, one month before he was assassinated. So people believe at that point he was trying to improve the relations. President howard cut the diplomatic relations between the u. S. And cuba 70 days before president kennedy took office. It was a disaster. Sentia organized that and to the president this is going to be easy, this is going to be easy. We will take power. The cuban people will be with us. It was a disaster. We have later the missile crisis. What happened . President kennedy was able to negotiate. We avoided a nuclear disaster. At this point, he was clear about the situation in cuba. Reason we made the revolution. What is cuba . I have to be brief. Cubans are known for long speeches but we are against the clock. This is cuba. We are 11 Million People. The population of ohio. We are smaller the pennsylvania. This is very important. Because every time you compare cuba, it is not fair. We have the same resources. By the way, this all comes from the world bank and also from the United Nations. So you can check all these numbers and this data. Most important, if you dont believe me, go to cuba. I really believe it is important. According to the world bank. , this is our labor force. Right now, more than 10 of the labor force in cuba is in the private sector, and that is a huge change from those tha. For those that say cuba does not change, what about the private sector . Recognizing the new cuban constitution that was approved in a referendum. By the way, i did not read that in the news unfortunately here. For mormore information about cuba. Lets go to the other one. Yes. Life expectancy. 78 years old. Mortality rates. Immunization. 99 of the children receive the vaccines for free. 8. 2ave, and this is huge, for physicians per 1000 people. 44 of the state numbers report less than one physician, and we have 8. 2. For that reason, we have doctors in more than 60 countries around the world. Not only venezuela like the media says. Not now. We started our collaboration since the 1960s. We have more than 400 doctors in haiti. Not when the earthquake happened. Before that for many years. Also, and this is data from cuba. We produce 52 of the medicines that we need in cuba. We dont produce enough food. Im going to talk about that later. We produce 62 of the medicines that we need. 100 of the cubans know how to read and write. But look at the world. More than 700 Million People dont know how to read and write right now, according to the united stations. Tocourse, 95 have access improved water sources permit 92 have access to improved sanitation facilities. This is how much we spent on education. 12. 8 ofee we spent our gdp. The highest on education worldwide. We have spent 12 of our gdp on health. We only spent 2. 9 on military. We know our priorities. We dont have enough resources. Yes . That is good. And dont give it too much time. Not to a lawyer. This is very important. Remember our gdp. People say, why dont you have more things . Because we dont have all the resources we want. We spent a majority of the resources on education and health care. We have many things we are proud of, as i showed. Let me Say Something here that is very important. I dont come here to say that we are perfect. I dont come here to say that we are the best country in the world. No. I come here to say we are proud of many things. We are a country that works. But we dont deserve the regime. We can Work Together. Not only with all the countries. With the United States. We can do many things together. We need to learn from each other. We are living in the same world. We are facing similar challenges. We are neighbors. All the people want us to be partners. We can be friends. To be very honest, after four years here, i saw a lot of respect for the cuban people. Love for cuba. For many reasons. I really believe we should have better relations. It is what the majority i believe wants. More information about cuba. That is poverty. We are humble. Again, not the things you have here. A social Justice System that provides people what people need. This is something for me that was very interesting. The Bloomberg Global health index 2019. You can see cuba has a better place than the United States. We have 74 points. You have 73 points. We are in place number 30 out of 169. According to bloomberg, we have the Better Health system. Again, my point is not to compare with the United States. It is not my point. The reason is im showing this because you are not going to read that in the media. All the things you are going to read about cuba is bad things. Cuba is one of the worst countries in the world. For that reason, the u. S. Government tried to justify the sanctions against cuba. This is something that is not cuban propaganda. It is what the world recognizes. I love sports. Of course, i cannot talk about Winter Sports because we dont have any winter in cuba. But in the summer olympic games, we have 78 gold medals. You know how expensive these ports are. The sports car. Before the cuban revolution, we did not have we probably have less than 10 gold medals. The majority of the metals come after 1969. The opportunity to practice the sport. It is not about money. It is about passion. The nationals won this year the world to reasonably believe because they dont have good player like bryce harper. It is not about money. It is about passion. So i put this because this was part of the new moment between the United States and cuba. Cubans and Major League Baseball is nothing new. Cubans in Major League Baseball is nothing new. You can see the first player came and played in 1871. 213e that time, we have cubans playing in Major League Baseball. Everyplace you visit, there is a history of cuban players. You know . For that reason, we were number three on opening day this year. We have 4 cubans. I have been there three times. Amazing place. A lot of history. We have 4 cubans. But you know what . It was a threat if they wanted to play in Major League Baseball get you are a russian player, you dont play in the national hockey. If you are chinese, you can play in the nba. If you are cuban, you have to defect to play Major League Baseball. Unfortunately, as you can see, cuba signed an agreement with Major League Baseball. The given Baseball Federation signed an agreement with Major League Baseball and the union in Major League Baseball. Unfortunately, the new administration canceled that deal. Can you imagine . 30 teams agreed to sign an agreement with cuba. It was about a sports. It was about to avoid human traffic. Because the majority of cuban players have to defect. They are part of the human traffic. So why they cannot play Major League Baseball . In the future. More information about cuba. This comes from nasa. You can see nasa put a tweet saying happy birthday to the first latin american and firstperson of african ancestry in space was a cuban. Cuba is the only country in the world to meet the criteria for sustainable developing. According to the world health organization, cuba is the first country in the world to syphilis and hiv. Again, it is a country that works. It is a country that is proud of many things. We can do better. Yes. We can improve many things. Yes. But we dont deserve sanctions. For more than 60 years. You can call it an embargo. You can call it a blockade. At the end of the day, the sanctions are hurting the people of cuba for over 60 years. So, this is about hunger. This is United Nations. You can see. Cuba is not a concerned about this. You can see that right now, 800 Million People go to bed hungry in the world. It is not the case of cuba. I really believe that there is a lot of misinformation in this country about what is the reality of cuba. But this is the United Nations. It is not cuba propaganda. I also put this. Women are very important. We really believe in that. Cuba is the number two with more women in our parliament, ou r national prominent. Cuba is number two. 53 of the cuba parliament. We are talking about women that are members of the National Parliament. You can see how many things we are proud to say about the women in cuba. Gaprding to the global report, 2018, cuba was 23 out of 149 countries. What that means, we are perfect . No. We can improve many things. Yes. But this is a reality. Critics aboutead cuba, i say, why dont you help to improve . So my internet. I remember when i came in 2015, people say why dont you have internet in cuba . I said we have internet in cuba. It is expensive, it is slow, but we need more technology and resources. But you know what . Now we have internet for everybody in cuba. Again, it is still expensive. It is still slow. We start with 3g. Now we are opening for 4g. It is not about will. It is about resources. We spend resources in health and education. But look at this. This is the United Nations. ,ast year, for the first time 51 of the cuban population was able to access internet. So the problem is not cuba. It is everywhere. You can see 57 again according to the United Nations are using internet in 2017. United states 87 . Can we compare the gdp and resources . Again, it is not that we dont want to open the internet. We did it. Because in our case, it is important for the education. So we believe it is an important tool. Lets save the questions for the end. Thank you. So why i put this . Because people say, wipe . Who are you . Which countries are the most important for you . We have Good Business with all the countries of the world. You can see and export, canada is our main partner. This comes from the Congressional Research service. Again, everything comes from american sources. You can see venezuela, china, and spain. When people come to our embassy and take, i want to visit with cuba, what can you say to us . I say, ask the canadians. We are doing business with everybody. , beforesee, 2016 for th the new administration changed what president obama did with cuba, we received in cuba