In March 2017 a weekend National Conference for the Normalization of US-Cuba Relations was organized in New York City at the Fordham University School of Law. Some 250 people attended, including Cuban representatives from the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) and the Cuban Mission to the United Nations. (see www.us-cubanormalization.org) for the extensive archives of that historic gathering)
A second larger and broader International Conference was scheduled to take place March 18-20, 2020 in New York City. This projected gathering had about 300 organizational and individual sponsors and was building strongly, but the initial upsurge of the pandemic led to inevitable postponement.
Since then the International US-Cuba Normalization Conference Coalition https://www.us-cubanormalization.org/ has maintained our united front efforts against Washington’s anti-Cuba sanctions, continued to meet on zoom, and has organized some 15 excellent, well-attended webinars about Cuba. (These can be accessed on our website.) Through these webinars our growing movement has accumulated over 3500 distinct emails as well as greatly expanding our fraternal relations with veteran and new activists and organizations.
We have also, as conditions permitted supported street actions in the US and Canada, particularly the Bridges of Love Caravans initiated by Carlos Lazo and Cuban-American families and activists. One of our major strengths has been the full support and mutual collaboration from the US National Network on Cuba (NNOC, the Canadian Network on Cuba (CNC) and La Table de Concertation et de Solidarité Québec – Cuba (La Table).
Under the auspices of the NNOC, CNC, and La Table our movement launched the Saving Lives Campaign for US-Cuba-Canada Medical Cooperation in summer 2020 which worked with much success to pass over 30 Resolutions against US anti-Cuba policy and sanctions from coast to coast. Most recently partnering with Global Health Partners we raised over $650,000 to deliver six million syringes to Cuba with another 2 million purchased and delivered by our sisters and brothers in the CNC and La Table.
Much Has Changed
US-Cuba relations have changed significantly since March 2020. Any hopes that the Biden administration would return to Obama’s limited, partial opening towards Cuba have been dashed. Indeed the chances of even a modest overturning of some of Trump’s 243 blockade-tightening measures have clearly diminished for now. Emboldened by the highly orchestrated events of July 11th in Cuba, the Biden Administration is putting its hopes in reviving regime change subversion and destabilization policies to once-and-for-all overthrow the Cuban Revolution.
Meanwhile Cuba has been stable ever since and is on track to fully vaccinate its population, including children, against COVID in 2021 with home grown, highly efficacious vaccines which are driving down infections and deaths sharply. On November 15th Cuba started reopening its devastated tourism industry and Cuban children returned to school after 20 months of virtual education.
The Cuba solidarity movement has also moved on. It is stronger and more united than it has been in decades. It has made progress in broadening the movement but there is still much work to be done on that front.
It is in this context that we want to hold another internationally attended US-Cuba Normalization Conference – partly in person but also taking advantage of Zoom and other technologies to broadcast throughout the continent, hemisphere and beyond. But before putting out the International Conference Call we want to reach out to organizations and movements that weren’t part of the 2020 conference planning – to seek out their ideas and solicit their involvement in planning and carrying out the International Conference.
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