Drug policy and Cuba headline Summit of the Americas (+video)

Leaders from the Western Hemisphere meeting in this colonial port city over the weekend failed to agree on some of the region’s most contentious issues, but for the first time, according to several presidents, topics like drug policy and Cuba were discussed with frankness.

Thirty heads of state from the Americas, including President Obama, gathered in Cartagena for a two-day meeting where the issues of drug regulation and Cuba's inclusion in future regional meetings showed more divisions than the unity that the Summit of the Americas was meant to promote. The summit concluded with no formal declaration of signing ceremony, but Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said the leaders chose to discuss “the issues that unite us as well as the issues that divide us in a sincere dialogue,” behind closed doors.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón welcomed the fact that discussions were even held on these contentious issues, marking a “radical and unthinkable” change from previous summits. This was only the Sixth Summit of the Americas, but historically the summit agenda has been seen as dictated by the United States.

Cuba inclusion

President Santos said that the majority of countries present at the summit “support the participation of Cuba” in future meetings, while the United States and Canada stood firm on excluding the communist nation which has been suspended from the Organization of American States (OAS) since 1962 and subjected to a US economic embargo for half a century.

 But the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas (ALBA) – a bloc of Latin American nations created in 2004 by Venezuela and Cuba as a counterweight to US influence in the region – said they would not participate in another Summit of the Americas without Cuba. ALBA member countries’ participation in this summit, in fact, was minimal. Ecuador, which pushed for Cuba to be invited to the Cartagena summit, boycotted the meeting, while Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez abstained due to health concerns. Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega did not attend, either.

But it wasn’t just the usual suspects from the Latin American left who called for Cuba’s inclusion. Santos, a moderate and seen as the closest US ally in the region, called the embargo on Cuba “anachronistic” and “ineffective.” Future summits without Cuba would be unacceptable, he said.

Mr. Obama, for his part, defended the US stance on Cuba, but said he was “hopeful” for a transition. “I am not someone who brings to the table a lot of baggage from the past and I want to look at this problem in a new and different way,” Obama said. Earlier in the weekend he said the discussion surrounding Cuba was reminiscent of “gunboat diplomacy and Yankees and the cold war.”

But analysts say the US is in a time warp. “The only players in this movie who are stuck in the cold war are in the US,” says Eric Hershberg, director of Latin American and Latino Studies at American University in Washington. “The Latin Americans are saying ‘Let’s move on.’”

Drug policy debate

On drug policy, the leaders agreed to direct the OAS to initiate a thorough review of drug control policy in the region, analyzing alternatives to the “war on drugs,” initially introduced by President George H.W. Bush in 1991.  Most analysts agree the approach has been less than successful.

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