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Pedro M. Burelli : The Castros' revenge
on Thomas Shannon: When Enemies Collude

It would seem that Fidel Castro has found the right allies - some of those who purportedly oppose him in the US - to exact revenge for the slight of hand that deprived him of his 47 year old "I am a victim" sob story. After San Pedro Sula - site of the latest General Assembly of the OAS - I have not heard any Latin leader talk about, much less demand, the reentry of Cuba into the interamerican fold. That fact alone should be sufficient proof that Assistant Secretary Shannon is a consummate negotiator and one that informed Cuban Americans in the US should hail not pillory. At that meeting, all the countries in the OAS approved a resolution conditioning the return of the expelled island nation to its ability to live by the core tenets of organization. Countries like Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Zelaya's Honduras had to sign on the dotted line as they could not explain to others why such conditions were excessive. But, when it comes to the Cuba policy debate inside the US, anything is possible, and one has to conclude that the Castros' have been blessed by having the least Pavlovian enemies in the world. For the most vocal anti-castroites, failure has only been an evident signal to stay the course; obstinacy has been sold as virtue, and success seems more related to funding status quo maintenance efforts than affecting real constructive change in Cuba. On this point, a set of "talking points" against Shannon's confirmation making the rounds in the US Senate reads like something right out of the backrooms of the Palacio de la Revolución in Havana or the "fertile" minds that manhandle affairs from Miraflores Palace in Caracas. One would expect that US Senators (their staff's actually) would have the means to spot Fool's Gold; but it seems the barriers to entry into membership or employment in that select club of 100 have fallen significantly in the last few years.

Those who under the grandiloquent flag (who entrusted this job to them in the first place?) of displaced Cubans, Hondurans, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans are trying to line up sequential "holds" on the confirmation of Thomas Shannon as US Ambassador to Brazil are either misinformed or in cahoots with those that have been foiled by Shannon's non histrionic approach to rouge Latin regimes intent on justifying their multiple failings on the "evil Empire". A few months after Roger Noriega, a darling of the Cuba PAC, was fired and replaced by Shannon, Venezuelan Foreign Minister was quoted, in a previous OAS General Assembly, saying "We miss Roger Noriega". They still do. PMB

See: The Senate's New Piñata an article post in the blog post below by Investor's Business Daily's Monica Showater provides additional color on this wasteful effort to punish success.

Pedro M. Burelli is a financial consultant, a former member of PDVSA board of director and ex head of JPMorgan Capital Corporation – Latin America. Petroleumworld does not necessarily share these views.

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Petroleumworld News 11/09 /09

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