Island is ‘ perfect place’ for vital negotiations

HAVANA — The heads of the Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches will hold a historic meeting Friday in the threadbare international airport of an officially secular, communist- run tropical island.

Odd as the location seems, Pope Francis’ and Patriarch Kirill’s attempt to reconcile their churches after centuries of estrangement will set the tone for a year of peacemaking in Cuba, a nation trying to shed its historic role as international socialist provocateur.

In addition to the meeting of the church leaders, Cuban President Raul Castro is expected to welcome President Obama to Havana as early as this spring to celebrate the detente the two men declared at the end of 2014, ending a half- century of hostility. And four years of talks in Cuba between Colombia’s government and its main rebel group appear set to produce an accord ending the Western Hemisphere’s longestrunning conflict, perhaps as early as mid- year.

If all goes as planned, 2016 could cement Castro’s construction of a foreign policy legacy markedly different from that of his brother Fidel, who oversaw five decades of tension with the United States, dispatching Cuban troops and advisers to Africa, Asia and Central and South America, and offering safe haven to anti- Western fighters from conflicts around the world.

“Cuba has been transformed from a revolutionary actor, isolated from other states in the Western Hemisphere with the exception of Mexico and Canada,” said Arturo Lopez- Levy, a Cuban- trained professor at the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley. “The country has come to be seen as a country in transformation, part of the modern- day international system.”

The Obama administration has cited Cuba’s role in Colombia’s peace talks as a reason for the U. S. to engage with the island.

“These days,” said Richard Feinberg, a professor of international politics at UC San Diego. “Cuba is the perfect place for negotiations.”