Cuba eases travel curbs and takes a step forward

Havana has no need to fear defections

In May, during my last reporting trip to Havana, a Cuban friend asked me for a written invitation to attend a journalism convention in the USA next year. With a letter, she thought, the government would give her a visa. Cubans have long needed their government’s OK to travel abroad.

The paranoia of government officials — and a haunting fear of desertion of “The Revolution” that swept Cuba’s communist government into power — made it difficult for many Cubans to obtain permission to leave the island. That lack of freedom has been a major point of criticism from U.S. presidents, even as this country has imposed its own travel ban on U.S. citizens who want to visit Cuba. But since entering office, President Obama has eased the rules that regulate U.S. travel to Cuba.

NEW REQUIREMENTS

Last week, under a rule that takes effect Jan. 14, most Cubans no longer will need government permission to travel abroad. All that will be required is a passport and an entry visa issued by the country they want to visit.

While Cuban Americans are given boundless freedom to visit their ancestral homeland and to send money to relatives there an unlimited amount of times, the U.S. limits other Americans to giving no more than $2,000 a year to people or religious organizations in Cuba. Even with the new rules, the few Americans allowed to travel to Cuba must get a license from the federal government.

POLITICAL COURAGE

Cuba’s new travel rule is an act of political courage. Havana has long feared open travel would make it easier for the U.S. to destabilize the country. It was especially worried about the brain drain that would occur if professionals could travel freely.

For that reason, the government made clear there will be some limitations, including to guard against “subversive plans of the U.S. government,” which offers incentives for Cuban doctors to defect. “Those measures aimed at preserving the human capital created by the Revolution ... shall remain in force,” according to Granma, the official newspaper of Cuba’s Communist Party.

So, it’s unclear to what extent Cuban professionals will benefit from the easing of travel rules. But the country’s leaders cannot long deny the “best and brightest” the freedom to go abroad without turning them into a troubling class of dissidents.

I think Cuban President Raul Castro understands this and eventually will let all Cubans travel freely. He’s probably betting that — combined with other recent reforms — the new travel rules will rally most Cubans to his side, not turn them against him. I think he correctly believes that the vast majority of his people want a better life where they are, and not a one-way ticket to Miami.

The reforms he has taken ought to be embraced by the Obama administration and right-thinking Republicans in Congress. Cuba is moving — albeit slowly — in the right direction. And it’s time for this country’s leaders to admit it.