Cuba to EU: No thanks

They must be going crazy in Madrid.

Via Reuters:

HAVANA • Cuba's communist government rejected calls from the European Union for negotiations to improve relations yesterday and said talks can only happen when the EU scraps sanctions imposed on the island in 2003.

Cuba also sent a stern warning to the EU for suggesting that political change on the island might be on the horizon, insisting that Cuba's one-party state is united and firmly in control of the country.

The EU reached out to Cuba on Monday, inviting a Cuban delegation to Brussels to explore a gradual thaw in ties.

In justifying its move, the EU said the temporary transfer of power from Fidel Castro to his younger brother Raul-the first such transfer since 1959 - constituted a "new situation."

"If when the (EU) alludes to the delegation of President Fidel Castro's duties to comrade Raul Castro and it qualifies it as a 'new situation,' it expresses the hope that contradictions or differences between the leaders of the Cuban revolution exist, they are wrong again," the Foreign Ministry said in a front-page statement in the Communist Party daily Granma.

Relations between Cuba and the EU soured in 2003 after Brussels imposed a freeze on diplomatic contacts with Havana after the arrest of 75 Cuban dissidents in a crackdown.

The EU eased restrictions on some lower-level contacts in 2005 and Spain is leading a push to fully normalize relations.

But the Spanish campaign has met resistance, notably from the ex-communist Czech Republic, which insisted the EU remain tough on demands that Cuba improve its human rights practices.

Child of the Revolution sums it all up nicely.