The meeting with Castro came on the final day of the BWA's July 3-8 General Council meeting in Havana. Meeting with the Cuban leader were BWA General Secretary Denton Lotz, new BWA President Billy Kim of Korea and immediate past BWA President Nilson Fanini of Brazil as well as leaders of Cuba's four Baptist conventions.

The BWA, founded in 1905, is a global umbrella organization of Baptists. It represents more than 43 million baptized believers in 110 nations. The early July annual council meeting and related events attracted more than 400 international participants from 60 countries.

The BWA event was the first-ever international Baptist gathering held in the socialist nation of Cuba. The meeting featured simultaneous evangelistic services in 40 Cuban Baptist churches. A public evangelism rally attended by more than 3,000 people reportedly was the first such Baptist event since Castro came to power in 1959.

Lotz said the July 8 meeting with Castro signals the Cuban government's growing recognition of Baptists' influence as the largest evangelical group in Cuba.

Castro "understands religion can play a significant role in the life of people, in Cuban society and even in helping international relations," Lotz said.

Emphasizing that BWA participants "were not here to affirm any ideology or government, but to affirm the people of Cuba," Lotz said the resolution opposing economic boycotts recognizes that "the Cuban people are the ones suffering from the boycott." Withholding food and medicine from people in need "should not be used as a form of government policy," he insisted. The U.S. government has maintained a strict economic embargo against Cuba since early in Castro's 41 years of control there.

Describing access to food and medicine as "a basic human right," the resolution emphasizes that "the denial of such access should not be used by nations as a tool of geopolitics."

In addition to highlighting needs in the council meeting's host nation, "we also are addressing several countries that are engaged in similar sanctions," explained resolutions committee chairman Keith Jones, president of International Baptist Theological Seminary in the Czech Republic.

Underscoring "the urgency of the need for all nations and peoples to respect and support the human rights of all," the measure calls on churches to "take steps to express their solidarity with oppressed people."

Morris H. Chapman, president of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee, proposed deleting a phrase calling on governments to remove economic sanctions.

"We have taken a strong stand on human rights," Chapman affirmed. "I'm grateful we have had the courage to speak to the Cuban issue particularly."

He voiced concern, however, that a global call for governments to end economic sanctions is "a very sweeping statement that goes beyond what the intent of this resolution is."

"All of the weight here is upon the country that applies the sanctions, but there is no weight upon the country that causes the oppression," Chapman said. "We are asking countries to remove sanctions when we do not know all the countries that are applying sanctions."

Council members adopted an amended resolution calling for governments to "remove economic sanctions that relate to food and medicine."

Castro wrote a note to council members thanking them for adopting the resolution.

Even with Castro's endorsement of the measure, BWA leaders insisted the action was not political.

"I believe the resolution is not political," Kim said. "When people are suffering and the Baptist family is persecuted, if we don't make a statement we are sinning against our brethren.

Victor Gonzales, general secretary of the Baptist Convention of Western Cuba, said the resolution is significant for Cuban Baptists.

"Our whole people will appreciate the resolution," he said. "Much suffering has been withstood by our people during these years."

Lotz described conversations with government leaders as a form of "pre-evangelism." Noting that Baptist leaders were able to tell Castro that "Baptists believe in the separation of church and state and are concerned about the spiritual conversion of people," the BWA leader added, "It's much better to talk than to snipe at one another."

Lotz said the BWA meeting in Havana and the dialogue with Castro "give credibility and visibility to Cuban Baptists, which is very significant for a minority movement." Cuban Baptists have more than 400 congregations and 900 mission sites, with a total of 38,000 baptized believers in a nation of 10.8 million people.

Kim said the BWA General Council meeting, which is held in a different nation each year, helped Cuban Baptists "strengthen their profile among their people because they have been under less freedom for the past 40 years."