U.S. officials Cuba will be kept on list of nations that sponsor terrorism

Posted on Wednesday, 05.01.13

U.S. officials: Cuba will be kept on list of nations that sponsor terrorism
By Juan O. Tamayo
jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com

The U.S. government has no plans to remove Cuba from its list of state
sponsors of terrorism, U.S. government officials said Wednesday.

Opponents of U.S. sanctions on the island's communist government have
been lobbying hard for months to remove Cuba from the State Department's
list of state sponsors of terrorism as a gesture toward improved
bilateral relations.

The Boston Globe reported in February that U.S. diplomats had concluded
Cuba should be taken off the list. Another news report a month later
said Cuba's removal might be announced when the Country Report on
Terrorism, also managed by the State Department, is issued.

The list of state sponsors was created in 1979 and currently includes
only Cuba, Iran, Syria and Sudan. The Country Report is a totally
separate, annual and country-by-country review of terror activities
around the globe, including the four nations on the state sponsors list.

There are no current efforts or plans to remove Cuba from the list of
state sponsors, said knowledgeable U.S. government officials who asked
for anonymity in order to speak frankly and in detail about the often
confusing issue.

Inclusion on the list blocks a nation's access to World Bank and other
financing, and puts an international magnifying glass on all its
international banking transactions.

The next version of the Country Report, expected to be made public in
coming weeks, will certainly report that Cuba remains on the state
sponsors' list, the officials told El Nuevo Herald.

But that does not rule out the possibility that at any time in the
future the U.S. government will decide that Cuba should be removed from
the state sponsors list, the officials added.

A Congressional Research Service (CRS) study dated April 5 reported that
technically either the U.S. president or Congress can remove a country
from the list, although it would be more likely for the president to do
so in either of two ways.

The president can send Congress a report "certifying that there has been
a fundamental change in the leadership and policies of the government
and that the government is not supporting acts of international
terrorism and is providing assurances that it will not support such acts
in the future," the study noted.

Or the president can send Congress a report, at least 45 days in advance
of the removal, "certifying that the government has not provided any
support for international terrorism during the preceding six months, and
has provided assurances that it will not support such acts in the future."

The State Department is required to publish the annual Country Report at
the end of each April, but it regularly misses the deadline. Last year,
the report was made public in July.

The newspaper and blog The Hill in Washington D.C. quoted a State
Department spokesperson late Tuesday as saying that the Country Report
will be made public in the latter half of May and will note that Cuba
remains on the state sponsor list.

"We don't use this report to announce designations" to the state sponsor
list, the spokesperson was quoted as saying.

Cuba has been on the state sponsors list since 1982. Havana also is on a
separate U.S. government list, with Venezuela and others, of countries
that are not "cooperating fully with United States antiterrorism efforts."

The Country Report in 2012 alleged Havana provides safe haven to U.S.
fugitives and members of the Basque Homeland and Liberty (ETA) in Spain
and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Washington
considers both as terrorist groups.

Cuba claims the ETA members are on the island with the Spanish
government's approval, but some are wanted in Madrid. Havana is
currently playing host to peace talks between FARC guerrilla leaders and
the Colombian government.

Miami Republican Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart
recently argued that the shootdown by Cuban MiGs of two civilian
Brothers to the Rescue airplanes in 1996, killing all four Miami men
abroad, amounted to an act of terrorism.

Ros-Lehtinen said Wednesday that the U.S. government's decision to keep
Cuba on the state sponsors list "reaffirms that the Castro regime is,
and has always been, a supporter and facilitator of terrorism."

Supporters of removing Cuba from the list argue that the Castro
government has not supported terrorism for years and note that North
Korea and Moammar Qadhafi's Libya were removed from the list in recent
years.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/05/01/3375305/us-officials-cuba-will-be-kept.html#storylink=misearch