AP sources: US offered Cuba swap for American [Alan Gross]

Associated Press ^ | Friday, October 14, 2011 1:34 AM EDT | DESMOND BUTLER and JESSICA GRESKO

[Hunton Peck]

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States offered to let a convicted Cuban spy return home in exchange for the release of an imprisoned American, but Cuba rebuffed the offer, U.S. officials said.

The U.S. also indicated it would be willing to address other Cuban grievances after Havana had released imprisoned contractor Alan Gross, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the sensitivity of the issue.

Cuba rejected the offer, noting that the Cuban, Rene Gonzalez, already had served most of his sentence. It wanted pardons for at least some of the four other Cubans convicted with Gonzalez. U.S. officials said they would not consider pardons.

The December 2009 arrest of Gross, a Maryland native, has aggravated relations between the United States and Cuba just as the Obama administration was making tentative movements to ease decades of tension.

Gross was caught bringing prohibited communications equipment into Cuba while on a democracy program financed by the U.S. Agency for International Development. In March, he was sentenced to 15 years for crimes against the state. The United States says Gross was merely trying to help Cuba's Jewish community communicate with the rest of the world and should not have faced prosecution.

The Cuban government has long been upset about the fate of Gonzalez and four other Cubans, known as the "Wasp Network," who were convicted in 2001 of spying on U.S. military installations in South Florida. Cuban officials say the five were trying to prevent terrorist attacks on the island by monitoring Cuban exiles.

Gonzalez was released this month after 13 years in prison but a judge has ordered him to serve three years' probation in the United States before returning to Cuba.