House Votes to Lift Cuba Travel Ban - How Can This Be Good for the U.S.?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - For the third time in as many years, the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday defied White House veto threats and supported lifting the four-decades-old ban on Americans traveling to Cuba.

The House voted 262-167 to lift the travel restrictions as it debated an $18.5 billion bill funding the U.S. Treasury and general government operations in the next fiscal year. It is expected to pass the spending bill sometime on Wednesday.

In the past, the Cuba travel effort has failed in the Senate. This year, however, the Senate also is moving to lift the ban, setting up a clash with President Bush.

The White House last week threatened to veto any change in U.S. policy toward Cuba, accusing Congress of providing "a helping hand to a desperate and repressive regime."

But proponents of ending the travel ban say it infringes on U.S. citizens' constitutional right to travel freely and has demonstrably failed to weaken the grip of President Fidel Castro on the Caribbean island nation.

"For 42 years we've had the same, failed policy," said Arizona Republican Rep. Jeff Flake, the chief House sponsor of the effort. "And the question occurs: after 42 years isn't it about time to decide maybe we need a change here?"

House Republican leaders and the influential U.S. Cuban exile community staunchly oppose the move, arguing that the ban should be lifted only once Castro releases political prisoners and returns fugitives from U.S. justice.

"Any revenue from increased travel or trade will go to support Castro's regime, and the Cuban people will continue to live lives of oppression and poverty," said New Jersey Republican Rep. Chris Smith.

House leaders sought to outflank the vote on the travel ban by trying to add a proviso that it could only be lifted if Bush certified Cuba was not developing biological weapons or aiding terrorists -- but the move was rejected by the House.

Currently, U.S. citizens must get a license from the U.S. Treasury to travel to Cuba, and those are generally limited to Cuban-Americans visiting family, journalists, academics, government officials and groups on humanitarian missions.

But Americans are increasingly finding ways to reach Cuba anyway by traveling through third countries, with an estimated 176,000 visiting the island in 2001. The House action would cut the funds the Treasury uses to enforce the ban.

The House, as it did last year, also rejected a bid to lift the full U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, voting 226 to 204 against the broader move.

But it did back amendments to loosen rules limiting the amount of money U.S.-based Cubans can remit to relatives on the island each year, and to make it easier for U.S. farmers to take advantage of an earlier easing of curbs on food sales.

WHEN YOU HELP CASTRO YOU HELP TERRORISM

GIOTOPOULOS PROFILED AS SON OF PROMINENT TROTSKYIST
Alexandros Giotopoulos visited Cuba to learn how to develop an urban guerrilla operation in Greece. Several months ago, the daily Ta Nea (whose publisher also owns To Vima and the Athens News) reported a trip to Cuba by the man Greek authorities suspected of being the leader of 17N.

Athens News
19/07/2002, page: A05
Athens News
Athens
Greece
La Nueva Cuba
Julio 20, 2002

LIKE a ripe fruit ready to be plucked, the man suspected of being the author of the 17N terrorist group's proclamations was arrested on the tiny remote eastern Aegean island of Leipsi on the very day that the pro-government daily To Vima identified him as Alexandros Giotopoulos, also running a detailed biography of his late father, a prominent figure in the Greek and international Trotskyist movement. Mitsos Giotopoulos, who is said to have been an associate of Leon Trotsky, and was known by the name "Witte" during the 1930s, founded the Archeio-Marxist Party of Greece (AKE) in 1947 and got 51 votes in that year's elections.

Alexandros Giotopoulos' alleged ties to armed violence are said to go back to his years as a university student in Paris in the 1960s. According to To Vima, he founded a Maoist group called "May 29" on May 29, 1968. That was the year he was expelled from the Greek Communist Party - which he joined in 1967, according to the same paper - by "a well-known" Greek politician.

The leads to Giotopoulos, 58, were supposedly developed by Scotland Yard, which set up shop in Athens after the June 2000 murder of British military attache Stephen Saunders. Starting their investigation of 17N from scratch, the British police reportedly interviewed dozens of older Greek leftist intellectuals, some of whom had resided in Paris in the late 60s.

The newspaper report indicated that Alexandros Giotopoulos visited Cuba to learn how to develop an urban guerrilla operation in Greece. Several months ago, the daily Ta Nea (whose publisher also owns To Vima and the Athens News) reported a trip to Cuba by the man Greek authorities suspected of being the leader of 17N. To Vima also reported a trip to Chile by Giotopoulos, in a show of solidarity with Salvador Allende, before his "May 29" group finally disbanded, adding that Giotopoulos "joins the faction that insists on the armed struggle of Che Guevara." During the period 1974-75, the story says he returned to Athens and "certain people have strong suspicions that he continues to insist on his views regarding struggle".

The elder Giotopoulos ("Witte") was born in 1901 and left Athens for Paris in 1934. He had already founded the group Ergasia ("Labour") and is said to have been a mentor of the late Trotskyist Michalis Raptis, or "Pablo", who in the past was unfoundedly accused of being behind 17N. The elder Giotopoulos allegedly broke with Trotsky over the Russian revolutionary's instructions to his French followers to operate as a faction of the French Socialist Party. In an October 1933 letter, Trotsky cites a need to "restrain comrade Witte".

Mitsos Giotopoulos and his Archeio-Marxist Party eventually abandoned the international Trotskyist movement.

Where have you been living Castro's pawns in the Congress for the last 43 years? Castro has been in war with U.S. on every front. His henchmen tortured American P.O.W. in Vietnam. His troops have been roaming through Africa and guerrillas from every Latin American country have been sponsored and trained by Cuba. Puerto Rican terrorists under Cuba’s control have bombed U.S. cities and executed the Wells Fargo $9 million heist that ended in Castro's hands.

Even today, the ETA, the Basque terrorist organization has bases in Cuba in spite that Spain has been Castro's friend, business partner and supporter. Likewise, with the Mexican guerrillas, whose leaders were financed and trained by Castro while Mexico has been unrelenting in the support of Castro's crimes. England is another business partner of Castro though Cuba is supporting the IRA terrorism.

Castro is powerful enough to throw out the U.S. from the United Nations Human Rights Commission, the body that has been condemning Castro’s regime for decades of human rights violations. Seventeen of our friends who promised to vote in our favor, betrayed their word and voted in favor of the violators of Human Rights, with Castro at the forefront.

Castro is in open war against everything U.S. represents and stands for in the world: free enterprise, democracy, respect for human rights.

Nobody disagrees with you that he (Castro) and they (Cuban Communistas) are not evil. We don't need any further and lengthy treatises on what the Cuban government is up to. We know it all to well and nobody is challenging that point, already! We disagree about methods to overthrown the Cuban communist regime.

I stand by my earlier posts that unless China, North Korea or Vietnam travel is banned--communist nations with horrendous human rights violations and partial if not full participation or knowledge of the terror network (which it won't be banned) then it is only a matter of time that Cuba will no longer be off limits to Americans. In which case we have to milk it for every cent it is worth in the way of subversion, fomenting counter revolution, supporting the underground, bringing in news from the outside world to educate the isolated Cubans, and flip people in their government to pull a Soviet Union on the CCP.

THE TERRORISM NETWORK CLOSE RANKS.

Outgoing Iran's Envoy Meets Cuban VP

Havana
Irna
Tehran
Iran
La Nueva Cuba
28 Julio 2002

MADRID -- Outgoing Iranian Ambassador to Havana Davood Salehi, at the end of his tenure in Cuba, Wednesday met and conferred with the Cuban Vice President Jose Ramon Fernandez, IRNA reported.

Salehi recalled the successful measures taken so far to boost Tehran-Havana relations, and stressed the need to further diversify ties in all areas.

Fernandez, for his part, appreciated the efforts by the Iranian ambassador to bolster bilateral relations.

He said Cuba attaches special significance to promote two-way ties with the Islamic Republic of Iran, and voiced Havana's support for the Iranian nation's struggle against U.S. hegemonic policies and its unauthorized interference.

Fernandez said Washington is trying to wage war and conflict in the world in efforts to distract American public opinion from its own internal economic woes.

He stressed the recent massive turnout of Iranian people to voice their hatred of the interventionist remarks of U.S. President George W. Bush had been a manifestation of public support for the Iranian leadership.

Fernandez reiterated that U.S. various plots against Iran and Cuba have so far fizzled out to bear any fruit or affect the two nations' determination to confront Washington's hostile policies. Elsewhere in his remarks, the Cuban vice president who is also a ranking sports official said he would visit the Islamic Republic of Iran at the invitation of Head of Iran's Physical Education Organization Mohsen Mehralizade as soon as possible.

Canadian firm gets Cuban ship detained
Adecon owed $3M

John Turley-Ewart
Financial Post

http://www.nationalpost.com/financialpost/

Tuesday, August 06, 2002

A transport ship belonging to Cuba's state-owned maritime agency has been detained in Guinea over money owed to a small Canadian company.

For two years, Mississauga-Ont.-based Adecon Ship Management has been pursuing the Cuban government in Canadian courts, seeking more than $3-million.

Adecon says Havana failed to pay after it financed ship operations for Cuba's maritime business.

Last year, a Federal Court ordered Cuba to pay. But the Cuban government has ignored the ruling, which was properly served Cuba by Canadian officials.

Carrying a large load of steel that is apparently headed for Ghana, the m/v Lilac Islands sailed into the harbour at Conarky on July 24, the capital of Guinea, and was detained. The ship will be held until the Cuban government discharges its debts to Adecon, which on this ship amounts to more than US$275,000.

Alexander Printzios, Adecon's managing director, decided two years ago to go after the Cubans in a Canadian court.

Efforts to negotiate a settlement took place in 2000, but ended in Mr. Printzios being detained in Cuba after the former Cuban Minister of Fisheries and Oceans had invited Mr. Printzios to the Communist country.

Soon after arriving in Havana with a Canadian lawyer in tow, Mr. Printzios claims Cuban officials pressured him to drop his case in the Canadian courts. When he refused, the Cubans took away his documents, computer files and detained him.

It was only after the intervention of Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs, says Mr. Printzios, that he was released and his documents and computer returned.

The Cuban government is concerned about the ramifications the Guinea decision could have on their ability to trade with other nations.

Cuba took the case to Guinea's Appeal Court, which upheld the ship's detention and accepted Adecon's contention that Cuba, a Communist state that owns all means of production and transportation, was liable.

Guinea has long ties to Cuba and their relations have generally been good, but the detaining of their ship based on a Canadian court judgment is putting a strain on relations.

Cuba is scheduled go before a second court today.

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