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Three visiting U.S. senators said on Saturday they hoped Congress would support President Barack Obama's opening toward Cuba, including lifting a ban on U.S. citizens traveling to the Communist-run island. Democratic Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Ben Cardin of Maryland joined Republican Dean Heller of Nevada on a trip to Cuba where they met First Vice-President Miguel Diaz-Canel, Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez and ordinary Cubans.

In the age of derivatives, swaps, and electronic money transfers, a new form of warfare has emerged: financial warfare. Recently, the US has passed sanctions on countries such as Syria, Venezuela, and North Korea , but the majority of energy related sanctions passed have been targeted at Iran and Russia. An estimated 68 percent of Russia’s government revenue is derived from oil and gas exports, while 80 percent of Iran’s revenue comes from oil exports. That presents a very large target for the use of financial weapons.

DALLAS (AP) — A Texas delegation is arriving in Cuba with hopes of building a front-of-the-line position for renewed trade with the Caribbean nation long isolated by a U.S. embargo. The Dallas Morning News (http://bit.ly/1IX4MDi ) reports the delegation landing in Havana on Sunday is the first Texas has sent to Cuba since the U.S. and the communist island nation agreed to restore diplomatic relations. Texas industries with potential to expand trade with Cuba include agriculture, airlines, oil, technology and tourism, said Cynthia Thomas, president of the Dallas-based consulting firm Tri Dimension Strategies and leader of the delegation. "The last...

U.S. officials consider removing Castro regime from terror listU.S. officials are considering removing Cuba from a list of state sponsors of terrorism, even as Cuban allies continue to launch military attacks and trade for weapons. As part of President Barack Obama’s announcement in December that he would normalize relations with Cuba, Obama instructed Secretary of State John Kerry to review Cuba’s terror designation and issue a report in six months. While reports indicate that the administration is leaning toward removing Cuba from the terror list, such an action would conflict with the Cuban regime’s support for Colombian militants, Iran, and...

Now where have we previously heard Senator Rand Paul’s cliché-fest that constitutes his rebuttal to Senator Marco Rubio on Cuba sanctions? Well, from The Council on Foreign Relations to the New York Times and from Hillary Clinton to The Congressional Black Caucus—and that’s for starters. And oh, we also heard it repeatedly from every single one of the KGB-trained Cuban spies convicted by U.S. juries recently. “The embargo is Castro’s best friend,” Clinton chanted to an extremely friendly audience at the Council on Foreign Relations back in June while citing and promoting her book Hard Choices. The sanctions give “Castro...

Since The Resident’s unexpected and unethical decision to unilaterally discard a half-century of history and reopen diplomatic relations with the Castro brothers’ prison colony known as Cuba, a particularly destructive claim has resurfaced, one that merits careful analysis and rejection. For decades now, the Left has spouted a peculiar claim – that Cuba is poor because of our 54-year-long embargo against the communist country. If the reader has compassion for the suffering denizens of that miserable island, this has to be a strong argument, but it’s wrong – utterly without merit, in fact – for several critical reasons. The claim...

Obama has evidenced a preference for authoritarian regimes. His preference is why he did not force concessions from Cuba, concessions that would have fostered democratic reforms and given hope to those languishing in Castro’s Stygian domains. He appears to be more interested in sanctioning and weakening Israel, our sole democratic ally in the Middle East, than he is in enforcing the current embargo against Cuba. He seems to be more interested in sitting down at the bargaining table with Iran than he is in strengthening relations with America’s Western allies. The president’s actions have enormous implications.

Cuban President Raul Castro said in a nationally broadcast speech that he welcomes the restoration of relations with the United States. He said differences remain between Cuba and the U.S. in areas such as human rights, foreign policy and questions of sovereignty, but he says the countries have to learn to live with their differences "in a civilized manner."

Today Barack Obama normalized relations with Communist Cuba. The president said the current policies were not working.Castro already is making demands from the US. Castro: "The blockade…must cease" #Cuba— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) December 17, 2014 The blockade must cease. Raúl Castro: Diplomatic relations will be restored, but the economic blockade should be stopped.— Sjamme van de Voort (@SjammevndVoort) December 17, 2014 Castro also gave a speech today in response to the announcement. LIVE: Pres. Obama, Pres. Castro holding news conferences to announce changes in relations: http://t.co/YoGbFPNqdI pic.twitter.com/iuKHaBbYWd— ABC News (@ABC) December 17, 2014

An assortment of rabidly anti-Israel public figures, including seven Nobel Peace Prize winners, have called for an international arms embargo on Israel for its "war crimes and possible crimes against humanity" in Gaza. The statement came in a letter published in Britain's The Guardian on Friday.

The European Commission has ordered EU member states to stop holding bilaterals with Russia over the pork trade and has threatened to complain to the World Trade Organization, claiming that a Russian embargo on European pork is unwarranted. EurActiv France reports. According to informed sources, France, Denmark and the Netherlands established bilateral contact with Russia in an attempt to end the embargo on European pork. The embargo, which began in January over concerns of African swine fever in European wild boar, blocks all European pork on sanitary grounds. […] Brussels “called for Europe to speak with one voice, seeing as...

So America IS trading with Iran ... US sent nearly $2m worth of bull semen to Muslim state last year Strict trade sanctions have been in place between the U.S. and Iran since the Carter administration Bovine sperm side-steps the usual sanctions since it qualifies as humanitarian aid Iran has made it a goal to become self-sufficient in meat production by the year 2016 Altogether the U.S. sent $45.7million in humanitarian aid to Iran last April. While the number seems like a lot, it's nothing compared to the $26.2billion sent to our biggest trading partner - Canada. Bovine sperm side-steps...

Although the amount of oil Iran is producing and selling on the world market has shrunk substantially in recent months, due to U.S. and EU sanctions, Iran has still been selling oil to countries in the Far East like China – and that supply, experts say has been one factor in why the price of oil has not risen even more. And on Tuesday, Iran struck back at Western sanctions against it, saying that if the sanctions continued it would stop producing oil altogether. The sanctions have been the cause of significant economic instability in Iran, according to Western economists....

More than two-thirds of Iran's lawmakers have endorsed a statement calling for cutting off oil sales to the European Union before EU sanctions on their country go into effect. The statement, which was read Wednesday in an open session of parliament broadcast on state radio, said "in the case of the continuation of illogical policies" by the EU, Iran will look for alternative customers for its oil before the European embargo goes into effect in the summer. The statement was signed by 200 of the parliament's 290 lawmakers.

-excerpt- Diplomats said the measures, which were adopted in Brussels by the EU's 27 foreign ministers, include an immediate embargo on new contracts for crude oil and petroleum products, while existing contracts will be allowed to run until July.

EU adopts Syria oil embargoAFP – Thu, Sep 1, 2011 The European Union on Friday adopted a ban on crude oil imports from Syria although European companies will be able to fulfill existing supply contracts until November 15, the EU and diplomats said. The EU also expanded the list of individuals targeted by assets freezes and travel bans, adding four Syrian businessmen accused of bankrolling the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, the diplomats said. Three companies, including a bank, were added to the blacklist as well. "In view of the gravity of the situation in Syria, the (European) Council today...

Despite sanctions and trade embargoes, over the past decade the United States government has granted special licenses allowing American companies to do billions of dollars in business with Iran and other countries blacklisted as state sponsors of terrorism, an examination by The New York Times has found. At the behest of a host of companies — from Kraft Food and Pepsi to some of the nation’s largest banks — a little-known office of the Treasury Department has made nearly 10,000 exceptions to American sanctions rules, approving deals involving countries that have been cast into economic purgatory, beyond the reach of...

In the wake of a weekend Central Committee meeting, exports of vital rare earths to the US/EU -on which the Chinese maintain an unsettling stranglehold- are restrainedPerhaps it's more difficult these days to awaken Americans to the comprehensive threat posed by the rise of Communist China now that our own country's being run by a Smiley-Face Marxist who's actually to the left of Beijing's policies on health care, defense, and fiscal management... but there are increasing numbers of powerful Chinese leaders that see the United States as an enemy -no matter how socialist we are. They didn't get along with...

(Reuters) - A congressional panel is poised to take the first step toward ending a decades-old U.S. ban on travel to Cuba and removing other hurdles to food sales to the Caribbean island, a senior lawmaker said on Tuesday. "This bill has been needed for a long time," House of Representatives Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson said in a statement ahead of committee action on Wednesday.

On Sunday, Israeli naval forces intercepted the ships of a Turkish nongovernmental organization (NGO) delivering humanitarian supplies to Gaza. Israel had demanded that the vessels not go directly to Gaza but instead dock in Israeli ports, where the supplies would be offloaded and delivered to Gaza. The Turkish NGO refused, insisting on going directly to Gaza. Gunfire ensued when Israeli naval personnel boarded one of the vessels, and a significant number of the passengers and crew on the ship were killed or wounded. Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon charged that the mission was simply an attempt to provoke the...