Cuba denounces continued inclusion on U.S. terror list

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Cuba denounces continued inclusion on U.S. terror list
AP/ May 30, 2013, 9:06 PM

HAVANA Havana is forcefully condemning a U.S. government decision to keep Cuba on its annual list of state sponsors of terrorism.

A statement from the Foreign Ministry calls it an "arbitrary and unilateral" ruling that cynically aims to justify the 51-year economic embargo and placate the Cuban exile lobby.

It says Cuban soil will never be used to accommodate terrorists or organize violent acts against any nation.

Cuba rejects charges it harbors Basque militants and Colombian FARC rebels, noting that it is hosting peace talks between the FARC and the Colombian government.

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57586984/cuba-denounces-continued-inclusion-on-u.s-terror-list/

[Mnemosyne]

1. I wonder how many countries dare to have the US on their terrorist list? We are committing terrorism

every day at Guantanamo, yet have Cuba on the list. Sickeningly hypocritical.

[madrchsod]

2. really? state sponsors of terrorism?

i guess one hand doesn't know what the other is doing. or maybe they do when it comes to hard cold cash.

oh my, what is this....

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c2390.html

or this ....

http://www.cubatrade.org/

our foreign policy sucks

[flamingdem]

3. Well the M&Ms should be happy

Those evil terrirists foild agin

[former9thward]

4. There will never be normal relations as long as Cuba continues to harbor murderers wanted by U.S.

Many have committed hijacking and brutal armed robberies. The count is currently about 70 including some the U.S. considers terrorists. No other country the U.S. has normal relations with does this. It has to be resolved.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/12/world/americas/12cuba.html?_r=0 Article is 6 years old but the basic point remains.

[Pterodactyl]

5. From the Department of State:

http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/2011/195547.htm

Cuba was designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism in 1982. Current and former members of Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA) continue to reside in Cuba. Three suspected ETA members were arrested in Venezuela and deported back to Cuba in September 2011 after sailing from Cuba. One of them, Jose Ignacio Echarte, is a fugitive from Spanish law and was also believed to have ties to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Reports suggested that the Cuban government was trying to distance itself from ETA members living on the island by employing tactics such as not providing services including travel documents to some of them. Press reporting indicated that the Cuban government provided medical care and political assistance to the FARC. There was no indication that the Cuban government provided weapons or paramilitary training for either ETA or the FARC.

The Cuban government continued to permit fugitives wanted in the United States to reside in Cuba and also provided support such as housing, food ration books, and medical care for these individuals.

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has identified Cuba as having strategic AML/CFT deficiencies. Despite sustained and consistent overtures, Cuba has refused to substantively engage directly with the FATF. It has not committed to FATF standards and it is not a member of a FATF-style regional body, although in 2011 it did attend a Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering in South America meeting as a guest and prepared an informal document describing its anti-money laundering/counterterrorist financing system.

[MADem]

6. They'll come off the Naughty List when Castro dies.

For whatever reason, and there's plenty of speculation to go around, that boy is and will always be UNFORGIVEN. He did a bad, bad thing!

We got over fifty eight thousand dead young Americans in Vietnam....and we got over them, now, didn't we? We're all wearing underwear and summer shirts "Made In Vietnam." Yet we can't get over Cuba?

I've got my speculations, as do others, I'm sure.

I just want to live long enough to see the mystery solved! There's a big piece of world history that is still under wraps, I think....

[kelliekat44]

9. They will come off the list as more and more young Cubans grow up and become Democrats. nt

[karynnj]

10. Like Rubio and Cruz? - just asking

[MADem]

11. There will likely be a convergence of those two events! nt

[Peace Patriot]

7. Universal free medical care and college education are terrorism, don't you know?

One of the rightwing military coup generals in Honduras ('09) said that their coup was intended "to prevent communism from Venezuela reaching the United States" (--quoted in a report on the coup by the Zelaya government-in-exile)

See? Cuba is exporting terrorism (universal free medical care and college education) to Venezuela and, from there, terrorism (universal free medical care and college education) threatens to spiral up through blood-soaked Honduras, past all those trigger-happy DEA agents and busy Pentagon subcontractors, into blood-soaked Guatemala, infecting that U.S.-supported fascist state as well, with icky, gooey, infectious terrorism (universal free medical care and college education), then into blood-soaked Mexico right across the border from the "Homeland" and only a 'Berlin Wall' away from the land of defunded schools and bankrupt college graduates and the home of $100,000 bypass operations and Medigap, where the only good communist is still a dead communist and anybody that somebody behind closed doors decides is a "terrorist" gets drone-bombed without trial.

See? See? If you want an "Alice in Wonderland" country, where everything is upside down, inside out and backwards, you've got to keep those communist-terrorists (believers in universal free medical care and college education) out--cuz they might turn corporations from being people back into being private, regulated, temporary business consortiums formed for the common good and forbidden to do harm. And if THAT happens--if the communist-terrorists from Cuba through Venezuela reach the United States--people might crawl out of the Rabbit Hole and SEE THINGS AS THEY ARE and demand action for the Common Good!

It all goes back to Cuba and their kicking the 1% off the island. Cuba is now terrorizing the world with universal free medical care and college education and other heinous plots! Right in the belly-button of the Western Hemisphere! It is intolerable! Off with their heads! Send in the exploding cigars! Blow up their airplanes! Shun them! Hate them! Lie about them! Break the elbows of anybody who trades with them! Pile up Berlin Walls, and Great Walls of China, and Hadrian's Walls against these maniacal terrorist hordes who defy Rome and Ayn Rand!

And introduce "Mad Tea Parties" to stop thought!

[LiberalLovinLug]

8. Great Rant!