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Fortsetzung: The US Embargo on Cuba

Alice Coulter

Return of properties belonging to US citizens and firms

The act that first prompted US sanctions was the Cuban confiscation and nationalisation of many US-owned businesses on the island. "The rationale provided by the U.S. for having adopted the embargo was that it was based on the Cuban government’s prior confiscation of its citizen’s property. As the property owners rightfully claimed at the time, the actions of the Cuban authorities constituted a flagrant breach of international law. In essence, from that original standpoint, the case against Cuba remains unchanged".[9]

The Helms-Burton Law of 1996 codified US policy towards Cuba and reaffirmed the importance attached to confiscated property. Title III of the Helms-Burton Law states that: "To deter trafficking in wrongfully confiscated property, United States nationals who were the victims of these confiscations should be endowed with a judicial remedy in the courts of the United States that would deny traffickers any profits from economically exploiting Castro’s wrongful seizures".[10]

Helms-Burton has proved extremely unpopular around the world. This is partly in response to its extra-territorial aspects, whereby goods produced in third countries which contain Cuban inputs are restricted, and US nationals and corporations are granted the right to sue foreign companies which "traffic" in property expropriated from the US after the 1959 revolution. The restrictions within Helms-Burton have been criticised on the grounds that they violate international trade law.[11] The UN has passed several resolutions calling for an end to the embargo as a direct result of the extra-territorial aspects of the act.[12] Indeed, many of the companies with US certified claims to Cuban properties strongly and actively opposed the adoption of the Helms-Burton Law.[13]

A point to note at this time is the lack of distinction made within the Helms-Burton Law between properties confiscated from US citizens and those confiscated from Cuban citizens who have subsequently become US citizens. While the former is indeed an issue of international law, the latter is strictly a Cuban domestic issue, in which the US cannot legally interfere. Indeed, Helms-Burton appears to contradict US federal court rulings stating that "confiscations by a state of the property of its own nationals, no matter how flagrant and regardless of whether compensation has been provided, do not constitute violations of international law".[14]

Perhaps in recognition of the highly contentious nature of these provisions, President Clinton, and subsequently President Bush, have consistently made use of a Presidential waiver to suspend the right to bring actions under Title III of the Act for consequential six month periods.

Regardless of this legal distinction, confiscated US property remains a controversial and unresolved issue. Cuba has offered to enter into negotiations with the US companies and individuals whose property was nationalised, as it has with other countries, but only as part of broader negotiations about future relations between the two countries. Rather than follow international examples of engagement with Cuba, the US has strengthened sanctions over time, further preventing bilateral discussion about the issue.[15] This lack of US-Cuban engagement over issues of mutual concern has wider repercussions, particularly in the areas of drug trafficking and environmental protection.[16]

Severance of the Soviet-Cuban alliance

During the Cold War the presence of Soviet forces on Cuban soil, in close proximity to US shores, was understandably of real concern to Washington. In return for permission to house a significant military presence just 90 miles off the US coast, the USSR provided economic and logistical support to the Castro regime. A further point of contention for Washington was the fact that a proportion of this Soviet aid was put towards Cuban military support of revolutionary regimes in Latin America and further afield. In response, the US sought to make Soviet maintenance of Cuba an expensive burden by politically and economically isolating the island.

For over two decades the Soviet Union provided significant support for the Castro regime, selling subsidised Soviet oil in return for Cuban sugar, bought at well above market prices. The combination of economic and political support from the USSR, meant that Cuba prospered, and the country’s social services, including health and education, came to be counted as among the best in the world. The refusal of many countries (even close allies of the US) to comply with the imposed embargo also helped the Cuban economy avoid its worst effects.

In the 1980s, as the USSR sought closer ties with the US, Soviet support for Cuba began to wane. Cuba was forced to cut back its military capacity and thus the country’s ability to support international revolutionary movements was severely impeded. The subsequent decline in Cuba’s international relevance was finalised in the early 1990s as the collapse of the Soviet Union brought a complete end to Soviet subsidies and logistical support.

Thus some of the principal objectives of US policy, weakening the Soviet-Cuban alliance and halting Cuban support for revolutionary regimes throughout the world, were met. While it would be possible to claim that Cuban dependence on the Soviet Union for economic sustenance was in some way influenced by the US policy of isolation, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the subsequent severance of the Soviet-Cuban alliance, were a result of external developments and not therefore attributable to the US embargo.

[9] Antonio Jorge and Raul Moncarz, "Causes and Results of the U.S. Embargo, and the Failure of the Cuban Economy,". http://www.be.wvu.edu/divecon/econ/trumbull/cuba/embargo.pdf
[10] The Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act (Helms-Burton Law), Title III Section 301(11).
[11] Dr Ernest Preeg, "The Helms-Burton Law: A Detriment to US Interests in the WTO," statement before the House Committee on International Relations, Subcommittee on International Economic Policy and Trade, 105^th Congress, first session, 19 March 1997. http://www.csis.org/html/7wtch173.html
[12] UN General Assembly Resolutions A/52/L.11 (1997) and 51/17 (1996).
[13] Michael O’Heaney, "A Closer Look at the Helms-Burton Law," (Cuba Campaign). http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/ cuba/US-Cuba/HelmsBurton.html
[14] Ibid.
[15] Smith, "Cuba," p. 2.
[16] Peter Kornbluh, "Cuba, Counternarcotics, and Collaboration: A Security Issue in U.S.-Cuban Relations," Cuban Briefing Paper No. 24 (December 2000) publication of the Caribbean Project, Center for Latin American Studies, Georgetown University. http://sfswww.georgetown.edu/sfs/programs/ clas/Caribe/Bp24.pdf Fortsetzung: The US Embargo on Cuba