Biden to lift Cuba’s state sponsor of terrorism designation

Latin America Daily Briefing

Jordana Timerman
January 14, 2025

U.S. President Joe Biden said he will lift his country’s designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism. In a national security memorandum issued yesterday, he certified that Cuba hasn’t provided any support for international terrorism during the last six months and had provided the administration with assurances that it wouldn’t support acts of terrorism in the future.

Biden also announced, yesterday, that he will also lift sanctions on companies run by Cuba’s military and again suspend a provision in a law that allows Cuban Americans to seek compensation for confiscated property on the island. (France 24)

The moves backtrack on policies enacted by Donald Trump, who returns to the White House next week. Though announced as a unilateral move by the U.S., yesterday Cuba’s government announced it will free 553 prisoners, including political dissidents detained in relation to protests in 2021, in a deal facilitated by the Catholic Church. The White House said the move also designed to “facilitate” the dialogue Cuba has undertaken with the church, reports the Washington Post. U.S. officials said dozens of detainees will be released before Biden leaves office on Jan. 20, reports the Associated Press.

Cuba has been discussing the possibility of a prisoner amnesty with Vatican officials since at least 2023, reports Reuters. The Vatican has been key in prior negotiations to release prisoners from the island’s jails, and also helped broker the historic resumption of ties between Cuba and the United States in 2015 under former President Barack Obama.

Cuba’s government did not say who would be released under the deal, and said releases would be gradual, notes the Miami Herald.

Maykel González Vivero, a Cuban journalist and LGBTQ+ activist who was arrested during spontaneous street protests in 2021, told the Guardian he hoped that the prisoner release would include figures such as the prominent dissident José Daniel Ferrer and the artists Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and Maykel “Osorbo” Castillo Pérez, saying: “There is great uncertainty over the possibility that Trump might return Cuba to the list, but the prisoner release will not be reversed, so this is a great day for Cuba.”

Biden’s announcement is part of a chain of changing U.S. policies towards Cuba, and could be reverted by Trump, who has appointed a foreign policy cabinet with marked hawkish positions on Cuba. The Obama administration removed the terrorism designation for Cuba as part of a broader effort to normalize relations with the nation, a move reversed by Trump shortly before leaving office in 2021, when he placed Cuba back on the list, notes the New York Times.

U.S. Congressman Mike Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, celebrated the release of political prisoners and suggested that Biden’s steps could be rolled back. “Anything that they’re doing right now we can do back, and no one should be under any illusion in terms of a change in Cuba policy,” Waltz told Fox News. (Reuters)

Mauricio Claver-Carone, who was recently named Trump’s envoy for Latin America, scoffed at the announcement. “Whether Venezuela last year or now Cuba, the Biden administration seems to love fake deals that favor authoritarian anti-American regimes,” he said, referring to a 2023 prisoner swap with Venezuela. (New York Times)

Haiti

• The powerful Haitian gang coalition Viv Ansanm, is one of several organizations mentioned on a document sent to the 15-member Caribbean Community bloc that suggests ways the country’s troubled political transition can be saved — a signal that leader Jimmy “Barbeque” Chérizier’s promise to morph his group into a political party, earlier this month, might be real, reports the Miami Herald
  
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• The document mentions Viv Ansanm as an organization that supports reconfiguring the country’s beleaguered Transitional
  Presidential Council, the move aims to show the breadth of support for such a move, but also legitimizes the violent gang leaders who, in practise, control large swathes of the country. (Miami Herald)

Guatemala

• Guatemalan President Bernard Arévalo accused the public ministry of undermining his efforts to battle against entrenched corruption in his first year of government. His legislative agenda was further complicated by judicial efforts to disqualify his Movimiento Semilla party, though lawmakers managed to pass his proposed budget for this year. (El País, Prensa Libre, InSight Crime)
  
  
• “The viability of Arévalo’s anti-corruption agenda may rest on whether the president succeeds in removing Attorney General Consuelo Porras, whose office has targeted the administration with a relentless wave of legal attacks aimed at undermining its authority,” according to InSight Crime.
  
  
• “The legal tit-for-tat has eroded the government’s authority, as Arévalo has been unable to deliver on one of his most important campaign promises. It has also disrupted broader governance efforts. Simply put, it is hard for political institutions to function normally when the president and attorney general are at war.” (InSight Crime)
  
  
• What Porras seeks “is impunity for all cases, especially those of major corruption,” former Guatemalan attorney general Claudia Paz y Paz says in a new interview with El Faro English. “The Public Prosecutor’s Office is misused to persecute political opponents, prosecutors who have only done their job, independent judges, journalists, and even people of this government. The criminalization of the Public Prosecutor’s Office has been pointed out by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. It was one of the reasons why Consuelo Porras was included in the Engel List as an actor in favor of impunity and corruption.”
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• For example, InSight Crime looks at how the conflict with Porras has undermined efforts to crackdown on prison corruption.

Venezuela

• Venezuelan opposition leader Edmundo González landed in Guatemala yesterday, and is scheduled to meet with Arévalo today, reports the Associated Press.
  
  
• González’s movements are being watched closely in the region, as he has promised to try to enter Venezuela — rumor has it through Cúcuta in Colombia. (Silla Vacía)
  
  
• The incoming U.S. government should pursue regime change in Venezuela “through coercive diplomacy if possible or force if necessary,” argues Bret Stephens in a New York Times op-ed. An incentive could be an offer of exile for Maduro and close allies, “along with a guarantee of amnesty for all Venezuelan military and intelligence officials who stay behind and pledge loyalty to a government led by the legitimate president. The threat is U.S. military intervention of the sort that in 1990 swiftly ended the regime of the Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega.”

Mexico

• Polls published around the 100 day mark have President Claudia Sheinbaum’s popularity near record high levels, notes the Latin America Risk Report. (See yesterday’s post.)

Brazil

• Meta told Brazil’s government — in response to an official query — that the company will test and refine its new policy eschewing fact checking in the U.S., before evaluating expanding it to other countries, reports El País. Brazil’s government has voiced concern over the change, which applies specifically to moderating hate speech.

Trinidad and Tobago

• Trinidad and Tobago’s parliament extended for three months a state of emergency declared in December, citing intelligence about an imminent gang war. The security measure temporarily suspends several constitutional rights, and gives the police and defense force the power to search and seize assets, reports the Guardian.

Migration

• Frontier cities in Mexico are bracing for a potential wave of migrant deportations under the incoming U.S. government, but say they face economic and organizational obstacles to expanding shelters. (El País)
  
  
• The U.S. Department of Homeland Security says it is continuing to accept requests for asylum-seekers arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border, and is authorizing travel for certain nationals of Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela seeking to lawfully enter the United States through a humanitarian parole program beyond Jan. 20, reports the Miami Herald.

Ecuador

• A judge annulled an executive decision that suspended Ecuador’s vice president, Verónica Abad, from office. But she said security agents have blocked her from accessing her office. President Daniel Noboa is running for reelection in February, and has sought to avoid delegating power to Abad, as constitutionally required, reports El País.
  
  
• The recent killing of a prominent gang member in Duran is an example of how constant fragmentation of the Ecuadorean municipality’s gangs has helped ignite a never-ending spiral of violence, reports InSight Crime.

Argentina

• Argentine libertarian President Javier Milei is slowing the monthly devaluation of the peso — the so-called crawling peg — which effectively extends an unorthodox currency policy that he says is essential to ending the country’s inflation crisis, reports the Financial Times.

Histories

• Archeologists say they have found evidence of subterranean Incan passageways in Cusco, mentioned in historical texts but previously unverified. (El País)

EnergiesNet.com 01 15 2024