Activists protest in Washington DC, to urge Biden to take Cuba off State Sponsors of Terrorism list. Photo: Craig Birchfield.
United States President Biden has announced that he will remove Cuba from the US’s list of State Sponsors of Terrorism in his final days as President, reversing Donald Trump’s addition of Cuba to the list in 2021. The Biden administration said on Tuesday, January 14, that this move is meant to facilitate the release of individuals detained in Cuba. “I transmit herewith a report to the Congress with respect to the proposed recission of Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism,” Biden announced.
State Sponsors of Terrorism list
Countries are added to the US’s State Sponsors of Terrorism list by the State Department that have allegedly “repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism”. In practice, however, those countries included on the list—Cuba, North Korea, Syria, and Iran—are all nations that have refused to toe the US line on foreign policy, while highly controversial nations such as Saudi Arabia are excluded from such a list.
Cuba’s designation on this list had meant that the US could apply several types of unilateral sanctions to the island, and also has the added unofficial effects of ostracizing the socialist nation from potential trading partners, who fear incurring the US’s wrath. This results in shortages of key goods, such as fuel, the cause of multiple humanitarian crises. According to the advocacy organization the Washington Office for Latin America, “Fearful of being accused of abetting terror and the mammoth fines that an infraction entails, most banks refuse to process Cuban payments and have frozen funds for permitted religious and humanitarian activities, requiring additional licensing.” Cuba’s designation on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list exacerbated the devastation caused by the sweeping blackouts last year.
Cuba was added to this list at the end of Donald Trump’s first term. For nearly his entire four years as President, Biden had done nothing to change this designation, despite growing pressure within the United States and across the world for the same.
“Off the list!”
On December 5, a coalition of elected officials, labor leaders, and organizations across the United States issued a joint call to demand that President Biden take Cuba off of the SSOT list. These included New York State Senators Jabari Brisport, Brad Hoylman-Sigal, and Julia Salazar, as well as Minnesota State Senator Sandra Pappas, Massachusetts State Representative Erika Uyterhoeven, Los Angeles City Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez, and Nate Baker of the Durham, North Carolina City Council. Labor leaders and trade unions also signed on, including United Auto Workers, the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America, the Professional Staff Congress-CUNY, and the Committee of Interns & Residents, a local of Service Employees International Union (SEIU), as well as Dr. Brima Sylla, Vice President of Amazon Labor Union IBT, Ali Fuhrman, the President of AFSCME Local 2822, and Anica Walls, the President of the Public Sector Employees of California, SEIU Local 1000.
Earlier, in September, 35 former leaders from across the globe had penned an open letter to US President Biden, urging him to remove Cuba from the US’s “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list. Signatories to the letter include Dilma Rousseff, former President of Brazil, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, former President of Argentina, Evo Morales, former president of Bolivia, Rafael Correa, former president of Ecuador, and Manuel Zelaya, former president of Honduras.
The move has been celebrated by social movements across the world as a people’s victory. The People’s Forum which has organized a number of material solidarity campaigns with Cuba as it has suffered under the restrictions of the SSoT wrote in a statement, “This milestone is the result of relentless efforts by activists and organizations over the past several years who worked tirelessly to challenge the baseless designation, which made it nearly impossible for Cuba to make transactions using international banking systems and acquire necessary goods on the international market.” They also emphasized, “Today’s removal of Cuba from the US list of State Sponsors of terror is a huge victory, but the fight isn’t over: lift the US blockade on Cuba now!
🇨🇺 VICTORY! CUBA REMOVED FROM STATE SPONSORS OF TERRORISM LIST
Today’s removal of Cuba from the U.S. list of State Sponsors of Terrorism marks a major victory for not only the Cuban people, but also for all people of the world who stand for sovereignty, dignity, and justice.… pic.twitter.com/RpUkxFxySK
— The People’s Forum (@PeoplesForumNYC) January 14,
The Party for Socialism and Liberation, an political party building the movement for socialism within the United States, wrote in response to Biden’s decision that “For years, activists in the United States and around the world have demanded that Biden lift this ridiculous status, which was designed to tighten the blockade that causes so much hardship for the Cuban people. “This is a victory for world public opinion, which recognizes that Cuba is the victim of US-backed terrorism, not a perpetrator of it. Now, we need to fight to demand that Trump not re-impose the ‘state sponsor of terror’ designation when he takes office. With anti-Cuba fanatic Marco Rubio set to lead the State Department, now more than ever we need to demand an end to all forms of US aggression!”
