For the past 15 years, the Castro regime has sought to entice foreign companies to Cuba by offering slave wages and stolen property. The cost of doing business there is that you pay workers' salaries to the regime, take the government as your business partner and agree to lobby against the U.S. embargo. As astonishing as it sounds, there are American businessmen who look upon these woeful conditions and ask, "How do I get in on this?" U.S. policy bars "trading with the...

Iran, Cuba and Venezuela have developed a close and cooperative relationship against the U.S. and in support of terrorist groups and states. The three regimes increasingly coordinate their policies and resources in a three way partnership aimed at counteracting and circumventing U.S. policies in the Middle East and Latin America. Within this relationship, Cuba plays a strategic role in terms of geography (proximity to the U.S.), intelligence gathering (both electronic eavesdropping and human...

HUMAN RIGHTS Watch’s paints a somber picture of political life in Cuba. “The Cuban government continues to repress individuals and groups who criticize the government or call for basic human rights,” the report notes. “The government controls all media outlets in Cuba and tightly restricts access to outside information, severely limiting the right to freedom of expression. Only a tiny fraction of Cubans are able to read independent websites and blogs because of the high...

Early this year the Argentine prosecutor, Alberto Nisman, disclosed a 500-page document of evidence of Iran’s terrorist networks in Latin America. It included a number of countries, among which were Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Guyana, Paraguay, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname, and Uruguay. Iran’s activities in some of these countries are carried out with the direct or indirect support from the local government. For example, in my , I described the role played by the...

President Raúl Castro Ruz Head of Cuba’s Council of State Chairman of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) Dear President Castro, When you were sworn in as chairman of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) for one year at the end of the recent CELAC summit in the Chilean capital of Santiago, you undertook to act “with total respect for international law, the United Nations charter and the fundamental principles governing...

This week marks the third anniversary of the Cuba's arrest of USAID subcontractor Alan Gross for the "crime" of delivering internet equipment to a Jewish group in Havana. Working under a U.S. program to support the Cuban people - as opposed to the Cuban regime - Mr. Gross was subsequently sentenced in a Cuban kangaroo court to 15 years in prison for acts "against the state." The ordeal has taken a terrible toll on Mr. Gross. He has reportedly lost more than 100 pounds, may...

After a decade of silence and an apologetic attitude towards the countries of the Bolivarian alliance (ALBA), the international community finally protested attacks against freedom of the press in Ecuador, forcing the Ecuadorian president to back off. For years the Organization of American States and countries of the region have been enablers and thus passive accomplices of the anti-democratic wave that has penetrated Latin America. Under the pretext of helping the poor and the...

Now that it is known that Iran is moving ever closer to obtaining a nuclear weapon, the United States is targeting sanctions against the Iranian Central Bank. Likewise, the European Union is moving in the direction of imposing an effective oil embargo on Iran. These sanctions are apparently having a more dire effect on Iran’s economy as evidenced by their threat to close the Straits of Hormuz. If anything the Iranian government’s animus towards the West and towards the U.S and...

Iran is quietly seeking to expand its ties with Latin America in what U.S. officials and regional experts say is an effort to circumvent economic sanctions and gain access to much-needed markets and raw materials. The new diplomatic offensive, which comes amid rising tensions with Washington and European powers, includes a four-nation swing through South and Central America this month by . His government has vowed to increase its economic, political and military influence in the United...

Two leaders in the peaceful Cuban resistance movement who were released on the week ofDecember 12-18 after being subjected to violent arrests and inhumane prison conditions declared that the Cuban regime is intimidated by the rise and strength of the human rights groups in the island. Jose Daniel Ferrer García (released Dec.12), leader of the umbrella group UMPACU, (Cuban Patriotic Union) in Eastern Cuba, and Angel Moya Acosta (released Dec. 14) who resides in Havana and is the main...