In his opinion column in the newspaper The Grenada Informer, Dr. Terrency Marryshow, coordinator of the Granada-Cuba Solidarity Committee, demanded the immediate withdrawal of Cuba from the arbitrary list of state sponsors of terrorism, as the name of his journalistic space says. , Enough is enough… Just Food for Thought!
Cuba has been subjected to a criminal economic blockade imposed on her by the United States over the last 63 years. It is the longest period of sanctions and hostility imposed on any country in modern history. This blockade defies all of the norms and principles of the United Nations as it relates to the right of countries to choose their own path of development and the right to self-determination.
The US, which is a signatory to the UN charter continues to violate and flout with impunity these basic principles, which over the last 60 odd years have bought untold suffering to the people of Cuba. Ironically, Cuba’s only “crime” is that she refuses to bow to the dictates of Washington and following their successful and triumphant glorious revolution of January 1st 1959, decided to pursue a path to development dictated by the years of exploitation at the hands of the very US and in the footsteps of their national hero Jose Marti.
In carving their own destiny, Cuba has always been on the right side of history and despite the economic blockade has been a bastion of support and solidarity for the exploited and dispossessed and for the struggling peoples of the third world, fighting for freedom and social justice.
The so-called pundits and detractors of Cuba always believed that the collapse and dissolution of the former Soviet Union and the Eastern European Socialist block after 1999, would have inevitably led to the disintegration of the Cuban socialist system and revolution. For many years, the US propaganda machine continued to tout Cuba as a satellite state of the Soviet Union and predicted that once subsidies from the Soviet Union disappeared with the disappearance with the Soviet state, Cuba would follow suit.
Much to the chagrin of the US and its allies, Cuba survived and has continued to survive. They again wrongly predicted that with the passing of the indomitable and iconic comrade leader Fidel Castro, the revolution would follow him to the grave. Again, their predictions were erroneous and even though the hardships and suffering for the Cuban people are incredibly severe, they have still found a way to survive.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US, sensing Cuba’s vulnerability, passed a series of legislative measures aimed at intensifying the blockade, all without justification. Measures like the Cuba Democracy act in 1992, Helms-Burton Act in 1996 and the Export Enhancement Act of 2000 were all designed to bring Cuba to her knees. Not only did these illegal measures make life even more difficult for Cubans inside of Cuba but the US was now going out of its way to punish and penalize countries for doing business with Cuba.
The Obama administration correctly recognized that none of these measures were working and in fact were anachronistic after decades of trying and so decided to change course and try a new method by establishing formal diplomatic relations on 20th July 2015 with the formal opening of embassies in both Washington and Havana. This was done shortly before President Obama visited Cuba in March 2016 becoming the first president to do so since President Calvin Coolidge in 1928. Although the blockade, which required an act of Congress, was not lifted, the Obama measures significantly increased airline travel between the both countries with an increase in tourists on commercial flights and cruise ship arrivals to Havana from the US. This significantly impacted the Cuban economy, which in short order was showing signs of improvement.
That fledging relationship and diplomatic progress were short-lived with the incoming Trump administration in 2017 undoing almost everything that was done by Obama. The Trump administration wasted no time in imposing new measures against Cuba, all without justification. Over 240 new measures were announced while considering Obama’s measures as “terrible and misguided. They blamed Cuba for their unsuccessful efforts to overthrow the Nicholas Maduro Government of Venezuela, a close ally of Cuba. By the end of the Trump administration in 2021, Donald Trump arbitrarily put Cuba on a select list of countries that the US considered as state sponsors of terrorism with no evidence to justify this claim except that he had the power to do it.
The incoming Biden administration in 2022, contrary to their campaign promises left intact the almost 240 punitive measures against Cuba by the Trump administration with absolutely no shred of proof of their allegations that Cuba was a sponsor of terrorism. If the truth be known, Cuba is and was a victim of terrorism, the first being the bombing of the Cuban airlines by agents of the Central Intelligence Agency while leaving Barbados on 6th October 1976 killing 73 innocent people, many of them athletes. A wave of bombings designed to cripple the tourism industry and Cuba’s economy took place in three hotels in 1997 all inspired by US agents.
Despite a worldwide outcry within the United Nations General Assembly, which overwhelmingly voted for the last 29 years for the removal of the criminal economic blockade against Cuba, the US has continued to thumb its nose at the international community and the almost unanimous support for Cuba with the exception of Israel. Since 2021, there have been calls from all sectors around the world to have Cuba removed from the list of state sponsors of terrorism because it is simply not true. When a country as powerful as the United States arbitrarily decides to place a small struggling country like Cuba on a list that sponsors terrorism and subjects it to all of the sanctions and punishments associated with such a designation, then it must mean that they have become overly desperate. The US has tried every means imaginable to bring Cuba to its knees and has failed miserably. It is no wonder that there is a culture of bullying within the Us society because the US as a country engages in this despicable practice of bullying countries who refuse to bow to the their dictates.
The Biden administration recently announced that Cuba has been removed from the list of countries that are not cooperating fully in the fight against terrorism. What gross deception and hypocrisy is this when the US still maintains Cuba on the list of countries that are State Sponsors of Terrorism? The US intelligence service is one of the most advanced in the world and they more than anyone else know which countries are state sponsors of terrorism. They know for a fact that Cuba does not belong on that list but has resorted to the most sinister and oppressive of measures by putting Cuba on such a list so as to prevent Cuba from doing business with other countries and to be excluded from the world financial system. It is all designed to do what they have been seeking to do since January 1961, which is to undermine the Cuban Revolution and create sufficient hardships that would force them to turn against the government and end their revolution.
These measures have never worked and by now they should realize that the Cuban people are steeled in struggle and are not about to give up what they have fought so long and so hard for over the last 64 years. It is time for the US to do what is right and just and stop being a liar and manipulator of world opinion by heeding the call of the vast majority of people around the world who have been saying with one united voice that it is time to remove the criminal blockage, return the illegally occupied territory of Guantanamo to the Cuban people with immediate effect and without conditions, remove Cuba from the list of State Sponsors of Terrorism and give the Cuba people a chance to breathe for they have endured enough. Enough is enough… Just Food for Thought!