Obama drops Cuba from terror list

WASHINGTON - President Obama told Congress on Tuesday that he is removing Cuba from a list of state sponsors of terrorism, the latest action in his drive to normalize relations with the island but one that paves the way for a showdown with Congress.

Obama said Cuba has not provided any support for international terrorism in the last six months and has given him assurances that it will not do so in the future, the two conditions necessary for a country to be removed from the list, which also includes Iran, Sudan, and Syria.

President George W. Bush removed North Korea from the list in 2008 in a failed effort to get that country to give up its nuclear program.

Congress now has 45 days to override the move or to do nothing and allow it to proceed. Even if Congress takes action against Obama's decision, he could veto it.

U.S. officials declined to specify when they believe Cuba last sponsored or assisted an act of terrorism. The substance of a State Department review, which was delivered to Obama last week, remains secret.

Obama telegraphed the move over the weekend at a summit in Panama, where he sat down for an hour with Cuban President Raul Castro, the first such meeting between the nations' leaders in more than half a century. But while taking Cuba off the terror list carries heavy symbolic value, its practical impact may not be great.

Cuba remains under a U.S. economic embargo, and efforts to lift that embargo are gaining little traction in the Republican-controlled Senate and House. A series of Cuba-specific sanctions imposed by the Treasury Department over the years also remain in effect.

Obama ordered the State Department to review Cuba's presence on the terrorism list - where it had been placed in 1982 - on Dec. 17, when he and Castro announced plans to normalize relations, which were severed in 1961.

"As the president has said, we will continue to have differences with the Cuban government, but our concerns over a wide range of Cuba's policies and actions fall outside the criteria that is relevant to whether to rescind Cuba's designation as a state sponsor of terrorism," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

Tuesday's action brought condemnation from many Republicans and support from Democrats and some in the business community.

Whether the action would affect the timetable for reestablishing embassies in Havana and Washington was unclear. The two nations have held three rounds of talks to discuss issues related to that goal, but sticking points remain.

A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity under rules imposed by the White House, said Tuesday that new talks between the two sides last weekend in Panama "were really pretty productive," but Secretary of State John Kerry remains cautious.

"He wants to get this right, not necessarily fast," the official said.

That means haggling over the replacement of obsolete equipment and facilities, debating which agencies are allowed entry, and fixing staffing levels for both sides, the official said, so that each of the diplomatic missions can operate adequately.

Another senior administration official, also speaking on terms of anonymity, said economic sanctions would remain in effect and most transactions with Cuba and with Cuban nationals and the government of Cuba would remain prohibited, absent authorization from the Treasury Department and its Office of Foreign Assets Control.

Still, the chokehold on Cuba appeared to be lessening. After more than a year of operating on a cash basis after M&T Bank closed its Cuba accounts, the nation's diplomatic mission at the United Nations and its interest section in Washington appear close to establishing a new banking arrangement, the official said.

Removal from the list is also a first step toward Cuba's gaining "much-needed access" to financial markets and having representation in multilateral financial institutions, said Jason Marczak, deputy director of the Atlantic Council's Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center.

But there are a number of hurdles along that path, including U.S. sanctions that "prevent the U.S. from voting for Cuba's ascension into international financial institutions," Marczak said. Congress would have to vote to lift them.

In its 2013 terrorism report, the State Department concentrated most of its attention on al-Qaeda and Lebanon's Hezbollah movement and devoted only a short section to Cuba, noting that "Cuba has long provided safe haven to members of Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA) and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)."

But the report also noted that Cuba had hosted and supported peace negotiations between the FARC and the Colombian government and said Cuba's ties to ETA, which is blamed for more than 800 deaths in its push for independence for Spain's Basque region, have become more distant.

The report also mentioned that Cuba continues to harbor fugitives wanted in the United States.

Cuba acknowledges that it has granted political asylum to a small number of U.S. fugitives, including JoAnne Chesimard, a member of the Black Liberation Army who is known as Assata Shakur. On the FBI's list of most-wanted terrorists, she was convicted in the 1973 murder of a New Jersey state trooper and fled to Cuba after a jailbreak.

Three nations remain on the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism:

Iran

Syria

Sudan

A spot on the list means sanctions, bans on exports and arms sales, and other punitive measures aimed at freezing business.

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