From: NY Transfer News <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2001 17:38:06 -0500 (EST)
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (NY Transfer News)
Subject: [CubaNews] Big vote in UN against US embargo of Cuba
Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit
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Big vote in UN against US embargo of Cuba
By Evelyn Leopold
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 27 (Reuters) - The U.N. General Assembly, for the
10th consecutive year, voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday for an end to
the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, with Havana saying not even most
Americans approved of the 4-decade-old sanctions.
The vote was 167 to 3, identical to last year's record vote. Those
opposing the resolution, in addition to the United States, were
Israel and the Marshall Islands, the same countries who supported
Washington in 2000.
Nations abstaining were Latvia, Micronesia and Nicaragua. All three
nations abstained last year, in addition to Morocco.
Despite strong U.N. support for American positions since the Sept. 11
attack against the United States, sympathy for Cuba's financial
plight and condemnation of the blockade remained unchanged.
The 15 members of the European Union all voted in favor of the
nonbinding resolution because of U.S. laws that seek to prevent
foreign firms from having commercial dealings with Cuba. Belgium,
speaking for the EU, said Europeans deplored the consequences of the
embargo on the Cuban people.
Speaker after speaker, especially those from developing countries,
said the unilateral embargo was a violation of the U.N. Charter, and
affected international trade.
The resolution, as in previous years, referred to the 1996
Helms-Burton Act that allowed U.S. citizens who were Cuban citizens
before President Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution to file suit in U.S.
courts against foreign companies or individuals who "traffic" in
expropriated property.
U.S. representative James Cunningham said the trade embargo was
designed to promote democracy in Cuba and that the United States had
moved dramatically to allow Havana to buy food.
"Cuba, long out of step with the trend of democratization in the
world ... has proven itself even more out of step with its recent
hideous remarks on the U.S. reaction to the September 11 terrorist
attacks," he said.
Havana's foreign minister, Felipe Perez Roque, last month denounced
Washington for waging an "ineffective unjustifiable bombing campaign"
in Afghanistan.
But Perez, in his address to the assembly on Tuesday, detailed the
U.S. prohibitions and said Cuba would be willing to reach an
agreement "for the nearly 6,000 U.S. companies and citizens" whose
properties were nationalized after the 1959 revolution.
However, he couched his unusual offer by saying that "Cuba-recognizes
their rights -- and would be willing to reach an agreement that also
takes into account the extremely burdensome economic and human
hardships inflicted on our country by the blockade."
And he said that putting Cuba on the U.S. State Department list of
terrorist states was particularly outrageous.
"This is an outrage to the Cuban people, who have in fact, as
everyone knows, been the victims of countless terrorist acts
organized and financed with total impunity from U.S. territory,"
Perez said.
"The blockade does not enjoy majority support in the United States,"
he said.
14:21 11-27-01
Copyright 2001 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
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