Cuba Rejects Inclusion on US List of State Sponsors of Terrorism

The spokesman of the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, Alberto Gonzalez, said that the Cuban government is cooperating in the international fight against terrorism and added that the Island “has complied, is complying and will comply with the internationally recognized security measures for these cases.”
   

Gonzalez insisted that Cuba “does not recognize any moral authority of the US government to certify its inclusion and that of the Cubans on this type of list.”
   

The Cuban representative stressed that the Caribbean nation “has a perfectly clean service record in this area. Cuban territory has never been used to organize, finance or execute terrorist acts against the United States of America or any other state.”
   

Gonzalez noted that the inclusion of Cuba on the black list has a political character because the government in Washington “cannot cite a single terrorist act or intention that has come from Cuban territory.”
   

“On the contrary,” he continued, “Cuba has been the victim of violence and terrorism by people such as Luis Posada Carriles.”
   

Posada Carriles, along with Orlando Bosch, masterminded the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed all 73 people on board. He is currently living in the United States and Washington has ignored a Venezuelan request for his extradition in the airliner bombing.