U.S.-CUBA: Officials Attack Computer Convoy to Cuba

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

NEW YORK, Feb 1 1996 (IPS) - A religious group opposed to the U.S. embargo of Cuba expressed shock and dismay after its members were assaulted by federal agents Wednesday while trying to transport computers across the Mexican border.

The group, Pastors for Peace, was prevented from transporting the computers after federal agents at California’s Otay Mesa border crossing tackled group members, arrested 15 people and seized some 350 used computers intended for use in Cuba.

“The place was crawling with as many as 150 (agents), from San Diego police, U.S. Customs police, and plainclothes people from both the Treasury Department and FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation),” Blake Dunlap, a coordinator for the convoy, told IPS from San Diego Thursday.

“The Customs police grabbed our humanitarian aid,” Dunlap said of the used computers. Many of the roughly 200 convoy participants, he added, “were gang-tackled, (by) sometimes as many as eight officers to one participant.”

The raid was an exceptionally harsh challenge to groups opposed to the 24-year-old Cuba embargo. Pastors for Peace — and U.S. trade delegations — have recently pushed for greater access to Cuba.

The Rev. Lucius Walker, executive director of Pastors for Peace and one of the 15 members arrested, argued that his group was unfairly punished for seeking to provide computers that would help link hospitals, clinics and medical schools throughout Cuba.

“It is inconceivable that our government would want to deny modern medical care to Cuban children and senior citizens,” Walker said after his arrest. “The seizure of these computers is a shameful page in U.S. history.”

Humanitarian aid, he argued, is exempted from the U.S. embargo against Cuba. Under the embargo’s terms, any U.S. citizen participating in economic activity with Cuba without a permit can face up to 10 years in jail and 250,000 dollars in fines.

Dunlap said the raid was surprising since the group had carried out four previous caravans, all of which had been allowed to cross the border. Last year, he said, Pastors for Peace was able to ship a larger number of computers without any problem.

But Alan Bersin, U.S. attorney for San Diego, said the convoy participants could be charged with assaulting law enforcement officers. Eleven convoy participants were arraigned before a court in San Diego Thursday.

“What happened today was not civil disobedience,” Bersin told the San Diego Union-Tribune Wednesday. “What happened today was an assault on the U.S. Customs Service — which responded with restraint, but with firmness, in upholding the law.”

“Our manner of conduct is always peaceful,” Dunlap countered. “We had told the authorities exactly what we were going to do. We cooperated fully.”

The Pastors for Peace convoy expected some tensions, however, after receiving a leaked copy of an “unclassified but sensitive” Commerce Department document warning about the convoy.

The document, an excerpt of which was obtained by IPS, details Pastors for Peace’s effort to send the computers to Cuba via Tijuana, Mexico, and said a multi-agency task force, including Customs officials, the FBI and local police, was planning a response.

“Customs officials stated that, according to guidance from the Office of Foreign Asset Control, they will not allow the export of prohibited computers to Cuba,” the document says.

“Agency representatives were united in stressing the need for calm and restraint in dealing with the Pastors for Peace group, and said they hope to seize the computers prior to their arrival at the border,” the Commerce Department document adds.

Dunlap contended that the Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) may be behind the apparent change in policy.

Last fall, he said, President Bill Clinton “broadened the definition of its Cuba policy to include stiff enforcement of the embargo.” Under that policy, Dunlap contended, Richard Newcombe of OFAC had directed Commerce officials to take a tougher line than before in blocking aid convoys to Cuba.

Despite knowing about the Commerce documents, Pastors for Peace informed both the U.S. and Mexican authorities that they would cross into Mexico at Otay Mesa at noon Wednesday, Dunlap said. But instead of forestalling any problems, that information set the stage for the Wednesday confrontation.

“I find it shameful, as someone who voted for Clinton, ” he added.

For several years now, Cuba specialists outside the Cuban- American exile communities in Florida and New Jersey have urged Clinton to lift the embargo, which has had little effect in its stated aim of toppling the Communist government of President Fidel Castro.

Clinton restored relations with Vietnam last year, and has even provided aid to North Korea, a U.S. nemesis for more than 40 years. But, as with previous officeholders, the president has found the domestic politics surrounding the Cuba issue more tricky.

In 1994, the administration toughened sanctions on Havana following a summer in which thousands of Cuban refugees took to the seas to seek asylum. That September, U.S.-Cuba talks in New York yielded an agreement on limited, legal migration from Cuba to the United States. Further agreements last year helped foster an exchange of news bureaus between the two countries.

But, politically, Cuba remains a hot potato, especially in a presidential election year. Florida and New Jersey, with heavy concentrations of right-wing and vocal Cuban exiles, are considered key “swing” states in the November elections.

Dunlap said he found the continuing onus on Cuba mystifying. “The Cold War is supposedly over,” he argued. “Why is Cuba considered an enemy?”