CUBA: Parliament Considers Helms-Burton “Antidote Law”

By Dalia Acosta Reprint | | Print |

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Dec 23 1996 (IPS) - Cuba’s Parliament will be considering an “Antidote” to the US Helms-Burton Law this week, in a move to protect foreign investments in Cuba.

“It is our duty to seek all possible formulae to help the investors and protect their interests,” said Ricardo Alarcon, head of the Parliamentary National Assembly which will meet Tuesday and Wednesday this week.

The Helms-Burton Law, signed in March by President Bill Clinton, allows for legal action to be taken in the United States against enterprises or entrepreneurs of third countries dealing with former property of US citizens in Cuba.

The project to be debated in Cuba’s Parliament considers all cases brought under the Helms-Burton Law null and void, be they people or entities, independent of their citizenship or nationality, said Parliamentary sources.

The legal initiative recognises that fines on nationalised US- owned properties could form part of a negotiating process between Washington and Havana.

But under the new project, whoever makes use of the mechanisms planned by the Helms-Burton Law will be automatically excluded from any possibility of having their claims compensated by Cuba at a future date.

The Cuban law will also recognise demands against the United States government for economic losses resulting from the blockade on the island, at an estimated value of around 60 billion dollars.

It also establishes the right of those affected by actions backed or supported by the US government to claim the corresponding compensation from Cuban Justice Ministry commissions.

Cuba rejects the Helms-Burton law as it considers this deepens the economic blockade on the island decreed in 1962, but also because it suggests the creation of a new government in Havana which will be systematically accountable to Washington.

Alarcon recognised compensation as one of the core issues of the Helms-Burton law and assured Cuban law will follow the steps of similar norms being considered by Mexico, Canada and the European Union.

The Cuban project received the approval of the Constitutional and Legal, International Relations and Economic Affairs comissions of the Cuban Parliament, and will be submitted to the plenary in the “Christmas” sessions.

Parliament will try to resume the two ordinary sessions corresponding to 1996 – considered a hard year by most Cubans – in barely two working days.

The outgoing year leaves behind it the bad memory of the “airplane crisis,” the approval of the Helms-Burton Law, the stagnation of dialogue on a guideline cooperation agreement with the European Union and a diplomatic crisis with Spain.

In just one day, on Feb. 24, the Fidel Castro government shot down two civil planes, bringing to an end the incipient rapprochement between Cuba and the United States which had led optimists to predict a prompt end to the US blockade on the island.

The Cubans also suffered the effects of economic cleansing measures, the return of the “hard hand” in the ideological sphere and the damage caused by a hurricane and heavy rains.

The first ordinary session in Parliament, which should have been held mid-year, was delayed when the government faced international questioning over the incident on February 24, when it was still uncertain whether or not the Helms-Burton Law would come into effect.

The official Communist Party daily “Granma,” reported the sessions corresponding to this year will be carried out in two days and must approve the guidelines of the economic policy and the State budget for the next year.

The Cuban “Antidote Law” project shows the government’s disposition for “suitable and just compensation” for the goods taken from people and legally recognised entitites with US citizenship at the time when the nationalisations occurred.

Parliament will give Cuban government the job of adopting the dispositions, measures and additional facilities needed for the total protection of foreign investors on the island and the defence of investor’s interests.

With this end in sight, the government will be empowered to authorise various formulae like the transferral of interests from foreign investments to fiduciary companies, financial entities or investment funds.

The Cuban initiative will declare illicit any form of direct or indirect collaboration with the application of the Helms-Burton Law, including the search for and administration of information to any representative of the US government.

Similarly it will be illegal to request, receive, accept, facilitate the distribution of or benefit in any way from financial resources, materials or other elements coming from or channeled by the US government in relation to the Helms-Burton Law.

Once it is approved, the law will guarantee tax relief on remittances sent from family members abroad and Cuban emigres in order to keep open bank accounts in freely convertible currencies on the island.