By Brian Kesten

Starwood Hotels & Resorts, an American company, has agreed to buy and renovate three historic resorts in Cuba. The purchase, approved by the Treasury Department in the U.S., marks the first major foray of an American company into Cuba in decades. Although Congress has not acted to end the embargo on Cuba, President Obama continues to lift restrictions on travel, financial transactions, and trade with Cuba.

The major Caribbean island observed a 25 percent increase in visitors in 2015. However, Cuba may not have the capacity to welcome additional visitors: Cuba’s resort industry has been oversaturated, causing shortages and overbookings.

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April 06, 2016

By Anthony Zurcher

In a letter published by the state run newspaper Granma, Fidel Castro wrote that “we don’t need the empire to give us anything” following Obama’s historic visit to Cuba. Breaking silence for the first time since the U.S. president’s visit, Castro reminded readers of events such as the Bay of Pigs invasion, and suggested that Obama not “develop theories about Cuban politics.” Although officially retired from public office, Castro does wield significant influence over the Cuban population, casting a shadow of doubt over both countries’ willingness to bury the past.

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April 04, 2016

By Sarah Akbar

The State Department announced Friday that Secretary Kerry would not be accompanying President Obama on his trip to Cuba later this month, raising suspicions that there were disagreements over which dissidents the President would be allowed to meet. Shortly after Kerry’s announcement, the White House was firm in its view that the President alone would decide which members of civil society he would meet. The Cuban Commission for Human Rights reported that 1,414 political arrests occurred in Cuba in the month of January, and U.S. Representative Illeana Ros-Lehtinen brought up that more than 8,000 people had been allegedly arbitrarily arrested since the two countries decided to normalize relations in December of 2014.

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March 17, 2016

By Alex Yeager

Nearly a year after President Obama’s pronouncement of a goal to normalize trade relations with Cuba, minimal progress has been made on a path towards tangible trade growth.  To be fair, some real steps have been taken; most recently, the Obama administration issued regulations in September aimed at making it easier for U.S. companies to establish subsidiaries and do business in Cuba.  And, regulations regarding U.S. travel to Cuba have also been dramatically loosened.

But overall, what are the real trade effects as of now?  Virtually none.  In fact, aggregate trade numbers have actually dropped between the two countries in the time since President Obama’s proclamation.  Officials on both sides maintain that the long-standing embargo is still severely hampering any trade progress between the nations.  Some disagreement exists as to whether this is really the biggest hurdle, but it seems fairly intuitive that a trade embargo is not conducive to free trade between neighboring nations. 

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November 16, 2015

By Abbie Schepps

While 50 plus years of economic sanctions hit Cuba hard in their factories, banking system, and hospitals, it seems to have missed the fans of American movies and television. The Washington Post reports that currently playing, for free, on Cuban television and in the movie theaters is American media content.

Cuban officials claim that since U.S. sanctions remain so restrictive, discussions regarding copyright protection would be a bit premature. While these protections are important, trade issues must be the primary focus for now.  The idea is that once the U.S. eases its aggressive and punitive measures, Cuba will be more willing to discuss protections of property across the board. Of course, the government’s handling of the media content is just a drop in the bucket and nothing in comparison to street-level Cuban bootleggers.

Cuba is not against the protection of intellectual property. As a signatory to major international treaties protecting such property, Cuba has done a good job of enforcing these protections for many U.S. products. Unfortunately, media content is not one of these products. With free media content pervading the country, media piracy will most likely pervade long after efforts to correct the system begin.

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October 30, 2015

By Shannon Togawa Mercer

In his Saturday address to the United Nations General Assembly, Cuban President, Raul Castro, highlighted the continued detrimental impact of the U.S. Trade Embargo. Castro estimated an aggregate $121 billion in damages to the Cuban economy. While President Obama has taken steps to liberalize trade, only Congress can lift the embargo. The U.N. General Assembly has urged the U.S. to end the embargo on an annual basis since 1992, when it adopted a resolution expressing its disapproval. The General Assembly isn’t alone. Companies such as Cargill, Proctor & Gamble, Caterpillar, Shell Oil and Chevron are lobbying Capitol Hill for further liberalization. Surprisingly, of all the horses in this race, Arkansas’ is chomping at the bit. Governor Asa Hutchinson, in anticipation of the decreased trade barriers and availability of financing opportunities, hopes to increase Arkansas’ agricultural exports to Cuba. He travels to Cuba today as a part of a trade mission.

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October 14, 2015

By Victoria Hines

The Obama Administration took another step towards normalization between Cuba and the U.S. by releasing regulations authorizing American entrepreneurs to pursue arrangements with Cuban government owned companies. This policy announcement is representative of the administration’s larger scheme to depart from the 1960 U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, which poses an interesting dilemma for the U.S. cigar industry. Americans can now bring back $100 worth of Cuban cigars back to the U.S. But, will this policy adversely impact U.S. cigar companies? The U.S. cigar industry has recently suggested that they are not fearful of the influx of competition from their Cuban counterparts. Rather, they are convinced their superior quality will prevail over the mysticism Americans associate with the Cuban cigar.

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September 28, 2015

By Ena Cefo

On April 14th, 2015, President Barack Obama recommended that Cuba be removed from the U.S. government’s list of “state sponsors of terrorism”—following a review and report by the State Department, which found that Cuba met the criteria for rescission from the list. Until now, Cuba had remained on the list along with just Iraq, Sudan and Syria. The removal of Cuba from the list will “eliminate some sanctions, including restrictions on foreign assistance, a ban on defense exports and other financial regulations, though the embargo remains in place [because lifting the embargo requires Congressional action, such as the proposed bipartisan bill by Senator Klobuchar].”

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May 01, 2015

By Craig Tarasoff

Over the past few months, the United States and Cuba have taken great strides to normalize their relationship. On December 17, 2014, U.S. President Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced that they would be lifting many of the decades-old restrictions between the two countries. After 54 years, some of the hostility and separation between US and Cuba may be heading toward an end. At the very least, by easing some of the travel and commerce restrictions, the two nations can distance themselves from the rigid policies of the past half-century. 

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April 24, 2015

By Stephen Levy

The Treasury Department lifted sanctions on 45 entities related to Cuba on March 24^th, according to Reuters, but few of them were still functioning. The Treasury Department said that the adjustments to the Specially Designated Nationals List were not driven by recent moves by the Obama Administration to improve relations with Havana. Instead, it was merely to update the SDN List. Two of the people removed from the list had been executed in 1989 by the Cuban government, raising questions about how often the Treasury actually analyses the SDN List.  Additionally, the lifting of any sanctions, regardless of the fact that most of them are either dead people and sunk ships, will likely raise eyebrows among the Cuban population in the United States.

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April 17, 2015

By Jieying Ding

Two months after Obama’s historic announcement to normalize relations between U.S. and Cuba, the U.S. relaxed restrictions on imports of goods and services from Cuba, reported by The Guardian.  However, many goods still remain under embargo-including the famous and beloved Cuban cigars. The new trade agreement also excludes business controlled by the Cuban government. Nevertheless, the news excites the trade market between U.S. and Cuba, and major companies such as Netflix and Twitter expressed interest in expanding their business to Cuba.

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March 09, 2015

By Craig Tarasoff

After President Obama announced in January that restrictions on trade with and travel to Cuba would be relaxed, the ITC initiated a study to learn of the economic effects on exports of goods and services. The ITC will be preparing a report for the Senate Finance Committee, which will include an overview of Cuban imports, a description of how US law will affect Cuban imports on US goods and services, and an estimate of US exports to Cuba. This analysis will be particularly important for manufacturers with an interest in investing and trading with Cuba. A public hearing will be held in March. See Industry Week and National Law Review for more details.

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February 17, 2015

By Stephen Levy

Lost amidst the news of the political opening with Cuba, the United States has continued to target and sanction one of the Castro’s closest allies, the Venezuelan government. The State Department, as noted in the Miami Herald, imposed visa bans on February 2^nd on officials culpable in the crackdowns on political and economic protests in Venezuela, as well as those engaged in corruption. Despite lacking the sheer verbosity of Hugo Chavez, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro tried his best to imitate Chavez in his response, criticizing the U.S. as an “irresponsible imperial faction”. Maduro then ordered a pharmacy’s CEO arrested in an attempt to get the company to release more of its products. It seems unlikely that such an action will stem the increasing number of protests on the lack of basic human necessities at Venezuelan grocery stores.

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February 11, 2015

By Catherine Kent

Chairman Baudouin Prot of Paris-based French bank, BNP Paribas, is now the second bank officer to step down after BNP Paribas spent 10 years (from 2002 to 2012) funneling money to nefarious regimes in Sudan, Iran, and Cuba, in violation of U.S. sanctions for which BNP Paribas paid the record-breaking fine of $8.9 billion this summer.. Mr. Prot, who had worked for BNP Paribas  for 30 years, had just been renewed as Chairman this year, and was not due to run again until 2017.

As the bank plead guilty to two criminal charges, it will also face a one year ban on its dollar-clearing business. Meanwhile, as top officers are stepping down and taking blame for this violation, industry sources are speculating that the bank might take this opportunity to find a new, fresh-minded leadership group for BNP Paribas – and hopefully one that will avoid violating U.S. sanctions in the future. 

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September 29, 2014

By Julie Inglese

On Tuesday, China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Cuba, and Algeria won seats on the U.N. Human Rights Council. 

A recent article from The Washington Post has noted that many groups have nothing kind to say about the newly elected countries. This includes UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer who said, “China, Cuba, Russia, and Saudi Arabia systematically violate the human rights of their own citizens, and they consistently vote the wrong way on U.N. initiatives to protect the human rights of others… For the U.N. to elect Saudi Arabia as a world judge on human rights would be like a town making a pyromaniac into chief of the fire department.” 

Neuer is not the only one with strong feelings about the election. Humans rights groups have been claiming the newly elected representatives undermine the council’s credibility. Human Rights Watch has pointed out that five of the new council members have refused to allow U.N. visits to investigate alleged abuses, which generally means a country has "a lot of explaining to do." 

Continuing reading about the controversy over at The Washington Post. 

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November 20, 2013

By Abraham Shanedling

A new report has disclosed that Cuban weapons found on board a ship bound for North Korea violated United Nations sanctions on North Korea.

The report, posted by 38 North, includes pictures of weapons and a scanned cargo manifest of the North Korean-flagged Chong Chon Gang, which was intercepted on July 15 in the Panama Canal with 25 containers of Cuban military equipment. The military equipment was not listed on the ship’s manifest and included two MiG-21 jet fighters, anti-aircraft systems, and missile parts.

Current UN sanctions ban North Korea from trading arms in order to deprive the regime of resources because of its pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

Check out The Miami Herald for more on this story. 

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September 05, 2013