U.S. Department Of State Discusses Cuba's Inclusion On List Of State Sponsors Of Terrorism.

United States Department of State
Washington DC
14 December 2023

Briefing excerpts:

QUESTION: Matt, follow-up. Question on Cuba. At the end of the Trump administration, they designated Cuba as a State Sponsor of Terror. Last week in a briefing with Congress, the State Department told members of Congress that they have not even begun a review of whether Cuba should be removed from the State Sponsor of Terror list. As you know, there’s been 450,000 migrants that have flown out of Cuba over the last two years. The economy has been decimated as a result of this designation. Why hasn’t the review begun?

MR MILLER: So I’m not going to speak to either an internal deliberative process here inside the State Department or our conversations with members of Congress, though they of course are —

QUESTION: Matt, follow-up.

MR MILLER: I’m in the middle of answering someone else’s question right now. You might – maybe hold for just a second. As we have said previously, should there be any rescission of the State Sponsor of Terrorism status, it would need to be consistent with a specific statutory criteria for rescinding that determination. Any review of Cuba’s status on the list, should one ever happen, would be based on the law and the criteria established by Congress, but the President and Secretary Blinken remain committed to the policies that we have advanced that will advance the democratic aspirations of the Cuban people.

QUESTION: There’s a six-month statutory requirement, as you know. Is the administration nervous that you will run out of time in this term in order to make a decision if you haven’t started the review yet?

MR MILLER: So again, I don’t think I can answer that with violating what I said I wasn’t going to do at the outset, which is comment on internal deliberations.