Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

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Cuba: Rouhani will visit

Yes, the same Rouhani that the late Argentinian prosecutor Alberto Nisman accused of involvement in planning the July 1994 terror attack on the AMIA Jewish Center in Buenos Aires, will pay the Castros an official visit after stopping by the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit in Venezuela this week.

The Obama administration laundered billions of dollars for Iran, and now it’s junket time!

Warms your heart, doesn’t it?

Carlos Eire posts the details of Rouhani’s latest,

After attending the Dictator’s Summit in Venenozuela, Rouhani will head straight to the Castro Kingdom, where he will be hold “negotiations” about “multiple cooperation agreements” with King Raul.

While in Castrogonia, the Iranian despot will also visit Ex-Maximum Leader Fidel.

Afterwards, Rouhani will travel north, to meet with other enemies of the U.S. at the United Nations.

In other smart diplomacy era news, US official: Navy aircraft threatened with shoot down by Iran.

Prior posts on Rouhani here.



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Iran’s LatAm tour

The $99,999,999.99 x 13 is in, and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is touring Latin America, with an entourage of 120 “politico-economic” delegates.

First, Cuba and Nicaragua.

Now Ecuador,

While in Quito, Zarif is scheduled to attend a joint economic commission with his Ecuadorian counterpart Guillaume Long to be held later today. Separate meetings with President Rafael Correa, Speaker of Parliament and Foreign Minister are also on Zarif’s agenda on this one-day official visit. The two sides are also slated to sign a memorandum of understanding for economic cooperation.

Chile, Bolivia and Venezuela are next on the schedule.

Perhaps this explains what they are doing with all the money Obama gave them for his worthless nuclear deal

Smart diplomacy.



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US paid $400million ransom to Iran

Double-dealing behind Congress’ back, the WSJ article goes on to describe that the Obama administration

procured the money from the central banks of the Netherlands and Switzerland

because it is illegal to do so in the U.S.

Read my post, US paid $400million ransom to Iran



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Colombia: No matter how you cut it, the FARC deal is bad news

I didn’t do a Carnival during the weekend, but in its place I recommend that you read this article by Mary O’Grady:
The Unraveling of a Narco-Terror Non-Deal.Colombia’s FARC will keep raising its demands as the ‘peace’ charade drags on. Calling the process a ‘peace’ charade is almost being kind. I would use the word travesty, since Santos appears willing to place the government of Colombia at the mercy of the world’s largest narco-terrorist organization in exchange for their assurance that they won’t attack cities:

Still facing significant popular opposition, Mr. Santos last month tried using a scare tactic: “We have ample information that they are preparing to return to war and urban warfare, which is much more devastating than the rural war. That is a reality, I know,” he said. “If the plebiscite is not approved, we return to war, it’s that simple.”

As O’Grady points out, Santos’s own Defense Minister, Luís Carlos Villegas, contradicted that statement.

While the negotiations – hosted in communist Havana and blessed by both Pope Francis and the Obama administration – drag on for over five years, Santos has slowly phased out the people of Colombia from the process (emphasis added):

Mr. Santos initially promised a national referendum to approve each of the specific points within the final agreement. But FARC leaders insisted that the group’s members not do jail time for their many crimes against humanity, and demanded the right to enter politics—no doubt bankrolled by their immense drug-trafficking profits. These concessions require changes to the constitution that would eliminate the principle of equality under the law and allow felons to govern.

Most Colombians do not support them so Mr. Santos backtracked on his referendum pledge. Instead he is using his simple majorities in Congress to extralegally change the constitution. This will set a precedent for future presidents to rewrite the highest law of the land as it suits them, thereby dangerously concentrating power in the executive.

So Santos, who is likely looking forward to a Nobel Peace Prize, would concentrate power, while installing unelected narcoterrorists in Colombia’s Congress.

Not that this should come as a surprise; when Santos was running for re-election three years ago, he promised the FARC unelected seats in Congress, along with allowing the FARC to become a political party and labeling drug trafficking a political crime.

Last week former president Álvaro Uribe wrote in the WSJ that Narco-Terror Is Being Rewarded in ColombiaThe so-called peace deal does little to redress decades of deadly violence.

The current negotiations do not ensure genuine accountability for FARC members responsible for war crimes and human-rights violations; and that those guilty of kidnapping, murder, forced abortions, armed displacement, indiscriminate attacks on innocent women and children or drug trafficking will be appropriately punished. On the contrary, the so-called peace agreement will serve as a thick mantle of impunity.

Uribe points out that, in addition to impunity and seats in Congress, the deal is going to cost U.S. taxpayers an untold amount of money  since (emphasis added),

To make things worse, the agreement includes no demand for FARC to surrender the billions of dollars worth of illegal assets that it has amassed through the drug traffic. Colombian and American taxpayers—the latter through U.S. foreign aid to Colombia—will carry the entire burden of economic reparations for FARC’s victims.

On the very same week,

The 1st Front (also known as the “Armando Ríos” Front) of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC) announced it will refuse any eventual order to lay down its arms in a press release published by Caracol Radio on July 6. The front belongs to the FARC‘s Eastern Bloc and is active in the remote eastern departments of Guaviare, Vaupés and Guainía.

InSight Crime concludes the 1st Front won’t be the last,

Following months of field research in areas with a strong guerrilla presence, InSight Crime estimates that at least 30 percent of FARC fighters will choose to ignore an eventual peace deal in order to maintain lucrative criminal economies such as drug trafficking and illegal mining.

The opposition’s Twitter hashtag is #SantosEstoNoEsPaz (#Santos This Is Not Peace)

A great deal for the FARC, a bad deal for everybody else.

And it’s ten days away.

SEE ALSO: What the FARC really want.

As of the writing of this post, I have not found an official text for the agreement either in Spanish or in English.

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Cuba: Celebrity Distractions, Security Detraction

Capitol Hill Cubans has the visuals on Obama’s Cuba Policy: Celebrity Distractions, Security Detraction

In case you haven’t been paying attention over the last few months (or been successfully distracted by Obama’s celebrity circus), here’s a timeline of events:

— Amid Obama’s political expansion of direct commercial flights to and from Cuba, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officials privately express concerns to House Homeland Security lawmakers regarding the security and infrastructure of Cuba’s airports.

— The House Homeland Security Committee schedules a hearing to analyze these concerns, but is stonewalled by The White House. (See here for more.)

— Under threat of subpoena, one relevant TSA official publicly testifies to the House Homeland Committee, but won’t discuss specifics.

— The Associated Press travels to Cuba’s airports with U.S. airline officials and highlights various security and infrastructure concerns. (See here for more.)

— A bipartisan delegation of House Homeland Security lawmakers are denied visas to Cuba to independently investigate these concerns.

— The State Department sends Shaq to distract.

Read the whole thing.

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Nicaragua: New Russian spy site

Moscow Building Spy Site in Nicaragua. Signals intelligence facility part of deal for 50 Russian tanks (h/t Stephen Green). Not content with simply sending spy ships to Cuba, now

The Russian government is building an electronic intelligence-gathering facility in Nicaragua as part of Moscow’s efforts to increase military and intelligence activities in the Western Hemisphere.

The signals intelligence site is part of a recent deal between Moscow and Managua involving the sale of 50 T-72 Russian tanks, said defense officials familiar with reports of the arrangement.

Exit question, what does Nicaragua need fifty Russian tanks for?



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O’Grady on Iran in Latin America UPDATED

Nature abhors a vacuum, and so do countries:

Iran’s Infiltration of Latin America. With U.S. influence waning, Tehran moves in, as a new report on Argentina shows. Mary O’Grady writes,

Joseph Humire, the executive director of the Washington, D.C., based Center for a Secure Free Society, uses thousands of documents and legal wiretaps released to the public to show how the prosecutor’s death eliminated a key stumbling block for Iran and “paved the way for [it] to move into a new phase of its information and intelligence operations in Latin America.” If the theocracy, which is the No. 1 state-sponsor of terrorism in the world, did not murder Nisman, it was the biggest beneficiary of his death.

The bottom line won’t come as a surprise to readers of this blog (emphasis added),

Authoritarian Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua have welcomed the presence and influence of Iran. But others are being surreptitiously invaded, beginning with embassies, cultural centers and mosques. Peru’s southern rural communities are typical targets for launching networks. Front companies in the beef and oil industries in Brazil and Uruguay are used to provide cover for Iranian operatives. As for Chile, Mr. Humire’s report shows how Iran has infiltrated universities.

It’s not hard to see how the end of sanctions on Iran—triggering the liberation of $150 billion in assets and the reopening of international economic channels—will increase Iran’s penetration of the Western Hemisphere.

“Smart diplomacy”!

UPDATE
In other news, while we can still have them,

Government censorship: Lynch: “Partial Transcript” Of Orlando 911 Calls Will Have References To Islamic Terrorism Removed

Find the common thread between the three stories, if you may.

UPDATE
FBI, DOJ release new, full transcript of Orlando shooter’s 911 call

Andrew Klavan connects the terrorism dots in his podcast (24:30 into the podcast).

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Cuba: Russia, North Korea, tax havens in Panama

All in the week’s news,

First, the tax havens:
The Miami Herald reports,
Panama Papers show Cuba used offshore firms to thwart embargo

Highlights:
At least 25 companies in tax havens had Cuban links

A brother of Raul Castro’s son-in-law appears in the leaked documents

Cuba was at the heart of a deal to export Russian oil that involves a Lebanese company

But wait, there’s more! Russia-Lebanon-Havana connection

One of the more intriguing schemes mentioned in the documents puts Cuba at the heart of a deal to sell Russian oil to Latin America through a company registered in Panama by the Bassatne family. The family controls BB Energy, a conglomerate founded in Lebanon in 1937 that buys and sells 16 million metric tons of crude and derivatives each year. One Bloomberg report showed BB Energy had $10 billion in revenues in 2012.

Read the whole thing.

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Rep. Joe Pitts writes about Russian ports and NATO:

. . . Russia’s best option was, and has been, to borrow from other countries and use their warm water ports to extend its global reach.

Cuba is one of the most obvious examples. Even though it’s not on the Mediterranean, it demonstrates how enlarged Russia’s scope is with the gain of Cuba’s friendly warm water ports. Russian vessels have utilized Cuba’s installations, along with Nicaragua and Venezuela’s, to reach west across the North Atlantic. As a result, Russia announced in 2014 that it would be reopening an “eavesdropping base” 150 miles away from U.S. soil: In Cuba. Through the access to these strategic ports, Russia’s reach handily extended across the Atlantic.

I had posted about the port.

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Via Capitol Hill Cubans, The North Korea-Cuba Connection. Havana’s continued cooperation with Pyongyang is an alarming blow to the normalization process.

How Illegal Trade Persists Between Cuba and North Korea

Despite the immense international controversy resulting from Cuba’s 2013 arms sales to North Korea, sporadic trade linkages between the two countries have continued largely unhindered. In January 2016, Cuba and North Korea developed a barter trade system, which officially involved transactions of sugar and railway equipment.

According to Curtis Melvin, an expert at the Washington D.C.-based U.S. Korea Institute, barter trade is an effective way for Cuba and North Korea to evade international sanctions without depleting their hard currency reserves. Cuba’s use of sugar as a medium of bilateral trade has close parallels with Myanmar’s historical use of rice in exchange for North Korean military technology assistance. This form of trade has been vital for the North Korean regime’s survival in wake of the Soviet collapse and more inconsistent patronage from China.

Bottom line:

While the Obama administration has removed Cuba from the state sponsors of terrorism list and taken a big stride toward lifting the Kennedy-era embargo on Cuba, Havana’s continued cooperation with Pyongyang is an alarming blow to the normalization process.

Smart diplomacy!

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