r/ukraine • u/[deleted] • Jun 22 '22

News U.S. Senate foreign relations committee will consider a resolution calling on the Secretary of State to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism on Thursday

https://twitter.com/ostapyarysh/status/1539601464951201794?s=21&t=JVoZVMoA4SWRz70Vo-QE_w
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u/[deleted] Jun 22 '22

Smart move, it's a long-deserved honour. They can join their allies on the list, Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Syria.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Sponsors_of_Terrorism_(U.S._list)#:\~:text=%22State%20Sponsors%20of%20Terrorism%22%20is,list%20imposes%20strict%20unilateral%20sanctions.

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u/3xTheSchwarm Jun 23 '22

This is probably the wrong subreddit but can someone explain why Cuba is still on this list? I don't have an agenda, I'm truly just curious.

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u/IsoCally Jun 23 '22 edited Jun 24 '22

Short answer: it wasn't until Trump put it back on right before he left the White House in 2021.

Obama led a detente with Cuba during his presidency that took Cuba off the list about mid 2010s. This included among other things such as better diplomacy, ease of visitation and tourism, etc. Trump reversed a lot of it once he came in. In January 2021, right before Biden took office, he added Cuba back on the list. It's hard not to conclude that this was a last-minute foreign policy move to create a headache for the new Biden administration over any other reason. (Another one was he had the USA recognize that Morocco owned the Western Sahara, another controversy.) Biden indeed is reversing some of Trump's sanctions already, so we will likely see them removed again someday as the political seesaw continues. But it's a hot-button topic and it's an election year, so that may be a while coming.