[Congressional Bills 103th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 38 Introduced in House (IH)]

103d CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. CON. RES. 38

  Calling for the United States to propose and seek an international 
          embargo against the totalitarian government of Cuba.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           February 16, 1993

 Mr. Diaz-Balart (for himself, Mr. Torricelli, Mr. Menendez, Mr. Smith 
   of New Jersey, Mr. Ballenger, Ms. Ros-Lehtinen, and Mr. Deutsch) 
 submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to 
                    the Committee on Foreign Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                         CONCURRENT RESOLUTION


 
  Calling for the United States to propose and seek an international 
          embargo against the totalitarian government of Cuba.

Whereas the United States has shown a deep commitment, and considers it a moral 
        obligation, to promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms 
        as expressed in the Charter of the United Nations and in the Universal 
        Declaration of Human Rights;
Whereas the Congress has historically and consistently manifested its solidarity 
        and the solidarity of the American people with the democratic 
        aspirations of the Cuban people;
Whereas the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 calls upon the President to encourage 
        the governments of countries that conduct trade with Cuba to restrict 
        their trade and credit relations with Cuba in a manner consistent with 
        the purposes of that Act;
Whereas the 1992 FREEDOM Support Act requires that the President, in providing 
        economic assistance to Russia and the emerging Eurasian democracies, 
        take into account the extent to which they are acting to ``terminate 
        support for the communist regime in Cuba, including removal of troops, 
        closing military facilities, and ceasing trade subsidies and economic, 
        nuclear, and other assistance'';
Whereas the Government of Cuba has engaged in the illegal international 
        narcotics trade and harbors fugitives from justice in the United States;
Whereas the Castro government has threatened international peace and security by 
        engaging in acts of armed subversion and terrorism such as the training 
        and supplying of groups dedicated to international violence;
Whereas the Castro government has utilized from its inception and continues to 
        utilize torture in various forms (including by psychiatry), as well as 
        execution, exile, confiscation, political imprisonment, and other forms 
        of terror and repression, as means of retaining power;
Whereas Fidel Castro has defined democratic pluralism as ``pluralistic garbage'' 
        and has made clear that he has no intention of tolerating the 
        democratization of Cuban society;
Whereas the Castro government holds innocent Cubans hostage in Cuba by no fault 
        of the hostages themselves solely because relatives have escaped the 
        country;
Whereas although a signatory state to the 1928 Inter-American Convention on 
        Asylum and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 
        (which protects the right to leave one's own country), Cuba nevertheless 
        surrounds embassies in its capital by armed forces to thwart the right 
        of its citizens to seek asylum and systematically denies that right to 
        the Cuban people, punishing them by imprisonment for seeking to leave 
        the country;
Whereas the United Nations Commission on Human Rights has repeatedly reported on 
        the unacceptable human rights situation in Cuba and, in Resolution 1992/
        61, took the extraordinary step of appointing a Special Rapporteur;
Whereas the Government of Cuba refused access to the Special Rapporteur and 
        formally expressed its decision not to ``implement so much as one comma 
        of Resolution 1992/61'';
Whereas on December 4, 1992, the United Nations General Assembly passed 
        Resolution 1992/70 which ``Regrets profoundly the numerous uncontested 
        reports of violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms'' 
        described in the Special Rapporteur's report to the United Nations;
Whereas Article 39 of Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter provides that 
        the United Nations Security Council ``shall determine the existence of 
        any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression and 
        shall make recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken . . . 
        , to maintain or restore international peace and security.'';
Whereas the United Nations has determined that massive and systematic violations 
        of human rights may constitute a ``threat to peace'' under Article 39 
        and has imposed sanctions due to such violations of human rights in the 
        cases of Rhodesia, South Africa, Iraq, and the former Yugoslavia;
Whereas the totalitarian nature of the Castro regime has deprived the Cuban 
        people of any peaceful recourse to improving their own condition and has 
        led thousands of Cuban citizens to risk or lose their lives in 
        attempting to escape from Cuba to freedom; and
Whereas the Cuban people deserve to be assisted in a decisive manner to end the 
        tyranny that has oppressed them for 34 years: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), 
That it is the sense of the Congress that--
            (1) the United States considers the acts of the Castro 
        government, including its massive, systematic, and 
        extraordinary violations of human rights, a threat to 
        international peace; and
            (2) the President should advocate, and should instruct the 
        United States representatives to the United Nations Security 
        Council to propose and to seek, a mandatory international 
        embargo against the totalitarian government of Cuba pursuant to 
        chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations.

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