[Congressional Bills 104th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 24 Introduced in House (IH)]







104th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. CON. RES. 24

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


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            February 7, 1995

 Mr. Diaz-Balart submitted the following concurrent resolution; which 
        was referred to the Committee on International Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                         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 engages in the illegal international narcotics 
        trade and harbors fugitives from justice in the United States;
Whereas the Castro government threatens 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 continues to make 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 and killing them for attempting to do so (as demonstrated in 
        the case of the confirmed murder of over 40 men, women, and children who 
        were seeking to leave Cuba on July 13, 1994);
Whereas the Castro government continues to utilize blackmail, such as the 
        immigration crisis with which it threatened the United States in the 
        summer of 1994, and other unacceptable and illegal forms of conduct to 
        influence the actions of sovereign states in the Western Hemisphere in 
        violation of the Charter of the Organization of American States and 
        other international agreements and international law;
Whereas the United Nations Commission on Human Rights has repeatedly reported on 
        the unacceptable human rights situation in Cuba and has taken the 
        extraordinary step of appointing a Special Rapporteur;
Whereas the Government of Cuba has consistently refused access to the Special 
        Rapporteur and formally expressed its decision not to ``implement so 
        much as one comma'' of the United Nations Resolutions appointing the 
        Rapporteur;
Whereas the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 1992/70 on 
        December 4, 1992, Resolution 1993/48/142 on December 20, 1993, and 
        Resolution 1994/49/544 on October 19, 1994, referencing the Special 
        Rapporteur's reports to the United Nations and condemning ``violations 
        of human rights and fundamental freedoms'' in Cuba;
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 in the case of Haiti, a neighbor of Cuba not as close to the United 
        States as Cuba, the United States led an effort to obtain and did obtain 
        a United Nations Security Council embargo and blockade against that 
        country due to the existence of a military dictatorship in power less 
        than 3 years;
Whereas United Nations Security Council Resolution 940 of July 31, 1994, 
        subsequently authorized the use of ``all necessary means'' to restore 
        the ``democratically elected government of Haiti'', and the 
        democratically elected government of Haiti was restored to power on 
        October 15, 1994;
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 36 years and the continued failure 
        to do so constitutes ethically improper conduct by the international 
        community: 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.
                                 <all>