[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 130 (Thursday, September 30, 1999)]
[House]
[Pages H9194-H9195]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  WHITE HOUSE APPEASING CASTRO REGIME

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Hayes). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) is 
recognized for 15 minutes as the designee of the Majority Leader.
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, I just want to say I just got 
back from Colorado Springs a couple of weeks ago, and what the 
gentleman said about Colorado is absolutely true. It is a gorgeous 
state.
  Mr. Speaker, once again I underestimated the lengths to which the 
White House would go appease the Castro regime, the most violent 
sponsor of terrorism in the Western Hemisphere.
  If you think freeing over one dozen FALN terrorists responsible for 
the deaths of his own countrymen is unexplainable, what the White House 
is doing right now is baffling.
  Mr. Speaker, today I am disturbed by reports that as the White House 
was preparing to grant clemency to 16 imprisoned terrorists, it told 
the State Department to grant a visa to a notorious Cuban spy named 
Fernando Garcia Bielsa. This visa would allow Mr. Bielsa to work under 
diplomatic cover at the Cuban Interests Section just blocks from the 
White House.
  Ironically, Mr. Bielsa is a high-ranking Cuban communist party 
official in charge of supporting the very terrorist groups to which the 
prisoners belonged. President Clinton is asking the State Department to 
issue a visa to Bielsa, in spite of the evidence in intelligence 
reports linking him with the FALN terrorists and other terrorist 
groups.
  I was particularly impressed by reports that the FBI strongly 
objected to granting a visa to him. Yet, apparently when the State 
Department pressured the FBI, the Bureau had to drop its objections.
  It has been reported that Mr. Bielsa serves as the chief of the 
American Department of the Cuban Communist Party Central Committee. The 
American Department, known by its initials DA, has a long tradition of 
being Castro's main instrument for coordinating terrorism in the 
Western Hemisphere, including agent influence activity and support for 
Puerto Rican terrorism against the United States.
  Mr. Speaker, the State Department continues to classify Cuba as a 
state sponsor of international terrorism. In fact, the State 
Department's report, Patterns of Terrorism Report for 1998, Cuba 
reportedly maintains, ``close ties to other state sponsors of terrorism 
and leftist insurgent groups in Latin America. For instance, Columbia's 
two main terrorist groups, the FARC and the ELN, maintain 
representatives in Cuba. Moreover, Havana continues to provide a safe 
haven to a number of international terrorists and U.S. terrorist 
fugitives.''
  Make no mistake about it: Cuba believes what the FALN stands for and 
has a history of supporting them in very material ways. Senate hearings 
in 1982 revealed that Cuban intelligence helped organize the FALN 
terrorists and other related groups. Here are a few examples.
  Cuba continues to provide asylum to FALN terrorist fugitives, 
including William Morales, who escaped in 1979 while serving a 99 year 
sentence for bombing and murder. He fled to Mexico, where he fled a 
policeman and was finally granted asylum by the Castro government.
  Just last year, in 1998, Mr. Bielsa flew to Puerto Rico to meet with 
leaders of a Puerto Rican terrorist group. What I want to know is why 
did not the Clinton Administration automatically refuse Mr. Bielsa's 
visa application? Under U.S. law, the State Department cannot 
independently issue visas to foreigners believed to be entering the 
country for the purpose of hostile intelligence activity.

  A 1981 State Department report says the DA was created to 
``centralize Cuban control over covert activities'' in support of 
revolutionary groups in our hemisphere. Who pressured the State 
Department to grant this visa for Mr. Bielsa? Was it the National 
Security Council? If so, who pressured the NSC?
  Mr. Speaker, Castro has spies here in the U.S. For example, last year 
10 people allegedly operating as a spy ring for Castro were arrested 
and accused of collecting information on U.S. military installations 
and anti-Castro groups in Florida. At the same time, the arrests ended 
the most extensive espionage effort involving Cuban agents ever 
uncovered in the U.S.
  U.S. Attorney Thomas Scott was quoted as saying, ``In scope and in 
depth, it is really unparalleled in recent years. This was an attempt 
to strike at the very heart of our national security system.''
  Investigators said it was the first time in memory that a Cuba-
sponsored spy ring had been dismantled in Southern Florida, even though 
between 200 and 300 operatives are believed to have worked with 
impunity in the Miami area for decades.
  Our intelligence has uncovered new construction and an expansion of a 
Russian spy base near Havana that could endanger U.S. military 
operations overseas. The number of satellite dishes has doubled from 
three to six. Workers built new buildings, new parking lots and a 
swimming pool for the Russian military technicians who are now running 
the base. From this facility, Moscow has intercepted communications 
from the White House, the State Department, Washington-based 
international financial institutions and private U.S. companies.
  In fact, the Russians had intercepted advanced word on U.S. military 
movements during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. And, Mr. Speaker, if that 
doesn't frighten the American people, China's defense minister visited 
Havana last year to negotiate the construction of an electronic spy 
base next to this Russian facility. This is not fiction from a 
paperback novel, Mr. Speaker.
  So it is obvious why U.S. counterintelligence believes that the 
Castro

[[Page H9195]]

government is placing their agents where they can influence policy 
decisions on issues affecting the Castro regime.
  What decisions, you may ask?
  How about granting clemency and allowing terrorists back on the 
streets, the FALN terrorists? Many in Congress have opinions about why 
that offer was made. Some feel it has a lot to do with what is going on 
New York politics today, but maybe there is more to it.
  What other kinds of policy decisions would Castro want to influence? 
How about easing the restrictions on the U.S. embargo on Cuba? The U.S. 
embargo was instituted to pressure the Castro regime to abandon its 
dictatorial and subversive ways. Castro has been able to stay in power 
because the embargo was not strong enough and because of massive Soviet 
subsidies.
  The collapse of the USSR triggered a 60 percent contraction of the 
Cuban economy, proving the utter bankruptcy of Castro's policies. In 
addition, passage of both the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 by this 
Congress, the Toricelli Act, and the Cuban Liberty and Democratic 
Solidarity Act of 1995, the Helms-Burton law, have further tightened 
U.S. policy on the totalitarian dictatorship of Fidel Castro.
  These factors, as well as the complete weariness and disgust of the 
Cuban people with Castro, indicate that time is running out on the 
dictatorship in Cuba, but not if Castro can send his highest ranking 
spy to Washington and influence key officials to ease that embargo.
  Is it working? Well, let us just see.
  Earlier this year the White House expanded commercial flights to 
Cuba. The President allowed U.S. residents, not just those with family 
in Cuba, to send larger amounts of money to individual households, 
which simply gives Castro the hard currency he needs to prop up his 
communist regime. He allowed direct mail service between our countries, 
the President did, and finally he has authorized the sale of food and 
agriculture products to ``private companies'' in Cuba.
  One more policy decision that could be influenced should be 
considered. Only December 3, 1998, a 7.2 metric ton cocaine shipment 
bound for a state-owned company, Union del Plastico, in Havana, Cuba, 
was seized by Colombian National Police in Cartegena, Colombia. The 
consigned company was a joint venture with two minority Spanish 
partners, who contend they were not partners, but rather shipping and 
purchasing agents for the Cuban government.
  Cuban ``spin'' started the day after the seizure with Castro's anti-
narcotics police searching the company's premises with drug dogs and 
coming up with no traces of drugs there whatsoever.
  Cuban police claimed the shipment was destined for Spain, without any 
proof. Castro made a speech on January 4, 1999, identifying the two 
Spaniards as the culprits in this scheme which had been alleged to 
operate without his government's knowledge and complicity. That is 
baloney. The U.S. State Department has bought this story from Castro 
and accepted his claims as evidence and proclaims the shipment was 
headed for Spain.

  However, two House committees and one Senate committee have conducted 
a thorough investigation into this shipment and determined the shipment 
was likely headed to the United States, 7.2 metric tons of cocaine 
through Mexico. The Cuban company has a subsidiary, Plastimex. There is 
a company bearing that name located right across the U.S. border in 
Juarez, Mexico.
  Regardless of the final destination, the 7.2 tons of cocaine, Cuba, 
as a recipient of this shipment, should meet the criteria to be placed 
on the major list of countries who traffic or transit illicit 
narcotics.
  The Cuban government has been complicit in drug trafficking for 
decades as a method of collecting much-needed hard currency to keep 
Fidel Castro's regime in power.
  As a matter of fact, Raul Castro, Fidel's brother, is under 
indictment for drug trafficking in Miami, Florida. So, influencing 
decisions to keep Cuba off the major's list and look the other way on 
drug trafficking would sure help Castro, and it is working.
  The Clinton Administration is assisting Castro in his coverup by 
sending two Coast Guard personnel to Havana to help promote the image 
that Fidel Castro is getting tough on drugs, and this is simply not the 
case. It is a public relations campaign by the Castro regime to repair 
its tarnished image on the drug front.
  The Clinton Administration is doing nothing but strengthening 
Castro's position. Clearly this 7.2 ton drug seizure should place Cuba 
squarely on the major's list.
  Not to mention the increased overflights of Cuba by drug trafficking 
planes, which have been unchallenged by Fidel Castro. Also drug 
trafficking fast boats into Cuban territorial water go without a 
challenge from the Cuban navy.
  It seems strange that the Cuban Air Force can shoot down two unarmed 
American civilian planes out of the sky and Castro's Navy can sink a 
tugboat full of innocent women and children, yet they cannot respond to 
the hundreds of increased drug trafficking activities in Cuban air 
space and territorial waters.
  Mr. Speaker, the granting of a visa for Mr. Garcia Bielsa is an 
affront to the national security of the United States. The American 
people will be outraged when they learn that a top Cuban spy known for 
his support of terrorism and espionage is allowed to set up shop real 
close to the White House here in Washington.
  Why should Mr. Bielsa be allowed to live and work in Washington, 
D.C.? The Cuban Interests Section, as I said, is not in need of 
personnel. Quite the opposite. Prior to 1994, the Cuban Interests 
Section contained 24 staff and, according to the Cuban-American 
National Foundation, nearly all of whom were intelligence agents.
  According to the Congressional sources today, the espionage presence 
in the Cuban Interests Section is nearly doubled. Granting a visa to 
Mr. Garcia Bielsa is more than misguided, because this man and his 
mission here pose a real threat to our Nation's security right here in 
the United States.
  Mr. Garcia Bielsa is not just an ordinary Cuban citizen or a visiting 
diplomat. He is a principal spy and a leader within Castro's inner 
circle. With Mr. Bielsa using Washington, D.C. as a base of operations, 
Castro's campaign to discredit the U.S. and our commitment against 
communism has been invigorated.
  I believe Mr. Garcia Bielsa's presence in Washington, D.C. will, 
without a doubt, enhance Castro's ongoing operations against the United 
States. That is why I sent a letter, along with four of my colleagues, 
to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright expressing our concerns over 
these troubling reports. We also asked her to provide us with answers 
to a few simple questions.
  First, why were the views of the Federal Bureau of Investigation not 
respected in the decision to grant a U.S. visa to Mr. Bielsa?

                              {time}  2030

  Second, has any representative of the Department of Justice or the 
FBI provided any information to the State Department regarding Mr. 
Garcia Bielsa's anti-U.S. espionage spying or pro-terrorism activities? 
Did this information talk of his contact with Puerto Rican terrorists 
or so-called nationalist groups?
  Three, if the State Department did have knowledge of Mr. Garcia 
Bielsa's activities, who instructed his visa be accepted?
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, I hope we receive accurate and helpful 
responses to these questions because we now know that China has stolen 
classified information on every thermonuclear warhead in the U.S. 
ballistic missile arsenal, including the W-88 warhead, our most modern 
warhead; we also know that Chinese penetration of our national weapons 
labs spans at least the past several decades and certainly continues 
today; finally, because the Chinese Government used illegal fund-
raising channels in this country to influence the 1996 presidential 
elections.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe that the time has come for our government to 
cease and desist with these shortcuts that have led to a breach of our 
national security and initiate a more rigorous system of scrutinizing 
the campaigns of hostile nations against the U.S., and I believe that 
Mr. Bielsa's visa should not be approved.




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