The U.S. Agency for International Development awarded a three-year, $4.3 million Cuba grant to the New America Foundation. That triggered some mild controversy because the foundation also operates the U.S.-Cuba Policy Initiative, aimed at promoting engagement with Cuba. News of the grant surprised Anya Landau French, director of the U.S.-Cuba Policy Initiative. She wrote: What [...]
September roundup
Former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson journeyed to Havana in early September, saying he was on a mission to secure the release of jailed American subcontractor Alan Gross. He told the Associated Press that he had promised Judy Gross that he would see her husband in jail. But then he called Gross “an American hostage,” [...]
August roundup
Cuba’s highest court upheld the conviction and 15-year jail sentence of American subcontractor Alan Gross, who was arrested in 2009 while doing U.S. government-financed democracy work in Cuba, Cuba’s state-run press reported on Aug. 5. Critics of the Castro government were outraged. Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., said in a statement published on Capitol Hill Cubans [...]
June roundup
As $20 million in democracy funds for Cuba remained hung up in Congress, the State Department responded to Sen. John Kerry’s questions and concerns about the programs. According to an internal memo that the Cuba Money Project made public on June 3, the State Department told Kerry: … we designed these new programs to strengthen [...]