The government’s planned proscription of Palestine Action is appalling state overreach. As journalists and media workers, Novara Media unequivocally opposes this historic infringement on freedom of expression in the UK. We believe it is a gross abuse of legislation to equate a non-violent, direct action protest group with the likes of Isis, Al-Qaida, and National Action. Never before in Britain has it been illegal to support a protest group.
We report day after day on Israel’s atrocities in Gaza. We have watched countless hours of footage, heard testimony, and combed through data. It has been evident for many months that Israel’s attacks on the Palestinian population, from opening fire on unarmed crowds at aid distribution points to the bombardment of refugees at so-called safe-zones, amount to the crime of genocide.
Meanwhile, the establishment media remains biased in favour of Israel. Even the BBC, a public service broadcaster, grants 33 times more coverage per fatality to Israeli deaths than those of Palestinians. If there were ever a time when non-violent direct action was justified in the prevention of greater harm, it is now.
Furthermore, we are disgusted by the arrest and investigation of pro-Palestine journalists such as Asa Winstanley, the imposition of excessive restrictions on pro-Palestine rallies, and attacks on the artistic expression of Bob Vylan and Kneecap’s Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh. Novara Media views the proscription of Palestine Action as part of this wider effort to silence opposition to Israel’s campaign of genocide against the people of Gaza.
Everyone should be alarmed by Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper’s decision to designate Palestine Action a proscribed terrorist organisation. The use of terror legislation will dramatically limit what anyone in the UK can say about the group. Section 12 of the Terrorism Act gives the state sweeping power to restrict speech that it deems supportive of proscribed organisations. Wearing a Palestine Action T-shirt, praising the group in public, or expressing a positive opinion about it online could all be grounds for arrest and prosecution.
There is no journalistic exemption to the Terrorism Act. Reporting freely carries the risk of large fines and up to 14 years imprisonment. Journalists arrested under terrorism legislation may have their homes and offices raided, or work devices seized and searched, putting them and their sources at risk.
Novara Media strongly upholds the right to report events and produce fact-based analysis without the interference of the government. We oppose all state attempts to crush legitimate expressions of political opinion. We abhor Keir Starmer’s willingness to clamp down on free speech, dissent, and longstanding traditions of civil disobedience that are vital to democracy and liberty.
Without equivocation or caveat, we stand opposed to the government’s proscription of Palestine Action.
dizzy: Me too.
Vote Labour for Genocide.UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone obect to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities,mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.
A protest in support of Palestine Action in London last month. Photograph: Vuk Valcic/Sopa Images/Shutterstock
Minister argues move will not impinge on people’s right to protest but critics call it ‘grave abuse of state power’
MPs have voted to proscribe Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation despite concerns that the move could risk criminalising legitimate protest.
The draft order to amend the Terrorism Act 2000 and proscribe the group, laid by the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, passed the Commons on Wednesday by 385 votes to 26.
The order also bans two neo-Nazi groups, the Maniacs Murder Cult (MMC) and the Russia Imperial Movement (RIM).
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It will become a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison for anyone to become a member of and support the direct action of Palestine Action.
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After the vote, a Palestine Action spokesperson said: “We are confident that this unlawful order will be overturned. As United Nations experts have made clear, spraying red paint and disrupting the British-based operations of Israel’s largest weapons firm, Elbit Systems, is not terrorism.
The terrorism and war crimes are being committed by Israel against the Palestinian people – armed and enabled by this government.”
The announcement came as police imposed restrictions on Palestine Solidarity Campaign protests outside parliament.
Before the vote, the lawyers group Network for Police Monitoring and the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers had warned the home secretary in two separate letters that proscribing Palestine Action would conflate protest and terrorism. The letters collectively were signed by hundreds of lawyers and by UN experts.
Several UN special rapporteurs said they had contacted the UK government to say that “acts of protest that damage property, but are not intended to kill or injure people, should not be treated as terrorism”.
Last week, Cooper linked Palestine Action with the MMC and the RIM, saying each of them had “passed the threshold for proscription based on clear national security evidence and assessments”. She said: “Violence and serious criminal damage has no place in legitimate protests.”
Vote Labour for Genocide.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone obect to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities,mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.Keir “I support Zionism without Qualification” Starmer supporting genocide.
People take part in a demonstration at Trafalgar Square in London in support of Palestine Action, June 23, 2025
YVETTE COOPER’S determination to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation for an entirely peaceful protest is a grotesque assault on civil liberties.
If it is not defeated it will have a chilling effect on free expression in Britain, and not just on direct actions of the kind Palestine Action specialise in.
Witness the absurd prosecution of Kneecap band member Liam Og O hAnnaidh for allegedly displaying the flag of proscribed Lebanese group Hezbollah: public expressions of support for Palestine Action would become illegal. As Metropolitan Police chief Sir Mark Rowley makes clear, that would include the kind of solidarity demonstration that took place in Trafalgar Square today.
Some say the government’s hysterical overreaction is due to deep embarrassment that two individuals could break into Britain’s biggest RAF base, ride up to military jets on scooters and pour paint into their engines in protest at the RAF’s role in providing intelligence to Israel’s armed forces committing war crimes in Gaza, before leaving undetected.
But the reality is that Cooper’s draconian extremism is entirely aligned with the government’s record — and that of its predecessor.
The cross-party consensus in favour of an ever more authoritarian state is as firm as their joint support for militarism, war and an Israeli state facing genocide charges in international courts.
Labour in opposition declined to overturn the successive restrictions on our freedoms by the last Conservative government — from the policing, public order and national security Acts gifting police sweeping powers to shut down protest and providing for 10-year prison sentences for being a “serious nuisance,” to new ministerial authority to declare organisations “extremist” with no court process or right of appeal, banning public authorities from then talking to them.
This legislation is aimed squarely at suppressing the mass movement for Palestine. So is the ban on Palestine Action. Both are attempts by an unpopular government to mask just how unpopular its active complicity in Israel’s war crimes are.
People take part in a demonstration at Trafalgar Square in London in support of Palestine Action, June 23, 2025
Home Secretary Cooper confirms plans to ban the group and claims it’s peaceful activists ‘meet the legal threshold under the Terrorism Act 2000’
PROTESTERS gathered in London’s Trafalgar Square shouting “we are all Palestine Action” yesterday as Home Secretary Yvette Cooper confirmed plans to ban the group under terrorism laws for its direct action campaigns.
Hundreds waved Palestine flags and chanted at the top of the square, parts of which were cordoned off for an event.
Some protesters spilled onto the road and staged a brief roadblock before being arrested by the Metropolitan Police under Section 14 of the Public Order Act.
Protesters clashed with police to resist the arrests, with one woman shouting “that’s too much force” and others chanting: “Let them go.”
The protest was originally set to take place outside Parliament, where there was more space, but the police imposed an exclusion zone.
Pro-Palestine protesters protest in Trafalgar Square, including supporters of Palestine Action. Photograph: Sean Smith/The Guardian
Proscribing organisation under anti-terrorism laws raises stakes amid already increased powers to stop protests
The crackdown on protest in England and Wales has been ringing alarm bells for years, but the decision to ban Palestine Action under anti-terrorism laws raises the stakes dramatically.
As the group itself has said, it is the first time the government has attempted to proscribe a direct action protest organisation under the Terrorism Act, placing it alongside the likes of Islamic State, al-Qaida and National Action.
The home secretary, Yvette Cooper, said the proposed ban was evidence-based and had been assessed by a wide range of experts.
“In several attacks, Palestine Action has committed acts of serious damage to property with the aim of progressing its political cause and influencing the government,” she said.
Proscribing the group, which uses direct action mainly to target Israeli weapons factories in the UK, would make it illegal not only to be a member of Palestine Action but to show support for it.
Given that neither its methods nor its targets are unprecedented, a ban is likely to make every group which has an aim of “progressing its political cause and influencing the government” through protest think twice.
Greenpeace UK’s co-executive director, Areeba Hamid, said a ban would “mark a dark turn for our democracy and a new low for a government already intent on stamping out the right to protest. The police already have laws to prosecute any individuals found guilty of a crime.”
Palestine Action activists are removed from an Elbit Systems factory in Oldham, Greater Manchester, January 2022. Photo: Palestine Action
If you can’t beat them, ban them.
“We’re a new breed of activism. We’re not your parents’ Humane Society. … We come with a new philosophy. We hold the radical line. We will not compromise. We will not apologise, and we will not relent.” This is how one activist described Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac), the animal rights group active from the late 1980s to the early 2010s. Shac’s central demand was the closure of Europe’s largest animal testing facility, Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS). It didn’t ask nicely. Anticipating that the state would never act with the urgency commensurate with such a moral outrage as beating beagle puppies – how true that’s proven to be – Shac set about making the company’s life a misery, smashing up laboratories and picking off suppliers with boycott campaigns. All this nearly bankrupted HLS, until Labour’s science minister Lord Sainsbury personally interceded to keep the company afloat. Unable to tolerate this humiliation, the government sent hundreds of police to round up dozens of Shac members. Ring any bells?
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Many have correctly pointed out how harmless PA’s actions are in comparison with Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. However, PA has distinguished itself within the Palestine movement, and amongst leftwing activist groups in general, by the severity of disruption it has caused. While successive UK governments have complained noisily about the “chaos” and “crisis” besetting Gaza (it was David Cameron, lest we forget, who in 2010 referred to the strip as an “open-air prison”), PA has done something about it. Much like its puppy-rescuing Shac forbears, PA has cost its primary target – Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems – vast sums of money, and used many of the same tactics. It has shut down two of Elbit’s factories and chased the company out of its London headquarters. It has isolated Elbit, forcing its metal manufacturer, couriers, property managers and even lobbyists to drop it. It has temporarily halted the manufacture of F-35 parts. It has rendered the company such an unreliable supplier that the Ministry of Defence axed hundreds of millions of pounds’ worth of its contracts, which fell 18% the month one contract was pulled. For five years now, PA has wreaked havoc for Elbit and, thanks to the consciences of jurors and the uselessness of police, mostly gotten away with it.
PA’s continued success represents a major embarrassment to the Labour government. Part of the RAF base was, it has since emerged, secured with little more than a wooden fence. The risk, however, is more than reputational. PA is a menace to both the UK and Israeli governments, which have, much like HLS and Lord Sainsbury, responded as a team. Earlier this month, Declassified reported that Northumbria police spent £210,000 protecting the Newcastle outpost of Pearson Engineering, owned by Israeli weapons company Rafael. This week it found that Elbit lobbied the Home Office to retry PA’s co-founders Huda Ammori and Richard Barnard after they were acquitted in December 2023. The Israeli embassy tried something similar with the attorney general’s office, which has been remarkably obliging. The UK and its ally have poured vast resources into beating back PA, a testament to just how seriously both understand the threat to their individual and joint military and business interests (not to be confused with their citizens’ interests).
Let’s be clear. Direct action is not terrorism and taking action against genocide profiteers is not terrorism.
We are writing this statement in unequivocal support with Palestine Action and the outrageous decision by this government to try to proscribe them.
The British government is currently aiding and abetting Israel’s genocide. There is one clear legal and moral path available to them – imposing a full two-way arms embargo. Instead they are labelling those taking action to stop genocide as terrorists.
Let’s be clear. Direct action is not terrorism and taking action against genocide profiteers is not terrorism.
There is a long and proud history in the peace movement of direct action at military bases and arms companies. Keir Starmer himself was part of the legal team defending the Fairford Five during the Iraq war. Using the protest at Brize Norton as an excuse for proscription is manufactured outrage. It’s an excuse to do what Israeli and arms trade lobbyists, such as Lord Walney, have always wanted. For generations, from Greenham, Aldermaston, Fairford and others, the peace movement has taken action against military bases – actions that regularly involve breaching security, getting inside and causing damage. This is not something new. This is legitimate opposition to illegal wars. This is not terrorism.
At CAAT, we are the proud custodians of one of the hammers used by the Seeds of Hope Ploughshares women to smash up a hawk aircraft bound for Indonesia in 1996. CAAT supported the women who were eventually acquitted by a jury.
Supporting those who dismantle the tools of war is at the heart of CAAT’s past and present. Successive governments have failed not only us as citizens, but more importantly, the Palestinian people. They have stood aside while Israel commits horrific war crimes. They have ignored international law. They have misled parliament, obfuscated and done everything in their power to protect arms dealers’ profits. Instead of imposing a full two-way arms embargo, this Labour government has instead increased the UK’s arms trade with Israel – licensing £127m of arms in the last three months of 2024 – more than 2020-2023 combined.
When our government fails to act, it is down to us, ordinary people with a conscience, to take action. We applaud those who feel their moral duty to disarm weapons factories outweighs the risks of imprisonment. We cannot sit back while UK companies profit from genocide, when Palestinian children are killed by 2000lb bombs dropped from F-35 combat aircraft that the UK is ensuring remain operational with its supply of spare parts.
Attempting to proscribe Palestine Action is designed to scare us, to intimidate our movements and to divide our solidarity.
It won’t work. When the state remanded the Filton 18 on the spurious basis the action has “terrorist connections”, it hoped that it would deter people. It didn’t. The actions have continued because people care, because they have a conscience, because taking action against genocide is more important than the personal consequences.
Now is the time to be courageous. We will defeat this ban through mass opposition. Met Commissioner Mark Rowley said he was “shocked” by the emergency demonstration held today in Westminster. He shouldn’t be shocked. Our movements are based on solidarity. And it is essential that this solidarity continues.
We are all Palestine Action!
Keir “I support Zionism without Qualification” Starmer supporting genocide.Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAUK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Four UN Special Rapporteurs have written jointly to the UK government demanding explanation of its inappropriate persecution of journalists and political activists under the Terrorism Act. They state that those persecuted:
appear to have no credible connection to “terrorist” or “hostile” activity
The cases taken up by the United Nations are those of Johanna Ross (Ganyukova), John Laughland, Kit Klarenberg, Craig Murray (yes, me), Richard Barnard and Richard Medhurst. The UN letter is signed by:
Ben Saul Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism
Irene Khan Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression
Gina Romero Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association
Ana Brian Nougrères Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy
Under this UN special procedure, the letter is sent to the government in question which has sixty days to respond. This letter was sent by the UN to Starmer’s government on 4 December. No reply having been received, it has now been published.
It is worth noting that even with the UN letter on its desk and ignored, Starmer’s government in fact stepped up the use of the Terrorism Act against pro-Palestinian journalists and activists in this period. The cases of Asa Winstanley, Sarah Wilkinson and Tony Greenstein, among others, happened after the letter was drafted.
I should be clear that I was, working with Justice for All International (for which we had a crowdfunder last year in relation to the Assange case at the UN), heavily involved in assisting with preparation of this initiative, and made three visits to the UN in Geneva on the subject together with Sharof Azizov, and on one occasion Richard Medhurst. Your subscriptions and donations to this blog are the only funding I have to make such activity possible, so thank you.
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There is no sign the UN has given the Starmer government pause; human rights are extremely low on their agenda. Support for Israel and the crushing of pro-Palestinian sentiment, or of any criticism of western foreign policy, is extremely high on their agenda.
UK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWREGenocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpA
CodePink led a November 2, 2022 rally against the U.S. economic blockade of Cuba outside the White House in Washington, D.C. (Photo: CodePink)
“Seriously? You wait until six days before leaving office to do what you promised to do during your 2020 campaign?” said one observer.
In a move likely to be reversed by the incoming Trump administration, President Joe Biden on Tuesday notified Congress of his intent to remove Cuba from the U.S. State Sponsors of Terrorism list, a designation that critics have long condemned as politically motivated and meritless.
Noting that “the government of Cuba has not provided any support for international terrorism” and has “provided assurances” that it will not do so in the future, the White House said in a memo that the Biden administration is moving to rescind the first Trump administration’s January 2021 addition of Cuba to the State Sponsors of Terrorism (SSOT) list and take other measures to ease some sanctions on the long-suffering island of 11 million inhabitants.
Cuba’s SSOT designation was based mostly on the socialist nation’s harboring of leftist Colombian rebels and several U.S. fugitives from justice for alleged crimes committed decades ago, even though no other country has been placed on the SSOT list for such a reason and despite right-wing Cuban exile terrorists enjoying citizenship—and even heroic status—in the United States.
“Despite its limited nature, it is a decision in the right direction and in line with the sustained and firm demand of the government and people of Cuba, and with the broad, emphatic, and repeated call of many governments, especially Latin America and the Caribbean, of Cubans living abroad, political, religious and social organizations, and numerous political figures from the United States and other countries,” the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
“It is important to note that the economic blockade and much of the dozen coercive measures that have been put into effect since 2017 remain in force to strengthen it, with full extraterritorial effect and in violation of international law and human rights of all Cubans,” the ministry added.
For 32 straight years, the United Nations General Assembly has overwhelmingly voted for resolutions condemning the U.S. blockade of Cuba. And for 32 years, the United States, usually along with a small handful of countries, has opposed the measures. Last year’s vote was 187-2, with Israel joining the U.S. in voting against the resolution.
Cuba followed Biden’s move by announcing it would “gradually” release 553 political prisoners following negotiations with the Catholic Church, The New York Timesreported.
Many progressives welcomed Biden’s shift. Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez (D-N.Y.) said in a statement that Cuba’s SSOT designation “has only worsened life for the Cuban people without advancing U.S. interests” and “has made it harder for Cubans to access humanitarian aid, banking services, and the ability to travel abroad.”
“It has also deepened food and medicine shortages and worsened the island’s energy crisis, especially after Hurricane Rafael,” she added. “These hardships have driven an unprecedented wave of migration, leading to the largest exodus in Cuba’s history.”
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) called Biden’s move “a long overdue action that will help normalize relations with our neighbor.”
“This is a step toward ending decades of failed policy that has only hurt Cuban families and strained diplomatic ties,” Omar added. “Removing this designation will help the people of Cuba and create new opportunities for trade and cooperation between our nations. I look forward to continuing the work to build bridges between our countries and supporting policies that benefit both the American and Cuban people.”
David Adler, the co-general coordinator at Progressive International, called the delisting “far too little, far too late.”
“POTUS removing Cuba’s SSOT designation in the final days of his presidency only means one thing: He knew—from day one—that the designation was simply an excuse to punish the Cuban people,” Adler added. “But he maintained it anyway. Sickening.”
The peace group CodePink released a statement welcoming Biden’s shift, but adding that “it is unacceptable that it took this administration four years to address these injustices.”
“President Biden made the inhumane decision every single day to not alleviate the suffering of millions of Cubans by keeping this designation in place,” the group added. “As we mark this overdue progress, we can only hope that the Trump administration does not reverse these crucial steps towards justice and diplomacy.”
Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is the son of Cuban immigrants and a fierce critic of Cuba’s socialist government. In 2021, Rubio introduced legislation aimed at blocking Cuba’s removal from the SSOT list. Trump has also tapped Mauricio Claver-Carone—a staunch supporter of sanctioning Cuba—as his special envoy for Latin America.
Alex Main, director of international policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said Tuesday that “while this decision, which comes years after 80 members of Congress urged Biden to reverse Trump’s ‘total pressure’ approach should have been made long ago, it is better late than never.”
“Sixty years of failed policy should be more than enough, and hopefully the new administration will have the wisdom and the courage to pursue a new course, one that’s in the best interest of both the U.S. and the Cuban people,” Main added.
Cuba was first placed on the SSOT list by the Reagan administration in 1982 amid an ongoing, decadeslong campaign of U.S.-backed exile terrorism, attempted subversion, failed assassination attempts, economic warfare, and covert operations large and small in a futile effort to overthrow the revolutionary government of longtime leader Fidel Castro. Cuba says U.S.-backed terrorism has killed or wounded more than 5,000 Cubans and cost its economy billions of dollars.
In stark contrast, Cuba has not committed any terrorism against the United States.
Former President Barack Obama removed Cuba from the SSOT in 2015 during a promising but ultimately short-lived rapprochement between the two countries that abruptly ended when Trump took office for the first time in 2017.
“Cuba will continue to confront and denounce this policy of economic war, the interference programs, and the disinformation and discredit operations financed each year with tens of millions of dollars from the United States federal budget,” the Cuban Foreign Ministry said Tuesday. “It will also remain ready to develop a relationship of respect with that country, based on dialogue and noninterference in the internal affairs of both, despite differences.”
The Biden admin has taken the long overdue step of removing Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terror list. Congratulations & thank you to @dsa_cuba organizers and our friends @AllianceForCuba@LAWGaction, @NNOCuba, & everyone who helped make the case for Cuba at home & in… pic.twitter.com/6fJkVF1Ldz
David Adler, the co-general coordinator at Progressive International, called the delisting “far too little, far too late.”
“POTUS removing Cuba’s SSOT designation in the final days of his presidency only means one thing: He knew—from day one—that the designation was simply an excuse to punish the Cuban people,” Adler added. “But he maintained it anyway. Sickening.”
The peace group CodePink released a statement welcoming Biden’s shift, but adding that “it is unacceptable that it took this administration four years to address these injustices.”
“President Biden made the inhumane decision every single day to not alleviate the suffering of millions of Cubans by keeping this designation in place,” the group added. “As we mark this overdue progress, we can only hope that the Trump administration does not reverse these crucial steps towards justice and diplomacy.”
Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is the son of Cuban immigrants and a fierce critic of Cuba’s socialist government. In 2021, Rubio introduced legislation aimed at blocking Cuba’s removal from the SSOT list. Trump has also tapped Mauricio Claver-Carone—a staunch supporter of sanctioning Cuba—as his special envoy for Latin America.
Alex Main, director of international policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said Tuesday that “while this decision, which comes years after 80 members of Congress urged Biden to reverse Trump’s ‘total pressure’ approach should have been made long ago, it is better late than never.”
“Sixty years of failed policy should be more than enough, and hopefully the new administration will have the wisdom and the courage to pursue a new course, one that’s in the best interest of both the U.S. and the Cuban people,” Main added.
Cuba was first placed on the SSOT list by the Reagan administration in 1982 amid an ongoing, decadeslong campaign of U.S.-backed exile terrorism, attempted subversion, failed assassination attempts, economic warfare, and covert operations large and small in a futile effort to overthrow the revolutionary government of longtime leader Fidel Castro. Cuba says U.S.-backed terrorism has killed or wounded more than 5,000 Cubans and cost its economy billions of dollars.
In stark contrast, Cuba has not committed any terrorism against the United States.
Former President Barack Obama removed Cuba from the SSOT in 2015 during a promising but ultimately short-lived rapprochement between the two countries that abruptly ended when Trump took office for the first time in 2017.
“Cuba will continue to confront and denounce this policy of economic war, the interference programs, and the disinformation and discredit operations financed each year with tens of millions of dollars from the United States federal budget,” the Cuban Foreign Ministry said Tuesday. “It will also remain ready to develop a relationship of respect with that country, based on dialogue and noninterference in the internal affairs of both, despite differences.”
People take part in a demonstration at Trafalgar Square in London in support of Palestine Action, June 23, 2025
