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US-Cuban relations more tense than neighborly
Washington, Aug 1, 2006 Relations between the United States and Cuba long have been more strained than neighborly, ranging from US occupations to Cold War enmity to, at one point, the brink of nuclear war. Here are some of the key events: - 1898-1902 - After the Spanish-American War, the United States occupies former Spanish colony Cuba, pulling out only after Cuba agrees to terms making the island independent in name only. - 1906 - The United States occupies Cuba again, staying three years. - 1959 - Fidel Castro leads the ouster of US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. In April, Castro visits the United States, denying any communist influence and pledging free elections. The next year, Cuba nationalizes US and British oil companies after they refuse to refine Soviet oil. - 1961 - After the United States breaks diplomatic relations with Cuba, the Central Intelligence Agency organizes the April 17-19 invasion of the Bay of Pigs by Cuban exiles, who are defeated by Cuban government forces. - 1962 - The US launches a full trade embargo on Cuba, and then discovers Soviet missiles in the country, sparking a tense nuclear standoff in October putting Washington and Moscow on the brink of war. Soviet premier Nikita Krushchev agrees to withdraw the missiles after the United States pledges not to invade Cuba. - 1965 - Cuba allows hundreds of exiles to sail to the United States in the October-November Camarioca boatlift. US president Lyndon Johnson establishes "freedom flights", and 260,561 Cubans would leave their country through the April 1973 end of the program. - 1977 - US-Cuban relations improve slightly with the establishment of "Interests Sections" in each other's capitals. - 1980 - The Mariel boatlift: Castro says anyone wanting to leave can do so through the port of Mariel, and about 125,000 arrive in Florida by late September. - 1985 - Washington begins anti-Castro broadcasts on Radio Marti, but the broadcasts are largely blocked by Cuba. - 1996 - A Cuban MiG fighter shoots down and kills three US nationals and a resident of Florida, flying Florida-based small civilian planes. Cuba said they were in its airspace. - 1999-2000 - Elian Gonzalez, a Cuban boy who survived a shipwreck while fleeing Cuba, becomes the focus of a six-month politically charged international custody battle. US-based relatives fight to allow him to remain in the United States against his father's push to bring him back to Cuba. Finally, US federal agents storm the Gonzalez family home in Miami's Little Havana to forcibly repatriate Elian. - May 2002 - Former US president Jimmy Carter visits Cuba, becoming the first US leader in or out of office to do so since Castro took power. On Cuban television, Carter speaks favorably of the Varela Project, a Cuban dissident effort to achieve peaceful political and economic reforms from within the prevailing system. - May 2004 - The United States says a military plane will broadcast pro-democracy messages into Cuba as part of a nearly 60-million-dollar plan to "hasten" Castro's ouster. Community Email This Article Comment On This Article Related Links
Iran remains defiant in nuclear stand-off
Tehran, Aug 1, 2006 President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed Tuesday that Iran would not bow to "the language of force and threats", a day after the UN Security Council ordered it to freeze sensitive nuclear work by the end of the month. |
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